affinity designer Smarty Studio : Our Project (made with Affinity)

[Uncle Mez]

Hello everyone,

From today i believe i have to start sharing few of our design works (actually i'm working alone but i do build a team from time to time depending on project size )

Most of our client/requesters are Church based and we really enjoy doing stuffs for them but what you will se here is more about Smarty Studio standing with other studio/teams together into what is to become Congolese Design Style.

Well each country have it's own style of design but Congo doesn't have a proper thus most of Congolese designers simply clone/copy styles from everywhere.

This is a beginning, please your inputs on each design palet/kit will be of great help and will help us improving better.

 

Blessings !

[Uncle Mez]

Project:    Revival Now (2 days gathering)

Location: Pointe Noire - Congo B

Date:        3/28/18

#Content made for web use only (including WhatsApp profile and status)

 

[Wosven]

Hi, those are nice, but you should take care of the space between letters like "AV" and "VA", there's too much space.

The first one, red, stand out from the orange-brown background, but the second one is a little bit "eaten" by this background.

And last one : why is there different fonts for the digits (1 and 2) in the white/colored bullets?

Edit: another one, seems you forget the reflection/shadow for the 2 orange squares.

[Uncle Mez]

2 hours ago, Wosven said:

Hi, those are nice, but you should take care of the space between letters like "AV" and "VA", there's too much space.

The first one, red, stand out from the orange-brown background, but the second one is a little bit "eaten" by this background.

And last one : why is there different fonts for the digits (1 and 2) in the white/colored bullets?

Edit: another one, seems you forget the reflection/shadow for the 2 orange squares.

Hi @Wosven Nice to read from you.

Yes you are right, i take note of everything you mentioned.

1- Will correct the space between AV & VA (didn't see that ... you rock's man :-)

2- Here i tried to make a kind of progressive design, i used the concept of traffic light (green - orange - red) to say we target the red point but still we consider the preparatory orange step. but there too i will try to make the BG thing you said a bit more present.

3- can't recall but i believe it was a matter of beauty or something like that; give me time to open the project again and try to make it the same to see if i went too fast or just forgot to make it similar

4- Yeah ... the design itself was made with Affinity Designer + Affinity Photo but what you see there (Gradient BG + Shadow + Reflection was entirely made with another software i use for "mock up" (can i say that in this case ???) that software works the reflection and shadow i 1 click (for each) which makes me save a lot of time ... but truly, i forgot to make it reflect and have proper shadow like the previous ones.

 

Thank you so much for these precious points.

Blessing !

[Wosven]

Thanks for the explanations @Arnaud Mez

For point 3, it's not really a problem, strangely, I doesn't mind (and I can be picky sometimes!), it doesn't feel like an error, it's simply more visible on the green one since they are together.

Perhaps you'll have other advices about it.

[Uncle Mez]

3 minutes ago, Wosven said:

Thanks for the explanations @Arnaud Mez

For point 3, it's not really a problem, strangely, I doesn't mind (and I can be picky sometimes!), it doesn't feel like an error, it's simply more visible on the green one since they are together.

Perhaps you'll have other advices about it.

Oh i see, they don't use the same blending mode and even the transparency percentage used is different.

Do you think using the same blending with Zero transparency percentage will make it better ? Just asking  it was published already so your advices helps me to see the small missing stuffs in there and i'm really glad to take note of that.

[Wosven]

Since you talked about the transparency, I see it now, but I didn't at first. You'll have to do tests, as in printing and ask people around which one they like best, and why… and which parts they would modify. That's usually usefull to look at our work from 1 m, 2 m, 3 m… (better than squinting the eyes).

Perhaps same font and same transparency will look more "regular", or perhaps those differences are the ones that do the trick.

But there's nothing I dislike in your design, it's nice and if it's already printed, let's talk about the next one !

