hello; my name is Krysta M. Micallef & welcome to my very first portfolio
contents; 04. 07. 19. 29. 32. 41. 51. 59. 60.
this is me editorials 15. +spreads branding exposure poster design 37. +typography photomanipulation 47. vehicle wrapping self-initiated a word of thanks get in touch
Krysta Maria Micallef is a student Graphic Designer who has spent the last four years exploring and perfecting her skills in the field: aided by lecturers at the Mcast Art & Design Institute in Malta. Her strengths lie in marketing design with an emphasis on typography, and despite that she favours minimal design, she is a designer that has no inhibitions with trying something new or catering to a client’s brief. Despite her short years in the field, Krysta was one of two designers chosen for the Leonardo Exchange Project in Malaga, Spain, in February 2013 and by September of that same year, her work was on all of Malta’s doorsteps with her front cover design for Yellow Pages. Krysta’s work also featured in America, in a collaborative branding project for comic convention Monitacon: a one day event attended by more than 400 individuals. Right now her sights are set on achieving a Bachelor’s Degree in Interactive Media & Graphic Design and from there she hopes to someday achieve a Master’s Degree in Illustration, so she can continue creating works in the two fields that truly inspire her.
“Misjub” was a comic book written, illustrated, and designed by myself in response to a brief handed to us by the Maltese Commissioner for Children association and Transport Malta. The safety of children on the road was the main message this comic book had to deliver. What I did for it, though, was shape a futuristic setting where animals are a rare sight. Spotting one fuels Luca’s curiosities (our protagonist), and he is quick to run out the door in search of it again, leading to an exciting but dangerous adventure.
Child Safety on the Road Comic Book
“Perpetua Font Book� is another project catering to a client brief. Except this one comes with quite the few regulations in tow. The typeface used had to come from a preselected list of serif and sans serif, and the body text had to be the writing of one of the Beat Generation Poets. The way we chose to interpret it was completely up to us and the whole point of the piece was to be as experimental and creative as possible. Black and white consumes most of the pages in this booklet, but a slight hint of red helps bring attention to elements that would have otherwise passed for common letters on a page.
Perpetua Font Book
The Tagline of Sex SellS and how The general adulT Public PerceiveS iTS conTribuTion To adverTiSing Today.
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By Krysta Maria Micallef
Throughout this essay, we have seen how the consumers’ views and reactions have in fact evolved with the years and the adverts presented to them. It is very difficult to assess just how far the population has come, mostly because not a lot of studies have been conducted around the reaction of onlookers towards these adverts. The history of sex in advertising and its affects and consequences are subjects that have long been discussed, concluded and reinstated. Although exactly what people make of these adverts upon seeing them has been given little attention. Despite this, when evaluating specific examples, it is easy to see that albeit the responses tend to be subjective to the individual and the provided advert, in most cases where people have found offence the complaints tend to revolve around a concern for underage audiences and the placement of these adverts (given the last example: TV screening was an issue, internet however was completely fine). The subject of the presented advert also effected judgement: where a bikini clad women was completely acceptable in both examples, but an ‘orgy’ (something publicly labelled as outside of the norm) and a poster of two gay men simply hugging and holding hands caused public outcry (before being recognised as a homophobic attack and being reinstated).
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5. ConClusion A questionnaire I put together featuring eleven questions that revolved around the individual’s own personal opinion regarding sexual appeal in advertising brought back similar results. This questionnaire was shared both among my peers and complete strangers, and from the results (See Questionnaire Results Form), only 18% voted their direct disapproval of sexual adverts, and from those stating why they might disapprove, only 19% voted that it was because they found them to be unethical or offensive. The majority of those that disapproved (30%) were for the simple reason that the product had nothing to do with sex, and this was followed closely with the opinion that sex in advertising was overdone (26%).
