Gary Oldman, Pretty in Ink

Here's another one of my final ideas for the Little White lies Brief that we've recently finished, I'm really happy with how this turned out, the contrast of  the black and white works really nicely. Compared to some of my other ideas the form of this image is much less structured, because I drew the original image from 2ft away with a stick in ink, the portrait has a loose/flowing feel. I used courier (Again) but this time I drew it freehand in ink onto cardboard then scanned it in, I wanted the text to retain some of it's hand drawn feel, as the shapes aren't all perfect but I still cleaned a lot of the bleed up on photoshop; I think it's worked rather nicely.

The main idea for this image was to make it all a bit of a jumble, because the film's about secrecy I wanted the text to appear coded/embedded, as if it's emerging from the image of Oldman.

Little White Lies D&AD Brief

So here's a couple of finished designs that I've been working on as part of the Little White Lies brief we were given at college; The brief was part of the D&AD student competition, the target, to create an illustration of selected film's main characters. The choices were Super 8, Drive, Tree of Life, Black Swan & Tinker, Tailor Soldier, Spy... I chose to do Tinker, Tailor.. because I'd seen the film beforehand and thought it was a brilliant film, both in cinematics and the plot, there was a lot of moodiness in the film and the main character Gary Oldman was quite interesting as the character 'Smiley'. Because the chosen brief was illustration focused, with the final design needing to be a portrait of the main character and our class were specialized in graphics we were allowed to deviate from the original format and change the focus onto key objects / scenes in the movie; rather than a facial shot.

I wanted to keep the colour pallet quite dark as this tends to be the overall mood throughout the film, so I've mainly used monochrome within my designs, however I may redevelop some ideas to include colour. A key aspect I wanted to include was the use of 'Courier' typeface, with courier being a more computer friendly version of original typewriter, I thought this would work nicely in my ideas, as well as being able to play around on the actual typewriter! The font is a key part of the design because typewriters are often associated with formal documents in the era that the film was set. Overall I've really enjoyed this current project as it's steered more towards the structural / editorial style of graphics that I prefer.

Geo Law illustration!

I first came across George Law's work in 'Now Then' magazine in July last year, Now Then is a free independent magazine based in Sheffield that regularly features designers/illustrators as the main feature, the magazine itself looks into popular culture around the city and is definitely worth following!

Back to the main topic however, I'm really interested Law's work and have been a keen fan ever since my eyes rested on the quirky creatures, bold lines and statement colour!

Not long after that, he produced the designs for the posters and merch for 'Tramlines' festival 2011, the design worked really nicely because it gave off the hectic yet fun vibe of the festival and keeping in the local Sheffield feel by adding the tinsley water towers, a perfect icon of reference for locals and visitors alike! Law's quirky style shines out in all his work, digital and physical. Personal favourites of mine are his own personal projects such as 'Deities of Geoda' & his watercolour collections, the use of colour and simple line really make the illustrations jump out! I'd definitely recommend anyone to check out his other stuff!

Looking Up.. On Photoshop!

Checkered Sky

I made this image as part of my development for the project 'Looking up/Looking down' I'm really happy with how this image turned out! Due to the sheer number of squares and their dominance as a focus point, I wanted to keep the total number of focuses to 3, to prevent the overall image from looking too busy. 


The contrast between the graph paper and the blue sky make a really nice / subtle background for the squares to be placed on top of, helping them really stand out. I got the idea of the squares from the original image, where there were 3 buildings, one of which was covered in these large squares, resembling a cheese grater! I tried using the building in the composition but it looked too busy, so I removed the building and re-drew the squares myself on photoshop.

Look Up / Look Down Photos

These are just a few photos i've uploaded for using with the ipad. I've focused on the literal perspective of looking up / down.

iPad Life Drawing

Here's a couple of drawings that I did on the ipad as part of the life drawing ABC, I thought that it would be near impossible to create relatively accurate drawings with these tablets but I was pleasently surpised at how accurate they are! It was was really fun to draw with and the various media settings made it easier to create images with broader depth than traditional charcoal. I used a program called 'Sketchbook Pro' and would advise anyone with an ipad, to download this as it's really convenient for rapid or detailed observational drawings!

Observe & Experiment Project (Week 2 Summary)

The second week of the project was focused solely on developing ideas from the observational studies we'd collected the week before. At the end of the week we were expected to have produced 10 images using collage e.g magazines, photocopier, 4 digitally manipulated images through photoshop and 5 double page spreads with a combination of image and type.

Initially I struggled with developing a focus from my images that could immediately transform into a full blown, finished idea, too bothered about whether or not the idea would turn out ok rather than just trying and finding out after. So I decided to just shrug of my inhibitions and start experimenting with collage, even if I chose not to develop that idea or media it was still a starting point. I photocopied sections of images/found materials, readjusting the size and colour to create sheet images that I could use to cut out my shapes from. I played around with the composition of these until I'd made completely new ideas. For example, out of the sheet image of a costa cup, I made a steaming cup using collage.

Although I liked the end results of using collage, I preferred experimenting with stencils, I found it a much more enjoyable process as complex type with crisp fonts could be created using any sheet material suitable as a base media. I took phrases found in my drawings such as "Fresh" & the "i" on information boards and stencilled them into found bits of paper with interesting patterns or colours on. I also experimented with monoprinting over a stencil, although the end result didn't turn out quite as planned, and the ink that rubbed onto the stencil gave it a very distressed look and so I decided to use this as an idea. Again using a stencil, i tried out a variety of differenr media, from oil stick rubbings to ink and colour washes.

I've really enjoyed the second week of the project most because I've been able to experiment with a vast variety of styles and media and compare as to which i prefer, and by doing this I've found styles that i have an affinity for and will use in later projects.