Where have I been?

I seem to be answering that question a lot.

Weeelll. I've been keeping busy. In fact, I've been looking around the web for better means of hosting my materials. Deviantart and blogger are good. But the insanely effient tumblr is catching my eye over blogger's rather cluttered features. The move could happen soon, so a lot of my work would be redirected there, instead of here.

For those who don't know, Tumblr is a blogging site, with the sleekness of twitter and less mess that you get with facebook, it's a very very clean format to work under. More so when promoting work.

However, that's all for another time. Right now we are talking -
http://www.tricorderproject.org/about.html

I though this would be an interesting idea for me to share for the little traffic I get through here. However it strikes me as something very interesting to see become a reality. (Which it slowly is) Design is my one true love next to technology and the two go hand in hand.  A project like this could really dwarf the iphone or whatever google is doing with project glass (still waiting on that).

If the open source tricorder project does get in the air, I would be very very interested to see how it pans out on the market, and both as a tool. When you can compact what we once though would be a mass of tools into one small box, well the possibilities are endless. Not just for ease of use, but for education, and science as a whole.

Of course, it's running linux, so there will no doubt be tumblr, facebook, twitter or instagram apps for it if it ever did become public. Ah, apps. Didn't predict that one did you trek?

Fencing poster.

In an effort to do something a little different I have been working on something a little new in my area of poster design. While it still retains my almost trademark like characteristics, I tried to give to give it a new spin.

I've always liked those old style Boxing posters, the fun lies in the type really, it's all about getting the right look for it, once you have pinned that, the rest is easy.

That said, this is still missing a shot of a fencing to fill the body of the poster. Being quite proud of this one, I decided to water mark it, I know it does spoil the look, but sadly there are people who would be quite happy to steal and repost my work on other sites. So unless I link you to the site saying my work has been reposted there, it's not me, and wont ever be me.

Internet piracy PSA out of the way, I present to you -

I may continue to tweak the image, perhaps adding in a little rough and worn look to it, perhaps some rough edges. I'm not sure yet. One thing's for sure. It's quite fun, and I hope to make more posters this vein. 

And where have I been?

Well, short answer, busy. Long answer, very busy.

I've been expanding my place on the internet, this means a lot of work being uploaded to my new folio on deviant art - Look my up, Daykin-Design. It's been a hefty bit of work, combined with current project work its ment I have had little time for this blogger, there is the chance that this may get phased out of use since the deviantart account has everything I need...that is until I move to Tumblr but lets take one step at a time shall we.

I'll give you a wee taste of things that I've been working on. Mostly static web concepts. No, I still haven't learnt HTML, will get there eventually...

So, that's the main three webpages. I'm resisting the urge to make more, it would only provide to to be overly time consuming. Right now I want to nail the points on these pages. That border for a start. Something needs to be done with it. Just not sure what. When it's white it doesn't look complete. When it's black it looks too confined and clunky.

And then there is the logo. Normally they grow on me over time. But as the project has grown and matured. I've gotten a little..."Eh" about it. It's just not working for me like it did when it was young fresh and cool looking. It's run it's course for being a placeholder logo. Time to get my hands dirty and do some proper logo design.

Then after that, well it will all be topped off with a nice leaflet. Leaflets are nice. I would have more, but as it is right now things are on a time limit. I have a potential interview in six weeks time, so I am trying to cram my folio with new and impressive work. Hopefully this strikes a cord with them. I'm a little worried that my current work is dated and a little sloppy. I know there are some aspects that really don't meet my standards.

I have a nice selection of design books to help me through though, picked up a few creative little things in the last few days. Should be nice and inspirational. If not, well then I did sure screw up.

I'll try to be updating this as much as possible. But the deviantart page is where more of the work will be posted. Perhaps the really rough stuff and behind the scenes stuff will get posted there, I'm trying to direct most of my pageviews through deviantart as it's easier to keep a track of both work and my interweb rants. Once I have my own site with a blog section, twitter feed and gallery there wont be a need for so much link saving. But I've got a list as long as a very long thing...

Still, ta-ta for now. Going to get back to playing Minecraft  design work!

Let's talk the google.

http://thedailywh.at/2012/04/04/google-tease-of-the-day/

Now I love gadgets. I am a gadget man, I love how they make our lives easier and just run that little smoother. Call me a techno-zombie now driven with a shiny Apple logo on my forehead as I doodle through twitter on my iPod, or look into the latest fun little gizmos on ThinkGeek. But I love them.

