Sunday 11 March 2012

LOVE TYPO

One of the projects during the imaging section of this first year on the degree course was to design a new typeface including uppercase & lowercase letters, numbers and punctuation. The brief specified we could use any graphic design program, 2D, 3D, and even edible materials. It had to represent something we are passionate about. To design my typeface I used letters, numbers and punctuation marks from the titles of films. For a long time I have been a huge lover of films from across the world from Japan to the United Kingdom. I’m into a variety of genres and types of films from horror to Disney and romance to action. Over time I have built up my film collection and whether they terrify me or make me cry, in my nature I am extremely curious and a daydreamer. I am very passionate about films and thought they might be perfect possessions to base my new typeface on, and turned out to be quite interesting, varied, bold and unique. I used letters, numbers and punctuation from throughout the titles not just the first characters as sometimes the most interesting letters weren’t the first. Once a film was used it wasn’t used again and only a few of the films I used were not my own. NOTE: Unfortunately, I had a little trouble finding films with some of the punctuation marks in and had to leave them out from my new typeface on purpose as I didn’t want to make them up and not use characters from a real film. In my research I gained knowledge of the different kinds of types used through the eras in film posters, I also found illustrations of type from Andy Smith and Ed Fella to be quite inspirational for my final typeface.
FILMS USED FOR UPPERCASE LETTERS.
FILMS USED FOR LOWERCASE LETTERS.
BELOW IS MY FINAL TYPEFACE, ALTHOUGH, I HAVE ONLY INCLUDED MY UPPER AND LOWERCASE TYPE.
I hand drew all of the characters and used a variety of materials. Although it took longer than i thought, I’m quite happy with the end results. They’re bold, charismatic and unique, and they represent something I’m really into and forever building on.

LIVE POSTER WORKSHOP

During the Imaging section of this first year at uni, we participated in a 2 day live poster workshop. The idea was to group up and create and replicate a film poster from any generation and genre. We all decided we wanted an old horror poster to work with and ended up choosing the 1958 film, “The Crawling Eye”. We liked the different elements within the poster and thought we could have a lot of fun with it. We all chipped in doing different jobs and used a variety of materials from cardboard to old pairs of tights stuffed with newspaper. We wanted the end result to look “terribly good” and I think we achieved that. We did leave out a few minor details though, as they wouldn't show up in the end photos. It was actually quite an interesting and fun experience and something I've not done before. It was nice working with people I hadn't worked with before and we had a lot of fun participating in the workshop. We also decided to use our only male group member as the main female character, as we thought it would add to our fantastic mess. We all got involved in holding up the scenery and being in the photograph, we wanted it to be very obvious that it was all being held up and together.

These are a few photos I took of us hard at work. We worked really well together and got everything done in time. It was quite nice to be able to get back to basics and have some good old fun with paint.
These are our final images. We wanted to include a lot of group participation and get everybody from our group into the photos. The end result was terribly good.

Saturday 10 March 2012

LONDON FASHION WEEK - February 18th 2012

A couple of friends and myself headed up to London Fashion Week on the Saturday, it was rather busy and our attempts to get into some shows in the Courtyard didn't go to plan as they were completely full up. It was a bit of a disappointment, especially with the torrential rain, which also meant that I didn't get as many street style photos as I would have liked but it was a nice day anyway. Got snapped a few times by various photographers/bloggers which was a surprise but very flattering! There were some GORGEOUSLY dressed people at the event, shame about the weather. Despite the lack of sunshine and entry into shows, it was a nice day and afterwards we ended up in a lovely Nepali restaurant - DELISH!!
COURTYARD, ADS & PEOPLE.
THE FASHION FILMS SHOWN ON THE SCREENS OUTSIDE THE COURTYARD WERE MESMERISING, ESPECIALLY IN THE DARK AND RAIN.
ENJOYING A LOVELY CUPPA AND A TREAT AT THE CAFE.

