_Ciaran McLaughlin_

My Universe!

2012-01-19T06:40:00.000-08:00

Well the real work has begun now here in Germany. I've been working on my characters for a while now and i'm making great progress. I am planning to present the characters as part of a series of posters. Each character will introduce their planet and state an interesting fact about that planet. I am also illustrating the planet by drawing them in my sketch book in a way I feel illustrates them best. As I originally planned to make a book I am still going to experiment with a fold out styled book and maybe make something to hold the fold out together. I am going to experiment and see what happens as this is possible here with the equipment we have. I am also going to try printing my posters using silk screen printing so i'm going to try limiting each poster to just 3 colours. This may also be interesting because I could experiment with different types of paper and I could also print onto T-shirts and maybe sweaters.

This project will be presented at Leipzig Book Fair in March so it is a good idea to produce work that I can actually sell my work and make a profit. I've been told by my Professors assistant that last year the students made 3000 euros which means each student made over 100 euros each selling their work which was great as this covered the costs and everyone made a little profit. Although I wouldn't say the focus of the book fair is to make money but to produce work and present it to the highest standard you can so you can impress as there are a lot of other stands and the book fair and we have to capture the interest of the visitors. I am hoping there will be a young audience as my work is quirky and fun and so far people have been responding great to my completed work. I am constantly making developments and as i've been practicing my sketching style and this has worked great for my illustrations.

So here is an example of one of my layouts for my poster series. This is my poster for Venus and stars my character 'Zedder'. As Venus is known as the 'Earth's Sister Planet' I made a character with a form similar to a human but with tentacles fro arms. Zedder also wears rather Gangster clothing as he's been to New York where of course he did some sightseeing and maybe he abducted a few humans just for fun :) So here he is..

I'm still playing around with fonts and I think maybe I will change the layout of the typography. Although following a consultation with my professor he said it was fine but if I wanted I could change it but it would make little difference. Each Poster has the name of the planet in the Typography I designed myself. I have been sketching each planet in a very sketchy style that seems to be working. Everything in the posters, the space ships, little planets and stars have been hand drawn by me and then i've worked between photoshop and illustrator to make vectors. All of the content seems to be working well and i'm carefully choosing colours so each poster is unique and the colours of the character work well. Each poster has a white border but some of my little planets and space ships go over the border and some also bleed off the page but i've been told this is also a nice effect and works well for the style. I feel I have accomplished a good layout and it works, now I need to see how they look on paper and if the colours look well or need adjusting. So perhaps next week when I start test printing I will Blog a couple photos to keep myself up to date as I go along and it would be good to Critique as I go along and improve my designs.

Oh and that other Excursion..... Wood Cut Type!

2012-01-06T21:01:00.000-08:00

So here's a couple photos of the second excursion I went on to Friedrichsrode (in the middle of no where in Thuringen). The place was so far from civilisation that there was no mobile phone signal so everybody had to survive with Facebook etc.. This gave me the opportunity to concentrate on my studies and do lots of wood cutting which was the aim of the Excursion. We had already done a little wood cutting on Hiddensee in october but second time around we had a lot of work to do as we had to carve the alphabet so we could use it for printing. This meant we had to cut the whole alphabet a few times so we have enough letters to write sentences using them. We weren't suppose to start printing until we cut out the letters when we get home in the wood workshop but I went on ahead and did a few experiments just for fun anyways as I had plenty time. I really enjoyed this Excursion as everyone I was with basically spoke fluent German and of course my German isn't great so this gave me the opportunity to listen and learn and by the end of the 5 days I had picked up a lot more German. So here's a few images I took whilst there...

The Excursions have really helped me as I have never experienced anything like it before. It's great to just get away from everything and do some work in peace and quiet and relax with friends and tutors.

On my Travels

2012-01-06T20:11:00.000-08:00

While I was looking through some of my stuff I remembered about one of my little books. Since I came to Germany and i've been travelling so much I decided to start carrying a little sketchpad and a few pens with me. This way if I see anything that interests me or I get an Idea for an illustration i'm working on I sketch the Idea there and then. This has actually really helped me as i'm doing my work because if i'm looking for a little inspiration I just have a flick through my book. It's also cool to have a little fun to learn German through images too as when my friends mention an interesting word or a humorous word I get them to do a little illustration to make it memorable. Even little thumbnail sketches with notes are very helpful and can be useful when trying to remember a particular memory or idea. It has also been very cool to see the different drawing styles and techniques that other Erasmus students use in order to do their work. I have friends from all over the globe so getting to have a look at how they work and how they develop their ideas is very interesting. So here is an example of a little fun sketch I did whilst on a train.

