Beats Digging Ditches - My Life as a Professional Graphic Designer

USDA Meat and Poultry Inspection Mark – FREE Vector Graphic Download

Clay (The BDD Dude) — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 23:41:52 +0000

The Raw and Processed Meat and Poultry Inspection Marks, Icons and Labels That The USDA Forgot to Provide

The USDA doesn’t provide edible vector files for their Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) marks. Really, no lie. I had several clients who needed them so I made my own. Now you can enjoy them too. These are Illustrator editable files so you’ll need Adobe Illustrator to change the EST and P numbers.

Download the Free Editable Vector USDA (FSIS) EST Inspection Mark Icon for Processed Meat

On the EST icon/bug inspection mark on processed products, you just need to swap out the EST. (processing plant) number.

Download the Free Editable Vector USDA (FSIS) Inspection P Mark Icon for Raw Poultry

On the inspection mark on raw poultry just swap the P number (poultry) number for your product.

The fonts are Akzindenz-Grotesk BQ.

And if you need someone to design your product package, email me or call 831-477-9029 to get started.

File Under: Raw Meat Inspected and Passed Label, Raw Poultry Inspected and Passed Label, FSIS Meat and Poultry Bugs, USDA Meat Inspection Marks, USDA Poultry Inspection Mark

How to Design a Shrink Sleeve Label – Shrink Sleeve Packaging Design Tips

Clay (The BDD Dude) — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 21:13:46 +0000

Shrink Sleeve Packaging is Super Sexy – Learn How the Shrink Sleeving Process Works with This Shrink Sleeve Tutorial

First Some Good News

You don’t need to add the distortion percentages on a shrink label yourself. You just design it the regular non-distorted way according to the dieline and the printing company will add the distortion to your design to match the curvature of the container. They have special packaging software for doing that. Really, they do. No lie.

I found this out the long way back in 2006 when I received a blank dieline from OSIO. I was working on the new Zola bottles. They were transitioning away from juice boxes at the time and were moving to shrink sleeves. Although my design is not in production anymore, they continue to use shrink sleeve technology to this day.

Along one side of the dieline was a list of millimeter markers and next to each one it specified the percentage of distortion needed. Confused on how I was supposed to do that, especially on a design that contain hundreds of round acai berries near the top of the bottle where it narrows the most, I called up the production department.

“Oh, you don’t have to do the distortion. We do that for you. That’s just for our information. It also let’s you know that it’s best to keep anything that could suffer from the natural effects of shrink sleeving, like tiny text or geometric shapes, away from the part that will shrink the most.”

“Whew, that’s a relief!”

Since then I’ve done a variety of shrink sleeve labels so I’m making this little tutorial that walks you through the process. For this example I’m going to use the shrink sleeved Canna Cola bottles I designed and take you through it from beginning to end.

Decide if Shrink Sleeve Packaging is Right For You

This comes down to cost and appropriateness. Cost depends on your margins. Shrink sleeves are more expensive to print and apply. However the shelf appeal is undeniable. Shrink sleeving is sexy and consumers respond accordingly. If you want to make a big splash, then shrink sleeving may be worth it even at the cost of slimmer margins- especially in the beginning when your print runs are lower.

Next is appropriateness. Would you shrink sleeve pickles? Probably not as people like to see the pickles. Seeing the size, cut, color and shape of the pickle is part of the decision process. However yogurt, fruit drinks, smoothies, supplements, and other foods that are usually in opaque containers are good candidates for shrink sleeving.

Picking The Container

Before you design anything, you need to choose your container. Without that you have know idea what you’ll be designing to. The manufacturer will have spec sheets for their containers whether they are bottles, jars, tubes, or tubs. Sometimes it’s an outline of the container with measurements and sometimes it looks like a CAD drawing. Either way you need this file and some physical samples to test with. Here is an example of glass bottle spec files so you can get a good idea of what you’ll need.

Here’s a few top manufactures of containers:

Anchor Glass
One of the largest glass container companies in the US

OI
Owens-Illinois Inc. is probably the biggest glass manufacturer in the US and possibly the world.

Thomasnet.com
Always a great place to start to find suppliers for plastic bottles, glass bottles, and plastic jars

CKS Packaging
Huge selection of plastic containers for all product types.

Plastic Bottle Corporation
I guess the name says it all.

Send a Sample to The Printer

The printer will want the spec sheets AND a sample of the container. This way they can double check everything. They will also use the container for testing.

Not everyone does shrink sleeving and these days you can get into very short runs with digital printing. You pay a premium per label over flexo or gravure but the set up charges are very low and mixing SKUs is very easy. Plus, with flexo you’re looking at entry level print runs of 25k per SKU just to get in the game. However, with digital you can print a couple of hundred if you like, you just pay a premium price per label. With flexo and gravure, that’s not an option at all.

Here’s a few shrink sleeve printers I’ve worked with:

Collotype Digital
Fantastic digital labels. Perfect for short runs. They can also do flexo and gravure print runs starting in the 25k per SKU range.

OSIO
Good choice for gravure printing. You’ll need big print runs in the 50k plus range per SKU to take advantage of their services

Century Label
Digital and flexo shrink sleeve printing.

Walle
I haven’t used this company personally but based one what I know, they look like a top notch company.

Design Your Label According to The Dieline

The printer will provide a dieline. If they didn’t, then ask them for one. For the Canna Cola Bottles I actually made my own just by wrapping a piece of paper around the bottle and then marking the overlap and then measuring it. Not the recommended way of doing it but it was spot on when we ran the tests.

The reason you can get by with an on-the-fly method of dieline creation is that no matter what the shape of the container, you will still be designing to a rectangular space. It’s no different than designing a flat label. Before sleeving, each label is cut off from the master print roll and then rolled into a tube and then seamed. The tube is placed over the top of the container and then sent though the tunnel. It’s the shrinking that creates all the great contours, not your dieline.

Note on Barcodes:

On a shrink sleeved label, place the barcode vertically (turned 90 degrees on it’s side).

This ensures that they will be scannable after they are shrunk.

Print Out and Mock Up The Design

It’s not the most pretty method, but print out your sleeve design and then just hand wrap it around the container. This will give you a decent feel of how the design works three dimensionally. Sure, it’s a wrinkled mess, but it’s good enough for judging balance, flow, composition, readability and the placement of key label components.

True, you could do a 3-D mock up in Illustrator but monitors are deceiving. We’re so used to zooming in that we quickly lose touch with how our design will feel in actual size. On the monitor your designs ALWAYS feel bigger than they really are and the text ALWAYS looks bigger and more legible.

However, the customer won’t be zooming in at 600% to read the label. They won’t see it on a brilliant LED display. They will see it on a shelf surrounded by hundreds of other products all trying to get their attention. This is why you need to do full scale hard prototypes. It’s the only thing that will simulate how it will actually be perceived in the marketplace.

Approve the Proofs

The printer will send you some proofs. Either digital or print. If it’s good, then approve it. However, only sign off on the visual part, make sure your client signs off on the text. Even though the labels will ultimately be shrunk around the container, the sleeves themselves will be cut and seamed into straight cylinders, just like a tube. Most likely your first proof will be flat and not cut and seamed. The proofs will look funny because they will already have the distortion factored in. So parts that will have a large amount of shrinkage will be stretched horizontally while low distortion areas will look almost normal.

Run Some Sample Labels and Do a Shrink Test

You may or may not be there for this step. For the Canna Cola labels I went to the packaging plant myself and ran the test. We ran dozens of bottles and tested all the flavors. We tweaked the settings on the shrink tunnel as we dialed in the best speed and heat level. A shrink tunnel is basically a conveyor belt that runs though a metal box that is filled with steam jets. The steam shrinks the label to the container. It’s kind of magical to see it first hand but it needs to be dialed in to your specific label and container.

We had hundreds of sample labels that were pre-seamed (cut from the original roll and seamed together into tubes) but we had a limited number of bottles. So labels that shrunk poorly were cut off the bottle so we could run another label on it.

Some shrink tunnels use steam, and some use a combination of infrared and hot air to shrink the labels. Which method you use depends on application. For full body applications, and when you want high quality, distortion-free graphics, steam tunnels are best. Steam is also best for pressurized containers or products with high flammability. For tamper evident labels, a hot air convection tunnel does an excellent job. If your neckbands are very dark in color, radiant infrared is an excellent choice because dark material absorbs heat.

Rework the Label if Necessary and Repeat

After you run your tests you many notice problem areas. On Canna Cola it was the sunburst THC decal on the neck. This was placed on a very high distortion area so the decal came out more oval then circular. Rather than have a large amount of rejects we opted to drop the circle.

This is why it’s best to keep geometric or highly symmetrical shapes off high distortion areas. Asymmetrical or organic shapes can hide distortion flaws much better.

Run the Final Labels and Bask in the Glory of Your New Designs

Shrink sleeve packaging is hot, hot, hot. Even though it’s increasing in popularity, it’s still a novelty in the general market. And because it’s more complicated and expensive that a paper label, or printing a couple of spots on aluminum cans or plastic tubs, I suspect it will remain a premium look for quite some time.

Need a Killer Shrink Sleeve Package Design? Call 831-477-9029 or email me if you’d like to discuss what great branding can do for your product packaging design.

