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BIG ECHO is the work of Portland, OR based designer John Whitaker.
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The Evolution of an Ad
I’ve recently been asked how my work is conceptualized from the beginning to end. I had no one answer to be sure, and I doubt I ever will. I think of each work as an individual piece, some require much more of a thought process and research than others. I like to look at all my projects with the theory that nothing comes easy, even if the best idea is right off the top of your head the first time. I try to rethink everything at least once.
Below I’ll show the thought process and the growth of a magazine ad for the Yamaha Motor Corp. to promote a new generator in RV Life magazine. Explaining the stages of brainstorming, conceptualizing, designing, roughing and then proof changes.
First off, research. Work with the client to come to an understanding of what they want. Look at what’s been done before with the attitude of improving everything you can find. With a magazine ad such as this you must take into account the target group. After you’ve given it some thought sketch up a few quick drafts.
When working with sales collateral there are a few simple techniques to get your point across:
- What is it?
- Why do I need it?
- Why is it better? (than the competition, previous models etc.)
- Why should I buy it now?
Yes, these are very simple rules to follow and by no means do they work for every project, but if you can fulfill these questions in a quick glance, your ad will be relatively successful.
After you have an idea of where your going, gather up as much reference material and photography as you can. I hunt istockphoto, stock exchange, and many other sites to find the right material, if it comes down to having the right shot don’t be afraid to pick up your camera; that’s how the magic happens. Luckily for this particular project, I was given access to Yamaha’s wonderful stock photo site, It’s nice when your client comes prepared but don’t think it will happen too often.
They gave me quite a few choices for product shots, many of which were already masked, but I appreciated the straight on angle of this photo, I also felt it would sit well with copy.
Initially one of the concepts was to show the generator in-use in a vacation themed lifestyle, this also gave me the ability to use some of the other Yamaha shots as action to draw in the reader to the product. The Generator was masked out of the superbike shot, and using the above photos this first draft was created:
This was a strong idea structurally, however the use of the ATV had added complications. We would have had to receive special permissions and on a tight deadline, this wasn’t going to be possible. Also while many RV’ers use ATV’s while vacationing, this wasn’t the main focus of the publication. So the ad was reworked.
Some more photo hunting…
And a new feel was given to the same ad:
This round was a good turn, and the client was much more receptive, but it isn’t right until it’s right, and it wasn’t right. This ad though back on track with the correct lifestyle imagery felt somewhat empty and didn’t make a whole lot of sense. The generator on the beach looked good but what’s it doing there?
So once more back to the hunt. Don’t be afraid to make drastic changes in your design, even start all over if you have to. This time around I set out to show the product as it would be used by the target demographic.
And after much time spent masking grass and everything else, a clean lifestyle ad was born.
This ad captured the client’s desire to show ease of use, light weight, low noise and that sense of green living we marketers are all striving for lately.
However, rules are rules, and getting back to basics we know that the best way to get your message across is to show the product, branding and tag as quick and clean as possible. After deliberation we felt this ad lost the product in the background and would be easily missed by those just skimming the pages of the magazine. However the fact that we see the generator working was appreciated. This time around it was back to the original layout whilst showing the product in use.
A new lifestyle shot was found after brainstorming with co-workers, Thanks Jen!
And after another round of ‘Shop we had our final piece.
That’s it, I hope if your reading this gives you a little insight into how I go about the process. This project was a lot of fun and it’s not too often I get these great, classic graphic design jobs with signatures, print proofs, the whole bit…from beginning to end. Makes you miss how things use to be done.