El Walsh Graphic Design: January 2013

31 January 2013

I Love Dust

My chosen agency is I Love Dust I was just so drawn to their work, I really like their bold use of typography and their playfulness which is also sort of strict at the same time. I was also really happy to find this agency as when asked in my university interview what I saw myself doing in the future I said that I'd like to work for big names like Nike and have my work recognised in the street (I was once an ambitious fool), so that combined with the typography just makes me think that this agency is me and this is what I would genuinely want to do. In a way seeing their work was just a reminder of how much I like graphic design.

Below are a few examples of their work that I particularly liked.

[Source] http://ilovedust.com/projects/by/type

These two pieces seem to be slightly different to the majority of the work they have produced due to the addition of the illustrative element and maybe this was why I was drawn to them, this explains what I meant in my previous post when I said that type can also dip into other areas of design which I like but don't like enough to do (or I'm not very good at). The top image however fits in more with the general feel of their collection of work and I'll explain that later in the post.

[Source] http://ilovedust.com/projects/by/type

Although they will have been employed to do so I like the use of the slogans here and this is an idea I might take forward into my own work when including my four pieces of information I might use a series of slogans or motos to explain me as a designer to these people, I think that would be a slightly different apporach.

[Source] http://ilovedust.com/projects/by/type

With these final two images I have picked out I like how playful they are and this like the slogans may be something i use as an idea for my own work, I think with a company like this which as a varied range of work it gives you freedojm to play and I also think that playing shows that you enjoy it and you have good ideas, you're willing to think differently, outside of the box.

Across all the work displayed on the website I have noticed a bit of a trend, although they may have been employed to do it, they seem to use a lot of black in their work and sometimes have splashes of bright colour and in their work there is no really link between each piece and it's typeface, almost every one seems to be different, I sort of find this a little strange when a fair few pieces are for Nike yet there isn't much standardisation between pieces like you'd expect with a brand or corporate identity when companies usually stick to the same font and have continuity. Another thing I found was that the agency like the idea of innovation which (if I treated this as a job application) I would clearly need to show that I agree with that idea in my own work; this will be somehtinbg I attempt to do.

Who am I as a designer?

Who am I as a designer is a question I have struggled to answer, I have found it hard to think about myself in that way as although I like certain parts of design I think the things which stuck out more when I was thinking about myself were the things I didn't like.

However, after thinking about it for a while I have chosen typography as my area of design. I chose typography because while I enjoy it on its own it also dips into other areas of design that I do like but not enough to want to do them all the time; for example it dips into illustration when it is hand drawn and I think it dips even more so into advertising and other 2D media and even sometimes 3D media. Therefore I think my choice of typography is the best way to encompass everything I like about design.

After making this choice I started looking at design agencies who work with typography and I found two that I really like.

The first is Central Illustraion, founded in 1983 I like the look of this agency because they work with a wide range of artists and looking at the work of the typographers they don't just take on artists who all follow the same style but there are a range of styles from paper cutting to hand drawn to vintage type, this appealed to me because I like multiple styles of typography (this also posed as a problem for me when looking for an agency).

[Source] http://centralillustration.com/artistswork.asp?type=typography

The other agency I found really excited me as it is more towards the advertising side of things and I really like the work that they have produced. Their work is very digital and not rustic (although a lot of the time I prefer a more rustic style) but one thing I liked about them was that they have worked for big names including Nike which caught my eye. This agency is called I Love Dust. (I actually found this by accident while looking for Dust collective but I'm glad I did)

[Source] http://ilovedust.com/projects/by/type

30 January 2013

Curated-by

Last Saturday I spent the day at the Cruated-by confrence and university where we got to see a range of speakers. First up was Morag Myerscough, se produces large pieces of work for public spaces, a couple of examples are below:

[Source] http://studiomyerscough.com/index.php

When she spoke about her work she didn't give lots of detail on a selected range of pieces but more of an overview of her portfolio which was ok although Iwould have prefered the first option, she did manage however to give a good back story to her work. In her actual pieces I really liked her use of space particually they way she chose to design gallery displays, I thought it was interesting how she used a sort of unconventional method where you'd expect quite small pieces she was working with prints 4 metres high. Another aspect of her work that I liked was her use of typography.

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The next speaker was Jack Schulze, he works in the tech side of design. I never thought that I'd find something like that interesting but I did. I liked the way that in his talk he explained things and didn't show too much.

[Source] http://berglondon.com/projects/

I though the Little Printer was a fantastic idea how it printed out a 'personal newspaper' and I think it's a good example of forward thinking although he admits that he didn't create it because he wanted it to be in the world he just did it. I think by far my favourite thing of his was his iPad app called Penki, this creates and image when the iPad is moved using single frames and being photographed with a slow shutter speed you get this light painting effect; as the owner of an iPad, when i get some free time I can't wait to have a go at this myself.