The image on the left is yet another sketch of the Owl I found on the island Hiddensee whilst studying the House marks there. Since then I have sketched this Owl everywhere and I don't really know why but maybe someday I will find it's purpose. On the right I drew a self portrait from my reflection in the window on the train for some fun. I've been experimenting with this particular technique of drawing for a couple weeks for fun. When I draw a sketch I give myself time limits of 60 seconds or so per drawing and limit the amount of colours to 3. The idea of always using pens means even when I make a mistake it can't be undone so I only have one chance to do the sketch so it has to be done right. I will upload a few more sketches when I return to Germany as I have a bit of travelling to do and I will be doing plenty sketching.

Font Development

2012-01-06T19:42:00.000-08:00

So it's been a while...

So I was doing some work and thought i'd upload a sample of a font i've been working on for a book. Currently I am working on a book of characters from each planet in our solar system. I've always been interested in creating my own character series and by making a book I can prepare all the back up work I need for moving into animation. I am basing the features of each character on the atmosphere of their particular planet. Each character will introduce their planet and explain it's main features, e.g. distance from the sun, temperature, weather, living conditions etc.. They will be stating facts about their planet but obviously when they describe how they live there this will be based on fantasy. Therefore making it a more fun to learn whilst creating a fun story. I'm actually having a lot of fun learning about the solar system as it's given me the opportunity to watch my Blu-ray of Professor Bran Cox's amazing series 'Wonders of the Universe' (pictured below).

The book I am working on is going to be presented at Leipzig Book Fair in mid march so over the next few weeks I will be researching and developing concepts. Depending on time constraints I may update my blog as I feel it's became a little neglected. There you have it.. That's what i'm doing right now :)

Book Binding!! I like it :D

2011-11-20T07:02:00.001-08:00

This is a small selection of Photos of my Book binding workshop which was a lot of fun and I can't wait to do more. It will be great to actually print my own book and bind it by myself. As usual I added a silly photo of myself taken by a class mate, everyone knows I can't hold a straight face for a photograph. I will be Binding more books next week so I will update my Blog as I go along.

Hiddensee Post Card concepts!

2011-11-02T06:43:00.000-07:00

So after a wonderful trip to Hiddensee I sat down looked at my sketches and started to think of what would make a nice Design for a postcard. In my experience PostCards seem to always have either pretty photography or maybe some humorous typography. As the main object of our visit was to examine the Hausmarken it seems appropriate to base my design around them.

I took this photograph whilst relaxing before dinner and thought it shows quite well where my initial design process began by simply doing a rubbing of the Hausmarken I had carved. In my earlier post I gave a little example of what I had already done but after taking a closer look at the pattern some things seemed a little off and I had to fix so I could refine the Design. I have also spent a little time messing around with layouts and experimenting to see what I could come up with. Obviously none of my designs are finalised yet and I have another idea that I want to try out hopefully before the end of this week which could work much better. Here are a few of my designs for the Postcard, I also intend in using German in most of my work but I'm just using some English for these early concepts.

So that's just a few examples of what i've come up with for the Postcard, as I said i'm hoping to try something else out this week as an experiment which could work much better but I will wait and see how that works out. I hope I can upload a couple photographs no matter what happens with the experiment as it's always a good idea to show what doesn't work out.

Zeichen

2011-10-30T20:33:00.000-07:00

My Adventure begins here!

So I'll begin with a short introduction to what i'm doing at the moment. As part of my studies here I have 3 modules per semester just like at home. So I have a seminar in Art, Memory and Commemoration which takes place for once a week for an hour and a half. I also have a Project class and a Workshop class. So I chose the Project called 'Zeichen' which means 'Signs' as it interested me the most. My workshop is fortunately done as part of my Project so this makes my studies a lot easier and I have the same professor for both of these.When I signed up for my project I agreed to take part in an excursion to a small island on the north coast of germany called Hiddensee. This Excursion took place last weekend and was one of the best experiences of my life not only did it give me the opportunity to get to know my new class mates but I also got to stay on a beautiful island. The reason we went to the island was that the houses there have signs on the front known in german as 'Hausmarken'. These have been used on the island for hundreds of years and are combinations of lines, shown in the image below.

