Business lecture - summary 2

We started by looking at the different types of firms. These included sole trader/self employed, partnerships, limited partnerships, limited liability and public limited liability. 

Knowing your costs is paramount, ALL YOUR COSTS. You can not correctly gain profit without knowing this. The taxman will asses your profit, and he will take a proportion of it. If you do not keep a handle on your costs, this assessment by the tax man may be bad for you as they will take more money, and it is hard to dispute once the taxman has made an assessment. 

Costs

Costs can be broken into two distinct groups. The first group is the general costs, also known as overheads. This could include heating, lighting etc. Te second group is project costs, which will be the costs related to a specific project. You will have to take into account the time on the project etc. 

Your value:

If you are self employed designer: £35 per hr. 

If as a mac monkey: £18 per hr. 

This value may rise if you merit it, special jobs for big clients, etc. 

Fredric Jameson and Specluative fiction

Culture isnt science - don't need to prove how film or culture work, you need to look for different levels of entertainment of films. This is what is involved in the making of new films, as they will be veered towards the demographics and ideologies in which people like. References to earlier films in the new can help the discussion.

Fredric Jameson

The logic of cultural creative practices is the emergence of new things. Creating a platform to talk about things in different ways and be entertained in a different way. Needn't confuse it with the truth. Fredric Jamerson sidesteps this by talking about everything being unconscious. Dealing with things that are invisible as creatives, asking the question... How do you know that something on screen presents a certain point?

The master narrative is revealed by literary theorists in correspondence to broader social structures from which the empirical text derives meaning.
Empirical texts - distinctions between SAYING and SHOWING. Overly didactic, showing is visually sophisticated and indirect. didactic description closes the film down (what was the point of the film)

In cultural industries, 5 years later there could be an alternative reading of the film and therefore can be seen in a different way and creates more theories and arguments. Bringing life back into the old. In a way this is what starts to help us close the distance between fiction and reality.

Think of a film as a refractive thing which affects the way we talk about things. In a post-modern view, there is a very refractive relationship in a film and what it tend to address.

WHAT DIFFERS IS THE ATTITUDE OF THE PERSON LOOKING INTO THE CONCEPT.


Speculative fiction

Any animation that involves a story has to be integrated into a plausible world where the narrative can exsist, creating something called a SPECULATIVE FICTION (meta-genre ) , where it could speculative that it is something that could happen in the future, or you can imagine it being slightly true.

Take something from a new genre and give it a new gloss. The first Star Wars films are basically a western with political backgrounds that have been changed from pistols to lightsabers and hats to stormtroopers etc. Appealed to a future opposed to history. The archetype is very close to structures of that genre of film.

Godzilla - King Kong poster - holding hands, with the Japanese flag/sun in the background. Been constructed thinking about the symbolic resonance of the image and the ambiguity of what it represents building into the invisible semiotics.

Hello kitty 

No background or story, there was nothing there in the first instance. No real cat, no real story, however, has had massive effects on children's reality in particular. Simulation is a creation of a thing with its own hyper reality. It may have multiple-narratives supporting it that will engage with different cultures and demographics.

GDP

We started by looking at the GDP in relation to land mass across the world. It was not a direct correlation between the larger land masses and where the wealth was, however. More wealth was congregated in smaller areas of the world where the weather people are living and setting up businesses. Looking in capita terms is a more accurate way of looking at, however, both of these have been affected by historical events.

Emerging markets - Problem areas

- Countries and markets that are now developing / potential markets for new businesses.

China
India
Russia             BRICK COUNTRIES  - high potential, high growth, large resources etc.
Brazil

Middle east
China / Taiwan        PROBLEM COUNTRIES - Problem reasons.
Russia

Interconnectivity of Technology

The reason why these things are important is because these countries may be investing in the UK. Some of your clients may well be from these investors who will be a new economic powerhouse.

Key issues with China


South China Sea - Chinese navy has been becoming exceptionalist, taking over land and islands by force.

Donald Trump - Not respecting of china, but with some reason. China needs to adhere to world issues.

India - Much more westernised. better trading with the world.

Budgeting

Budgets 

In today's lecture with Peter, we looked into organisations using budgets.

A budget is an allocation of money (or resource) in order to undertake a particular task. Maybe a project, or a time period, or both. An allocation is only proposed however, therefore a budget is usually inaccurate as it is a guess.

Budget - proposed resource allocation.
Actual - Actual resource used
Variance - Difference between the two.  (Positive, negative, neutral)
Cumulative variance - All of the variances added together.

They are there to help understand where and how your money is being spent which then help to save money the next time around. Over time the information gathered from previous budgets will help to create a more accurate budget for the future.

