Paula Healy

Flirt FM 2022-23 Academic Year Branding

Background

Each year since 2011 I have made an A2 academic wall planner for Galway students with campus and national events included. I have made the background in photoshop using my own photos, stock images, drawing from scratch, duotone filtering and overlays.
2018-19 Theme
2019-20 Theme
2021-22 Theme
For the coming academic year I pinned some gradient brush images that I thought would work well. The first tutorial I found from Designer Flo turned out to be excellent and easy to follow, and I created a custom brush in Illustrator for use in Photoshop.
Adobe Illustrator screengrab of a gradient circle
The resulting background was exactly what I was looking for, and as an added bonus I could focus light and dark areas where I need them for overlaid text and graphics.
This year’s Wall Planner, made with Adobe InDesign is currently being printed on matte 135gsm paper (chosen so you can write on it with without smudging or going through the paper, but the weight of planners doesn’t inhibit delivery around campus). This year there are 2,500 copies of the English language and 500 copies of the Irish language versions in the print run.
section of a wall planner