At Endicott, each student spends their last year working on a senior thesis. Graphic design majors spend the fall semester researching and writing a paper on their chosen topic within the world of design. They then spend the spring semester working on their Senior Capstone, a large body of work based on the research from the fall.
In the fall, I researched illustration and brand personality and how they both relate to a cohesive brand identity. In the spring, I created a branded summertime festival using what I learned in my research about brand personality and illustration.
Below is a break down of my final presentation on my festival: Ocean Odyssey.
Here is a break down of some of the research that I did in the fall while I was working on this project.
I compared other festivals in multiple categories to help me see where I wanted my brand to stand among its competition. I also completed a case study and a book report to have a better understanding of branding and planning an event. Along with that, I interviewed someone with considerable knowledge on my topic and conducted a survey with my target audience to see how people would respond to and interact with my event.
In the spring, I began to design. The first thing I did was create a cohesive and identifiable brand. I first came up with a theme that I wanted my festival to have, which would help me give my brand a personality and a direction for my illustration. Then I needed a name and a logo. From there, I built the brand, and organized it all into a style guide.
Here are a few pages from my completed brand guidelines.
Once I had created a brand, I began to work on what the event would feel like, and how the brand would be represented. It was very important to me to show the branding in all aspects of my designs. I created numerous mockups and designs of things that would be at the event, including food trucks, a wall graphic, carnival games, signs, and a map of the location.
As part of the project, I had to include a user experience component. I learned in my initial research that, for an event, an app is very helpful, and makes the event itself much more memorable to the attendees. Thus, I decided to create an app that would allow the user to interact with the event through the app, through games and easy access to schedules and information. I also created a landing page that would tell people about the event and direct them to the app.
Finally, for the final part of this project, I created some marketing and merchandising campaigns. First, I created come Instagram carousels that would communicate details about the event to a wider audience through social media. I also created some signs and a billboard design to catch people's attention out in the world. Then, I created some branded merchandise that would be sold or won at the event.
Overall, I was pretty happy with how this project turned out, and thought I was successful in creating a cohesive, exciting, and welcoming brand.
