Ben Haddock

It’s been a good month and a half since this portfolio launched and in that time my unabashed...

Sun, 08 May 2011 13:52:53 +0100

It’s been a good month and a half since this portfolio launched and in that time my unabashed self-promotion has yielded a nice bit of support from various design sites across the net. I was also really excited to have a little Q&A written up about me on the creative community site Pelime — go and have a read and experience my cheesy portrait shot!

Chapter 2

Tue, 22 Mar 2011 10:01:00 +0000

I’ve been wanting to refresh my portfolio properly for months.

After toying with different ideas I settled on creating a ‘sequel’ to my final year university portfolio, as its themes encompassed everything I enjoy the most and I wanted a serious writing challenge.

I sat down and started creating this portfolio on Christmas Eve last year. After many disjointed weekends and late nights, feverishly writing and frantically dusting off my CSS knowledge, I’m finally ready and proud to launch it today. It’s definitely a labour of love and I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

In the weeks to come I’ll write a nice making-of (mainly for my own record and as a ceremonious brain dump) and gradually release some other little bits and bobs I’ve got planned — in amongst new bits of work being added, of course.

Enjoy!

This was a campaign idea for Matalan — a homage to the Eternal Moonwalk. The Eternal Catwalk is...

Mon, 21 Feb 2011 22:13:00 +0000

This was a campaign idea for Matalan — a homage to the Eternal Moonwalk. The Eternal Catwalk is a never-ending platform for customers to celebrate their wardrobe.

Another portfolio cull. This was a concept redesign for the McArthurGlen Designer Outlets — the aim...

Mon, 21 Feb 2011 22:06:00 +0000

Another portfolio cull. This was a concept redesign for the McArthurGlen Designer Outlets — the aim was to create a more aspiring and enticing visually-led site. The header and footer frame, like letterboxes, the filmic scene in the centre. Very much liked this at the time but the typography’s looking very weak now.

On the first day of Christmas...

Mon, 20 Dec 2010 22:44:05 +0000

We’ve had quite a few Christmas related ideas at Code the past few months. One I envisioned (and which we were going to run with until we collectively realised it would take far too much time and manpower to do successfully) was a ‘Twelve Days of Code’. Each day we’d present a unique video, microsite, app, game or whatever that gave a look into the life, culture or people of Code. We genuinely had something great and interesting for each day but alas time and common sense was against us.

My idea was sparked by my line “On the first day of Christmas Code Computerlove gave to me…” — I aimed to rewrite the Twelve Days of Christmas song, syllable for syllable, reflecting each of the twelve ‘presents’ we were going to give. Housed in a microsite, its layout and structure would reflect the recursive nature of the song — so you could effectively sing it and browse the website at the same time.

Third — Refuge. I wrote about this way back here actually, and then I eventually mocked it up...

Mon, 20 Dec 2010 22:32:00 +0000

Third — Refuge. I wrote about this way back here actually, and then I eventually mocked it up visually. I still quite like it.

Secondly, Sunkist. This was a very quick brief and I helped with ideas, some design, and I did the...

Mon, 20 Dec 2010 22:28:00 +0000

Secondly, Sunkist. This was a very quick brief and I helped with ideas, some design, and I did the copywriting.

The first casualty of my portfolio cull is Beaverbrooks. I really enjoyed creating this at the...

Mon, 20 Dec 2010 22:20:00 +0000

The first casualty of my portfolio cull is Beaverbrooks. I really enjoyed creating this at the time. I tried to gently introduce tactile visual elements to reflect the very ‘hands-on’ process of choosing jewellery pieces.

Despite my incredible lack of writing on here I have been very busy. Got lots of shiny new work to...

Mon, 20 Dec 2010 22:16:00 +0000

Despite my incredible lack of writing on here I have been very busy. Got lots of shiny new work to show off but I’m holding back until I’ve created my new portfolio. Granted, I’ve actually yet to start that — I’m going to reward myself with its creation once I’ve done a bit of animation (I’m getting into After Effects and I’m quite surprised to say I love it).

My current portfolio’s in need of a trim as some of my work from last year is beginning to show its less flattering side — I’m moving some bits here so this blog can act as a little journey through my career, hopefully showing my progression as a designer and writer.

