The Daily Tee with Ronald McDonald House Charities

 

My poster design was for the 16th Annual Golf for a Cause Classic. The design process taught me the importance of creativeness as well as decision making. In addition, I learned that the process of producing the final product takes time and substantial effort. The most important lesson I learned from the process is how to be receptive to feedback and open to change. 

Furthermore, the process opened a new perspective of what it is like to be on the producing side. Throughout the process, the producer creates content with a specific audience in mind. For the producer, there is more of an emphasis on the thought process in designing, whereas the consumer views the design all at once. On the other hand, a consumer visually takes in the advertisement and processes it in either a negative or positive way depending on their background. Consumers are selective about what interests them, and they choose what to respond and relate to. 

During the process, I was mainly surprised by how the slightest changes in one's design can go so far. For example, for my design, I was advised to center a block of my text, and in doing that completely organized the flow of my design. 

In reflecting on the process, I found that the incorporation of the design principles as well as the application of colors worked well. When I began the process of creating my design, I first wanted to capture my viewers' attention through a focal point, which is the "center of visual interest or CVI because it focuses the eye's attention" (Golombisky & Hagen, 51). The focal point was successful because when observing the poster, the viewer's eye is drawn from the golf ball, the focal point, towards the event title. 

In regard to colors, the ones that I implemented into my poster overall highlighted the golf tournament and the cause at hand. When creating a design, it says that "the rule of thumb says to stick with dark-on-light or light-on-dark combos" (Golombisky & Hagen, 124). For my design, I used the light-on-dark combo not only because of readability and visibility, but also for the color to stand out and elicit my viewers' emotions. 

Although there were many things that worked, there were also parts of the process that did not work. From the onset, I struggled to create a design for this event because I was trying to use a software that I did not know how to use. In addition, my first design had many issues, including my color scheme and the element of stair stepping within my title. Even though these were downfalls of my poster draft, there were some in my final design as well. For example, the title of the event as well as the information below it has stepping stairs, which is when "beginners try to fill the space by stair stepping their chosen elements down the page" (Golombisky & Hagen, 36). Even though these are some issues, every design is going to have flaws in the consumer's eyes. 

If I had the ability to go through the process again, I would change how I went about the design process. When beginning my design poster, I approached it as an assignment I had to complete rather than immersing myself as a true media content producer. Also, I found it to be beneficial when receiving feedback from outside viewers, so possibly next time, I could ask others for their opinion of my design. In all, the process gave me confidence in my own creative potential especially for future projects.