Whilst on the island we lived in a hostel and we were put in cooking groups so every night each group took their turn to cook starters, main course and desert. This was a great way of getting to know our classmates and learning to work as a team. Of course we weren't just on the island to sight see though, we were joined by an illustrator and a wood carver. We did workshops with both and then were allowed our own time to work on whatever ideas we had.

Before departure to the island we were also given two tasks each, one chosen by ourselves and another chosen at random. The task chosen by ourselves had to involve a statistic or detail about each person in the group and the other chosen at random had to be something about the island. My tasks were:

1. To find out everyone's Hometown.

2. To count how many horses I saw on the trip.

The idea of these tasks was that when we completed them we would make an info graphic that illustrated them so whilst we were at Hiddensee we got to work on how we would illustrate these.

The image I placed at the top of this post was taken while I was working on my woodblock cutting of my chosen Hausmarken. We each had to chose a Hausmarken and then cut it into the woodblocks which of course took up quite some time. We did these wood block cuttings so that when we returned to University we could print them. I quickly thought that maybe it would be a good idea to do a rubbing and see what I could come up with and it looked something like this.

So as we were going to print these Hausmarken to make a post card I worked a little further and started experimenting with Illustrator and messing around with colour.

I then made a little discovery that my Hausmarken may actually work well as part of a pattern and I then started looking at colour schemes in which to use it. Here is an example of what I came up with, i'm still working on layouts and i'm trying to figure out what other colours may work well.

So this is just a quick post to show what i've been up to and I have a presentation this thursday so following that I will post all the rest of my work. I am very excited about what the rest of my year here has in store for me as the beginning has been really Invigorating and Interesting.

Weimar ist Super

2011-09-12T23:26:00.000-07:00

Just a couple of my photographs to give you a little flavour of what Weimar is like.. It's all about culture and history here and i'm Loving it.. The people are great, the beer is nice and the nightlife is pretty fantastic :D

DES306 School of Creative Arts Posters

2011-05-26T10:00:00.001-07:00

This was a project that involved creating a series of posters for the School of Creative arts. I saw this as a great opportunity to use mark-making and create some typography. I got some cardboard and cut out the letters and sprayed them onto paper and let the paint run. I then scanned these and adjusted them to get the effect I wanted. As my posters are part of a series when they are put together they spell 'ARTS'.

DES306 LessWasteMoreRights competition

2011-05-26T09:54:00.001-07:00

This is the poster I designed for the Less Waste More Rights competition. My Design highlights the fact that in third world countries people do not have access to the basic medical supplies. I feel that in our country take this privilege for granted due to the misuse of drugs in society. I kept my design simple and to the point, and the typography to a minimum.

DES306 Logo Design - School of Creative Arts

2011-05-26T09:47:00.000-07:00

Logo Design

Business Card (front)

Business Card (back)

Compliment Slip

Letterhead

DES 306 Brochure Design

2011-05-20T10:55:00.000-07:00

For this project I thought it would be a good idea to mess around with vectors and type. After having fun with type in first year it was easy to remember the skills I learned. As the Verbal Arts Centre is at the Heart of the Derry walls I thought it was a good idea to take images from the surrounding area and make them into Vectors. I experimented with the colour scheme as well but chose orange and black because the images worked well. After presenting the brochure to my class I made the decision to add a little white to the brochure as it compliments the imagery nicely.

Here is a couple photos of the finished product printed up...

A little Fun - Z Brush style

2011-05-20T10:11:00.000-07:00

Since the head i modelled was decent I thought i'd play with Z Brush :D

My Final Video Character animation

2011-05-16T19:11:00.000-07:00

Final 3D Character Development

2011-05-16T18:30:00.001-07:00

The final unwrap

Here you can see the mesh of the unwrap

Adding weights to the model for Animation

Here you can see the Fingers on the biped

Scaling the Biped

Here I just unwrapped and painted to see if the unwrap was tidy

The final model with Turbo smooth

This was an alternative unwrap method I tried but I then decided to attempt my own method

This is a series of images from the texturing stage right through to rigging and rendering some final images.

My Character Near completion :D

2011-05-13T12:26:00.001-07:00

My Model with Head :D

2011-05-12T11:22:00.000-07:00

All done except need to tackle the feet and eyes... spent quite a while on the head and it seems to work quite well..

App Screenshots

2011-05-09T11:26:00.000-07:00

This is My icon Design

Load Screen

Welcome/Home screen

My Profile

Edit Profile

My Mail

Mail Respond

My Contacts

Conor's Profile

Send 'Call Me' invitation

About ?

