*Transcription Disclaimer: the following transcription was automatically generated, and may have errors, or lack context.*
Alex Lazaris:
Hello, everyone. I'm your host, Alex Lazaris, and I'm joined with Christina Jackson of Creative Club or Club Creative today. I'm super, super excited. I see a lot of regulars in Chat this morning. So I want to just call out. Everybody, thank you for tuning in. Wherever you are in world. I know that could be middle of the night, early morning, whatever. We're so excited to have you over here. If you are tuning in on YouTube, make sure you come over to Adobe Life so you can hang out with us real time. But I see Barbara, Jack, Wade Lamont. Hello, Katrina. Welcome. Welcome, everyone. But without further ado, let's give it to Christina. So, Christina, tell us what you are working on today. Who are you? All those good things.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. So hi, everyone. I'm Christina. I'm the owner of Club Creative Today. We're going to be working on a passion project brand. So every quarterly I release some Club Creative challenges for other designers and creatives to take part in. So it's one of those, and it's going to be called Cheesies. It's a cheese flavored mini snack pack brand for kids adults. We're going to keep it organic, playful, fun. So, yeah, it's going to be super fun. And I want all your guys thoughts, ideas, and I want to bring you all along in the journey with it all.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. Awesome. I'm super excited about this. I know that you've got some puns saved up for me, so I'm very, very excited. But really quickly, show everybody your Instagram. I know that you've got quite a big following there. So if people are unfamiliar with your work, make sure that you go follow Christina on Instagram and her behance and everything.
Christina Jackson:
Yes. So this is my instagram. As you can see, I like color illustrations. It's all very bright. I work with lots of different types of businesses. This was a creative challenge I was talking about if you wanted to go and give it a go and also take part in Cheesies, which is also in there. So I can see all your ideas too. And let me have a look.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. So I think this is awesome. I love the idea of Cheesies. I think it sounds like a really fun product. I'm super excited to see where we get to in the next two days. Let's start jumping into it.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, of course. So this is a mood board I came up with for the brand. You can see the style I want to go with with this. We're going to use the craft paper to keep it natural, organic, and it just looks nicer, I think, on packaging when they use the craft like this. So this is where we're going to start adding the puns. I really like all these ideas olive about you. So we're going to think of some for cheese. I do have a couple of ideas already, but I want to hear your thoughts any ideas you might have for it.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, Chat loves a good pun, so naming jokes, anything like that, chat will help us out massively. So just let us know when you need some gouda responses from Chat.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, I'll let you know. And for the font, I want to keep it like handwritten type a bit more sketchy and keep it fun and playful. I really like this one. I think this is a nut and chocolate mix, but I like how it's all packed and condensed into the packet and it seems like it's a bit too much information but it looks fun and yeah, so this is basically everything. Take a look.
Alex Lazaris:
Some of these pieces have some illustrated bits to go along with it. So you're going to do some lettering. Are you also going to be doing some illustrations with it or is it going to be mostly type driven? How are you looking at that?
Christina Jackson:
We are going to do some illustrations today as well. I've sketched a few up and we're going to digitalize it all today. I've drawn some little different types of cheese and we'll work on that together.
Alex Lazaris:
Awesome.
Christina Jackson:
So this is the type of style I want to do. I wanted to go for this more dainty style at first, but I quite like the way this looks where it's a bit more blocky and bold because we are going to be mixing it with this type. So we've got actual pictures of crackers from Adobe stock and we're going to mix it together. Love it. Something like this where it's a real image and a little illustration with it.
Alex Lazaris:
Cool. I think that's a really powerful way of bringing the brand and the cracker elements together in a really nice that's cool.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. So we're going to start with looking into different fonts and for the logo, we're not going to heavily go into the logo design. We are just going to have like a simple type logo today and then focus more on the packaging and the illustration side. So just going to type cheesy.
Alex Lazaris:
Do you already have kind of packaging dimensions and ideas around that already? Kind of or do you typically let the design narrate kind of what the packaging is going to look like later on?
Christina Jackson:
We're just going to really have a play around and see where we get to. I do have an idea of how I think it will look, but we'll see what we come up with.
Alex Lazaris:
Really cool. That's awesome.
Christina Jackson:
I'm just going to copy and paste these so we can start looking into different fonts. So, like I mentioned, with this, we're going to go for more of the handwritten style. So not so clean and tidy. We're going to go for a bit more fun.
Alex Lazaris:
Awesome. How do you typically find your typefaces that you want to use or explore?
Christina Jackson:
So I usually just spend hours on creative market Adobe fonts, Google fonts, have a look through different type boundaries and just see what I can find. Really?
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. People don't realize how much time you could spend always looking for typefaces.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
It's always fun whenever you stumble upon some really great ones. That's a cool one.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
I love that. It's called cheap potatoes already.
Christina Jackson:
Oh, yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
Cheap, but a great name for it.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. So we're just going to have a look through. I quite like this one.
Alex Lazaris:
Have you seen the wonderful typeface called Comic Papyrus?
Christina Jackson:
I've seen papyrus.
Alex Lazaris:
Somebody's made a combination of both of them and it's kind of a running joke around.
Christina Jackson:
I think I've heard this in a previous Adobe live.
Alex Lazaris:
It's a great one. Top ten typefaces.
Christina Jackson:
For me, I'll have to have a look at it properly.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah.
Christina Jackson:
I'm just trying to think of some that I've seen before. So we're going to choose a font for the Headline accent font and the body font as well. The body copy font.
Alex Lazaris:
How do you typically try to go about pairing those typefaces, like your headlines in your body or your paragraph copy? How do you typically try to get them to be cohesive together?
Christina Jackson:
I guess I just lay them all next to each other, have a look, type some words out, see how it fits. But it's usually just having a play around and testing it all out. Really?
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. That's fair. Is there any characteristics that you would probably want in a body copy? One once you have your headline copy kind of defined or like that headline style?
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. So with the body font for this brand, I do still want to keep the handwritten style, but maybe go for something a little bit more simpler. So when you've got a full type of copy in there, you want to be able to still read it. And I think with stuff like this, it might be a little bit too hard to read, but I don't want to go for any harsh lines. I do still want to keep it quite playful. So we're going to have to have a play around and see what we can find.
Alex Lazaris:
Ones already that you have in here. I'm excited to see kind of where this starts to go.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, look through here again. I have so many fonts in here, I have to make sure I use this filter option.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. And for those of you all at home who are unfamiliar with the filter button, you have the option to search between different styles, characters, classifications, and then also search through what's on Adobe Creative Cloud so that you can quickly download and install fonts. And you don't have to go to Adobe fonts anymore directly anymore. You can just do it straight in the app, which is awesome.
Christina Jackson:
So I think we've got quite a few options here.
Alex Lazaris:
Which one's kind of sticking out to you?
Christina Jackson:
I really like this, I think because we are keeping it as a simple word mark logo, I like the way that those all fit in. There's a lot of E's and there's three E's in this. And I feel like they all kind of look repetitive in the rest of them. But this one, it all kind of fits in well. I think especially this one, there's just too many lines that might be an option for the headline. Also this I quite like. I think it works well with the once we start placing it on the craft, it might look quite nice. For the body font, it's going to have to be either this or this. I think they're the two simplest ones. Maybe this one a bit bolder and accent font.
Alex Lazaris:
When you're typically working on these type packages, do you typically have three that you send to a client? Or is it one or two or is it really just depends on the project?
Christina Jackson:
Well, to be honest, I just create the brand identity to begin with and then at the end of the PDF will be the color codes and I'll give them an option for the body font because usually it's just the headline and the accent because we normally begin with just the logo suite and the colors and stuff. And then later on we might work with packaging and collateral material where body font will be needed. So usually that's at a later stage. But yeah, I do normally just suggest something. Usually I don't really have clients saying, no, they don't like this or anything. They're normally just quite happy with it right away.
