Brief 15 // DFGA // Category Icons

DFGA is a very diverse course and the students within it do a lot of different work. When I first met with Mike he told me that every year is different because of the students interests. Even though there is alot of different work, the course can be split down into different categories. We identified that key areas of design within the year are:

- Film Makers
- Animators
- Gamers
- Animators

The idea of using the category icons and placing them within the document is to identify the type of work that each student does. This will give their own practice an identity and work as consistent way to identify each student throughout the PDF document.

These icons will be explained within the document so the users know what each one means, even though they are pretty obvious what each one represents.

The icons have been designed to a simple aesthetic, these are created to be bold and easily identified, as within the PDF they will be displayed small within the spread of each student.

Icons

Category Icon set

Easel represents Concept Artists. 

The reasoning behind using an eagle is because a concept artist is someone who creates designs to convey an idea and out of all the course this area is more related to the art side of DFGA, hence the use of an easel. It is more based around the drawing and displaying of the ideas within the work. 

Game pad represents Gamers. 

Using a game controller is the easiest and most identifiable icon to use to present gamers / game design. This is very simple and bold icon that clearly displays the area design that it is representing.  

Film Camera represents Film Makers

Again another simple and bold icon that clearly shows what the area of design is. Using this icon will clearly show that the student works within film. 

Motion to represent Animation. 

Animation was a hard icon to create. The most notable thing with animation is motion and movement. So the use of the two balls with motion lines implies movement within the illustration. Also the placement of the line within the balls makes them feel 3D within the illustration and placing this in a different place within the two balls, shows that they are moving and in a rolling motion. 

Icons in Use

Each of the icons will be placed within the document at the top of each of the student spreads. They will be at scale that makes them noticeable and legible to the reader, but not too big that they over power the layout / content of the spread and take the users eye away from the rest of the information displayed on the page.