'Call Me' App Video

2011-05-08T13:14:00.000-07:00

Stop motion work research

2011-05-04T08:19:00.000-07:00

Here's some of my Previous work with stop motion :)

This was a project I did during my Foundation in the North West Regional College. I really enjoyed the modelling side of Stop Motion animation as you can see above, this was my Emu 'Gus' who had some pretty silly adventures.

Above are a couple of the screen shots from the animation I did using Gus the Emu, unfortunately as I was using a trial version of the Stop Motion software the edited video did not export and was lost although I have the video experiment I did at the time which I may upload to youtube.

DES 317 Stop Motion Work

2011-05-04T08:15:00.000-07:00

Here are my Stop Motion experiments...

My 3D character mesh..

2011-05-03T06:03:00.001-07:00

I've been working on building a male model which I plan to unwrap and add robotic features. Not sure about the head yet, I have I head already built but my initial plan was a helmet.

Stop Motion.... here it goes.... :D

2011-04-21T18:13:00.000-07:00

Well i've been going over idea after idea for my stop motion and I thought it would be better if it was fun. Therefore I chose one of my favourite characters of all time... the mighty 'Optimus Prime'... this is just a simple experiment using a transforming toy..

For my final stop motion I picture using people, maybe just myself. I would like to make a funny stop motion as it seems to be a good way to capture the audiences attention. I enjoyed doing this experiment and it helped me to learn more about stop motion :D

EpiCentre - Final Floor Plan

2011-04-07T04:23:00.001-07:00

GIMME A SHOUT

2011-04-05T03:43:00.001-07:00

This is the 450pixels wide version... ---->>>

For this project I am going to:
Design an app that can allow someone to alert a friend for example that they want him or her to call.
By sending a ‘Call Me’ invitation via Facebook, Twitter etc.. The user can let someone know they want him or her to call. I thought this would be a good idea as sometimes people run out of credit or texts and the only way they can reach someone is through social networking.
Be it an emergency or even a casual call there will be options that will allow the user to personalise the ‘Call Me’ invitation. For example if someone has a problem they can sent an invitation that shows the other person that they have a problem and they need his or her help.
I plan to develop this app for iPad/iPhone/iPod Touch format as I think it would interest this market.

Epicentre Logo Animation

2011-04-01T09:45:00.000-07:00

for some reason it pixelates ate the start but the logo looks fine, this is a 3Dmax model of the Logo that has been exported into flash and tidied up...

DES 317 Epicentre Research

2011-03-31T11:25:00.000-07:00

I started by researching websites for similar organisations like EpiCentre but to be honest I didn't find much that was interesting. As i mainly work in 3D I decided I was going to use 3Dmax for the project as it would allow me to animate the Logo as this was the first idea I had. When I saw the logo for the first time my first idea was to animate it as it seemed to have an interesting shape and the lighting could be done similar in 3Dmax.
I then came up with the idea that i could develop a 3D floor plan application using Flash... I found one I really liked here.... http://www.citynorthhotel.com/3D-floor-plans
Although this floor plan was very complex i decided i would simplify the idea because i had never worked between 3Dmax and flash before. I will admit that Learning Actionscript has been pretty hard but i feel that with more work in the future i could develop much more complicated designs. Whilst doing this project I have got further with Actionscript than i thought but it was all down to keeping at it and not giving up and most of my research on the web was based on sourcing actionscript code that i needed...

Epicentre Illustrations

2011-03-31T11:22:00.000-07:00

I started the project by messing around with a few images just to see what i could come up with, i'm not using these though as my work is all based in flash.

Early Flash Layout Concepts

2011-03-31T11:19:00.000-07:00

This is a few of my concepts that I designed for my 3D floor plan, I decided not to use these as they were too busy so I simplified the design.

Working with Actionscript in Flash

2011-03-31T11:16:00.001-07:00

This is a number of different screen shots of my work on flash, i seemed to get to grips with Actionscript 2.0 easily enough but it took work to get there..

More 3Dmax work for Logo

2011-03-31T10:16:00.001-07:00

I worked with shadow in the scene and then decided to export the file as a PNG and take it into Flash so i could work with it there.

Logo Work in 3Dmax

2011-03-31T10:14:00.001-07:00

Here are some of my renders of the Logo work i did in 3Dmax..

Epicentre 3Dwork

2011-03-31T08:53:00.000-07:00

I worked with 3Dmax to create my Logo and the animation for my flash document... By exporting my 3D work as PNG files i was able to take it into flash and work with it there..