Alex Lazaris:
That's awesome.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
Teach me the ways, please.
Christina Jackson:
I quite like how it works with the name. Got that playful look to it. So I'm just giving you a little peek into the flavors that we're going to be creating today.
Alex Lazaris:
Awesome. So are we also going to be creating the brand for it as well or just the packaging today? How are you?
Christina Jackson:
We're not doing the brand inside. No, we are just keeping it simple and just doing the packaging. But we are going to focus a lot on the packaging and the illustration side of it and how it all looks. Awesome. I do like this copy and this one. Try these two. I think I like this one. I feel like sometimes when you've got so many options, you have to just get rid before you start changing your mind again.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, I really like that one. Especially with kind of your inspiration around the thicker illustration style. I think this off of it really nicely.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, the tagline is going to be cheese flavored mini crackers.
Alex Lazaris:
Not cheese. It's good. We're going to have some grumbit pun or something.
Christina Jackson:
We're already going to have many puns in there's. Types it all in capitals by accident. Think I prefer it in lowercase. We're just going to keep it really simple for the logo because the rest of the packaging is going to be a lot crazier.
Alex Lazaris:
Cool. Yeah. I think it complements it really nicely. That could work too.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
So it seems like you're pretty organized when you're building out your files. It seems like from what I've seen on your Instagram, you've got your four x four kind of mood boards and collateral pieces, which are really fun. And then here you've got your artboards dedicated to each function.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, I feel like it's just a lot easier and you don't forget anything. Then if you've got it all set out, ready to go.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, you need to see my artboard. Sometimes it's pretty crazy.
Christina Jackson:
Mine do get messy, but I put them really far away. Then sometimes I forget that when I save the file, I realize, oh God, there's all this stuff all tucked up in the corner. I don't know which one I prefer. If I prefer the body.
Alex Lazaris:
I kind of feel like the second one. The one on the right.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, it works well.
Alex Lazaris:
Anika asks: how do you gauge the content that they put out in short form on their Instagram versus reels? Is there a template you follow? If not, what's the thought process behind it?
Christina Jackson:
Sorry, can you just repeat that? Sorry.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, there's a lot of questions all in one. Essentially, how do you gauge your content that you put out in short form on Instagram versus your reels? Or do you have a template that you follow or do you kind of just free form at all?
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, to be honest, I just wing it, really. I just see what I've created and then I do try to start scheduling things out so I can see how it looks on Instagram. But my page is just a cluster of projects. I don't post any template based work or anything. It's all mostly just the client projects, passion projects, what I produce, and they're just random. If I really, really like something I produce, I might make a reel of it, make the post for it, put it on Pinterest, put it on Behance. But yeah, it's just random. I don't really think about it, to be honest.
Alex Lazaris:
No worries. It seems like some of the content you've done, you've figured out a really good posting strategy for it and you just kind of repeat that. I love your I already mentioned it. Your four x fours where you're showing the whole collateral suite. I think that's really lovely.
Christina Jackson:
I do try and post one of those once a month because they do really well. Everyone loves them and it's nice to see everything altogether all on one page.
Alex Lazaris:
You don't see that on the carousels, right?
Christina Jackson:
It's so hard.
Alex Lazaris:
You got to swipe through everything. So I love that you just have a really great snapshot of the whole brand in the collateral system. It's awesome.
Christina Jackson:
We're going to keep these fonts with us, and I think I am happy with this. I don't think I really need to do much to the headline font. I do quite like it as is. Make sure I've spelt everything right. Crackers.
Alex Lazaris:
CF designer asks, is it recommended to do a headline, accent and body font or does it depend on the project?
Christina Jackson:
I think it depends, to be honest. Sometimes it's not needed. Sometimes you might just have one font that works well on everything and you can still see which is the headline in the text and which is the body in the text. If you have the different bold regular, then everything light. But usually I do, I feel like it just gives it a bit more depth in the brand and they've got more to work with then. Now that we have this sorted, the logo and the tagline, like I said, we are just going to keep it simple. So we're just going to stick with that now. Now this is where I need everyone's help. Have a look at the colors, see what we come up with. So this is the craft that we're going to be working on. So I thought I'd put that there so we can lay over it and see how it'll look. I got some pictures of other cheeses. I couldn't find a mozzarella one. I was just going to go with this, but yeah, it seems like cheddar is always like a mustardy yellow color, which I think would work quite nice with the craft paper mozzarella, I think. I don't really know what color. Maybe green.
Alex Lazaris:
It's like a white, but like the cheese itself is like, white.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. You normally have like, the basil leaves with it. I drew some basil leaves, so I think maybe the green could work nice. Yeah. Red. Lester is just red. Cinderella. Well, it's actually orange, but I think the packaging is always red. Let's pull up this color. I don't think we're going to have many colors, to be honest, in the package.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, I think most of your inspiration was pretty minimal. It was like two or three colors maximum for each package.
Christina Jackson:
We're definitely going to have black and white. Maybe we won't need the white. We'll see. We'll have the black I don't think we really need. Let's try out another yellow if we can get it a bit more vibrant. Pull those over. I don't really like the white on the craft. I do prefer the black on the craft.
Alex Lazaris:
Oliver says, I think most mozzarella I've bought, the packaging has been white and green. Yeah.
Christina Jackson:
Oh, that's good. So we'll stick with green.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, great idea.
Christina Jackson:
I think we should stick with black, but I'm not sure which of the yellows I think this stands out the most.
Alex Lazaris:
And I think with these kinds of projects, especially if these were going to be a real brand, it's always so dependent on what materials you have available.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
What kind of finishing you put on it, stuff like that. But yeah, I think both on either side, like, that really nice. Yellow on the left also is nice, but I can see the brightness being necessary as well.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. Might be a little bit too green. So we're giving ourselves, because it is a passion project, we're giving ourselves a full budget here with the colors.
Alex Lazaris:
No print requirements needed.
Christina Jackson:
No, we can do whatever we want with this. We can have the brightest colors.
Alex Lazaris:
It is great whenever you're just making mockups where you don't have to get everything ready for print.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, it can all be an RGB. We don't need CMI. Kit.
Alex Lazaris:
Exactly. No. Half toning.
Christina Jackson:
No. We've got some green options. I do like this one. I think it works with this one. Even though they are different flavors and different packaging, I like to see them all work well together as a collection.
Alex Lazaris:
Absolutely. Because they're going to still be close to each other on the aisle, if not right next to each other. Do you have a when you're designing these types of things, do you typically consider what it looks like on the.
Christina Jackson:
Shelves or sometimes yeah. And sometimes no. I feel like sometimes, yeah. If it's like a small like this is going to be a small little packet. I think more about the type size rather than the colors.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. And Chat, if you're just now joining us, we're here with Christina Jackson of Club Creative and she is working on Cheesies, a organic cheese cracker company.
Christina Jackson:
Quite like these three, but I do also like this one. Which red? This is more a pinkish red. Maybe we should stick to the ready red. Or maybe because it is actually orange, the red. Lester itself go more of an orangey red. Like the orangey red.
Alex Lazaris:
That's cool. It feels also like a nice balance between the three.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. I think we're going to stick with these. If everyone else agrees or if anyone has any other ideas.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, Chat, if you have ideas, let us know. Oliver is asking the all important question. Of course. What's Christina's favorite cheese?
Christina Jackson:
Mature cheddar, I think.
Alex Lazaris:
Nice. It's a great choice.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, I think cheddar. Definitely.
