Branding for HEYKERI by Perry Ting

A PROCESS BOOK

BY PERRY TING

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HeyKeri in concert.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

5. BIOGRAPHY 7. PROBLEM STATEMENT 11. TIMELINE 13. PROJECT IMPLEMENTATION 15. PROJECT DELIVERABLES 23. PROJECT REFLECTION

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BIOGRAPHY

My name is Perry Ting, and I’m a 5th year Graphic Communication major, concentrating in Web and Digital Media, from Cupertino, CA. I am an aspiring Visual and UI/ UX Designer, always looking forward towards new learning experiences and opportunities. In the past, I have also pariticpated in programs at Hochschule der Medien (Stuttgart Media University), School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and Otis College of Art and Design.

Previously, I have been the Director of Events + Experience at Camp PolyHacks, and the Creative Director at Urban Movement. I have also worked at IBM, MINDBODY, and Cal Poly Extended Education. On the side, I am passionate about backpacking, pot stickers, and competitive Super Smash Brothers.

Email: me@perryting.com Website: perryting.com

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HeyKeri’s current SoundCloud serves as her only access point.

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PROBLEM STATEMENT

HeyKeri is an up-and-coming electronic music artist. However, she has no consistent visual branding, whether it be the visual representation of her name of the big screen or the backgrounds of her online music tracks. This inconsistency is difficult for fans and audience to recognize her across multiple platforms. Secondly, audiences that are interested in discovering more of HeyKeri have no central access point that contains her music, show information, and social media accounts altogether. The lack of a hub for everything HeyKeri produces, making it increasingly difficult for fans to interact with and share more about HeyKeri.

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HeyKeri in concert.

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PROBLEM STATEMENT The purpose of this project is to establish a cohesive online presence for electronic music act HeyKeri through a visual branding and outreach that reflects their creative style and audience. The first solution will consist of a complete visual branding for HeyKeri. This will include but not be limited to logos, style guidelines, social media visuals, and merchandise design. The second solution will be a personalized website for HeyKeri, a place where fans and audience can access her music, upcoming shows, and different social media accounts in one place. The website will follow the aforementioned visual branding and guidelines.

Before beginning this project, I established three measurable, professional objectives: 1. Create a visual branding and website worthy of representing HeyKeri. Success will be measured by user feedback and/or visitor statistics to be collected and analyzed.

2. Communicate (call if possible) with HeyKeri and at least one other target audience member or other electronic music artist once a week. Success can be measured with success rate of fulfilling the calls.

3. Consistently keep a calendar for project timeline, including calls, work time, and deadlines set by myself. Success can be measured with success rate of fulfilling each task by the deadline.

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HeyKeri in concert.

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TIMELINE WEEK 1 Begin background research on client WEEK 2 Begin background research on industry and customers/users, finish background research on client, meet with mentor WEEK 3 Finish all of background research, begin branding with logo creation and visual language WEEK 4 Finish all of branding, begin website design with coding and collection of information WEEK 5 Continue work, meet with mentor WEEK 6 Continue work WEEK 7 Begin implementing visual language into website design WEEK 8 Continue work, meet with mentor WEEK 9 Finish project

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Various SoundCloud statistics from HeyKeri’s account.

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PROJECT IMPLEMENTATION RESEARCH I conducted a lot of background research, and not all of it can be presented, so here are some of the key takeaways.

From individual background research, we can see that a large chunk of EDM listeners are young, college-aged adults in the US. EDM is also dominated by social media presence and an ever-changing genre due to the accessibility of sampling and the low barrier of entry. I was also able to access HeyKeri’s own personal SoundCloud statistics, from which I was able to contact three of her top fans and interview them individually.

As a collective, they also listened to hip-hop, but noted that the reason why EDM sticks out to them is because of the family that it creates. They also love HeyKeri’s smooth transitions and energetic beats. As for HeyKeri herself, her favorite music mainly revolves around artists like ODESZA, Madeon, and Neszlo. Her goal for her music is to be able to spread her appreciation, exploration, and art of making EDM to the world.

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PROJECT DELIVERABLES

BRANDING Taking those into account, I began my branding process with a moodboard. This includes but is not limited to taking alreadyexisting brandings by artists that both HeyKeri herself and her top audiences listen to. This is quite significant for HeyKeri because not only does HeyKeri pull visual inspiration from these artists, but also musical inspiration as well. You can see here various artists that were mentioned before, as well as other artists with similar musical and visual styles. With the moodboard on my side, my sketches begin based on my background research as well as the moodboard visuals. I kept in mind the ideas of community, transitions, and exploration.