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The third speaker of the day was Jonny Kelly, he is an annimator by trade and works for a company called Nexus in London. I liked how he spoke about his inspirations because it's always nice to see things from start to finish and I liked how he said that previously as a student he never really saw the point in sketchbooks but when he went into industry he realised he was wrong in a way; he said, "sketchbooks are a useful brain-dump and we can use sketchbooks to slow our brains down to the right speed because we often don't have speace to think". I think this was really inspiring and before he said it I'd never really noticed how right he was about that so now i am starting to apply that to my own life.

This advert was designed by Jonny for Chipotle, a food company who were trying to show certain ideas about farming and the environment, I really like the annimation and it could be a possible inspiration for future projects particularly the print to pixel module coming up soon. I also liked what he said about the animation: "The graphic simplification of annimation allows you to tell stories that you otherwise can't" and I think this is definitely true especially when trying to appeal to a family audience.

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To end the day we had Erik Kessels, after flying all the way from Amsterdam his talk was great. He struck me as someone with humour from a country with humour and he was good at expressing his ideas. Personally I'd class him more as an editer than a designer with his more recent work although his earlier work is more graphic. I liked it when asked what he would class his self as creatively he replied "I am not anything, I don't have to choose, why should I choose, you don't have to be just one" and I somewhat agree, although it is great to have one fantastic thing under your belt why should that have to be the only thing.

[Source] http://www.abitare.it/en/graphics-2/kk-holiday-in-venice-teachme-7-fast-forward/

[Source] http://www.creativereview.co.uk/cr-blog/2012/april/erik-kessels-dad-north

His earlier work I think is great as it used humour to attract an audience and it worked, it is quite simple in design but sometimes simple is better. I liked his approach to his work "sometimes it's better to look in the side streets not where everyone else is looking" and in saying this he was demonstrating that design is all about risks, especially as a couple of his tv adverts caused a bit of contraversy. His more recent work is more focussed on found items and editing, he produced a series of books of found photography which when put together told a story of life. I found this interesting because I also have an interest in photography and I felt inspired.

Overall it was a great day and although the day was focussed on narative I think it was also giving out an overall message of 'do what you want in life', all the speakers had this in common, the took something they liked and made it into what they do for a living. I think the day was a great opportunity to hear people who are out there working, doing the things we want to be doing in a few years time, speak about their experience(s) and i definitely think it would be well worth going to something like that again, especially as these are pretty much one time oportunities.

Summary so far

So far in the project I have done a lot of research into paper crafting but I am still not very focussed on the practical side of things. I think the next steps for me now are to be more practical and get making some mock items. In order to do this I have collected some box nets and I am going to have a go at manipulating them and recording them in my sketchbook.
My next step will be to work on a brand and a logo design and decide on my target audience, so far I only have a very vague idea of this so I will do some internet research to come to a solution.

28 January 2013

Jeff Nishinaka

Jeff Nishinaka is an artist from Los Angeles who has produced work for some big name companies in the 28 years of his work. He uses a differnt techniques than anything I've previously looked at for producing 3D paper craft.

[Source] http://www.thedonutproject.com/inspiration/jeff-nishinakas-paper-sculptures/

This was the first piece of work I saw of his and I had to double take it to figure out if it was 3D work or not but it made me want to look more into his work. I think one thing which may have drawn me to this image isn't actually the technique but the fact you can relate to the work because who doesn't have a messy desk area? I would love it if I knew how his work was created because I'd have a go myself because I think you could create some really nice things with this, things to enjoy looking at.

[Source] http://www.thedonutproject.com/inspiration/jeff-nishinakas-paper-sculptures/

This image again is something we can relate to with all the world's landmarks. I really like the depth that has been captured here and I think my favourite part would have to be the Eifel Tower, such a level of detail even though it is set back within the image.

[Source] http://www.thedonutproject.com/inspiration/jeff-nishinakas-paper-sculptures/

Yet again a well known relatable image which I just had to include, I adore Nishinaka's work I think it is amazing .

[Source] http://www.thedonutproject.com/inspiration/jeff-nishinakas-paper-sculptures/

This reminded me of Su Blackwell's scenes with layers upon layers creating depth and overall a magical image.

[Source] http://inspirationfeed.com/inspiration/20-incredible-paper-sculptures-by-jeff-nishinaka/

This final image of Jeff Nishinaka's work I am showing is through pure amazement at the amount of detail that is in it even at the very back of the image, how it is done I don't know but instead of attempting it myself I will sit in awe wishing I could do the same.

Su Blackwell

Yet another way to show 3D is by creating a scene, Su Blackwell, a Sheffield born artist is known as a book sculpter because her medium is book pages. She almost uses the book and the stage and the pages as the set to create these scenes with the inspiration of the woods she used to play in as a child .