Additional Reading:

Nice white paper that explains how shrink sleeving calculations are achieved

Nice layperson’s article on the shrink sleeving proccess

Learn about shrink tunnel technology

Videos:

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

This is a steam shrink tunnel in action.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

This is most likely an air or infrared shrink tunnel for a tamper evident label application.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Here’s a nice video of shrink machine money shots. If you like manufacturing as much I do you’ll dig this.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

More shrink packaging porn with a killer English host

File Under: Shrink Sleeve Packaging Design Tutorial

Product Localization – Marketing Your Product to US and Global Markets

Clay (The BDD Dude) — Mon, 05 Sep 2011 00:08:14 +0000

Critter Quitter- A Case Study in Product Localization for the US Market

Last month I was approached by Impulsis Games, the dev division of Impulsis, a Ukrainian software company. Their specialty is building ecommerce websites with a focus on the Magento and TYPO3 platforms. However, they have started branching out into custom apps and had recently designed a game for the iPad. Being such a large market, Impulsis wanted to target US gamers specifically. They quickly realized that although their English is quite good, they were not proficient enough to successfully localize their product for a US market. They needed a native American English speaker with a marketing and branding background to develop a name for the game, a tagline, and all game descriptions and instructions that would be used in the game itself as well as press releases and the company website.

Yuri, the game director, walked me through the app and sent me all the supporting documents including screenshots. The game centered around defending your plates of burgers, pizzas and assorted treats from ravenous bug like creatures by crushing them. Not being a native American English speaker he was stuck on the obvious choice of calling the game “bug something”. The trouble was that nearly every combination of the word bug paired with some kind of crushing action was already taken. So most likely, no bug.

I brainstormed some names and ultimately came up with a list of 16 respectable options. However, it was readily apparent both to myself, and to the team when they took a vote, that only 3 were really in the running. Two of the names included the word “critter” and the other, the word “bug”. My favorite being “Critter Quitter”. It not only rhymes but uses alliteration (when two words start with the same sound). The human brain loves rhymes and alliteration. It’s like a little tickle to our neural pathways. And for a quirky video game that’s makes a lot sense.

When I initially presented the list to Yuri he had no idea what a critter was, although he did like the sound of it. I explained that a critter is any small animal. Usually the word is applied to mammals but its also used as a generic to describe any small animal that’s quick and scurries around. I also explained that it’s often used affectionately or at least neutrally but can also be used to describe pests and vermin. I mentioned a popular line of children’s books by Mercer Mayer called Little Critters where the lead character is a small mammal of unspecified origin. We don’t know what he is – he’s just a “critter”. I specifically mentioned the book series as an example of cultural ubiquity of the word. I also pointed out that a Google search for the word “critter” fetched 41,500,000 results. So we were safe knowing that Americans would understand the word.

The next question was appropriateness. Yuri had explained that although this game can be enjoyed by all ages, they were making a clear push for women and younger children. They wanted a family friendly game with mild cartoony violence. This was the second reason I was a big supporter of the word critter. It’s a friendly word and ubiquitous enough to include cuddly creatures as well a vermin. Perfect for a game where the antagonists are bug-like, but not actual bugs in any scientific sense. The creatures have bulbous humanoid eyes, funny features, and are very colorful. So they would be very much at home in any Tex Avery or Warner Bros cartoon.

The quitter part of the name refers to the action. This too fit well as we wanted something softer than “kill” or “destroy”. Instead of using a word that refers directly to an action, such as crush or squash, quitter refers to the goal of the game, which is making the critter’s quit. As in quit eating your food. A Critter Quitter can also refer to the person who gets rid of the bugs. The same way we refer to the person who exterminates and the exterminator.

So all around, the name Critter Quitter works well for the branding goals of the game and describing the goals of the game itself.

Next we needed to create a one sentence tagline that would work well when promoting the game in the iTunes App Store, in the press and on the web. Something that reads well for humans but also hits our keywords for search engines. Basically an elevator pitch.

I condensed it down to a simple “who, what, why, where” statement:

Critter Quitter iPad Game – Protect Your Food from Ravenous Bug Invaders

Up next was a simple branding story for the company. They knew who they were, but this being their first game, no one else did. This would be used with the press and as the developer credits in the game.

Straight out of Lviv, the “Silicon Valley of the Ukraine”, Implusis brings a fresh, independent spirit to the development of games and applications for mobile devices.

Since 2005, we’ve been merging form and function to create user-centric mobile games and apps that blur the line between business and pleasure. Impulsis – because life’s too short for bad apps.

Next we needed to rewrite the copy for the website, the directions and instructions for game play, and write a press release (you can download the full press kit here).

Impulsis had provided a decent framework for the website copy, but since they were not native English speakers, the idioms and grammar were off the mark in many places. Too far off to be acceptable. I rewrote the text they had provided and we posted it on the website in preparation for the official product launch.

They had also written up the directions for game play that included names and description for all the characters, what they do, and the names and function of the player’s weapons (AKA: Power-ups). As expected, I could easily understand the directions but it had a distinct “English as a second language” quality and many of the names of the characters were poor matches for the game’s new name, for branding purposes, and for an American audience’s expectations.

Below are the new game directions localized for a US market.

Critters

Lil’ Buggy (Formerly: Small Bug)
Your run of the mill critter. Tap once to kill it.

Funky Fly (Formerly: Big Fly)
Funky zips around food before pouncing. Tap once to kill it.

Stinky (Formerly: Stinky Bug)
Ugly green critter with a super strong shell. Throw it off the table to kill it.

Cockroach
Cockroach is quick and clever. Tap once to kill it.

Big Boss (Formerly: Strong Bug)
This critter is twice as tough as Stinky. Tap twice to kill it.

Kamikaze (Formerly: Kamikaze Bug)
Take cover! Kamikaze explodes when killed and kills critters that are standing too close. Good for you, bad for them. Use it wisely. Tap once to kill it.

Big Mamma
Big Mamma releases her larvae when she dies. Very dangerous! Tap once to kill then get ready to squash all her offspring!

Tanker (Formerly: Armored Bug)
This critter has the strongest armor of all! Tap three times to kill it. Yes, THREE times!

Furious Fly (Formerly: Fast Fly)
Fast and unpredictable. Even Furious doesn’t know where it’s going next. Tap once to kill it.

Colorado Critter (Formerly: Colorado Bug)
Colorado is a tricky one. Must use Electric Bucket in the corner to kill it.

Power-ups

Frog
Frogs love to eat critters. Place them on the plate and they will help you to protect food. The more expensive the frog, the more critters it can eat.

Shield
Shield covers food from critters for 15 sec.

Electro-Shield (Formerly: Electric Shield)
Electrified Shield covers food and kills all critters that try to break through. Last for 15 sec.

God Finger
Your finger becomes so strong that it crushes anything!

Electric Bucket
Extra bucket for killing Colorado Critters.

Napalm Nuke
The ultimate weapon of mass destruction. Activate to vaporize all critters on the table.

Spray
Use your finger to spray the table with deadly disinfectant.

Machete
Swipe your finger across the screen to make critter confetti!

Slow-mo (Formerly: Slow)
All critters move very slow for 15 sec.

Freeze
All critters on the table freeze for 8 sec. Shatter them before they defrost.

Game Rules

How to Play

Your mission is to protect your food from hungry critters. Squash them, collect their juice, and use the juice to buy power-ups for more effective defense.

Juice
Each critter kill earns you juice. You can use juice to buy power-ups. The juice multiplier at the top right of the screen shows how much bonus juice you will earn when you complete the level. Each level completed increases the multiplier.

Power-ups
Power-ups help you when things get crazy. Each power-up has a cost – so use them wisely. Combine power-ups to achieve stronger destructive affect. Power-ups are stored on the menu.

Perfect Wave
If you stop ALL critters from taking a bite of your food you will earn a perfect wave bonus for that level. A perfect wave doubles your score.

Juice Store
Have a Juice Crisis? Don’t lose heart. You can always earn some extra free juice or buy an unlimited amount from our store.

Finally, we wrapped up the project with a press release. The press release was fairly easy since we had already solved most of the branding and localization issues earlier

Impulsis Games then delivered my new copy to their localization teams in France, Germany, Russia, and Spain. This is the right way to do localization. You can’t rely on automated translations. Proper localization must be done by native speakers who are talented writers and branding professionals. If you have any doubt if this is correct, just run any text or website through Yahoo’s Babel Fish or Google Translate and see how horrific the translations really are. Sure, in a pinch it’s good enough to help you understand the gist of something, but it’s also completely inadequate for marketing and branding. If you rely on an automated translation service you will kill your business for international markets.

If you’d like some help localizing your product for the US market call me at 831-566-3046 or email me.

Links:

Download Critter Quitter on iTunes

Check Out The Official Critter Quitter Website

Visit Critter Quitter on Facebook

File Under: A Case Study in Product Localization for the US Market – How to Localize a Product for Global Market – Localization Services for International Markets – Translation Services – Translation Tips and Tricks

USDA Safe Handling Instructions Label for Meat and Poultry – FREE Vector Graphic Download

Clay (The BDD Dude) — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 21:01:13 +0000

The Safe Handling File That the USDA Forgot to Provide to Designers So They Can Make a Decent Package Design for Their Bacon Product.

If you’re in a hurry just download the Print Quality Vector USDA Safe Handling Instructions Graphic now.