Alex Lazaris:
Jimmy says love the combo. So Chat's loving it, which is great.
Christina Jackson:
We can just have a look how it will look on the craft. So cheddar is yellow.
Alex Lazaris:
Oh, that looks great.
Christina Jackson:
Mozzarella might be a little bit too bright. That one's quite hard to read. That one might need to be darker. Seems easier to read.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. So you're thinking about naming each in that color palette? Or are you thinking about doing illustrations in the color palette? How are you kind of looking at breaking it all down?
Christina Jackson:
I think we'll have some wording in the colors and then we'll have the illustrations in the colors too. Yeah, I think we'll have a mix. We'll have some illustrations in black and some in the colors. We're going for a really playful design today.
Alex Lazaris:
Awesome. I love it. Danny says love it. Oliver really approves of your cheese, your mature cheddar, and then Gemma says Christina is one of my biggest inspos on Instagram. So this is super fun to watch. You go, girl.
Christina Jackson:
Maybe I think that one's okay. This green, I think I'm just struggling with the green a little bit.
Alex Lazaris:
Green's a tough one, especially on a background like this without getting into the darker territory. That's nice. I feel like it actually blends in with the red and the yellow more. Now.
Christina Jackson:
Let'S try something darker.
Alex Lazaris:
What do you not specifically like about it?
Christina Jackson:
I don't know. I feel like it's just a little bit hard to read. I think when I see the lighter, I think that's hard to read. But then when I compare the two, the lighter seems easier to read.
Alex Lazaris:
Well, you can always just adjust those later on as well.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, true.
Alex Lazaris:
Once you start seeing it on actual packaging.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, we'll just stick with those. I think they're quite nice. Got those flavors. And then here's the fun part. The different puns. These are the flavors. I added spice because I thought Cheese Louise, and I thought that needs to be something spicy. Yeah, we've got mozzarella good. That's good and easy. Cheesy just because it's the original flavor. But I do need everyone's help. If anyone does have any ideas for these, send them in. We can change it up. They don't have to stick as these.
Alex Lazaris:
Yes, please chat. Please tell us what puns you would like to incorporate or taglines. And if you are typing in YouTube, please come over to Adobe Live so we can see your puns over on this side, just so we can interact with you. Say hello and obviously get your puns inside of this work.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, please do. We need all the ideas.
Alex Lazaris:
Where's Nick Longo at? I'm sending up a bat signal. Nick is really good at these puns.
Christina Jackson:
Oh, really?
Alex Lazaris:
Oh, yeah. That's cool.
Christina Jackson:
Just going to get a little bit organized over here. We've got our colors, we've got our font. All good to go. We might change up the colors later on, but we'll see. And then the puns, we can stick to these, but I also want to hear everyone's ideas, too.
Alex Lazaris:
I think it also really depends. Right. I think all the packaging you've got some really great ones for the packaging, but I can see this really going well on Instagram or things like that, where you start to play with some of the cheesy language.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, definitely would be really good. So now that we have those, we can start moving into the illustrations. So these are some that I've drawn up. You might start getting an idea of where I want it to go. I really want some smiley faces. Make it really fun. Some rough cheese sketches that I've done.
Alex Lazaris:
These are great.
Christina Jackson:
I use the Wacom wacom tablet to draw these out. So usually I would sketch them out and then scan them in and then start drawing. Sometimes I just try and freehand them. But I thought for today, I'll pre plan it so we don't get stuck.
Alex Lazaris:
It's a good idea. Richard says hello everyone from sunny New York. Welcome, Richard. And also, how about cheesy peasy? Cheesy peasy is a good one. Carol Pearl says what's a pirate's favorite cheese? Do you know?
Christina Jackson:
No idea.
Alex Lazaris:
It's havarti. What else we can do? Like for like a social post? You could do like you're so cheesy going, yeah, mind your own cheese wax. Just brie yourself. But brie wouldn't be a very good cheese cracker, I don't think.
Christina Jackson:
No.
Alex Lazaris:
Maybe that's where cheesies actually accelerates as they do unconventional things like cheese crackers.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, maybe they have all types of cheeses.
Alex Lazaris:
Exactly.
Christina Jackson:
These ones I'm just drawing without the tablet because they are quite just straight lines, easy to draw.
Alex Lazaris:
Are you going to try to keep it more organic or are you thinking about just keeping some of the illustrations very geometric?
Christina Jackson:
We are going to keep it organic with the cheeses. All these but I want these little bursts because the pictures of the crackers that I've got, they're like snapped and there's crumbs everywhere. So I thought these would be cool to make it look like you've snapped it.
Alex Lazaris:
Love it. CF designer says cute drawings. Steve and Carol got some cheese puns going on in Chat.
Christina Jackson:
We do want to keep it more like the hand drawn doodly style to fit with the fonts that we've chosen.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. Do you use the Blob brush tool or just the normal pen?
Christina Jackson:
I use brush brush. We're on this little oval three point.
Alex Lazaris:
Oh, nice.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, it's not a perfect circle. Like a little oval.
Alex Lazaris:
Jimmy says OMG. So satisfying to watch. It is always calming. Whenever you just are retracing work that you've already kind of done, you can just obviously not as easy for you right now because you're live, but if you were to be just at home doing this on your own time, a little bit more calming.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
When you are in those calming modes, what do you typically listen to? Are you listening to music? Podcasts, books? Nothing.
Christina Jackson:
Usually I'm watching a Netflix series every time I'm working all day. I have a Netflix series on or a TV series. I never really listen to music. Sometimes I had a phase where I did listen to loads of podcasts, but I always just have a series on. I put my phone right next to my laptop screen and just watch that and work at the same time. Really?
Alex Lazaris:
What are you watching right now?
Christina Jackson:
So I'm currently watching a series on BBC Iplayer called Lies.
Alex Lazaris:
Okay.
Christina Jackson:
To be honest, I've not got the gist of what it is just yet. It's a bit weird at the minute. It's just like I don't know, it's just a bit of like a I really don't know how to explain what it's like. It's a bit of everything. Like every episode seems to be a bit different. It's all the same people, but you're kind of going through each of their storylines and all the lies or the mistakes they've done. Some of them are just like little white lies. Some of them are serious, like the partners cheating on each other and stuff like that. It's a nice series to watch.
Alex Lazaris:
Sounds very not stressful at.
Christina Jackson:
No, no. This is an easy going series.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. Denny asks, do you always start with your drawings with a pencil sketch?
Christina Jackson:
Not all the time, no. Sometimes if I've got a few reference images, I just put them all at the side of the artboards and then just start sketching live straight away. But sometimes it is easy. It's nice to sketch it out on paper first because you can try out a few different variations, different ways you can lay things out. But usually I do, but not always.
Alex Lazaris:
Awesome. Christian says, Cheesy come. Cheesy go. I love it. Keep it going. Christina says, cheesy peasy we've already got, which is great.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, we've got cheesy peasy.
Alex Lazaris:
I'm on a website about cheese puns and I've got celebrity versions of things, which is amazing.
Christina Jackson:
Oh, I think I actually saw those when I was having was there one like Justin Breeber? Stuff like that.
Alex Lazaris:
There's a kim kardashian cheese curds. What else? Paris Stilton.
Christina Jackson:
That would be really fun if we did the names after celebrities.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. And just did, like, illustrations of each their cheese equivalent. I love that you're doing these all in Illustrator as well. So you can just blow them up and they're vector. They're ready to go. Yeah. Packaging or billboard or anything your heart desires.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, it is a lot easier. Thought I could just copy and paste those, but they don't sit right.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, it's tough whenever you're trying to get the perspectives to match up.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
Carol asked, Has Christina played with the lines profiles for drawings?
