PPP Task

Retail and Merchandise

Charlie Wager 

Band posters

Luke Dixon

T-shirts, fashion

Product- Album cover

Harvey Nichols christmas window display

(But all their window displays are amazing!)

Marcus Oakley for Lazy oaf.

Character and Narrative

Lauren Child- Charlie and Lola

Quentin Blake- the Bfg, children's book.

Jack Teagle- Jeff Job Hunter

Judith Kerr- children book

Chicken run- Aardman animations

Editorial and Reportage

Brian Rea- New York Times

Arian Tomine- The New Yorker

Lizzy Stewart- Wrap magazine

Pat Perry- California sunday mag

Jon Klassen-  For National theatre

Product and Packaging

 Collaboration by Óskar Þórðarson, Kjartan Gíslason, Karl Viggó Vigfússon and André Úlfur Visage

Toro Pinto

Hylton Warburton

Brenno Pinto-

Nick Dwyer-

Notes from the session and how they inform the images above-

Context of illustration- where it is

Product- What it is

Function - Why/what does it do?

Can a product be the function? Anything thats physical, conceptual or disciplinary can be the context.

Reportage is a disciplinary context, but it can also be a function because it responds to a text and also becomes a product.

1. Drawing is a process/investigation (media, line, translation.) This becomes...

2. Image making when we add visual language (composition, shape, texture, colour etc)

3. It becomes illustration when it communicates a message/solves a problem. When in response to a brief. Illustration is all about the brief.

Session 1-reflective practice and professional contexts

Who makes the rules? Question this, try and figure it out. Its hard to define what illustration is, so I must continue to ask questions and figure out what fits and what doesn't. 

Allow events to change me. 

I must be willing to grow.

I must learn to benefit from my practice because I do it for myself, free lance, its about exploring my own personal potential.

Think about who I would want to work for, and whether working for them will benefit my practice, whether it will support my own views and continue to hep me grow as a practitioner. 

At least 50% of what we define as illustration is defined by people out there, not us. 

Networking will become very important. I must always be aware of the requirements.

What do I need to learn? 

How do I know that I've learnt it?

Whats driving/informing me?

Level 5 is a time to individualise my own practice.

KEEP ASKING QUESTIONS. Questions are positive things.

Big heads - Kyle Webster

I really enjoyed the big heads Skype with Kyle Webster, and I felt he had a lot of interesting things to say and a lot of knowledge to pass on. Its always great to see how someone works professionally in the creative industry, and I feel almost everyone does it differently. Kyle Webster is not only an illustrator, but he also created his own range of photoshop brushes, which has probably made him quite a lot of money, and got his name out there even more so. He makes photoshop brushes that emirate natural media, which is something photoshop was lacking prior to his creation.

One thing he said which I really liked, was that sometimes you should create work because you want to make it, and then find a market for it after. So, its not always best to wait for someone to hire you, if you just keep creating for the love of creating, something good will come from it.

He also advised not to limit yourself to one style. If you have a set of various skills under your belt then you're more likely to be asked to work on a bunch of different jobs. 

What makes illustration great?

"When it goes beyond simply decorating the page. You have to own the context, which is hard because its focused on the content."

What I've learnt and will take away from Webster-

1. Dont limit myself to one style, be experimental and expand my portfolio.

2. Buy some of his photoshop brushes, they look great.

3. Pay closer attention to colour theory and light.

4. Create the work I want to create, then find a market for it.

Creative Strategy

5 things I've learnt so far on the programme-

• How to juggle various briefs at one time.
• How to be critical of my own work and the work of others 
• How to reflect on my own practice and understand how beneficial this can be for me
• How to work hard
• Where to look for professional practitioners work and know how to relate it to my own practice. 

5 things I want to know more about-

• Where my practice would fit or work best in the industry/working world.
• How to get some recognition in such a competitive field.
• Im actually interested to learn the boring stuff like copyrights and taxes etc
• How to set up my own business 
• Would like to improve combining traditional methods with modern digital methods.

5 things I think are my strengths-

• Im not too shy, I'm pretty confident most of the time
• Im quite business minded- always considering where my work could be and what it could achieve
• Willing to try new things, I don't feel I have one set style, which I used to think was a disadvantage but now I think it could be a good thing
• Can be very organised when life doesn't get in the way
• Willing to work hard

5 things I want to improve-

• How much I do towards my course when Im not actually in university. I.e more independent gallery trips and research would help.
• Blogging- need to blog on a more regular basis
• How much craft and time I spend on my image making
• Having a better finish on my digital work, really never feel its very good.
• Would like to be more focused this year

5 practitioners that demonstrate my interest in illustration-

• Lizzy Stewart
• Jack Teagle
• Ian Stevenson
• Hattie Stewart
• Alex Griffiths

5 websites/online resources 

• Its nice that
• colossal 
• tan n loose
• Behance
• Pinterest