Colourlovers

http://www.colourlovers.com

Continuing on my exploration for inspirational and useful websites, I recall being informed of a website called 'colourlovers'. On this website, using the search bar, you can look for the colour palettes that other artists have used in their work. I have found this website invaluable as I often struggle to find colours that work well together in my work, not only does this website solve most of my issues, but it also teaches me what colours work better together allowing my to require less help but is always there if I need it.

Behance

http://www.behance.net
Another website that I have found especially useful is that of Behance.

Like 'It's Nice That', Behance is a website full of creative pieces of work covering all areas. While Behance arguably a less refined selection of work rather then filtering only the best, the useful search bar they have allows the user to search specifically for the kind of work you are looking for. Using both Behance and It's Nice that, will surely provide more then enough inspiration for ideas should you need it.

D&AD Annual

Anyone in the creative industries is surely aware of D&AD as it is usually the ultimate goal of any creative to receive one of their renowned yellow pencils, or if you are really aiming high, their black pencils. D&AD also release an annual book packed full of the very best work produced within that year over all creative sectors such as graphic design, photography, animation, film making, etc.

I have been fortunate enough to purchase the 2009 and 2011 edition and I can say first hand how full these book are of inspiration. After all, they are full of the best pieces of work from that year showing the most creative and effective ideas.
I would say if you are after inspiration in a more specific area, say logos for example, this may not be the most useful, however, if you just want to get ideas for your creative field in general, then I can not imagine and more useful book.

It's Nice That

http://www.itsnicethat.com/

I just thought I had better share this link, it is to a great website called 'It's Nice That'.
This website has a wealth of inspiration no matter what creative industry you are in, so if you are struggling for ideas, this you should be able to find a wide variety of articles to help get your creative mind working.

Don Kenn

Don Kenn is an artist whose work i can really appreciate.
His is work consists mainly of horrific, yet beautifully detailed sketches on post-it notes using a fine liner. Now I personally am a fan of fine liner, and when it comes to sketches, i find it is my strongest medium, yet i find myself amazed that Don Kenn is able to create such wonderful images, with as much detail as this on such a tiny canvas. While I can only assume they are not all made on the most standard sized post-it notes, the ones he uses surely cant be anywhere near A4.
Thanks to his use of this paper, his otherwise colourless images are now filled with this dull, eerie yellow which completely gives his work a whole new level of 'creepy'. If these images were created on regular white/cream paper, the effect would be much further away from what Don Kenn is after.

Another thing to note is, while his images are predominantly made up of these hulking monstrosities, there is a recurring theme of children present in his images. What I think this does is, gives his images some story, these are not just pictures of behemoths, these are pictures of massive creatures, lurking around innocent children, if this is to immerse the viewer more, or simply because of his affinity to children (he writes childrens television shows) I am unsure.

Little White Lies

For the final part of my research I felt it was necessary to look at the previous Little White Lies magazine covers in some more detail. This has proven to be invaluable as I noticed one trend that most of the previous editions seemed to follow. It would seem that most of the covers use only one character from the film that they represent as the content of the cover. This discovery works directly against the previous idea I was pushing, of having all four characters on the front cover, those that have the nickname of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier and Spy. I now realise that I should perhaps simply focus on one crucial character for the front cover, possibly the character of George Smiley (played by Gary Oldman) as he appears to be the characters seen on poster and the like. One other important factor I realised about the covers is that, despite the Little White Lies logo being in the unusual place that it is, it does not appear to be an issue. This is because, all the more recent editions seem to place the portraits as though the logo is not even there, so the portraits are just placed suitably on the page with the logo happily overlapping some of the portrait. This has given my much less to worry about in terms of my layout if the logo can be treated as though it is not even there rather then treated as an obstical I must work around. The final aspect I noticed about the Little White Lies covers is that the colours they use have a clear relation to the film, such as the yellow for the Sin City cover. In the case of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy however, colour does not play a major part in the film, but instead, what I feel I should do, is perhaps use dark and dull colours to closer represent the dark and subtle themes of the film. Looking at the Little White Lies magazine covers in more detail has, without a doubt, given me the most inspiration, and new insight into how I should develop my ideas, namely, focusing on one portrait rather then four.

Juxtapoz

As part of my research for my Little White Lies Brief I felt, after look at the two artists, Matt Gondek and Olly Moss, that I should now focus my research on magazine covers in order to gain better insight into layouts and content. Looking at Juxtapoz gave me an excellent, refined sources of inspiration.