[Source] http://www.ideastap.com/IdeasMag/The-Knowledge/su-blackwell-interview

[Source] http://www.spring-fling.co.uk/blog/su-blackwell/

[Source] http://www.greendiary.com/10-papercraft-artists-world.html

I really quite like this style of working, it almost has a sense of quiet and magic about it. She doesn't always just cut paper and layer it but in the top image she is also rolling paper. I think her work is beautiful and I would really like it if I could find a way to include something like this in my work, I think it's quite different and a great use of paper.

Arguably 3D?

There are some artists which produce work which is great and somehow edges a place in my research for this project but something makes me think that it doesn't quite sit right. The common way to think about 3D is as a physical object you can hold, twist, turn - it has faces, sides, surfaces whatever you want to call them but there are some people who would class the examples I will show as being 3D even though they somewhat go against what I just said.

Simon Schubert

[Source] http://tigerprint.typepad.com/tigerprint/2009/05/simon-schubert.html

Is work like this really classed as 3D? Some people would say yes, others would say no and well I would say no. I don't think you can class this type of paper manipulation as 3D because it is more of an optical illusion and although areas of the paper may be a little raised by the effect it still isn't to me a 3D piece.

To me embossing, debossing or etching are not forms of creating 3D elements within pieces or work but more of a 2D decorative feature.

Rob Ryan

[Source] http://www.twitter.com/RobRyan_Art

Some people also seem to think that 2D paper artists such as Rob Ryan are 3D artists when they are not, this is simply because it doesn't, because it isn't 3D work until it is used in some way such as being bent into a shape or layered etc.

Jen Stark

[Source] http://www.jenstark.com/

Optical illusion is I think the most common thing to get confused as being 3D because that is really the point of it half the time but optical iiusion itself is not a 3D form of art, however, Jen Stark's work is both optical illusion and 3D which is great. She uses laters and layers of paper to create the illusion effect and it works well.

[Source] http://www.jenstark.com/

This example is different to her other work as you can clearly see it is 3D but the illusion comes with the depth of it with a mirror behind the boxes and then I assume that when you look from a straight on angle it would appear as a flat white square.

[Source] http://www.jenstark.com/

I like the idea of this piece but with this and all Stark's other work I wouldn't know how or where to use it and here I am just using it to explain a point of view.

Overall, even though all the ideas here are not 3D there may be some possibility to use them in my work to create extra effects especially in areas where I may not be able to create 3D; for example I could use embossing on an area of the graphics covering the 3D piece.

Ingrid Siliakus

Similar to Elod Beregazaszi this artist works in pop up. Ingraid Siliakus is an artist from Amsterdam and works in paper because she was inspired and has "given her a personal means of expressing herself" and each of her designs is created 20 or 30 times before the final piece and is drawn out layer by layer.

[Source] http://ingrid-siliakus.exto.org/

Both of these pop up buildings involve a massive amount of detail to a degree I won't attempt myself but I like the idea of pop up for adding an extra element to my final piece for my project and I think it could be effective if I used it well.

I think I also need to explore other ways of producuing 3D structures although I may come back to this method later.

Elod Beregazaszi

Apart from phyisical 3D objects you can hold an alternative way to create 3D things out of paper is by usuaing pop up. Elod Beregazaszi uses pop up in his work and has a studio which he set up in 2006 called Popupology, this is also the name of his website and it's a sort of play on words meaning the study of pop up (from what I can gather)

[Source] http://www.popupology.co.uk/

One of the first things you come to on his website are these pop up cards of famous places around the world, this could be an idea I could use to extend from our workshop with the brand logos we were asked to experiment with. I could also take something like this forward into my project and use it possibly to bring out certain elements in my work.

[Source] http://www.popupology.co.uk/

He also does very simple things like these business cards and space invaders and everything on his website comes with a free pdf so you can do it yourself. I like these simple ideas because they are useful and effective yet don't take a lot of effort to create. I like little things like these and I might have a go myself at something similar possibly with my logo design.

[Source] http://www.popupology.co.uk/

Another part of his work I like are the more compicated things he does like this lampshade, these involve a lot more detail and would be beyond my abilities but it is a good example of how paper craft can be used for a purpose instead of just being an object like some previous examples I have looked at on the blog.

Naruki Nakeamura

This artist is a Japanese origami artist who has what I'd call a secret which makes his work stand out above others who produce paper craft.

[Source] http://www.curiosite.com/scripts/news/ennews.php?frmIdPagina=10097

Just looking at this piece of work I thought it was amazing but then when you find out what it actually is it gets even more amazing; the heart is made up of origami gears which then create a moving form. This, however great it is, would be far out of my reach for this project although it is inspirational just to show what can be done. Below is a video which demonstrates the heart and why it is so good.