Got a minute? Then read on.

I’m designing the packaging for a new line of premium natural bacon for Tender Belly. This bacon is the real deal – all natural, hormone free, cherry wood smokey and sweetened with maple syrup. However when it comes time to place the USDA safe handling instructions that are required for all meat products, I’m stuck with a low resolution gif file that they oddly call a “reproducible master”, or a jpg file that they call “larger”. The gif file is unusable and the jpg is just not good enough for printing if you are at all serious about package design.

So I decided to make my own based upon the USDA official Safe Handling Instructions and Guidlines.

It came out really nice, and since no one else has bothered, I figured I’d make it available for everyone to use.

So download my improved Print Quality Vector USDA Safe Handling Instructions Graphic.

FREE Bonus USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) Included in Safe Handling Document

The USDA doesn’t provide edible vector files for Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) icons either.

On the EST icon/bug Inspection mark on processed products, you just need to swap out the EST. (processing plant number).

On the inspection mark on raw poultry just swap the P number (poultry) number for your product.

The font is Akzindenz-Grotesk BQ

Enjoy.

And if you have a product that needs some seriously good packaging design then email me or call 831-477-9029 to get started.

File Under: USDA Labels Requirements for Meat, Poultry and Pork – Bacon Package Design

Package Design Tips – Top Ten Tips for Product Packaging Designers

Clay (The BDD Dude) — Sun, 12 Dec 2010 19:24:59 +0000

The Ten Most Important Things Every Package Designer Should Know About Packaging Design that Have Nothing to Do with Creating a Great Package Design

This is advice is NOT about creating a killer package design, instead, this is about NOT screwing up. If you want to know how to make dielines or learn the theories that drive powerful package designs, I have other tutorials for that. This article is about avoiding the most common mistakes a designer makes when entering the field of product packaging. However, this is not a theoretical list of blunders by some writer cranking out another generic puff piece from stuff they copy and pasted off the web. This is the real deal. I’ve made all of these mistakes myself back in the day, so don’t feel bad if these seem like news to you. Nobody gets everything right the very first time…or even the second…and perhaps the third as well.

1. Use Adobe illustrator

I know you don’t want to hear it but you need to break your addition to Photoshop and learn the beauty of Illustrator. In the printing world and especially packaging, vector rules the roost. So forget Photoshop. Pretend it doesn’t exist. You shouldn’t be using it, so the sooner you make the switch the better.

This was all done in Illustrator. These can and have been blown up to the size of a tradeshow booth without any loss of clarity or color. That's the power of vector art.

You should only use Photoshop for three things:

Image editing (masking, color correction, touch-up, collages, etc)
Coloring raster images ( painting, drawing, etc)
Web design

Once you get good with Illustrator you’ll find your self using it as much as possible as the advantages are so great it’s worth mastering the learning curve.

2. Mind Your Dieline

Put your dieline and your artwork on two separate layers. Stack the dieline layer on top of the artwork layer. I’d lock the dieline layer as well so you don’t accidentally move it or mess it up.

3. Watch Your Bleeds

Always include a 1/8 inch (.125 inch) bleed minimum, and when in doubt, give them a full quarter or even a half. Better yet, call up the printer and ask what their bleed requirements are.

4. Converting Text to Outlines

Before sending file to printers convert all text to outlines and expand all objects. FIRST, save a copy of your master and add the word “outlined” at then end. Then open this new file, choose Select >All and then choose Text >Convert to Outlines. If you don’t follow this rule religiously you will someday convert the editable master to outlines and then close the file, thus ruining it for ever. I’m serious. This is the most important rule as this mistake is permanent. The other mistakes are fixable. If you want to be extra diligent then go to Select >All and then choose Object > Expand Appearance. This will convert all your applied editable effects like zig zag and warp into a permanent state. Now there’s no way that cool arched text banner will print wrong.

5. Embed Those Files

Before sending to printer embed all placed files. Select image then choose Embed and follow the prompts.

6. CMYK Always

Make sure your color space is CMYK. This stands for Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Key (Black). This includes ALL placed images, so convert all your photos and raster images to CMYK as well. Just make it a habit. The placed and embedded files will regularly trip you up as your client will always send you RGB images and it’s very easy to touch them up, save them, and then forget to convert them to CMYK.

7. Use Rich Blacks

Use rich black for all your big black areas. Rich black is adding some Cyan, Magenta and Yellow to 100% Black. A popular rich black is 60/40/40/100. Don’t up your CMY total higher than this as you want to stay within the suggested 240% maximum ink saturation. Small type should just be black (0/0/0/100) unless you’re printing digital then you can go all rich black without any registration issues.

8. Those Damn Barcodes

If you don’t have the real barcode, grab a fake one off the web and use it as a placeholder. Keep the barcode at a minimum of an inch and a quarter wide (1.25 inch). You can safely chop the height down by half but the width must be at least this 1.25 inches wide if you want to be 100% safe. Don’t think you can design a great label and just make the barcode fit later. Design for it from the beginning. If you need to generate a barcode from your client’s UPC code then use this Free Barcode Generator.

9. Print and Assemble

Always print out your dieline and make a prototype. Don’t ever trust your dielines or your measurements. Print it out and assemble it to make sure it’s correct.

10. Proof This!

Do not sign off on any proofs. That is your client’s job. Your job is to make sure it prints as intended. Your client must take responsibility for typos.

Call 831-477-9029 or email me if you’d like to discuss what great branding can do for your product packaging design.

File Under: Design and File Prep Tips for Graphic Designers Making a Package Design – Top Package Design Mistakes – Avoid These Common Package Design Design Mistakes

Package Design Tutorial – How to Create Product Packaging That Sells

Clay (The BDD Dude) — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 22:45:40 +0000

Putting the Packaging Cart Before the Branding Horse

An entrepreneur contacts a designer. He has a new product and he’s eager to sell it. He’s convinced it’s going to change the world. It’s really, really, incredible and no one’s done it just like this before…ever! It’s truly that original. So original it’s scary. But, he’s been so busy perfecting his product that he’s devoted almost no time to developing the brand. But that’s not important right now because this product is so revolutionary people will flock to it even if it was wrapped in a brown paper bag and tucked under a rock. However, he’s not suicidal, so he knows he needs a killer label, and if not killer, it needs to look at least as good as his competitors. Oh, and he needs to get it done now!

Much more than a pretty picture. Every design element in a package is there to support the brand story. That's it. It's their purpose in life. There is no fluff or filler.

So the entrepreneur starts off by describing what he wants on his product package. It’s a wish list of stuff that he’s absolutely sure he needs and he articulates each one with utmost confidence. He wants a big photo of the product here, the name in an oval here, and the background needs to be green. Well maybe blue, but definitely not red or yellow. Plus a star burst with the word “new”, and on the back, three big bullets points that say “all in one solution”, “no other product works better” and “patent pending!”. He also picked out the perfect fonts for the name – either Papyrus or Impact. He logically sees this as the first step. How else can you make a label if you don’t know what you want on it?

Now, the label design is last thing holding him up, so he’s super pumped and ready to move. He’s spent three years developing this product and he needs the label in two weeks. But that’s ok, because he knows exactly what stuff needs to be on the label and even picked out the fonts already. He just needs a designer to put it all together.

The designer, young and eager for work, jumps on it. He doesn’t bother asking any questions because the design is basically “done” and just needs an artist’s eye to put it all together.

The designer and the entrepreneur have a great first meeting. They brainstorm ideas on how big the photo should be, if the oval should have a gradient and a drop shadow, and which of the two fonts would work best. Everyone gets excited as they throw one cool idea after another on top on the design pile until it’s nearly falling over. Then the designer, flying high on enthusiasm and confidence, makes the package.

A few days later the client receives the comps and he’s thrilled because it has all the things he wanted. Just a few tweaks and we’re done. Yeah! Then everyone pats themselves on the back for a job well done.

This is all too common and completely ass-backwards. Yep this is the wrong way to design a package and will greatly reduce your chances of success in the marketplace.

A package design is not a pretty picture you glue to a bottle, it’s not attractive box that you put something in, and it’s not an empty vessel waiting to be filled with your latest design ideas. It’s not another entry for a design competition, it’s not an object of beauty to impress your peers, and it’s not another showcase piece for your portfolio. It’s not a laundry list of things you think you want or a billboard for your personal preferences. So what is it then?

A package is a self-contained, self-sufficient marketing machine - an advertising department, company spokesperson, floor salesman, radio jingle, full-page ad, and a 30 second commercial all wrapped up into one. It must survive on its own. It must single-handedly convey its value and then close the sale – and it must do this without the advantages of mobility, voice, and thought. A package is a foot soldier sent out to destroy your enemies and capture the attention of the fickle consumer where victory is measured in sales. No sales, no victory. And to get those sales you’re going to need some serious weaponry.

So I’m not going to give you a tutorial on how to use Illustrator. And I’m not going to discuss filters and effects. You can learn that from a book or a YouTube video. It also compounds the problem because they have nothing to do with creating a great package design. I know it’s common to think of software, fonts and effects first – and many clients will try to push you into that model – but it’s backwards.

So instead, I’m going to tell you what every designer and every entrepreneur needs to ask themselves, and what three requirements your package design must satisfy, if they are serious about their product thriving and not just surviving in the marketplace. Then, and only then, can you justify spend hours tweaking pixels, points and percentages to really make the package sing and leap off the shelf and into the consumer’s basket.

