My other blogs

Just to announce that i have created a new seperate blog for my photography rather than spamming that on top of my design work, especially as i will be posting parts of a few comissions i am soon to be doing. this new blog can be found here:

http://lunaisnapshot.blogspot.com

This contains anything about my photography and available prints i am selling!

Degree Show at NUCA

Last night was our private view at norwich university college of the arts. It was a good night and a great opening to the weeks ahead of open days for people to come and visit, if you are in the area feel free to drop by and come look at the work on show. Heres some photos of the evening:

Number 67

Number 67! My fish in the end of year degree show at Norwich university college of the arts. where you see this fish you will see my work, a digital submission of a website and a link to this very blog, and my portfolio, if you are around Norwich come take a look, everyone's put a lot of hard work getting this show up.

In other news i also have a lot of digital photography going up on my deviant art account this week, so keep an eye out for that. I have passed my BA(hons) degree and im really proud of myself that i've achieved this, now comes the hard part, even though we've been preparing for it, i dont think anything can really prepare us fully. Even if i dont get a job straight away i love designing so much im going to carry on doing a few designs myself, just to play around and keep design fresh in my mind, websites, branding, packaging, advertising you name it.

Whilst i was in london i got a brief chance to get out and about to see the latest art installment throught the great city, although i barely got 1/4 of them on camera, the elephants are amasing, each one painted by a different person, from a different art school, each show their individual creativity within the designs. We had similar in our home city, but nothing on this scale.

Just a different canvas material. these skateboarders are true artists, was uite inspirational to see their art all over the place, a lot of people look down on people who are grafitti artists, i agree there are some places it shouldnt be but i agree there should be more places like the skate park i walked past, the skaters were happy people taking photos of their art and tricks and even posed for photos.the art they do is a bit like cave carvings, however its different styles and materials on the stone.

If you do visit our show please dont hesitate to leave comments in my comment box below, or leave your comments with any of the students and tutors who are also there.







Thanks for reading,
Keep on swimming.

London 2012 Olympic mascots

Anyone seen these guys yet? Yup the new olympic mascots what they are hoping will raise them 70million profit, yet they wont tell anyone how much they cost to design. however i do feel a good design is somethng you shouldnt have to explain much yet they did? the first people to unvail where the one show, the second they had the entirety of the worls were allowed to see, but i dont understand is the only thing remotely brittish in these is the Taxi cab sign.. but then other places in the world have these too lol, i mean america do for one I was guessing the patterns on them were a simplyfied version of the british flag when looking through the website where i got this image, i do also like the idea of using the olympic rings ans bangles instead and will be a good merchandise point, and probably their biggest source of profit. Also i love the animation but again its a bit of a poor storyline? feels as its been thrown together, anyone else have opinions?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1279736/London-2012-Olympic-mascots-Meet-Wenlock-Mandeville.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

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Advertising: Kit Kat

I found this whilst lurking the google for internet meme's and something to have a laugh at, i thought this was pretty clever idea, the idea of using their slogan "take a break" in a literal form and meaning by turning the bench into a kit kat! Love it

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Up and running at last!

I can finally anounce that my website is officially up and running, i still have to buy my url but for now you can check it out here: feel free to e-mail me or leave comments about it all here

http://lunaidesign.zxq.net

Logo and pitch

recently been doing a project that involves rebranding and advertising the sealife centre, you maybe could tell from my last post and poll. Well here is the final logo that i have been using.

Also yesterday had my first pitch, i felt it went really well and i was real proud of myself. all i have to do is wait for the results to come in now. It was an experience, i was nervous, but it was fun and interesting at the same time.

Sharks or rays cast your vote!!!

Which do you prefer to see when you visit the sealife centre, sharks or rays? which gets your more hyped? cast your vote now! leave a vote in the right hand side poll. its open for two days.

Herbal essences gift package

The idea behind this project was to design a gift packaging for herbal essences shampoo and conditioner, however i found that most gift packages when you've emptied them you would just simply discard it so i designed it with a soap dish so you had something to keep once the rest of the shampoo had gone. i added 2 tubes of bath bombs to add to it aswell. i wanted a clear package because the bottles are usually rather decrative anyway and didnt want to take away from that. also it means the package is universal for each type of their shampoo and conditioner range.

Self Promotion and candidates

Finally, its been a while but i can say i have my buisness cards now, im real pleased on how they've turned out, can't wait to start handing them out. My website is also almost finnished, just a few more bits to do and i can start uploading it to a host, so keep an eye out i will post a link here to it when it is done. I am also looking for candidates for websites to go onto my "random favorite" link, so if you've got a website that you think is worth promotiong on there drop your link in the comments bellow so i can check it out.

I said i would post this.... my before college days.

