UK Greetings - Brainstorm of Ideas / Starting Point

Initial Ideas:

To start sketching and brainstorm ideas,

Link ideas to certian age group

define age group

edit images to suit greeting card style

Things I would be working on:

Illustration technique

Time management 

Working with other briefs - managing how to cope

Use of specific audience identification

finishes

Initial Sketches:


After researching the designs UK GREETINGS displayed, i noticed alot of these designs where quite 'cartoon' and 'character' based computer / vector illustrations. 

my inital thought was to try out some of these designs to see how long they would take me and what aspects ofdesign i could cover.
Would it be applicable to audience / why would they chose to do this card? How does these designs fit with others yet stand out enough for competition?

DESIGN ONE:

TrainLife:

I decided to focus at first with a 'travel' concept for my first 'mock up' design. I wanted to produce the vector based design work featured in a lot of the cards produced my UK GREETINGS:

I chose to use bright concept colours to grab the audience attention. This design works to evoke a 'happy' nostalgic feeling for the audience. I chose to use block colours to add a halftone effect on the image.

Working as a simple design start.

DEVELOPMENT OF DESIGNS:

From the design above, i relaised that the designs had to have a theme, i relised that the most common themes at the minute are:

Olymipics (summer)
Christmas
Education

These themes also co-enside with the regular themes of birthdays / easters / celebrations.
I wanted to keep the word CELEBRATION entwined with the designs, and use bright colours and simple imergy to translate this message:

Design experiment two:

London Olympics starting point - Cards / Design Ideas to help people to get in the mood for the sporting events as it promoted a happy and 'come together' atmosphere which brought all ages together. 

Using simple lines as a race track and simple text it could stand out - but the development of a visual image could help to bring the design 'to life'. 

Adding in legs to an actual image links illustration with the photogrpahic elements. Adding in humour

'STRECH YOUR LEGS'

Implies that the person recieving the card is getting ready for the olymipics - and engaging in light hearted tone.

Final image for celebration of sports card.

This is not a final design for uK greetings, but i feel that the tone of the card and what it is trying to do works well to engage and make audience feel 'happy'. From these basic design the main trand i have picked up is that i would like to combine illustation both physcially and digitally to see what kind of illustartion works best for the audience.