Illness

Unfortunately, I have been ill Wednesday, Thursday and Friday and diagnosed with flu. I have pushed myself to go into college each of these days as I have had sessions on and workshops which I have needed to attend, but unfortanetly I have then had to leave early to go home and rest each time, not good.

This has also meant that I was unable to attend the opening night of 'inpress at Dock Street Market'. I did manage to pop down though, for about 20 minutes and it was looking great. Hopefully, I will feel well enough to help out at the shop over the weekend, fingers crossed. 

UT:: at inpress

I took my UrbanTease t-shirt designs that I printed along to the inpress event at Dock Street market to sell. This has made this t-shirt brief become live.

The t-shirts designs are still in Dock Street Market being on sale as part of Dock Street Arts.

Web Session 4

responsive script (screen changes size depending on device)

Easier to use/save source from website using Google Chrome or Firefox.

...use this device to take the code from other websites. need to download it.

...use this website to test own website design as it would be seen on different browsers. (internet explorer)

Web testing is a massive part of web design. Needs to be tested on all browsers and all web browsers.

WINNER!

I have received an email this afternoon to confirm that my design has been selected as the winning design and will be used as Leeds College of Arts Christmas card 2012. Result!

I now need to have a few meetings with the marketing team to discuss the production of my card design.

Hope:: range

I want to extend my range of deliverables for the clothing boutique, so I am going to propose the design of an open/closed sign, receipt pad and loyalty card. I think the loyalty card would be a good idea for a small clothing boutique like Hope; if they were to offer a percentage off the customers 5th and 10th visit, it would give customers the incentive to return. An open/closed sign and receipt is a necessity for any small store; especially seen as Hope currently use one with their old logo on it.

RSA:: free e-card

I was going to propose that with everyone of my RSA greetings card, the buyer also recieves one free ecard. However, I wasn't really sure what an e-card entailed and after looking, I have found that are pretty much just short animations. Animation is not an area of design I wish to delve into, so I am going to leave that simply as a design idea!

Pressing the postcards

Seen as my crit was cancelled I decided to use my time wisely and took yet another trip down to the Vernon print rooms to press my postcard in the hydraulic press.

I got Nial to show me how to use the press, which was fairly easy, although it used a lot of arm strength! I put a piece of greyboard on top of the plate and postcard in an attempt to give it a deeper impression. This worked, so I then used a thicker piece of greyboard to give an even deeper impression. All in all, the plate worked very well in embossing the paper, I think this was also due to me choosing a low gsm paper stock. The laid concorde paper also looked very effective against the embossing.

I really like the fact that I have been able to use a specialist print process which makes sense to my work and highlights what the type is saying.

Fourth crit boards

These are my crit boards to show the proposed digital designs I have been working on so that my peers can see this as well as the physical products I have brought in to the crit.

Lasercutting Greeting Cards

I extended my range of card design and proposed that I could make the design with the Christmas trees work across different designs. Rather than just proposing this, I decided to put it into practice and got myself down to lasercutting to cut this design. I then sold these at the inpress @dock street market event.

to do

Hope:: Proposed Web design

I have also mocked up the proposed web design for Urban Tease onto devices, again to see how the designs work in context.

I wasn't sure if it would be clear to the user that they had to click the logo to enter the next screen, so I tried adding in an [enter] sign at the bottom to direct users. However, I think seen as there is nothing else that the user can click other than the 'Hope clothing' logo it would be sufficient and clear enough to leave it as just this type.

Photography workshop

This morning I attended the photography workshop, this proved very useful and educating me on the different types of lighting available to use, as well as different attachments and devices. All in all, this will allow me to begin to develop my skills in photographing my work to a professional standard.

inpress:: postcard artwork to print

I have printed the artwork for the postcards, ready to press on the hydraulic press tomorrow. I decided to use the lined paper stock as I thought that with it being only 80gsm it will deboss better than the thicker card stock I could use. Also, from previously printing onto these stocks, I found that the ink sat better on this paper whereas the ink tended to be drawn into the card stock.

RSA:: Notebook printing

I have printed the patterned insert of the notebook onto the Reindeer poo and seeded paper card, ready for my crit tomorrow and submission. I now need to reprint the instruction card and then this product is finished.

Making the reindeer cards

This evening, I printed the reindeer card and painted in watercolour each of the noses. The cards are now ready to sell at the inpress event on Friday.

Feedback I have had from peers has been very positive towards these, so hopefully these sell! 

Making the copper plates

Today I went down to Vernon street to pick up my copper plates, they were soaking in a solution which I needed to leave them in until the blue film was removed.

I then washed of the solution in the sink, blotted my plates dry and I was ready to go!

I took the copper plates home so that I could line up the type in the correct place and mark it with masking tape so that I could position every other postcard in the same position when I came to press them all.

Vernon:: Copper plate

I went down to Vernon street today to make a copper plate for my Hope branding and the type postcard for inpress. It was a fairly lengthy process but Neil helped me through it and I learnt a lot (could definitely go down and do it again).