My character Development...

2011-03-29T03:09:00.001-07:00

I've been working with my Bamboo Wacom.....

Character Design... Let's Go... :D

2011-03-15T12:10:00.001-07:00

So for this project i'm thinking about designing a futuristic police officer with perhaps robotic parts. I think this idea might be cool, and maybe I could create a much more advanced RoboCop as technology has come on a bit since those movies. The characters in the new Tron film were pretty cool as they had suits with lights built in. Terminator is also a good reference as the robots are human like but as they are damaged you begin to see the robotic parts. I want my character to walk and have the same characteristics and movement as a human. As I thought of this Iron Man came to mind as the suit is controlled by a human the movement isn't as robotic and more natural. After my last project I feel by getting stuck in early and getting the work done I could really pull this off as I learnt how to Unwrap and add texture as well as a bump map.

Final Robot video

2011-03-09T16:35:00.000-08:00

Final Rendering :D

2011-03-09T08:50:00.000-08:00

The Unwrapped part certainly makes a difference to the quality.

Unwrapping and bump maps

2011-03-09T08:14:00.000-08:00

Took a while to get a hang of it but the unwrap is complete :D

My Final Robot... Unwrapped Main section.. :D

2011-03-08T13:27:00.000-08:00

Well this is possibly one of the toughest things i've done on 3Dmax so far, and i'm shocked i managed it by myself...

Now I am going to attempt to add perhaps writing and possibly even attempt a bump map.

My 3Dmax Robot... :D

2011-03-08T11:27:00.000-08:00

Well i've been working on this and I am using an image of Magee carpark for my compositing. It was a very dull morning so the lighting wasn't great but i've been working with Max in order to make the model fit into the scene.

My robot in 3Dmax

2011-03-08T02:40:00.001-08:00

As I decided to do a robot here is a HDRI example using the image from class :D

Sticks, Dowels and a bit of drilling 2

2011-03-07T11:20:00.001-08:00

Of course this is only my practice runs as I wanted to see how I could use the dowels to create my final piece. I am going to experiment steaming the wood so it can be bent into intricate shapes.

Sticks, Dowels and a bit of drilling :D

2011-03-07T11:15:00.000-08:00

Well i've had a got at this new project, went into the garden and cut a couple branches of a tree. Here are a few photos of me messing around in the garage, don't mind the mess it's just christmas decorations etc..

3Dmax Modelling a Robot

2011-03-03T11:32:00.000-08:00

Well i've decided to make and animate a robot, simply because I think designing a car was a little too advanced for me.. so after abandoning that idea I set my sights on designing a robot which I thought would be easy but that was short lived.. here's a few screen shots of my development
:D

DES 317 Designing with Numbers

2011-02-11T01:17:00.001-08:00

http://studio.sketchpad.cc/sp/pad/view/X8hDRJKvta/latest
this is the link to my animation :)

and this is the embedded version

file:///Users/ciaranmclaughlin/Desktop/newrandom/applet/index.html

DES 317 Designing with Numbers

2011-02-10T16:29:00.000-08:00

Well here's my final 8 images, i have enjoyed working with processing and flash and it is clear I have much more to learn. I did not expect there to be so much mathematics involved but by simply changing numbers in the code, rotating things, moving stuff and being to be very honest random this is what i came up with.

Design Dialogues Module - Laptop power supply research

2011-01-31T11:08:00.000-08:00

So for this new module we have been asked to research a laptop power supply. This may seem pretty simple although with so many different laptops around these days this makes it much harder to get information about a piece of equipment that comes in many different shapes and forms.

I'll begin with the size, many laptop chargers are rectangular in shape and vary a little in size. Some are quite large and this may be due to the fact they must be robust in order survive constant use. The average laptop charger can weigh up to several pounds and as i have researched many companies do not include the weight of the charger when they specify the overall weight of the laptop they are selling. This is somewhat misleading as companies pride themselves on making their products lighter and much more durable in order to compete with others. In doing so they simply forget about the design of the power supply and this is why most power supplies are not very aesthetically pleasing and they are predominantly black in colour.

I began my research by looking at universal power supplies that have adjustable voltages and interchangeable heads which allow compatibility with a range of different laptops. Below i have included a picture of a universal laptop power supply, including the heads that can be changed and you can also see on the side of the block there is a voltage button that can be adjusted.

A laptop power block contains an AC-DC adapter which converts 110 - 240 V AC power from the mains supply to a range of different positive DC voltages (between 15V to 24V).

