Secret 7"

Secret 7" is a lovely project that combines art and music for a good cause. Designers create covers for tracks by various artists which are sold later at a charity auction.

I created a "Heartbeat Wave" inspired by Jessie Ware's song "Still Love Me". You can find out more and vote here.

Subbuteo Illustrations

I've started the new year trying my arm at creating illustrations with a view to getting up to speed and looking longterm to chance my arm at getting some freelance and possible editorial work. There's a way to go and I'm just looking at getting used to working with shade and layers.

There's a series of football based posters taking shape and this City (I know.. don't act like you're not surprised) No 9 is one of them. It needs some depth and texture, but I thought I'd post it here as a work in progress.

Tube Posters

There are some lovely posters in the Tube at the moment for a variety of exhibitions and shows - here's just a small selection. A really gorgeous and lovely way to start and finish a day.

2013 - Rip it up and start again..

Tomorrow is a bit of a landmark. It will be two years since I quit my job as a Marketing Manager to become a Designer. It's been a tough road but one that has definitely been worth walking. 2012 is ending with my working full-time at a small agency in Lambeth and lots of exciting plans and ideas for 2013.

There's a new website in the pipeline and a determination to really move things onto the next level.

Time to rip it up and start again..

Happy Christmas..

Just a wonderful illustration from the Guardian. Grab a mince pie and enjoy while listening to Tracey Thorn's gorgeous version of Joni Mitchell's River.

Happy Christmas!!

Patrick Morgan

I discovered Patrick Morgan via Stylist magazine. His work just makes me catch my breath. Seriously how beautiful are his drawings, paintings..how clear is his style.

Arunas Kacinskas

I'm always torn between line drawing and using illustrator to get my ideas out of my head and on screen. Arunas has a nice clean approach that I like a lot. There's complex ideas in everything he does but he manages to make it look effortless and very visual.

ohhdear cushions

It's been a while since I blogged, tied up with the new job and trying to set up a new website of my work. However the other day I got the chance to submit a couple of illustrations to ohhdear as part of their Pillow Fight competition.

Initially they were just entries but ohhdear decided to put all of the submissions up on the site so that anyone could buy them for a limited time period. Nice. So here are mine.

Trainer Fight

If You Love Me Let Me Know

Available to buy here for the next three weeks.

Kerry Hyndman

More inspiration from Kerry Hyndman. There is something about the way she layers and cuts into her drawings and illustrations. Nothing is clean, everything including the textures she uses works while keeping a subtle edginess.

Olympics

All in all, a bit like the Commonwealth Games arriving in Manchester. Months of people complaining about how much it's costing them to host replaced by everyone smiling and telling each other how much they love their city. Wembley for the USA v Japan Women's Final and a night back in the East End for the Paralympics. Brilliant. 

Inspiration

via Northern Lights

Rob Lowe

Dana Tanamachi

Studio Output

So what the fuck was that all about then..?

It used to be the way that whenever I mentioned to someone that I was a Manchester City fan they would fix me with a look that said two things. Pity and admiration. I've seen it too many times. A recognition of a long suffering fool - Jack Lemmon in The Apartment say.

I'm a City fan because of my Dad. It's partly his fault because he'd take me to Maine Road each time he drove the match bus. I was seven the first time and we'd sit in the old Platt Lane, leaving early enough to get back in time to open the doors for the punters after the game. I didn't get to go to the cup Final in 81' but I did get my first season ticket the year before, standing in the Kippax with my mate Ronnie Jackson. So it seemed rather fitting that my Dad was the first person I called as I walked back into Manchester after the game finished.

I was born the last time we won the league, so 44 years of hurt (and my life as a City fan) were rightly encapsulated (after a brilliantly fantastic season) in a mad, crazed five minutes. The ninety minutes of pain, anguish that went before - along with a feeling that I could and might be physically sick at any time - were forgotten. Three and half minutes, from being 2-1 down to winning 3-2, taking the Premiership with the final kick in the last minute of the last match of the season. Quite simply I went from utter devastation to a strange kind of joy. As Elliot said in the pub after.."So, what the fuck was that all about?"..

It was just one of those days, one of those moments. I hugged everyone and anyone who was close. We smiled, we cried and then we were Champions.

Plaid shirt please..

It's just over five months since I started working (initially as an intern) at OceanBarefoot (who I can't thank enough for the opportunity) and the great news is that after a few close run interviews I have a job. Whoop! It's at a small digital agency in Lambeth North and I really couldn't be any happier.

