Articles, advice and musings in the world of graphic design, branding, corporate reporting and so much more.
Navig8 opened its doors in 2000 in a tiny office on Goodge Street, so tiny that I could touch both walls at the same time, by just stretching out my arms. So we are really 15 and a bit years old, but adding 'a bit' to the graphic looks rubbish. We've moved offices three times. Every time, just around the corner, but in many ways we have come so far.
Infographics are a brilliant way to quickly communicate a journey, a process, a service, all sorts of things. They are far more visually engaging than a paragraph of text and done right, can deliver complex messages quickly and with style. We do a lot of them and there are certain things that help make them work hard for you.
Branding is an emotive subject, no matter if it is a rebrand, launch of a new brand or just communicating brand values. We all have an opinion. Brand, what does that mean? What on earth does a sub-brand mean? Can you brand under an existing brand and still have a brand? Oh my life, what is brand hierarchy? What is evolution and what is revolution in terms of brand?
Graphic designers are always banging on about typography, but what are they going on about and does it really matter? In this installment we tackle the issues, discover the disasters and detail the do's and don'ts*.
The allure of creative freedom, public recognition and the joy of walking into a record shop anywhere in the country and seeing your own work, makes album cover design a graphic designers dream job. The days of the 12" double gate fold album offered a huge landscape for designers, now the reality is often a condensed digital download icon. The forerunner to Navig8, The Design Corps was established in the music industry back in the 90s. Let's look at the world's most iconic album covers and the designers behind them.
Colour plays a huge part in every aspect of design and can arouse strong opinions from clients and designers alike. Colours are often chosen on personal taste or some spurious theory. A client of ours once rejected a suggested colour pallet because it reminded him of the new curtains his wife had just bought, and he hated them. Let's look at good use of colour and how to get it right.
Sometimes you get a dream client. Something you'd just love to work on. In my case, this is the historic and global brand Barbadillo. I'm a Manzanilla drinker myself. It's a very dry sherry, made in a tiny area of Spain. Having visited the winery (Bodega) in the interests of research – I changed my view of what a drink's brand is and what it takes to make something unique. Let's look at the best.
After all these years (released in 1990) PowerPoint still plays a huge role in client presentations as the ‘go-to’ software for the account exec, sales bod and public speaker. We deliver a massive amount of templates and presentations for our clients with the same issues of budgetary restrictions and customisability being the main issues. Let's look at best practice, where the potential problems lie and what we can do together to produce a show-stopping presentation.
To be 100% clear from the outset, this is the Top 10 Graphic Design book for graduates and graphic designers starting out in the industry - but with an additional three books (shameless plug) written by our Director. We've all gotta eat, right? I've avoided design books that just show pages and pages of other people's work as much as possible. It turns out that a lot of these recommendations doff their caps to the past. That's not to say modern designers haven't produced great work and great books.
We all love infographics don't we? They are a brilliant way of communicating complex data, journeys, services etc. But like most things in design, they are not easy to get right. Things like too much content, not enough levels of data and the use of poor iconography will mean your infographic will not work hard for you, or at least not as hard as it should.
In this article I set out some of the things a client and designer should consider when creating an infographic.
Free pitching is a hot issue. Why do clients ask agencies to work for free? On many occasions, an agency will be asked to 'do the job whole' to be considered for the work. Madness.
The creative industry is the only industry, as far as I know, that gets asked to deliver work that has value, before being paid. Is this fair? Or as clients say, 'well that is just how it is'.
Print buying and management is a service Navig8 provides and is grounded on years of experience and a very deep and broad knowledge. It certainly isn't just buying and selling. To provide an excellent service to your client, there are a number of areas you must be an expert.
I picked up an old notebook that I used to jot down some handy graphic design tips when I was doing work experience and the first little while I was first employed. Some pretty useful tips in it to be fair. Here they are, I'm just going to write down exactly what I have in front of me:
So I have written an article on what it takes to be a Drupal Agency In London from the more technical perspective. Navig8 is a full service agency, we design it build it, SEO it and brand it. Focusing on the creative and planning aspects, below are the activities and services A full service Drupal agency should deliver.
Every now and then a print job requires a press pass, particularly if the job is of high value and complexity or simply because you want to get the best results for your client. Such is the case today. As I sit here, just a little bored waiting for the next section to be plated and 'run up', I though I'd share with you the experience and process of passing for press.
That’s what we are, Navig8 that is, often called a ‘Drupal House’. But what does that mean? Sounds a silly question, with a straightforward answer. But things are more complex than they seem.
The balance between flexibility and consistency is paramount. A good branding agency will create solutions with longevity that will allow the identity to naturally develop and lend itself to new applications.
Drupal provides many solutions for integrating CRM systems. This blog discusses the modules that connect the CRM system according to your needs. Remember Drupal is a very powerful and scalable platform and can provide lots of solutions that a CRM system provides.
Yes, I wrote a whole book about this so to condense it down to a blog post is going to be like condensing the Bible into the 140 characters...
I’m not sure whether Display Advertising has been referred to as the Dark Horse of PPC before. With its comparatively low clickthrough rate when pitted against its more conventional Search cousin, you’d be forgiven for thinking Display might be a waste of money.