First of all, layout. Juxtapoz magazine covers do not seem to follow a specific layout except for the header. The header has remained the same for the past few years with only the colours and artist names changing. For my brief however, I do not need to worry about the header as it is provided in the exact place the client wants it. From what I have seen, most of the images on the Juxtapoz covers seem to be in the centre of the page, however, other then that, there seems to be nothing in particular that can be point out about the layout of the content.

The content of Juxtapoz magazine covers seems to be primarily focused on catching the eye as they display wonderfully bright pieces of graphic design, street art and photography. It is on this level that I have gained a lot of inspiration. Looking at Juxtapoz magazines, I feel strongly that I should experiment on making the content of the cover eye catching and now focusing heavily on the layout of the magazine. So long as the header stays where it is supposed to be, I should be alright when it comes to the layout.

Olly Moss

Olly Moss is a graphic designer that I have only really recently discovered. His work, I find, is exceptional on many levels. What stands out for me most of all from his work is the intelligent input that has gone into every piece, from the Star Wars posters above, C3-PO's eyes are made of the 2 suns that the planet orbits, the centre of Bobo Fett's mask is made from an iconic building within the films, and part of Darth Vaders mask is formed from the tree branches. It is the clever details like those that I really appreciate about Olly Moss's work, the way he manipulates iconic moments from a film/game to form the posters is ingenious. Even despite this however, his work continues to surpass in terms of typography, colour and texture. The Wolverine piece below for example, first of all has another superhero in the picture (Batman) showing how he manipulates the shapes excellently, but the colours and textures just fit really well and make the piece stand out. It is due to this sheer talent that he has been given the privilege of designing the logo for the Playstation 3 game, Resistance 3. In terms of briefs I have at hand, I really feel I have drawn some inspiration for my Little White Lies brief, however I will continue to research other artists to increase my wealth of inspiration.

Matt Gondek

Matt Gondek is a graphic designer that I have respected since I discovered his work way back in 2008. Since then, his work has evolved exponentially in terms of quality. While always involving great mixtures of bright colours, initially, his work began with very little texture and shading. Over time his work has developed to be more varied, as well as include much greater detail, whether that is in the tone he uses or in the finer textures of his work. Nowadays his work is much darker in comparison to his once bright and jolly pieces while continuing to improve in his use of finer details.

Matt Gondek is arguably one of my most inspirational artists. His work is the kind of style that I would love to be able to produce, would a brief allow it, I would like to design some of the weird creatures in the style of Matt Gondek, as of yet, I have not had the opportunity. Obviously I lack the ability at the moment to replicate it, but, I find the most appealing part of Matt Gondek's work has to be all the tiny details he includes, whether its all the wrinkles he puts around eyes each with a shadow or the slime that has correct tone applied everywhere. There are other artist that follow a similar vein to Matt Gondek in terms of style, some that are arguably much more skilled such as Dan Mumford, but it is Matt Gondek that has inspired my work for years.

Los Logos Compass

As you can probably tell, this book is packed full of logos of all different shapes and sizes. With previous editions prior to this one, Los Logos books continue to show the development of logo design through time. This book alone acts as a great archive of modern logo designs, split into sections to help categories those logos with similarities should the reader be look for a particular style to gain inspiration from, whether its logos that use ideograms or logos that manipulate text.

For me personally, this book has been a great investment, especially considering the recently received brief for the Newcastle Medical Photography department at the RVI. Looking through this book has really helped me generate initial ideas as well as think of ways to develop those ideas to better fit the appearance of modern logo designs. While I do have other books on other areas of graphic design, this book stands out especially to me as not only a great purchase but as a source of great inspiration.

Alvaro Tapia Hidalgo

Alvaro Tapia Hidalgo is an artist I have recently discovered. 

His work caught my eye due to its sheer visually striking appearance. From what I have seen of all the artists I have looked it, Hidalgo's work has an abstract unique quality about it. Clearly, what makes these images stand out most of all is the perfect combinations of colours he uses. From what I have seen, he tends to favour a more pastel blue, and when coupled with a jet black background, the foreground images are emphasised. Between the sharp defined edges and shapes and the rough, gritty textures, the juxtaposition of artistic methods compliment one another greatly throughout all of his pieces. While all of his work seems to follow in a similar vein, a variety in the content of his work is apparent, this method and style of his works with horrific images to small animals.