My thoughts on Twitter

Sun, 08 Aug 2010 18:20:18 +0100

I tried using Twitter while at University but found it fruitless (I didn’t know who to follow, and barely any of my friends could be bothered using it), and it was only since working full-time, surrounded by friends/co-workers who actively used the site that I was encouraged and inspired to follow suit.

Make of it what you will: Despite my incessant tweeting of whatever I find interesting or inspiring (largely design-related), I mainly use the service just to see what people at work are up to and to share in-jokes and amusing quips with said people. However it’s of course a very useful and efficient tool to discover news and products related to the industry, if you’re following even just a select number of people that share your interests.

Cull, cull and cull some more: Don’t be afraid to unfollow people if you don’t find their tweets particularly interesting or useful, else you’ll find Twitter to be an unwieldy, time-consuming beast of spam, self-congratulating and inane musings (and that’s just my profile) — that’s from my experience at least. And I’ve never seen the attraction in mass-following people in the vein hope that they’ll return the favour, it seems bizarre and impersonal.

A completist’s nightmare: I’m sure I’m not in the minority here, but I’m compelled to read every single tweet from everyone I follow. The list of people I follow is trim, so this is easily manageable, but it’s as though I’m reading an eternal novel and I naturally need to read everything chronologically — so I’m checking Twitter constantly to almost see ‘what comes next’. Maybe I’m just strange?

Spoiler: This was written as part of an upcoming article on the Code Blog.

I’ve added a couple of more projects to my portfolio — an iPhone application of Cuppa,...

Sun, 01 Aug 2010 17:36:06 +0100

I’ve added a couple of more projects to my portfolio — an iPhone application of Cuppa, naturally entitled Espresso and some concept designs for the Benefit Cosmetics blog I’ve been working on at Code.

I’ve had a little refresh and tightened up my portfolio on...

Thu, 08 Jul 2010 22:46:49 +0100

I’ve had a little refresh and tightened up my portfolio on Cargo, visually and work-wise. I’ve decided to eschew designing myself a portfolio site (I’ll inevitably tire of it anyway) as I like the familiarity of Cargo and its interface. In a similar vein to viewing my friend’s profiles on Facebook — which naturally have the same user interface and follow the same content structure — right now I actually quite like the idea of people’s portfolios having the same UI, letting you focus on their work a lot easier.

Games

Sat, 03 Jul 2010 20:20:06 +0100

Video games have quite an influence on my work and I’m generally very interested in them and their industry. Since around 2001 I’ve designed, built and edited numerous games websites (the ones with news, reviews and the like), each with varying degrees of success. The last was entitled ‘An Extra Life’ (which coincidentally died) — I plan to redesign this very soon, purely as a process to envisage what I’d want from a games website and to improve my web design skills. Should be fun.

I shamefully haven’t written anything in a while as I’ve been internet-less while moving...

Sat, 03 Jul 2010 20:10:18 +0100

I shamefully haven’t written anything in a while as I’ve been internet-less while moving into a new apartment. I have got around to redesigning my Cuppa site though, which will be completed this weekend. Now, as for building the actual thing…

I created this back in August as part of a job interview. The...

Mon, 21 Jun 2010 11:21:33 +0100

I created this back in August as part of a job interview. The brief—design a brochure for a new office development and name it too. The iconic grim, restrictive office cubicle crossed with Metal Gear Solid-style (corporate) espionage inspired me to create Escape—an office development and a decree to leave your current drab workplace and move to this fancy new open-plan one.

The execution is a little poor but I enjoyed creating it—particularly the little cardboard cubicle. I also wrote copy for the inside pages and the straplines on each page, the latter of which I quite liked:

Escape to an exciting new office development

Escape to a contemporary, spacious new home for your business

Escape to Lloyd Street North, Manchester, M15 6SE

Don’t judge a book by its cover, especially when the book...

Sat, 05 Jun 2010 14:14:02 +0100

Don’t judge a book by its cover, especially when the book is wrapped up in an 80s-style textbook eyesore. Brilliant Copywriting contains brilliant copywriting and will probably help you write brilliant copywriting. It’s an inspiring, motivating guide to how to best approach briefs, it’s a book full of useful writing tips, it’s a journal with insightful interviews with some of the best copywriters working today and it’s a showcase for its writer’s—Roger Horberry—brilliant work.