Christina Jackson:
No, I didn't think that was on Illustrator.
Alex Lazaris:
I'm not sure what Carol's referring to, but Carol let us know.
Christina Jackson:
I think it's where it's got the guides, where there's, like, lines. I think that's what she means.
Alex Lazaris:
Not sure. Well, let us know in Chat. Carol, Jim asks, have you ever tried sketching on an iPad and bringing it into Illustrator? Or do you just use your Wacom tablet?
Christina Jackson:
I don't have an iPad. I do want one, but not yet. I'm still on the wacom. It is pretty easy. At first it was hard to use because it's not a screen. I'm looking at the screen and then drawing below. But I've got used to this now. But one day I will get the iPad.
Alex Lazaris:
Annika says Width profiles. So probably just in the oh.
Christina Jackson:
Push me in the width. Yeah. Yes. Sometimes I use that when I'm doing, like, submark logos and I want one side a bit thicker than the other. Or we could possibly use it on these circles and stuff.
Alex Lazaris:
Carol says, up at the. Top where it says uniform. Check the drop down underneath that. So instead of where your three point oval is, you could on the one next to it on the left.
Christina Jackson:
Oh, here? Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
You can always mess with those.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. Yeah. I think sometimes I use this one all the time when you're doing like, a logo and you need the line underneath. Sometimes I do those ones and then the text is above and below. We can have a play around. I think we might actually do use some of the different brush styles to get even more of a sketchier look. Not that one similar to that. I do have one that I usually use. I never know where they are here.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, it's always tough when you start getting into a brush package. Package and stuff like that.
Christina Jackson:
I think it was something like this one just to get, you know, a bit more of a rough texture. So we can have a play around with those too.
Alex Lazaris:
It says you can use that one for extreme cheesy flavors.
Christina Jackson:
Oh, yeah, that was rough. Yeah, we could have a big range of flavors for cheesy.
Alex Lazaris:
Exactly. You could. This is the cheese that keeps on giving.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
So you don't have any smoothing out on your pen, right. You're just trying to keep it as natural as possible. So you've kept it.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
So tell us a little bit more about your prop creative challenges. And this is one of them, right?
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, so this is one of so I release them every quarterly. There's a list of eight different fake client briefs, and they're all different business sectors. They're just really fun to do. If you're any creatives out there that are having a creative block or have got some ideas, they want to try out, seeing any Inspo that they want to give it a go, and they're just there, ready to go. They can do whatever they like with it. They can change up the names if they want to, or change up the add different things. Like they can add their own taglines. There's no rules to it. There's no winners or losers or anything. You can just have fun with it. But yeah, they're available on my website in the shop, download the PDF. And it's really nice to see because people tag my account in it. And then on Instagram, it's nice to see everyone's ideas of the same brand and see what styles people do for the different businesses.
Alex Lazaris:
And it's all free, by the way, chat. So if you're wanting to play along as she's working through this stuff, you can absolutely be doing that at home.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
Or at your job. Whatever you're doing right now, you can help out.
Christina Jackson:
A couple of people have actually already done the cheeses one and it's really nice to see different people's ideas.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. That's awesome. When did they go live? How long has this current one been out for?
Christina Jackson:
Since the start of April.
Alex Lazaris:
Oh, awesome.
Christina Jackson:
You don't have to do them all. You can choose whichever one you like.
Alex Lazaris:
That's awesome.
Christina Jackson:
That's great. Make sure you tag my account and then I can have a look at everyone's ideas.
Alex Lazaris:
That's great. CF Designer asked, do you ever use the Pen tool? But you were using it earlier. But I think for this project, you're specifically trying to keep it feeling hand drawn or hand lettered. Yeah, it's a lot more work to do that with the Pen Tool.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. I do usually use the Pen Tool for more geometric shapes. So we are going to use this for some of them, but with this because it is more of like an organic natural cheese pack. I'm sure you've seen it on different crisps and everything where they all go on saying baked, not fried. So we're going to keep it with that.
Alex Lazaris:
That's great. Do you have like a hashtag or things like that that people use as well for the challenges?
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. So it's just club creative.
Alex Lazaris:
Awesome.
Christina Jackson:
We can tag Club Creative Ltd or Hashtag Club Creative.
Alex Lazaris:
It's great.
Christina Jackson:
It's nice to have a look through as well, other people. If you want some ideas, you can go to the hashtag and have a look at everyone's ideas.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. Awesome. So I know you started your freelance business officially, what, January 2021, correct?
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, officially. No, I did on the side. I was still working in house in a design studio and then I set up the business properly in February this year. So I've not been self employed for long, till I've been a couple of months. I took the plunge earlier this year.
Alex Lazaris:
How's that going so far?
Christina Jackson:
It's going good. It's going good. I think it was a bit of a smoother journey because I was already doing some freelance work on the side and I had already set up the page and already met the amazing design community there is on Instagram and then made some designer friends, spoke to them about how their first month was. How did it go? And then I think I just got a lot of good advice from a lot of people that made it a lot easier.
Alex Lazaris:
That's awesome. And it sounds like most of your client bookings from at least your website talk about Instagram being kind of the catalog.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
How was that journey of embarking on kind of the Instagram world to post your work and get bookings in to start with?
Christina Jackson:
It was slow, like any other businesses. I think it was when I started doing these types of passion projects a lot and posting them. And then it seemed like every time I was doing, say, a passion project on pets, a lot of pet businesses came through. If I did something beauty, beauty businesses came through. So if there was anything that I wanted to work with, I did a passion project in that. And then luckily, some businesses would come through and say, oh, I want exactly this, or something like this. So it was good, I think. I wasn't really planning on like January last year. It was more just a hobby on the side because I was working full time anyway. And then I just started doing them passion projects. It was just a bit of fun. And then when clients did start inquiring, I think that's where I saw like, oh, maybe this can go somewhere.
Alex Lazaris:
That's awesome. Did you ever get the chance of selling some of the passion project works to clients? If they're like, oh, we love what you've done for that doggy hotel. Would you be willing to sell it to us or not yet?
Christina Jackson:
I did have an inquiry a couple of weeks ago for one of the passion projects and they said, oh, can we use this? We have this exact product, the name will be changed, everything, but we want to use the same fonts, colors, design patterns, everything. And then that was the first experience I had with it. And then they asked for a price and then I didn't even have any idea at all. So then I asked them what was their budget and then they said they didn't have an idea and then they just kind of disappeared. So no, I've not sold anything yet. I would be open to it because they are still my ideas, everything. And it would be nice to see it used because I feel like sometimes with client projects you can be restricted and that's why it's fun to do passion projects. So if someone does come along and say, oh, we want to buy this exactly as is, that would be quite nice.
Alex Lazaris:
It the work is already done. That'd be great.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, money for it.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, I totally get it. That's awesome. What do you think have been the biggest challenges so far of starting your own shop? Could be too fresh for you, so maybe no worries if you don't know yet.
Christina Jackson:
I think it's a lot of I hate emails, I hate the communication part of it. I love the designing part and I've tried to make it easier by recently. I've just got the whole notion client portal, everything set up in there. Like concept one, concept two, and then revision one, revision two, and then they've got the space ready to type their amendments. And to be honest, if it works out well, I don't really need to speak to them much during the whilst we're creating all the designs, but it's fine. And I think sometimes when an influx of inquiries come in and it's so hard to keep up and keep track with all, I think I am quite organized. But it is very hard when you've got inquiries because sometimes I get them through the website, sometimes through Pinterest, sometimes through Facebook, and then probably 80% of it is on Instagram, on Instagram and I think Instagram DMs are so hard to keep clean and organized. It's just everywhere. So I would probably say just the whole organization and setup has been difficult so far.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, I think that's one of the biggest challenges that people don't really prep you for is the business side of it. You're so focused on doing the design side for so long that it makes it difficult to start to the project management, the invoicing, the communication, all that stuff.
