Competition: D&AD New Blood

I was very pleased to of won a merit for the New Blood Awards with Seb for our entry to the British Council brief. We have been invited to a portfolio clinic on the 1st of July with leading industry figures to go through our portfolio. This is an amazing opportunity and hopefully i'll get some really good feedback on my portfolio.

Portfolio Meeting: PearlFisher

After not being able to attend my Pearlfisher portfolio meeting last time I was in London I regained contact with them again. I was pleased to see that she was still interested in getting me in to meet a creative director. I hope to arrange one for after submission with a printed portfolio.

THOMPSON: Portfolio Meeting

I had the meeting at Thompson with Jimmy and Ash and I felt the whole process was incredibly useful and helpful in understanding how professionals view your portfolio and projects and what stands out to them. They gave me some really useful feedback on my projects and what else they'd like to see. I'd actually cut down my boards to around 2 per project but they said they wanted to see elements brought out and shown big.

Feedback:

Femfresh:
- show it in the environment e.g. buses
- how could it connect with places/context - toilet roll?
- push the copy - show it by itself

Beadhive:
- more branding
- letterhead & stationary etc
- photography of products - got good photo skills so would be good to see them
- shoot beads in store

Posh Nosh:

- good composition
- perfect amount of the project
- got it straight away

Black Label:

- make the photos black and white and not sepia
- see it black on black eg. logo embossed
- see the logo bigger - detail of the script text
- bigger images of products - look interesting but can't see the detail
- show vintage photography by themselves

Feel Good:

- mock up on a bottle
- drinking going down in bottle - more clear

Break up the projects on separate pages so two don't show in one spread

Construct Agency - luxury design

Show build up of process - close ups and applications
Show info graphic of concepts or ideas

jimmy@thompsonbrandpartners.com
ash@thompsonbrandpartners.com

PPP: Third Floor

One of the surrounding studios I contacted is ThirdFloorDesigns in Cheltenham. They responded within the hour of sending the email and said they were all impressed with my portfolio which was a very pleasant thing to hear! From this we spoke about work placement and the details. There actually looking to fill a junior designer job so I need to make the decision wether this is what I want to pursue.

PPP: Emailing Studios

After looking at my situation after uni I decided that I would more than likely be moving back home therefore I started to email surrounding areas contacting them about kickstarting my career and looking at my portfolio. I researched in Birmingham, Evesham, Cheltenham and Oxford and selected a few studios which I emailed:

PPP: Print Portfolio

This is my print portfolio that i've created for my portfolio meeting with Thompson on Thursday. 

Visiting Professional: Ditto Press

Ben Freeman spoke to us from Ditto. I met him at Leeds Print Festival and so was slightly familiar with there work after looking through there stall.

He went through his early beginnings of working in numerous jobs and then going to college and uni and doing a masters. It was evident his experiences from a young age are what had influenced him and his practice.

I really liked his focus and determination to do things such as his friends doing a travelling gallery in a converted caravan which they then got work from. Things like this I think people are often scared to even think of now because it seems so out of reach however back then they just did it and it worked. I think, to me, it made it clear that things are possible if your willing.

I also found his year research into the war deaths really interesting and how it went and collected all these resources and information and then put it into something practical as a publication. This encouraged my view on the COP research book that we are expected to produce. His view on research and enthusiasm made me feel like I could do something interesting and exciting with my research rather than something boring and expected.

Visiting Professional: Dalton Magg

Stuart Brown came and spoke to us from Dalton Magg and ran through the process of creating a font as well as some of the fonts they have created.

I have never been so overwhelmed by such an art form. I have a whole new appreciation for typefaces after finding out the extent and detail put into forming one. I always thought I wouldn't no where to even begin and there would be just so much to consider in creating one but to be shown and told really put it into perspective. 

I no for definite typography isn't a practice I want to go into myself but I now look at type in a whole different way and with a lot of respect. It's made me consider my decisions more and to try my hardest to use it properly so that it's kept beautiful instead of being haggard by bad kerning etc.

Visiting Professional: Barrie Tullett

Type: What are you designing for?

eg. paper work has to be held

line length

8-10 pt (depends on type)

leading - enough white space

12-14 reads column width

Swiss - keep same pt size

- just alter weights

skip a weight - show a difference

never letterspace lowercase - ruins word shape

Dante -

I really enjoyed seeing his passion, fixation and enthusiasm for one topic that had just completely consumed his personal practice. It was really interesting to learn about aspects of Dante and then how he'd applied them in type design. They are very complex and deep ideas and yet when he explained the piece he had done to represent it, it was spot on and so simple in communicating it.

The Caseroom Press

I also really enjoyed looking through the publications they had produced. It just showed that craft and individualism isn't lost in publishing and bespoke items with stitching can still be relevant and produced.

PPP: YCN Annual

My work featured in the YCN Annual!

San Fan: Internship

In response to my email about the internship they replied surprisingly fast just requesting two things before they move any further with the process.

 Due to the visa having to have a host employer I replied with this. Hopefully this will be what they are after and will continue to the next stage of the process.

