Graphics Reference
In-Depth Information
Back to Step One
Don
'
t forget, just because you completed that first concept, you
aren
ll
need more choices to offer to the client. In addition to giving the
client more options, you can also take this opportunity to do a little
mix-and-match exercise. After you
'
t actually finished yet. As I stated earlier in this chapter, you
'
ve come up with your two or
three concepts, take a look back over each of them together and
see if you can find pieces to pull out of one design to put into
another. You may be able to find ways to enhance your designs
and you may even find enough from each concept to develop a
fourth piece that could possibly end up outshining all of the others!
'
Conclusion
Designing banners isn
t as straightforward and simple as some
might think. The amount of thinking and planning that goes on
before, and behind the scenes of, the actual artwork can get very
extensive in some cases. Knowing your client
'
'
s brand and knowing
'
'
your client
re designing their ban-
ners, but knowing your client at a somewhat personal level can
give you an inside track on their likes and dislikes. On top of know-
ing your client, you should also know who your audiences are and
the sites on which they
sbusinessisamustwhenyou
ll be viewing your work.
The goal of the campaign will also be a determining factor in
your designs. If you
'
'
re working on a brand awareness campaign,
you
re going to treat it differently than you will a sales/marketing
campaign. With a brand awareness campaign, you
'
ll generally want
to make users feel good about the brand and remember it the next
time they see it. With a sales campaign, your overall goal is to
drive users to buy a product by highlighting its price and value. At
thesametimeyou
'
ll also want to inject
a little brand awareness into the design; something that says,
'
re asking them to buy, you
'
“
Buy
me now, remember me later.
”
An important factor to think about in designing banners is how
they will animate and how they will make transitions from one
frame or section to the next. It
s a good idea to think about these
movements beforehand because once in development, it can some-
times be difficult to retrofit an animation of a particular object. In
addition to thinking ahead, you
'
'
ll also want to make sure that the
assets you
re working with can actually animate in the fashion you
have pictured in your mind. In Chapter 3, I
'
ll start getting into the
steps involved in bringing your designs to life, from planning out
how it will be built to using code as a time saver to sending your
work through quality control.
'