Christina Jackson:
But hopefully the notion parcels that helping.
Alex Lazaris:
Absolutely. Well, I love how on your website you've illustrated out the steps so that clients know exactly kind of what to expect along the way. I think that's awesome. I think it's a great way of just being like very clear expectations, very clear deliverables. Right. It's awesome. Wade says exactly. Keep that paper trail clean and organized.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. I do like to start client projects with maybe a zoom call, a phone call, and just go through exactly everything that they want, everything that they're expecting. And then I just kind of say, right, leave it with me now, I'll be back in a few days with some concepts.
Alex Lazaris:
But yeah, awesome. What type of timeline do you typically have for a brand project like this? A couple of weeks, it sounds like.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, so sometimes they do. Sometimes it can be really quick. I've recently just had a client where I did two concepts and straight away they loved the first one and had no changes, no amendments at all. And then we moved on to all the Instagram digital materials, like Instagram highlights, feed templates, story templates, stuff like that, all the digital stuff, and straight away loved it. Gone. Then we moved on to the collateral material, thank you cards, everything. And they sent all the content over right away, got it all completed and then again done. And that was done in maybe five, six days.
Alex Lazaris:
Wow.
Christina Jackson:
And that was probably the quickest project I've had. But yeah, usually about two weeks. Sometimes if it's a much larger project, then much longer. But a lot of my clients do just go for the same package. I offer, like a digital branding package, which includes the whole brand identity, so your full logo suite, any illustrations, artwork, patterns, and then just like a startup Instagram type thing, because a lot of the businesses are based on Instagram. So your highlight covers your feed story templates, stuff like that. And that does usually take a couple of weeks.
Alex Lazaris:
What do you typically include in terms of, like I know you said logo suite, but I'm really curious about the Instagram startup stuff. Is that like a couple of posts.
Christina Jackson:
Or how do you kind of in the logo suite, we have the primary secondary logos. Sometimes I do add an alternative logo if it works with the brand. I'll just say to them, I think you should maybe have this as well. And the submark and all the watermarks and everything of all the logos and then the Instagram material is I usually offer three feed templates and three story templates and then six highlight covers. But sometimes they add or subtract some and the feed and the story templates are usually just sometimes clients who aren't very experienced in Illustrator or any apps. And they use a lot of apps, like Canva, stuff like that. So sometimes they'll ask, can I upload this onto Canva and then work on it and I make sure it's all ready to go. Just then they can add their own content in if needed.
Alex Lazaris:
That's awesome. You should try out Adobe Creative Cloud Express sometime. It's a new product from Adobe. It's really sweet.
Christina Jackson:
Oh, really?
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, it's like Canva, but better. It's my tagline, it's my new pitch. I'll be teaching it next Monday and Tuesday morning.
Christina Jackson:
Oh, wow.
Alex Lazaris:
Okay, stick around.
Christina Jackson:
I'll let any of my clients know.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, it's great. Honestly, you can upload all your brand stuff into it and you can invite them to collaborate. So you can already control the color palette typefaces, all those types of things.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, that would be really helpful.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, it's super easy.
Christina Jackson:
I do feel like sometimes with different clients day, it's overwhelming. Sometimes when you've worked on the branding for couple of weeks and then the day that you just hand it all off, they're just overwhelmed with all the colors, all the fonts. They don't know what to do with what. That would be really good to just have it all ready to go and like a little pick and mix for them to have a look through.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, and it's super easy to take from Creative Cloud Express. You can take your Instagram and then make that a flyer really quickly because the dimensions has a lot of just scalability with it. So it's super simple and the handoff pays for them.
Christina Jackson:
That would be really good.
Alex Lazaris:
I love the leaves. They're so cute.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, these are going to be the little basil leaves for the mozzarella.
Alex Lazaris:
Eyes right now. I feel like what somebody was saying that was so satisfying earlier. Yeah, just like, oh my gosh, it's so cute. Have you, I guess more questions around the Instagram business side of things. Has it been beneficial for you? Do you feel like you're able to still maintain the kind of traction that you've had when you first started it? How's it going for you right now?
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, it's going really good. It's gone better, really, as the time's gone on. It's still just like on an uphill at the minute. It's not the breaks haven't come yet. It's still going, still really busy. I think it's just if you just stick around covenant, other people's work, have a look at what other people's creating. Like I said, the design community there is just really good take part in different passion projects. I still do some every now and then. And you do pull in the clients that way.
Alex Lazaris:
That's great. Do you have any tips for somebody, maybe a new designer who's trying to start their business on Instagram? Like, what have you found that's worked well for you?
Christina Jackson:
The passion projects and completing briefs definitely take part in as many as you can show your skills on there. I don't think you can really get clients from just not showing anything on Instagram. You really need to show what you can produce. So create those fake passion projects, fake clients, come up with your own. If there's a specific business sector you want to target yeah, just go wild with it. Really see what you want to produce. And then clients will start, different businesses will see your page, and if there's the same type of business on there, they're more likely to have a look at your page.
Alex Lazaris:
And inquire that's a good way of putting it. I think what has stuck out to me from one of the things you said was essentially to show the work that you want to make and whether that's dog grooming or whatever or Boba Tea making that client list. Or making work that shows that you can do that industry work will get. Because I think people struggle to see, I think as creatives, we can see, oh, this person's really good at XYZ thing. They would be great at this other thing. But as a client, they're like, oh, well, they don't have experience with dog grooming or boba tea.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
So why would I hire them? So you kind of have to show that you can do that work before you get that work in.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. So if you already have a dog grooming project on there, they're going to think, oh, they know more about it already. Even if you don't know anything about it, they're more likely to come to you.
Alex Lazaris:
Absolutely. As a singer sings a thought.
Christina Jackson:
In some smiley faces, there's worse things to.
Alex Lazaris:
Draw on a Wednesday afternoon or evening. Where did your business name come from?
Christina Jackson:
Sorry?
Alex Lazaris:
Where did your business name come from?
Christina Jackson:
To be honest, it was just me and my little brother just coming up with loads of names. We had all sorts. And then it was just Googling, seeing if they exist, looking on company's house, stuff like that. And then it was actually just going to be Creative Club, which a lot of people do say Creative Club. And then I thought it was a bit too I don't know, I preferred Club Creative. And then we just tried all sorts, really. I had a lot of different ideas. And then I just thought club creative sounded really fun. And I feel like my branding and the types of brands that I work with are bright, colorful, fun. It just sounds like a fun place to be, really. Club creatives, I think.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, that's greater it so if you're just now tuning in, we have about 50 plus minutes left in the stream. Christina Jackson is working on Cheesies, which is an organic cracker cheese brand. And so far we've gotten an logo, headline copy typefaces, find colors, and now she's working on vectorizing some of the drawings that she's already made, and then that will be used on the packaging work. But if you're on YouTube, come on over to behance at Adobe Live and then we can get your comments and chat. We want to hear from you. Help us out with some puns. We had some puns earlier. We can have more now. Whenever you're ready.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, please do.
Alex Lazaris:
I'd love to hear everyone's punsy face with the head on the right there. Like the actual face around it or the head.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, that's what I'm trying to do. Some circles, these are so hard to draw because I want it to look like something like this and this where it still looks it's not a perfect circle.
Alex Lazaris:
Drawing circles is the hardest thing.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
Jemma says you're making me want to take part in Cheesies now. Do it, Gemma. Do it. Please. Post it on Instagram. Hashtag Club creative. Is that right?