1. Your Product Package Must Convey a Compelling Brand Story

Unless you’ve invented and entirely new product that defies categorization (not likely) you will face a wall of established competitors. Having a unique, easy to read package, while necessary to get the consumer to pick it up, is not enough to get them to put it in the cart and seal the deal. The consumer wants to know why they should buy it.

This “why” is the brand story. Depending on your category, a brand story can be a simple articulation of being organically certified or as complex as a character driven back story. A highly contested category with few differentiators among products will place greater demands on your brand story than an uncontested field with high variety.

Greyston Bakery has several differentiators, two of which are very expensive or impossible for their competitors to replicate. So it's a wise move to build a brand story around their philanthropy and their unique relationship with Ben and Jerry.

Say you have a category where being organic, fair trade certified, and raw are the top three value positions demanded by consumers. There are three brands in this category, but all three products already meet these demands. So being organic, fair trade certified, and raw is no longer a differentiator but a base level requirement to enter this category. So while having these attributes is essential to enter the game, it will not be enough to get someone to switch from a competitor’s product to yours.

This is where your brand story comes in. Perhaps all your competitors are foreign-owned imports but yours is a domestic company. Maybe your company is the only one that donates 10% of its profits to environmental causes. Perhaps your business is minority owned, women owned, or employee owned. Maybe it’s union made or uses recyclable materials. Whatever you have that your competitors don’t can be the basis of a brand story. And when given a choice of options emphasize the ones that are difficult or expensive to acquire or copy. It’s not that difficult for your competitor to source the same recyclable materials as you, but it is very expensive for them to become a union shop or employee owned. And if you don’t have any attributes that are difficult or expensive for your competitor to copy, then pick something they can’t have no matter what their budget. This can be a family recipe handed down from generation to generation, a product that was invented by Uncle Joe in his garage, or one developed for Oscar, your finicky cat that hated all the other commercial pet foods. These brand stories are not that impressive in of themselves, but they are impossible for your competitor to copy. However, in a crowded market with nearly identical options, they are enough to give consumers a reason to switch their brand loyalty.

So how valuable is a brand story? Well Coke and Pepsi have been waging a billion dollar war for decades over which is more important – being the “Real Thing” or being the “Choice of a New Generation”. Why? Because they have nothing else to offer as a differentiator. They’re both sweet, carbonated sodas that rot your teeth, make you fat and give you type II diabetes. The only thing left is to create some psychologically driven fantasy about what type of person you are if you drink their beverage. That’s it. That’s all they got. But it works because it creates a clear distinction between their brands in the consumers mind – even if it is just smoke and mirrors and entirely without substance.

Your brand story’s job is to create that distinction, even it’s mostly bullshit.

2. Your Product Package Must Match Consumer Expectations for Its Category Yet Also Differentiate Itself from Its Competitors.

This is the paradox is great packaging. It may seem like a killer idea to make your soda pop look like a bottle of detergent, but when the stockers accidentally shelve it next to Tide or when it’s sitting next to the Coke and Pepsi and is completely ignored by the consumer because they think it’s for washing their clothes, it won’t seem like such a hot idea. So don’t try to change the way people have been conditioned. If you think you can retrain the entire population and wipe away generations of habit, you’re dreaming. However, to have any chance of success, your packaging must be different enough so it stands out from its competitors. So a frozen burrito wrapper must look like a frozen burrito, yet be different from all the other frozen burritos.

So how do you accomplish this feat?

Even if you couldn't read or were seeing it from across the store you'd know this is a wall of spaghetti sauce. This is because there is a distinct DNA for this category. This DNA includes clear, wide mouth jars, paper labels and lots of reds, yellows and greens. The brand in the middle of the second shelf is breaking the DNA - or is it? No other labels are white, or put the ingredient graphic at the top above the name, so it sticks out in a major way. It's shocking how something so simple can create such drama. How would you react? Are they breaking the DNA and taking an unnecessary risk, or is the white label with reverse order hierarchy a bold stylistic choice that will pay off?

First, take a look at all the products in a specific category. It’s best to do this in a real environment, like a supermarket. Look at them and note the category’s DNA. These are the shared visual cues that let the consumer know that yes, these are jars of spaghetti sauce and not bottles of soy sauce. This DNA cannot be changed without very careful consideration to the consequences. Mess around with the DNA and you may make a mutant. In humans, our DNA places our eyebrows above our eyes and your nose in the middle of our face. This is where we expect them. If you suddenly showed up with eyebrows on your cheeks and your nose on your chin you would stand out in a very bad way. You would not get dates easily and people would rightly think something is seriously wrong with you. Your product will be treated the same way.

Now look at all the elements that are different within your product category. These are stylist choices. This is what you should try to change first before messing with the categories DNA. As long as your hair is on your head you’re fine. It can by curly, straight, short, long, colored or even missing and you will still get dates. They’ll be a segment of the population that will really dig your hair no matter how it’s styled. However it must be on your head. It can’t be on your elbow or on your foot.

There are also macro and micro levels of DNA. Take breakfast cereal. On a macro level, cereal comes in a box. Only oatmeal or cooked cereals come in a cylinder. So your cereal should be in a box. On a micro level kids cereals are colorful, cartoony and have characters on them while adult cereals are conservative, earth toned and use folksy imagery of nature. If you made a donut shaped kids cereal with frosting and marshmallows but called it Nature’s Way and put it in a brown box with forest and gold accents, you will sell very little cereal. Both kids and adults will not be able to identify it properly. Any adult that bought it looking for a healthy cereal would be rightly pissed. Likewise, if you made a low sugar, flaky, dry, organic, 100% oat bran cereal that had a colorful bug-eyed parrot on a rainbow colored box and called it Wacky Frosted Doodle Bombs, no one would buy that cereal more than once. Any kid that begged their parent to buy it would be in for a major disappointment. So you need to follow the product category’s DNA or risk major confusion and rejection from your target consumer.

3. Your Product Package Must Be Easy to Read, With Good Flow and a Clear Hierarchy of Design Elements

Visually, all successful package design comes down to hierarchy and flow. Hierarchy allows a customer to digest a large amount of information easily. Flow is the way the customer’s eyes effortlessly move up, down, and around the package. When composed properly, a package design layout takes the customer on a journey of discovery, taking a path with an infinite loop. This infinite loop keeps the customer’s eyes on the move where each design element leads you to the next one, which leads to another, unlit they complete their journey and are prompted to take it again.

Leave nothing to chance. Surf City Garage Pacific Blue Wash and Wax is an easy to read, powerful label by design.

But these journeys are not fixed. Your design may encourage a customer to start at the top, the middle, the bottom, or on the margin. The journey may zigzag or follow sweeping arcs and dips like a roller coaster. The customer may even encounter your product fallen over on its side or facing backwards. But this shouldn’t matter. A good design will pull them along until they’ve seen everything. You should be able to hand your product to someone and say look at the barcode – the most static and ugly part of any package – and the design’s flow and hierarchy would lead them effortlessly from the barcode to the rest of the design. If their eyes just stay there, you have a problem.

So that’s the theory but here’s how it works in practice.

1. Tell a Story

Your product package design’s job is to tell a compelling story. The better the story the better the sales. You need to know this BEFORE you start designing. It is essential to your brand strategy and must be resolved before you start to design. I’ll say it one more time – you need to know your brand story BEFORE you start designing. Really, it’s that important. Otherwise you’re just making a pretty picture and that is NOT what a good package design is.

2. Pick a Focus.

Something on your product is more important than everything else. It could be the company name, the tagline, the product’s name, how it’s used, what’s inside, its key differentiator, or an illustration or photo. Your brand strategy will determine what this element ultimately is. This element needs to be bigger, bolder, and more interesting than the rest. You can use size, color, texture, shape, placement, or psychological and emotional triggers to create this interest.

3. Create a Journey

Now it’s time to turn your focus point into the first step of a journey. So where do you want the customer to go next? Where you take them next depends on your brand strategy and the story you want to tell. Every element on a package has two jobs. Job one is to tell its part of the brand story. Job two is to get you to the next step in the journey. That’s it.

You achieve this through hierarchy and flow. Every element along the journey should have an emphasis that is appropriate for its job.

The composition of the package and the stylistic elements of each part should point you somewhere. You can create a linear top to bottom flow by stacking elements. You can create an “s” or zigzag pattern by staggering elements. You can mix and match visual patterns. Any pattern is acceptable but it should be clear and create an infinite loop.

Simple tricks to create flow and direction often include directional cues like arrows, italics, stepping, arches, and images with a distinct point of view. Below are examples that demonstrate these concepts in action and the consequences when they are ignored or violated.

These principles may seem obvious when illustrated so simply but they are routinely violated by entrepreneurs and designers.

Need a Killer Package Design? Call 831-477-9029 or email me if you’d like to discuss what great branding can do for your product packaging design.

If you’re a beginning package designer read my Top Ten Tips for Product Package Designers and learn to avoid the most common technical design mistakes.

