1. Evaluation
Producing Print Based Media
Visual Language:
Composition
How have you chosen to set out your designs and why?
When deciding how I wanted my recipe cards to look, I designed five different
layouts to help me. I initially designed very simple and effective layouts that would be
easy to work with and that would be easy to change last minuet if I needed to. The
final layout I chose was very simple and had a basic design. On this design, I had
decided to make the entire back page of the recipe card an image of the food on the
card, with a ‘chefs tip’ featured on top of the image somewhere. The front of the card
would have the title for the dish in the top left hand corner, a close up image of the
dish in the right hand top corner and then the ingredients and the method where to
be underneath this.
This is a very simple design but I felt that it would be the design that would be most
effective for my target audience of children aged between 4 and 13. I think that the
text to image ratio on the recipe cards is well thought out for this audience, by having
a well balanced mixture of text and images on both sides of the recipe cards, the
child will constantly have a visual opponent to look at to go with the text. I decided on
the main bulk of text being on the front of the recipe card because it is straight to the
point and allows both the children and the parents the chance to look at both the text
and the image on the page. I think that by breaking up the text with images, it will
draw in the younger children, who might see text as being boring, and images as
being fun and something interesting to look at. It also helped to separate the recipe
cards up, making them a lot easy to look at and to read. The bright colours of the
cards went well with the colouring of the images and helped to make them more
creative looking and therefore more attractive to the children.
The second side of the card was very simplistic and only featured a very small
amount of text and an enlarged image of the dish. We decided to do this in order to
make the cards even more attractive in the eyes of the target audience, who are
children. We also did this because during initial planning and drafting, feedback from
our peers told us that having a large version of the image on the back of the card
was a proffered design which drew in the audience and made them want to see what
the recipe was.
Image Construction
Discuss the contents of your final images and reflect upon decisions made.
From the very beginning of our planning, we had decided on using stock images for
the recipe cards. We decided this because in order for us to make the recipe cards
of good enough quality, we wanted to be able to spend time tweaking the layout and
the copy we used on them, without having to worry too much about the images that
we used. We also felt that stock images of the food would look more professional,
and therefore help our recipe cards have that appearance as well. When looking for
our images we tried to find ones that would look like they were part of the same set,
we didn’t want a huge variation of images, they needed to be a similar size and
colour quality as each other. The colours that have been used in the images and on
the recipe cards them selves vary a lot, we wanted bright, bold and eye-catching
colours that would draw in the target audience, and due to our target audience being

2. of a young age, we wanted them to be interesting to look at and creative. By
ensuring that we had eye catching colours, we were ensuring ourselves that children
would find them fun to look at and would want to look at them more and then maybe
even look at the food on them and want to try this food. Each recipe card has a
different eye catching colour that went well with the colours in the images on the
card. Each card also featured colourful fonts. We wanted the text to stand apart from
the colours of the recipe card itself, we decided to use clashing colours for this, such
as red and green or yellow and blue, but we also wanted the, to be attractive to the
audience. During the production of the recipe cards, we gained peer feedback in
which one person said the loved the use of ‘eye popping colours to draw the
audience in’’.
Representation
Discuss the semiotics and connotations created from the content you have
included.
In the final design, we decided to use bright, bold and in your face colours, which
have a connotation of having fun, and I felt that these were related directly to the
target audience (children aged 4-13). The bright colouring used is also a great way
to attract people to the card as they stand out and look interesting, especially if you
were to walk past them in a shop. Each colour on the recipe cards also relate to the
dish on that specific recipe card, for example on the veggie burger recipe card, we
used green as the primary colour on the card, which is also featured on the burger
itself, as the green lettuce shows through very clearly. We also thought that it would
be a good idea to find images that have green in them someway, as the green has
connotations of vegetarianism, and it also relates back to the vegetarian society, as
well as their logo which is featured on each of the cards.
Audiences:
Create an audience profile of your chosen demographic
The target audience for our recipe cards are children aged between 4 and 13, who
are beginning to learn about the foods they like and don’t like. When creating our
recipe cards, we didn’t have a specific gender in mind as we felt that the food we
chose to show on the recipe cards weren’t gender oriented, anyone could eat them,
for example if we were to do deserts that were mostly pink and featured lots of love
heart shapes, then these recipe cards would probably be aimed more specifically at
a female audience. Due to the target audience being so young, we don’t have a
target geodemographic for them, although if we were to be targeting the children’s
parents as well, then they would most likely be ABC1 on the NRS social scale grade.
We also never went as far as to discuss the hobbies or sexuality of the target
audience due to the young age of them and the fact that the recipe cards weren’t
specific enough to need to know these things. Although if I were to think about the
hobbies of the target audience now, I would say that they would be energetic sand
playful, willing to try new things, whether that be sport or more creative things.
How have you constructed your work to appeal to this audience?
Use box below for text or page space to include an annotated copy of an example of
your work to help illustrate how you have done this. You can use a combination of
the two. We conducted a lot of research in order to discover what our target
audience would want from this product, in order to appeal to our target audience, we
would have to think seriously about the colours, fonts and copy that we used on the
product. We discovered that the colours would have to be bold, bright and eye

3. catching in order for the children to be interested in them at all. We also found that
‘bubble’ writing styled fonts so that the target audience could look at the text and see
it as being fun and playful, instead of boring text that they didn’t want to read. We
also used minimal copy to try and make the recipe cards seem more image
orientated, so as to draw the audience into the product. We constructed the layout of
the recipe cards to be very simple; we decided this because we wanted the design to
be simple and effective, using the colours as the main tool for attracting the
audience’s attention. We had always decided to keep the layout and text simple,
concentrating on the font and colours, because these were the two things that were
always going to be more attractive to the target audience.