A laptop charger can get very hot depending on the conditions in which it is used, it is advised to keep them in an open space of their own away from any other electrical devices and nothing should be left on top of them. In situations where a laptop power supply has been covered they can short circuit and catch fire.

As with all electronic goods there are regulations and standards to which they must live up to. All laptop Chargers that come into the european union will have the CE logo, which means they have met the required standards to be supplied.

Many laptop chargers have cables that can become frayed at the edges and this can cause electrical faults. Apple have solved this problem with their Mag Safe charger which doesn't get caught and rip the cable. They also have a handy feature that allows the user to wrap up the cable so it's tidy for easy storage.

There is no given specification for the shape of a laptop charger although they are all mainly the same shape. Considering that many people spend a significant amount of money on their laptop charger perhaps it is about time companies made effort when designing them. The colour of laptop chargers are also limited to just black or white, there doesn't seem to be any reason as to why they couldn't be supplied in a range of colours.

I feel if they looked much more dynamic that they could look like they are a powerful device. I will experiment with different shapes in order to explore the possibilities.

Generally PVC (polyvinyl chloride) cable is used for laptops as it is durable and has a low cost.

Laptop chargers are manufactured to be highly durable so they can be carried around.

From personal experience I can say that a laptop charger can last up to 18 months. This depends on where the laptop is used and whether or not the user carefully packs away the charger between charges. Generally a laptop will last longer than the charger, although it has been known that when the charger stops working this can also affect the laptop.

They can cost between £14:99 and £100.

The time it takes to charge the batteries is usually rated depending on the size of the computers screen.

The average length of the cable is 6 foot/1.8 metres.

The performance of a power block depends on the output voltage required.

app icon design

2011-01-12T10:10:00.001-08:00

postcard from the beginning

2011-01-12T10:08:00.001-08:00

My App Video

2011-01-08T19:32:00.000-08:00

My iPad App : About ?

2011-01-08T15:57:00.001-08:00

About ??

My iPad App : Scores

2011-01-08T15:56:00.001-08:00

Scores

My iPad App : Game Finish

2011-01-08T15:50:00.001-08:00

Game Finish

My iPad App : Triple Points

2011-01-08T15:49:00.001-08:00

Triple Points

My iPad App : Double Points

2011-01-08T15:48:00.000-08:00

Double Points

My iPad App : Start

2011-01-08T15:47:00.001-08:00

Start

My iPad App : Game, Set, Go...

2011-01-08T15:45:00.001-08:00

Start Game...

My iPad App : Game beginning, delails

2011-01-08T15:44:00.001-08:00

Game beginning, details on how to play etc...

My iPad App : Drinking List Details

2011-01-08T15:42:00.000-08:00

Drinking List Details, type of tea, how much milk etc...

My iPad App : Add John

2011-01-08T15:41:00.002-08:00

Adding a Friend and typing

My iPad App : Add a Friend

2011-01-08T15:41:00.001-08:00

Add a Friend

My iPad App : Drinking List

2011-01-08T15:40:00.001-08:00

Drinking List

My iPad App : Home Screen

2011-01-08T15:39:00.000-08:00

Home Screen

My iPad App : Load Screen

2011-01-08T15:38:00.000-08:00

Load Screen

3Dsmax character

2010-12-15T09:00:00.000-08:00

My 3D work never ends, this is screenshots of 3Dsmax which I'm using to create a character for my City of Culture Augmented reality stuff :)

LessWasteMoreRights round 5

2010-10-18T14:25:00.001-07:00

Well after going over such a simple design a million times here it is :D

Dance

2010-10-03T17:32:00.000-07:00

Design

2010-10-03T17:31:00.001-07:00

Drama

2010-10-03T17:29:00.000-07:00

Final Final poster designs :D

2010-10-03T17:21:00.001-07:00

Final Poster Design's (i think)

2010-10-03T13:51:00.001-07:00

iPad Icon Design

2010-10-03T07:21:00.000-07:00

More icon work for my tea app.... Starting to get a good grasp of illustrator now :D

Dance

2010-10-02T09:49:00.000-07:00

Drama

2010-10-02T09:48:00.000-07:00

Music

2010-10-02T09:46:00.000-07:00

2010-10-02T09:38:00.000-07:00

These are my Posters for paddy...