And this, - well if you didn't just check the link above well then I suggest you do because it's quite interesting. Obviously a made up hypothetical tech demo, but it's one of those things that gets you thinking none the less. Much like how Apple suddenly make us realise how awesome the Siri app is, this is something that has made me realise just how far technology has jumped - it's sort of like a space-race with tech to see how cool the next toy can be for the highest bidder. Got to say, I would love one, (despite my fears the Google will become a self aware being and reduce humanity to dust Skynet style). I know this will be a few years off, and I would probably have to sell my kidney for one. But don't it look pretty?

Having "onscreen" apps floating around my head would be new, and eventually (after I realise this is real life and I'm not playing Doom) I think I would get used to it. With a voice command system like Siri, the might of the Google, throw in a few blue tooth and wireless functions and it would probably be a big leap forwards in the word of tech.


In doing a little bit of reading I did find out that google do in fact have their own OS, it's a little odd that this slipped me by, probably because I am chewing on the Apple, but it seems to me this should have been big gospel shouting from the roof top stuff. Ah well. Apparently there is a feature on their "Chromebooks" that replaces the cap's lock key with a dedicated search key. Seems a bit of an off design choice, personally I would have gone with using one of them function keys. You know the one's at the top of your keyboard? They're like that one room mate that promises he will get a job, and eventually only gets one when you start assigning proper functions to them - or if you like me they already have a function and get in the way of playing games because all they do is dim the screen light or fiddle about with your music playing. I digress.

Apparently Google's branching out into making an operating system with a machine was less than well received. Apparently it lacked any real offline capabilities and it was little more than a dressed up power book....apparently. I ain't the horses mouth but I just say what I read. So that does put me in another mind about this new Project Glass, could it be awesome? Well if they learn from past mistakes maybe, it seems like they might be trying to make up for that with this Project Glass, some sort of Geordi Laforge headset that you can wear while sorting out dates, playing the Ukulele to your girlfriend and shopping for books on how to play said Ukulele. The add itself it no doubt trying to pry it's way in front of the sleek Apple style adds while yelling to everyone that doesn't currently own an Iphone with Sirri on it. - "Hey look what we can do with this technology we're not even really showing you!"

Perhaps I am being too harsh and too early. Of course this is a teaser of what it is to come, but the real question is...will it? Is this actually going to be a massive leap forwards where we all look like Garrus Vakarian with little blue thingies over our faces? (Admittedly it would look cool, but the depth perception has got to suck after a while.) While I want to welcome this new fangled gizmo with open arms I am a little hesitant. This could just be a massive teaser with nothing to follow, while I don't doubt that Google has the funding for it I'm sure we all know of a few companies that have fallen behind with delivering promised good - See Valve and Half life 3 here. Maybe this is a stunt to rekindle interest after their flash in the pan with their Power Books? Maybe I am talking out a hole that isn't my mouth? Answers on a postcard. Time will tell if this is a dead end project or if this could be something that may rise up and strike the iPhone in the back when it least expects it.

Until then I'll go back to my corner and stop pretending I know what I am talking about. Laters.

Yet to be titled cinema project.

-Warning what your about to read may or may not make any sense what so ever, let this be a reminder to people who put stuff up on the internet, never do it when you're exhuasted. You'll only look silly.-

So, this past week has ultimately been rather quiet. So I've been picking around through some old work to see if it can lend a hand with coming up with a project or two. 

It paid off surprisingly and it leads nicely into my current idea. 

Cinema. Or the be more precise the decline in the smaller lesser known independently run organisations around the UK.

The idea is full of hypotheticals right now as I have yet to observe the current infrastructure of the cinema industry, but what my main goal is to see if I can create a campaign that would help bring interest back to these smaller cinemas.  Some of these establishments are well known for being a little more creative than the much larger corporations such as Vue and Odeon, such has having film nights, replaying classic films, foreign films, and mini conventions showing off artwork and Q&A sessions with film makers. 

These elements help make the smaller cinemas stand out, but in some ways I don't think they stand out enough. The original concept of cinema was to express ideas and to tell a story visually with elements that can't be told in a verbal format. I think over time most of use lost that sense of exploration that comes with cinema instead falling into the pit of one Hollywood blockbuster after another. While I'm not condemning cinema for being a largely American industry, in my opinion I think sometimes the people can be missing out on a more enriching experiance if they gave other films/directors/even different countries a chance of showing what they can do. 

My overall plan then for this campaign is to do something big, (We all say that about our projects but stay with me here.)