It is always good practice to create a safety net out of the budget that you receive. An example of this would be getting a £100,000 budget and taking 10% of that as a reserve. You would then have a budget of £90,000 to work with, and if things go wrong somewhere along the line, you will still have money to fix the problem. Your data sheets should always be up to date, always taking the variances that you accumulate off of the budget.

Business planning

We first discussed the purpose of business planning. This was what you as a person want out of the business. Some of the reasons could be things such as having a healthy income, wanting to make some good profit or even having enough money to give to charity and help other people. It is important that you are truthful with yourself about what you want to achieve through the company. 

We then discussed the type of businesses. These include Freelance, Ltd, Semi-partnership / partnership. 

It is also important to know what nature the business is. Obviously, you can not be starting a business that is illegal. You should be thinking what you can be doing and not just what you want to do. As a designer, for example, you may move into other markets and not just advertise yourself as a graphic designer, but as a general designer in general. 

Finally, its is important to think about where the business is going to be located from a geographical standpoint. When starting up a business you need to be realistic, therefore it is a good idea to start in the UK and prove yourself in that market first before moving over to somewhere such as New York. It is a realistic goal to want to open a practice in America, however, that would be more realistic further down the line. 

All of these things need to be carefully thought out. These aspects are fundamental to success as if you have no direction, you will drift and unlikely be able to succeed. If yo have the knowledge of where you are, it will allow you to plan where you want to be. You should not start a business if all of these aspects are not hammered into place. 

Plans should deal with 3 distinct scenarios:

GOOD - What you hope for works. 

BAD - You are making enough to just survive, breaking even. Struggling to keep afloat. 

UGLY - Open for business and nothing happens. 

It is important to address what you would do in each situation. 

You should always split your needs into two groups. 

Group A - Personal life costs 

Group B - Business costs

Co-mingling these figures can make things confusing and can loose your money with the tax man.

To conclude, these things help you to realise when it is time to kill off the business.  

CV and Intellectual Property Rights

In todays lecture with Peter we looked at CV's as well as intellectual property rights. This helped me to gain a better insight into what my work is worth and what I am worth as an designer.

Curriculum Vitae

Understand how it is read:

Name and contact 

Your name
Address
Telephone (Personal Mobile)
Email (Uni and personal)
Webpage (Online portfolio)

Age
DoB
Status (if single put this on, if not, don't)


Education 

Most recent first:

University of huddersfield Graphic Design and Animation BA Hons (Expected graduation date)

College etc. NO GRADES, Just say you have the qualifications. Been to University, that is enough. No list. GCSE's for example - GCSE's including maths and english etc.

Skills  - Computer literacy (Program Specific)
           - Driving licence (Get driving lessons)

Work experience 

Date - Organisation - Job
Doesnt matter what the work is.

(Revolution,
 Function room
 Park
 Whitehall Country Club)

Most recent first. Showing you have a work ethic.


Hobbies - interests 

Be very brief - This is to show you have a life. Keep aspects back for further discussion. If you ask questions, you want to eloborate and chat aboiut what you have done.

Aspect of head screwed on, banterous etc. 2 or 3 things i enjoy doing. Make sure its real.

Referees (Not reference - its people who could give you a reference)

Name
Company
Position
Address
Telephone
Email

Work Reference, Academic.

Be creative in how you approach people.


I.P. - Intellectual Property 
I.P.R. - Intellectual Property Rights

Patents: Theses must be NEW
               HOW things work
               HOW they are made
               TECHNICAL contribution

Copyright 
Automatic Production covering anything written or preformed.

Design right 

The way an object looks.
Similar to copyright, it is automatic, and similarity, the key issue is proved or originality.

Pre paten registration - £25
Design right registration - £50
Copyright registration -  £50


(1) Client ________________ You (Designer)
                                                  Potential commissioned work

(2)You assess if you can do it   ______ (Ability, Time, Scope/size, Resources, Cost)

(3) Client ____Agree Terms____ You (Designer)
                Cost, Payment, Deadlines, Brief details, Technical file, etc)

(4) Client ___Liaise with client____ You (Designer)
               Undertake work  -  Deadlines, Project management, Booking resources etc.

(5) Client _____ Deliver work ______Complete work.

(6) _________ Receive Receipt

(7) Send Invoice __________

(8) _________ Payment made

Liase with client - 

Keeping client engaged, the more the client thinks the ideas are theirs. Make milestones to show the client. make them sign off on work before you do too much and they go back on it. Recorded delivery and get receipt at that point.

