BRIEF
The theme for the Batsford Prize 2017 was ‘Interpreting Nature’. The brief required innovative and well-crafted interpretations, either through the subject or materials used, or both. I wanted to use this brief as an opportunity to explore abstraction and visual symbols. i started considering our relationship with nature, in terms of themes such as animals, e n v i r o n m e n t , p l a n t s , a n d w a t e r.
IDEAS AND EXPERIMENTATION
In trying to avoid just drawing natural forms, I wanted to explore our interaction with nature, i r e g a r d t o h o b b i e s , i n p a r t i c u l a r, swimming, gardening and a s t r o n o m y. I made lots of compositional roughs, primarily using shape and used Photoshop to experiment with colour and overlapping. I found this to be a struggle so decided to go back to line drawing, which I felt was more true to my practice.
FINAL IMAGES
These are my final pieces for the brief, symbolising astronomy and swimming. I actually produced screenprints of my designs but I decided that they weren’t strong enough so submitted the digital files instead. I didn’t quite achieve what I set out to (only producing 2 images instead of 3) but I am pleased that this brief enabled me to explore a different side to my practice, using abstracted forms.
BRIEF
The brief was to produce 12� singles covers in response to chosen songs, purely using visuals. I thought that this would be the perfect project to explore my interest in music graphics and explore my visual communication skills. I decided to stray away from the given list of tracks as I wanted to produce designs for artists that I felt confident in representing.
IDEAS AND DEVELOPMENT
When producing roughs of my ideas, it was important to me to use the square format as the compositions had to work within this frame. As colour is integral to my practice, I explored colour schemes at the ideas stage, which greatly aided my decision process later on. G e n e r a l l y, I p r o d u c e d t h e i m a g e r y using analogue techniques and used Photoshop to complete and refine my designs.
OUTCOMES
These are my 4 outcomes. I aimed to produce my designs in a limited amount of time, meaning that they were all fairly spontaneous, instinctual images, taking cues from both the lyrics and atmospheres of the songs.
THE BOY IN THE BUBBLE
AS LONG AS WE’RE TOGETHER
BIG BEAUTIFUL DAY
ALLAH, ALLAH, ALLAH
As this brief was so open and only required my interpretation of the tracks, it allowed me to experiment with different methods of image making (collage, s h a p e - b a s e d i m a g e r y, a n d p u r e l y digital designs).
BRIEF
The brief was to produce a greeting card design for the brand O h h D e e r. F o l l o w i n g o n f r o m m y UK Greetings project, I thought that this would be a good short brief to complete as it would allow me to produce a commercial design for a contemporary brand. After looking into Ohh Deer ’s products, I noticed a trend in animal based designs, as well as f u n n y, p e r s o n a b l e s l o g a n s s o I decided to go down this route.
IDEAS AND DEVELOPMENTS
I decided to use my design of a bird wearing a leather jacket with the slogan ‘you are one cool guy’. The design isn’t intended for a particular occasion but just as a friendly greeting. I used a chinagraph pencil to draw out my design and Photoshop to a l t e r t h e l i n e c o l o u r, a d d t e x t u r e s and other colours. This process allowed me to be experimental in q u i t e a s p o n t a n e o u s , q u i c k w a y.
OUTCOME
This is my final design. I chose the slogan ‘pretty fly for a bird guy’ as I felt that sense of humour was important to the design and this fits well. I decided to add flat digital colour as opposed to textures to make the image much bolder and to differentiate it from my UK Greetings designs. I have handwritten the text to give a further sense of playfulness and p e r s o n a l i t y. Although the style is obviously mine, I feel I have stepped out of my comfort zone with my use of colour and followed the Ohh Deer brand aesthetics.