Haven't done a blog in far too long! .... 8 months apparently. I have been pretty lazy to be honest. A lot of things going on, and not really going on. So I guess I will try my best to give you just the highlights over the last 8 months. Back In September I discovered that my Redbubble account (my shop) seemed to be slowly picking up so traction. I have made a few more sales that I was completely unaware of. YAY people want to pay me to do arty things!!! This gave me a bit of a kick up the arse. To try and get back into the way of things. Yes I know I sound like a broken record! Since then I now have my own desk set up at home with everything set up and ready to go. I have been researching local artist and looking at so many things. Pinterest is a wonderfully handy tool. I have even started a new sketch book. As if I didn't have enough... So for a bit of the boring stuff. Since moving in to my house I have been pretending to be a really good cook. I have even been baking! Even using the pears out of my own garden! I more or less stole these from my Instagram, As you can see I have been doing a lot of baking and a lot of eating. In the last 8 months. I have recently made a few very big decisions. I have decided to take the plunge and I have opened my own Etsy store: https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/CraicinDesigns At the moment I only have 1 listing. I am still working on a few other things. The listing that is currently up allows for a custom portrait or action scene. Such as previous ones I have created below. Almost all of these little prints you have seen before but one of them is new. So one of my good friends, will randomly call me up every so often asking for unique birthday, and engagement gifts. Usually everything he asks me for is themed. Breaking Bad, Fight Club, Jurassic Park. So just when I thought he could shock me. He asked for the above to be made. Just to clarify what the above is. One of his friends took his girlfriend to New York and proposed to her in Central Park. He sent me a photo of the magical moment, when he popped the question. Then asked could I draw the groom-to-be as Venkman from ghost busters, and the bride-to-be as Miss Piggy from The Muppet's..... So I did what every artist does and just created what my client asked me for. While the whole time thinking he is totally mental.I have to admit still an awful lot I am not happy with within the image. It took me a week alone to do the New York skyline and trees in Central Park. So yes. I take completely random requests! I have also been experimenting with a few others. Here is a little sneek peak: none of the above is finished!
It's all just a starting point for me looking into different ways of designing posters for bands, Looking into more detailed patterns, looking into more detail of machines and devices. I am also experimenting with the idea of inspirational quotes and the idea of creating a scene or back ground that is just as powerful as the quote. So It's all happening. Slowly, but surely. I have also been getting back into designing some wedding stationery. I currently have three brides, which is fantastic! one who continuity changes her mind. however it can sometimes be frustrating. I am getting more design trials done and these can be used for perhaps other clients down the road. I am trying to keep a positive spin on things. That's all from me, I will try to get back into writing a blog at the end/beginning of every month.
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Today has been such a tiring day. So today I was to put up my work for the end of year show. I went to put my work up and then after speaking with tutors. They thought I should go back to my plan and edit it a little further, such a blow. I was hoping to have all of this done by today. So I went back to he drawing board and came up with these very similar ideas to show: I decided to in the end go with the second image. So I then had to go and get my vinyl done. I have to admit I was very nervous about getting it done. I have never used the vinyl cutter, but thankfully I had another class mate who was just as clueless and we, I mean she. Figured most of it out. I have to admit I have been working so hard and trying to get all of my work done for hand in and then some. I was a total zombie most of today. So with my vinyl I had originally wanted to have under my facebook image, "If you're not paying for the product, the product is you." Under the Coca-Cola portrait "Open Happiness?" I wanted to plat on words for that. Then finally for my bar-code image "Just another price tag." Due to my Coca-Cola and Bar-code slogans being one line, after a little bit of debate, and discussion. My self and the tutors all agreed on simply shortening down the slogan. "The product is you." The plan is to finally get all of these up tomorrow for the end of year show. I have to admit after all the running about I have done today, I definitely feel more prepared for putting all the portraits and everything up tomorrow. Also excited to see how the vinyl will look.
