ART 418 · Charleston Southern University · Fall 2026

The semester project

One project across the whole term. You take a real product or technology that has no market yet and use design to take it toward one. First the strategy and the brand: choose an audience, pitch it, set the directions, build the identity. Then the brand becomes the foundation: the brand book, with the product-market fit plan inside it, and a landing page for signup, all made against the brand's own rules. Four milestones, each presented to the class, and each built through dated checkpoints between them; the full run is on the project page.

You start where a startup starts: with a product or a technology that works, and no customers. Some are offered in class, real ones from biotech, hard tech and software, each with a real problem attached. You can also bring one you found yourself, using the same methods we teach for finding problems. Whatever you pick, enough has to be published about it that a semester of research does not run dry. You are not redesigning the product: you find the people it is for, frame the business problem in design terms, and build the brand and the plan that could sell it.

The run

Every date here is a class day, and every one is presented, turned in, or both. The late-work policy is in the syllabus.

Personal statement

5% · 2 steps

Written twice. A first pass in the second week, made with AI in the open, and a final one in the last week, after a semester of work has given you something to say. Say what the machine did.

  1. MonAug 31checkpoint

    Personal statement, first pass

    Six hundred words on the work you do and the work you want to be doing, made with AI in the open. Keep the prompts and keep the versions, and hand the statement in with a short note: what the machine wrote, what you cut, what you kept, and where you overruled it. Close on the worlds you already know: they are where your first audiences come from.

  2. MonDec 7checkpoint

    Personal statement, final

    The same statement, rewritten in the last week of the term. What changed in it, what changed you, and which of the two you would rather show someone. The August version is in the history, so put the two side by side. The AI note is written the same way it was in August.

Milestone 1: the pitch

15% · 3 steps

The opening argument, built across September and presented standing on September 21: the product, the problem it poses, the audience you chose, and the ideas you want to carry into the brand, as a deck with a one-page proposal behind it. Say what the machine did.

  1. MonSep 7no class

    Labor Day

  2. WedSep 9checkpoint

    The audience

    Three audiences who could want your product, a paragraph each: what problem it would solve for them, what they use today instead, and what that costs them. This is segmentation the way Davis teaches it in chapter 1. Say which one you are leaning to.

  3. MonSep 14checkpoint

    The problem statement

    One page framing the problem for the audience you are leaning to: who has it and how you know, what it is and what signs show it, why it is worth solving and what it costs unsolved, and where it shows up. Compressed to one statement from the audience's side, with every claim naming a source. Say what the machine did. Turned in, not presented.

  4. MonSep 21milestone, presented

    The pitch and proposal

    Three minutes standing with your deck, plus the one-page proposal that carries the detail: deliverables, a timeline against the milestone dates, and what the work would cost. The pitch is the argument; the proposal is what a client would sign.

Milestone 2: brand explorations

15% · 3 steps

The pitch distilled to a creative brief in class, then two weeks of open exploration: a moodboard, the brand themes, and the brand language, with the research behind them and recommendations rooted in the business problem. Say what the machine did.

  1. WedSep 30checkpoint, in class

    The creative brief

    The pitch, distilled in class to a two-page creative brief that answers Davis's eleven questions: the client, the budget, the date, the target, the business problem, and what the work has to do. Written in the first half of the session so exploration starts the same day. This is the document the brand answers to for the rest of the term.

  2. WedOct 7checkpoint, pinned up

    The explorations, in progress

    The moodboard, the brand themes, and the brand language as they stand, pinned up and worked in the room: the images and references on the board, the themes emerging from them, and the first words the brand might use. None of it is graded on polish; it is there so the exploration happens in the open instead of the night before the critique.

  3. MonOct 12no class

    Fall Break

  4. WedOct 14milestone, presented

    The explorations

    Moodboard, brand themes, and brand language, with the research behind them and your recommendations. Images, references, adjacent brands, and analogous technologies, each one tied to the business problem it helps solve, and the recommendations saying where the brand should go and why: the foundation for the product's development and its market fit. Added to the deck as a section and presented in three minutes, last version up first.

Milestone 3: the brand

25% · 4 steps

The brand itself, built as the answer to the brief, and the largest body of work in the term. At minimum it carries a mark, a palette, the type, the voice, and three applications. Say what the machine did.

  1. MonOct 19checkpoint, in class

    The direction and the first rules

    Out of your explorations, commit to one direction for the brand and defend it against the brief: which of its words it answers best, and what the alternatives would have cost. Then start writing it down the same day: the first rules, each named for the decision it came from, go into the repository before you leave. Made in the studio, in the room, so the build and the book start together.

  2. WedOct 28checkpoint

    The rules, written for a machine

    Every choice in your brand, written down as a rule someone who has never met you could follow: a person or a machine. The parts with exact values, like colors and type sizes, become data a machine can read; designers call these tokens. The judgment calls, like what the voice sounds like, what the brand refuses to say, and where it says it, stay as plain written instructions. Then hand it all to a model and keep the receipts: what you asked for, what came back, and which rule each failure points at. Started in class on October 21 and built in the repository, not a new document.

  3. MonNov 2checkpoint, in class

    The system, reviewed

    By now the machine has been making things under your rules for two weeks, so this is a review, not a rewrite. The whole system on the desk: the brand data, the rules, the written instructions, and the skills you have built for the machine, read as one thing. What the runs taught you gets folded in, what drifted gets reconciled, and the rest of class is studio time on the brand, which is presented Wednesday.

