Tuesday, 17 May 2016

OUIL603 - Summative Statement

This has been an incredibly rewarding module to complete. Looking at work from last year, my work has moved forward so much more than I thought it would. In my statement of intent, I set myself the goal of getting better at producing portfolio-worthy work in less time. I think I’ve definitely achieved this, looking at the amount of work I’ve produced this year and am happy to include in my professional portfolio.
As a side effect of this, I’ve also slowly remedied the concern that I’d had since last year – my seeming lack of a developing tone of voice. Re-visiting the War Horse brief and updating the illustrations to make them tighter is what really opened my eyes to what my work looks like and how I like to produce it. Seeing how well they turned out afterwards was really beneficial to my confidence as a practitioner.


Although I also said that I wanted to stop relying on digital so much and work on my traditional skills, if digital suits my practice then I’m prepared to just come to terms with it. I’ve at least learnt that the whole process can’t be digital – it has to start traditionally and then be added to with digital. Regardless, I still have the screen print side of my practice, which has come a long way since just the beginning of the year. I learnt something new each time I went down to the print room and now feel as though I can leave here confident enough to continue growing not just as an illustrator, but also a printmaker.

OUIL603 - Project Report

OUIL603 - Updated Statement of Intent

OUIL603 - Presentation Boards

Studio Brief 1: Screen-printed Gig Posters

   

Studio Brief 2: Astronomical (Big Kahuna)
Studio Brief 3: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
Studio Brief 4: War Horse

Studio Brief 5: Smaller, Responsive-style briefs (Penguin, Secret 7", Orion)
Studio Brief 6: D&AD x Shutterstock

Studio Brief 7: The Bell Jar
Studio Brief 8: Lolita
Studio Brief 9: Naked Lunch

Monday, 16 May 2016

Astronomical - final boards

Here are the final boards for my Astronomical brief, outlining the material created for the project:

I'm incredibly pleased with how this project has turned out. Even though I didn't get to make my screen printed concertina, or even a screen printed book, I think the quality of my posters is top-notch and the book that I've mocked up looks really slick.

Having the main imagery for the project presented in a boxed design means that it has translated well to the inner book spreads and the vinyl sleeves which I've mocked up. I've been told that some of the poster designs, such as Jupiter would look good on textiles, though I don't feel as though mocking such products up would give me any better understanding of my imagery, especially as I am not a textile designer.

The final imagery was produced as a result of me simplifying both my scientific and visual research more and more. Simplification has been key  for me this module, and has resulted in me making some really interesting images. The lengthy research period was enjoyable as it fed into my practical development very quickly through my planet paintings. Once I understood how I could visualise the planets, I was able to go back to researching and pick out what were the most relevant points to read up about. I feel as though this is an even more organic synthesis than exhibited in my COP module.

Although I can't submit a physical version of my book, at least I have produced all 36 spreads and the binding design. I intend to get it sent off it blurb.co.uk to get it printed soon though, as I would like to have a copy.

This brief has been a great exercise in my abilities as a screen printer and designer - the designs/quality of the posters and the book is well beyond anything I've produced on this course before, making it a suitable end to the module.

Astronomical - Book complete

I decided that for the front cover I would have a big red sun, as I think it's a lot more eye-catching than a diagram of the solar system. It's a bit more representational than the images inside, but I think it's okay to have this sort of contrast existing between the outside and inside of the book.

I'm really happy with how the book looks. Giving the planet pages a white background, while also featuring some full bleed darker spreads in between breaks up the flow in a refreshing way. I also think that having the poster catalogue at the end is a good way to really tie together the print series and the books. It makes the book and prints seem like companion pieces.

It's a shame I don't have time to print and bind it, but I would really like to after submission. I'm not sure exactly how I would go about binding it though. I like the idea of a perfect bind, but perhaps sending it off to a professional printers like Blurb would be the best way to do it.
I drew a mocked up perfect bound version and I think it could look pretty cool:
Very sleek, I'm excited to send this off to a printers. Would be nice to get a couple printed, with one to put in the show.

Saturday, 14 May 2016

Introductory spread

I started designing the introductory spread today, which is meant to introduce the solar system and have some information on its origin. I wanted to have a whole image of the solar system as I thought it would make sense before delving into the close up surface images I have produced. I made a rough solar system on Illustrator and then fiddled with it on Photoshop to get the final shape and colours.



