Summative Evaluation

This module has been one of the biggest learning experiences of my educational journey to date. That being said, however, I feel as though a lot of this learning was done outside of the classroom. Engaging with multiple live briefs this year has allowed me to better understand how I work as a practitioner, where my work fits in the ‘real world’, and how to conduct myself as a professional. I can honestly say that I wouldn’t have been able to make the progress this year that I have, without the faith of those around me who have trusted me with their time and money to make something with feeling.

Usually as each module comes to an end I talk about my lack of time keeping, and though my blogging has been far from perfect for this module, my ability to organize and manage my time with multiple live briefs has really improved this year. I’ve had to balance a lot of client work alongside my studies, and at times this may have impacted my grading, but it’s a conscious choice I made. I’m really proud to be finishing this course with such a range of live work in my portfolio, and to have been lucky enough to work for people and briefs that I believed in.

It feels a little strange to be leaving, but the excitement for post-uni life far outweighs the nerves. I’m looking forward to having the time to get back to my personal practice again, and use the skills I’ve developed this year through live briefs in my own work. More than that though, I’m just looking forward to having the time to fall in love with my craft again. I feel ready to go home.

Project Report

Final Outcomes for OUIL603

Reviewing Statement of Intent

Reviewing Statement of Intent

Reflecting back on my statement of intent, I feel as though I've excelled with some of my intentions, but perhaps not quite achieved some others. I would confidently say that I have explored  the context of music based illustration. The many briefs undertaken for La Bete Blooms and Warren Records are testament to that. I'd also add that within the genre of music illustration I've gone beyond the obvious contexts of gig posters and album artwork, and explored other aspects such as story boarding for a music video, illustrating a logo, and getting to grips with hand rendered type alongside my image making. Working with live clients has also allowed me to professionalize my practice within this context, which will be very useful going forward and leaving the course.

When it comes to undertaking more self initiated briefs however, I don't feel as though I've really made the time since writing this statement of intent. It's been very difficult for me to balance the live briefs and uni work at the same time. While I've been able to use these live briefs as uni work, I've also had to blog about them, take the time out for workshops, crits, visiting practitioners, and complete both COP and PPP throughout the year. With all this in mind, I haven't really had the time to focus on a self initiated brief other than my final major project. I think this is also in part due to the fact that what I like most about self initiated projects is that they are personal. While I understand blogging for this course is necessary, it's not something I enjoy doing, and I think having to blog about a personal led project would leave me feeling a little down about it and unable to enjoy it as much. This goes for my intention of creating more zines and self publications, I think it's something I'd rather do outside of the realm of academia. 

I've definitely kept up my momentum with live briefs, I have a number of commissions already lined up within the coming weeks and months, and it's something I plan on keeping up. I also think it'll be a lot easier to balance my live work and my personal work once uni is out of the way (sorry LCA but let me go). I'd also like to think I've continued to put human emotion into most of the briefs I've completed this year. At no point did I feel as though I was taking on a brief 'purely for the sake of doing it' or 'purely for the grade'. I've believed in all of the projects I've done this year, which is a great feeling to be leaving this course with.

FMP; Final Prints

The final posters and mocked up examples of how they'd be hung. I finished the brief!!

Colour-Way Studies

Having finished my final posters, I decided to test out different colour ways. I won't have time to screen print the finals for hand in, but I still wanted to show the colours I would have proposed they be done in.

I started with two colour prints to see how they'd work with the linework not being black. I stuck to a lot of reds / yellows as they're both colours used often in the Hull music scene (eg. The Adelphi, The Sesh etc). However part of me felt that the coloured linework didn't have the same weight as the pure black. The line work of each image is the focal point so it's integral that it stands out and is visible against the background.

After playing around with a few I thought that the red/yellow background and black linework looked best. I also feel it translated across all the prints (only 3 shown above) and kept them cohesive. 

I then mocked a selection of these up as prints. I think this is how I'll present them within the final presentation boards; proposed as a select number of what would be a larger body of work exploring the Hull music scene and exhibited in a gallery setting.

I'm thinking of doing some of the final prints in the red background and some in the yellow, depending on which works best for the individual image. Within the proposed exhibition all prints would then be either red or yellow in background colour so the series worked cohesively. 

Final 5 Posters

Using my composition sketches, I created four new A3 poster designs and decided to include a previously created image. I'm happy with how these images have turned out individually and how they work as a set.

I think the mixture between thick and thin line-work creates more diversity than my other images had before, and these certainly have a lot more energy and a gritty punk aesthetic to them. I'm hoping as a series they do reflect the Hull music scene and what it's about, though along the way, perhaps this project has become more about a personal response to the music scene through primary research and experience, rather than trying to express a specific emotion or point of view? 

Moving forward I need to add a background colour to these so they can be seen as they would be in their final context (screen printed and hung for an exhibition).