R094 Task 1 Guide: Designing the Identity and Planning the Graphic
What Task 1 asks you to do
R094 is assessed by an OCR-set assignment: a brief from a fictional client, with tasks to complete. Your teacher marks it, OCR moderates the marking, and it is worth a quarter of the qualification. Your teacher gives you the current assignment. Its wording, its tasks and its marking grid are what you are assessed against, so read them first and keep them open while you work.
Task 1 assesses Topic Area 1 and the planning in Topic Area 2. On OCR's current recording sheet it is worth 20 of the unit's 50 marks, across three criteria: how suitable your design concepts are, how well you justify that they are fit for purpose, and your planning documentation. In outline:
| Part | What you produce |
|---|---|
| Interpret the client's requirements | The business type, brand values, target audience, purpose and constraints, in your own words |
| Research and generate ideas | Analysed research, a mind map and an annotated mood board |
| Design concepts | Different concepts for the visual identity, the chosen one developed and refined |
| Justify the designs | How each decision meets the client's requirements and suits the audience |
| Plan the digital graphic | A visualisation diagram, an asset table with sources and licences, and any other planning document the assignment asks for |
Step by step
- Read the brief twice. Highlight everything the client says they want, and everything they imply. List the constraints.
- Write the client's requirements in your own words: business type, brand values, target audience, purpose, and what must appear.
- Research, and analyse it. Three or four competitors, each with a comment on what its identity communicates and what gap that leaves for your client.
- Mind map and mood board. Annotate the mood board: why each colour, image and typeface is there.
- Sketch widely. At least six quick thumbnails, then three genuinely different concepts.
- Judge the concepts against the brief, choose one, and refine it until it works small and in one colour.
- Define the identity: the logo and its versions, the palette as exact values, the typefaces with their licences, the slogan.
- Justify every decision from the brief: the business, the values, the audience.
- Plan the digital graphic: a visualisation diagram with exact sizes, colour values, fonts and positions, and the reason for each.
- Complete the asset table: every image, font and other asset, with its source and licence, as you find it.
Copying the brief back out shows nothing. Explaining what the client needs, including what the brief only implies, is the first evidence that you understand the task.
A worked example on a different brief
These extracts use an invented client, Spokes: a community bike repair workshop run by volunteers, whose brand values are friendly, sustainable and practical, and whose audience is local commuters, students and families. Do not copy them. Your client is different, and it is your decisions that are assessed.
Spokes is a not-for-profit workshop, so the identity must feel welcoming rather than expert: most bike shops look technical and expensive, which would put off the families and students Spokes most wants to reach. The brief asks for something that works on a shop sign, on stickers and on social media, so the logo has to read at a few centimetres across and in one colour.
Spokes Green carries the environmental message and is calm enough for long passages of text. Chain Orange is used only for calls to action, so on every poster it means 'do this'. I rejected black and grey, the colours most cycle shops use, because they read as specialist and expensive, the opposite of the welcome the brief asks for.
Poppins Bold for headings, because its round letters feel friendly and stay legible on a sign at a distance. Source Sans 3 for body text, because it is clear at small sizes on stickers and phones. Both are free for commercial use under the SIL Open Font Licence, which is recorded in my asset table.
