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.

The Coney Island Project. Colour Poster

FOR SH! AWARD JUDGING

So, I've been a bit quiet lately. I don't even know why. Anyway, I've been burrowing myself away with a current project, based on the Coney Island Side Show in New York after visiting in March. After a fantastic trip, completely overwhelming and breathtaking, I've taking on this project, producing Lino cut prints into a "theatre style" concertina folded final piece. It will be a run of five, consisting of the concertina with a wrapped outer. Also, I will be producing a black and white, and colour poster advertising the show as if it were coming to Sheffield. The Lino's are cut and ready to print next week, the black and white poster is in conception and the colour poster is right before your eyes. Enjoy!

William Kentridge

After visiting the MoMA gallery whilst in NYC, and in particular the William Kentridge exhibition, I have returned to Sheffield utterly inspired. Displayed was a collection of beautiful sculpted prints and fantastically chaotic charcoal drawings. I now know that I want my main focus of my journey as an Illustrator to be Lino and Woodcut printing. In "Trace" a collection of his finest linos, drypoints, aquatints and etchings, in a talk with The Associates of The Department of Prints and Illustrated Books (MoMA) he mentions his methods and I was left utterly overwhelmed by the intelligence and chaos control he has over his work. He is not it's slave by any means and produces work so sequentially perfect that I have received a massive boost in my intentions at University and for my career post education. One part in particular was when he mentioned "before each plate was printed, I gave myself half an hour to rework the plate, so although that it was a print produced a number of times, each one has little variations." This is an unbelievable dedication to his art form. Uniquely edited and continuously adapted his work from print to print. This is an amazing inspiration to myself and I would be shocked to hear that it didn't influence other people.

Ranging from pure observation to twisted and dream like, evaded of reality, his work encompasses a huge selection of communicative elements even including motion work. If I am 10% of the designer William Kentridge is I will be happy. Though in my nature, I will not be satisfied until I can communicate as fluently and effectively as Kentridge does in his work. Purely incredible is a far short a statement from the beauty his work achieves.

GrassFace

GRASS GRASS GRASS.
I decided, as I like the calmness of drawing a large page of grass, like the couple I had done before, to produce another A3 sized piece, but this time drawing in a couple of hidden objects. Lego 2x2, Army man and Toy Car.

I'm Here by Spike Jonze

http://www.imheremovie.com/#

This is a wonderful little short film about love by Spike Jonze. I found out about this through being on the Ghostpatrol mailing list, proving that mailing lists aren't just for hte purpose of filling your inbox with useless drivel and junk mail about viagra and all things perverted. Well worth a look. (WARNING - you may have a wait a little while to watch this as the "seats" in this online "cinema" seem to fill up quite quickly!)

Enjoy

The End of the Line - Finished Book Cover

FOR SH! AWARD JUDGING

This is my final book cover for the "The end of the Line" brief. I very pleased with my final piece and really happy with my current aesthetic. I like it, I enjoy designing in this style and it really works for me. I hope you enjoy it too and that you are eager to see more work from me! Tell your friends.

 

These are a few close ups of the Front, Spine and Back covers. I feel my final really flows nicely across the cover. One of the more challenging things was the actual design method. Instead of designing for a normal editorial or poster etc, a book cover needs to, in a sense, be designed backwards, due to the front cover being on the right hand side, when you'd normall start on the left. In effect, I was having to read my final piece right to left and back and front. Challenging but I really feel i've done myself proud. There were a few more changes to make but due to my ridiculous two week virus I was unable to tweak everything I wanted to.

 

Some Buildings

This is nothing special. I was simply trying to fill the hours in the day since I've been back in sheffield by myself. I quite like it though. A T-shirt perhaps, or maybe just another background.

Mumford & Sons - Sigh No More

What a fantastic album. Truly stunning. I first heard this band a while back, not really thinking it more than just a rare treat on the radio and instantly forgetting the name. I wish I had followed up by finding them because I am absolutely blown away by their debut album. I look forward to hearing more of their music and definitely seeing them live whenever I can. 10/10.

Listen to the album here...

