Brand colours

Having developed the website further, I have now decided on the following palette of colours as brand colours for 'blue'.

The primary palette is what will be used on everything, they are key and by which 'blue' will be recognised. The secondary palette of colours are representative of the different trip style and will be used whenever the trip styles are present.

All of these colours are inspired by the environment. I think the green and blue in the primary palette work well together against the darker grey. I don't want 'blue' looking too corporate so by putting contrasting colours together it keeps the look fresh and contemporary.

The secondary palette are earthy colours which work well together as a group, against the primary palette and on their own. I think each colour has an emotive feel so they should work well throughout the website and any other collateral.

Optimising for best screen resolution

This was taken from the W3C website, some useful stats...

Website layout - feedback

Today I had a really interesting meeting with my tutor Hugh to discuss my website layout. Some really useful points were raised that now I need to address:

• Browser optimisation - I created the layout for 1024 x 768 however I narrowed the layout so there would be plenty of room either side however one of the points was that this room is wasted and could be used to stop the page from being too long

• The menu - does 'about us' and 'essentials' need to be there? the main focus of this website is for people to be able to book travel so the focus should be on the 'adventures' menu and possibly a 'destinations' menu as well

• The rollover buttons - how do visitors know that they are active? which is a fair point as there isn't any indication that more information is contained within it

• The idea of the trip styles being colour-coded needs to be brought into it a bit more as there isn't any indication of this at the moment

This website needs to cater for people who don't know what they want and for people who do. The slider on the home page will allow visitors to create a search personal to them however I need to also cater for visitors who do know what they want.

This is where I probably do need a separate 'destination' page because the 'adventures' area can be dedicated to the different trip styles. This will then allow visitors to either create a search from the offset or go to the 'adventures area to search by trip style or to visit the 'destinations' page where they can search by location. More work to do me thinks!

Website layout - first attempt!

This is my first attempt at designing the layout for the 'blue' website. I'm trying to keep it simple and not too cluttered.

I want visitors to be able to personalise their search so I've added a slider which will help them ask themselves key questions about what they want from their adventure. Their results will be individual to their requirements, it also gives visitors a starting point.

The images at the bottom of the screen are rollovers... each image represents a style of adventure so when a visitor rolls overs a box, information will be revealed along with a link to the relevant page.

Emotive colour palettes

As part of my branding for 'blue' I have been looking at colours and putting together palettes which have emotive meanings. I thought this could be a way of determine my branding colours or the colours I use on the website or for my promotional material.

Website wireframe

Having storyboarded my website, I have created the above wireframe for my website (the different colours represent the different trip styles available).

When I first started this project I didn't realise just how big this website would need to be however having sat down and designed the first three levels of navigation and how much information would need to be available, I now realise that a website like this would be fairly huge. Luckily I'm not intending to build it all, only a few pages to demonstrate how it would work which is just as well really!

Trip style idea

As mentioned earlier, I really like the idea of categorising trip styles as the following:

• Adventurer
• Explorer
• Adrenaline junkie
• Sun seeker
• Volunteer

Each style could also be colour-coded so when a customer chooses/reviews their package they can see the different types of adventures they have bought. It maybe that they just want to explore so their package would be one colour.

This could also work well on the website and help different between the different adventures. I need to work on this a bit more but it's an idea that I thought could work well both within the site and through promotional material.

Website - home page ideas

Now that I've finally got my name, logo and strapline sorted I can now move on to the website which is where the fun really begin!

Having spent quite a lot of time researching existing travel companies I have a few ideas for the website... first and foremost I want to keep the website looking clean and tidy as a lot of travel websites look quite busy. It's like they have so much to say to their visitors that I think they pile it all the home page. I'd like to move away from that and have a landing page that of course is informative but which also looks clean and tidy. I don't want to overload the visitor on what there is, I'd like them to find it all out by naturally moving through the website.

When a visitor lands at 'blue' they are either thinking about going travelling or they have decided to do it. 'blue' isn't about being the cheapest travel company around, it's about providing the customer with an unforgettable experience at an affordable price. 'blue' focuses on the customer and what they want to get out of their experience rather than just selling them a package deal and so the design of the website needs to reflect this. Key items will obviously need to be displayed on the home page and I need to design it so that the visitor can navigate easily through the site possibly landing where they need to in 3/4 steps.

The home page must have really strong, engaging imagery to entice customers. I think having the right imagery can go along way to visually selling what 'blue' has to offer and to also reinforce the brand as images will help set the tone and quality.

I was thinking that the home page could contain a short questionnaire that gets the customers responding to questions about what they want from their experience instead of just having a map of possible destinations that they choose from. This helps reinforce that 'blue' is about a personal experience so when the customer does complete a short questionnaire, the results they receive are then personal to them and what they want their experience to be.

Blue - final logo

Having spent the week working on my 'blue' logo, I have decided that this maybe my final design: it's simple and yet effective. I really like the typeface as it's contemporary, I think it's also memorable.

As I design my website and collateral I'm sure this logo will no doubt evolve so for the time-being I'm going to leave this as it and probably work on it further later on.

The biggest challenge with this brand is that it needs to be able to appeal to a broad audience (from students to people in retirement) so this logo needs to not only represent the brand's values but to also appeal to people in different age groups which is why I think keeping the logo simple works best.

I've chosen a purer blue that I think suits the brand. The marks at the top of the text is in grey as it's there to reflect land, air, water, movement, journey, path etc. By applying a solid colour to it I would be fixing it's meaning so by keeping it grey, it could be/represent one of many things although all to do with travel/journey.

I've decided that my strapline will be 'pure adventure' to reinforce what 'blue' is about. I need to write a mission statement as well which will also be available on the website. I think it's important to really emphasise why 'blue' is different to other travel companies.

I was thinking that a way I could develop this further is by creating a splash page on my website where (whilst the page is loading) the fluid mark changes form really quickly to emphasis it's representation/meaning. I think this could work really well and reinforce what 'blue' is all about. Just a thought!