Lady in Berlin

Berlin was full of people on bikes, but one lady in particular caught my eye as she peddled her tiny poodle around the city. I originally sketched this illustration out while I was back at my dad's house in Germany, and I finally got around to colouring it up properly yesterday.

s is for sloth (and sadness)

hello followers, just popping in to inform you all that i am still alive and kicking! uni work has once again taken over and today's been a bit of a drag, just one of those days where every time i put pen to paper i'm disappointed with the outcome! so, to combat this disappointment and bad mood, i stepped away from my sketchbook, took out my tablet and proceeded to draw a sloth, because there's no way i can be unhappy when looking at a sloth (just LOOK at those adorable little vacant faces!)

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my favourite ladies

last week i decided to experiment with pencil and watercolour, and after enjoying the results that i achieved, i decided to have a go at creating a set of images within this style. i chose to use some of my favourite ladies as my models, marina diamandis, ellie goulding, zooey deschanel and emma stone, because i have a soft spot for every one of them but also because they're all beautiful, too, and i've found that drawing beautiful people is, for some reason, very enjoyable.

so, there we have it. a 'project' of mine, if you like. hopefully when uni's done with and i'm not a slave to my coursework i'll be able to set myself some more projects and have fun with them!

 please view on flickr for better quality!

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the wind in the willows: draft 1

so as i mentioned, this year i wanted to enter the puffin children's book competition just for fun, experience and to prove to myself that i can manage other projects alongside my university projects, and here is (finally) my first draft of the book cover!

i still want to tweak the back page and i'm considering reillustrating the main characters so that they interact better with the entire front cover (this design isn't how i initially planned it to be, but while arranging all my characters/text in photoshop i realised that my original plan wasn't really going to work,) but other than that i'm pretty content with the colour scheme, background and type (which is a first!)

here's the background pattern i created, it simply features some of the characters that the main four characters bump into along the way and i felt it was important to include them in the book cover design because they help influence how the story moves along.

any feedback on how to improve this design would be really appreciated, so if you've any comments at all i'd love to hear them!

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motel rocks illustrations

at some point last week i became aware of the competition that motel rocks are currently holding, where entrants are asked to illustrate their favourite motel rocks pieces for the chance to win money to spend online and some arty goodies. i thought "what the hell?" and drew up a few sketches before finalising them into what i've got displayed above.

this isn't a style i've drawn in before, and is probably one i won't revisit again, but it was something different to have a go at and i felt it was appropriate for what it was i was illustrating. i've seen a couple of brilliant entries so far - and although i drew these up for more of 'something to do' rather than because i was interested in entering in an attempt to win - and they've left me feeling a little nervous about entering! i've ten days left to enter, so in that time i think i'm going to decide whether or not i want to enter; half of me says "why not? you've nothing to lose!" and the other half says "if you do enter, it means a few judges might have a few cheap giggles if they don't like what you've done." probably a nasty mindset to possess, but it's one i'm struggling to let go of at the minute.

in other news, i'm now back in barnsley for my 3 week spring break and in that time i intend to finalise some ideas i've had for the wind in the willows book cover, finish my outstanding university project that i should've finished a LONG time ago (oops...) and make a start on my new university project, which sounds very interesting but also scary because we have a measly 4 weeks to get it all done in. 

busy as ever, being a graphic design student is a lot of hard work.

mothers' day preparations

this year mothers' day has managed to creep up on me so i've been left desperately thinking at the last minute of what gift i could get her and have it posted home in time for the day. i considered flowers (but £30 a bunch is just waaay out of my price range,) chocolates (but we've still got a shed load left over from christmas) and bailey's (but she's still got two in the cupboard from christmas), until it hit me that i could send her a personal, unique gift for just the price of a picture frame and postage!

i decided to dig out a photo of me and my mum from when we went down to london for my 18th birthday to watch the lion king in theatre (which was fabulous, by the way) and put my own spin on it. i'm hoping she'll appreciate the gesture, i'd like to think that a few hours of my time and a personal gift beats a box of chocolate or a bunch of flowers that'll die within a couple of weeks, but who knows. i suppose i'll find out on the day when she's received the gift!

