Make The World Seem A Better Place

Make The World Seem A Better Place

We were asked to find a public place that we found to be ugly, mundane, boring uncared for or neglected. It had to be a place that allowed the public to pass through to somewhere more interesting like a waiting room, cafe or pub. The place had to be somewhere that was open to everyone.

We were then asked to explore, investigate and uncover the hidden beauty of the chosen place by producing image based work. The work had to reveal the hidden beauty of the place in the most interesting and engaging way as possible.

I started off looking at my local train station. This particular train station has no accessible ticket machines, no ticket office counter, no accessible toilets, no carparking, or wheelchair ramp. I didnt know where to start exactly so i ended up taking pictures of things and taking them into a group tutorial where I managed to get lots of feedback from people.

These three images above of the rubbish cans on the station were the ones that people commented on most and said stood out. I then decided that I would focus on the rubbish that people are throwing out onto the station which makes it seem a lot more dirty and abandoned. At first I thought of doing a poster but that wouldnt really be engaging with the people at the station as much as i could have been. By using the Kipling Method (also known as the 6 Thinking Men or 5 W's & 1 H) http://creatingminds.org/tools/kipling.htm to generate as many questions as possible about the object. The questions all start with either: Who, What, Where, When, Why and How. The aim was to start with obvious questions and then keep going till you're asking stranger and stranger questions. From that I got the idea of making a trash can out of the rubbish collected from the station.

I started off with simple cardboard boxes and cut them out into the shape of a life sized box, i then worked on from there and used a glue gun to stick on bits of crisp packets and cans that were found on the station so that the bin appeared to be made completly out of rubbish.








The finished bin. I then put it on the station to see how many people noticed it and found that almost everyone saw the bin. People were asking about it even though they were already at their destination and didnt have to wait around anymore.



In the image above, the man wanted to buy the bin after we had finished with it.





I enjoyed this project because I didnt do the m0st obvious thing that I could have done, and therefore I managed to answer the breif but in a unique way. I also enjoyed making the actual bin even though it was hard finding and cleaning a hundred cans and bits of rubbish that i could use to make the bin.

Homework: Modern Polish Poster Design

Homework Design Studio have a new exhibition at the Kemistry gallery on modern Polish poster design. The exhibition shows a selection of over fifty prints from classic cinema and modern Polish theatre posters. The clean and traditional style they use is something that works really well, and is a reason for their success.

Wedding Card

A wedding card I designed for family friends.

Okido Project

Okido Project

My project set by Okido involved creating a mini project booklet that can be sold at the Okido shop in Brixton, and the final project which is a page or two that could go in the Okido childrens magazine.

I started off with simple sketches set in a storyboard layout so the book would be simple and easy to follow. We were given a list of subjects that the information in the mini project book would be based around because its an educational magazine for children. I chose 'living things' and decided to focus on the transformation of a catipillar to a butterfly.

Once i finished all the sketches I then scanned in the images and edited them on photoshop to fit the right size and layout so it will be able to fold in the right places when i make the actual book. I added colour to them and kept some of the drawn lines to give it a 'drawn out by hand' feel. I also kept the colours basic and minimum as the target audience age group was between 2 and 5 year olds.

These images were then placed onto an a4 sheet of paper together and folded into a small a7 sized booklet. (if a7 is a real official paper size)..

The Final Project

For the final project I had lots of initial ideas about what to do but thought that following on from the mini project would be good. I wanted to design a colouring page or a pattern of some sort that could go in the book. I started off with similar images to start off with and added things to them so they were drawn out better and looked more finished. I then got them made into stamps at staples and stamped them onto an a3 bit of paper creating a really nice printed effect that i wouldnt have got from using photoshop.

After experimenting with four different layouts, I chose one final one and edited it on photoshop to give it a more finished look.

This was the final image I produced for the okido magazine. The page itself didnt give alot of information or was as educational. I did design an extra page with matching butterflies and had information about the different species but Rachel Ortas who assesed this project mentioned that the pattern itself is eye catching and quite bold on its own that I didnt have to have additional pages with it.

Anish Kapoor

Anish Kapoor

I really enjoy the work of Anish Kapoor, as with his sculptures wherever they are exhibited, there is a strong interaction with the people who come to see his sculptures. I remember reading about a specific piece he did at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, where he had made a sculpture Memory (2008) where the visitors could only see small sections of the object while as they moved around the museum they would piece together all the small sections to play on their memory which I really loved. The way in which he makes the public think differently through his installations is what intrigues me most.

Experimental Type Posters

I saw this work for the 2008 events poster for Cornell University’s College of Architecture, Art and Planning, and I love the way they use the angled type to create an experimental layout which catches the eye. Also love the combination of colours especially the pink on the yellow as the emphasis can be placed on more important parts of the poster.