Just a little miffed that I have left playing with the vinyl to literally the last week of university. Although I have to also admit I found that the process with vinyl is unbelievably tedious. Tomorrow will tell more however. I also decided it was best to go a head and get another sketch book. As I plan to do a lot more editing and just in general more work. So that now brings me to having 10 sketch books to hand in next week. I am just hoping that tomorrow I will be able to really start in getting things done. I have also done a lot more of my sketch book write ups today. So I plan to finish it off hopefully tonight and then the rest of tonight I will be stuffing my face with chocolate and watching Netflix. That's all from me today. Today, I just went back into my magazines and even did a little advertisement stuff: I wasn't too sure about how to cover the magazine cover with the type. To be honest I am still not too sure, I think I will have to edit this a little more. I did however print out the first image in A4 to see how it looked. I have to admit I still want all of the writing and topics around the cover to be a lot bigger. Which is strange due to while in Photoshop I didn't want to cover the face too much. I think I will have to do some additional research. The coca-cola image I was getting pretty annoyed with the portrait I had chosen for the end of year show. The colours within it I really couldn't get it to work. It started to look like a 90's magazine cover, which isn't a big deal. But it's not the idea I am trying to convey. So I got my original portrait of the Coca-Cola portrait and put that as my magazine cover. I think this image work a lot better. I am again still not happen with my colours or fonts. Within this sort of magazine cover, I decided to go further and put my images into bus shelter advertisement slots, buses and even billboards. So I did a bit of a mixture, although I have to admit, I prefer the bar-code image to the other portraits: As you can see, I have been busy. I am also still trying to figure out what to say underneath the portraits. I also realized that with other awareness portraits, they have their image, slogan and then some other smaller text: here is just one campaign, that shows what I am describing. I might even go back and try some of my other images that I took for the portraits to try and see what else I can come up with. I will hopefully have something great to hand in, which is now a week away, and I have a funny feeling it may end up with a 10th and final sketch book....
Today has been a productive day! So I got talking to my tutors and I was surprised to find, that actually they preferred my first design that I gave them. They also looked at my coca-cola image and we all agreed, to take out the writing at the top as the image is stronger in it's self the way it is. I also let them have a look at the bar-code images, they didn't even know it was me! We also came up with more ideas for two other designs. So Because the ViewBug challenge is due. I will have to just add one of the bar-code images for my second image. Although, I am very glad that my tutors really liked what I had done and want me to expand on it. So much so that they want me to use projectors and project images onto the face. So I now have the loan of a projector. Very excited! I have wanted to experiment with using a projector for ages, so I am really looking forward to this. I also got started on my illustrations. I now have a completed suit, although there are still some changes I want to make to them. Here is where I have gotten up to so far with them, this being the Clubb suit: I have to admit, I don't think they all look like they belong to each other. As with the ghost, she is very detailed and there is a lot to her. The Robot and Alien, not so much. So I printed these two images out and drew directly on top of them as an experiment: I think doing this has defiantly improved how they look and the changes I will make later on. I think that this also makes them look more gruesome. ore monster like and even possibly more graphic.
Short blog today, so that's all from me. So my video is finally up, however this isn't my official video. All I have to change however is the music. Which I will fix tomorrow. I am proud of my video, although I'm unsure about showing it at the end of year show. I also got my images done for the ViewBug challenge, you have already seen the Coca-Cola image I made. I decided to continue on with one of my other ideas with the bar-code. I wasn't too sure but I thought it was worth a shot to see how it would at least look: These are my four finals, while designing these, I tried to dehumanize myself. As you can see I tried to remove facial features. In one case I completely covered the face. I purposely made it so you can see some of the facial features through the bar-codes. I am still trying to tie this challenge in with my main project work of happiness and consumerism. Although I still plan to do my posters of my student finance. I plan to start them tomorrow as well as my deck of cards. I have been doing some more sketches. These characters are for robots and aliens: As you can see, my sketches aren't fantastic. Soooooo I did some research also see below: As you can see I really wasn't too sure on what I'm doing. Although now I have a better Idea, I'm hoping to again get started on my deck of cads project tomorrow also. So that's all from me for today.