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
Nailed it. Hashtag Club creative. Post and tag. And at.
Christina Jackson:
We got smooth teal. Always come to the rescue. I don't want it a perfect circle. I do want it to be like that. And we have all these shapes ready. This is when I would use pen tool stuff like this. We could actually play around with the width tool here and have.
Alex Lazaris:
Oh, that's fun.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, something like this, we can mix it, keep playing around. Or we could try this. That might work a little better.
Alex Lazaris:
This is great. You have some awesome options.
Christina Jackson:
We have lots to work from.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah.
Christina Jackson:
We have everything all digitalized, ready to go. Just get rid of that now. Some of them are obviously a lot thicker than others, but this is where I would I want to use that rough brush.
Alex Lazaris:
Okay.
Christina Jackson:
Just keep those just in case.
Alex Lazaris:
The pixels are free. Might as well use them all.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, definitely.
Alex Lazaris:
Looking good. I like how thick that one is.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, I think if we did it where it's already we're adding a stroke to it, it won't be as thin as that's. Rid of all these little points.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, they can be painful.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
There you go. Nailed it.
Christina Jackson:
Another one.
Alex Lazaris:
Nicole says, hey, Christina, love your page. Where do you usually find your mockups for packaging?
Christina Jackson:
Mockups? I get it from I think there's a few mr. Mockups, I think is one page, which has a lot of freebies as well, which is good. And there's a really good one. I think it's LS or LP mockup, something like that.
Alex Lazaris:
LS store.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, I think LS graphics. I think it's called LS graphics. This one is really good. They have some really nice mockups on there.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. When they first started, they were doing, like, the 3D iPhone mockups, and they were so cool. Now it looks like they've started expanding into more packaging and branding work as well.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, I do get a lot of them from there. And sometimes they have them on Etsy and Creative Market.
Alex Lazaris:
Oh on etsy too. That's funny.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, there's a lot on Etsy. They do a lot of bundles, which is quite good.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, yellow images is pretty good as well. If you want like mockups or maybe soccer kit or something snowboards, whatever.
Christina Jackson:
The mockups that we are using tomorrow are actually from yellow images as well. I forgot about yellow images. I get a lot of stuff from yellow images.
Alex Lazaris:
Kind of expensive.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, I worked with them quite a while ago, so I had the year membership. I just downloaded as many as I could then. I think it's something like 90% off. If you have the membership.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, they get you. But Adobe Stock has some mockups as well, and so does you work for them. And Creative Market has a pretty big amount of them as well. But you can also make your own mockups.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
Don't forget you can photograph things with your iPhone now. You can also use dimension.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, I've never tried dimension I've not gone into that.
Alex Lazaris:
It's pretty straightforward and pretty easy to use. It's pretty great. It's good for like, bottles and things as well. Control the lighting.
Christina Jackson:
I've seen a few other designers use it and it just looks complicated, to be honest, when you've not gone into it yourself.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, I think it can be a little bit overwhelming if you're not familiar with 3D design. Yeah, 3D is just a whole nother world with camera controls and lighting and stuff like that. But I think Dimension makes it pretty easy for you to just jump in and plug some stuff in and get it to work really well. Carol says PS. AI and dimension work so well together. So Photoshop, Illustrator and Dimension.
Christina Jackson:
Let'S have a look into it. We're just making everything a little bit more bold so it stands out on that craft packaging. And because we are mixing it with some imagery, I want it to be a bit bolder and stand out against the images.
Alex Lazaris:
To see these on a markup. Very excited. This is going to be cool.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. We've got a front and the back of the mockup.
Alex Lazaris:
Oh, yeah. Awesome.
Christina Jackson:
That's tomorrow we will be working, looking into the packaging site. We're not going to go into all the boring stuff like nutrition and everything. They will be there, but they'll just be fake ones. Really?
Alex Lazaris:
Nothing fake ones that you've made.
Christina Jackson:
We will make them.
Alex Lazaris:
Okay.
Christina Jackson:
We can see, but because it's organic, we'll make sure the calories are low.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. Got to still make it a healthy snack. So for each of these, now that you've drawn them, you're expanding the appearance and then adding a stroke to them, correct?
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. Just because I feel like that brush, it goes a little bit sparse in some areas.
Alex Lazaris:
Absolutely.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
And it gives you that little thicker that matches your typeface more.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. Gives you a bit more of, like, a sketchy look to it.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. Jimmy asks what's your favorite color combination, if you have one.
Christina Jackson:
I don't know. I love a lot of colors.
Alex Lazaris:
What's your least favorite color then?
Christina Jackson:
Hmm, I don't know. Probably I think it used to be green. I used to hate green. I've grown to love green.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah.
Christina Jackson:
Oh, I don't know. I don't like working with browns, but I like wearing browns. So I like browns in everyday life, but I don't like browns in design.
Alex Lazaris:
I think that's yeah, that's fair. Think browns are a tough one, which is interesting that you've chosen the craft.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. It looks a tiny bit more on the orangey side. You.
Alex Lazaris:
Chat. We have about 40 minutes left, so if you have any questions for Christina, please let us know. We're happy to answer them.
Christina Jackson:
Think this is a little bit too busy.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, I think you're right.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. Compared to the other illustrations.
Alex Lazaris:
Gemma, what is your favorite color? Since you asked that, I'd love to know.
Christina Jackson:
What's your favorite color?
Alex Lazaris:
Mine? Oh, man. I don't know. I'm pretty open, I think. I always gravitate to really natural colors in terms of, like I guess it depends if I'm designing for myself or clients. I typically use very vibrant colors, but I have a healthy love for, I think, like, navy blues, dark blues, blues, even. Just, like, an emerald green is really lovely. As.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
Pretty. Yeah. I think anything that feels like a really crisp mountaineer is probably pretty nice. It's like Paco, but mountaineer. Ben says, Hi, Ben. From Nigeria. Like to know how and where you get your inspiration from.
Christina Jackson:
So a lot of Pinterest, the dye line. I follow a couple of pages on Instagram, like the Penta Awards, and there's an account called Inspo Finds, which is really good. But yeah, just usually those sometimes from other packaging, other things in the shops. Walking around, I'll see things or varied things, to be honest, anything. It could have absolutely nothing to do with what I'm working on, but I like the way it looks, and I try and switch it up a little bit and give it a go. But mostly those accounts on Instagram and Pinterest.
Alex Lazaris:
That'S great. Jimmy says I'm a sucker for both color combos pinks, reds, and yellow. That's awesome. So some great colors.
Christina Jackson:
It but a lot of those annoying little points everywhere.
Alex Lazaris:
Well, they're looking great. I think I'm a big sucker for smiley faces. I try to include them wherever I can.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, I thought it would fit well with cheesies.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, absolutely. Look at that Facebook. They went through, like, a punk phase.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. Not sure what this little line is. What's this like?
Alex Lazaris:
It's just one of your art, like, points. Since you doodled it like that, I think.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. Okay. We'll use the same eye nobody will notice.
Alex Lazaris:
Nicole's, asking that great question. Out of all your projects, which one would you say is your favorite?
Christina Jackson:
I don't know. I don't think I have a favorite.
Alex Lazaris:
Really?
Christina Jackson:
I really like it. I honestly don't know. I do really enjoy a lot of the stuff. I think Passion project that I completed a while ago that I really enjoyed and other people seem to enjoy it as well, was top tier, like a cake bakery.
Alex Lazaris:
Awesome.
Christina Jackson:
Because that was full of pastel colors. I really used the whole rainbow in that one. That one was a good one, I think. That probably is one of my favorites. There's another one called Dough. Crazy Doughnuts. And that one, again, is just full of color everywhere.
