Targets!

This week I will aim to choose my final 3 poster designs, at the moment I am unsure what imagery will be placed on my 3 posters, after many initial ideas as well as development, I feel I am nearing a decision. I will also attempted to make the Ministry of Sound logo provided 3D as to fit my design, this will probably all happen on illustrator using the pen tool.

Research Task 2- Alan Kitching

I am now very much a fan of Alan Kitchings' work, mainly, for the chaotic aspect, but also because he as managed to create many different and beautiful pieces of work. While this work is on the opposite end of the spectrum to Lance Whymans' more minimalistic approach, I feel this diversity of inspiration has only worked to spark my imagination that much more. I have managed to draw much more inspiration from Alan Kitchings' work, due to the massive variety of ideas has has presented. This variety has given me more motivation to try experimenting with very diverse ideas in the early stages of my project, in order to cover as many possible ideas as I can. I also believe I should experiment with printmaking further into this project, and depending on how successful that proves, perhaps integrate it into my final idea development  If printmaking does not prove to be a useful endeavor then I should at least attempt to integrate textures into my text to what results they provide.

Research Task 1-Lance Wyman

The minimalistic and linear style of Lance Wyman’s work are the key features that I find most appealing. I also particularly like how much his logos convey and play on what the company does and what message they are trying to put across, whether it is the Minnesota Zoo or Earth Day. While his work style does not appear very diverse, it is the development of his particular style that has given him the recognition he has today. From this research, I have learned that simple yet bold ideas may be the way forward, and so in future, I will experiment further with brighter, bolder, simpler ideas, and not so much on complex busy ideas. I shall also take from this, the idea of incorporating the companies key features into designs as, as you can see, it produces logos that give off the essence of the company it is representing.

Project 2-Puffin Book Cover

 

For this project we had a choice to decide between designing a front cover for 'One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest' (Penguin Books) or 'Grimm's Fairy Tales' (Puffin Books). I was instantly drawn to the Brothers Grimm idea due to the darker nature of the fairy tales. After some research on book covers and on the fairy tales I began my idea generation process with scamps. After this, I found I was more drawn to the silhouette ideas, particularly the witch, and the idea with the tall trees to the top right of the scamps.

Next I developed the most promising ideas with more detailed sketches in my sketch book attempting to use more unusual media, such as marker pens, cardboard, biro, felt pens and watercolours.

I also developed some of my ideas on Illustrator in order to get smoother edges and bolder, cleaner colours.

Clearly this method helped to significantly improve the quality of my silhouette idea, giving a much deeper black, far cleaner edges, and a selection of text fonts to choose from. Using the tools Illustrator provides I was able to construct the idea to the left all from scratch, however I felt the chaotic nature of this idea of this idea was quite overwhelming and so produced a disappointing piece.

In the end, I decided to go with the idea of the tall trees with the stalking wolf. This idea was scanned in from my idea development in my sketch book and then developed almost entirely on Illustrator. The pen tool was the most heavily used tool which helped to create all the shapes from the trees and wolf to the title and stars. I used 'Handwriting-Dakota' for the text on the spine and back copy. After the pen tool created the shapes and the pencil and oval tools created the final details, I moved the piece into photoshop where I added a simple gradient which I felt really transformed the look of the idea. As with the previous project, I feel my real weakness lies with a lack of skill in both Illustrator and Photoshop, I feel I will have to seriously begin to practice using these programmes till I am at a point where I feel more comfortable using the more unusual tools, in particular, I would like to be able to add gradients and texture efficiently. I would say my strengths for this project lay in my preparation, I significantly improved how much research I did which lead directly to the ideas I was able to produce.

Mini Brief-SYNC

This brief was given to us from Newcastle university, unlike the staff bistro brief there was, albeit only two, some requirements for our logo designs. First of all, the text 'Sustaining Future Research' had to be part of the final design. We also could not use colours such as reds, oranges and greens, we had to use light, pastel colours. Without meaning to sound like I am making excuses, I felt, as the time of this brief, that I was experiencing some sort of creative drought, I simply could not think of any interesting or diverse ideas and so I finished this idea, which was frankly the best of a bad bunch. There are some points to this logo that I do like, such as the tracking of the 'SYNC' to the edges of the tunnel within the box. At this point, I felt that my major weakness was a lack of skill in both Photoshop and Illustrator, being  totally new to these products at the beginning of the year left me still unsure on how to navigate each of them.

Project 1- Staff Bistro

The brief for this project was to design a new logo and brand name for the Staff Bistro based at Newcastle College. The brief contained very little restrictions in terms of names, colours, symbols etc, so we were given free reign to design the logo however we wish within the parameters of our skill level.

     

After a suitable amount of ideas generation for the name, I settled on naming the bistro 'The Attic' based mostly on its location within Rye Hill House. I felt the name was homely and welcoming, however, the lack of relation to a restaurant or food left the name questionable.

In an attempt to solve the name issue, I made some designs that involve cooking cutlery to help form a connection to what The Attic does. Unfortunately I felt these above ideas were lacking in some aspects, such as colour and an eye catching appeal.

My final piece is the culmination of all my criticisms to previous segments of work, the addition of some ideas that were implemented towards the end and heavy usage of initial ideas. The first thing worth mentioning is the continuation of the cutlery idea to help form the connection between The Attic and food, I feel that, in comparison to the previous idea, the cutlery is not as subtle, but this helps to rid the concern that my logo would not so eye catching. One idea that I introduced fairly close to the end of the project, was the integration of the college blue. This pastel blue was, I believe, would be a welcome colour to use in any case, but fortunately, it happens to link back to college. Lastly, my favourite feature of this piece is the double T building shape, this idea was one of my earliest and instantly drew my attention as an idea I should take forward. I feel that shape helps to centralise and frame the entire logo, giving it a lot more structure. Overall I can not help but feel that, for a staff bistro, the logo is not entirely suitable, it seems to rigid and simple, it does not link to healthy food at all, and the cutlery in the center looks somewhat out of place. Hopefully, in future projects I will be more educated in Illustrator and Photoshop, and therefore able to try to develop more unusual ideas, and when couple with greater knowledge and a greater source of inspiration, I will also be able to think of a wider variety of initial ideas.