Advertisement 1.2 - PRINT AD

"When one reads books, he/she starts living it and identifies (or not) with main hero. These print ads for the Mint Vinetu bookstore, which sells lots of classics, focuses on the idea of becoming someone else. And provokes people to try on different personas."

Love these - simple concept, good type, reminds me of them record-face-thing people do. 

[end of in depth analysis]

Advertising 1.1 - TV Ad

To kick off our FINAL PROJECT OF THE YEAR(ish), over easter we were asked to look at a range of adverts, including TV, print, guerrilla and environmental.

For the TV ad, i chose to look at my favourite ever - Ikea's "Happy Inside" from 2010 because cats.

Anyway, the ad starts with an establishment shot, but not of the exterior - it's relying on the viewer to know that it's Ikea from the type of furniture and layout of the shop. It shows the cutie cats exploring Ikea, and as the advert progress's, they become more human in their actions in exploring the drawers, sitting on the chairs, getting heads stuck in headboards ect. As the adverts winding down, some weird lady begins to sing, and I'm not sure about the singing - I much prefer the piano on its own, just as the notes match the cats movement. When we were discussing this in tutorial, someone said that they thought it sounded like a cat..so maybe thats why they used it. Anyhow, as it winds down and the cats are getting comfortable, all tucked up in bed, the slogan pops up - "Home, its how it makes you feel" and finishes with a final establishment shot of the Ikea logo with the "Happy Inside" and guess what guys, this advert does make me feel happy inside.

I love the Ikea adverts, I think they're so good - i like the latest one too.

Wind in the Willows: Research

Oh this project. Was a struggle. I began with looking at Atonement and thought not to bother with the Penguin competition. However I began to get jealous of people drawing cute things so thought sod it, I want to do that too. A week had already gone by, bugger.

After perusing Waterstones and Amazon, I noticed something. Wind in the Willows covers are very green, therefore, I won't use green. REVELATION!

I spent the longest time faffing around on this project deciding what to do. I did a lot of character drawings, which were cute but I just didn't know how to incorporate those into a book cover. So I decided to move on and chose a scene in the book to illustrate. BUT NOT USE GREEN.

The scene I chose was when Mole was running through the woods looking for Badgers house - quite a sinister scene if you ask me. My colour scheme was Orange, Grey and Black. However, because I'd left it SO LATE these were my only sketches! How disappointing.

In the brief it specified it wanted some nice typography, so I had a go. Did many of this, many different types but I decided in the end to go with a swirly one to contract the shapes in my final image.

This is my final cover, which I created digitally. I've never done "digital painting" before so I thought I'd give it a go - didn't realise how long it'd take me. Many hours were spent on this, but I don't really think it looks like that. It's alright, but it's not brilliant. I think what makes it stand out from others I've seen is the colours, thats it though. I would've like to spend more time on it, making the tree's better and stuff but I got mad and lost interest. Maybe it would've been nicer in watercolour? Who knows.

WEB DESIGN: WEEK 2.1

I normally do sketchbook look throughs, but I'm not really using a sketchbook except for sketches, so thought I'd pop on a bit of research I did over the weekend.

Here's another song to delight your ears with...

Nice Things: Marc Johns

www.marcjohns.com/

Do I even need to say the reasons I like Marc Johns because really it should be painfully obvious - he's funny, simplistic style and its watercolour!!!!!!!

watercolourrrr

Nice Things: Alex T Smith

alextsmith.blogspot.co.uk

Alex T Smith is one of my favourite children's illustrators probably ever. His work fills me with such childish glee, his characters are so happy and full of personality. His work is probably one of my biggest influences stylistically because aaagh its just soooo cute. It's weird because in terms of Graphic Design, I prefer things being really bold, blocky and sleek where as in illustration i love texture, pattern and an overall busy look to an image.

Nice Things: Nicholas Saunders

www.nicholassaunders.co.uk

Nick was our guest lecturer today and he'll also be taking our screen printing workshops! I've worked with print loads of times but never experimented with layering colours, so I'm looking forward to him imparting such things. Also looking forward to agreeing with the whole: yes i only know photoshop no i don't want to learn illustrator!! Also he worked on Harry Potter lol what.