San Fran: Networking

I spoke to John about placements and contacting people etc. I mentioned about San Fran and gave me a list of people from San Fran that he sourced from linked in as an example of how to do detective work to source the right people to contact. 

He also named me Alex Broadhurst who is a senior designer at Apple and studied at Leeds Uni. His friend Jimmy Smith is an ex LCA. This shows how you can get close to people through connecting on linked in.

Placement: Analogue

I had decided to look for studios local to me now for placements as I do love what the north are doing design wise and also its practical financially. I found a studio called Analogue situated at the bottom of town which I really liked there projects. Therefore I've emailed them about going for a studio visit.

PPP: Involve Studio

On the phone I asked about placements after thats what the course requires and would be more accessible for me now. She said they've never done placements before and wasn't sure wether it would be worth while as it could take awhile to get shown the ropes.

However Monday morning I received this pleasant email!

My plan of action is now to ring Vickki to clarify what they mean by the email and to make arrangements from there.

PPP: Involve Studio

On the phone I asked about placements after thats what the course requires and would be more accessible for me now. She said they've never done placements before and wasn't sure wether it would be worth while as it could take awhile to get shown the ropes.

However Monday morning I received this pleasant email!

My plan of action is now to ring Vickki to clarify what they mean by the email and to make arrangements from there.

The Dream: San Fran

THE DREAM: To go and work in San Fran for a period of time.

ACTION: So I wanted to go to San Fran but financially I couldn't afford to just go there and live so I thought what better than to go and work there. However it's easily said than done with Americas really strict visa rules etc. I've looked online at internships and graduate schemes as I thought this might be the best possible way of approaching working there:

However it was still difficult to figure it out. I also contacted Max Gregory who graduated last year as him and Niall went for about a month and visited studios. He gave us some great advice and said although they didn't have any response to there emails they just went to the studios and people were generally friendly and helpful. They visited different ones the entire time they were there so there appears to be plenty to see! I also went to speak to STA travel about working abroad and possible help with sorting it. They explained that Australia is a lot easier and cheaper to go work in but usually in other fields of work such as farming and hospitality. There visas only last a year though but you could try look for design jobs whilst there doing another job. America they explained was a lot more complicated when it came to visas.

I decided to look at studios in San Francisco myself to see if there were any in particular that I could target. I also tried to find ones which also had UK based studios so that I could try and take the path from working here originally and transferring. I found quite a few that I liked the look of.

When looking at the sites I did look to see if they had any internship programmes. A lot said to pop in with your portfolio and they'll try look at it, not really practical for me being thousands of miles away however. I found this internship on one of there sites which is paid! It would have to be a paid internship if I was able to do it due it being financially impossible to live there without it being.

Leeds Print Festival Talks

Creative Review
Patrick Burgoyne

I really enjoyed this talk and found a lot of what he said really powerful.

I thought this video was beautiful. He spoke about how instead of generating this quickly by doing it digitally they did a process that meant making a story. I found this really interesting and exciting.





This was another example he gave, by generating it in a longer and special technique it created a story. Although it may not be obvious when watching the advert on the tv that this is how they produced it even none creatives where fascinated and interested in the making of it when seeing this video. Which you can't blame them because it's beautifully crafted and this shows in the end result.

Leeds Print Festival

I wanted to create some prints which would be functional and beautiful so I created different geometric patterns for postcards. I wanted them to be simple but striking.

I then applied colour to see how the pattern would look if I screen printed them in bright colours.

I also tried overlaying the two colours so I could create one colour prints and two colour prints which overlay the patterns to create new ones.

Another idea I had was to create a gradient with two colours so I also mock up how this could look.

Another functional piece I wanted to print for the festival was these envelopes where you can write on one side and fold it up, lick and stick it together and post it.

I tried out similar colour schemes and ideas as the postcards as it would make the process cheaper to stick to a few colours.

I decided to make a few alterations to make the detail nicer such as curved corners and dotted lines.

Also to make the envelopes more interesting I added a simple spotted pattern which is where the stock colour could act as a second colour to a one colour print. I felt this was simple and effective

To mix up the postcards slightly I chose a second format so I could create two different ranges. I then expanded the patterns as I realised I had more room on the screen.

As Steph was unable to host the stall at Leeds Print Festival me and Katie stepped in and took her place. We collected the classes prints and brought them to the event. We had to lay them out strategically as it was only a small table and we had quite a few prints to sell.

I attempted to screen print but due to being really ill with an infection and bad back I had to leave and  sadly was unable to create my prints in time for the event. I did however bring the marble prints that me and Sam generated in creating the flag for the Dr.Me brief.

We struggled with the pricing of our work and a lot of people said we were underselling our work and people wouldn't buy it if it appeared cheap from its price. We did act upon on this and raise the price slightly early on in the day which didn't seem to hinder our sales which was good. Overall we raised £97 as a stall and it was interesting to see peoples reactions to work and what sold. A very useful experience and I would now feel more confident in going to print fair and would be more prepared.