Procrastination: Zombie Maker

Yesterday I almost sat down to do some summer project research until I realised that I could have more fun by turning my friend Nik into a zombie. I'd done something similar for a Zine I created for coursework this year, which he really liked and so when he said this I set about turning him into one (but more gruesome and gory than I've done before)

It's sad to say that this is the first bit of art I've created this summer for fun, rather than for someone else. Suppose I had to start somewhere! 

- Original Photograph -

- Zombie Nik - 

Moroccan Patterning: Repeat Pattern/Texture (Final Option)

The final option I created for the Moroccan food van I was asked to design for (at my internship) was a repeat pattern I made using a pattern I found and a texture that I created. This actually turned out to be my favourite result of them all, and annoyingly it only took me about 1 minute to create as I was messing around with some Photoshop effects for some ideas, and this happened! 

Yet again, it's another case of a happy accident when it comes to me creating patterns!

I kinda hope the client picks this pattern to cover his van!

It's definitely the best, in my opinion!

Final Animation Sequence!

Finally finished my animation today!

Watch it here! :D 

Big thanks go to Nik Stojkov and Phil Canvin for all their help with the sound! 

Animation: Storyboarding

Once again, something I anticipated that would take me less than half a day has consumed almost the entirety of it! Today I've been working on finishing everything to do with my animation, which includes a story board and character sheets (still on my to do list before the night is through) and I've pretty much had to re-draw the entire thing, but in a simpler form. I definitely couldn't have done a storyboard with as much detail as the actual animation and to be honest, it's not necessary.

I'm fairly happy with how this is looking so far. Still some finishing touches to add before I get on those character sheets though. ROLL ON 9TH MAY! Summer has been well and truly earned by everyone on my course this year.

Zine Complete! - Layout Previews

I'm actually quite excited that I've finished my zine! I've put a lot of hours into it recently to make it better than it was before my first informal assessment and it's totally paid off (i think). 

A few people have seen unfinished spreads in there and a few have even asked for a copy themselves, which is a real compliment! Hard work does pay off! 

Here are some previews of the spreads I have included in the finished piece.

These of course are not the final things though - just a teaser!

Making Texture: Another Happy Accident

Yesterday I was attempting to make a textured background for one of my magazine pages using an image I found of a bit of rust. With some twisting and turning of the image I managed to create this FREAKIN' AWESOME pattern in the texture!

Sadly, it was too detailed to use as a background but it'd be perfect for using as a tiled image somewhere else! I like these happy accidents I have! :)

Exhibition Poster Graphics: I Finally have an idea!

Finally, after many weeks of despising the promotional side of my Exhibition project I have an idea of what I'm doing with it. I had a tutorial with a tutor and some other students earlier today and this wasn't precisely what they suggested I do after looking at my initial plans, but what I then went on to draw helped me come to this conclusion!

The exhibition is based around the WW1 Uncle Sam posters (well, a selection of them) by James Montgommery Flagg and so I wanted to make a little insignia / logo that I could apply to all promotional items, and tonight... I have finally done it!

I started off in illustrator with my original silhouette line work and added a circle and some lines in for later on. 

I then took the image into photoshop and added colour to make it look like the American flag, and also changed the outline colour to white to stop it looking so cartoony.

Finally, I added some texture as I wanted to make it look less harsh on the page, and everything looks better with texture in my opinion! I'm not sure if this is going to be my final logo idea, I think it's probably worth still playing around with colour levels, but I'm finally optimistic that I'll finish the project with at least one piece of promotion! 

Day: Successful

Creating a brand identity: Poster Promotion

These three screen shots are the three final ideas I had for promotional posters for a graphics project. The whole logo and theme of the brand is based around the old, retro play buttons on cassettes and personal stereos - but with a modern twist. Logically, I called the range 'Play' and Goji is the brand that I am designing for. 

The posters are just an accompaniment to a pattern and a packaging based project, but I thought it'd be nice to try to tie in a poster with it for additional content.

This first one for me makes no sense to the actual theme of the range that I've already created, but it does look nice! 

This for me is one of my favourite designs but it also doesn't fit the existing theme of the range, as it's very minimal texture with lots of white space and is meant to resemble a spray paint type effect with the gold. This is just very decorative. 

This one however DOES fit the style I've been working with and I've also tried to make it look like a paint drip to tie in with the look of the pattern. This is the one I will be developing a little more to make my final poster. All it will need is some added information about the brand and it's good to go!

Making Texture With Spray Paint

Today I've been trying to make a sort of abstract pattern using spray paint. The purpose for it is to act as a colour scheme / texture scheme for a project I am working on involving creating an identity.

I tried spraying onto paper and then taking some of the paint back off with crumpled up magazine pages, which worked fine but the best effect I was able to create was made by spraying onto acetate and then extracting. 

This first image is done using white paper, but the magazine paper I used to pick select bits off the page couldn't take as much of the paint off the page as I wanted it to, to reveal more white underneath. 

This second image is much more successful and was created using acetate. Because it is transparent, when I scanned it in - the gaps became even more white due to the light scanning it. Double win! 

This is the image I'll be using for my final colour/texture scheme in project.

These two final images are just the paper I used to cover my floor so I didn't get paint on the carpet! The different layers of paper and acetate that were laid on them made a pretty cool pattern though! 

