A Design Project from Concept to Completion

I have not yet shared any of my design projects with you so thought I would give it a try. This project is one I did about a year ago, for a Design Management Company whose Client was a Multiple Sclerosis Charity.
The Brief
To design an A5 informative booklet for young people (from kids to teens) who have a parent with Multiple Sclerosis. Initially to produce 3 possible style for the booklet, one of them being on the lines of a manual style they supplied, the other 2 options were open to my ideas.

1. The First Step - Mood Boards
I don’t have children and was not sure of the sort of thing that would appeal to them so I decided to create some mood boards. This consisted of finding child/teen related imagery online and buying a batch of magazines, comics, greetings cards and paper targeted at kids. I then cut these all out and stuck them on mountboards to try and give me an idea of the kind of look I should be creating.
2. Step Two Sketching
Once I had an idea of the type of “feel” I was looking for I began by sketching ideas. This is a way I usually work for creative projects as it allows you to think quickly and clarify your ideas. My first scribbles usually involve brainstorming spider diagrams as well as possible layouts. I then narrowed these down to three sketches - the manual option (requested) and two other options. For the other two options I decided to go an illustrative route for one and typographic/graphic route for the other. I emailed this sketches to my client who luckily has an ability to understand what I am trying to show (as you can see my sketches are not going to win awards)

2. Step Three
My client liked the sketches so I worked them up up using mainly quark and illustrator. The teen illustrations are a little rough but get across the general idea enough for the end client to decide if this is the route they want to go.

4. Step Four - Amend then Artwork
The chosen design was the text and graphic version. I made some slight amends as requested to the visuals and then artworked it using supplied text. The final booklet is shown below.