A while ago i said i would post a tutorial, well i made this ages ago, and for a little fun and a laugh thought id post it, jsut to break off from the serious stuff for a bit. I Made it when i was teaching photoshop to people about 5 years ago on some online forum, A lot of them found it real handy, mostly for techniques rather than for making banners as i have in this, so enjoy comment, i laugh everytime i see this now at how much i have improved, its nice to sometimes reflect on old work to help you realise how much you really have improved.

well i hope you enjoyed that, now its back to the serious design side of things in the next entry.

Photos, A first outing.

Finally the weather is nice enough to venture outside for photo taking, and im starting to get into the swing of it again, so i would like to share a few shots with you mostly macro photography however i really like these images.

This is only two of many photos i took howeve i havent managed to upload them all yet to post.  My design work itself is comming on nicely and i hope to have my website up soon aswell, so keep an eye out for posts with more of my design work and the launch of my website.

Contemplating and Review

Its only 11 weeks til I finnish University, not long, that includes our final exhibition and i will give some more details on that a bit later on in another entry.

In previous blogs i mensioned about ordering a book, well i have read it and i loved it! theres so much treasure in the small book, its also got a few "tasks" in it aswell Its reat ofr anyone looking at branding or logo design, and its all wirtten by designers, not some critique who thinks they know everything and not even been there.

There was one thing mensioned in there i have tried out so far, and thats about logo awareness. I've done this twice in 3 different places to get an idea for my own advertising. All it is in the space of 30 seconds of what ever you're doing to just sitting in a place and looking around you count how many logos you see. the first time i counted 48 and that was sitting in my own room, the second was driving along in the car, I counted 23 and the 3rd time was during the ad break of Dr who and going to make myself a drink. Im going to keep refering to this book, its highly recomended by myself and a friend.

Cherry crafts

I was having a look around on logo design loves facebook group and looking at all the work other designers have done and i found two that were worth blogging that i've seen recently and this is one. I thought it was brilliant work, the type face sits perfectly with an imaginative literal cherry cottage with a 3D feel to it, sometwhat almost like a Mac icon feel. Simple imaginative and creative this was designed by Ross Green, its definatly more than just a logo.

A book worth buying?

I've decided it was about time i stopped borrowing books and baught a few of my own design books. And i found one that seemed interesting i will give a reveiw afterwards of my own once i recieve it in a few days. It is called logo design love, they have a facebook group aswell. its as you can guess by the title all about logos and branding and i thought it would be one of he 2 best places to start alongside typography and fonts. I baught it from Amazon.co.uk for £12.99 it was the cheapest ive seen it everywhere else was £25 abouts. so if you want to check it out for yourself it would be best to buy there. If you've read/looked at it and have any reveiws dont hesitate to leave them below. And if you have any typography/font book suggestions do the same.

Blender

Just a quick note to myself really, but if anyone else is interested, one of my followers showed me a programme as i was interested in doing some 3D logos and told me about blender so first thing i done, looking up tutorials if anyone knows of any good ones and this is the most basic starter i could find

blender tutorial


old photoshop banner tutorials with blending comming soon!

Fonts away!

I've been trying to search for many a font and found so many sites that do free fonts, so i thought i would list them all here for everyone else and for later reference.

Dafont

Font Squirrel

The League Of Moveable Type

Typophile

My Fonts

campivisivi

Fonts for big headers:

webdesignledger.com

Fonts for minimal design:

webdesignledger.com

High quality funky graphical fonts:

webdesignledger.com

Bad me i guess?

Well i seem to have neglected my blog one night.. oops. well i was going to do a "blast from the past!" blog but im leaving that til tomorrow because i need to find the images to write it.

I still cant beleive how far my own design thinking has come aswel as my work, i cant help but feel proud. but thats not the only thng thats changed, design in general has changed over the years, and rather largely. you wouldnt think it but the same as fasion and technology design seems to go through "fads" aswell from vetor and clean design to the old war ime poster feel and back again, its like i said in my last blog technology is always changing, and so is design, its trying to keep up with that aswell as acheiving goals thats the hard part.

I'd like to slip in here the link to my deviantart page, i love design and so forth but at the same time i love photography, i guess it kind of comes with the design process in some casses especially for art directors. ive had a lot of inspiration from my own photos, and i love my macro shots so please feel free to look around on there too. here are just a few images including a photo of japanese singer momoi halko during her pannel at Ayacon 2009:

http://hatsune-hawke.deviantart.com

Keeping up with technology.

Although being very inspired to write about the lecture i attended today i am unable to get my notes to tell you enough so here i will talk about this instead.