Animation: Preview Clip

The past two days I've been trying to refine and perfect the scenes in my Animation sequence ready for next weekend when I am hoping to add in my sound effects and Narrative. I've finally gotten around to adding in a small black dot to represent a small fly that my frog looks up to eat. 

This clip is just a small section of the scene. 

Check it out!

My Book Design: Professionally Printed

I came home yesterday from a birthday trip and amongst some other packages, this beauty was waiting for me. If anything I think it excited me too much... But it looks so cool! And knowing I made it just adds to it. I feel sorta proud of something and it doesn't happen often!

So relieved that it's another thing I can now cross of the To Do list! :)

Zine Design: Making Changes / Updating Template

This morning I concentrated my time on bringing my Zine design up to date and making some changes that I though were necessary for my next assessment. The thing I was most concerned about was one of my comical 'style' pages that focusses on 'What apron is best for your body type' (Since my Zine is based on a Good Housekeeping-style magazine for the dead housewife)

The thing I didn't like about it was that I had originally hand drawn, and then scanned in my illustrations, which looked fine, but have ended up not looking like the rest of my illustrations in the Zine as I have done the rest of them digitally. 

Today was all about drawing in some new heads and adding them to the existing bodies. 

Below are the line drawings of the new heads, meaning to be a mix of all ages to fit the theme of the magazine - and then the final result of the page when imported into InDesign.

Animation Preview: Clip Still Under Construction

I thought I'd take a quick screen recording of one of my animation scenes to show you. 

I haven't yet finished the scene - I still need to add a bounce into the leaves when the frog jumps on each one and some sound, as well as play around with the graph editor to make the jumps look a little more weighted and lifelike! 

What's going on here has taken me a good few hours to make considering it's only a 12 second clip, but thats due to the fact that there's so many layers involved. Typical of me to make things more difficult than they need to be! Ah well. Hopefully it'll turn out good in the end! 

Animation Development: New Background Design

Today I've been continuing with some animation work and I've started making up the components of my next scenes background! I love adding texture to things like this, it gives it so much more character and life, and I even messed about with the blending options just for a bit of fun!

Original Image with black outline

Original Image, No outline

Altered Image - Looks tropical! 

Final Image - White Outline

This is what I'll be using in my animation for the background. 

It fits with the style I've created so far and looks pretty cool too! I'm happy.

Finished Book Design: Loco Motion

I have finally finished my Print on Demand book and I am very happy with it! I'm hoping the quality is as good on the printed version as the preview of it that I have of it online. It's taken such a long time to do and it's caused me a LOT of problems so I'm hoping it'll be worth it. 

You can actually preview my book by following the link here!

http://www.blurb.co.uk/bookstore/invited/3406253/d9eb1a1d96caf352e768ea03561c74e3583bddeb

Here is the dust cover I have designed to wrap around my book. 

Print On Demand: Continued Development

I haven't posted anything in a while as I've taken a few days off due to it being Easter holidays and all. However in terms of work I'm just adding the finishing touches to my Print On Demand book for a bookmaking brief. I am slightly behind with this due to the time off I've taken but I'm hoping that by the end of the day it'll all be sorted and ready to be sent off to be printed! 

I think the hardest part is figuring out what kind of narrative/text I want to accompany the images.

Full spread preview

Close-up of selected pages (Unfinished)

Close-up of Line/Ribbon Detail

Animation: Sequence Sketches

Animation is currently taking up a lot of my time at the moment and no wonder when you have to draw every little movement in a different sketch! I'm trying to enjoy the process, and when I see the final sequence coming together the effort you've put in does make you feel good, it's just the hassle and stress whilst doing it that gets me down. Especially if you have to re-draw something that doesn't fit properly. Thankfully for these, tracing paper was a life saver and Im not that bothered that they change shape slightly. It'll make for an interesting transition I'm sure. 

These images are part of a sequence where my frog is looking up to catch a fly.

Animation: Background Design

I keep forgetting how long making one part of an animation takes! As part of my second scene I've started to create these layers, which will form part of a forest-type background for me to animate over the top of. To fit my running theme / style of illustration I've given them a white outline with painterly textures overlaid within the leaves. Something tells me this is going to take a lot longer than I had planned to make everything this way though. 

Bring on the sleepless nights! 

Typography: Creating Letters In Smoke

This is another example of some older work I have done last term but its something I really enjoyed making even though it took me around 4 hours! This was a part of a project where I had to create my own Zine (small magazine), which could be based on anything I liked. My topic was a kind of "Good Housekeeping" guide for the dead housewife (so a twist on your standard preconception of this sort of magazine). 

This isn't the title of my magazine but the text created for an advert type page for a new perfume called 'Mascarilla', which I believe means 'Death Mask'. I added a Day of the Dead sugar skull into the foreground and made it look like it was spraying this text out of a trigger spray at the top of its head, so it was all very stylised and awesome (I think!) Lets hope the effort is worth the long term grade!

Before and After: Vectorising An Image

I'm still working on my Animation project, slowly but surely and yesterday completed the main image for the final scene of it. (Even though I've not made the middle of it yet, hah!) 

I thought it was an interesting before and after shot, and it was my first time of trying to make an image made completely of Vectors in Adobe Illustrator so I learnt a few different things from Googling my problems. I'm sure there's quicker ways to do what I did but considering it was my first attempt at a fully Vectorised image, without using Photoshop for the majority of the work I think I did pretty well. 

I'm not quite sure what name to give him though. Thoughts............?