Designers and advertisers continually have to interpret design briefs, produce new solutions to familiar problems and work to keep their clients' brands high in the public consciousness. This highly informative guide brings together for the first time discussions and case studies that illustrate the working methods of major advertising and graphic design firms.

Each chapter explores a different theme of 'problem solving', and concludes with a case study to illustrate a particular solution in detail. Themes include: producing innovative work, avoiding repetition, standing out in the market place, reinventing a tired brand, communicating essential facts in a culture of information overload, keeping a brand young and trendy, dealing sensitively with propaganda, the use of shock tactics, and word-based advertising in a world over-run with images and sound-bites. Examples featured are taken from classic and contemporary international advertising. Designers and agencies whose work is discussed in the book include Chermayeff and Geismar, Saatchi and Saatchi, BMP, Minale Tattersfield, Derek Birdsall, Niklaus Troxler, Bob Gill, Wieslan Walkuski, Makoto Saito, Paul Fishlock and Pentagram.

Michael Johnson is creative director of Johnson Banks, which was voted most creative consultancy in Britain in 1999. He is Chairman of Education for British Design and Art Direction (D&AD) and lectures regularly on design theory and practice.