Driven Work Placement

During the Easter holidays myself and James decided to take the opportunity to do a work placement at Driven in Wilmslow. We were offered the placement after a portfolio visit a couple of months ago. It looked like a great place to work with some big clients so we were happy to do it.

The agency is situated in Wilmslow town centre which means it doesn't get too busy like the town centre yet you can still go out with a lot of things to do around. The Aston Martin garage is also directly opposite which is a bonus for me with my love of cars.

We arrived at 10am on the first day which allowed them to get themselves sorted for the day before meeting with us and going through what was required of us.

We were then given a ambient advertising brief for a energy supplement company which was a great initial brief to get into as there was a lot you could do with it and we tried to inject a bit of fun into it. The overarching theme was already in place and we had to come up with ideas around this. We produced a lot of ideas and had a meeting about them. We went over the ideas but there was an issue of quantity over quality with them. Some ideas were good but some were just thrown in and didn't achieve what it should have. We spoke about this and it helped us be more focussed on our next challenge which was for a famous fruit juice company.

The task was to think of ideas for a TV advert which was within a budget so we had to consider the amount of animation, camera work, location, props and extras. Most were kept to a minimum but we were able to keep the fun factor. We drew up lots of storyboards and wrote a lot of scripts which took us a few days. We had a couple of meetings about this in which we found out which ones should be developed further. This allowed us to work on the dialogue and Sound effects and it was good to get involved in different aspects. In the first week we didn't do any designing at all which I was happy with as I prefer coming up with ideas anyway.

The TV brief then changed slightly to viral ads for across the internet. We had to try and design something that people will pass around the internet. This was hard at first as we have never really designed a viral ad before but once we started coming up with ideas, more ideas started to flow. A lot of the ideas were very interactive and used the screen on a computer as the actual platform for what happened in the video and pop ups. This idea lent itself to iphone apps so we designed them too. We then had a meeting about the TV and viral ads and Driven were pleased with what we had come up with and how hard we had worked. We had learnt to focus our ideas more and produced a lot of work so it was good to get the recognition.

We were then given a design brief for something not so glamorous but we still had to come up with some exciting ideas around a number of existing themes. The task was to design a new compost bag. We sketched up a lot of ideas on the first day and then worked these up to presentation standard on the computer. We then applied them to a blank bag which brought the designs to life and made them look real. We then had a final meeting about the designs and they were impressed with the amount we had done aswell as the way they looked. It was nice to have our effort and ideas appreciated.

Just before we were leaving on our final day, we were called into the office for a chat where we were asked to come back when we graduate. We thought this was great as it seems they see potential in us to help their business in the future. The client list is good and Driven get involved in everything from ideas through to design. I would like to get involved in everything and not confined into one area so I am very happy to have been asked back. This is an option I am taking very seriously and it would be good to repay Driven's faith in us in the future.