Forging Invictus – Design

Conveying a thousand words with a picture, despite being a hardened cliche, is seldom an easy task. Brochures need to spark excitement as much as they have to convey information, and posters and banners set a standard for the event, while helping create atmosphere. To find out how the Design team of Invictus pulled it all off, we sat with Darshan Temker, who helmed the committee.

What did you do in Invictus Design this year?

Darshan: I got involved in Design a little later in the process, and my first task was to finish the brochure. I had a very short deadline of 12 hours, and I had to meet it, which was very hectic. Working with what we had, we managed to put it together in time. The rest of the work, like the posters and backdrop, I had more time to plan. I would bounce ideas off my team and we would work on them. The work didn’t end there, though. Delegate cards, ID cards for the committee, t-shirts for the crew and participants, the backdrops on the stage, publicity posters and banners – they were a lot of work. However, as we got one design down, it became easier to work on the next one, so things got better the more we did.

What about the process did you enjoy most and why?

Darshan: I’ve been working on Design for college fests over the last two years. This year, however, I got a lot more control over how the final product turned out, which made it all the more enjoyable. Having veto power meant I could sometimes say no entirely to a bad design, and Madhur, Poorva Sanya and I had to rework it and try to do better.

What was the team dynamic like?

Darshan: It was always a lot of fun, even when it was hard work. I wanted to train them, so they could take over from me next year, and I hope I did a good job of it. That they did so much was commendable, especially because Sanya was heading decor for the Sports Committee in addition to everything else.

Tell us about an unexpected hiccup and how you managed to overcome it.

Darshan: An unexpected hiccup would be having around 12 hours to complete the design for the brochure. This was when I hadn’t taken over as the Design Head yet, and I realized that while work had been done prior to my involvement, it had been done in haphazard pieces. My team and I worked together from 6:30pm to 3-4am and sorted through all that we had and everything that needed to be made from scratch, and we actually managed to put out a respectable brochure by 6am, which did get circulated that same day. I’m really proud of what we managed to pull off in that one night, and that’s when I realized just how helpful and resourceful my team was.

If you had free reign over next year’s committee, what would you do with it?

Darshan: I would make someone else do all the work (laughs). On a serious note, however, I do feel like it was a continuous process and we got better with time. I’d want to keep that going in the years to come.

– As told to Dharini Prasad.