2010-10-02T09:16:00.000-07:00

Well we've been working on Tea stuff for Design Interaction and i've been considering what my icon would maybe look like if i were to make it for the iPad or iPhone. I've done it in the style

of an App Icon and i did this with the help of an Illustrator tutorial, i found this at www.tutvid.com.. This is an awesome website if your looking for help to learn new software and here is an example of what i came up with.. hope you like it :D

Typography posters

2010-10-01T06:24:00.000-07:00

Right so i've been working on these posters for our project and i think i'm getting somewhere.. here's a few samples.... :D

2010-05-07T14:11:00.000-07:00

Just a little more research for my wearing type here. I thought looking at some of my designs that they were like Maori facial tattoos so i had a look at some examples. Their tattoos are based on their peoples history and in tribes their tattoos vary depending on their rank. Therefore Maori tattoos are like a badge of honour worn proudly by tribes.

In our society we would not see many people with facial tattoos to the same extent as the photograph simply because it would not be socially acceptable.

My Moving Type, starring Biffy Clyro :D

2010-05-04T13:19:00.001-07:00

Moving Type work

2010-04-10T14:07:00.000-07:00

As i was inspired by some videos on the internet i thought it would be appropriate to create backgrounds for my moving type. As i am using a quote from one of my favourite songs i thought it would be cool to create a rock styled background. This was achieved using photoshop including some of my own mark making and some brushes i downloaded. I think this image is effective and would be appropriate for my background. I will develop a few different backgrounds in order to achieve maximum effect.

This is the image i created previously only i worked with the colours and added text which i think looks cool. I thought this concept looked like a poster design and i am going to print it out. I think the worn type works well with the image a

lthough for my final type i'm going to have to develop my type using In Design.

I really enjoyed creating this image and i think it would be cool to develop the concept further and perhaps use flash to animate the text.

2010-04-09T11:08:00.000-07:00

This is another one of my photoshop experiments using the same image from before but i have changed the colour of the background and changed the colour of some of the letters.

I'm currently working on my concept pages and i'm trying to figure out how i'm going to make the type move and what direction is it going to move.

I've been messing around with my work and found if i invert the colours i get this dark and rough look which i like and i thought if i brought this into flash i could make the words flicker like for an old black and white movie effect or i could make the words look like they are burning.

I want my moving type to reflect the music of the band which is very progressive and heavy. Although there is also a much softer side to their music which may be reflected in my moving type. It depends which quote i use from their music because each song is very different.

MOVING TYPE

2010-04-09T06:05:00.000-07:00

As i want to use a line from one of Biffy Clyro's music for my moving type i decided to do some initial work with type. I'm considering using either flash or IStop Animation but i'm unsure which would be best for my moving type, Stop Animation involves a lot of preparation and is very time consuming and flash is hard to figure out at times. As i am developing my concepts i will decide what to do about the programmes but at the moment i'm choosing what font would be suitable for my moving type and what should my type actually do. I have a few really interesting ideas but i'm unsure of how to achieve the effects i want. So it's time to sit down and figure out these programmes in order to get type moving :)

Some Photography

2010-03-28T10:47:00.000-07:00

My candle of hope.
Some beautiful patterns in stained glass, i seem to have a new found interest in taking photos of stained glass. Most of these photos have been taken in chapels and cathedrals, the patterns and colours interest me.

The Sign to St. Brigids well.
The Virgin Mary decorated with peoples rosary beads.
Blurred image of the a cross.
St. Brigid's Well

I took all of these photos today on a trip to a holy well near my home, i used to visit here as a child and i thought it would be a good opportunity for photography. I will upload my photography as i start my work for our image making class, i would appreciate any feedback from you guys so feel free to leave comments :)

2010-03-26T11:28:00.000-07:00

I thought this was one of my best concepts for the article based on the Rhino's, i created the image by roughly sketching a rhino and drawing some of the facts from the articles on the rhinos head. Then i stained a page using tea bags and burned it to create a background.

2010-03-26T10:52:00.000-07:00

One of my many concepts for paddy's news article illustration.

2010-03-14T17:23:00.000-07:00

I began my wearing type research by looking how people wear type on their body. A perfect example of this is how people have typographic tattoos. I feel this is a very interesting as people feel that certain quotes, words, names etc are so important to them they want them to be permanently tattooed on their skin. I personally love tattoos and I like how they allow people to express themselves. I am also aware that tattoos are very addictive as whilst I was having my tattoo done i was

thinking of what i wanted next.

