Bjorn Rue Lie: Big Heads

We spoke to Bjorn Rue Lie today (who didn't feel comfortable showing his face) he discussed his process and showed us some of his work whist doing so. I don't really like Bjorn's style but he has got a good eye for colour. I would like to improve on my understanding of colour use, so maybe viewing more of his work will help.

Noma Bar Guardian Article

Here's an article on Nora Bar detailing his illustration of a language book:

http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/architecture-design-blog/2014/mar/26/chineasy-learn-chinese-characters-book-design

Photoshop: Worn Effect Practice

Today I learnt how to make a worn effect in Photoshop. I simply asked Google and found this page:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCZ2cl0CjMk

The process is actually incredibly simply.

- I found a stock image of worn paper on the Internet and opened it up in Photoshop.
- I then altered its Curves before changing it to Grayscale.
- Then I selected it all and copied it over to a new channel in my Postcard image (also opened in Photoshop).
- After this I went to Select and chose Colour Range.
- I played around with the field of selection somewhat and chose an area of the image to select.
- Then I went to my image layer and inverted the selection so as not to delete the majority of my image.
- Finally I pressed select and removed parts of the image to make it look worn.

Although I've had a bit of practice with this process I feel I can do it better. I may attempt to create the worn effect for these images again at some point.

Kiss Kiss Kill Kill

This morning before I came to the studio I went to the College's Kiss Kiss Kill Kill exhibition. The posters within displayed an array of women in different provocative poses. This will tie in well with my Context of Practice work in which I am examining how women have been objectified throughout modern times.

Thomas Flaherty Illustrator Portrait

I'm starting to play around with Adobe Illustrator. To get a bit more experience with the software I made an illustration of a lad I used to work with called Thomas Flaherty. I'm quite happy with the piece however there are some issues. For example I tried making my own swatch for it but it doesn't seem to have worked well making him look somewhat fat, I need to look at a way to suggest depth within vector imagery. I am however quite happy with the texture overall - specifically his hair and beard inspired by the work of Kristyna Baczinski.

Leeds Zine-Fest

I went to Leeds Zine fest today with Adam, Holly and Roweena and it was such an informative day! We first walked around and had a look at the wide array of different zones and such on sale. Then we went and spoke to Kristyna Baczynski who visited us a few days before in the studio. I asked her about a few of her processes (which I didn't have time to during the studio visit).

We later found out that the chaps running the Zine-fest were asking for participants to create work for a zine they were making on the day using Risoprinting. We jumped at the chance to learn this new process which turned out to be similar to screen printing in some aspects, however more technology based.

I really enjoyed today and hope to get some work ready for next year so I can attend the Zinefest as a selling rather than buying.

What is Illustration For?

What is Illustration for? When I was asked this during my interview I think I responded with something along the lines of 'to communicate an idea via imagery'. This is correct, but is also rather vague, there is so much more to illustration. Illustration IS a method of communication, but it can be done with a variety of tools and be displayed in an extensive number of ways. Illustration isn't just pencil on paper.

It can be used on food packaging, or be an image on a website and it can also be the front cover to a book among other countless things. What is important is that it serves a function - in that it communicates visually not necessarily with the aid of text. For example: illustration on a food product should communicate what that item is without the need for text.

It can also be used on book covers to give the reader a brief idea of what the context of the book is about without the need to read the blurb.

You can also find illustration within magazines. Here illustration is usually used to reinforce a piece of text or to promote it's contents similar to a book.

Although generally considered to be targeted at children, illustration is in fact targeted at everyone (or rather a specific audience for that product).

http://www.kristyna.co.uk/NME-Last-Christmas

http://www.jackteagle.co.uk

http://www.cineworld.co.uk/unlimited/howitworks

https://www.nintendo.co.uk

http://harrypotter.bloomsbury.com

Jackie Chan Adventures: Backgrounds

Whilst watching Jackie Chan Adventures today on Netflix (because I am a man child) I noticed how cool the background designs look with the colour rarely aligning with the line work itself.

It reminded me of Eiffel Tower design I made in Visual Communication. I may use this method for the rest of my work within the current studio brief: Greetings From….

Illustrator Tutorial: Isolated Selection

While I haven't learnt too much yet in the Illustrator tutorials that I don't already know this far, today I discovered the 'Isolation Mode'. This is a very useful time saving method of selecting a certain object within a grouped area of my Illustrator image.

If I have many objects grouped together in a layer and need to alter one specific object I can simply double click on the group. This opens 'Isolation Mode' where I can then select the exact object I want to alter. Once this is done I can close 'Isolation Mode' by simply pressing the back arrow at the top left of the window.

Vector Illustration

Publishing

Vintage Bond Collection Suzanne Dean (Vintage Books)

Coralie Bickford-Smith

Jason Levesque

Jen Wang

Michael Chabon

Promotion

Bonedaddy

Collaps09

Roberlan

Sebdesign

Strongstuff

Packaging

Kamila Mitka

Peter Gregson

Postler Ferguson

R Design

Studio H

Victor Branding Corp

Editorial

Daniel Hertburg

Daniel Teran

Jessica Hische

Zozu Edzech

Christina Sicoli