Final Major Project: Evaluation

I feel that my Final Major Project has been a success, I completed all my briefs to a standard I am happy with and I believe I got the most out of the time I had. I have developed a greater understanding of interaction design and improved on my design practice since the start of this module through the five briefs I have completed as well as my design context publication.

The three main briefs all involved proposing an interaction design supported by promotional material and other deliverables. My Quick Reader project allowed me to explore creating an app that improved a user’s reading experience. Creating an experience is something I wanted to explore though my fmp and I feel this brief helped to realise this. If I had more time I would have liked to create a demo video to show the concept in motion; but I think the ‘narrative’ designs I created for the website mock-up did address this.

The Cat Trails app allowed me explore creating a promotional video and also proposing an app that interacted with another device. This project also involved creating some fun character illustrations to be used on the app designs and promotion pieces. The idea of combining my illustration with interaction design is something I wanted to attempt in this module; I believe that I did a good job of this and that the final product benefited from it. I really wanted to create a motion piece for one of my briefs and I’m glad I pulled it off for this one, though if I had more time I would have produced a more in-depth demo reel for the app.

My NHS Therapy project also involved both creating an overall experience for the user though the proposal of a service. This brief tackled the subject of clinical depression and hitting certain emotive qualities was key. I created a smile-inducing doctor character for the app design and promotional material and kept everything in an upbeat visual style. I really enjoyed creating something with the aim of delighting the user rather than just performing a task, I’d say the emotive element was key for this project.

Creating my context publication was another great experience to have had, as I actually produced a functioning iPad book using iBook author. The production of a fully functional app is something I aimed to do in the module from the start, although I would have liked to produce something alongside a developer for one of my other briefs.

My other two briefs were the surveyor website and DFGA yearbook and I feel that I leant quite a lot from them even if I consider them the less influential projects. I managed to propose some digital aspects to the yearbook and even though I didn’t end up coding the surveyor website (due to time constraints) I did develop a better understanding of design for web.

I would have very much liked more time to produce a more detailed video for one of my briefs and to have also done a collaboration with a developer, if I could go back I would have given myself more time for these two things. Overall I think that I addressed many key elements that I had highlighted on my statement of intent through my final major project and I have learnt a great deal, expanding my skills as an interactive designer.

Design Context PDF

Here is a PDF version of my final context publication. Although it gives a basic ideas of what the final app is, none of the interactive elements work so please make sure you look through the app to get the full experience and see all the images & videos.

Final Publication File

I have exported my final iBooks file and will take it in to the DFGA office to copy it to an iPad this morning so that I can submit it with my main boards. I tested the book out on my own iPad, here is a shot of the final file in my iTunes library:


Context Publication Organisation

Here are some lists I've been making of what content is going into my final publication:




Bookmarks for my Context Publication

Here are some screen-caps of the bookmarks I've been keeping for when I'm deciding what to include in my final publication:



DFGA - Final Boards

Here are the final boards that I will be submitting for the DFGA yearbook brief:

DFGA - Board Sketches

These are my initial ideas for my 5 DFGA boards, these will be submitted as a PDF as it isn't one of my main three briefs:


DFGA - Book Proof Photos

We got the proofs in the DFGA yearbook and I took a few photos to possibly use on my final boards. The colours came out strange on a couple of them so I'll have to re-touch the ones I plan to use in Photoshop.





DFGA - Image Touch-Up

A quick job was to tidy up this picture of an SLR camera for one of the filler pages. I removed the tape that was covering top top part of the camera:




DFGA - Cover Submission Development

Here are the final designs for the yearbook cover. I had to add a spine, some more information on the front and the college logo on the back to adhere to the brand guidelines we were given.



Cat Trails - Final Boards

Here are the final boards that I will be submitting for the Cat Trails brief:

Cat Trails - Board Sketches

These are the initial sketches for my Cat Trails final boards, I'll be submitting these as  printed boards because it is one of my three main projects.



Cat Trails - Collar Mockup

I found an image of a GPS collar online and added this logo to it in Photoshop:



Here is the final mockup of the collar that I will use on my final boards:


Cat Trails - Website

Here is the website design for my Cat Trails brief, it would use the promotional video I created alongside some annotated screenshots to explain the app to the user. There are also links to an online store so that they can buy a collar for their cat and a link to the app store so they can download the app.


Here is a mockup on an iMac for my final boards:


Cat Trails Promo Video

Here is the development for my cat trails promotional video, I used After Effects to put my video together and used a variety of images from my other designs for the brief for the graphics:


An initial version of the video with the music slightly off time at the end:



Here is the final version of my promotional video that will be included on my submission CD:

Cat Trails - More Storyboards

Some more storyboards planning out my promotional video. These boards will serve as a guide while I create the video but some elements will most likely change though the process:



Surveyor - Final Boards

Here are the final boards for my surveyor brief. I'll be submitting these as a PDF as the brief wasn't one of my main three projects.

Surveyor - Board Sketches

Some initial ideas for my final boards:


Surveyor - Extra Deliverables

I created a variety of extra designs for this brief to support the website. Each of the designs uses elements of the website design and content to create an overall brand:

Here is a business card design for the client, with the front:

And the back:

I also made a more contextual mockup of the cards to use on my final boards:


This is a van decal design I created, still fitting to the overall brand, hopefully if the client's new venture is a success I may be able to get work producing the full designs for this:



And finally a letter and email template so that that clients and suppliers will get to experience the brand more often:






NHS - Final Boards

Here are the final boards for my NHS Therapy brief. I will be printing these off to submit as one of my main three briefs:

NHS - Board Sketches

Here are the initial sketches for my NHS submission boards:


NHS - Website

The website for this brief is for use my the therapist to see the information that their patients have been entering into their mobile app. This information should help them to treat their patient and check their progress. Here are my initial ideas for how it could look:





The final designs use the current NHS website as a template and show how the therapist can see all the information entered by the user across a calendar:

I also mocked this design up on an iMac to use on my final boards:

NHS - Advert Developemnt

Here are my initial sketches for the NHS Therapy App advert:




This is the final design, it uses a mixture of different elements from the app design:


I wanted a contextual image of my poster so I found a photograph of a therapist's waiting room online...

...and created a vector from it with my board added to the wall, I'll use this mockup on my final submission boards for the brief:




NHS Second Mockups

Here are the new designs for my app, I created a notification system using the character's speech bubble and also carried the pixel theme across to the buttons. I modified the colours of the buttons to match the moods they represent. Overall I feel this is a much happier and approachable design that people with depression would enjoy to use:


Cat Trails - Second Mockups

Here are the second mockups of my Cat Trails app. I used the new illustrations and modified the colours of the app to match the different cats. I carried the fur background across the other screens to keep the app more consistant:

NHS Icon Designs

Here are some initial sketches for the icons that will be used for each of the main sections:


I found some images that had a similar look to my final sketches to use as a guide:





These are the final 8-bit pixel graphics I created to work with my doctor illustation:



Final Illustration

After asking a few people I've decided to go with the pixel doctor as my final illustration. I want to carry this style over to other elements in the design such as the buttons and icons. I will first design some icons and then move on to the rest of the app look.


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