Is it hard to keep up to date with technology? In my opinion with design its always hard theres always something new, new ways of advertising, new ways of promoting, new technology being introduced needing new designs and programming, new programmming to create designs, but thats the great thing. if you can keep up with it it can be very useful. I was searching for some flash websites for inspiration the other day and found this:

http://www.promote.uk.com/eTAG/

I thought it was brilliant! A new way of advertising, being advertised using new technology. I loved the animation too, modern sleek and quite cute too.

http://www.promote.uk.com/

also an amasing designed flash website.

Just a short post.

Just a short post today, i've not had time really to do too much been a very busy day and heres to more to come. I've got my flow back now i think, im feeling good about it all. so here is a link to something else (yeah i know another link) i will get around to finding some more interesting stuff later but as i said been very busy.

http://weburbanist.com/2008/06/29/top-10-3d-graffiti-artists-in-the-world

i never get tired of these images.

Photoshop Manipulations and fun

Designs not always about hard work, infact i personally always look forward to designing soemthing new and exciting taking on the challenge. But i have had a few times got some ideas and not known how to put them together or how o get certain effects. But a while back i found this:

Manipulation

Its a site with some amasing photoshop tutorials on with links to many many others. I've even tried a few myself and i found them really useful, finding out how to use certain things and merge others how to get a certain effect on objects or creat something new, or old looking. somethings i knew before but its always good to brush up on these things. Well i dont a few and here were my results. I was uite chuffed with them, it was my first try at some of these things, including creating the new photoshop box logo,

 

  

 

Yipee!

I don't have really anything to put into my blog today, but ill make up with someothing tomorrow however i have to celebrate today as i managed to get hold of 2 free tickets for myself and my mother to go to Grand Designs being held at Londons Excel Centre 1-9th May. Although its not 100% to do with the sort of design i do, it is still inspiring, and you can get some good ideas from it. however the second i got my tickets i was screaming at the screen about how badly pixilated it was saying "you should have saved it as a TIFF first!". It's pretty exciting, i've been watching it on TV all these years, and now i finally get to go! however i have been asked ever so kindly by my mother now not to do what i do around the supermarket and to be on my best behaviour. "what do you do?" Well what any Graphic designer does points out packaging say how they would change it or say "i've done somethig connected to that" I must admit it is anoying but to know you have done something that tiny bit that is being used in everyones daily lives, you just get that tiny peice of satisfaction out of it, and it definatly does make my day and i hope it will in years to come.

Designer block

They always say sometimes theres days when things really dont come to you at all, and its best not to force crative thoughts toherwise they could result in something terrible. I've currently come to a halt in my currnt project because of it, and hopefully can get on track soon! bother other things are flowing fine, infact more than fine (see other blog for outside of design things).

There is one thing i've noticed used a lot lately though. After summer last year trying to take photos out the car at night of the lights i realised how awsome the images were that came out of it, blurry lines of glowing light making patterns, then on the news more and more adverts tarted to appear with the sae kind of effect. I really like how it works and its really effective, i hope i find a use for my own photos someday but for now heres an example

actually whilst searching for an xample i found a really favorite site of mine and its even given me some ideas for my project *thumbs up* I've been watching it for ages i cant beleive i forgot about it. This site i added afer i was looking for a creative desktop/log in screen for my computer. they have some brilliant photoshop tutorial and illistrator tutorials and the results are simply amasing, heres the link and some imagery its definatly worth a look in =D

ndesign-studio 

The whole website is amasingly created and illistrated!

 

  

  

they even have a flash site veiwable here:

ndesign-studio flash version

although its no longer updated, but it includes some of their earlier G.comm designs aswell as illistrations and web designs. i hope you like as much as i do.

“Hi & Lo” – Special Collboration Product

And here is the answerto my previous post! But we never know they may eventually ey? But this is a pretty awsome exhibition not just because of what takashi mirukami added to it. here the link

"Hi & Lo"

Takashi Murakami!

Although an artist Takashi murakami has had a lot of inspiration on me in the past so he deserves a slot in my blog! He is the most amasings japanese artist and i am ashamed to say i am really dissapointe i didnt go to see his first london exhibit in the tate gallery. however recently he along with Fragment and Kaikai Kiki brands have come up with some awsome stuff, now i do not know if it is for sale, i know he has books but i would LOVE the shoes and a couple of his cushions =D They are really something amasing simple and stylish.  He was my inspirtion through my Art diploma in collage and he still inspires me to date!

 

Takashi Murakami's Website 

A few of you may actually recognise some of his works from his recent appearance in Kursten's new music video for her cover of "turning japanese" although i am discusted by the video and he interpritations of cosplay (and the fact shes a big multi millionaire supposedly and couldnt even afford a decent wig!) and what its about and japanese culture Takashi Mirukami done a good job trying to get it better thatn what she wanted it to be like.

Bad design is bad!