4. Historical and Cultural Context:
What did you use as your design influences and why were they chosen?
There were many different products that helped to influence my designs and the
overall look of my recipe card. These existing products helped me to think of an
appropriate layout and design of the recipe cards. The main products I found that
helped me were children’s books and children’s games. I found that I was hugely
influenced by the colours and illustrations used in the children’s books, specifically,
‘The day the world went Loki’ influenced me the most, if was filled with bright
primary colours and the layout of the book itself was very simplistic with minimal text.
Do vegetarian products have a specific design aesthetic and how does your
project reflect/contrast this? Why?
When researching vegetarian products, I found that they mostly used a variety of
shades of green on their products. I found this in most of the vegetarian products
that I analysed and found that it was very common, and was rarely strayed from. I
think that this is very stereotypical and in our recipe cards we wanted to stray away
from this somehow, by using green but In smaller areas, so that it still showed it was
vegetarian but not overtly in your face. Our recipe cards are very bright and colourful,
with each one featuring the colour green somehow to relate back to vegetarianism.
Finished Products:
Does your finished product reflect your initial plans? How? If there are any
differences, describe why changes were made.
We found that our final products ended up looking exactly the way we had panned in
our flat plans. The images, text and title were all in the same places as we designed
and stayed like this throughout each of the recipe cards.
Does your finished product match what you were set in the brief? How?
Our final product meets the brief that we were originally set. We made sure of this by

5. constantly going back and checking the brief to ensure that what we were doing was
correct and on the lines of what the company wanted and that we were meeting the
requirements. Even though we were always checking, when we had completed our
product, we found that we had missed some of the requirements that the vegetarian
society needed on these products, for example we didn’t put whether or not these
recipes were vegan friendly. Although when we found that we hadn’t done this, we
went back at a later date and changed the recipe cards, ensuring that we had these
details on them.
How did the use of peer feedback help you in your production?
The peer feedback we received helped us massively when it came down to final
production. We received a lot of feedback that was specifically about the fonts we
chose to use, and how they were hard to read with the colours we had chosen.
Originally we had used two different fonts for the method and the ingredients, but the
feedback we received told us that the ‘method’ part was very difficult to read and that
in order to see it properly you would have to really concentrate on the words to be
able to understand what it was saying. We took this feedback in and immediately
decided to change the font to a more readable one. We then asked for peer
feedback once more, and it was established that the font was much easier to read,
which made them think that the recipe card was much better. Another piece of
valuable peer feedback that we received was regarding the colours we chose to use
on some of the recipe cards. Because of the brightness if some of the colours, the
audience found it difficult to concentrate on the text, which was also written in bold
colours, so we decided to change the more bight and intense colours to
lighter/darker shades so that they were much easier to look at.
Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of your final product regarding its
technical and aesthetical qualities.
I think that the strengths of the recipe cards we designed were that they were
colours, eye catching and attractive which makes them ideal for the target audience.
I believe that this is a massive strength because it will help the cards become more
popular with the target audience. I think that another strength of the recipe cards is
that after editing, they became very easy to read and the instructions are very easy
to follow, which is good because of who they are aimed at. Another strength would
be that each of the recipe cards are clearly from the same collection, which I think
shows how good the planning and designing was, due to the fact that they were
produced by two separate people. I feel that the planning was also a great strength
of the recipe cards as they wouldn’t have been completed If we didn’t have
successful planning.
What skills/knowledge have you gained/developed in this project? How could
these be applied in future practice?
I feel that my skills in photo-shop have been further developed whilst working on this
project. I think that I would now confidently be able to use photo-shop in any of my
future endeavours as I feel I have the basic knowledge to be able to complete tasks
using it. I also think that I have learnt how to work more efficiently and effectively
within a group, including how to plan effectively so that the work is completed to the
best of both our abilities. I think that developing my knowledge and skills when
planning something has improved greatly, and I will be able to apply this to all thing

6. that I do in the future. Each new skill I have developed or gained can be used in the
future, especially in the creative industry.
Production Processes
Do you believe your work is creative and technically competent? Why?
I think the recipe cards were creative due to the colours and the images used on
them. The colours were bold, bright and attractive to the audience. I think they were
technically competent because the recipe cards do the job they were made to do,
and each one features the required details given by the client. A specific example of
this is on the first page of the recipe cards, we decided to make the main title curved
and have the edges darker as well as having it in a childlike font, which would help to
make it more attractive to the audience. We felt that doing this would make the
pages more visually impressive, as well as a way of showing which recipe was being
shown on this card. Another way we made the recipe cards more creative was by
using one main colour on each recipe card, and then using variations of that colour
for the text on that card. For example on the ‘veggie burgers’ recipe card we used
green as the primary colour, we used this throughout the page, changing the shade
of green each time. We also added a dark green border around the edge of the
cards in order to make each card look individual but also part of a set.
How effectively did you manage your time?
We created a very strict time schedule that we would work by to ensure that each
task and page of the recipe card were completed on time. By working to this
schedule as well as extensive planning we found that we were completing tasks
ahead of time, which would give us time to go back and edit aspects of them and
receive feedback for them. I think that we used our time very well and we completed
our project on time, with contingency time to go back and edit the cards further.
If you could repeat the process what would you do differently?

