In Book!!!!!

A couple of weeks ago Kathryn and I were told by D&AD that our LBi work had been awarded 'in book' at the 2010 student awards. We had to keep it quiet but it has now gone live on their website along with some other great entrants...check out all the work here.

Its a great achievement for us both and a nice way to finish our last competition brief at university!

Up and running!

I've been working on my website for what seems like forever after numerous problems with a lot of technical information that really baffles me , BUT I finally have something up and running - I still have more to add over the next couple of weeks but I can now refer people to my website!

www.isobelstockhill.com

Why not associates...

Ive been thinking about and designing my exhibition piece over the last couple of weeks and I am currently working on the design. Taking elements of this terms work to move off the printed page and take my typographic designs to a much larger scale. The degree show is a great chance for me to show that I can work at a larger scale still with typography so I am pushing myself to try and do this!

Looking for research reference and inspiration I was told about Why Not Associates they produce some great large scale typographic work. They are a british graphic design company who "turn their passion for design into commercial success for clients in business, government and the public sector."

They work in many different media on many types of projects, including corporate identity, digital design,motion graphics and television commercial direction, editorial design, environmental design, publishing, and public art.

They work closely alongside Gordon Young, a visual artist who creates art for public spaces. They have collaborated together on a number of concepts that specifically involve typography.

This piece for Crawley Library is one of my favourite pieces - using typographic tree columns to become focal design points in the library - working the type into the environment rather than it becoming an added printed piece somewhere. The words used link to the environment as they are the library users favourite books, places and memories - the work becomes site specific to locations within the library.

Some really great inspiring typographic work!

a little update...

Its been a busy few weeks finishing journal and cracking on with my current projects. Here's a few snaps of my work so far...

My major project this term has been an experimental brief working with typography and language so I have a number of final outcomes as a result of my experimentation.

- from hello to goodbye -

An all typography reversible concertina book showing the link in words from hello to goodbye. Open the book one way to see hello which then meets with goodbye in the centre and flips the direction of the words and colour of the type.

- York.sha -

my finished yorkshire poster - re-printed

- Self promotion -

I've designed and had my business cards printed - I wanted them to be bright and eye-catching but quite a simple design. I created a logo for myself based around an 'i' and hopefully these promote me as a versatile graphic designer as I purposely designed the cards to not be specific to any one design discipline.

There are 3 different cards all using the same design but with a variation of 3 bright colours. The reverse uses a neutral colour so as not to compete.

- Mapping words -

Investigating the links between words - showing how we can take parts of one word to make another, adding or removing individual letters to create new words or make variations of others. Using the cut-out letters to represent how we make new words and how words meaning and pronunciation can change over time and with new generations.

I've blogged about this piece before but have been working on it more over the past week or so. I have nowre-photographed the piece adding more letters and changing the layout - any comments are welcome!

As a further addition to the brief I am now working on the final part - looking at typography with conversations and how people naturally speak. I am currently working on this to be designed as a newspaper style layout and will upload the finished spreads soon!

My third year journey...

Yesterday was journal hand-in day....after having a disaster trying to bind my journal last week I was glad to get it finished. Although I am pleased with the final printed piece my initial intention was for the journal to be bound into a book but this didn't work out. So...after a late night re-printing I chose a white wire spiral bind. I wanted the inside of the journal to be relatively simple to make the information easy to access but also show a good design style. I had text inserts on each double page spread of images to make the layout more interesting visually.

Another thing ticked of the list!

Adrian Shaughnessey & Tony Brook - Who would start a publishing company in this climate?

Last week D&AD held a lecture at the Odeon cinema in town and we had the opportunity to go and hear from Adrian Shaughnessey & Tony Brook, who collectively work as Unit Editions.

Starting with Tony Brook, he talked of his agency 'Spin' is a London based design studio, founded in 1992 by. They have an international reputation for, “INNOVATIVE, EFFECTIVE AND AWARD WINNING DESIGN ACROSS A WIDE RANGE OF DISCIPLINES AND MEDIA.”

I had heard ‘Spin’ mentioned before but had never seen any of their work, so hearing from Tony Brook was a great experience. He talked about Spin and the work they produce as an agency and how working with Adrian Shaughnessey brings together something they both love within design, publishing.

Unit Editions is the new publishing company the pair have set up, dedicated to producing high-quality, affordable books about graphic design and the visual arts. They offer the highest standards of design and production creating the highest quality books, a collaboration between two top designers, Adrian Shaughnessey and Tony Brook.

I have had Adrian shaughnessey’s book “How to be a graphic designer without losing your soul,” for a few years now, and in the recent months have been reading it as I prepare to enter the design world. The book is very informative and honest and provides a great source of information, from a talented, experienced designer, so it was a great opportunity to meet Adrian in person. The main focus of the lecture was the area of publishing within design. Both Adrian and Tony have collaborated to work in an area they are both very passionate about.

It was a great opportunity to hear from two very successful designers on their opinion of the design world as it is today. They are both very successful in their own right and collaborating together are proving to be as successful in the area of publishing. It was great to hear their personal experience of the design industry, they know that they are taking a risk with a publishing company when electronic media is so dominent...will people still read books? One main point that I took away from the lecture was how a designer will always need and want books...you can find something on the internet but will you be able to find it again? As designers we sit at our computers and most likely there is a book open at the side of us. Books are a great source of inspiration and I do love to buy new books. having something you can keep and constantly refer back to for new inspiration and ideas is something that maybe the internet cannot provide us with. I know that personally design books are something I will always buy and I love adding to my collection. I can go back to books now that I’ve had for a number of years and each time I will see something different, something new to inspire me for my current project.

It was a brilliant, informative, lecture by two top class designers and a great opportunity to meet them and hear them talk first hand and about their passion within design.

A great collaboration.

SEA - Bryan Edmonson

SEA is an award winning brand design consultancy, founded in 1997 by Bryan Edmunson and John Simpson. There produce a wide range of diverse design work across my disciplines, from brand identity to brand art direction to packaging and interactive design. They host an impressive client list from big brand companies such as Jamie Oliver and GF Smith down to small individual fashion labels.

Their moto is simple, they just EXECUTE A SIMPLE IDEA VERY WELL.

Bryan showed us a very impressive range of the agencies work. I in particular loved the work for GF Smith and Grafik. as Bryan said the ideas are relatively simple but they execute them to the highest possible standard, working with top photographers, leaving no detail forgotten. using the ink to show the quality of the paper, and the vibrancy when you print on it - something quite simple but executed to the highest standard possible. Their Grafik editorial covers were particularly impressive, simple changing the colour used for the screen print each time to create 15,000 totally unique covers.

I had not previously heard of ‘SEA’ but they are definitely a company I will be keeping track of in the future to keep up-to-date with their current work. Their print based work is was what particularly caught my attention as it is of such a high standard. Bryan gave a very informative, detailed lecture showing some very impressive, inspirational work.

Overall, a really enjoyable lecture that made me want to produce great work like theirs!