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“The Tagline of Sex Sells and how the General Adult Public perceives its Contribution to Advertising Today” is one of my latest works: a booklet detailing a referenced essay also written by me in response to a client brief. We had no rules for this. No guidelines, and it is an editorial piece I made sure to deliver in a professional light. Clean, minimal in detail and décor. It is a design that exudes the sensuality the topic calls for without quite tipping into the crude display sex depicted by amateurs can be.
Sex in Advertising Short Thesis
Middle page spread design exercise where spread had to contain a set list of editorial design elements.
Spread Design
THE MODErN PINSTrIPE the revival of a classic
A
new breed of pinstripe suit has been popping up this year – featuring an improved cut and
shorter jacket length – giving the style a much more contemporary appeal. With
the right accessories and a carefully considered shirt and tie combination, a pinstriped suit isn’t the sole reserve of annoying Wall Street wannabes anymore, but an excellent purchase for anyone who’s looking to add a bit of pattern and variety to their existing tailoring. Personally, I think more traditional pieces of tailoring (like the pinstriped suit or the patterned blazer) are having a resurgence due to the direction that menswear is starting to take. We’ve gone through our 1960s inspired period of skinny suits, shirts and ties, which evolved into more expressive elements such as bold patterns and brightly colour pieces.
Now it’s time for a slightly more 1970s twist to be incorporated, with designers, tailors and the high street all edging towards a fuller, more confident and masculine cut within formal wear collections, which is ideal for classic items such as the pinstriped suit.
The first thing you need to consider when choosing a pinstripe suit is just how pinstriped you want it to be, because there are a wealth of options out there.
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Generally, the distance between the stripes on your suit will correlate to the amount of confidence you have when wearing a suit.
If this is your first time delving into the murky depths of tailoring, you may want to stick to stripes that are close together. On the other hand, if this is just another suit shaped brick in your sartorial wall, then why not go bolder with a wider stripe? With each added millimetre, you’ll need to have an equal increase in confidence. You then need to decide the details. Suit colour? Stick to monochromatic colours such as navy, grey and black. They’re the most versatile when paired with other pieces and will help cement the traditional formal aesthetic. Stripe colour? I prefer a chalk stripe for the statement that it makes but there is no end to what you can find. For a more conservative look go tonal, such as navy and light blue. For a bolder look, maybe go for navy and red. It’s up to you.
Lastly, decide on what to wear the suit with. If you want to keep things simple, do
so. You’ll never go wrong with a white or blue dress shirt paired with a solid neutral tie and black Oxford lace-ups. But this is 2012 guys, and these are a new breed of suits. So why not step it up a bit?
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Spread design using a number of typographical exercises I had attempted. Part of the Beat Poets Project.
My design for the Voices event for 2014, themed Voices: Heart & Soul. I focused strongly on the visualisations of Soul (as music as well as emotion), and also on the idea of Heart. The energy and complete devotion people put into creating that which their heart is truly into. Be it music or the show itself.
Voices - Heart & Soul
SOUL T R A AND HE VOIC E S
MICAS is the branding concept for a new Contemporary Art Space being opened in Malta. MICAS (Malta International Contemporary Art Space) is planned to exhibit both local, as well as international pieces, and this international factor is what fuelled the concept for this brand identity. The red logo mark, usable both as an individual element as well as with the full text logo, represents locations. Different places marked on a map across different countries, ethnicities, religions etc. The brand extensions, displayed on the far left of this spread in different colours and placements, have also been created to represent this diversity.
MICAS - Malta International Contemporary Art Space
One of two Cosplay conventions I have had the honour of designed for so far; Monitacon was a freelance project myself and artist and designer Danni (Daniela Farrugia) happily collaborated on. It was a client brief that demanded our creativity and individual touch. Danni brought to life all 6 of Monitacon’s characters with her impressive illustrations and I finished off the rest; tying everything in to equip the organisers with flyers, banners, badges, and business cards amongst other things. Anything needed to give the 400+ attendees that showed up the experience of a professional convention.