Libby Stanion

Libby Stanion is a designer who has come from a handmade and fabric background and uses it to create 3D structures in different materials.

[Source] http://cargocollective.com/lrsdesign#

In this 3D structure you can see that it is made up of multiple shapes and put together to create a new shape, I like this work because in a way it looks like something you can relate to like something you see in doodle form on the corner of an exercise book. This style could be something that I would consider for my own work because it is simple yet effective.

[Source] http://cargocollective.com/lrsdesign#

Here a similar shape has been created and repeated but this time it is made of fabric, this shows that these things don't nessecerily have to be made of paper and you can still produce the same effect. With this piece I also like how the stripes and colours are arranged although I'm not quite sure why, I can't pin-point it but it could be something to consider when making a background or theme colour when working with shapes with multiple sides as it shows it can still look good without it naturally flowing into the next face of a shape.

Richard Sweeney

Richard Sweeney is a sculpter from Huddersfield, he studied in manchester and got into the art of paper manipulation and now he has his work displayed in galleries around the world. I looked at his work because he was mentioned during our workshop so I thought I'd take a closer look at his work.

[Source] http://www.richardsweeney.co.uk/menu.html

This piece uses pleated paper to form this very intriguing shape with it's multiple different types of pleat all coming together to create a free standing structure; although I like this piece I don't think it would be anything I would attempt myself, mainly because of it's complexity. This is also different from things I have looked at previously where a shape is created from a single flat sheet of paper; I would assume that this is made up of multiple sheets.

[Source] http://www.richardsweeney.co.uk/menu.html

Here we can see what looks like an amazing piece of work which indeed it is although it is actually more simplistic than what it seems to be on the surface, it is actually made of up multiples of the same 3D paper shape. This is an idea that I could take forward into my own work as these kind of pieces can be considered as being "showstoppers" and if done correctly look great.

[Source] http://www.richardsweeney.co.uk/menu.html

I have included this piece of work because I think it is amazing how something so delicate can be made of paper yet be strong enough to hold it's shape, although this is somewhat ascthetically pleasing, for my project it wouldn't be functional I don't think as I would need some form of surface area to place text or image on to.

[Source] http://www.richardsweeney.co.uk/menu.html

In this image we can see some of Sweeney's development work for the pieces above and over similar projects he did at the same time.

More paper-folding

When I was looking at books the second book I found of interest was Folding Techniques For Designers From Sheet to Form. I found this book to be a great source of inspriation of things to try out and it even comes with a CD-ROM with templates which is very useful for me. The book had a range of things from simple pleating to some very complexed shapes with multiple folds.

[Source] p.85 Folding Techniques For Designers From Sheet to Form

This first example I thought was similar to our workshop when we were taking a net and addapting it and changing it's shape and this shape I found particularly interesting, I'm not sure how I could use this but it may spark some ideas for my practical work.

[Source] p.115 Folding Techniques For Designers From Sheet to Form

I found this piece interesting because of the shape and I like how the book shows how it would look if the folds were reversed, that is something I could possibly take forward into my own work if I was to create a paper structure of some sort which would then be turned inside out or be interactive.

[Source] p.41 Folding Techniques For Designers From Sheet to Form

This particular piece amazed me to thing that this was crafted by hand to be such an amazing shape yet this, and the other examples above, all use the same scoring and foling technique. I think it is a great way, yet again, of showing how much variety can be produced with the same materials. Although I would love to be able to create something like this of my own I think it would be a little too ambitious.

Paper-folding

After our workshop on paper engineering I went into the library to look at books based around the subject and I came across a couple of good books, the first one being; New Encyclopedia of Paper-folding Designs. The book mainly features ideas on different ways to fold leaflets etc (may be of use in future projects) but when I looked through I came across some examples which were similar to what we'd been doing in the workshop.

[Source] p.188 New Encyclopedia of Paper-folding Designs

[Source] p. 189 New Encyclopedia of Paper-folding Designs

We can see here from the template and the finished paper leaf that a series of scores have been made to create this 3D effect shape, I think this is effective to a certain degree and if you made lots of these it could be turned into something like a large wall display to give it more context than a single leaf. I think I prefer the second set of leaves with two layers of colour as it adds a bit more interest.

[Source] p.165 New Encyclopedia of Paper-folding Designs

These rabbits caught my eye as they show that applying a simple effect (scoring) to different shapes of paper can turn into something good and interesting.

[Source] p.92 New Encyclopedia of Paper-folding Designs

This net really interested me as something inspiring, I might use an idea like this for my project. I thought it was good because it has an interesting shape and it has a lot of surface area which here is greatly shown my the text going around the outside of the shape. I think something like this is definitely something which you could play with, especially with image and text placement.