So far I only have a rough bare bones idea on what I am working with. My plan is to help bring to light these cinema's that are suffering and perhaps give them a wider audience for people who not only enjoy film, but want to reach out and explore a different format in cinema. 

This could include old films British, American, European - films that are not as well known by the current generation. 

Foreign films - Famous directors such as Jean-Pierre Jeunet (Amile), Hayo Miyazaki, have a large fan base, but sadly because these films are foreign there is often a good chance that they will be pushed to a straight to DVD format, often cheating people of the chance to go see the film in a cinema as intended. 

Smaller independent films - While this is becoming less of a problem in America with the Sundance Film festival I feel that smaller independent films are still suffering outside of these events because of their lack of coverage. The Sundance FF has created a format that has allowed for very small independent film makers to be able to produce and show their work. It could be possible to incorporate these ideas into a scheme for British film makers as well. 

A rough idea of what would work be produced - 

Branding - logo

Website 

Posters

Web ads

Website

While they are the typical bare bones of the idea I am getting across a style already. I'm currently exploring artistic styles relating to older film posters (don't worry it's not more Saul Bass, but you'll be seeing more of that in the future). I'm exploring the old style Grindhouse posters as a style of long forgotten cinema that has a goofy but ultimately different thematic style to them. My only concern though is that it really does limit your visual elements as well as the Grindhouse genera wasn't really a PG setting. So while I could perhaps use it with the connotations for film buffs in mind I am considering exploring outside that element, perhaps even forming a whole new kind of poster. 

Here's a snippet of ideas. It's sort of at the top of my idea chain, (sort of like a food chain but with ideas),

it was mocked up while I was pulling together bits and bobs to help get the ball rolling. I'm prone to sketch out ideas and little snippets, but I enjoyed working on this one a lot so I kept it hanging around. 

I totally forgot John Hurt was in this film. How do I keep doing that?

It needs a good polish though, there are a few things lacking, for example there is no real depth to the poster, and sadly the only high resolution image of the Xenamoprh I could get my mitts on was from Alien Vs Predator. *shudders* I may invest in the fancy Alien skull boxed set purely for a better image of the beastie. 

I may even pull the "Jaws" and not show the monster since that's the ol' trick of cinema (sort of lacking today) is to only show the monster partially and let the imagination go wild. Perhaps I should take cues from the original poster and use the face hugger egg instead as that as always been a far more predominant image in advertising for the original Alien. 

Perhaps a fresh version of this poster may crop up when I have the time as I really enjoyed working on this one, the type especially as it's rare that I make myself do movie posters, it was fun to come up with creative ways of displaying the cast list that wasn't in the conventional 'tiny text and the bottom of the poster' routine. 

Well that's all we have time for today kiddies. Minecraft beckons to me but I'm going to resist and go and scribble stuff for you all to stare in awe at. 

Until next time. Keep cool y'all. 

Opinionated blog post - Detective comic's comic.

Face it, we're designers. And we have opinions about everything. I know it, you know it, we all know it. If there is one thing we designers like...nay love to do is put our foot in the door and say. "Well I think."


Oh we do it so often I've lost count how many times I smugly walk into a situation with ego carrying my aloft over the crowds of undesigned neanderthals all using comic sans or that horrible font from the Avatar poster. I descend into the situation with a firmly placed. "Well I think -" and I promptly receive looks of death from everyone in the room. 


Don't worry if it seems like I'm rambling. Because I am. What I'm getting on about is how all us designers like to have opinions, so. what am I being opinionated about? 

Seems the good folk at DC have unveiled...something. I think it's their new logo. It seems they've been trying to radically alter themselves over the last few months and give themselves a new face. They rebooted all their comics creating 52 new comics, some good, some bad, some pointless. But now they have unloaded a new logo at us. It seems odd that they would do this some five months after they had this paradigm shift. But what do I know about the comic book industry? 

So, the logo in question. Short answer. - I don't like it. 

Long answer - I really don't like it. 

Okay, perhaps I should elaborate. 

It's nice. And a creative idea, it's also a big step away from what DC have had as their logo for some fifty plus years. 

Dc's evolving stamp logo has been around for donkey's years, eventually evolving into the spinning star. Here's the thing about these logos. None of them actually contain the words comic. And there is a reason for that. Anyone care to tell us that DC standards for? 

Detective Comics. - from the original publication of Batman. So, yes Detective Comics is now "Detective Comics comics." 

Smooth. 