as well as the framed illustration, i also designed a personal card for her. the two little piggies are me and my brother and the biggest piggy is my mum, the whole piggies idea spirals from my mum's fondness of piggins, but also because she enjoys calling me her little pig and making the occasional hilarious joke about me eating bacon being cannibalism, etc. etc.

i meant to take photographs of the framed illustration and the printed card, but me being forgetful and in a rush to get things posted on time forgot to do so, d'oh, so i'm hoping the original design/scan will make do!

it's all over!

so after spending the last two weeks working like a dog to get everything completed, mounted and and put into a presentation for today's assessment, it's finally all over and done with! so, as promised, here is what i've created for my digital graphic communication university module.

i'll start off by briefly outlining my campaign's ethos and aims. my campaign was to get children between the ages of 4 and 9 cycling for fun while staying safe and improving their fitness, but because my target audience is so young, i also took into account that parents would become part of my target audience, too. because my campaign aims to bring everyone together, both children and parents, i called it 'pedal pals' as it suggests a friendly community and sense of support, but also because the alliteration makes the name memorable and punchy and would so appeal to children.

this is my logo. i wanted to create a mascot for my campaign that would represent its ethos, so i chose to use a monkey because they live within large groups and support one another within them, but also because monkeys are easily recognisable, easy to anthropomorphise and closely linked to humans, meaning they could perhaps be easy to relate to. i suggested cycling safety subtly within my logo through the inclusion of the helmet.

these are my three posters. i wanted to create a campaign that would be promoted through primary schools, so my posters will be on display around schools in classrooms, dining halls, gyms etc. my idea was to make my posters somewhat interactive so that my audience would get involved with them rather than walking past them and dismissing them, so i chose to directly address my audience by asking them to look for something within the posters. i thought this may be a fun idea for a child as they like to interact with their environment, so while keeping my poster entertaining for them, i once again made sure to subtly enforce safety while cycling, so the items my TA will be looking for are linked to cycling safety within different situations. the use of rhyme also makes the posters sound more fun and entertaining for a young audience while the font looks quite childlike and welcoming, giving the posters an overall friendly, inviting look.

this is my animated web banner. the web banner was always hinted at being the least important aspect of the whole project, so i only left myself with a measly three days to plan and complete it. i initially wanted to work with image on my banner like i had done within my posters, however i discovered the dimensions weren't large enough to include images successfully, so i looked at using a typographic solution. i figured that there wouldn't be many 4 - 9 year olds online, so my banner is mainly aimed at parents. my idea was to present them with a cycling fact that they may not know, so i chose the one above to highlight how easily accessible cycling is and how popular it actually is worldwide as it may open a parent's eyes to the different possibilities when thinking about travel, finance and fitness. i kept my campaign's consistency through the use of my font and the textures which i used throughout my three posters.

so, everything's over and done with and i'm fairly happy with the overall outcome (and a lot happier with my work for this project than i have been my last two,) so i'm crossing my fingers that i get a grade that i'll be happy with. only time will tell!

recent work: dulcie

with my main project for this term being over and me having gotten my relief out of my system (by going out four times in one week, oops,) i finally got around to sitting down and finishing off a few of the outstanding illustrations i'd promised people a couple of weeks ago.

above is an illustration i did for dulcie over at la-dulcie-vita as a thank you for the post she recently featured on her blog which featured a short interview with me and displayed some of my work. it was so flattering to have dulcie approach me and ask if i'd be happy for her to feature my work, it's really incredible to think that so many people have laid eyes on my work and that a percentage of those people are actually interested enough in my work to approach me about it! so once again, a big thank you to you, dulcie! if you'd like to read said post, you can find it here.