Today I didn't get a much done as I wanted to. Although I am starting to make progress with my main project and starting to get my third and possibly final re-designing of the deck of cards done. Below is a quick sketch I did for one of my characters of monsters, my ghost. I think it looks very Tim Burton like, So I thought it would be pretty interesting to make all of my character stick in with this theme Here is some characters from Tim Burton's movies for inspiration.
I have also been sorting out the information that is going into my video. It is a lot more categorized, which is good. Tomorrow I am planning on just working on my video. I also have to re-write my little blurb that will go beside my work at the end of year show. Things are getting really hectic, I am hoping to also purchase my new business card tomorrow..... hopefully, I have asked a good few more people their opinions on which business card designs I should get. I have had a bit of a unanimous decision on which design to go for. I am still waiting on people to get back to me, but I think I might just go for it. Means they will be here before the end of year show. That's all from me today,hopefully more things to show tomorrow I have done so much work today and I am actually still working away after I write this post. So I have designed a few new bits and pieces for my surveys: So the 2nd image is simple, but I actually really liked how I gave the answers a facial expression. I also tried my hardest to have a the scales of all the heads to the correct proportion of the percentage I got from my surveys. The rest of my surveys I kinda felt because I want to make a small video of my findings and give people the results of my surveys. I think sticking with pie charts and graphs will go a long way, although they are traditional I think this will make more of an impact. So here are just some of my pie charts that I made. very simple, all the info is there though, now down to real buisness. and start designing what I want to do for my video, so here are a few images from my sketch book on how I have been designing so far: So one thing I am noticing about this is half way through drawing everything up, suddenly I get a new idea and I want to move things about and change my layout. This is where I have gotten so far with designing my video, I am getting nervous and excited about continuing on and actually getting this made. I hope I get everything I want done on time for hand in, as I have said before I have used After Effects, however it has been over a year since I have used the program. So yea, thats all from me today hopefully Ill have a bit more colour and things to show tomorrow.
So today, I did a bit more work to my sketch books, I am now on my 3rd sketch book for my main project which is crazy, especially because with my first sketch book I actually added more pages to it before just buying a new sketch book. It has taken me only two weeks to fill one sketch book for my main project, and to be honest I feel like I am just getting started with my project and really getting down to business of what I want to do, so it's pretty crazy and I can now say I definitely feeling the pressure starting to mount. This is the last week of April, I have pretty much only have a month to get my work together and 6 weeks to actually hand in my work to find out if I am graduating with honors or not. So the above our my sketch books for just my main project. Besides my main project, a mini project was emailed to me. There are some students in my class taking part in New Blood, I have spoken about New Blood previously, it must have been just before Christmas. They have an idea for the end of year show to sell some tea towels with Communication Designs portraits on them, just like the ones you would have done in school. I originally just took a photo of myself and started to trace it in Illustrator. But the more and more I started to draw it, I got bored of it. I mean this is a graphic design course, I can be very serious about things, but myself taking a photo, I have actually been told off by friends mothers for not taking a photo properly... These are sort of a small range of photos of me not being very serious and so on.... So here are the images I originally created from for the tea towel task: These pretty much are Illustrating my "Resting Bitch Face". I have to admit I look kind of scary, and I do like to think of myself as a nice person, obviously I'm a little mental, but a good mental. So below is the face I pretty much pull in most of my "Selfies" on Instagram. You can follow me on Instagram: https://instagram.com/craicin_designs/ I have to admit as well, because this is going on a tea towel. There is no point in doing shading, this needs to be all block colours and lines and they have to be black and sharp, so that they can pick up on all of the lines here to print on the tea towel. I asked my boyfriend and my best friend which they preferred out of all three. Both chose the 3rd saying it looks very like me.... not too sure if I should be insulted or Yay!. I think I am going to go with the image above.
