This brief gave me to opportunity to conduct a range of primary research with service and ex-service personnel, to understand more about life in the Armed Forces, which was something I have always been interested in but have never had cause to actually ask people about the Armed Forces until now, so this was something that I really enjoyed doing. The interviews that were undertaken in person allowed me to get a much better understanding of their time in the Armed Forces than I would of done had I emailed them the same questions. Ideally I would of liked to of done this for all of the people I interviewed, however time and distance were an issue, as some of the people I interviewed currently live abroad, so it wouldn’t be feasible to travel to them just to interview them for this brief. Similarly, those who were in the UK were scattered all around, and this posed the same issues but on a smaller scale to those who lived abroad. I found it so fascinating reading the responses I have received for this brief, and if anything this has fuelled my interest in the Armed Forces.
I didn’t feel it was appropriate to try and create material for the Armed Forces, as I was aware I wouldn’t be able to create anything that was accurate enough and matched their high standards, and none of the issues raised in the interviews were something that I could personally fix, so the logical solution was to present my interviews in the form of a publication, along with additional content, so that people like me who are interested in the Armed Forces can read it, whether cover to cover or in parts depending on the amount of time they have available to read it. This also meant that the extensive interviews I conducted weren’t sidelined, but put to the forefront, and as this was the most important part of the research undertaken this was the most logical thing to do.
As a result of feedback on this publication from Venn Creative, I ended up researching into grids and editorial design, in order to present the interviews and content in the most professional manner possible. This not only resulted in a professional publication, but it also sped up the designing process, as I created character styles, which made it really easy to change one set of styles of type in one go, rather than having to go through them all individually.
My time management on this brief was really effective, as I was aware from the beginning that this was going to be a large brief, and because of the topic I wanted to make sure it was done correctly, so I allowed myself a lot of time to get this brief right and to allow for any changes and alterations.
One thing I wish I would of done differently with this brief was the amount of signatures I created the book in, to ensure there was as little oversplay as possible. As it was I only created 3 signatures, and with it being a lengthy publication, this resulted in a reasonable amount of oversplay and the pages being cut slightly too close to the text upon binding. This could of been avoided if I had done a full scale mock up, however due to the length of the publication and having to use the same stock to ensure it would be as accurate as possible to the final publication, this would of been too costly a process.
However, I am still really pleased with the final publication, and feel it reflects the Armed Forces and those who I interviewed in a positive and accurate light. This is also definitely a topic I want to learn more about as well.
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