After the short walk from the train station to the studio I was introduced to Christophe, a designer/artworker in the agency along with Ben who was outside in the sun on the phone to a client. I was shown around the surprisingly big studio on the top floor of the building which had a main studio, a meeting room, an office, a bathroom, kitchen/dining room and storage before being taken to a mac and getting very quickly briefed on what I was going to be doing that day. The week before, one of their permanent freelancers did a flyer for them which wasn't to their standard and my task was to re-do it.
I don't know if this was the dominant reason for enjoying the day so much but my task was to create a flyer for a local bike shop about the government funded cycle-scheme. Some clients arrived and Sam left me to go to the meeting and I was left to my own devices. As I started to plan out my ideas in my notebook, more people began coming in and I surprisingly acted rather confident in my introductions, a rare occurrence as I am very shy at first with people. From the start there was so many laughs and a lot of studio 'banter' which kept the room lively and smiling.
It was a fascinating work environment that made me realise how different Analogue were with how they dealt with everything. This was very laid back nonetheless hard-working, whilst the creative director at Analogue would send off negative vibes around the studio often if he wasn't happy with something which would leave the room in silence. Did I actually enjoy my time there? The first time, definitely. I learned a lot about the industry, worked with some amazing creatives for big names and got paid £200! The second time, definitely not. Working at PC World might of drilled it into me that bosses are always power-mad and unlikable people and so I saw past Barry. But here, everything was so relaxed, fun and always interesting with no negative characters, it was a nice change to what I was used to and made me feel very relaxed and happy to be there.
For lunch, we walked into the town so I was able to experience Harrogate for the first time. I wasn't sure what to expect but it was a very nice place that felt like it catered for expensive tastes. We went to the Waitrose to pick up some lunch and as the pizzas were on clearance we decided to have a little pizza + salad buffet. We put £2 each in and got enough for everyone. Lunch felt a bit intimidating purely because it was the moment everyone were in the same room at the same time and as I was a new character, people were asking a lot about me. I dealt with this okay and feel like it sparked a better connection with everyone at the studio.
Once lunch was over, everyone got back to work and Sam came over to see what I'd done. I was told I had free reign so I enhanced the logo and redesigned the flyer completely which was beyond Sam's expectations as I got a lot of praise for it and he told me it was perfect and I'd pushed it to a really good point. He gave me a couple of bits of feedback on the illustrations and then urged me to continue and try and finish it that day.
Before I knew it, it was 6pm and I had finished the job to a standard I was really happy with. Everyone crowded round the computer-screen and all agreed that it was done to a much better standard than the last time and that I seemed very adaptable of what I was creating depending on the brief/client.
Me and Sam made a quick dash to the train station after I was debriefed quickly by him and Tony (the big boss) who both agreed that they wanted me to come back again and work collaboratively with them so they could see how I worked in that scenario as well as solo.
The train journey back was very confidence boosting as Sam told me about how he started to work with the company and it was exactly the same as I had come in that day. He has grown with and helped grow the company six years down the line and he is now the creative director. We talked bikes a bit more and then said our goodbyes once I had thanked him for the opportunity once more and he promised he'd be in touch.
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