[Uncle Mez]

Hello Dear Friends,

As promised and said, i want to share another concept with you.
I promise in this one you will see a lot of uncorrect stuffs, it's not a test design at all but it was made like the client wanted it to be.
My point here: Would like Y'all to point the missing stuffs and even share the how you would fix it (if possible with what tool you would achieve it and your recommanded settings for that same tool).
I know, tools are used as we would like to see things but sometime in a middle of trying to redo what a person told we should do, we often find the setting we where looking for.
One said: Make the weel perfect, don't try to recreate it !

Project:    LSE Ministries -Launching (1 day gathering)

Location: Pointe Noire - Congo B

Date:        4/27/18

#Content made for print and web use (WhatsApp and FB profile are absent here )

[Uncle Mez]

Hello Everyone !

i'm happy to be back, well want to share the new one achieved with Affinity Photo + Designer for both platform.
Affinity Photo Beta .119 on Windows for everything pixel then Affinity Designer Stable 1.6.1 on Mac for everything vector.
Hope you will like it !

Please do not hesitate to share your inputs, it's will help a lot !
Big thanks to @Bri-Toon, the guy from Digital Art Studio, Olivio Sarikas both on youtube (i hope you guys are here too !) and also the Affinity Tutorial team, what you recorded is really helping me to improve.

Blessings !

Note: the design was done for print in CMYK color space so, didn't took time to convert it to RGB/8 or 16 color space before posting. Forgive for that !

Edited August 14, 2018 by Arnaud Mez
Correction of typing error

[Bri-Toon]

Looks really nice, Arnaud. I'm happy to see you build new skills. Keep it up.

Quote

Bog thanks to @Bri-Toon, the guy from Digital Art Studio

I'm not sure what you mean by this. What is Digital Art Studio?

[Uncle Mez]

45 minutes ago, Bri-Toon said:

Looks really nice, Arnaud. I'm happy to see you build new skills. Keep it up.

I'm not sure what you mean by this. What is Digital Art Studio?

Hello @Bri-Toon it's corrected.
Sorry for that typing mistake.

Blessings !

[Bri-Toon]

No problem. I was just curious.

[Uncle Mez]

Hello Everyone, wanted to celebrate the new beta cycle of Serif products.
So i quickly did this ads that i wanted to share with you plus added a short video of how the new Affinity Photo runs on my Mac.

Also i'm planning to re-base but slowly slowly my Yt contents on everything Affinity Beta from now believing it will help people to understand and even discover more about what is released and what can be done at this stage.
Big thanks to @AdamW and @Patrick Connor also i won't forget @Andy Somerfield for their hard job to deliver such level of tools to us !

While you watch this, i will watch the interview of Ashley Hewson on Episode #1 of Superclose (Youtube)

[Serge R]

Nice work but I have a question: Why do you convert files to CMYK and work in that colour space? There are no CMYK monitors, you are limiting your colour space by millions of colours. Work in sRGB and let printers covert it to whatever they need as you never know what print process they are using (they might print in CMYKGO for example). If you create poster in CMYK and send it to print on 8 colours inkjet you are loosing a lot. Stick to sRGB

[Uncle Mez]

8 hours ago, Serge R said:

Nice work but I have a question: Why do you convert files to CMYK and work in that colour space? There are no CMYK monitors, you are limiting your colour space by millions of colours. Work in sRGB and let printers covert it to whatever they need as you never know what print process they are using (they might print in CMYKGO for example). If you create poster in CMYK and send it to print on 8 colours inkjet you are loosing a lot. Stick to sRGB

@Serge R it's actuallu a good question, why i do my work in CMYK and not in RGB.
in fact i was doing jobs in RGB and realized printing companies was just messing up with the output and colors where not what i should be so i decided to "kind of" help them bby doing it up-front.
But in the same time i'm also making my way to print everything clients request from me, learning a bit and doing it myself is actually a better choice for the good of my clients.
Thank you for asking, it's pleasure you have noticed that.

Blessings !

[Uncle Mez]

Hello Everyone !

Glad to be back on this topic.
Was Off cause of learning purpose; now i'm back with this new project that i want to share with you long time before it goes online.
On this poster/flyer project i really wanted to make something different then what i always do and this was made possible by taking time to study and apply the few of the New Affinity Beta.

