OUGD603 EXTENDED PRACTICE - NOOTROPICS INITIAL IDEAS

After the previous meeting I started thinking about what tea flavours we could produce to go with our relevant nootropics. I undertook this decision through researching the different properties of teas in helping aid stress, depression and anxiety.
This was recorded in a table I drew out:

The circles and starred flavours were the ones which came up the most for each thing to combat. I decided not to go with St John's Wort for depression and chose chamomile instead as I thought the name would be off putting for people.

The next stage was to research what these herbs and plants and fruits looked like to see how they could be adapted into a pattern for the packaging.

Lemon Balm

Valerian

Valerian

Camu Camu

Gotu Kola

Gotu Kola

Liquorice plant

Liquorice root

Green Tea leaves

Siberian Ginseng root

Siberian Ginseng plant

St John's Wort

Chamomile

After researching the different types of plants I created a mind map about the progression and ideas for this brief:

Here I have explored the different kinds of formats our tea product could take, such as tea bags, ready to go drinks, gift packages, multipacks, to make nootural in a form suitable for every mother. I also thought about the colour scheme, how it should appear to consumers, what kind of atmosphere it should portray. I thought about how the nootropic will be in a powder format, however the different ways it could be added to tea, such as within the tea bag itself, ready mixed drinks, and also as a powder you can add to any drink you like. Finally, I thought about what natural nootropics actually means, and how we should portray natural nootropics. These things should all be taken into consideration when designing the packaging and product.

Starting off with Lemon Balm and Valerian I produced some sketches of the plants:

I tried to produce illustrations of individual aspects of the two plants, as I thought this would be easier to produce a pattern from, otherwise it'll just end up being an illustration.

Using the initial sketches and research photographs I produced the digital Valerian illustration, taking the colours directly from the research photograph so ensure it's an accurate representation.

I tackled the Lemon Balm leaf in the same way as the Valerian flower.

I arranged the two to create a pattern which isn't too overwhelming. What I have noticed though is that the light colour of the Valerian flower doesn't stand out well at all against the background being white and the leaves being such a vibrant shade of orange.

The flowers were changed to a brighter shade of pink to ensure they didn't fade into the background.

The pattern was then applied to an initial box design. The research I undertook into tea packaging was so helpful when I produced these designs, as I had a good idea of what information to include and what elements worked well. The typeface for the logo I used is called Lust, and is the typeface I used for my branding last year which I really like, and was the first one I tried which I thought was bold yet feminine and had enough to it to be a standalone logotype. It worked surprisingly well so I've just left it as it is. Using Lust for the flavour however appeared a little too detailed to work on a smaller scale, so I used Biko instead, which is a simple sans serif typeface which is quite rounded so has a friendly appearance. I took a lot from the packaging of Teapigs, Morrison's The Best, and Pukka Tea for the layout of the front of the packaging, as these were three brands which I thought worked really well and had elements which fit nicely into our target audience too. The white block for the text to fit in allows the key information to be clearly read without detracting from the patterned background. The larger bottom rectangle is a hole in the packaging allowing you to see through to the teabags themselves, which is something that both Teapigs and Morrison's The Best used, and worked really nicely, as it showed you exactly what you are paying for, giving you peace of mind of the product you're buying.

Pattern developments to get the right size pattern to show it off the right amount without appearing too much. The hole is also mocked up to show what it would be used for.

After some contemplation and referring back to previous meetings notes, I changed the colours of the pattern to fit in with the colours we suggested, to reflect what the tea and nootropics are combatting.

More pattern and colour development is shown above, with further experiments in size taking place to get the optimum one. I used Adobe Colour Picker to find the right shades and colours that compliment one another, as this speeded up the process of finding complimentary colours. The colour change definitely works a lot better, as it if a clearer representation of the product itself and what it's trying to combat.