Three months to start with and if all goes to plan a permanent contract at the end. It's a small step for man, a giant leap..well you get the drift. I graduated last July so it's been a slow and at times tortured process, but finally I can focus on starting to build this new career as a designer.

Time to grow a beard and do up the top button of that plaid shirt.

Never Let Me Go

One of the reasons behind my quietness has been that I've been busy updating my portfolio. The ability to add 'realtime' projects such as the EMpower annual report I worked on whilst at OceanBarefoot has strengthened it. Alongside these my editorial magazine has been completely redeveloped and the property development now show a project that stretches across both print and web.

One result of sitting down to plan how to update it and challenge myself is that I've decided longterm that I'd love to try and get into book design. Designing a book cover at college allowed me to use my illustration skills, something I need to develop more. Anyway, whilst reworking things I illustrated and redesigned 'Never Let Me Go', another fave book. If you've read it you'll know the story.

The next step is pulling a portfolio of book covers together. So I've set myself the task of redesigning five books taken from the Orange Book Prize over the next couple of months. As you do.

Sir John Hegarty

Another evening at Typographic Circle, this time to see Sir John Hegarty, advertising guru. Once again, he didn't disappoint. Funny, open and honest, he showcased a body of work that to be painfully blunt is second to none.

The idea is everything. Get that and you can construct a sixty second message that will have appeal and make a visual impact with an audience. From a groundbreaking Levi's commercial with Nick Kamen stripping down to his boxers (changing a nation's underwear habits in a moment) in a laundrette to taking a pint of Boddington's and adding northern humour to it. There's a great video of him talking about his work.

Inspiration

Ben Tallon

Clare Mallison

David Sparshott

One of the things I talked about back in January was changing the look and feel of the blog so it became more of a showcase for my work as a designer and work I find inspiring. As such, I'm just going to throw some inspiration here and there, every now and then.

Harry Pearce

Although he has a name right out of Spooks, Harry Pearce is one of the most influential designers at Pentagram's London office and I was lucky enough to catch him at February's Typographic Circle event.  

Have to admit, I hadn't really heard of him before the talk (obviously did some research) but he was to be blunt, pretty amazing. His work touches many disciplines, from spatial design and identity to print, ( Halfords, Waitrose, Sainsbury’s, Anish Kapoor and the 2011 Summer Exhibition at the RA, Phaidon Press, the Science Museum, Saks Fifth Avenue) packaging and posters and he ran us through it and his thought processes in an engaging, funny and informative way.

His work for Witness (see poster above), an international nonprofit organization that uses the power of video and storytelling to open the eyes of the world to human rights abuses was particularly engaging and brilliant. 

Angus Hyland

Bobbed along to a packed Typographic Circle talk at JWT last week to see Angus Hyland, Pentagram partner, give a talk about Symbol, his new book. It was a great intro into the history of the visual language of symbols and how they interact with the design world.

An added bonus was a breakdown of the thinking behind the redesigning/rebranding work he has done over the last ten years (along with his wife Marion Dechaurs who I spoke about before Christmas) for Cass Art. The designs are clean, colourful and when added to a Swiss design bring intelligence to what is basically a simple idea. There's a nice explanation on the eye blog about it.

Kenneth Branagh

I haven't really done a lot of drawing recently, but since we're meandering towards the end of 2011, here's a few sketches I did from a Kenneth Branagh interview in the Guardian. 

Happy 2012!!

New Year, new blog..

So in next March, it will be two years since I started writing and posting on this blog. It's been fun and well worth it but it needs a lot of life breathing into it. New layout, new design?! Definitely some new creativity.

I also need to update my portfolio with new work and look into getting a website up and running. If so, I might start to incorporate the blog posts into that.

There's a lot to think about. In the meantime, this is my kick up the backside.

Happy Christmas

Belatedly of course.

I like these adverts for the Denver Theatre Company. A cool way of representing the three ghosts and consequently Scrooge's entire journey.

Internships

If you haven't seen Mr Bingo or his work then you should. He is damn fine illustrator and as you can see above his view on working for free is pretty clear. Spot on. What happens though if you're just starting out? Maybe this time last year you had a brain fart and decided to follow a dream, thereby consigning the last 15 years of a career into the bin marked "STARTING AGAIN".

In this recession? Are you kidding me? Squeekybumtime.

