Project 2: Packaging and Promotion

For Project 2, we will work with a very familiar subject: commerce. More specifically, we will be dealing with pragmatic issues of product packaging and promotion. Like all acts of communication, particularly those that are explicitly persuasive, advertising is thoroughly rhetorical.

Each student will select five songs from our class song pool. These five songs will be used to create a compilation CD. Each student will produce an appropriate complete package for the CD (covers, jewel case liner, disk with label, etc.) and one promotional material that targets a specific, appropriate audience. Promotional materials include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • animated .gif banner
  • Flash banner
  • radio spot
  • video spot
  • newspaper advertisement
  • magazine advertisement
  • flyer
  • poster
  • other

CD packages and promotional materials should be complete and of a professional, marketable caliber. Each CD package and promotional item should be accompanied by a thorough design plan. Neither the CD package nor any promotional materials may contain any copyrighted material.

To produce their packages and promotional materials, students will read critical texts over package and promotional material design. Students will also analyze existing professional examples and their own work.

Project Deliverables:
  • CD package (with design plan)
  • promotional item (with design plan)
  • postmortem
Due Dates:
  • CD package design plan draft due 9/25
  • promotional material design plan draft due 10/2
  • CD package draft due 10/4
  • promotional material draft due 10/11
  • Project 2 final draft (CD package and design plan, promotional material and design plan, postmortem) due 10/16
Grading:
Breakdown
  • CD package design plan = 5%
  • promotional material design plan = 5%
  • CD package = 40%
  • promotional material = 40%
  • postmortem = 10%
Rubrics
Excellent design plans will:
  • account for all the design plan elements outlined in Compose, Design, Advocate
  • proceed through a structure based on the sequence of design plan elements in Compose, Design, Advocate
  • provide a coherent narrative rather than a collection of disconnected parts
  • speak in third person about the data map and how it functions, not in first person about the designer's process of creation
  • speak in present tense about how the data map works, not in the future tense about what it will or might do
  • demonstrate thoroughly what rhetorical purpose the data map intends, who is targeted, and how the message is to be delivered
  • demonstrate coherence between the design plan and the resulting data map
  • be in a finished, polished format appropriate for an academic/professional reader, including appropriate grammar and mechanics
Excellent CD packages and promotional materials will:
  • achieve a specific purpose by targeting a specific audience
  • have a professional, polished appearance appropriate to a commercial product
  • demonstrate coherence between the design plan and the resulting work
  • display grammar and mechanics appropriate to situation in both material and design plan
Excellent postmortems will:
  • account thoroughly for all the sections of the postmortem form
  • focus on the designer's process of creating the data map
  • provide valuable insight into project successes, difficulties, and what lessons have been learned going forward
  • provide documentation that would be necessary in a professional setting
  • be in a finished, polished format appropriate for an academic/professional reader, including appropriate grammar and mechanics
Applicable Resources: Applicable Links: