Eagle Eye (cherry)

The second addition to the "totem" i've been drawing this evening (working title only). I'm struggling for animals to think of to draw really. Octopi have really rubbish eyes to draw. I hate reptiles. Maybe a fly?

I'll keep thinking. x

Hello, Wolfy.

Did this because a) I really like Wolves b) I like the eyes of wolves more c) I have been meaning to draw a page like this for ages (it is incomplete at the moment, but it's a start) I'll keep posting when i've updated the page. Enjoy x


Apologies for the crap picture...photobooth will have to suffice until i've got my slr repaired! x

Banner

Octopus Thief - gracing the banner for the tramlines live art review in From Dusk To Dawn.

From Dusk To Dawn - Tramlines Live Art Review by Raegan Oates

Here's a link to the review in Leicester's From Dusk To Dawn magazine, fantastic words from Raegan Oates. Keep checking for more information on up and coming live art events with the Stars and Stripes team, there's a chance we will be doing Oxjam in Leicester. NICE!

REVIEW HERE

BYWYD

"Bywyd" - Life, in Welsh, for my Welsh friend Andy. On a roll with the old illustrations at the moment. This piece is done on an old Vinyl Sleeve i sprayed white. Used permanent markers on these, pretty chuffed with this one. Hope he likes it. Peace x

Tramlines 2010 (Sunday @ Soyo)

The second day of two Live Art expos organised by George Law (of Hantu/Arcade). After the initial first time nerves on the saturday I was really relishing doing some more pieces and REALLY impressed myself with the two pieces I created on the Sunday.

And the Second...a last minute collaboration with Geo Law and Alex Godwin - my favourite piece of the weekend! Over and out from a massively chuffed T.G.P. Ball. Peace x

Tramlines 2010 (Saturday @ The Washington)

This weekend just passed was brilliant. Tramlines is the biggest free festival in Europe, and only in it's second year. It was a great honour to be able to partake in the Live Art days on saturday at the washington and sunday at Soyo. I thoroughly enjoyed myself and feel i really showed my versatility as an illustrator. This is the piece I created on the Saturday. A Marshmallow man, roasting a couple of humans. Sadistic...yes...but it's cool I think..?

DEP-TH

I've gotten into doing little Jeremy Fish style pieces, Oval shaped giving a nice border and limiting the amount of space to work in as well as having to think about the negative space around it. I'm still in my early stages of experimenting with this but I have had a complete surge of ideas so i'm pretty excited about what's to come over the next couple of weeks. Enjoy this for now.

Vintage British

This is a small piece I did for a Regent Sounds Studio (London) t-shirt design that I didn't finish because I got swamped with my Academy work. I thought it was a nice little design and something I will adapt a bit further hopefully along a similar themed "London" piece when I get a little more time. Enjoy.

Be Nice When You Play With My Heart

This is a little piece I knocked up this evening. Wanted to test out a new photoshop brush i made (squares) and thought this would be a bit nice. I don't really do much "soft" stuff. Thought i'd give the octopi and dead birds a week off. Enjoy.

Werewolf

This is a werewolf i've done for the o2 academy "halloween" themed night in November. I'm thinking of doing a small series of posters...probably 4 (werewolf, vampire, ghoul and headless horseman) and then a final poster (probably for the final outcome) incorporating all four on one poster. I think the arms need to be a tad longer on this though looking at the photo? I hope you like it because it's the first actual, non computer/photoshop/illustrator drawing i've done and i'm very impressed that i actually still know how to hold a pen. RELIEF.

BY THE WAY - The thing hanging in front of the pink silk screen print in the background is NOT a handback. It's my Olympus film SLR. OKAY?!

INSPIRATION (NEW)

On browsing the D&AD website just a few moments ago, I became completely captivated by this illustration work by Geoff Grandfield. "Our brief was to make a contemporary set of monochrome illustrations and a two-colour cloth jacket design for the factual account of a legendary mountaineering accident."

I love the simplicity on these illustrations. Often when I am challenged with working in a limited number of colours (like the "End of the Line" brief). They represent the content well, as well as being just simple wonderful illustrations.

Illustrator: Geoff Grandfield
Art Director: Eleanor Crow
Design Director: Joe Whitlock-Blundell
Client: The Folio Society

Reimagining the Past

This is a wonderful video I have seen, as posted by Creators-UK on Twitter. Superb visual effects, brilliant score as well.

http://www.thecreatorsproject.com/blog/reimagining-the-past--2

Some Rough Concepts

Semi-Roughs for some flyers and posters i've been asked to do. enjoy.

UNBELIEVABLE

Jai Paul - BTSTU this is one of the best songs i've heard in absolutely ages. Since the global domination of The XX, this is really amazing!

Creative Spark - Arts Institute of Sheffield 2010

Naturally, studying at Sheffield Hallam (Arts Institute) and having some friends in the final year, it would have been rude of me not to hop along before work and check out their show. I'm extremely glad I did. Overall it was an excellent selection of work displayed, across all the disciplines, Illustration, Advertising, Motion, Hand Made and Identity.