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PROJECT DELIVERABLES

BRANDING, CONT. Here we can see the branding forming a more cohesive shape, as I bring the ideas to a digital format. In addition to the manipulation of bold text, I also juxtaposed hand-drawn visuals to add intimacy between the visual and the viewer, but more on that later. This was an iterative process and required extensive communication between HeyKeri and I.

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PROJECT DELIVERABLES BRANDING, CONT. Finally, we arrive at the finalized logo. The text’s hard edges are refined like HeyKeri’s music, but smoothly transition into each other to reflect the same things. The hand-drawn peace sign is there juxtapose against the text’s hard edges, telling the audience that HeyKeri’s music is inviting and playful. The font of choice which is also used in the logo is Montserrat, and coupled with Lato, which is commonly paired with Montserrat as a secondary font.

The key imagery I chose for the branding are hand-drawn images; as mentioned earlier, they are juxtaposed against the hard edges of the text to create intimacy between the visual and the viewer. The peace sign not only reflects the “hey” of HeyKeri, but is also reflective of an essential acronym in the EDM community: PLUR, which stands for peace, love, unity, and respect. It gives into idea that EDM and HeyKeri’s music creates an inviting and inclusive safe space. The flower serves as a callback to HeyKeri’s previous identity on SoundCloud, where she would always place it after her name. Additionally, in a male-dominated field, it adds to a feminine identity, as well as reflect the idea that HeyKeri wants to be able to spread and grow her music across the world. The colors I chose were Space Cadet, which reflects exploration and the deep beats of EDM, as well as Sea Green, which reflects wonder and the pulsating energy of EDM. 19

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PROJECT DELIVERABLES

WEBSITE The third and largest deliverable for this project is the website. As stated in the problem statement, audiences that are interested in discovering more of HeyKeri have no central access point. The website serves as the hub for social media, linking to websites like SoundCloud, Youtube, Instagram, and Twitter. Additionally, the website follows the visual language and branding established prior. The website additionally displays relevant information that someone interested in HeyKeri will benefit from, including but not limited to a bio of HeyKeri, lists of upcoming shows, and media like pictures or videos.

To view the website yourself, please visit perryting.com/heykeri.

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PROJECT REFLECTION FINAL THOUGHTS There were a considerable amount of project objectives, stated earlier in the problem statement, that weren’t fully completed by the end of the project. For example, first objective was the visual branding and website, to be evaluated by user feedback and statistics. This was only evaluated by several user feedback, but without enough recordings or users to test it. Second is communication with HeyKeri, audience, or industry-related person once a week. This was not fully completed, but only due to the fact that it turns out that this is not necessary. The only constant communication that really should be repeated is communication with the client, and at the pace that the project was going, weekly meetings were not a necessity. Lastly, the last deliverable was to maintain a consistent calendar for the project timeline. While the project timeline was kept up to date, the success rate for keeping up with the projects were not. Most notably, there is an entire section that was not delivered: which is the social media section. There are a considerable amount of factors that lead to omitting the social media section, but it ultimately comes down to inexperience in dealing with time constraints.

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PROJECT REFLECTION NEXT STEPS I believe there are future steps that I believe can easily carry this project into a place that would be successful. First of all, the visual branding can be greatly expanded. I only really scratched the surface level of the possibilities that branding for EDM could go into. The hand-drawn style is something I certainly want to continue exploring, and would definitely longer than the length of 10 weeks to fully flesh out. This goes even beyond the visual branding itself, but can include the music visualizers and even merchandise and more. Secondly, I will need to finish the social media portion of the project.

While the website is a hub for the social media, the rest of the social medias like Twitter or Instagram either don’t exist or don’t accurately reflect the established visual branding. Third, I would need to conduct more testing on users. The website and branding could potentially improve much more if I was given more time to conduct extensive testing. Finally, I believe that this project has a lot more potential, just as HeyKeri’s growth as an EDM artist is seemingly endless. I don’t think the future steps just stop there—I need to be willing to grow and improve myself for this project as well. While I may not have fully met the objectives I set out to begin with, I am satisfied with my current results and look forward to produce more.

Thank you for reading! — ­ Perry 25

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