Alex Lazaris:
That's great. I love that. Yeah. See, you can pick favorites. That's fine.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
It's not like you're a parent. You can't pick between your favorite child that's frowned upon your projects. You can definitely pick your favorites.
Christina Jackson:
I don't know. I feel like I have as soon as I complete one project, I enjoy that one, and I think that one's my favorite. And then I do another project, and then I might prefer that one next.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, I think it's challenging. I think no matter what, with whatever project you're working on, sometimes you can get into the slump, I guess, where it's like, all right. Been working on this project for so long. I'm so tired of looking at it. Please never let me look at it again. And then eventually you come back to it, like, a year later and you're like, oh, my gosh, this is actually a great project. How could I ever have hated this?
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
Jimmy says your take on virgin is one of my.
Christina Jackson:
Really? I did enjoy that one too.
Alex Lazaris:
I haven't seen that one. I will have to dig for it. But I really like your packaging for Tease. Like, the corner with the skull on it was really yeah, yeah.
Christina Jackson:
I think Adobe Design reposted that one.
Alex Lazaris:
Oh, really? That's awesome.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, that one was really fun. Looking into the sins and everything for the flavor names. Now we have all our different cheesies. Just expanding all the strokes on them all. And.
Alex Lazaris:
Least favorite project you're like? I don't want to answer that.
Christina Jackson:
You don't have to answer. Yeah, I could answer that, but I don't think I should.
Alex Lazaris:
Okay, then. Doubt you're. Good. So did cat and canine. Was that a real project?
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
That's awesome. Little dog harness on it image.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, that was just a stock image. And then it wasn't actually a mock up. I couldn't find a good mock up of the harness. I wanted one on a dog.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah.
Christina Jackson:
So I just took it into photoshop.
Alex Lazaris:
Jimmy asks, what other Brief Passion Project pages do you follow?
Christina Jackson:
There's a few. The one that got me going at the start of last year was the Brief Club, which is a good one, and then. I've started looking into, I think, The Brief Babes by hello, Taylor. So I think her Instagram name is but the briefs are called the Brief Babes. And then there's the Creative Glow Challenge there's to be honest, a lot of them out there. There's so many. But I usually say who they are in the captions.
Alex Lazaris:
Wade posted your Tease Project in Chat, so if you're listening in, make sure you click that link. Check out the tease project. You'll see those incredible boxes she did that I think are just super cool?
Christina Jackson:
So that was part of the first release of the Brief Challenges.
Alex Lazaris:
Oh, was it? That's awesome.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. And it was really nice to see everyone's ideas for that as well. Some people stuck with the skull idea. Some people did like flames. Some people went into the whole Mexican, like, cactus route. It was really nice seeing everyone's ideas for.
Alex Lazaris:
Any who are your kind of favorite designers right now to be looking out and what they're creating and all that stuff.
Christina Jackson:
I think Christy from Pink Pony. She's been on Adobe live before. I love everything she does. All her illustrations are amazing, and her patterns that she works on are really cool. And then there's also Abby Connick, who? She has the Creative Glow Challenge. Her page is amazing as well. She's really personal with her work, so it's really nice. And she has a YouTube channel as well, so it's nice to see how she works, how she creates. Everything really.
Alex Lazaris:
Awesome with Pink Pony. Definitely a name you won't ever forget from an agency perspective.
Christina Jackson:
I do really like her work, and I love her business name, Pink Pony.
Alex Lazaris:
She even wore the pink blazer for our stream as well.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. Now we have the illustration. These two don't really fit in any of them actually use that for Red Lex. We'll see what we do once we start building the packaging up, but we've got all these fun little doodles can add everywhere. Smiley faces. Once add the logo, see if everything works altogether. I was thinking having, like, the smileys overlapping a little.
Alex Lazaris:
That's cute. That's a good idea.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. In the different colors. Looks like this. So all these sketches were just random. I don't actually know what cheese is what? But we'll just see what works. I think this is more Swiss. Yeah. And we have cheddar mozzarella and red Leicester.
Alex Lazaris:
Well, I think the top right looks like it could be just cheddar.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, like crumbly. This is definitely mozzarella.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah.
Christina Jackson:
This one's going to have to be Red Lester, because I do want to use this one.
Alex Lazaris:
It's fine. We won't tell anybody.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, we'll see what we do.
Alex Lazaris:
It's your own project. You can put whatever cheeses you want in the red luster.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. We're going to have a look into the images. We've got a lot of images from Adobe stock of crackers.
Alex Lazaris:
Oh, awesome.
Christina Jackson:
All this stuff. So just so you can see what we're going to be doing. We're going to have like crackers like this and then little bits of what cheese it is poking out and around everywhere.
Alex Lazaris:
Great.
Christina Jackson:
We've worked quicker than I thought we would. We can have a look into the actually, no, we'll leave the product information, but we'll just start having a play around the packaging for now. So with the dye line, this isn't really not to any specific size, it's just what works with the mockup. Because again, it is just a passion project. But obviously when you're working with a real client, you would expect them to send you the sizes and maybe even send you the template as well if they have it on hand. You honey. Usually if I am working on a box mailer design or anything like that, I would usually ask them to provide it because different printers have different preferences.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, but I think also for people who are just starting with their own businesses and stuff, just have the expectation that you'll probably be talking to the printer a lot versus the client most likely doesn't know all these things or how to communicate it or get the correct files from the vendor.
Christina Jackson:
Sometimes I would usually just say copy and paste this email or forward it on to them. This is what I need. Just let them know. But yeah, for the project today, I've just kind of opened up the mockup, had a look at what can be seen and what can't be seen. And then I've added these little light areas so we know that we can't have too much important information going into those areas. And then we've got the front and back as the back. For now, we'll just play around with the layout.
Alex Lazaris:
I think the headline and the subhead, like, pair so well together. I think this is really fun.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, it does work with the style that we're going for today.
Alex Lazaris:
Absolutely.
Christina Jackson:
I've already we took some of these images and went to Photoshop already to remove the background.
Alex Lazaris:
It I love that you're also embedding these images. So chat if you don't know about embedding images, it's a good way of making sure that your files, your images and things don't fall out of your project if you ever sync it or give it to a client or whatever. Sometimes those images don't show up. So if you embed them, makes your file a little bit heavier. But it's a good way to keep your files all working together.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, it is a bit of a pain sometimes if I forgot to embed something.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah.
Christina Jackson:
Actually need that one's. We have a couple of options. The squares I do definitely want to use the ones where they're cracked open.
Alex Lazaris:
So were these JPEGs before or sorry, were they PNGs before or were they JPEGs that you pulled out?
Christina Jackson:
They were JPEGs and then had to come into Photoshop, use the Remove Background tool, which I've only just discovered recently.
Alex Lazaris:
Oh, my gosh. It's a superpower.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. I used to just trace round with the magic wand.
Alex Lazaris:
The object selection tool is amazing.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
Saves so much time.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. I did not know it existed. I used to go all the way around just splitting them up just then. It's a bit easier to move around and play around with on the package design itself. And it.
Alex Lazaris:
Chat what she's doing right now is creating image masks on those images. So she's only showing part of the cracker when instead of all the images or all the crackers. It's a good way of nondestructive editing in Illustrator.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. These illustrations to look like they're just popping in and out behind the cracker, in front of the crack. Inference of the cracker.
Alex Lazaris:
Single image of the cracker is really powerful.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah. I don't think we should add too much in. Maybe we could have them just popping in at the back neither.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah.
Christina Jackson:
It's a good idea when we have all the content in, have them floating around the packaging. But I do really like the simplicity of just having the one on the front. I'm just going to grab the color to make sure it's it. What's everyone's thoughts on the yellow?