Monitacon Convention Branding
“Parallex” was a fun and fictional project between me and another designer in which our aim was to explore, identify, and show our understanding of corporate identity vs. brand identity through the actual creation of one. “Parallex” was what came out of this venture: a corporation that began providing parking on the Moon in the year 2050 and expanded to other popular galactic spots in the following decades. Elements on the right all belong to the corporate identity, whilst the elements on this page are examples of the branded planets Parallex provides its services on.
Parallex Corporate Identity vs. Brand Identity
Winner of the Official Front Cover Design for Yellow Pages year 2013/2014. The idea behind this theme started from Yellow Pages’ saying: “With you wherever you go;” something that stays with you and is ever-present. Much like a tattoo, the services Yellow Pages provides doesn’t affect us personally until we make the choice to resort to it. And only after we’ve made that decision is it possible for the possibilities of such a service to be known to us. Like this, it becomes something we carry with us. Something we know is there and available to us once the need for it arises. Like ink embedded into our skin, it becomes a part of us given time. And though we might sometimes barely remember it’s there; a fading piece of art at the back of our neck, we know that if we take the time to look into a mirror it would still be there: waiting for us to rediscover it, and to cherish all the possibilities it offers us.
Yellow Pages Front Cover Competition 2013-2014
Another typographical exercise in the Beat Poets Project. Promotional poster for a fictional Beat Poets Convention taking place.
Part of the Beat Poets Project. This one is a typographical poster depicting the poem “Wild Orphan� by Allen Ginsberg.
Poster design for a fictional exhibition. Titled Inside Out. Simplistic, high contrast and direct.
Environmental Awareness poster built on a number of elements; negative space, the inclusion of a human body part, and one element (fire, water, earth etc.).
The following are a few examples of a freelance photography & type job me and a fellow designer worked on together. Original photographs taken by him. Photo editing and typographical elements done by myself.
A short story laid out across ten photo manipulated images; this project was a humorous one where we were allowed full creative freedom. The result is this Beer Can Love Story between a can of Skol and the ever beautiful Shandy. No good story ever lacked a strong adversary, and that’s where the Pepper Shaker comes into the story and the two battle it out for Shandy’s hand. All in all a very engaging story which ends in tragedy. View from left to right.
Beer Can Love Story Photomanipulation Project
Photo manipulation was never something I had believed I could get into. I love realism and factual things far too much to get sucked into surreal themes too strongly. Sometimes, however, I give in and these are the results of my venture into professional photo manipulation. The woman, I’ve given a futuristic (or possibly even nonhuman and robotic) functional aspect to her previously very biological eyes whilst the squid has had its tentacles replaced for cables and the owl has seen a complete revamp to its face. A steampunk inspired mask and a high resolution shot of another owl’s eye tie in near perfectly to make the image as realistic as possible.
Force Fitting
Using two of the manipulations displayed in the previous spread, we were encouraged to also create vehicle wrapping solutions for Malta’s (at the time current) public transport busses. For the squid in particular, I filled in the scene with deep ocean depths and a number of manipulated squids that blend right in with the environment.
Starting from the very first image on the top left corner and slowly making your way to the final render displayed here, this small project is all about minimizing packaging to the barest solution possible without losing the product’s defining features. I have two examples displayed here; a box of Sugarpill Eyelashes, and a packet of Fox’s Chunkie Cookies on the following page. Hardest part of this process was coming up with reductions that were effective as well as attractive without damaging the brand, and to this day, it remains one of the most intriguing experiments I’ve attempted.
The Minimalist Project
The second in the series for the Minimalist Project. This time showing the drastic change in a Fox’s Chunkie Cookies packet.
i'll be dreaming of you tonight,
“I Swear I’m a Romantic” is a self-initiated project I am currently working on. I created it with the intention of expressing vulgar, as well as offensive words through this currently popular ‘romanticized’ ideal and vision. One would look at this and apreciate the photographic shot and delicate curves. They will read the starting text, which is in nature very romantic, only to then discover that the very opposite is what waits for them when they flip the card.
I Swear I’m a Romantic