Invoicing - Be prompt. Ensure you put all data on the invoice.
Order Number
Client Contact (Name of person)
Date of Commission
Date of Delivery

Business Lecture - Market data and market research

We started the lecture talking about quantitive research. There are 3 types which include:
Geographic
Psycographic
Socio-economic

The Pros to this Detail / Clarity - statistical information objective
Cons - Costly - £150000 + complex and difficult to do needs careful control

We then discussed qualitative research. Firstly looking at Primary data. This can be done through a interview focus group where you discuss with people in the know. We then talked about secondary which is data thats already been published.

The Pros - Cheap - cost of train ticket and lunch! Easy to do and offers holistic view.
Cons - no statistical validation, subjective, success depends on control of discussion.

Market segmentation - breaking market into specific blocks.

Can be done by:
Age,
Sex,
Social Class,
Geography,
Hobby/Interest,
etc.

Successful segmentation
Measurable/ identifiable
Accessable
Substantial
Meaningful

Segmentation ensures successful targeting.

Important:
Define the product offering clearly
Don't try and analyse different objects/products
Only compare like with like
Do not re-invent the wheel! Don't mess with the data to make it fit your criteria as this may ruin the authenticity of the data.

Data sources:

Mosaic
ACORN
Mintel
GMDB
Keynote - Reports
FAME - purely financial
Newspaper ProQuest
BRAD Insight

You need to be looking for turnover and not profit, as its misleading. The more profit you make, the more tax you pay. Turnover will tell you a lot more about how the company is preforming. It depends on the nature of the work the business does and what they are doing. They may be making a loss when it comes to profit, however the share price may go up every year as they are actually preforming well.

Magazines - try WH smiths
Newspapers - Ditto!
Company websites - Many give details of products and prices, they also give details of brand ethos and intent
Retailer websites

We looked at various ads that went beyond the norm. Doing something a little bit different and clever is a good way to advertise, as people will remember it.

I like what they have done with the camera add. I actually had to look twice, and i'm sure that other people would too. Its a very clever idea and has been designed well. 

I thought that this was a brilliant ida. A building under construction can be an eyesore. This is a good way to make something ugly into a work of art. 

Cybernetic self week 2 - *WTF* Lecture

Social Media is people. You are social media/ mediums. Its a way of communication.

Internet is a network of networks and internet culture is a culture of cultures. Internet is people. 

The video we watched described the internet as humanity as well as a culture as we takeke it for granted. It is revolutionising different areas of the world. 

It can mirror both good and bad.You are your Facebook post.  Good and bad reflections. Painted a painting or carved something in stone in past, this is the modern generations way of making their mark. 

It also discussed how the internet is now allowing us to be more creative than we have ever been before. The cost of creating used to stop people being creative however now it has enabled a human to be someone who can now be heard. It has made us more equal than ever as information, creation and distributing is more accessible. 

With social media of today, it can actually help your work take off. If you post it online and can blow up. This is a big advantage of working in the creative industry in todays day and age. 

Key words: 
Scenius - the talent of a whole community 

Creativity - people from different backgrounds having mutual respect and crossing over ideas in order to come up with an output. 

Mary Ponomareva - Sematic space 

Took imagery and graphics from differnt cultures and brought them together to create a new identity for the clash of imagery in graphics. 

Douglas Coupland - everywhere is everywhere and anything is everything 

Anyti-social man - animation 

A man who stops people from being anti social. Get off the internet in order to socialise. This concept is a bit tired. Clearly not the case.

Cybernetics - comes from the greek word meaning "to steer" 

Steering and getting to a goal. All intelligent systems have this problem. Loop of acting, sensing, comparing. These properties make a system intelligent. tech system have this property of self correct. people also self correct. 

Most powerful language of describing systems that have goals. 

Exceptionally great way of characterising tghe way the worl works. Biological world that has to work. Social world where conversations have to work . 

Once seen the world through cybernetic lense, all things are cybernetic. 

Physical, technilogical, biological and social systems. 

Recording devices tracking, capture what gets done, go editing room, imagine what he meant and take out stuff that doesnt make sense when editing video. You are having a conversation in your head when making a cut. using feedback in order to understand what has been done to improve what you do. 

Paul Pangaro - our design process. 

idea - different folds allow a different route, allowing different processes to represent the conversations we have with ourselves when making decisions. 

placement fair - next wednesday

Business Lecture - Different types of analysis

Placement Recap

We began the lecture going over more details about looking for placements, recapping on the free Index which has every registered graphic design agency in country.