some of you more observant followers may have noticed a slight difference in the texture of this illustration compared to previous ones, and that's because i've finally ran out of watercolour paper and am now working using coloured pencils in a sketchbook that really won't take watercolour (the pages just tear apart, boo); in future i'll know to not buy a sketchbook just because it's cheap! it's been quite refreshing reverting back to using coloured pencils, i find shading to be a lot more enjoyable, however, the whole process just takes so much longer! a punishment for being cheap, i imagine!

what do you think of my pencil illustrations? do you prefer this texture to watercolour?

vw family

please view on flickr for a better quality image, blogger destroys it!

everyone who knows me in real life knows that i'm an absolute weirdo about my car. personally, i don't think naming my car and giving her a personality is all that weird, but you know, we're all our own people... anyway, along with my volkswagen lupo and her being my little pea, i've extended the family in that polos are mothers and golfs are fathers, the parents of the lupos (ok it sounds weird now i type it out to myself.)

i'd been debating for a while how i could visually represent this idea of a volkswagen family, and after attempting drawing out cars, i found out that it's hard making a golf look as adorable as a lupo, so i scrapped the idea of using cars and started thinking about others ways to depict it.

i finally landed on the idea of using humans and dressing them up to depict the car models that they were representing, and very simply chose to dress the mother in polo attire, the father in golf attire, and the child in a wolf hat, as lupo means wolf in italian. a simple solution!

lately i've really taken to scanning in textures and illustrating within photoshop, using the textures to add depth to otherwise flat colours, and i've got my latest university project to thank for that as i found out that collaging alone is ridiculously time consuming and (sometimes) stressful, so using technology to push me along really helped to make things a little smoother and gave me a bit more control over exactly it was that i wanted to do.

in other news, i now have three posters completed and an animated banner to make before the end of the week as it's assessment (gulp!) the following thursday and friday... why do i feel as though i'm repeating myself?

spirit animals

there's always a lot of talk from the 'bloggers' on tumblr who think they're hilarious about 'spirit animals'; they'll reblog a post of their favourite celeb and a quote from them and comment something along the lines of, "omg -insert name here- is my spirit animal!" and it got me thinking about what a spirit animal is and what my spirit animal(s) could be.

so after a small spot of research, i basically discovered that a spirit animal is an animal that encompasses some of the characteristics that you do as a person. kinda cool, i guess, if you're looking at creating a fursona for yourself (wow, i've just been taken back to 2007 and my subeta days.)

anyway, rambles aside, i decided that i didn't feel as though any one animal could completely be my spirit animal, but there were a few that definitely have some of the characteristics i do. so, i decided on a sloth, mouse and a panda. a sloth because getting myself out of bed on a morning has become a hell of a lot more difficult over these past few months, a mouse because i'm generally a quiet, reserved, shy person (and also because my grandad has nicknamed me mouse), and finally, a panda because the minute i wake up i think about what i can eat for breakfast, and while i'm laid in bed on a night i also think about what will be for breakfast tomorrow.

so, me in a nutshell: i like sleep, food and keeping myself to myself. seems pretty accurate in my own eyes! what would you say your spirit animal is?

poster draft #2

just a quick update to show you what i've been working on today! in my feedback session i realised that from afar the white title text sunk into the green background so it wasn't really legible, and also the monkey sunk into the floor because the two colours were too similar. other feedback was that the monkey and the table looked too 'static' and that the image and text had equal prominence on the page and perhaps one needed to take dominance over the other.

so, in response to my feedback, i've worked on the title text and composed a text arrangement which i think is more effective than the previous one, changed up the colours that were sinking into one another and i've given the monkey and the table a slightly more dynamic angle. i don't think i've quite tackled the image/text hierarchy issue yet, but i'm still unsure about which i want to take precedence.

that's all for now!

recent work: roselovelybones

due to how quiet my blog's been this week, i'd thought i'd nip by just to give you all a quick update on what i've been up to this week and how next week's shaping up for me!