Hopefuly, Smarty is hosting a Linux training next month and i will be the host/speaker and teacher with couple of friends coming to join us.
I will take time to create some nice stuffs and maybe (i say maybe) i will schedule a discovery session for Affinity products !
No more words, please take your time and please your inputs are always welcome.

thanks to @MEB @MattP @Patrick Connor @Sean P @Mark Ingram and the entire affinty team for making this product so better and allow people like me to improve.
Blessings! 

EDIT:
-  @Serge R see ! this one i did it entirely RGB - 
- The First JPG file was removed and replaced with this new PNG as colors was darkish after upload -

 

 

[Uncle Mez]

Whooow !
What a busy day was this day.
... Just tried some few stuffs with the latest Affinity Designer, Photo and Publisher for Roberto Blake a great content creator.
... Got his photo from google images and ...
He is among that few number of famous and En Vogue creative who took it talked about Affinity, it was couple of years ago but he did it.
So i decided to start something new ... Photo work takes a lot of time for a person like me but i decided to jump far than i always do.

Please your inputs are appreciated !
Tell what you see that i need to improve with Photo.
Blessings !

EDIT: The second picture was processed from the first one (as source) unto the latest Affinity Photo Beta 1.7.0.103 which was released few hours ago.
i put both here so you see and compare.
Thank you @Andy Somerfield for the announcement.
The Tone mapping used was made by @Hanan Edwards which i also say thanks a lot !

Edited November 26, 2018 by Uncle Mez

[Uncle Mez]

On 8/14/2018 at 5:11 PM, Bri-Toon said:

Looks really nice, Arnaud. I'm happy to see you build new skills. Keep it up.

I'm not sure what you mean by this. What is Digital Art Studio?

Hello @Bri-Toon forgot about your question.
Digital Art Studio is YouTube channel that upload graphic Design Tuto and video made with Affinity Designer (most of them) almost twice or more per week !
I just don't know who is the man/women behind that channel so just wanted to thank him in case he was here on the forum.
it's been a long time since your channel was updated with a new content !

[Uncle Mez]

Y'Elloooooooooooo !
The weekend looks Good at the level i upgraded my Facebook Banner + Profile Picture.
Despite the blurriness i get when exporting from Affinity products (came back again ) after so many fixes that made me so proud of the product.
Took it and updated the thing, now let me share it with y"all here !

 

[Bri-Toon]

On 11/28/2018 at 8:03 AM, Uncle Mez said:

Hello @Bri-Toon forgot about your question.
Digital Art Studio is YouTube channel that upload graphic Design Tuto and video made with Affinity Designer (most of them) almost twice or more per week !
I just don't know who is the man/women behind that channel so just wanted to thank him in case he was here on the forum.
it's been a long time since your channel was updated with a new content !

Sorry for the late reply. I've been away and then come to find I have 67 new emails. And yes, I'm taking a break for now while I need to work out some other things.

[Uncle Mez]

Hello everyone !
i'm back in this topic with this other one concept.
Made with Affinity Photo + Affinity Publisher with the help of Art Text 3 (for 3D lettering)

The request is working for a Radio in my town and she's is really happy with this concept while i'm not that 100% Okay !
Please take your time to look at it and tell me what missing and what you think you could do to make it even better.

Blessings !

 

[GarryP]

It's difficult to advise on this kind of thing if we don't know what message you are trying to get over to people but I can offer a few ideas (all just from my own personal point of view, I'm not an expert in this sort of thing).
Left-hand side (going down):
* Top: The gap on the left looks out-of-place, like the design is waiting for something to go there;
* Second: The channel/time info' seems a bit 'squashed' to the side, like an afterthought;
* Third: My personal favourite of the four although the time info' is a little difficult to spot;
* Bottom: You're advertising a particular person's show so it's best to have that person in the design if you can (it gives a much more personal feeling, I.e. "This is the person who you'll be sharing your time with").
Right-hand side (going down):
* Top: The 'info-box' on the left looks like it's missing something in the gap and the name looks like it's slipped over to the left;
* Bottom: As with the left-hand side comments, it's better to have the person shown if that's possible.