Alex Lazaris:
Chat, let us know your thoughts. What are your options? Keep the yellow, change it different colors, need more yellow. What specifically are you looking for?
Christina Jackson:
I think it might be a little bit too I don't know, too yellowy.
Alex Lazaris:
I think if it was the smiley face like you had it where it was peeking over the cheesies, I think it's good. But I think you're right. I think it misses a little bit of the readability on the illustrations with the cracker.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
What if you used a maybe what if you did, like, a background? Like if you did a fill on the cheese blocks and then had an accent of either the yellow or the black. So maybe it was filled with yellow on the cheeses and then black accents on it.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, we do have a lot of gaps everywhere.
Alex Lazaris:
Be fine.
Christina Jackson:
All right, rap.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah.
Christina Jackson:
Go. Do you like that?
Alex Lazaris:
Like it makes it a little bit more legible, at least. Starts to have a little bit more purpose with, whereas I think otherwise it gets lost behind the full image.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, we could definitely do that. I do prefer it. It looks a little bit go ahead. Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
Want to hear your thoughts?
Christina Jackson:
I think it looks a little bit more like hand drawn and sketchy like that. Like it looks more cartoony. Really?
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah. Nicole says, I think with the craft, maybe there's subtle bits, could potentially be white and things like the other elements. Like the smiley face could be yellow, maybe. And then she said, Looks good. I think after the fill in.
Christina Jackson:
We could definitely play around with adding more white in there.
Alex Lazaris:
Absolutely. It maybe the illustrations need to be bigger, not sure, try it.
Christina Jackson:
I think once we start adding all the information in, we can all agree size and play around.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, that's a good point. What other information are you going to put on there? The cheese, the cracker flavor and the flavor name.
Christina Jackson:
I want to put something like I think I've got it here. Like, hey, we're baked sauce from local farms. I had this little line, no nonsense, you won't find any artificial colors of flavoring in here. So I just want to add, like, a little box of some sort in there. But I was thinking maybe to fit with the craft theme, do some sort of, like, ticket design where it's one of those, like a postage stamp edge. We could try that now. Saint and then this type of thing. Yeah, that could be fun, poking in somewhere.
Alex Lazaris:
And what would be on that? The no preservatives or yeah, a bit.
Christina Jackson:
Of everything on there, really. I think we'll have a play around. See, I have that overlapping almost. We have the cracker. It like this. And then we also have these little births that I do also want to include. We could possibly put the flavor name on here's to be a bit more.
Alex Lazaris:
I feel like those triangles are a good way of conveying sound. For some reason. I feel like I can hear the snapping of the cracker.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah.
Alex Lazaris:
Does that make me like Paul Hollywood? Can I be on, like, the Great now?
Christina Jackson:
Maybe just move over slightly.
Alex Lazaris:
So as you're going through and finessing these things, kind of what what are you thinking about as you're pushing things around and trying to nudge it and all that?
Christina Jackson:
Um I don't know. I'm just really seeing how it all works. And I'm kind of imagining it on the actual packet itself, which I've got a screenshot of it's like this.
Alex Lazaris:
Oh, cool.
Christina Jackson:
I'm just imagining how it could look. And I've added the little buffers top and bottom because we don't want anything going where it's sealed. I think I think that's what it is, honey. Yeah, but yeah, I think I'm just trying to play around, see how I can backsmite space and make sure everything still works altogether. I do want a lot of these little smileys because I feel like they're kind of the identity of the brand, like cheese. You want everyone to smile when they see it. Never to me, that's.
Alex Lazaris:
So I know we have about five, six minutes left. What are we going to be kind of trying to accomplish tomorrow? What are you trying to wrap up today and then tomorrow cross the next.
Christina Jackson:
So we've got quite a lot done today. Tomorrow we're just going to be carrying on with the packaging design, looking into the stuff for the back of the packet. So all this stuff, the ingredients, nutrition, everything, adding all of those in there and then looking into the two other flavors. And maybe if everyone comes back with a new pun. Tomorrow we can start adding the puns in, work on the different flavors, add the illustrations in for doors, just having a good play around, really seeing what works best. And then we'll be bringing them into photoshop to put them onto the mockups. And then if we have time, we can have a look at some social media posts, see how we can present them on social media. Or maybe like a poster ad, say that they're like brand new out now, stuff like that. So, yeah, that's everything really. Tomorrow.
Alex Lazaris:
Cool. I was thinking what could be helpful is even just some arrows, like some doodly arrows could be a good way of illustrating where because I think you have some really fun copy above. It could be fun to pull it in. It's like, hey, we're baked. And it's like, yeah, pointing directly at the cheeses or the crackers themselves or I don't know, how would you do a source from the local farm? Draw a little farmhouse somewhere? I don't know, it's probably too much work.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, we'll see. I think we could do maybe just like a little badge type thing to sit here, or even a little tab hanging. And we'll keep that a green color. Then you always know it's natural. Yeah, it's all organic. Organically sourced. Bring these fonts down. But, yeah, tomorrow we are just going to be focusing more into the content and how we're going to lay everything out on the packaging and then we'll see all on the mockups and see how it all looks and make any edits if we need to.
Alex Lazaris:
Awesome. I think mockup days are one of my favorite days because I think it just gets super fun. You can start to see the brand really come together.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, it's definitely my favorite part.
Alex Lazaris:
Wade says rows of freshly grown cheeses. Of course. Yes, you're right. Sorry, Wade, you're completely spot on. That's how you know it's a farm field of cheeses.
Christina Jackson:
It could possibly do something like maybe we could do a little flag, like a little cocktail flag type.
Alex Lazaris:
Oh, fun. Yeah.
Christina Jackson:
Quite nice. Make it a little bit bigger.
Alex Lazaris:
Yeah, really great start. So, I think with the last kind of two minutes left, I would love for you to do a quick little recap of what you've done over the course of the day so far.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, of course. So today we've worked on a lot of stuff. We started off with the mood board this morning, had a look at what we want. Not this morning, the start session. We had a look at what we wanted to do. The craft paper, the handwritten fonts, wanted it to be full packed packaging. And then we had a look at some different fonts and we settled on the headline font, the accent font and the body font. We looked through lots of different fonts, we created the very simple logo because we are just focusing on packaging. So we've got this fun handwritten type font and then one to match. It looks like it's really it's just been written out. It's not like it's not got any harsh lines or any actually, it is, but yeah. So we've done the logo and then we looked into the color palettes, looked at what other products seem to use, created our own color palettes that works with the craft. We might switch it up slightly for a couple of the colors once everything's on there. We've had a go at some puns, but I do want to hear more tomorrow, so make sure you come back with some good ones. So we've got them with the three flavors and the colors for each flavor. We've spent a good amount of time working on the illustrations and adding a bit of a rough texture to them so they look more like the sketchy style we want. So they all got to just push the organic and natural style we're looking for in the craft paper, and then we skip this for tomorrow. We've started looking at how it can all work on the packaging itself, pulling in the illustrations, the imagery, the logo. Yeah. Tomorrow we'll just continue with this, see how we can fit everything in, look into the content that needs to go on there, and continue with the rest of the flavors.
Alex Lazaris:
Perfect. Well, with that note, I'm very excited for tomorrow. I think we're going to have a lot of fun. The mockup is the best.
Christina Jackson:
It is.
Alex Lazaris:
Make sure that you follow Christina at Creative Club Ltd. On Instagram and we will see everyone tomorrow.
Christina Jackson:
Yeah, stick around tomorrow.
Alex Lazaris:
Bye, everyone.
Christina Jackson:
Thank you. See you later. Bye.
