Postcard designs

'Ben and Andy do a postcard'

My depression sketches/thumbnails:

I researched the word 'Depression' to see what different definitions came up, this way I could see what other people thought depression was and what signs they might see in someone with depression. I thought that this word 'Depression' was good for me because I suffer from it so it was an easy word to understand but isn't always easy to get out how you feel by picture or text, thought it might be a challenge for me.

NHS - "Depression is a serious illness. Health professionals use the words depression, depressive illness or clinical depression to refer to it. It is very different from the common experience of feeling unhappy, miserable or fed up for a short period of time.

When you are depressed, you may have feelings of extreme sadness that can last for a long time. These feelings are severe enough to interfere with your daily life, and can last for weeks or months, rather than days."

Rethink - "Everyone experiences variation in mood: sometimes you just feel a bit low, or experience normal grief that accompanies the loss of someone you love. But a long lasting low mood that interferes with the ability to function, feel pleasure, or take an interest in things is not merely a case of the blues - it is an illness known as depression....Depressionaffects a person’s physical state, mood and thought processes. People with depression cannot merely "pull themselves together" and get better. It is not a sign of personal weakness or a condition that can be willed away but an illness that needs treatment to reduce symptoms."

3 Draft designs for final postcard:

These were the 3 thumbnails I thought had the strongest meaning to the word 'depression'. The pills are a typical sign of depression and everyone can recognise this. They can mean two different things as well, they could mean overdosing to from depression or trying to control it with antidepressants, personally I prefer the meaning of overdosing because it is the stronger feeling you get with depression, the want to harm/kill yourself.

I think the tree postcard design is less noticeable as depression as trees can resemble a lot of different things but depression doesn't usually come to your mind first, but thats why I chose it, because it isn't obvious. I see this as depression because its dull and lonely. It's leaves have all fallen off and it seems dead/cold, the colours aren't lively (which is why I've only used pen to emphasise on this) and you get these feelings a lot with depression.

Finally my third design is just facing depression. Looking at someone you can't always tell they have depression unless they find it necessary to show it on the outside and let the world know, but 1 in 10 people have depression and the majority of the time you won't know but they do. On the inside they are just in pain, but are great at hiding it with smiles and kind words, always putting other peoples feelings before their own. Hiding behind it makes it a lot easier to handle other people because they don't treat you differently and you don't want them to. You just want to be normal, and want people to be able to talk to you about their problems. This postcard shows how depression is shown when other people aren't around. Feeling alone, usually upset from it.

Final postcard design:

(Drawn by hand, copied onto the computer, traced and coloured in photoshop then moved to illustrator to add text)

For my final postcard I decided on the third draft I produced. I thought this was the strongest postcard for how 'depression' actually feels not just how other people see it or think it is. Depression makes you feel useless, alone, like you don't do/get anything right. Depression can't just be turned off but it can be hidden from the people you love and the people around you so they can't see you have it unless you choose to tell them. I feel this postcard shows exactly how it feels. Having a black background makes it seem dark and lonely like nothing/no-one else is there. Then using darker/duller colours on the figure makes it seem more unhappy, more distant. The reason I've got the figure in this position with its hand against its face is because I wanted it to seem like it was thinking about something, possibly staring at the world around them while they were just alone in their room. Having the word 'depression' moving down the face like this was to represent tears, I think it is very affective and gives off the impression they are crying, that its not actually a word.