Project 3 Synopsis

Project 3 was a challenging application of the brand identity which was developed for Project 2. Considering actual products (one of which was assigned) allowed me to test how my identity could be executed in a practical situation. Thankfully, my brand identity was cohesive enough that the design process was intuitive and fairly unproblematic. After concepting different ways in which to package the product ( in which my goals were to use minimal materials and express both the form and function of the object), I was able to produce a variety of approaches for each packaging layout.

Once I attempted to construct the packages, I found that my second package design (for the pizza cutter) was problematic. After consulting with students and Prof. Fender in critique, a solution was found in using tabs to hold each plate of the encasing packaging together, and then to use a strip to encircle the disc and hide the tabs.

Once the packaging plans were finalized, I tweaked parts of their aesthetic compositions. I added an instruction illustration on the Pico design, and included elements in the pizza cutter design which were drawn from pieces created for project 2. The final designs fit perfectly with my established brand identity.

I had little trouble developing a mock-up Pico for the final pieces, but the pizza cutter became problematic. I tried to find different clays to mold a handle for the pizza cutter, yet I could not find anything affordable that could harden into a form in the stores I visited. Later I bought a few items with pre-made handles on them and tried to cut them to fit similarly to the eva solo pizza cutter, but they would not keep the appropriate shape or size. I decided to scrap the handle, but for sake of expressing function I created a pizza cutter blade out of cardboard. I gave it dimension and covered it with an image of a metallic texture. I also cut a hole from which the blade could be hung (which corresponds to the original design of the eva solo pizza cutter).

Final production was difficult but acceptable. After creating several mock-ups my confidence seemed to improve and my careful cutting and gluing became more accurate and fitting. I have never been strong in the technical points of production, but I improved greatly while practicing creating the packages for this project. The final works aren't free of error but are the best results I was able to achieve over several attempts. I believe a large part of the difficult in production came in the fact that I needed to match up curvilinear shapes to one another. In a real-world situation these packages would likely be die-cut with complete accuracy.

This project was a valuable experience not only because it allowed me to work with packaging design in a new way, but because it required serious conception and consideration for the consumer and product itself. The care needed to create packaging for these products can be applied to various other design projects beyond the world of packaging design. The continued efforts in forging the final mock-ups allowed me to improve my production skill. I have learned when working on future projects that require producing physical pieces I will continue to practice production throughout the process, as I did for this project.