File Under: The Most Import Thing Every Designer Should Know About Creating a Product Package Design That Sells – Product Packaging Design Tips and Tricks – The Design Theories Behind Good Package Design – Creating a Strong Brand Story

Storyboard Tutorial – How to Create Storyboards for Film, Video, and Television

Clay (The BDD Dude) — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 00:28:59 +0000

First a Quick Note to Aspiring Producers and Film Makers

This tutorial is aimed at people who want to storyboard professionally. However it also useful for beginning television and film makers just wanting to know the basics. If this is you, then ignore all the parts about being able to draw. Crude stick figures will work just as good for hashing out your ideas pre-production. For you, the most important thing is just to storyboard the script. Now on to the tutorial.

Download Materials for this Tutorial

16:9 Eight Up Storyboard Thumbnail Sheet

16:9 Two Up Storyboard Template

16:9 One Up Storyboard Template

4:3 Four Up Storyboard Template (not true 4:3 but I used this one for years)

Animatic Layered Photoshop Storyboard Template

Storyboards Are Like Comics…Mostly

Just to get my street cred out-of-the-way, I’m a working professional storyboard artist. My client list includes The Discovery Channel, Animal Planet, Google, Intel, Oracle, and many lesser know but equally demanding companies. I know what they like and how to keep them happy.

However, this is not a tutorial on how to be hired as a storyboard artist or how to find a job at a studio. I’ve never formally applied for a storyboarding position, so I have no idea what it’s like to pursue employment in the traditional sense. Directors and producers just find me on the web, like what they see, and then hire me. The ones that don’t hire me find someone else and I’m never the wiser.

The most important thing you need to be a storyboard artist is the ability to draw. And I mean REALLY draw – as in anything and everything. If you can draw anime characters reasonably well but struggle with other styles or realism, then you’re not ready. If your people look good only from one angle or you try to avoid feet or hands because they always look funny, then you’re not ready. If your women look like guys with boobs, or the reverse, hypersexualized fantasy characters, then you’re not ready. If you can draw a fully armored, teeth clenched warrior blasting a crowd while leaping through the air, but you struggle to draw a pudgy middle-aged man-eating a bowl of cereal in his pajamas, then you are most definitely not ready.

With storyboarding you’re not there to express yourself, you job is to make the script come to life. This doesn’t mean you can’t have input on angles, transitions and shot compositions, it just means that no matter how much you’ll like to have the lead character in a bug spray commercial use a pair of chopsticks to grab a fly in mid-air, it’s not going to happen if it’s not in the script. The same is true for the car rental ad that’s begging for a high-speed chase scene or the customer service training video that just cries out for a fantasy sequence of an employee doing a flying roundhouse kick to a disgruntled customers head. If it’s not in the script, you can’t draw it.

Understanding How Movies and Television Work

Now that you can draw you need to understand how stories are told in film and television. I’m not just talking about the language of cinematography and terms like wide shot, close up, extreme close up, pan, zoom, dolly, etc. I’m talking about how a story is told and the decisions that go into creating a solid narrative. If you’re the type of person that takes note of a cleverly framed shot or a great jump cut, if you sometimes find yourself analyzing how a scene was created rather than the scene itself, then you may be a good candidate for becoming a really strong storyboarder.

Punctual, Professional and Personable.

Now being able to draw and understanding the mechanics of great visual storytelling is just the foundation. You also need to be fast. You’re getting paid by the frame and the longer you take, the less money you make. Not only that, you won’t be afforded the luxury of time anyway. I don’t think I’ve ever been given more than a five day turn around once the script is in my hand. Sometimes it’s three days or even two.

Sometimes you’ll get a 9am emergency request for a couple more frames right before a presentation that afternoon. Sure, they could do the presentation without those additional frames, but it may make the difference between signing off on the script that day or three more weeks of meetings and pitches. If you are storyboarding for a production company or branding firm then the intended audience is their client and getting that script approved is of utmost importance. So yes, you’ll be dropping everything to knock out those additional frames.

One Size Does NOT Fit All

So now we’re going to assume that you can draw really well, you have an understanding of cinematic language, and you can meet deadline. The next part is style, and fortunately for artists, all styles are welcome in the world of storyboarding. That’s right, there is no “standard” look for a storyboard. Every director will have their own preferences and they will find a storyboard artist to match his or her own expectations.

Breaking Down the Script

Your client will provide a script. Usually it will be pretty tight. Sometimes it will include direction notes and a shot sequence. Whether it’s a traditional dialog script or one complete with a shot sequence, you will need to sit down with the producer and or director and walk through it.

Typical 30 second commercial scripts

This is where you talk about the intention of each scene, what are the most important parts, how many frames you’ll need, style, level of detail, format (16:9 or 4:3), what reference material is available, the look of the characters, and if this will be made into an animatic (ie. a simple animation that uses pans, zooms, and few key movements to drive the main story line). The animatic part is very important so ask up front. You don’t want to find out after the fact that they need the foreground and background on different layers or when the woman in the script pours a glass of juice they planned to actually have her pour it so they’ll need her arm on a different layer.

Thumbnail sheets and script with personal notes to myself on layout and composition

Now while you are reviewing the script with the director, make little notes on the script itself and have a thumbnail sheet handy to quickly block out the frames you’ll be boarding later.

I take pride in my accuracy so I always research before storyboarding historical material

Getting To Work

Once you have your notes, thumbnails, and source materials that were either provided to you or that you researched on the web, it’s time to start drawing.

How you go about this is up to you. Chances are you were hired because your portfolio matched the director’s sensibilities, so whatever you normally do to make a cool illustration, will be fine. If you are doing something different from your default style, then that was most likely defined in your earlier meeting and you’ll know what to do to meet that expectation as well.

So here’s the rub. This is a tutorial, but like I said, there is no industry standard. Boards can be black and white, mono chromatic, or full color. They can be old school pencil on paper or new school digital paint. They can be sketchy or tight. Cartoony or realistic. Packed with shot notes, action lines and arrows, or drawn like movie stills.

So instead of telling you how you should do it, I’m going to show you how I do it. Whatever style or medium you work in, chances are it will be something similar as all artists pretty much have to follow the same basics. If you’ve never drawn a storyboard, then you can safely copy my work flow, style, and materials and be reasonably sure that you will not look like a fool when you present your final boards.

Download Materials for this Tutorial

16:9 Eight Up Storyboard Thumbnail Sheet

16:9 Two Up Storyboard Template

16:9 One Up Storyboard Template

4:3 Four Up Storyboard Template (not true 4:3 but I used this one for years)

Animatic Layered Photoshop Storyboard Template

Classic Black and White Pencil Storyboards

This is my favorite style. It’s clean – with no speech bubbles, action line or arrows – and has a timeless and artistically pleasing look.

Materials: Technical pencil, preferably a Staedtler or Cretacolor, with 2mm or 4mm leads in the HB to 6B range, a kneaded eraser, a high quality lead or pencil sharpener, and whatever paper you like to draw on. I just use Staples brand recycled all purpose paper. After years of experimenting I’ve seen no advantage to using “artist” paper for storyboarding. You can also use any variety of artist pencils from wooden ones to the woodless Cretacolor Monolith where the whole pencil is a giant piece of lead. Go to a good art store and try them out. It’s really up to you so use what feels rights and gives you a good expressive line. You should also have a drafting board and a light table, but you can get by with any flat smooth drawing surface and a bright window for tracing. I’ve had a drafting board since I was twelve, so if an aspiring seventh grade artist felt it was a necessary item to practice their craft, then you should too.

1 – Lightly Sketching Out the Scene.

Use a harder lead in the HB range. Harder leads make lighter lines. Make sure you are drawing at the correct aspect ratio for the client’s needs. Most of the time I’m doing 16:9 these days. I have a stock template that fits two up on an 8 1/2″ by 11″ piece of paper. You can make your own or download my 16:9 storyboard template. It’s a good general template that works for most projects.

2 – Finishing Pencil Work.

Use a softer lead in the 2B, 4B or 6B range. Softer leads make darker lines and with less effort. Softer leads are also more expressive. It’s ok to overshoot the frame. You can leave them or trim them in Photoshop later.

3 – Scanning the Artwork.

Scan at grayscale at 300 dpi.

4 – Touch Up.

5 – Delivery.

Your client may want the PSD but most of the time they are happy with a high res JPG. Save your frames as JPG’s with a quality setting of 100%. Email or FTP to client. Make sure your file names make sense. They should look something like “Project_Script_Name_Frame_01.jpg”

Classic Ink or Marker Storyboards

This is a close second to classic pencil boards. Clean and crisp.

Materials: Technical pencil with HB lead, kneaded eraser, a lead sharpener, and whatever paper you like to draw on. I just use Staples brand recycled all-purpose paper. As for inking, it really comes down to personal preference. Some options include Manga pen sets, Sharpies, Kuretake Brush Pens, Pentel Pocket Brush Pens, Sakura Pigma Sensei markers, Faber-Castell manga and artist pens, Uniball pens, and Rapidograph technical pens. Go to a good art store and try them out. They won’t have everything but you’ll quickly get a feel of what you like. The most important thing is that it not bleed, it feels good, and you have a couple of line weights to choose from.

Old School Note: If you want to use markers for greyscale shading the old school way then use Letraset Promarkers and a good marker paper. However, you’ll still need to scan at 300 pdi and export as JPGS’s as everyone wants digital files these days.

1 – Lightly Sketching Out the Scene.

Use a harder lead in the HB range.

2 – Finishing Ink or Marker Work.