A Lifetime Lost

Whilst routing around for old books for some inspiration and just general things to do out of pure boredom, I found this beutiful collection of stamps from far and wide, assembled by my Dad when he was a kid and seemingly didn't have any technology/electricity. It's sad to think, that collections like this are now condemned to an "antique" pigeon hole to never be revived. Through the culture I have been brought up in, and how it's "fast food" nature has resulted in such high demand for quickness and accuracy, I can't deny that this is something I wouldn't start doing. My patience is too short. That's also why books like the one I found are so wonderful. These are just a small selection of some of the pages. They have proven to be a brilliant insight into my own design. I now see that on a large scale, things are much easier to communicate, but on the scale of a stamp, that can't be more than an inch in size, the detail and design has to be perfect. Truly amazing specimens and also a huge kick up the arse for my attention to detail. *(APOLOGIES FOR THE RUBBISH SCANS)*

City Chaos

FOR SH! AWARD JUDGING






































This is another octopus I drew on the bus home from Sheffield. I've edited and finished it in photoshop. I'm really pleased with the outcome. I'm really loving my layer masks too! (Available for print upon request)

Review - Term 1

It's been a really interesting term. I feel completely at ease. I've not felt unhappy with the course at all, and certainly not since choosing my specialism.
After undertaking the Illustration pathway, I've fully realised that I've always been an Illustrator. It comes so naturally to me and I absolutely love just sitting and spilling my mind onto a page.
With the briefs we've been given, I feel that i've responded very well to each of them. The reportage drawings of figures went better than I thought and I developed my double page spread ability. With the "Dog Exercise Machine" I've created something that I really love. I'm so happy with the outcome and it's improved my ability with photoshop substantially. I'm much quicker and more accurate with the programme and this will only better my design in the future.
This improvement has given me time to do a poster for one of the guest lectures next year. Whether it will be used or not is besides the point, i'm merely commenting on the freedom i've had because i've been able to work quickly and efficiently.
I feel now that I am totally limitless. I've really hit a stride with my illustration and my imagination is flowly unhindered and constant. I'm very excited for the upcoming term. I'm even more excited about my future as an Illustrator.

Proud.

FOR SH! AWARD JUDGING

























I've called this poster "Proud". We had the task of creating a poster no larger than A3 to show a "Dog Exercise Machine". With my chosen breed, the Border Collie, I began designing some over extravagent designs of machines. I liked none of them. I went back to my initial thought process and figured that because the Collie is a working farm dog, I should keep it within an agricultural theme. Also, knowing first hand that Border Collies are insane and need exercise at least 5 times a day, I produced a poster reflecting a truer "machine" for exercise. I've always pictures Collies as very proud, intelligent dogs and that is exactly how I have portrayed my dog here. The style i've used is also very rustic with the technique i've applied. I still had the challenge of incorporating some montage as a requirement of the brief, but feel i've pulled it off with the cut out tractor over the hill. I'm very pleased the final outcome,  I hope everyone enjoys it also.

New Designs on the Moor

This was a collection of work displayed in the Moors Shopping precinct in Sheffield. A collection of the best work from our Observation and Communication project. Compiled by Sean Gee and myself. (Got to test our In Design skills)





As a part of the brief, we had to complete a poster. As well as displaying the best posters, the tutors chose a selection of the best sketchbook work, to demonstrate the development and design ideas/process. I think it is really important, when designing and displaying work, that the development and process is shown. It creates a deeper understanding in the audience mind and makes the work more accessible to everyone

Excitement

OOOOOOOOOO I REALLY WANT TO POST UP MY "DOG EXERCISE MACHINE" POSTER.
Not quite finished yet, will definitely be completed TOMORROW - 15th December 2009
WATCH THIS SPACE!

Reportage Drawings of People. (1 Week Brief)

In this one week brief we were charged with reportage illustration. We simply had to draw 25 figures over a week. Once the initial bad sketches were done, I really got into the swing of it and produce some really visually exciting pages. Here are the best ones.

The Victory Fields, Ascot

I love this tree that I drew. I think it was back home at my local park. I have recently stopped drawing in fine liner and in my moleskin because I've simply run out of pages and ink. I hope to pick it up when my mixed media paint work calms down.

Another Collection of Sketchbook Work.

This is another collection of my sketchbook work that has just magically appeared out of thin air and into one of my A2 job bags. These were the better bits. A bit rough but again there is always the opportunity to mix and match ideas and turn them into something better.