between my time spent this week travelling to and from uni to receive feedback on my work and collaging for hours on end, the lovely emma over at roselovelybones contacted me about illustrating for her, so i leaped at the chance to finally take a break from drawing monkeys and cutting and sticking.


all in all, i'm pretty pleased with how both of these illustrations turned out and was glad to hear that both emma and her boyfriend liked them, too. after emma blogged about my illustrations, i had a mad flow of emails entering my inbox and i now have quite a long list of requests to be getting on with, so i'd just like to take a moment to thank emma for her interest in my work and her support!

in other news, my draft poster seemed to receive positive overall feedback; of course, there are tweaks to be made such as hierarchy decisions and colour choices, but overall my tutors seemed to think my ideas and visuals seemed to work well together, so i'll be making tweaks to the existing poster and (hopefully) finishing my set of three this week!

other than that, i'm just hanging on in there and trying to create the best visuals i can before the deadline arrives and i'm stood up presenting my campaign to my tutors and peers!

poster draft #1

i began working today around 11.30am, and didn't stop until around 8pm, and this is what i have to show for it! i slaved over scraps of card, paper, magazine cuttings and various tools such as paints, markers and pencils to achieve an illustrative monkey style that i was finally happy with (the amount of hand drawn and collaged monkeys in my sketchbook is something of a joke), then moved onto assembling a background (and i've still to try out a digital style just to see how i feel about it) before finally attempting to tackle the type on my poster.

type's something i don't really get along too well with. there are a handful of fonts that i'm comfortable with because they're just good all rounders, however, when it comes to combining fonts with my illustrations i feel as though the two just don't mix. recently i made a set of font brushes from my own handwriting, and when i've needed to include text on any of my illustrations, i've used those as the style fits in with my illustrative style. the text on my poster was no exception to this rule; i feel as though my font's somewhat childlike and playful, as is the imagery on my poster, so i tried the two together and i think they work pretty well! of course, i'll mention in my sketchbook that i made the font brushes for the purpose of this project, but that'll be our little secret.

the basic idea behind my poster is to promote cycling safety by subtly enforcing the idea that helmets, high vis jackets and waterbottles (there will be three posters in total) are essential items to take with you when cycling, depending upon the conditions, while also getting my audience involved with the poster by directly addressing them and asking them to interact with the poster, keeping it entertaining for them while also educating them.

tomorrow we're having a feedback session at uni so i can get some advice on where to go next with my design as it's obvious it's not quite as strong as it could be, but if any of you had any suggestions, i'd love to hear from you!

sunday doings

sundays for me are largely very unproductive; i've gotten into the habit of going to bed around 2/3am and getting up at 11am during my weekends and it leaves me with very little time and very little motivation - working on my sleeping pattern is something i intend to do over the next couple of weeks!

however, this week i was contacted by natalie over at simplyjustnatalie about creating an illustration for her blog, and after my inbox had been pretty quiet for the last couple of weeks, i was more than happy to get started on her illustration!

i opted for a slightly more realistic look with this illustration and focused on making it look soft and feminine as i felt that would mean the illustration would fit in well with the rest of natalie's blog, and overall, i'm pretty happy with the outcome!

i've had a couple more messages waiting for me in my inbox this week, so hopefully i'll have some more illustrations to post up on here very soon! the deadline for my digital communication module at uni is past approaching too and i have some posters to start designing (i have become far too good at procrastinating since starting uni,) so hopefully i'll be able to share my university work with you all soon as well! 

also, there are still six cards up for grabs in my valentines cards giveaway!

woodland animals

i've been meaning to get some more practice drawing animals for a while now, so today i took the woodland animals route, mainly because they're what i see a lot of online so they were the first animals that sprung to mind. i also chose to do something a little different with composition and tried to tie in the three animals together to make the piece flow nicely, and for a first attempt i'm pretty happy with the outcome.

yesterday i also reached 100 pageviews! in the grand scheme of things it's such a small, insignificant number, but it's nice to know that people are seeing what i'm doing and that i'm not just talking to myself when i post on here. so, here's to 200 and so on!