As you can read, I am quite impressed by this book.

An old idea for my portfolio. The homepage is a story of my...

Sat, 29 May 2010 00:18:49 +0100

An old idea for my portfolio. The homepage is a story of my graphic design shenanigans from Uni to Code and clicking a particular word or sentence would take you to different projects. Looking back, the writing is a little stilted and clumsy but this story/journey concept is something I’m keen to explore in future. In fact, here’s the wall of text itself:

Well hello there, this is the graphic design portfolio and inane story of me, Ben Haddock. If—hopefully—you’re as nosey as I am, I suggest you check my LinkedIn and Twitter profiles to see what I’m up to and to discover when I last ate. Had a good gander?

Right, let’s briskly skip past college and the beginning of university and have a sightsee around San Francisco, São Paulo and Tokyo. Sorry to disappoint both you and myself, but I haven’t actually been sightseeing at any of those places. Moving into my second year of uni, I branded a Victorian-themed store in New York, built (and maybe played with) toy sets for Hamleys, explained how to wear a t-shirt and shifted my grammatical tone of voice, because I’m sometimes quite reckless.

The summer holiday brought upon a clapperboard-inspired identity and my envisioning of ‘the milk of the future’. I then had my first work placement in Manchester at Drumbeat, where I did some comedy web stuff. This was promptly followed by a placement across the road at 999, where I completed some bits for (now sadly defunct) Love Saves the Day. As the cold weather encroached, my love for all things video gaming birthed An Extra Life.

I entered my third and final year at uni working part-time at Drumbeat, which was fun. Uni-wise I concocted many cryptid hoaxes with Bigfoot and the gang, explored the fine art of the moustache, dared people to try Spam and invited everyone to explore my portfolio.

Following my laborious (yet worthwhile, of course) education, I sat down with a hard-earned cuppa and then planned my hunt for an elusive job. After coming close with my ‘office escape plan’, I completed a work placement at Code Computerlove, creating ideas for Global Underground, trick or treating for Matalan and for a public relations boutique. My time there was rewarded with a permanent position, which I swiftly and gratefully accepted.

Advertising in Chatroulette

Sun, 23 May 2010 20:14:04 +0100

Advertising agencies have been quick to grab this bull by its exposed horns and use its captive audience to their advantage. Ads for Harley Davidson and Purina cat food (the latter is just a concept) are simple and static but users’ reactions to them seem to be positive (they are after all more visually pleasing than the likely alternative) while FCUK used Chatroulette very well as a tool to entice their customers into gaining free wares.

I’m certain this is just the tip of potential advertising in Chatroulette—recent ‘research’ sessions show many websites advertising through it in a manner akin to the Harley Davidson ad, but they seem to be peddling things probably not appropriate for this blog. This is quite crucial though—would brands want to be associated with the kind of content and the particular reputation that Chatroulette has garnered? FCUK’s tongue-in-cheek chat-up challenge fit perfectly with the ethos of Chatroulette and clearly appealed to its male customers but perhaps that’s the same reason why other brands have shied away.

Irrespective of a moral compass, there’s a big idea lurking within Chatroulette and I’ll keep hitting next until I find it.

I’m currently knee-deep in Code’s social web activities, organising some sort of unity...

Wed, 19 May 2010 22:54:26 +0100

I’m currently knee-deep in Code’s social web activities, organising some sort of unity and purpose between all the online profiles and accounts, sorting out media for them, writing blog posts and (probably tomorrow) persuading others to write for the blog. It’s fun stuff, I’m enjoying it even more than I thought I would.

Code were pitching for music label Global Underground (which we...

Mon, 17 May 2010 20:21:00 +0100

Code were pitching for music label Global Underground (which we won) when I first started my placement back in August. To keep me busy I was asked to design a site idea—it’s not particularly brilliant but it got me into the swing of things, web design-wise. The aim was to reflect the energetic, layered, textured nature and composition of the music through the site’s design.