Padd Solutions

If there is anything I need to do more, it's open my eyes. I have to admit I have been quite closed off from the world around me. Getting stuck in the same old routine for idea generation and not looking for any real inspiration harms my personal creative development. So, today whilst flicking through creative review I found an article on this London based illustrator and I liked the illustrative style he had. His website has a taste of what to expect from him

I felt that this type of design related to my pure brief design. This example is one which made me think about my own poster design for the pure brief. I think the illustrative approach is quite similar although the detail in this is much more apparent than in my work.

This example is probably my favourite which was taken from his website. I also like the fact that illustration makes it on to the front page of g2 (every issue I have seen has been just a bog standard photograph).

I have been looking around the net for an orange mobile campaign that I have not been able to find but I remember seeing somewhere before. Now I have found some examples, I shall post them. These illustrations by Marcus James were part of a poster campaign for Orange some time ago. I think I remember seeing something similar when I arrived for an induction in one of the old studios.

This approach is something I can relate too as I find typography can be stunning on it's own without the use for complications. The simple look, I think, is much harder to master appose to poster, or spread full of illustration, images and bright colours. I feel designers sometimes try too hard to make things work, rather than allowing the shape of typography to capture and hold attention.

Is this one of the best campaigns around? no. However, I think it takes a certain amount of guts to pull out something like this on what I assume would be a massive budget. I would like to work with this approach and develop my designs further. However, I want more of a hand drawn feel to my work.

I found this guide book in the library all about perspective. It could be really helpful, so I'll post up some scans. It has loads of examples which might be useful to my development. It has examples from basic perspective to more creative perspective and everything in between..

This is a very basic example of perspective showing what the eye sees from 2 different angles.








These are two examples from the book of simple one point perspectives.













This next example includes tonal shading as well as a two point perspective.

I have been doing some research into the subject as an extension on the session we had as part of the visual language module. I found a book in the library called 'Pictograms Icons and Signs' and I must say it has been helpful when developing my own sketches. Mine were a little complicated so I have used the book to work on my own into something more professional looking.


These icons are a great example of commercial icons which were used in the yellow pages. Even without colour we still have a good indication into what the icons represent.

So, I come back with renewed hope and an idea of what I would like to do for the next part of this investigation. My experiments have been lacking and I need to tighten up on this project. I am still confused as to what I have to actually produced for this as my brief says nothing about target audience and the fact that this project has to come to a head with some sort of product or final piece. I was assured in the crit that I needed a target and a focus so this should hopefully clear that up.

I have decided upon using identity as the focus of the brief, and continuing my investigation into line using natural lines. I'd like to create some sort of book of illustrations which will look at the differences in hand lines and also finger prints. I want to take photographs of peoples hands and also get an finger print from them. I will then use digital illustration and copies of the finger prints and focus one page per person. Analysis will go with the hand lines to show the various lines a palm reader uses when telling fortunes.

As for the target audience, first and foremost the people featured in the book would undoubtedly have an interest and other people who could be interested in the book could range from people interested in spirtual enlightenment to those who are interested in science and nature.

The questions I got back from Leigh, Mitch, Alex and Lauren were all suggesting I keep to the natural theme in one way or another, so I this only reinforces my decision to keep on track with this and leave behind the landart which was beginning to seem more like a fine art approach.

Rules = Can only use 4 colours + stock
No photography
Has to be a book

I had a few good ideas to go into the crit with today. I had reservations about how the group would respond but they all seemed quite positive. I did my usually thing like talking quickly and cramming a lot of stuff in but not trying to be confusing at the same time.

Just got this as my new brief, and I am really very happy, especially when I saw what I could have ended up with. I have already considered my target audience and what form my ideas may take.

My target audience is going to involve children/teenagers who are bored whilst travelling. I thought of this before even doing any research into the game itself. After researching I found that 20 questions can be played by anyone and everyone and more importantly it can be played anywhere. It's free to play and it's good for long journeys and keeping children entertained.

My ideas are already starting to take form and I am thinking that the scale of this should be fairly small and so it can be carried around easily. My audience definitely need to know the rules of the game as well as maybe some suggestions for typical categories they could choose when playing the game.

I need to do some market research now to find out where my target audience goes, who with and what they eat, watch and see. I need to be obviously careful when dealing with children and young teenagers so I am not going to be stopping them in the street. So I have decided to sign up some chat and discussion forums and pose questions and hope for replies. This seems like the best thing to do given the amount of time I have.

Some of the questions I will pose are:

What age group do you fit into?
8-12
13-15
16-18
19+

What's your favourite fast food restaurant? (one can choose more than one)
McDonalds/Burger King
Pizza Hut/Pizza Express
KFC
Subway
Other (please state)

Do you go on holiday? If so where?
Abroad
UK

Do you hate long car/bus journeys?
Yes
No
It's ok

What do you do to pass the time on journeys? (you can choose more than one)
play games
listen to radio/music
talk
other (please state)

If you play games, which do you play?
electronic games
word games (20 questions, I spy, etc) (please give examples)

I had a little presentation crit and I thought I was doing ok, even though I had not really spent as much time as I would have liked on this brief. I explained what I was trying to do, and I feel as though I have become lost in experimentation, which I thought was a good thing, but I have to almost reign myself in and restrict my work to something with more focus. I need a target audience and a final piece at the end of the brief, something which I haven't thought about. I am annoyed with myself because I should have thought about all of this instead of going off on a tangent with different experiments.

The only good to come of my wildness is that I have alot of experimentation to draw on and make some design decisions. I'm still enjoying studying Land art but I feel as though its something I am doing for myself rather than for a fixed audience. It's as though I thought this was going to be an investigation with an answer to 'what is a line?' but not to produce something of any substance.

The next thing you'll hear from me on this is when I finally make a decision on where this is going. I need to decide and quick!

These are a couple of images of a mini land art experiment I did. It all seems pretty pointless now though...

I thought I would take a few minutes to talk about this brief as I think it's the first brief I feel happy with. I feel I have a good deal of research, ideas and resolved finals to feel good about my time management. At first this brief felt like something that would get in the way, but whether I win or not I'm happy with the work I have produced and this is not often the case, particularly on a brief that lasted just a week.

I had my feedback from fellow students and there were some opinions on the aesthetics of the finals but nothing that would affect my final outcome greatly. I realise I could have tweaked a couple of things and darkened the colour, but I felt this was all down to personal preference. I submitted my entry online at www.dontpanicmedia.com a little while ago and now I am ready to move on to the next brief.

Overall, I have enjoyed working on this but that is mainly because of the way my ideas came together. I may decide to tinker with the final a little more before the module submission but I don't think it requires a complete overhaul.

In the end I decided to make a montage/thumbnail poster with different babies on and different names on the labels. Some were clearer than others and the only potential flaw I see in the work is the scale of it. Some of the labels may not read as well as some of the others. At A2 scale this would not be a issue though.

Seen as the target audience for this poster is older students who like to be made to think and rethink, I believe that this poster would appeal to them and but I also feel that the message is spelt out a little too much. However, I would rather have the concept there than risk people not grasping my concept.

In this session we looked at lighting as well as using a light meter to get the correct exposure. Will, Jonny, Ed, Luke and I were all in a group together and were basically taken various shots to gain a better understanding. Jumping into the process of taking images was better than learning from a book and I felt this session could have lasted longer. I have a few examples of images taken but Will has the rest of them and I should have got more examples from him.

I was in some of the shots but these were the only ones I could find.