I was going to have this kind of image on the front cover of the book, but I felt as though its diagrammatic nature betrayed the impact of the main inner illustrations and the posters. I'll have to come up with something else more interesting to make people want to pick up the book

Holst - The Planet Suite

Adam suggested that my poster designs could be re-appropriated into album artwork for Gustav Holst's planet suite. I really liked this idea so decided I should mock up my images on vinyl sleeves to see how they'd look.

I went to the website Discogs to look through their database of classical records and their sleeve artwork. I found that boxing the illustrations/artwork was a recurring feature in a lot of classical releases, even a Holst Planets one. This is convenient since it means my existing designs should translate just fine to the format.

Holst based his compositions on the astrological characters of the planets rather than physical, so even though my illustrations are representative of the planets' surfaces, I added the astrological symbol on the album artwork in order to uphold this element of the compositions' creation.

The sleeves are shown in the order in which the pieces are played in the whole movement, which is not the same as their distance from the sun.

Friday, 13 May 2016

All posters printed

  

 





I have printed all the planet posters and am mostly pleased with them. All are 2-colour, except for the sun which is 3.

The posters which required bitmapping were difficult to work with because these positives had to be printed on acetate instead of paper in order to avoid getting a moire effect. For some reason, all the positives printed on acetate were 2mm smaller than positives printed on paper, meaning they didn't quite register. I had to tape up 2mm from the top of the paper positives in order to make them work which was tedious, but they've turned out alright anyway.

Venus' red colour was printed with ink that was a bit too thin for my liking, meaning the colour isn't as intense as I'd hoped. It was also printed on somerset paper from the print room rather than from the library, which turned out to be slightly thinner. I intend to re-print Venus for the final show.

Uranus also came out a bit funny since the gradient wasn't subtle enough, making the print look like I had problems with maintaining pressure while pulling the squeegee. I also think I may have done a bad job washing out the screen after exposing it since there's a lot of noise amongst the bitmapping. I'm also a bit unsure about the colour, which hasn't translated that well to print. Uranus will be re-designed and re-printed for the final show.

Apart from these set backs, everything else looks great. The sun and Neptune's gradients work incredibly well and the line and shape work for all the others is super sharp. Really proud of this set - they definitely put my screen printing skills to the test.

Thursday, 12 May 2016

Book spreads

The book will be organised into four parts:
  • An introductory section with a bit of general info about the solar system and its birth, then a spread about the sun.
  • Terrestrial planets: four spreads about the inner four planets
  • Giant planets: four spreads about the outer four planets
  • Poster Catalogue: a sort of gallery for the screen printed posters in order to really help tie them and the book together as companion pieces.
They'll each be preceded by a little introduction splash page using the spacey background I was going to use for the planet spreads:


Still have to design the introductory section. I have the book mapped out at 36 pages, not including the front and back covers.

Monday, 9 May 2016

Some potential spreads

I made these spreads, but have now received feedback from Fred that the spacey background is detracting from the images themselves and that the white backgrounds I used on the previous post allows the images to breathe more. I will still try and use the spacey background for other introductory pages of the book though.




Sunday, 8 May 2016

Thinking about the book

Although I may not have time to actually produce the book, I want to at least design it and submit the spreads that would appear in it.
I think of the book as a companion piece to the posters I am producing, so I thought it might be quite interesting to go for an aesthetic that mimics exhibition and museum catalogs:

I don't think I know enough about graphic design to accurately replicate all the nuances of design that are going on in these examples, but I can at least take inspiration from the use of white space and the placement of text.


I'm pretty into the idea of having the poster image spill across the centerfold since the asymmetric design is quite interesting. The title text would probably have to be turned on its side or moved across to the second page since the patterned nature of some planets means the text could not be overlaid onto the image(as demonstrated with Uranus).
In the third image is a small caption that states "Jupiter, Screenprint on somerset paper 18"x24". I like the idea of the book being like an artists' book and having captions for each image, but all the captions would be the same, making it read a bit silly.
What is a really fun idea though, is having the Sun consume the whole of its own spread in order to emphasize its size. This is an idea I think I can hold onto regardless of the design of the rest of the pages.

The completed solar system


All finished, just need to get these printed now.