Of course people have been calling it DC comics for years out of sense of habit, like Marvel comics, or Image comics, but when you actually start putting it in the logo, it sort of gives the impression that you don't actually anything about the company your designing for. Hence why I don' think this really does look like a comic book company logo. Well I suppose the logo has strengths. For starters. The personality of the logo, well it hasn't got much. If any at all, it's more about the ways that it can be altered to fit the comics it's working for. It feels very tacked on less of a design feature and more something to help it feel less bland. And that's it's only real strength - ironically also being it's weakness. The logo lacks any real sense of personality and individuality. Yes they can make it glow like a power ring, yes you can have the bloody smear from the Watchmen, but outside of that. What is the logo in it's neutral form? If I want to by a product from DC, will it have just a plain format of this logo? Or is there going to be mass micromanaging of the logo for every product? 

I'm all for giving a logo of sense of continuity with a specific branch of it's creations, but at the same time it should have a just as recognisable neutral form. There's also the problem that it feels very amateurish. It's not pushing the envelope with it's ideas and staying rather neutral. Peel away the gimmick and all you have is a simple peeling D idea with a C under it. Of course they are comics, nay Epic Page turning comics! But it feels like something a college student would turn in with their own personal project of rebranding DC, it's weak. It's corporate and doesn't leap out at me. None of these logos say that it's it a company with a history, this was the company that brought me such things as Year One, All Star Superman, the Killing Joke. It tells me that they have a big roster, sure, but none of the above images makes me think of a man from Krypton, the dreaded Batman. Well that's unless they open some sort of law firm. 

The fact that your logo says DC, and then you have DC comics under it, well that is unnecessary type for a start. It makes the logo unbalanced and makes me wonder if the people who designed this where so worried that people wouldn't recognise the logo they had to put in a new section that tells people the obvious. 

When even the designers who are working on this lack the faith in their logos. It's a good sign that you should scrap it and go back to the drawing board. 

As I troll through the internet looking for information on this new logo I come across a little line about the logo. Sadly this quote has no name attached to it so I can't say if this is genuinely from someone in DC of if it was in fact their sort of buzz word for when they where working on the logo. But anyway, said quote is this. 

"re-capture the older branding"

Now I've got to stop and scratch my head here for a second. Older branding. Incase you've forgotten, scroll back up to the top of the page and look and new ones, then, scroll back down and look at the older ones. Go on, I'll wait for you. 

Okay, so if you feel that this is totally justified, please tell me, correct me. The internet is full of conflicting opinions on how someone can be so wrong, draw me a flow chart, give me a diagram. Hell just tell me I'm crazy. Because that isn't what I see. The older logos? They actually remind me of something else. They make me think of a big rubber stamp. (Well not so much the 05 to 12, but stay with me here) They feel like this big seal of approval. As if it was a certified product, as if this product was so awesome it has been awarded the highest honour of receiving this stamp. Of course that's blatant nostalgia talking since Dc has turned out as much tripe as any other comic company, but it's the idea behind it. This logo feels like like a seal of approval and more like a business card logo - as if Green Lantern hands these out after defeating Sinestro. "Do you have what it takes to join the GL corps?"

I digress. Really, I could summarise this ramble with a simple opinion. It's amateurish at best, it lacks the power of even the dignity of the classic brands. It feels more like a cheep marketing tool rather than a thought out logo crafted to make us think of the history and the creativity of this brand. (Of course the classic logos had that with a big hit and miss factor, but hey, now would have been a good chance to do so.) 

It's certainly not lacking imagination in parts. Time and effort needed to be put into this. When handling this logo it needed to be done with more expert care. This wasn't it. 

Well that's my opinionated blog post done for the afternoon, if you made sense of this. Well done! Feel free to comment bellow on what you think of the logo, be it good bad, and hey while your there what would you liked to have seen as a new logo? It's got to be better than this one. 

Brand new everything!

So there has been work done. Lots of it. New cv cover from my cv booklet. Now with a spin being more book like in design and format. A front cover, back cover and a little blurb. And there is a new logo! Didn't take me long, but I do consider branding one of my more stronger elements. So without further ado, let me show you what I've got.

Brand new logo! The classic lightbulb. 

I'll let you know how the hardback sales come out. 

While there is always a serious element to design it should be noted that really, ANYONE can be serious when they try. But being funny and still interesting is (personally) tricky. I think it shows a certain level of humanity in work and not being so plain faced. Hopefully I will be able to explore the humour a little more later down the line. But right now I am getting the feeling that with a less cluttered cover and a personal logo I have a higher chance of at least gaining some attention.