Lay down your ink or marker lines. If you overshoot the frame you can leave then or trim them in Photoshop later. Same with mistakes. Erase all the remaining pencil lines with your kneaded eraser.

3 – Scanning the Artwork.

Scan at black and white (Bitmap or Tiff) at 300 dpi.

4 – Touch Up.

You’ll probably see little “mistakes” all over once it’s scanned. How many you choose to leave depends on the look you are going for. If you’re going for a loose feel, then leave them. For a tighter feel you may want to clean up some stray lines with the lasso or eraser tool. If you prefer the eraser tool the file will need to be converted from bitmap to grayscale (Image>Mode>Grayscale)

5 – Delivery.

Color Storyboards

Nice and colorful but takes a lot longer than a black and white board. I charge about 50% more for color. It’s really important to decide ahead of time HOW you will color these. If you’re going to drop in color using the magic wand tool and the paint bucket or gradient tool, then your shapes better be closed. This means no “holes” in objects.

When dropping in color using magic want tool and paint bucket, gaps cause leaking. If you paint from behind by changing the layer from normal to multiply and then using the paintbrush tool to paint on another layer behind the drawing, gaps are not an issue.

Holes in objects that are supposed to be closed will cause the magic wand tool to leak. If you are going to color them digitally by either painting on top – or behind using the multiply effect on the pencil/pen layer – then the shapes can stay open.

Materials: Technical pencil with leads in the HB to 6B range, kneaded eraser, a lead sharpener, and whatever paper you like to draw on. I just use Staples brand recycled all-purpose paper. You may also need your favorite markers and pens if you’re doing an ink style line. If you don’t already own a Wacom tablet then this is the time to buy one. At a minimum get a Bamboo, but the Intuos is preferred. If you hem and haw at this purchase then you are not serious digital artist. Even my partner has one and she just does email and surfs the web!

Old School Note: If you want to use markers for coloring the old school way then use Letraset Promarkers and a good marker paper. However, you’ll still need to scan at 300 pdi and export as JPGS’s as everyone wants digital files these days.

1 – Lightly Sketching Out the Scene.

Use a harder lead in the HB range.

2 – Finishing Pencil or Ink Work.

Use a softer lead in the 2B, 4B or 6B range. For ink or marker boards use what feels best. It’s ok to overshoot the frame. You can leave then or trim them in Photoshop later.

3 – Scanning the Artwork.

For pencil boards, scan at grayscale at 300 dpi, For ink/marker boards scan at black and white (BMP or TIFF) at 300 dpi.

4 – Touch Up.

Open the file in Photoshop. If my pencils are plenty dark – but have lots of leftover sketch lines I want to eliminate – I bump up the contrast and brightness to drop out the leftover pencil lines I want to de-emphasize (Image>Adjustments>Brightness/Contrast). If my pencils are a bit too light I take down the brightness. Play around with the sliders until it looks right. Once you develop a consistent style you can save your favorite settings as Photoshop action and run it on the whole batch at once. For ink scans you can cut away lines that bother you. If you are going to be dropping in your color then zoom in and close all the gaps! With a pencil scan, just sample the darkness you want and then use the brush tool with a diameter that matches the thickness of your hand drawn lines. Set the Opacity and Flow at about 75% and see how it feels. You don’t want it to lay down too much brush effect at once or it will look like a patch. With a marker or ink scan, I usually use the Lasso tool and make a shape that matches the existing lines and then fill it with black. You can also use the pencil tool. It’s up to you.

5 – Coloring.

Convert file to CMYK or RGB depending on your preference when coloring. I prefer working in CMYK if the final result will be printed. For coloring, you are probably going to use one of two methods. Paint on top/behind or dropping in color. I prefer to drop but it’s really a personal and stylistic choice. Dropping color is going to give you a harder, more pop art cartoony feel. Painting on top or behind is going to give you a softer, more painterly look.

6 – Delivery.

Mixed Presentation Storyboards

These boards can include speech bubbles, action lines, arrows, motion blurs, signage, cards, and cutaways. If you are using these techniques, then you probably have a very specific audience in mind. Perhaps it’s a product demonstration that requires a more scientific or a step by step approach. Maybe it’s a board to be presented to a focus group and it needs to read like a comic book. Or maybe it’s for the DP or cinematographer and they need lots of shot direction.

Materials: Technical or artist drawing pencils with leads in the HB to 6B range, kneaded eraser, a lead or pencil sharpener, and whatever paper you like to draw on. I just use Staples brand recycled all-purpose paper. As for inking, it really comes down to personal preference. Some options include Manga pen sets, Sharpies, Kuretake Brush Pens, Pentel Pocket Brush Pens, Sakura Pigma Sensei markers, and Rapidographs technical pens. The most important thing is that it not bleed, it feels good, and you have a couple of line weights to choose from.

1 – Sketching Out the Scene.

Use a harder lead in the HB range. If these boards are going to have speech bubbles, arrows, split screens, cutaways or any other effects make sure to accommodate for then now or draw them in. The last think you’ll want to do it try to sneak in a speech bubble after the fact because you forgot to compose for one.

2 – Finishing Pencil Work or Inking.

Use a softer lead in the 2B, 4B or 6B range. If your inking, then ink now. It’s ok to overshoot the frame. You can leave then or trim them in Photoshop later.

3 – Scanning the Artwork.

For pencil boards, scan at grayscale at 300 dpi, For ink/marker boards scan at black and white (BMP or TIFF) at 300 dpi.

4 – Touch Up.

Open the file in Photoshop. If my pencils are plenty dark – but have lots of leftover sketch lines I want to eliminate – I bump up the contrast and brightness to drop out the leftover pencil lines I want to de-emphasize (Image>Adjustments>Brightness/Contrast). If my pencils are a bit too light I take down the brightness. Play around with the sliders until it looks right. Once you develop a consistent style you can save your favorite settings as a Photoshop action and run it on the whole batch at once. Now it’s time to put in the speech bubbles, arrows, signage, titles or any other elements that you intentionally left out, but composed for, because they are best done in Photoshop. I always do speech bubbles and most signage/cards in Photoshop but other effects are decided on a case by case basis.

5 – Delivery.

Storyboards for Animatics

These can be in pencil or ink, black and white, or colored. What separates these from the classic boards is you must compose in layers. This is time consuming but it’s great fun to watch the finished piece.

Materials: Whatever materials you like but I highly recommend a light table at this stage in the game. Every artists should have one but for this it’s a must or you’ll be getting up and running to a bright window every five minutes. This is not about a specific style, but a specific way of drawing and preparing your storyboards.When I’m going to be making boards for animatics I generally use my one up 16:9 storyboard template but I don’t draw on the template itself. I put it under my paper to act as a guide for dimensions. The reason being is that when you storyboard for animatics, you’ll want to draw bigger than usual and over shoot the templates boundaries. This will give the editor some wiggle room for pans, zooms, and pull outs. You’ll also be using several sheets of paper and doing a lot of tracing to make all the individual parts that need to be animated.

1 – Sketching Out the Scene.

This step is to block out the scene and make mental notes about what needs to be separated.

2 – Drawing Each Layer.

This is where a light table comes in handy. Your master scene sketch will provide the guide to draw each individual part. You’ll probably use several sheets of paper. A typical scene breakdown might include a master background layer, a master character layer with the action arm missing, and other layer or two for the action arm, and maybe a foreground element.

3 – Scanning the Artwork.

Scan at grayscale or color (for pencil) or black and white bitmap or Tiff ( for ink or marker) at 300 dpi.

4 – Touch Up.

With animatic boards you’ll be building the scene out of parts. So first you’ll create a master Photoshop template. You can download my complete layered Photoshop storyboard template featuring a Roman gladiator on his way back from grocery shopping getting mugged by a dinosaur with a tommy gun to see how it’s done. Move the parts around to simulate action. This template includes a frame for demonstration purposes but you could design yours without a frame and let the scene bleed to the edges. It’s this template that will be the final scene.

Open up all the scans for your parts. Do any touch ups on these now. Then cut and drag over the parts. I usually start with the master background layer. Name the layer “background”. Don’t size it down to make it fit. It’s good that it bleeds off the frame. The whole point is to give the editor as much flexibility as possible, so the bigger (within reason) the better. Drag all the parts over, name the layers correctly (eg. left hand should be named “left hand”) and shuffle the layers into the proper order. The animation department will want RGB files so work in that color space. Save the file.

5 – Delivery.

Your client will want the layered PSD so don’t flatten them. Make sure your file names make sense. They should look something like “Project_Script_Name_Frame_01.psd”. Email or FTP to your client.

View My Discovery Channel Storyboards Converted to Animatics

These were done in the classic pencil board style but later their amazing production department converted them to these very cool animatics. There is a lot you can do with pans, zoom, shakes and some very good voice over and sound effects.

12 Days of Terror - Original Discovery Channel Movie

View “Beach Days” Pre Production Animatic
View “Myths”Pre Production Animatic
View the Original Movie Trailer

Colosseum – Original Discovery Channel Movie

View “Civilization” Pre Production Animatic
View “Journey” Pre Production Animatic
View “Verus” Pre Production Animatic

Days of Courage – Original Discovery Channel Movie

View “Ike” Pre Production Animatic
View “Stories” Pre Production Animatic
View “Spies” Pre Production Animatic

Conclusion

So that’s it. That’s how a pro – or at least this particular pro – does it. How you do it is up to you. However, if you don’t have any methods of your own yet, you’ll greatly increase your chances of pulling off a successful storyboard project by following mine. But the true test is if directors keep rehiring you. If you keep getting work then whatever you are doing is the “right way”.