  4. WedNov 4milestone, presented

    The brand

    The built brand, pinned up and argued for. At minimum: a mark, a palette, the type, the voice, and three applications. That is a directed identity, not a finished system; the brand book is where it gets finished. Boards are up before class starts, so the three minutes go to the argument. The deck is rebuilt again and the brief rides in it; where the brand disobeys the brief, say so and defend it. Say what the machine did.

Milestone 4: the brand book and the landing page

25% · 4 steps

Where the term lands: the finished brand book, with the product-market fit plan as its go-to-market chapter, and a landing page for signup, both made from the brand's own rules. Say what the machine did.

  1. MonNov 16checkpoint

    The brand book, drafted

    The brand book in draft, holes marked as holes. Three parts. The brand: what it is and who it is for, the mark and how to use it, color with exact values, the type scale, layout and spacing, voice with worked examples, and misuse drawn from real mistakes. How it sells: the audience, the channels, the message in each place, the offer and its price, and the result that would prove people want it. The appendix: every color, type, and spacing value written as data a machine can read. I mark up the draft overnight and it comes back Wednesday. The finished version, page-numbered and free of placeholder text, is due December 2.

  2. MonNov 23checkpoint

    The landing page, first build

    The signup page, first build: the brand's rules driving a real page with one call to action, and what failed on the way. Bring the run that made it: the prompts, the rules, the commits. A first run that fails is normal and useful.

  3. WedNov 25no class

    Thanksgiving

  4. WedDec 2milestone, presented

    The brand book and the landing page

    The close, presented: the finished brand book, its go-to-market chapter included, and the landing page live enough to sign up on, produced with the machine under your rules. A one-page handoff README comes with it: what it is, how to run it, and what it gets wrong. The work is due December 2 for everyone; the room presents across the last two class days, half on December 2 and half on December 7.

  5. MonDec 7presented

    Presentations, day two

    The second half of the room presents, same format: run the system, show what it made, name what it got wrong. The work was due December 2; nothing new is turned in today.

Final versions

no weight of its own

Everything is due by the end of the last class, December 7: the final versions of the brand book, the landing page, and the personal statement, in the repository. There is no exam-week meeting and nothing is due after the last day. The room has already seen every part of the project.

  1. Dec 7

    The last class

    What is in the repository at the end of class is what is graded.

Finding the audience

Your personal statement points at the audiences you already know. Bring three candidates, each found in one of these four places, due Sep 9.

A world you know
A craft, a job you have held, a scene you are inside. You already know what the people in it buy and what they complain about.
Your community
A group or place you belong to. You can ask people directly what they need.
Yourself
You would use this product if someone sold it to you right. The risk is that you are the only one; the research will tell you.
A wild card
An audience that simply interests you. Held to the same evidence as the other three.

Problem framing

Problem framing is discovering and defining a problem your audience shares. It comes from design thinking, which puts people at the center of the work. Skip it and nobody can see what your product is for. Answer four questions, then compress the answers into one statement.

Who
Who has the problem, and how do you know?
What
What is the problem, and what signs show it?
Why
Why solve it, and what does it cost unsolved?
Where
In what circumstances does it show up?

Your problem statement is the four answers written as one short statement from the audience's side, due Sep 14.

The creative brief distills what the pitch settled: the client, the budget, the date, the audience, and the business problem. It is the reference every later phase answers to.

The deck

You prepare and present a deck of your research and initial insights: nine slides, three minutes.

  1. 01

    Cover

    The subject, one line saying what it is, your name and the date. No version number; the repository tracks versions.

  2. 02

    The product

    What it is and what it can do, compressed out of your problem statement. One slide. The source is on it.

  3. 03

    The audience

    Specific people, named the way you would name them to a client. Not a demographic bracket.

  4. 04

    The problem

    One sentence, set large, alone on the slide. If it needs a second sentence it is two problems.

  5. 05

    The evidence

    What you actually found, sourced. This slide decides whether the problem is real.

  6. 06

    What they buy today

    What the audience uses instead, and what those choices cost them.

  7. 07

    The four questions

    Who, what, why, and where, answered short. This is where a bad problem gets caught early.

  8. 08

    What you do not know

    The open questions, written down as questions. Every honest deck has some.

  9. 09

    What the machine did

    The three lines. Same format as everything else you hand in.

How you show your work

The work lives in one repository, with a running log of what you decided and what the machine did. How to set both up, and what a good entry looks like, gets its own note early in the term.

The stand-up
Work sessions open with three minutes each, screen up: what moved, what is stuck, what you will have done by next time. Participation is graded here. The rest of the session is yours to work in, with me in the room.
Say what moved
When a piece is re-presented, one line on what changed and why: critique, evidence, or the machine.
What the machine did
Three lines closing every piece you hand in: the tools you used by name; what you asked for and what came back; what you changed, cut or overruled. "None" is a complete answer.
The rule under all of it
Use AI on anything in this course, and defend everything you turn in as your own decision. Check every fact a model gives you; when one fails in the room, the error is yours.

How it is graded

Every piece of work is graded on the same four counts, each a quarter of that piece's grade. Participation and presentations are graded on their own; their weights, and each milestone's, are in the syllabus.

Process · 25%
Contributing to discussion and critique, and improving the work as a result of research and iteration.
Concept · 25%
Responding to the problem inventively, and thinking critically about the work in light of critique and reading.
Resolution · 25%
Making work that is effective and appropriate to its concept and its context.
Craft · 25%
Care in the manufacture of the work, and technical ability in the making of it.
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