One of the scarier moments during London Design Week was being told by an design agency that in order to get 'my break' I would have to accept working free internships, maybe for the next 12 months before getting my first design position. I'll be honest in saying it frightened the crap out of me.

To be fair there are a lot of paid internships inside great design agencies but they sit alongside those three months internships where they offer to kindly pick up your lunch tab. Yeah, well thanks. As you'd expect though competition is high - I mean how do you measure a three year course against a three month one?

Fortunately I'm writing this at the end of December. The interviews did start to come, though it took a good four months to happen. I've been lucky, I'm working a paid three month internship until the end of February at Oceanbarefoot.

It's a full service branding and creative agency and I'm loving it. It's a steep learning curve, but I'm gaining valuable experience and within reason, some space and time, to learn a new career. I'm getting faster in thought and process and I guess more importantly, I haven't broken anything so far..

Marion Deuchars

Towards the back end of the summer a few of us spent the day wandering around London, mainly Dalston, Shoreditch and Old Street talking to designers and illustrators as part of London Design Week. It was really engaging and as an opportunity to get into a variety of differing studios well worth it.

The highlight, beforehand for me, was the chance to meet Marion Deuchars and to be fair she didn't let me down. Her style is free and open, just what a great illustrator should be and while it's very much replicated I love it.

I thought we'd get ten minutes, but she gave us a good hour of her time, discussing her career, how she got started, ambitions and her working process, in and out of various design collectives. All in all she was pretty inspiring.

Happy Halloween!

And so I'm back...from outer space.

Well, almost. I've been away from blogging for a couple of months now as I have been busy trying to find design job/internship. I never had any expectations that changing careers would be difficult and I have to say unfortunately those expectations have been proved right. But I'll blog more about that in the next few days.

In the meantime I love this Guinness advert for Halloween. A really simple and brilliant design. Happy Halloween!!

Day 50: Full Circle

So here we are. Fifty days, fifty blogs, even if it's taken a little longer than I envisioned. This is the final version of my book cover. You can see the original one here.

I said back in March 2010 when I started this blog that "the end always has a start" and it still holds true. Having said that I never really thought I'd be here in such a short space of time, but starting to blog was one of the key creative kicks I needed. I'm a blogger disciple in that respect. You should all give it a go if you have the need to say something. It's really rewarding, honest!

It's been a lot of fun and it doesn't stop here. But for the moment, if you haven't already then why not wander along and see my design portfolio.

Day 49: Monkee looks happy

Just a few random shots from a wander around Spitelfields looking for inspiration for the fashion brief we did towards the end of the college course.

Day 48: Tweet Up Goodie Bag

And the sun shone. Behold the goodie bag from the #crtateup. It's a sock puppet in the making..

Day 47: Creative Review Tweet Up

Last week I wandered along to Tate Britain for Creative Review's Tweetup evening. Yes I'm on twitter @northernmonkee1 as well.

It was an amazing night with private view of the new Vorticists exhibition and the opportunity to meet other creatives and have some fun.

I spent most of the evening sat on the floor with the lovely people from NeonNiche drawing heads, bodies or feet with felt tip pens. Rather unsurprisingly I drew the football boots. As you do. A pretty good 'goodie bag' was included. No luck with the lucky dip lotto ticket though.

Day 46: Graduation

And so I'm done. All graduated and the like. The last couple of weeks as we rushed to get our portfolio's complete were 24/7 hectic with a few late night/early mornings but we made it.

I've had the best three months in terms of getting to know a whole new bunch of cool, fun people and spending the day designing with them.

Now I need to find a job as a graphic designer. Whoop Whoop!

Day 45: Wooden Toy Magazine

Had a guest lecture from Timba, an ex-Shillingon grad from Oz today. He illustrates, designs and self publishes Wooden Toy magazine. He's pretty cool and it's definitely a labour of love. He kept it straight, gave us honest sound advice as well as being inspiring. Especially with my illustrator/designer hat on, it just made me determined to have something of mine in a future issue.

Also finished my last brief today. That makes 38 over the two and a half months. Very strange to look back and see how things have evolved from the start and where I am at now. Have to keep reminding myself I've only been doing this for such a short space of time and that I'll only keep improving.

Tomorrow it's just the one-2-one with a tutor to work out what I'd like to put into my portfolio and what should go in to make it great. Then what looks and feels like will be ten days of no sleep....