Ohh Deer Box Competition Entry

Over the summer, I took the opportunity to explore more of what I want to create, without the restraints of a university project. I've recently set up an Instagram account dedicated to my illustrative work so have felt more motivated to take part in competitions and online challenges. A few weeks ago, I found out about a competition hosted by Ohh Deer to redesign their box packaging with an aim to promote the next generation of designers. The only requirement was that the designs were concept lead and used black line art to be printed onto their kraft boxes. 

I was quite late to the competition so only had a few weeks to get my entry in before the deadline on the 31st of July. I decided to focus on the smaller box with the dimensions- W: 312mm H: 218mm D: 23mm as it would be manageable with less space to fill. The design didn't take too long to come up with as I've had a robot character design I've been waiting to use and felt it would work effectively for this project. As they asked for a strong concept, I needed the robots to be interacting on the box to make each panel cohesive and impactive. After sketching different concepts and looking at other effective entries for inspiration, I chose to position a control panel on the top of the box, as if the robots were in control of packaging and sending out the orders, tying in with the idea of the boxes being sent out worldwide. 

Once I had the design concept, I started blocking in the main shape with the rectangle and ellipse tools on Photoshop to make sure the composition was accurate before going in with looser linework. I had fun coming up with what to put on the buttons and making little illustration relating to the robots needs; these included 'Oil Refuel' and 'Robomail' buttons as seen in the sketches below. I really enjoyed coming up with this design and in turn developed some new digital skills like using the scale tool to position the illustrations correctly on the box layout that Ohh Deer provided, making it look professional and giving a good indication of how the box would look in real life. 

Whilst playing around with the colourisation, I had the idea to use different opacities of black to provide a three-dimensional approach to the buttons and characters. I also meant that once applied to the box using the multiply tool, the brown box colour would come through and alter the design giving it a warmer tone than solid black line art. I think this approach worked well and the design would appeal to the target audience for their brand. The competition was hosted on Instagram where you had to post your entry using the hashtag #ohhdeerboxcomp. The competition had its own Instagram page which posted a few designs in the run-up to the closing date- sadly my entry didn't get featured but it was included on their stories among many other creatives. The winners have now been announced and 4 were chosen, not including my robots. I was sad not to have got further but happy I took the plunge as I hadn't entered something like that before so it boosted my confidence and I'll be on the lookout for more in the future.