Want to hire a storyboard artist? Then call me (Clay Butler) at 831-477-9029 or try Email

File Under: Learn How a Professional Storyboard Artist Works. Learn What Pencils, Pens, Paper and Art Supplies are Best for Storyboarding. Lessons on Drawing Black and White, Color, and Animatics Storyboards. How to Draw Storyboards.

Break Creative Block – How to Unleash Your Best Design Ideas

Clay (The BDD Dude) — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 15:16:05 +0000

Digging Yourself Out of a Creative Black Hole and Getting Back on Track

(How’s that for a mixed metaphor?)

Sometimes you just freeze up. No matter how much you try you keep recycling the same failed idea over and over again as if somehow you’ll find the magical tweak that will save it.

I say sometimes because if this happens often, you’re in the wrong field. Designing for the most part should be exciting and relatively easy. This is equally true for writers, painters, sculptors and any other creative field where you make something from nothing. If you find yourself struggling more often than not, then you should find something else to do. However, no matter how passionate and excited you are about your job, sometimes it just doesn’t go as smooth as you’d like.

Problem: The Idea That’s Too Good to Abandon

We’ve all been there. A sudden bolt of inspiration hits you and it’s just brilliant. This is the idea, the one that will define your client’s brand like no other.

The trouble is though, when you try to executive this amazing idea, it just falls flat.

Since you’re convince of your idea’s brilliance and you’ve already invested emotionally in it being the solution, you waste countless hours trying to polish what is essentially a turd.

Solution: There is only one way out of this and that is to just stop, toss the idea and look at other options. This will be followed shortly by another moment when the real solution pops into your head and you’ll wonder why you never thought of it before.

Lesson Learned: Know When to Quit

Problem: Going in Circles

This one is depressing because the design you’re working on is fundamentally decent but it just lacks a proper ending – that ah-ha moment that tells you you’re done. And you desperately want to be done.

Now, because the design is sound but anemic, you keep tweaking around the edges – afraid of disturbing the core. The trouble is the tweaks are just more of the same – booooring! And the results are the same – a design that is just shy of complete.

Solution: This one’s counter intuitive but you need to make a copy of that file and then just go ape shit on it. Try every ridiculous thing you can think off. Push the envelope as far as possible. Don’t worry, no one will see but you. Too many fonts, ugly fonts, gigantic fonts, fonts on angles or bleeding off the page, one word per line, once character per line, bad line breaks, all lower case, all uppers, mix and match, left justified, right justified, asymmetrical layouts, hideous color, tangents – it’s all good. However, in the process of creating intentionally bad design you will free your mind and see things that you previously dismissed as unworkable. Then you can go back to the original and implement the best ideas culled from the mound of crap you just created.

Lesson Learned: Loosen Up and Try The Unthinkable

Problem: Good, But Not Really Good

You understand the specs. You have a complete handle on the objectives. Intellectually it’s a no brainer. Unfortunately your designs are stiff and uninspiring. Technically there is nothing wrong but it’s not going to win any awards, and more importantly, make money for your client.

Solution: Go see what other designers have done to solve a similar problem. Nothing is created in a vacuum. We all draw our inspiration from everything we’ve ever seen, heard, felt or touched since the time we were born. So add some more inspiration to the pile. Don’t worry about copying someone else. If you’re reading this you probably know the difference between inspiration and theft. Then, wait a day or two, and tackle the project again with a deeper reservoir to draw upon.

Lesson Learned: Expose Yourself to the Best and the Brightest, So You Can Be the Brightest and the Best

Problem: Total Brain Freeze

This should be rare but sometime you just blank out. You stare at the monitor and just drift aimlessly in your mind. Perhaps you’re too sick or too tired. Maybe it’s burnout. Whatever it is you know that to continue working would be a farce.

Solution: Go to a movie. Go hiking. Take your kid to the park. Read a book. See a concert. Take a nap. It doesn’t matter as long as it’s not related to design.

To the average person it will look like you’re goofing off, but the artist in you knows better. You’re best work is often done subconsciously in the background. Just because you’re not at your computer pushing pixels, doesn’t mean you’re not working. The creative mind doesn’t take vacations. Doing other things allows you brain to practice free association and create the epiphanies. The ones that make you pull off the road, bolt out of bed, or stop in mid conversation, so you can jot down that perfect idea that just suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

Well, it didn’t just appear out of nowhere. While you were hiking, playing, or watching that movie, your brain was quietly working on that problem that had eluded you for days. When it finished, it pushed it forward so you could do something with it. Having fun and “goofing off” really is essential to the creative process.

Lesson Learned: All Work and No Play Makes Jack a Dull Designer

File Under: 4 Techniques for Breaking the Most Common Types of Creative Blocks. How to Break Creative Block for Writers, Artists, and Designers

Zigabid Rocks! Leveraging The Laws of Supply and Demand in the Concert Ticket Industry

Clay (The BDD Dude) — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 13:44:02 +0000

This is a story about Zigabid and front row ZZ Top seats at The Shoreline in Mountain View, but it starts with Rush.

On Monday August 9th 2001 at 3pm I got news that my grandfather just died. At 3:30 pm my old friend John calls me up and says he has an extra ticket to Rush at the Shoreline.

“I got an extra ticket, do you want to go?”

“Heck yeah! But what do you mean by extra ticket? Like as in free or do I have to pay?”

“No, it’s free.”

“Awesome! I didn’t get tickets because I really couldn’t afford at the moment but I really wanted to go. Thanks!”

“No problem. I’ll meet you out front around 5:30″

So I meet John and we head to the seats. They are serious nosebleed section, the last row before it turns into lawn, but I’m at Rush for free, so life is good.

View from nose bleed seats for Rush at the Shoreline. I knew it was Rush because I recognized the music and there were no women in the audience. As for visual confirmation, I just had to trust they weren't actually animatronic replicas or hired actors.

During intermission John says he’d like to see ZZ Top this year. They’re touring and he’s never seen them before. I head to the bathrooms and I notice a sign that says:

Today Only

ZZ Top Lawn Seats – $10

Friday September 3rd

No service charges!

So I go back to the seats and I tell John the news.

“Really? I’ll be back.”

He comes back fifteen minutes later the proud owner of four lawn seat tickets for a total cost of $40.

Now this has been happening all year. Except for a handful of reliable draws, shows have been selling slow. So weeks after the tickets go on sale they start slashing prices. That’s why I got half price Lilith Fair tickets. This, of course, is creating a problem. Early purchasers are resentful and rightfully feel like dupes. Conversely, the later buyers are rewarded for holding out. Taken to its logical extreme, concert goers wait to purchase in anticipation of a discount, thus causing promoters to slash prices to fill seats because of low tickets sales caused by people waiting for a discount.

It’s a classic dilemma that all businesses and brands that engage in discounting face. Once you establish yourself as a discounter, people will refuse to pay full price, thus forcing you to be a full-time discounter. This hurts profits which it makes it difficult to invest in expansion, marketing, and research and development.

A week before the ZZ Top show, John calls me up.

“Three people bailed on me. Do you want to go to ZZ Top?”

“Sure, why not?”

But as the day of the show gets closer, I’m starting to dread the law seats. You can’t see the band because you are so far away, so you end up watching television the whole time while freezing your butt off on a lawn chair. Not fun.

I know ZZ Top hasn’t sold out so I hit Craigslist the morning of the show looking for an upgrade.

The economics are simple. Since the tickets were only $10, we could buy some last-minute discounted seats and still come out cheaper than if we would had purchased the same seats the day they went on sale.

Some of the Craigslist sellers are clearly in fantasy land. They’re asking $150 a pop for section 102 seats to a non sold out show where the face value is $89. Not going to happen. However there are a few standouts and one in particular that had two choice seat for $52 each that you could buy right now – or you could make an offer.

Make an offer? Just what I’m looking for – discounted seats with a chance to get them even cheaper. The show is not sold out, there are plenty of seats at the box office and online, and it starts in about four hours, so it’s clearly a buyers market.

The seller has a link to his Zigabid profile. I’ve never heard of Zigabid but I click around the site and it seems legit. I look at his offer closely and notice that they’ll be a $15 rush fee on the tickets. The show starts in four hours. How exactly are these tickets going to be “rushed” and to where or whom? So I call them up.

“I’m looking at the ZZ Top tickets for Shoreline tonight and notice it says there’s a $15 rush fee. Aren’t these electronic tickets?”

“No, these are hard tickets.”

“So how will I get them?”

“We use a courier service to take them to the event. We do it all the time. They know us there and the tickets will be waiting a will call.”

“So is this per ticket or per order?”

“Per order.”

“So fifteen bucks flat.”

“Yes.”

“Thanks.”

I create an account, select the pair of tickets, and then press make offer. I enter $25. The worse he can say is no, right? The seats are pretty good – section 102 which is center stage and row G which is thirteen rows from the front because there’s a series of six AA, BB, and so on type super elite rows first.

