Still life: a modern vanitas

I did a still life based on the Dutch vanitas paintings. these paintings showed wealth, and often showed things like meat, but their aim was to show the passing of time, to give the idea that wealth doesn't last forever and death is inevitable. They show the meaninglessness of earthly belongings. The paintings often showed egg timers or clocks, skulls and bones, and flowers. i wanted to merge this idea with modern life and consumerism, to show both how short life is, and how much people rush nowadays. The traditional vanitas paintings were painted in a very realistic style, so i wanted mine to contrast to this by being a very simple line drawing.
I drew a digital alarm clock, to represent time passing, a chocolate wrapper to show how people don't eat proper meals a lot of the time and instead rely on pre-packaged foods and snacks. I also drew a dead leaf, instead of flowers, because many people do not have gardens any more and the only nature they see is on their way to work. It is autumn at the moment and there are beautiful leaves all over the floor, but nobody stops to appreciate them.

Textiles: monoprinting

Mono printing was one of the ways we looked at to apply pattern. I also used collage under the mono prints  For this one I used red and grey ink, over the top of a collage basic fish shape. I also used masking tape to create voids in the lines of ink

For my next one, I used scrap paper to block off the llama shape from the red and grey ink. I think I used too much ink on the plate because it printed onto the parts that I hadn't drawn onto, but I think this was a good effect because it made random shapes in the background.

I then made one using red, orange and grey, and it had quite a patterned design. my favourite part of this one is where I have used red ink after the grey to fill the gaps in the grey pattern.

My last one was more simple, I used less ink so the background would be plain, and just used red and orange so it wouldn't be too busy. I think this is very illustrative, and I like the simplicity of just having lines, with no shading or tone.

Overall, I really enjoyed the mono printing, but it was difficult because I wanted to lean on the paper, but this would have transferred onto the design, so I had to be very careful.

Illustration: Observational bird drawings

 In our first day of illustration, we were doing observational drawings of stuffed birds.

 The first drawing we did was with our non-drawing hand, so for me my left hand. This was to create a looser drawing, and to capture the basic shape and essence of the bird. We then did another drawing of the same bird, on top of the previous drawing. I like this because of all the overlapping shapes and messy lines.

 This owl was drawn without looking at the paper, just looking at the owl. At one point. my graphite stick fell off the edge of the paper. The basic shapes are all there, but aren't all in the right place.























This toucan is drawn using the same method, but with a felt tip pen. I like the shape of his beak and his feet. It looks like a toucan even though his head isn't complete.

This is my favourite of my bird sketches, it was done mainly looking at the bird, and only glancing at the page. I like it because it is very simple but also very accurate to the real bird.

Rebecca Robinson: Illustration

In illustration we have been looking at many different styles of illustration, but the illustrator I have liked the most is Rebecca Robinson, both because of her delicate detailed drawings, and her subject matter. She does children's book illustrations and scientific type illustrations of insects and animals

 I really love the detail on this beetle, at first I thought it was a photo, because the reflections are so realistic.

This picture is more brightly coloured, and it is for a children's book, so would go with a story. The bit I like most is the ladybird in the corner, because of the bright red. The cats eyes and the dandelion are very vivid as well, but because of the white background it still looks very fresh and not too garish.

Typography

We have been exploring different ways of creating hand rendered typography. We copied lettering off objects such as bottles and tins using a variety of mediums and methods.

for this design, I created a collage background using envelopes and graph paper, so the background had patterns on but wouldn't distract from the type. I used a graphite stick and one continuous line to make the lettering, so had to look very closely at my object to get the lettering accurate because if one part of my line was not in the right place it would affect the look of the whole of it.

For the next one, I created diagonal stripes using ink to make the background. I then used a stick dipped in ink to draw the lettering. I found this quite difficult because I had to hold the stick by the end so it was hard to control, and it was also hard to know how much ink to use to make a bold outline but not too much so it would drip.

This was the one that challenged me the most, as I did it with my left hand (I'm right handed) and it was Chinese writing so the shapes were unfamiliar and I had to concentrate very hard to get the lines in the right place. I think this was fairly successful, because the blue oil pastel really stands out from the brown ink background.

This one was my favourite method. we used masking tape to make the letters (or numbers, in this case), and then rubbed shoe polish on, to make a sort of haze around the letters, but very sharp lines on the inside because of the straight edge of the tape. I like the outcome of this because you do not create the letter, but rather the space around it, a negative of the letter itself.

More Graphic Design Research

Jonathan Calugi
I like the intricacy of Calugi's works, each one made up of lots of smaller images and shapes. He also uses very few colours, so even the very complicated and detailed images aren't too busy.









Janine Rewell
I like this work because of the shapes she has used, but also the way she has used the human body. this was made by putting vinyl stickers onto the model's skin, and then using a tanning booth to tan the parts of the model that weren't covered up.













Jean Jullien
Jullien's graphic design is very illustrative, and often includes hand rendered typography. I like the bright colours she uses, and the black outlines are very bold.









Fabien Barral
I like Barral's typography, because he uses images inside the letters, and keeps to one or two colours so his designs aren't overly complicated but are very effective.








David Airey
I think what strikes me most about this piece of brand identity design is Airey's use of colour. He has used all different shades of blue in the background, and this theme is carried on into the photo. I really like the simple shapes and geometry of this, and i think it is very effective as all the viewers attention is directed at the photo and the brand name.





David Carson
David Carson is a graphic designer and typographer, and some of my favourite works are ones where he has overlaid type onto a photo, because he does it in such a way that makes them work together, with neither one overpowering the other.