By Corey Smith - Creative Director at Xapsis Integrated Marketing
You have a
GREAT IDEA.
You can
picture it in your mind, clear
as day. It makes total sense.
So... how do you express this idea to
others? How do you instill confidence that your idea is the way
to go? How can you do this without
spending a lot of time, money, and energy?
The answer may be as
simple as Mood Boarding!
What's a "Mood
Board"? Well, let's
take a little quiz. Is it:
A. Dude, it's a new surfboard craze in California?
B. An emo-inspired skateboard?
C. A popular hippy board
game from the 60's?
D. A creative process to help visualize your ideas?
If you
answered "D" then give yourself a gold star and a pat on the
back. You are correct! Think of Mood Boards as a stepping stone in
the creative process. You have an idea but don't want to spend
a lot of time developing it into a
fully fleshed out final project until you can get a buy-in from your coworkers, friends, clients,
etc. The quickest
method of visually conveying these ideas to
others is through a Mood Board.
Mood Boards are basically posters (digital or printed) that consist of photos(pulled from magazines or
the internet), design elements, color swatches, typography samples(fonts), and key phrases that describe
the "mood" of the project. Mood Boards are used to set the style and
tone, or general feel and look prior to diving head-first into a final detailed design. Each Mood Board should have its individual style, with all the
elements fitting together into one
cohesive direction. Think of it as brainstorming on paper, experimenting with different
styles and elements without
being limited to specific parameters(like layout)
that will come later in the
process. I think you'll
discover that Mood Boards will
help streamline your creative design
process and will help your audience focus on
the initial overall idea, rather than getting
lost or hung up on the details
of the layout in the early phases of your project.