With this exercise however, I actually thought it was really good and I actually really enjoyed it. It cut out a lot of the usual things I would do and just went straight in with the basics. I actually really like this, it's simple yet really effective. I'm very happy, this is something I think I will be doing a lot more of, it have been a while since I have done this kind of line drawing. That's all from me today, tomorrow I will hopefully have a lot more Illustrations for you with doing my info graphics Today has been a pretty productive day, I managed to get a lot done despite being pretty ill today. I have finally started to design banners and layouts for my main project. The poorly photographed image on the left was my original concept idea. I then finally put this into illustrator and created the image on the right. This has even developed further, as I realized the pound sterling sign, the euro and the dollar sign didn't really go together. Especially as my project is aimed at universities within the UK. So I went back in and made them all sterling pound signs, I then began to play about a little with the design as, I felt everything was sort of floating in space. So I added shadows, banners and back ground colours to see how this would look Here are my mini experiments above, I do really like them a lot, although I have definitely decided against the green background. I was thinking a long the lines of the little piggy bank being free and running around. It doesn't look like that at all in my mind. I then began to look at the white and blue banners. I wasn't even too sure why I had three pound coins on display, so I went back in again and changed the display a little. So as you can see my piggy bank is trying to be a horse, ready to charge into battle. Well that's what I get from it's pose, which I really like to be honest. So as you can see I have made it look as though the coins are going into the piggy bank, or flying out of it, whichever way people see it. I'm pretty happy with it, although I do realize how cartoon like it does look. I'm worried it may look even too childish. So I started to finally get started on making a website. I used Weebly as my website generator. I have to admit, when trying to make a website for a specific thing, weebly sucks. I was on here for about 3 hours playing around with themes, trying to get things to work, change menus, messing around with the HTML codes (which I know very little about). I have to admit, for the amount of work I was trying to accomplish today with the website, it really didn't happen. So now I am currently struggling with the idea of wither, just creating what I want the website to look like on paper rather than actually make the website, or go to a different website developer and try again. I am going to have a break from it for now, here is the home page however: Currently it's very bland looking, there is a lot of restrictions within the themes which makes it difficult if you don't know HTML code. I have been trying, and I don't easy give up on things. I think I just need to shower my brain over it and think what else I can do. I also added my little protest character, he was a lot bigger but again on weebly, I found that once I got it to a way I liked it. As soon as I saved it, He was twice as big and took up all the space of the text. Here is all my sketch books where I also seem to brain dump all of my thoughts and feeling over my project: So these are just the pages I have done in my sketch books today. Tomorrow, as I said I am going to be just concentrating on my Cards project to try and get the entire suit finished tomorrow, and possibly even start another suit, I would love to say Ill have the whole set done by tomorrow, but there are a lot of design issues that do come up, like I've seen today with the website, so we will see how that goes.
I am also hoping to get some of my ViewBug projects started on Thursday, mainly if the weather is nice so I can get some underwater photography.... in fact even just to have the water to be calm, that might help me out more. That's all from me today. I didn't get to post yesterday due to feeling so ill. I didn't manage to get any work done yesterday. Still feeling crappy today. however I was actually finally able to do some work. Not a great amount but still a fair bit. I finished my Queen of Spades card, I am now currently working on the jack of spades. I also skipped a little bit a head and have started to design the newest deck of cards design, Cup cakes As you can see, I'm just on the concept of ideas, I plan to go ahead into illustrator and see what designs work better than others. I also have been toying with the idea of giving the cupcakes a bit of a horror/ monster feeling to them, I am as yet unsure. As I feel that the monsters could again be another design of a deck of cards on their own. I am hoping to be well enough to go to uni tomorrow, being ill is getting boring and I am dying to get my teeth stuck into my work again. That's all from me today, hopefully more to share and see tomorrow.
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