7. If we were to repeat the project I would try and be even more creative with what we
put on the cards and how the cards were designed. I feel like there was too much
text and not enough images for the target audience. I might also change the theme
and target audience completely, for example having a valentine’s theme recipe card
set aimed at an audience of only females. I think that this would make the cards
aimed at a more niche market as well as being for a specific time.
Working to a Brief in the Creative Media Industries
Constraints Experienced:
What constraints did you encounter and how did you consider/avoid them?
Legal Constraints
The legal constraints we would’ve come across would be copyright of the stock
images we used and the recipes we used. Both the recipe and images were not our
own and were taken from a vegetarian recipe website. We could’ve prevented
having the legal constraints by making the recipes and taking the images ourselves.
Doing this would prevent us from having to worry about the images and the recipes
not being our own and having to gain permission for them.
Regulatory Constraints
We didn’t feel that we encountered any regulatory constraints, although one we
might have come across was whether or not we were able to use the vegetarian
society’s logo on our work. In order to use the logo our recipes must be:
- free form animal flesh (meat, fowl, fish or shellfish) meat or bone stock, animal or
carcass fats, gelatine, aspic or any other ingredients resulting from animal slaughter.
-contain only free range eggs, where eggs are used.
-be free from genetically modified organisms (GMO’s)
-there must be no cross contamination with non-vegetarian products during the
production process.
Financial Constraints
The financial constraints that we would’ve come cross would be the cost of
production, including the distribution of the cards, as well as wages for the staff
helping to create them and the printing costs.
Management:
How did you work as part of a group?
I found it very difficult working as part of a group due to the fact that my partner was
absent for the majority of the pre production work, and again absent for much of the
production time. Although I enjoyed being able to share ideas and be able to divide
tasks equally between the two of us, I felt that it was kind of pointless because I then
ended up doing the majority of the tasks anyways, whether that was improving/redoing the parts he did or just having to do all of them. It was especially difficult during
larger tasks because in order to make sure he was completing the work, I would
have to constantly be emailing him to make sure that he knew what he was doing
and that he was up to date with tasks that had already been completed by myself. I
also had to make sure that I had copies of his work in order to submit them, which
weren’t easy to come by as he often took a long time to reply to emails requesting
work. A specific example of this would be when we were actually producing our

8. recipe cards, due to us having a lot of pre-production planning, we knew exactly how
our recipe cards would look, the layout of them as well as colour and font choices.
This didn’t seem to make a difference as I found myself having to change the recipe
cards he had designed as they didn’t match the plans, therefore didn’t match the
work I had completed. I think that the reason for the differences was because he
completed the work at home, therefore wasn’t here to double check what we were
doing or be able to compare work with me. Working with this particular person has
put me off of working in a group because I felt like I was left to complete the majority
of the work independently, so I felt like I was working alone anyways. I also feel that
if I had been working independently from the start I would’ve been able to make the
cards look more attractive to the target audience, because I would have been
spending my time completing late work from other people. I also didn’t like having to
rely on someone else to make sure that I would have the work I needed on time. An
example of this would be the final recipe cards, I would have to pressure him
constantly to make sure they were don’t in order to be able to submit them on time.
How important is communication when working in a group?
For us a group communication was very important due to my partner’s absence, on a
project like this you need to be able to talk to each other every time you do some
work to make sure that your works are matching. With him not being there for the
majority of the project, we had to make sure that we were emailing each other to
make sure that we were completing work at similar times and to a similar standard. I
think that our good communication was the reason that the work was submitted on
time and was completed on time, if we hadn’t of been communicating from home
then I don’t think our project would have been submitted on time.
What have you learnt about working in a group and how will you apply this to
future practice?
I have learnt that you need to be very clear and organised, knowing exactly what it is
that you need to be doing. I think that you also need to be constantly in contact with
each other, to ensure that the work produced is matching. I will apply this to future
practice by ensuring that who ever I am working with and myself know exactly what
we are doing, how it needs to be done and when it needs to be completed by.
What have you learnt about working in to a brief and how will you apply this to
future practice?
By working to a brief I have learnt that clients want a specific thing and you must
complete the job how they want it doing. I enjoyed working to a specific brief
because it allowed me to be more disciplined in what I was doing, having to make
sure that I was complying with the brief at all times, but I was also able to be creative
and put my own spin on the work. I will apply this to future practice by ensuring that
any work I do is what is asked of me by the brief, and doesn’t differ from that.