This was one of the last stages, where the copper plate had been exposed to my image with UV lights; I had to use a sponge to remove the excess and reveal the copper plate.

I have left it with him to soak in a solution overnight so it will be ready for me to pick up tomorrow.

RSA:: UPlant Cards

To branch out from the 'UColour' notebooks I have created I have also designed greeting cards which use the same principle. I was considering calling these greetings cards 'UPlant' so that it carries the theme on. The instructions would be printed on seed labels (that are then pegged into the ground so you know that this is where your seeds have been planted). 

So, I tried to use the same layout as I had for the 'UColour' instruction card but made the format slightly more narrow to fit conventional seed labels. However, I found that it was rather difficult to then fit all of the instructions onto this reduced size....

Consequently, I may not taper the bottom edges into a point, as they are traditionally, but instead leave it as a square card so that all the type is evident.

Screenprinting tshirts

Today I have stripped my screen and got it ready for printing. I mainly wanted to test the colours and see how each of them worked on the different fabrics, so I printed on a light (white), medium (light grey) and dark (dark grey) tshirts to see how the ink sat.

I chose to use one of my simple vector image designs on the t-shirts so that I could experiment with colour, without it distracting from the image itself. So I created a gradient from pink to blue. The ink didn't sit very well on the dark grey fabric but worked considerably well on the light grey and white fabrics. So, I am going to buy some more lighter coloured tees.

IP:: Meeting with Manager at Dock Street Market

Today we went down to Dock Street Market to have a quick meeting with Jake, the manager. We just clarified with him the space we are going to have on Friday night and what furniture we require. We have also discussed where the band will be positioned (on a stage in the main area of the bar). We have also ensured that our work will be stored securely overnight. Excellent.

Pantone matching

I have pantone matched the coloured papers that I had screen printed recently for my projects: the packaging and swing ticket stock for my tee project and the inpress business cards. As they would be sent to the printers as a spot colour, I need to be able to specify the spot colour. Some of the colours didn't match a pantone colour exact so I had a few coloure to choose from, but I manage to match them as close as possible:

Open publication - Free publishing - More matching

Urban Tease:

-Pantone Solid Matte: 178M, 1785 M, 1777M
-Coated Euro: 1777c, 1787c
-Solid Uncoated: 1787U
-Solid Coated: 177c, 178c

Inpress Business card:

-Solid matte: 285m (Blue)
-Solid matte: 375M (Green)
-Solid matte: 1787M (Red)

inpress:: postcard prep

I have prepared my artwork ready to make a copper plate from tomorrow. As it is the second line of type that I want to make the copper plate from, I deleted all the rest of the type and then made it 100% black.

Tshirt:: Prep

I have been trying to sort out which design to print for my tshirt design tomorrow. I have 2 screens ready so just need to go and expose my screen then print. I am going to try and fit the 'urbantease' inner label on one of them, as this will allow me to then print in the same colour (proposed spot colour) that I have printed the packaging in and swing ticket in, so that it will all work together as a collection.

The majority of my design are not to be simply printed onto the tshirts but instead combing different fabrics or using stitch.

Although I proposed this design would be stitched, I am thinking that I may print this tee design. I want to try and print the front and the back so that they meet, but I am afraid this may be a little tricky, so we shall see. But the point is, I don't want to just print a design straight onto the center of a tshirt; I want it to have something more about it. I like that this design is focused around the side of the shirt rather than being central.

I played around with how else this could work just down the front side of the tee, but essentially I think it is going to work better split into two and working around the side.

I have prepared my artwork on two A3 boards ready to print off in the mac suites. I may have to change the size slightly once they are printed on paper, but we shall see.

Hope:: copper plate prep

I have prepared my artwork ready to go and get a copper plate made up at vernon street tomorrow. I was unsure as to whether I should have 'Hope clothing' debossed, or just 'hope' or just 'clothing'. Essentially, I need to try and test it but it a little tricky when I need to make a copper plate to do so. So, I have decided to use just 'hope' as it will emphasize the brand name; I can then play around with how to interact the 'clothing' type with this.

I printed the business card and swing ticket to check the size of the type was going to be sufficient, as I will be using the same plate to deboss both of them, the type size needs to work across both printed materials.

inpress:: Christmas Card

I have been designing a reindeer Christmas card to sell as the inpress event (and if not, give to my friends and family!) as drawing is one aspect I love and miss, I have decided to incorporate this into my design and not just design digitally. I have however, drawn a picture (freehand) from a reindeer image I sourced, and then scanned it back in. I am then going to print this image onto cards and paint on (in watercolour) a red nose... for Rudolf!

I firstly tried this on plain card, keeping it minimal at first but then adding more colour. I wasn't too keen on this though, as I didn't have the time to make it as good as I wanted it to. So instead, I tried printing it onto a piece of the brown card I purchased (intially to lasercut from for my RSA brief). I thought this with a watercolour red could look minimal but effective ...and I think it does. Each reindeer will be individual as I am hand painting the noses on, which should make the card seem crafted and more speical.

