PH0701 – Research Project Proposal reflection
With a suggested ‘indicative length of 1500 words’, I was more than a little anxious as I raced past the 3000 words and battled hard to cut out comment that I considered less relevant in order to keep the word-count down. The feedback on this work suggested numerous other paths off investigation and observation that I could have made – some of which I had already covered, but then deleted as I felt that more than a 110%+ over-submission would not be well received. Perhaps it would be more helpful if there was not a suggestion of length, as this does not appear to influence the grading.
With a proposed project title ‘The Stained Glass windows of Oxford Chapels’, I was keen to tie-in a themed layout to the paper. Oxford’s famous skyline, punctuated as it is by the college chapel spires, seemed so utterly appropriate so to that end, I created a horizontal line that evolved into the Oxford skyline:
To avoid any ambiguity or confusion, my opening comment reflected upon this: ‘Matthew Arnold’s poem ‘Thyrsis’ called Oxford ‘the city of dreaming spires’ for good reason: the large number of University Colleges and private schools resulted in an extraordinary wealth of chapels, with more than 40 located in the city, painting a stunning skyline of towers and spires.’
The feedback upon this decision was more than a little surprising… ‘Interesting use of a header throughout the submission which brings some impression of professionalism. Curiously, the image refers more to Oxford than to the stained glass windows, which could be read as slightly confusing.’ On this point, we will have to differ.
My use of Oxford Blue as the colour of this line was far too subtle, but typical of the attention to detail that has always interposed my professional design, publishing and reprographic work.
Oxford Blue is the official colour of the University of Oxford. The official Oxford blue visual identity guidelines set the definition of Oxford Blue as Pantone 282, equivalent to the following colour coordinates:
- Hex triplet: #002147
- sRGBB (r, g, b): (0, 33, 71)
- CMYKH (c, m, y, k): (100, 80, 0, 60)
- HSV (h, s, v): (212°, 100%, 28%)