Let's say you're designing a logo for a client and you make some assumptions or
misunderstand what your client wants. You think they want a different look for
example, or a different type face and they really do or you think that they want a
typographic logo with the full name of the company and they really want a
monogram or a symbol or you simply come up with a very different look than what
they had in mind. One way to make sure you and the client are both on the
same page is by writing and discussing a design brief. So a design brief is a
detailed description of the design that you'll be creating for the client. So it
should include all the instructions and specifications for the design project as
well as information on what the final product will be. When you're formulating
a design brief, think about all the possible aspects of the project to cover
such as preferred color scheme, type of typeface and so on.
Sometimes a client writes the design brief and gives it to the designer.
Other times a company that is working with a client will create the design brief and
give it to an in-house designer or design team that works for the company,
and other times the designer will come up with the creative brief and send it
to the client. Regardless, you will both need to go over and agree upon it and
it's actually inserted later into the contract that you both sign.
The suggested questions to ask during a client meeting can be used to create a design brief so
we use those answers. However, structuring the design brief into a narrative rather
than just a question and answer list can help if the client wants more
information in detail. The example I'm showing is a bit brief just to keep it
focused on the essentials. Some briefs will be longer, some might be shorter.
In my client meeting. I didn't ask for what formats of files Chris prefers
because I know what files should be included. So part of the client-designer
relationship is the designer bringing that expertise of course to
know what to include in the design brief including file formats that will be
included in the final project. So they might not even know especially if they don't
have a design background or haven't done this before, or if they're new at the
company. Part of what you're being paid for is your expertise.
You'll also want to include who's the company contact.
For my example it's just an individual so I don't have to put that in there. So if you're just creating
a logo identity for a photographer, just an individual, then that's obvious.
The contact is the individual but sometimes you'll be creating a logo for a large
company or even a medium-size company and you'll need to know who the contact is there for approval,
how it gets approved and so on. You want to put the due date for the project
although I kept this out of my sample so it doesn't seem dated but just be sure to
add a due date for the project. You also want to include how many versions before a logo
is finally decided upon. For example, the client gets two complimentary revisions
that's included in the price or do they only get one or are any revisions, you know, considered
extra? So you have an hourly rate included in there.
So in this example that you can download in the next lesson, you just have company background,
Name: Fuson Enterprises, newly launched company and client etcetera etcetera.
Part of this process is to bring the parent company... he is already doing online
retail but he's establishing a parent company that's over it,
and wants to add in identity and branding to that.
No current slogan or logo and have logo, look and feel. He wants some kind of
monogram although there's also a version that we're going to be working on that
will have the full name spelled out below the letters. We want to include
classic, cool colors such as blue or black and grey, just more traditional
colors that aren't popping out too much. Words to associate with ... firm, professional,
simple, streamlined so kind of a professional firm look. The logo should
have a corporate professional look. The purpose of this as we discussed in our
client meeting, just to bring in the parent company in both trustworthiness
and respect for those considering doing business with the client. So we just kind of get their
name out there and establish credibility. Inspiration. He is looking at Amazon, some
other larger companies that sell things online and so his first competition that
might be smaller companies and even bigger companies that you're competing
with because people are deciding where to purchase things online. And then I added
types of media here. So the logo should look good in print as well as online,
including in websites and mobile because that's the target area, and then what
kind of files we're going to include. So high resolution
PSD which is the Photoshop file. Now you might want to explain to them if they don't have
Photoshop they might not be able to open it and then PNG, they should be able to
open it without Photoshop. But this is just a High Res. You want to make this
as large as possible or big enough to fit, you know, that they could downsize it.
We'll talk about that later ,but you don't want to give them a small file that's raster
version because then, if they make it larger from smaller, if they need it to be
in a larger format, that is going to pixelate so you want relatively large,
maybe not as large as possible per se, but just a very large raster version so
they can quickly downsize it and put it online. If they want something super large for a
billboard, they should use the Illustrator vector version because then it
won't pixelate as I make it larger. So you also want to include the Illustrator file even
though they might not be able to open it if they don't have Illustrator, but the EPS is kind
of a standard vector version that can work in various vector programs and
they can still place it if they have another program that you can play EPS'
into. They could do that as well, and I'm include a large PDF as well.
Now after you see this example here in the next lesson, then I'm going to go over contracting,
knowing how much to charge, going over a sample contract and we'll put the design
brief inside the actual contract that you signed. In the additional resources
in this lesson that you're looking at now you, can download the InDesign file
of this if you want to download that and check it out but this will be in PDF
form in the next lesson. Thanks