I am going to print a greeting inside the card to make it look more professional.

inpress print collateral print outs

After deciding yesterday that I didn't want to use colour on the front of the letterhead and compliment slip, I have had some feedback from fellow peers and now thought otherwise. I think the colour on the front helps bring through the block colour on the reverse and having the type in the box follows on from the theme of the website; it also allows the type written in the body of the letter to become a focal point and separated from out contact information. As we do not have an address, I have simply used a telephone number, our email and twitter address (not traditional, but this is all we currently have).

The letterhead would be used if we are going to write letters to potential clients or studios with regards to any matter we had. The compliment slips would be used to write a note of regards to anyone who purchases products from our online shop and will be sent in with the package.

In order to ensure the print collateral will look as I want it to when it is printed out, I printed out mock up versions. This allowed me to consider the point size of the type, the positioning of the elements on the page, colour and stock choices, amongst other factors.

From discussing with fellow peers, it was decided that I should use the last design of these where the box continues off the page; this makes the page appear bigger and, again, ties in with our proposed website design.

Urban Tease:: Website & App mockup

I have mocked up the proposed website and app designs to see what they will look like on the device itself. This is important in terms of scale, typeface size, readability and legibility of each component.

Weekend To Do list

inpress:: compliment slip

I wanted the design of the letterhead to be transferred through to the compliment slip, so I am going to use the same principle of have the type on the front and the use of block colour on the reverse. I played around with the positioning of the logo and contact information but I think it is going to work best positioned similarly to the letterhead.

This is the design I am going with::

inpress:: letterhead

I have designed the letterhead to tie in with the inpress website, using the same colour scheme, typeface and utilising the white space. I decided to keep the type on the front simple and have block colour on the back of the page to create colour. It will then be double sided but it will allow the print collateral to remain simplistic. I have designed the letterhead in each of the four colours to see how they each work and ensure that they will work together as a set.

I tried using a simple line box to bring the colour that is going to be on the reverse through to the front of the letter, however, I soon realised that this box was pointless and had no use in the design, it was just a distraction from the type which should be focal. I took this away so that the focus is now on the type and the reverse brings the colour. I may play around with incorporating a small hint of colour into the front in a subtle manor.

This is the final design I went with:

There were some small design decisions that I made, which are not necessarily obvious unless you have an eye for design. I have used my guides to ensure the type lines up in a coherent manor but to retain a playful element too.

inpress:: web design pages

I have created a gif to demonstrate how I envisage the transition from the homepage to chosen page (either 'work' 'about' 'contact' or 'shop')

work...

about...

contact...

shop...

inpress: Reindeer card to print

I have tried and tested this design on pieces of paper, in order to get it in the correct place on the pre-cut card.

Artwork to print......

inpress:: web design

I have been further working on the proposed web design for the inpress website. I had started this a few weeks ago, but I needed to pick it back up. I wanted to follow on using the four colours in our colour scheme and the principle of clicking on each corner to enter a different page. I then began to consider how each page would look and the transition from the home page to these pages. I want keep the website simple but informative through the typography whilst at the same time retaining an element of fun.

I have decided that the 'work' and 'contact' pages should be swapped from top to bottom, this is because you are required to scroll through the 'work' page but not the 'contact page'. It is unconventional to scroll up through work (which is would would currently need to happen) so it will make it easier for the recipient to navigate through the pages.

Hope:: Business Card

As I want to create a copper plate to emboss the business card I am going to keep the size of the type on the business cards and swing tickets the same. I have considered how I can use the colour scheme (beige, black and white) to its advantage.

I know need to consider how the type will sit on the back as this may effect my choice of colour combinations.

I am also considering having the 'clothing' type debossed rather than the 'Hope'. I can then print the Hope in black type, which will allow it to remain high in the visual hierarchy, and then blind emboss the clothing so that it is still present but not so high up in the visuals hierarchy. Maybe.

to do

inpress:: postcard final design

It is no good just viewing these designs on screen, so I printed out a couple of versions. I then pinned these onto my wall and gave myself a little crit, went back and made these amendments which in turn will improve my designs. I mainly altered the type size and positioning of the text on the page. Once I have decided on a design, I then printed the design onto different stocks to see how each one interacted with the stock: ink and type. It will only be then black type printed onto the stock, so I had to bear this in mind. I also had to consider the fact that the grey type would be embossed and this may effect how it sat on the page due to some of the pages already having an embossing within them. The 6 stocks I used were: plain paper, laid paper, embossed paper, plain card, cream silk card and marled paper.

I think the laid paper worked really well, better than the smooth plain card and paper, however, I need to consider how the type will work on the page once it is embossed into it as this may then change. So I am going to test the embossing again on these stocks once I have the copper plate made.