The client also needs an A4 poster for free repair Saturdays. This is the plan for it, which Task 2 then builds:
What makes it strong
| Weaker evidence | Stronger evidence |
|---|---|
| The brief copied out | The brief interpreted: the implied needs and the constraints, in your own words |
| A page of screenshots | Each example analysed: what it communicates, and what that means for this client |
| One logo idea, polished | Three different concepts judged against the brief, and one refined |
| "I chose green because it looks nice" | "Green, because the brand values are sustainable and friendly, and the audience..." |
| Colours named and fonts described | Exact values, named typefaces, and their licences recorded |
| The final logo only | The development: each version, and why it changed |
| "A poster, blue, big title" | A visualisation diagram with exact sizes, values, fonts and positions, each explained |
| Assets listed by file name | Every asset with its source and licence, fonts included |
Before you hand in
- The client's requirements are in your own words, including what the brief implies
- The research is analysed, not just collected
- The mood board is annotated
- There are at least three genuinely different concepts, with the development of the chosen one shown
- The identity has exact colour values, named typefaces with their licences, and the logo's versions
- Every decision is justified from the brief: business, values, audience
- The visualisation diagram gives exact sizes, colour values, fonts and positions, with reasons
- The asset table records the source and licence of every asset that is not your own
- The work is your own, and anything you used from elsewhere is acknowledged
Sources and further reading
- OCR Cambridge Nationals in Creative iMedia (J834): the qualification page, with the specification and the assessment materials your teacher works from.
- The J834 specification (PDF): the content of every topic area. Check that your version matches.
- Moderators' report, summer 2024 (PDF) and summer 2023 (PDF): what moderators saw in real R094 and R097 work, including where marks were most often lost.
- JCQ: artificial intelligence: the rules on AI tools in coursework.
- Adobe Color and Google Fonts: for building and recording a palette and choosing licensed typefaces.
Key terms you must be able to define
- OCR-set assignment
- A brief with a fictional client and tasks, written by OCR, completed and marked in your school.
- Moderation
- OCR checking a sample of a school's marking against the national standard.
- Brand values
- The qualities an organisation wants to be known for.
- Concept
- A distinct design idea, developed far enough to be judged against the brief.
- Justification
- A reason for a design decision, taken from the brief, the audience or the research.
- Visualisation diagram
- An annotated plan of a static graphic, detailed enough to work from.
- Asset table
- A record of every asset with its source, format, dimensions and licence.
Flashcards
Reach the top grade on this topic
- Work from your current assignment and its marking grid, not from memory
- Interpret the brief in your own words, including what it implies
- Show alternatives and development, not just the final logo
- Define the identity exactly, and justify every decision from the brief
- Plan the graphic with exact, annotated decisions, and complete the asset table as you go
Mistakes that cost marks here
- Starting to design before the brief has been interpreted.
- Copying wording or designs from examples, including the ones on this site.
- Showing only the final logo, with no alternatives or development.
- Justifying choices by taste: 'I like it' or 'it looks modern'.
- Forgetting to record the source and licence of images and fonts.
The Nike swoosh was designed in 1971 by Carolyn Davidson, a graphic design student at the time, for a fee of 35 dollars.
Knowledge check
Check you could explain this
- LExploring alternatives is assessed or shows your design process
- LThe first idea is rarely the best one
- LComparing them against the brief justifies the final choice
Developing three genuinely different concepts shows that you explored alternatives, which is part of the design process the task assesses. It also produces better work, because the first idea is rarely the best, and seeing three side by side makes their strengths and weaknesses obvious. Judging each against the brief, its values, its audience and where the logo must work, then gives you a clear reason for the final choice, which is the justification the work needs.
- LCompetitor research, analysed
- LSector conventions
- LAudience research
- LVisual research, such as colour, type and imagery, with notes
I would analyse three or four of the client's direct competitors, noting the colours, type and tone each uses, what that communicates, and what gap it leaves for my client. I would look at the conventions of the sector, because the audience already expects certain things of this kind of organisation, and the identity has to meet or deliberately break those expectations. I would research the target audience: who they are, what they respond to, and what would put them off. Finally I would gather visual research, colour, typefaces, textures and photographic styles, into an annotated mood board explaining why each piece is relevant.
- LIt records the source and licence of each asset
- LProblems with an asset's licence are found early
- LIt avoids rebuilding or legal problems at the end
An asset table records where every image, font and other asset came from and the licence it is used under. Completing it while planning means any asset that cannot legally be used, such as a photograph with an unknown owner, is found before it has been built into the design. Discovering it at the end would mean replacing the asset and reworking the layout close to the deadline, or submitting work that infringes someone's copyright.