I was a little dubious about it being held in the Hubs (our Graphics studio), but really, I felt it was a brilliant use of space. Enough room for a lot of people still with room for people to have a chat.


I thought the overall quality of student work was absolutely fantastic. I'd kind of half sat in on a few peoples tutorials with our tutor and been really excited about their ideas, though a couple of people hadn't really presented their work to what I had been expecting, though good nonetheless. I was already to say that the tutors have some responsibility for quality control (of the presentation of students work) though actually, in the third year, they should be well practiced and efficient at presenting their work. Although, maybe a subtle hint wouldn't have gone a miss, but then again, I know that i can rely on the opinions of my peers to provide me with decent feedback as to whether they think i'm doing something correctly. That's why I come into uni and work around them, and speak to them, and live with them. If it works, definitely don't try and fix it.


The signage for the show was brilliant. A massive well done to Chris, Andy and Ross for putting it together. Works very well and looks fantastic. Would've been nice if everyone could've come up with their own little logo for their artboards, but that's probably just creating extra work that they really don't need. Maybe I'll do it if i have time? Hmmm, food for thought.

MOANS- I did feel that the lighting of the work was a bit lame. Just one light? It could've been put down to the students to provide some more lighting (something i'll be enquiring about for our final show next year)


That's about it for the moans really, It was a brilliant atmosphere, handled professionally and efficiently.


My best in show:
Andrew Lester - Brilliant screen prints and some fantastic illustration.
Jess Burton - Wonderful concept to her work and well thought out method to producing the final outcome. Really clever business card/packet also!
Alex Tizard and Jonathan Rands - Absolutely brilliant advertising concepts with some superbly produced final outcomes. Brilliant, tongue-in-cheek motion Lynx advert.




Fantastic show!

A good telling off

I got CS5. I did this. Not finished. I feel looking at it now that it's a bit like the credit sequence of "Catch me if you can", which by the way is superb anyway. lovely.

AOI competition - Bike London

This is my only entry for the AOI Bike London Competition. Extremely pleased with the outcome. I hope I do ok!

More Moor Exhibitions

Once again some of my work has been put up in the Moor Artspace in Sheffield. Apologies for the terrible photo but i didn't have a camera only my worthless piece of poo phone. Oh well, still an achievement.

Coney Island Side Show - Final Linoleum Cut Prints.

FOR SH! AWARD JUDGING

At last. My final piece. Extremely proud with the final outcome of this and strangely fallen in love with the Bearded Lady. She's Beautiful. A long process has shown me benefits and drawbacks of lino printing, but ultimately i've worked out all the kinks and really started a journey with a process that i feel i've rea;;y begun to master and produce good work with. So yes, why delay any longer i hear you say? Enjoy this. All hand printed (minus the yellow insert which was digitally produced and laser printed) Run of 5 prints (around 19 indiviual prints per finished item!) Fully worth the effort, less the trapped nerve in my shoulder!

Front Cover. I went with a red, white and blue theme because of the colours of America. Simple and ledgible I feel this really works. Wish the type would've printed better on numbers 3-5 in the series but the first two were used for my portfolio and are in fact at university waiting to be handed in. I think it was due to using Rough Watercolour paper that has a very grainy surface. I will use a smoother rough paper next time. "Learn wisdom from the follies of others" as some kind chap posted as a comment on the poster in the last post (still awaiting to see my errors pointed out...git)

 

This is the back of the Lino wrapping. The clours printed on the front have linked very nicely into introducing a sticker which binds the two edges together.

 

A close up on the sticker. Probably one of the more fiddly pieces I produced to print with.

 

Left is "The Bearded Lady, my evergrowing love, and on the right is "Cyclops". I tried to created characters based on past and current members of the actual Coney Island Side Show but I also wanted to put my own little spin on things to produce some original characters. I'm not an amazing character designer but I am very pleased with the cast of my Side Show.

 

Right is "The Almight Blob", a kind of dig to out American counter parts and also just had a brilliant time drawing him up. I love the nature of Lino Cuts and inparticular how he has a kind of glow coming from his left Moob. Right is the "Fire Breather", the lino I most impressed myself with.

 

When tasking myself with producing a colour and black and white poster, I naturally approached the colour poster first, knowing I would be able to produce something very visually exciting. This was me subconciously delaying the undertaking of the black and white poster. I struggled with this greatly, more than anything I was required to do for this Self Directed brief. I can't even explain why. However, I soon realised that it was a tad unnecessary, and began to think more on promotional lines as if the Side Show was going to come to Sheffield. I thought a flyer, to be inserted into my lino cut piece would be a good idea if were to ever happen. After trying to print on a numbers of different colours, the yellow really stood out as something that would not be easily ignored. I am geuinely very pleased with my work as well as myself and will continute to print on a regular basis. I hope everyone enjoys it too.