The directory of design consultants only has companies that pay to be on site however this is is better if you are thinking of going abroad for your placement year. We are more of interest to people in the industry at university level than we were at college, so we should not sell ourselves short. Some of the countries that where mentioned were, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Each of these places massively appeal to me and i will be making the effort to get a placement abroad if possible.

Business structure

Peter talked to us about a business and the different areas that us as designers need to try and keep happy when designing a product. The different areas that were mentioned are; Marketing, Finance, Technical/ R&D and production.

The problem with having so many departments to please is that they all have different goals, and different aspects of the company to worry about. When designing a product for a client, it is important to know what they need/want. This can be tricky however, when marketing is telling you to improve the quality of materials in the design, and finance is trying to have you cut costs. R&D may ask you to incorporate new technology into the design which will also raise the price that finance won't agree with. Production get involve and then ask how it will be made. Under pressure to alter design to please other areas of the internal company. This is only concept stage and will cause a lot of pressure and stress.

When the development stage comes along, the finance department realise that your design will end up costing a lot for production a year down the line, and this can cause problems as it puts finance under stress. After the development stage is over, it is embodiment, detailed design in order to finally have the finished product.

understand what is happening....
the world
the economy
the client
the firm
the market

An example of when a designer not understanding what he was designing is when a Chinese designer didn't understand cultural importance of the arabic words that meant god that he put on slippers. This caused riots in Egypt. The Chinese ambassador had to make a public apology and designer never seen in the industry again. This was a design error and this is something that us as designers should never do. Every time you talk to client, make a note of whats said. Keep record of requirements and conversations you have.

It is important to ask questions before undertaking a design. How do you ask the right questions before you undertake the design? You need to know the direction that you are going in is correct.

Client is the boss.... or at least let them think that! Leave bits out. This makes the client add things and it makes them have ownership of the design. They have contributed to the design, therefore it is less likely for them to say its rubbish. Always try and allow them to have an input that you leave room for without changing the key concept of the design.

The information that you get given from the client is more than likely not the whole amount of information you need. Always ask them questions and access the situation in order to figure out exactly what the client needs.

Product Positioning

This is an axis in relation to the quality of the product and the price of the product. 

The 20-25 age group is very important as this is the age group that people want to be in. Younger people want to be older, older people want to be younger. We place our selves in different social groups and this may effect where, and who we sell products to. 

Dependent on what place in the market you are in (you may be in competition with ford and vauxhall for example) you need to be designing to that standard in order to compete. 

Boston consulting group matrix (BCG)

This is an axis in relation to relative growth rate and relative market share. I have already looked at this matrix in Business A-Level. It is made up of Dogs, Cash Cows, Stars and question marks. You should never want a dog as the market share and growth rate would both be low, therefore it falls out the market. Cash cows are what companies want. This is because the growth rate is low, however the market share is high, therefore you can milk a cash cow for as much money as possible. A star is where it has both high market share as well as high growth rate. Stars are products that will make a profit and are on the up. Eventually stars usually turn into cash cows, which is what the business would want. A question mark is a product that is new, and it is a bit of a risk. You can;t be sure how this product will do, and it could end up turning into any of the other three. 

PEST Analysis

Political

Economic 

Social

Technological

Now.... - 5 Years.... - 10 Years....

SWOT Analysis

Strengths 

                              Internal

Weaknesses 

Opportunities 

                             External

Threats

Product life cycle 

Introduction - Growth - Maturity - Decline. 

Can add an extension strategy in order to extend the product life cycle before the decline. This can be through marketing and advertising again. This may be a change in packaging, or targeting a new target market. 

Adoption Curve 

Innovators - 2.5%  Early Adopters - 13.5%  Early Majority - 34%  Late majority - 34%  Laggards - 16%

After a certain amount of time for different products, products become obsolete. This is something to think about when designing a product. Thinking about the future, and how long it will take for the product to become obsolete. Computers for example usually have an obsolescence of 3 years.

Design Audits 

These are more difficult to assess, often occurring after an event... useless then?! Its best to get it right the first time round! Look at the rate of change, where will the design be shown. Whats the strength of what i'm printing on. As a designer, its important to find out the technical requirements before the final product/ design is printed/ made. 

- Right talents 

- Right team structures  - or recognise where the problem areas are

- Involve all parties 

- Ensure management of information 

- Encourage collaboration 

- Resolve problems quickly 

- Ensure effective communication

Overall I took out a lot from this lecture, as it made me realise how the knowledge i gained at A-Level Business studies can be used in the real world of the creative industry. It was good to recap on the theories such as SWOT analysis, PEST analysis, Boston matrix and the product life cycle, and i think that thinking about these different things when talking to a client, or even completing a brief will be a massive help in the nurturing and improvement of my work.