All-in-all though, the colours are nice and the typefaces seem to be well chosen. It has a light, airy and dynamic feel.
It gives me the impression of: "Hi there. I have a radio show that's fun but it also covers the serious stuff too. Why not tune in and join me?" (although I don't know if this was your intention).

[Uncle Mez]

2 hours ago, GarryP said:

All-in-all though, the colors are nice and the typefaces seem to be well chosen. It has a light, airy and dynamic feel.
It gives me the impression of: "Hi there. I have a radio show that's fun but it also covers the serious stuff too. Why not tune in and join me?" (although I don't know if this was your intention).

Hello @GarryP !
it's a pleasure to read from you today, well it's exactly what i meant with this design.
I take good notes of the points you have mentioned as they are pertinent and will help me do better with my next project.

The lady on the Ads is starting with radio and she's really talented while she never went to school of journalism and never worked in any form of media before, so i created this set of Ads to help her be visible and get followers from all around the town.

in my country most of Radio guys are unknown, i mean totally unknown at the point nothing is organized to celebrate them.
Maybe when few will see this they will get out of their hiding places.

@MEB thank you so much for pointing me (through another topic) to Art Text 3, it happened to be very useful for this project.
@Scott Williams thank you so much for your tutos, i've learned good things there, my contour selection was bad and i just it fixed after i watched your content... Well this project is still the first one since i learned from your content and there are still stuff i need to understand.
@Sean P remember about the Ai topic ? Well, subject selection (with auto feather etc...) is actually the kind of operation that will take good benefit of Ai.

Blessings to Y'all !

[Wosven]

Hi,

Those are interesting, but I have some questions:

Why keep the "Tegra" band to only 1/4 of the width? Perhaps you can write "Mardi & mecredi" "20h30 – 20h45", that would allow a larger column for the text. 

And second is about the colors. They are individually fine, but I can count five of them (yellow-orange, purple, indigo blue, darker/prussian blue and black), and  look at each of them but they don't seem to be together, part of the same thing, blending...

Perhaps you can "sacrifice" the background image, so it blend more and is less visible, to give more attention to the other parts?

And last point, if she's begining, I would write bigger "et ses amis", since at this stage, her and her show need to be visible and readable, and for now "et ses amis" is more decoration than perceive as text to read.

That's a lot of interesting elements you've got

[Uncle Mez]

He @Wosven i'm really with your reaction as it is this kind of reaction i expected from Affinity Community.

4 hours ago, Wosven said:

Why keep the "Tegra" band to only 1/4 of the width? Perhaps you can write "Mardi & mecredi" "20h30 – 20h45", that would allow a larger column for the text. 

TEGRA brand actually have their own logo but this project was designed to be an independent one not linked with what they currently have ( their logo is in very low resolution and i would like that blurry stuff on one of my works unless we agree for re-branding contract).

4 hours ago, Wosven said:

They are individually fine, but I can count five of them (yellow-orange, purple, indigo blue, darker/prussian blue and black), and  look at each of them but they don't seem to be together, part of the same thing, blending...

Perhaps you can "sacrifice" the background image, so it blend more and is less visible, to give more attention to the other parts?

Yes i would do that but one thing is i'm still learning all things around Design and still struggling with everything that tends to colors or photos, so thanks bringing out this point as it help me to take clear note of what to upgrade as skills.

4 hours ago, Wosven said:

And last point, if she's begining, I would write bigger "et ses amis", since at this stage, her and her show need to be visible and readable, and for now "et ses amis" is more decoration than perceive as text to read.

i'm just Off a talk with Naïloth (the journalist) and she agreed with me (actually you) on that point, so i will make necessary correction and update the shared mock-up so you can all see the change.

i'm so happy that you and others have brought some interesting points that help a lot.
Activating our inner Creative gift is not as easy as we think it is but we are to never back down !

Blessings !