I wait awhile and I get no email response so I go back to bid on the tickets that are row M. When I get there I notice that he counter offered with $40. Still a good deal but my buddy is already in the hole $40 for the lawn seats so I want to spend as little as possible. I counter with $30.

I check back twenty minutes later and the tickets are gone. Damn, I guess somebody paid the asking price. So I put in a $25 bid for two tickets in the M section.

Shortly after that I get a call from a Zigbid rep.

“Congratulations, the seller accepted your offer, I just need to verify the name for will call.”

“Oh, that’s why the tickets disappeared, the person who bought them was me. Well I just put in a bid for another set of tickets because I though I lost out on these. What do I do now? I don’t want them.”

“Not a problem, I’ll show you how to cancel that bid.”

So he walks me through, I cancel the bid, and I’m all set with killer seats that I paid less than half of the face value for.

Ten minutes later I get a call from Zigabid again.

“Uh oh, I hope this isn’t bad news.”

“No, it’s good news. We’re giving you a free upgrade to row A.”

“This is still the same section right? 102 center stage?”

“Yes.”

“So this is really free. No extra charges at all?”

“Nope. It’s a free upgrade.”

“You’re sure about that.”

“Yes, I’m sure.”

“No charge.”

“Yes, no charge.”

“For real.”

“Yes, for real.”

“Wow, that’s really nice. Thanks. I guess this a very lucky day for me.”

You can understand my scepticism. Who voluntarily gives you more when they don’t have too? Row A is seven seats closer than G and as close as you get without getting into the super elite AA rows. It’s a pretty foreign concept to encounter. About as unlikely as a cop letting you off with a warning.

The order is processed and I get an email receipt showing an additional $10 service charge for the order. I go back to the website, and sure enough it was there all along, I just didn’t notice. Which makes sense because the operating expenses have to come from somewhere. Oh well, still better than the per ticket service charge from Ticketmaster and I got the tickets for such a great price that extra ten is easily absorbed into the total cost.

So it’s three hours before the show, I scored front row seats at half face value, and they are waiting for me at will call. I’m stoked, but part of me will only believe it when the tickets are in my hand. I figure if I get shafted, at least we still have lawn seats to fall back on, and I’ll just handle the charge backs tomorrow.

So you know by the foreshadowing in the beginning of the story that the tickets were there as promised. I pick up my tickets at will call. They have this really cool red and silver band on them that says VIP.

“Sir, you can go through the VIP entrance around the corner.”

Yes, the best seats have their own entrance which looks identical to the other ones for the commoners but you need a red banded ticket to use it. It even drops you into the same area with everyone else. It makes about as much sense at marking one urinal as “VIP” in the restroom even though it still functions the same, smells just as bad, and sandwiched between the toilets for peasants.

But you know what, it works. I do feel about seven percent more important and entitled than I usually do even though I’m completely aware of the psychology of the ruse.

On the way down to our seats it’s a series “right this way sir’s” and “enjoy the show sir’s” until we reach our destination. The opening band, 38 Special is already on and we’re shockingly close. Closer than I’ve ever been at a reserved seating show that I wasn’t shooting for the local newspaper.

After the band is done, I prop up my heels on the seat in front of me and take a wide-angle shot of my view to commemorate our good fortune.

Life is Good in the VIP Section

Naturally, I brought my Sanyo Xacti camcorder to shoot some footage but I’m sitting right up front and surrounded by staff and security. I feel really exposed. Will there be a problem? That questioned is answered by the guy in front of me, first row, two feet from security, who starts shooting the entire 38 Special set with his Flip camcorder. Then a friend comes up and gives him his Flip and he starts shooting the show with a digital camera in each hand. He looks like Chow Yun-Fat in a double fisted shootout in The Killer.

Now the Shoreline is pretty lax about these things, but in the VIP section, it’s almost your God-given right to shoot the show. Even with two cameras at once.

So how was the show? Awesome.

How were the seats? Killer. You could see each hair on Billy Gibbons beard, the seems in his jacket and the details in his jewelry. Combined with the intense light, it felt voyeuristic and very immersive – like seeing Avatar 3-D for the first time.

How was my video footage? Go see for yourself on my YouTube channel.

How close is close? This next shot was taken with my cell phone.

ZZ Top at the Shoreline. Taken with my cell phone. Row A, Set 4

So whats the deal with Zigabid? Well, unlike the other ticket resellers like Stubhub, Zigabid has a “make offer” component which enables haggling, or more accurately, enables the buyer and seller to act upon real-time market forces. As the show gets closer to start time, both the parties have a greater interest in making a deal happen. Nobody wants to miss a show and nobody wants to get stuck with tickets they couldn’t unload. Better to eat half the cost than the full cost. Would I have paid $52 for the tickets? No way. Did the seller need $52 to make the sale worth while? Under the conditions, apparently not or he wouldn’t have accepted my lowball offer.

As for customer service Zigabid does it right. When I had problems or questions about the system I always got a real person on the phone and they were always friendly and helpful.

Why did they give me a free upgrade? I’m not sure. Could be just to fill in the seats closer to the stage. Could be that they understood the PR value of a smooth move like that. There is no better advertisement than word of mouth. If the latter is the case, it obviously worked.

Zigabid rocks!

File Under: The Ultimate Zigabid Review – Ticket Reseller Reviews – The Economics of Aftermarket Concert Ticker Industry – Ticket Scalping

Beats Digging Ditches - My Life as a Professional Graphic Designer

Top 15 Questions To Ask Your Client Before Designing a Product Package

Understanding The Value of The Client Discovery Process.

What Questions You Should Ask Your Client BEFORE Giving a Quote, Taking a Deposit, and Starting a Package Design Project.

1. Where are you right now? Is this a re-brand or a new product?

2. What is the product?

3. Who are your competitors?

4. What makes you different? Why would someone choose your product over another option?

5. Are your suppliers, copackers or private labelers all lined up or are you still exploring production options?

6. Have you finalized what bottle, jar, box, can, tube, or bag you will be using? Do you need help with sourcing this?

7. Do you have your dielines ready?

8. Are you working with a printer already? What are your anticipated print runs? Do you need a printer?

9. What are your distributions channels? Direct to retailers? Selling to distributors? Private label? Box stores or mom and pop? Online only?

10. Do you have your UPC codes ready? Do you need help getting them?

11. Is your body copy complete? How about your name and tagline?

12. Do you have a print ready logo or any other graphics that you want to use?

13. Are your nutritional facts done? How about ingredients?

14. Are there any USDA or FDA requirements for your packaging?

15. When is your projected launch date?

So Now What?

USDA Meat and Poultry Inspection Mark – FREE Vector Graphic Download

The Raw and Processed Meat and Poultry Inspection Marks, Icons and Labels That The USDA Forgot to Provide

How to Design a Shrink Sleeve Label – Shrink Sleeve Packaging Design Tips

Shrink Sleeve Packaging is Super Sexy – Learn How the Shrink Sleeving Process Works with This Shrink Sleeve Tutorial

First Some Good News

Decide if Shrink Sleeve Packaging is Right For You

Picking The Container

Send a Sample to The Printer

Design Your Label According to The Dieline

Print Out and Mock Up The Design

Approve the Proofs

Run Some Sample Labels and Do a Shrink Test

Rework the Label if Necessary and Repeat

Run the Final Labels and Bask in the Glory of Your New Designs

Additional Reading:

Videos:

Product Localization – Marketing Your Product to US and Global Markets

Critter Quitter- A Case Study in Product Localization for the US Market

Critters

Power-ups

Game Rules

USDA Safe Handling Instructions Label for Meat and Poultry – FREE Vector Graphic Download

The Safe Handling File That the USDA Forgot to Provide to Designers So They Can Make a Decent Package Design for Their Bacon Product.

Package Design Tips – Top Ten Tips for Product Packaging Designers

The Ten Most Important Things Every Package Designer Should Know About Packaging Design that Have Nothing to Do with Creating a Great Package Design

1. Use Adobe illustrator

2. Mind Your Dieline

3. Watch Your Bleeds

4. Converting Text to Outlines

5. Embed Those Files

6. CMYK Always

7. Use Rich Blacks

8. Those Damn Barcodes

9. Print and Assemble

10. Proof This!

Package Design Tutorial – How to Create Product Packaging That Sells

Putting the Packaging Cart Before the Branding Horse

1. Your Product Package Must Convey a Compelling Brand Story

2. Your Product Package Must Match Consumer Expectations for Its Category Yet Also Differentiate Itself from Its Competitors.

3. Your Product Package Must Be Easy to Read, With Good Flow and a Clear Hierarchy of Design Elements

1. Tell a Story

2. Pick a Focus.

3. Create a Journey

Storyboard Tutorial – How to Create Storyboards for Film, Video, and Television

First a Quick Note to Aspiring Producers and Film Makers

Storyboards Are Like Comics…Mostly

Understanding How Movies and Television Work

Punctual, Professional and Personable.

One Size Does NOT Fit All

Breaking Down the Script

Getting To Work

Classic Black and White Pencil Storyboards

1 – Lightly Sketching Out the Scene.

2 – Finishing Pencil Work.

3 – Scanning the Artwork.

4 – Touch Up.

5 – Delivery.

Classic Ink or Marker Storyboards

1 – Lightly Sketching Out the Scene.

2 – Finishing Ink or Marker Work.