This is a photograph i took of my M ask made of type, of course it doesn't really mask the whole face but i like that effect. Unfortunately i could not find a mould of a mask so this meant i had to simply cut my mask out of card. I went through a number of attempts using card and it proved to be very annoying at times as the card would rip when i tried to cut out the detail of the letters. I decided to create the mask using the word 'Mask' as i discovered using longer words the mask looked too confusing. By just using 'mask' it is much easier to read and the letters are recognisable.

If i had more time and resources i could have found a mould for a mask and made it fit better but i feel i achieved the goal of creating an accessory out of type.

2010-03-09T13:36:00.000-08:00

Perhaps this might help those making a bag out of type.. I think Mark mentioned it :)

2010-03-09T12:50:00.000-08:00

This is another image of the same work i found, this was a typographic scarf and i thought it was interesting how the type looked when used to create an item of clothing. We don't see accessories being made of type every day as this is probably not the fashion but in most cases we can see the brand name on an accessory.

I was considering making a mask out of type but i'm not sure how to make the type mould to the shape of a face but then i thought i could get a plastic mask from any craft shop and moulding the type over the top of it using perhaps Paper Mache. I will have to test a number of methods before i can make my final concept.

I will do more research into the world of typography and try to find more inspiration for my work.

2010-03-09T12:26:00.000-08:00

This is a photo i found on the interweb of typographic scarfs which i thought was interesting. I have been thinking of a number of different accessories that i could create using type but i thought it would be best to simply experiment with type before i decide on a particular accessory.

2010-03-05T09:53:00.000-08:00

After spending so much time on my self portrait made of typography i thought it would be fun to mess around with it and using a scan of some of my mark making i created this image. The textures and colour worked well and i think this is much better than my plain black and white portrait.

2010-03-05T06:25:00.000-08:00

This is my drawing photoshopped slightly to take away the scratchy lines which i think makes it look much more graphic. In my previous work i thought the roughness of the lines made the image of my skateboard look much more busy and i think by simplifying the image it would look much more interesting. It took me some time to produce this outcome but i think it was worth it.

Final Magazine title

2010-03-04T12:21:00.001-08:00

This is the magazine title i decided to use for my final magazine cover, i thought my rough textures and the fact it was done freehand added a much more personal touch to the title.

2010-03-04T12:16:00.000-08:00

This is a photoshop image i produced in memory of the Ulster American Folk park trip.... :D

2010-03-04T11:57:00.000-08:00

After a number of attempts and hours of changing my layout i came up with this concept for my final A3 spread. Instead of using the drawing i had of my skateboard for the whole background i decided to use the image to compliment my text.

By simply adding an invert effect on the image it became much lighter end this allowed me to put text over it. Although i thought there was not enough detail in the image so i cut out the ends of the actual image and layered them over the top and i liked this as it added a blended effect. I also used the same font for my article as i used for my magazine cover.

I think my outcome is very effective and i enjoyed the development of my spread as it allowed me to take a closer look at my favourite pastime. I also learnt a lot about how a magazine spread should look and how important the placing of the text is.

2010-03-04T11:51:00.000-08:00

This i a concept for my A3 Spread and by using an image i created using a fine liner pen i created the background. By using my own first hand drawing i thought this added my own personal touch to the article as i was going to call it 'My Venture so far' as i have used the same venture trucks for 7 years and they have never let me down.

I chose not to use this concept though as it was too busy due to the background so i got to work on another simplified spread.

2010-03-04T11:32:00.000-08:00

Another concept i produced in the work up to my final magazine cover. I like this idea because of the textures of the background and i like how the shape of the skateboard can be seen, although the trucks were somehow lost as i had layered the effects on the image and this has made it look like the skateboard has no trucks or wheels.

2010-03-04T11:28:00.000-08:00

As i decided to call my magazine 'Hate It Skate It' i though it would be necessary to produce a number of concepts using my computer. I found that the text was too plain and did not have the same effect as my text i produced by hand. Therefore i decided to scan my own first hand work into the computer and use it for my final.

2010-03-04T11:24:00.000-08:00

These are two concepts i produced by simply scanning the colour image onto the computer and then flipping it black and white. It is easy to see that i was designing the type to look like skateboards and i thought this would look good by i wanted my type to be much more textural in order to give that extreme sports effect.

2010-03-04T11:14:00.000-08:00

This is another variation of my final magazine cover that i produced but i tried incorporating a skateboard image. I didn't like this concept though as the images take the readers eye away from the text, and as we are studying typography i thought it was important to focus on the type. This is why i produced my final magazine cover using the 'less is more' theory.