PURE LONDON - FEB 2012

I had the wonderful chance to work backstage as a dresser at Pure London 2012. The event takes place twice a year at Olympia London and is the UK's leading trade fashion event for sourcing hundreds of womenswear, young creative fashion, accessory and footwear brands. The event consisted of stalls and two catwalk stages that showed various shows all day, every day. The two stages showcased Womenswears, WGSN, Young Fashion & New Brands. It was a wonderful experience to be able to work in the hustle and bustle behind the scenes at a fashion show and to work with some wonderful new people, it was all very exciting! I was paired with the wonderful Irish model, Caitlyn Leckey, she was lovely to work with, absolutely gorgeous and such a nice girl. I had the chance to style with items from Iron Fist, New Rock and Kat Von D's new collection. It really was a wonderful experience and I enjoyed every minute of it. Here are some photos I took on my Blackberry of and around the event.
THE VENUE - PART OF IT AT LEAST! THE PLACE WAS ABSOLUTELY HUGE.
ONE OF THE CATWALK STAGES WITH VIEWERS AT THE READY.

CHECKING OUT THE MANY STALLS.
WANDERING AROUND.
AN IPHONE LIKE APP/SCREEN WHERE THE USER CAN ACCESS A DATABASE OF THE EVENT, FROM STALLS TO CATWALK TIMES.
CHHIMMI AND I GETTING OUR STEAM ON.
A CHEEKY PEAK AT THE GARMENTS AND GOODIES BACKSTAGE AT THE WOMENSWEAR AND WGSN CATWALK.
DRESSING ROOM FOR THE NEW BRANDS AND YOUNG FASHION CATWALK.
MODELS PRE-WALK LINE-UP.
I HAD THE CHANCE TO MEET THE WONDERFUL KAT VON D AT HER STALL, NOT ONLY IS SHE AN INCREDIBLE TATTOOIST, SHE'S ALSO A LOVELY PERSON WITH A KEEN EYE FOR FASHION AND DESIGN. UNFORTUNATELY, I LOOKED AWFUL ALL THROUGHOUT THE 4 DAYS SO I LOOKED EVEN WORSE STANDING NEXT TO THE GORGEOUS MISS VON D. I ALSO MET LAUREN POPE FROM TV'S 'THE ONLY WAY IS ESSEX' BUT I LOOKED EVEN  MORE TERRIBLE IN THAT PHOTO SO WASN'T GOING TO DISPLAY THAT ONE!
LEFT & RIGHT: A FEW OF THE MODELS BEFORE ONE OF THE NEW BRANDS AND YOUNG FASHION SHOWS. CENTRE: A COUPLE OF THE MUAs AND HAIR STYLISTS.
ME AND MY LOVELY MODEL, MISS CAITLYN LECKEY.

Sunday 4 March 2012

ROCK 'N' ROLL

A few of my friends and I have grouped up and decided to start setting up photoshoots in our spare time. The idea of the shoots is to all get a chance to direct, style, photograph and be a make-up artist as well as have have some wonderful photographs to show for it. For this shoot we shot in early February, Amy took the role as creative director, Chhimmi was the MUA and hair stylist, Tom was the photographer, Heidi was our beautiful model and I was the stylist in terms of clothes, shoes and accessories. Amy wanted to create a "rock chick" look, and took TV star & musician Taylor Momsen as her inspiration. She's young, bold and experimental with her style and perfect for Amy's overall idea. We chose locations that would match up and represent the style we were portraying in the photos, we chose edgy, real and gritty spots in London with walls, stairs, concrete and fences that were broken, cracked and stained with graffiti. We wanted it to be on the streets and true to the style. We chose Heidi to model as she seemed perfect for this shoot, she can work various looks, very versatile, stunning and works well with the camera. For the styling I wanted to incorporate big/biker boots, lace/leather leggings, leather jacket, denim shorts/jeans/gilet, suspenders, leopard print, big & baggy vests with large arm holes, band t-shirts, chunky boots/heels, anything with studs and things that were ripped, torn or grazed was a bonus. I wanted to stay true to the style and play around with the styling to make it work as much as possible. Although we were very lucky it didn't rain on the day of the shoot, it was extremely cold but worked through it and ended up with some really nice photos. Overall it was a very successful day and I am really happy with the final images. The images I have carefully chosen to feature I have specifically picked out from the many photos taken during the photoshoot, and as you can see, I have featured a fair few number of them but it was so difficult to narrow the selection down I just thought "WHY NOT?" and posted up my favourites.