Working on my current project i was searching up Merlin entertainments, fair enough they have some amasing stuff.... but ha anyone noticed one logo that stands out from the rest.. one website that you would think they would have put effort into due to its cause and not? yup the Sealife sanctuarys (not the centres). heres the link to their website and their logo:

~*Link*~

 

It might be just me however this in my opinion is very poorly designed they could have had something that fitted in with their other parks and so on, but no they've made it more like a RSPCA logo on a £20 budget! Wtih a logo thats been edited to suit multiple places, i somewhat feel like this may have even been drawn in paint? but it definatly doesnt do justice for what the sealife sanctuary is really about. Opinons? leave them in the comment box below!

Demonia Branding.

A previous Branding Project tookk me to branding Demonia, A world wide shoe company for gothic, alternative and other footwear including Lolita, and club wear aswell as every day footwear. they have a website if you wish to see what they current branding is like, however when discussed this was found to put a lot of people off buyng their shoes, or stores having them on their shelves. As they were too over the top gothic and didnt really show ther true potential and poen them for all people to buy as the target audience. Here is the logo for the new brandim i have designed.

Norwich Housing Society

From a live brief competition to design a logo for Norwich housing society, including stationary, heres the logo on a bilboard comments welcome. I became one of the four finalists and I'm about to hand it the final edited design. It was inspired by the shape of the housing they provide. the colour was their colour they already used. The reason for text layout was to get away from their NHS connection, as they were nothing to do with the hospital at all.

What Type Are you?

I was told to do this the other day and i think its great, yet spooky at the same time, if you get the time check it out, It is a quiz if you will about fonts, made in flash too, so its not any ordinary quiz, and i think its something all designers should do!

what-type-are-you

My font for those who are interested was Archer Hairline

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Samurai vodka

 

http://www.thedieline.com/blog/2009/06/samurai-vodka.html

A friend sent me this link the other day said i would love it, and she wasn't wrong, I love the design for this bottle, its simple and clean and definatly screams samurai, however there is one thing i would change, and as other people who have left comments, i would also have changed the text to suit as if the bottle had cut in half, but the design in my opinion is to the key 5 stars.

Tips from a Designer and Comic Artist to us designers!

Now during the first weeks of O's videos i asked if i was allowed to feature him in m blog and he said "my pleasure" He himself is a design tutor. and he also recomended to his students to watch his videos because even if its not directly relevent theres something they may not know and leanrn something in this particular video

http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/1715566

He is colouring his commision digitally on a computer, using multi scans because its a big drawing showing how to line up and layering multi scanning scanning tips and so on. I love his work ^^ even if you are not into comics its still interesting, the stuff he does on here is purely commissions.

Abnormality and O

www.commissionedcomic.com

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/Abnormality-cam

Although a comic artist, i've learnt alot from watching O draw live on camera. Ways of colouring, ways of doing line drawing. Never be afraid of drawing it once, then putting another sheet of paper over top and doing it in pen to get rid of the pencil marks, also never be afraid to use different materials fo colouring, for final peices the things he uses could be good, rather than printing it off, do it neatly by hand scan and multi print if needed.

Don't learn just from other designers, learn from artists too.

Remember!

When you walk out the door always make sure to have a camera on you, its good to take stock photos, and interesting peices of design, you run into it every day. you never know what you'll see, dont take risks and miss something amasing and regret it later.

What is Graphic Communication?

This is cheesy and americaniszed but it helped me explain to others what i was learning about, it misses a lot of detail out but it gives a rough idea.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=9n-NhA5fi1w

Youtube tutorials

Youtube has recently become the best search engine on the net, and i've found has the best tutorials for Flash, Dreamweaver, Photoshop, InDesign and other programmes, its got everything from basics to the really detailed gritty bits and some tricks, Adobe.com does have its own tutorials on all of its programmes, but they are the basic how to use. the tutorials on youtube however are made by the people who use it every day. best tutorial uploaders:

Flash: http://www.youtube.com/user/KnowFlash
Photoshop: http://www.youtube.com/user/PhotoshopTopSecret

These are two favorites ill add more into entries later on as i go along, if you have any recomendations leave them in a comment.

typographica.org

I stumbbled across this site today, I found it was really interesting, I've not been too good at fonts, and as i've had it commented on i thought this was a good site to look at. It has a range of fonts, what font go with what, and a huge list of font designers. It not only gives an array of fonts but a yearly font favorites list, a list of font books and reveiws.

http://new.typographica.org

Its worth looking at! Especially if you're stuck with a certain element with your font and don't know what to use.

Designer Life

Finally, I've found somewhere to host a decent blog for my design thoughts, links, ideas, and ponderings.

I will start by posting my previous blog entries here from earlier months (as i wrote but kept safe ready for a proper blog). We'll here goes nothing, a new blog, a new challenge. This shall be updated at least once a week if not more often, i hope. and please feel free to comment as and when you wish.