Russell Hancock - Graphic design & the dotted line

Russell Hancock’s talk was very inspirational and informative. He has great experience within the design industry, varying from Branding and Advertising to Illustration, Film making and Web design, so it was a great talk to give us advice for our upcoming entrance into the design world. The talk was similar to Craig Oldham's 12 in 12, each very informative in slightly different ways.. The topics Russell covered and the information we were provided with will be invaluable to us when leaving university and entering the “real world.”

Russell talked of numerous important things to consider when in industry, giving us examples to back them up, making us aware that sometimes things are difficult. What I loved most about this lecture, was Russell’s honesty. He was very open about times when he had had knock-backs in his career, it will not always be straight forward and go to plan, but as he showed, you can overcome obstacles, and in the long run they may make you a better, more confident designer.

Russell showed a range of his work, some which he was not so proud of, but not all the work we do will be ground breaking, design, as he said you will have your “regular” clients, and although the work may not be the most exciting, you have to do it to keep going as a freelancer or within an agency. He was passionate about his more personal work, re-branding his local cinema...something which came about after he pitched the idea to re-develop the derelict building and restore it back to it's natural beauty.

Hearing from designers that graduated quite recently, are the talks I find really interesting and inspiring. Although hearing from the big designers and agency’s is as inspiring, these very honest, open talks about the design world provide us with advice and information that will be of a great help. They know what we are going through and it’s great to see the success that can come after your degree!

Russell gave us some great templates for the more "business" side of being a freelance designer - terms & conditions, invoice templates etc. It was great of him to give us these and they will definitely be something I will use in the future.

Finally...a few top tips from Russell...

• GET MONEY & A SIGNATURE UP FRONT
• ASSESS FREE WORK CAREFULLY
• BE SURE OF YOUR OPINIONS
• ACT PRO - GET TREATED PRO
• ASK YOUR MUM!
• BECOME ORGANISED
• GET OUT & SOCIALIZE
• NEED GOOD INTERWEBZ
• SOMETIMES....CLIENTS ARE BAD
• REMEMBER PEOPLE - BE REMEMBERED

a little update

Sorry it's been a while...it's been busy time these past few weeks working away at my final projects...here's a few late posts of things over the past few weeks...

nice work...

Came across this very creative business card design... Bracket is a publication that features everything-in-between - ideas, process and voices overlooked and under-appreciated.

The business card looks deceivingly empty until pushed open to reveal a bracket that frames the information.

busy, busy, busy.....

So its been a while since I blogged about my current work. Ive been busy working away over easter on my main project for this term, looking into the area of language. With typography being one of my favourite disciplines within design, this final project is giving me the chance to really explore and experiment with the words.

I have split the project down into three main areas, two of which are well under way and the third will be developed further over the next couple of days. I want each of the final outcomes to be quite different although they are all within the same area, as I want to show a variety of final designs to show I can work in different ways.

The project so far has proved to be quite challenging in some ways, as I have tried to push myself to work outside my comfort zone. With the degree show in mind I know I have the opportunity to push the boundaries slightly and hopefully get my work noticed. I have focused a lot less on the research areas than last term as this was an area I needed to pay less attention to, and have experimented much more with a wide variety of different outputs.

Here are a couple of snap shots of what I've been up to...

Emily Forgot

Today we had a lecture from London based Graphic Artist Emily Alston, known as "Emily Forgot." Emily showed a variety of work both commissioned and personal projects for a diverse range of clients. Emily's work shows a wide variety, with anything from illustration, retail display, print design and visual identity she "prides herself on approaching all briefs with creative thought, originality, humour and beauty in mind." Embracing the odd, the everyday & the sometimes surreal with playful visual language and image making.

The subtle use of colour added in to Emily's work really helps to bring it to life as it is not too overpowering. One piece of work that particularly caught my attention was the large scale designs for the Selfridges parade. As I have been looking at working large scale over easter hearing Emily talk about how she went about working at such a scale was really helpful. Overall a good talk with some nice, interesting work.

Lose control...final panic work

My final 'panic' piece, printed, mounted and ready to exhibit!

PUSH printing

Today I went to a printing seminar with 'Push printing,' a printers based in London. It was an extremely useful talk and made me realise more how much I do love printed design, being able to touch the work for me makes it so much better. It is so true that the choice of paper stock can really change the whole feel and look of the work and if chose correctly, make it look much better.

Marisa talked us through the whole process of taking a piece of design to print including how a print specification should be written. She had brought along a massive selection of work they had printed and there was some really great stuff. Just by the way a piece of work is printed it makes you want to pick it up and look at it. She discussed the terminology used by printers and although some of it did sound a bit confusing a lot of it is just how it sounds for example: 'centre sewn' simply means the document is sewn down the centre...really not that confusing! Other common phrases printers use are:

• Perfect Binding - where the spine is glued
• exposed binding - there is no cover - the spine is exposed and allows the document to lay flat when opened, there is no restriction when you open the book.
• saddle stitch - stapled down the centre fold (I don't know why they don't just say stapled!)
• side sewn - sewn at the side
• centre sewn - sewn down the centre
• self cover - the document has no finishing - there is no outer cover - this works well with a light paper stock where the same stock is used throughout the whole document.
• duplexing - glueing two boards together - provides a rigid finish and is used a lot for invitaions

How to write a printing spec. correctly:

• give the work a title
• pages - eg: 4 page cover + 32 page text
• size (say in mm)
• how you want it printed - eg: 4 colour print throughout
• paper stock - for the cover and inside pages
• any extras - eg: folied, laminated, perferated etc.
• finishing - eg: perfect bound, saddle stitch etc.
• delivery
• quantity
• list any alternatives - for example how the price would alter if you wanted more foiled lettering etc.

A few examples of their work...

It was great to hear about the otherside of the design process, which is just as important as designing the piece itself. We were given a good insight into the whole printing process which I am sure is something I will have to deal with when working in industry. Overall a very useful seminar!