FLUX500

Several weeks ago I competed in MMU's inter-faculty Flux competition and was
selected to join a team to compete in the finals. I've just returned from the Flux500 Inter-University Business Competition in Nottingham. 33 Universities, 43 Industry experts, 1 Business challenge and.....about 30 hours.

I'm absolutely exhausted after a brilliant and intense three days in Nottingham. Our MMU team performed extremely well amongst strong competition. Where do I even start? The event is one of a kind and offers individuals the opportunity to develop key skills which overall build employability. These skills include communication, presentation, team work, creative problem solving, business plan development, negotiation, selling and leadership.

All 33 teams were handed the exact same business scenario, using an existing business and a current and relevant topic (developing training and working opportunities for the disabled.) At the end of the 30 hours each team pitched their entire business idea in a five minute pitch to an audience and several industry experts ('dragons'.)Followed by seven minutes of questions ('grilling'.)

The top four teams then went onto compete in and extended challenge, resulting in the winners taking the title of The FLUX500 National Champions of 2010, oh and also £3,000, cash. Most importantly for me it boosted my confidence and self-belief. It was a great experience and I gained valuable skills, met some great people and contacts and discovered things I didn't think I was capable of.

PANIC

My submission for the Noise Lab exhibition 'Panic' by Design & Art Direction third year students.

"Panic slowly encroaches upon us, getting more and more intense until we fully acknowledge the fear. The familiar sense of counting down the days, hours or minutes until an anticipated moment is something we all know a little too well."

Oswiecim

After my trip to Poland and Auschwitz back in February I decided to use some of the photographs I'd taken on the trip to produce a small personal photographic response of visiting there. I found it easy to arrange my images in a way that would emphasize their composition, however I found it really hard knowing what text if I wanted any at all should I place on the images. I felt it required some narrative/explanation/poetry but I felt I tainted the simple interpretative language of the images. In the end I combined some found poetry with words of my own and produced a few small concertina books. The book folds out and on the reverse is a really poignant juxtaposition of two images of the same scene. The focus shifts. I began to think of the psychology of prisoners and how they may view what is beyond the fences.

I printed one book onto newsprint and when I began to photograph the book using strong lighting I realized you could begin to see the image on the other side of the paper, I though this added a new layer in the communication of the piece, perhaps I could contrast some images?

Push.

A lovely lady called Marissa from Push print came in today, she brought with her a selection of (beautiful) examples of print work which Push has produced (mainly litho). With clients such as Adidas, Kurt Geiger, The V&A, Levi, COS, The Tate and a selection of High end property agencies and jewelers, Push can produce almost anything to meet your needs.
We talked about print specifications, relationships with designers and printers and with paper suppliers. Here is just a selection of the samples she brought...



We learnt a little more about terms such as Foiling, Flockage, Flood-colour, Die-cut, Flouro, Duplex and Pagination/imposition.

When writing a specification or approaching a printers for a quote, Marissa recommended that we:

- Title the project in an email
- specify the format
- specify the size
- specify the print process (e.g. 4col? 5col? dbl page printing?)
- specify the stock (or ask for a recommendation)
- Finishing
- Quantity to be produced

Finish with a deadline and specific dates, perhaps some examples of similar work, and follow it up with a phone call explaining how you are awaiting a quote.

The all-round clear favorite piece of the day was the...**magic book** wow was this a mystery, ok so imagine a beautiful glossy brochure for a new office build 'Wells & Moore' If you flicked through the brochure one way (e.g. front to back/left to right) it revealed all the information/details/type, however if you flicked the opposite way (e.g. back to front/right to left) you could see large scale photographs and images. The book is absoleley genius and my photographs do not do it justice. Pure magic? the trick is in the page sizes - as is revealed below.

The Surgery...

Ian Anderson Portfolio Surgery
On Thursday I had my first ever portfolio review with Ian Anderson
(of The Designers Republic)

Like everyone I was nervous and I didn't realize it would be feedback on our personal presentation, not really the portfolio work. I like to think I can take constructive criticism but we discussed in the studio how hard it is to have an emotional detachment to our work, so I did take it a little to heart. It took me until the evening to fully understand the feedback and to really take it all on-board.
I now realize its a really different language you have to use, I'm so used to presenting my work to tutors I'd mistakenly mentioned I'd worked with Rachael and Jenny (don't mention people you worked with, just mention once that you have collaborated to give the impression you can work with others.) I talked about "my most recent project"...or talking about projects in relation to time (this is not relevant.) Among other things...

- My portfolio was too small
- I didn't talk enough about each of the projects, I should have gone into more detail
- It had too much work, with too much variety

Despite my presentation being full of errors I did do one thing right and this was showing my rather large A2 day-glow Don't Panic poster which ticked the box of a 'memorable piece of work' to close my presentation with - thank god!

I feel I have such a variety of work (film, animation, branding, print, photography..) It's hard to show my best work and not look like I'm a 'Jack of all trades' I get that and I think its going to be hard to give the portfolio a 'style'.
I hate the fact that because I'm interested in a variety of disciplines it puts me at a disadvantage almost? It is quite hard to look at all the work you have done and think which ones are the best and which ones say something about me as a designer?

Ian Anderson gave us lots of advice about presenting to potential employers what they're looking for, and the most common mistakes people make. I'm really grateful we had this opportunity and having the feedback now is only going to help us improve.

Irish eyes are smilin...

We took advantage of St.Patricks day this year to fund raise for the degree show. Working with Rachael, Maria, Helen and Fredi we designed four tshirts for the day. The four designs were...

** Irish eyes are smilin **
** I heart the craic **
** I'm a drinker not a fighter **
** I heart my Paddy Irish man **



We decided to make 80 shirts and we hand screen-printed them all on tuesday. We got to Waxy's where Maria had ok'd it with the manager, because we were fundraising they let us sell inside...what no-one told us was that they were giving away free tshirts upstairs! so we had to convince everyone to buy a £6 shirt! well we definitely had our work cut out. It was a long night but we were determined to sell the lot! which we did and have managed to raise a grand total of....£202.43!

Right and now back to some work....

Mothers day card's

I get this rack of guilt if I don't contribute to any of the fundraising events going on! so I made up a few cards to contribute to the mothers day sale in the Holden Gallery. I loved the Russian doll logo for mothers day a perfect metaphor for a mum! Just bought one of the canvas bags - love it!

Review time...

This review couldn't have been more different to the reviews back in November. Five minutes to talk through 7 weeks work. My last review was like two and a half hours!
Has it really been 7 weeks! yikes I feel I've done twice as much work than last semester already!

I had my review with Sue and Clint, two tutors who I think haven't really seen any of my work since the beginning of second year. Unfortunately I missed my review slot with Hitch and I'm unsure if this has put me at a disadvantage.

It was really interesting to see what other people had been up to who weren't in my studio groups. Sue and Clint both reinforced the fact that every brief we choose we must really consider 'why am i choosing it?' and 'what do I want this work to say about me?'

...So which way do I want to go?

MMU Degree show pitch...

Rachael and I decided to work together and pitch for the Degree show identity. We both found ourselves being unusually inspired by Neil Grants pie charts.

I found it really inspirational working with Rachael we just took off one day into Manchester and photographed our surroundings. We were really excited bouncing ideas off of each other as we both felt like we were on the same wavelength. We were inspired by pie-charts, fans, wheels, cogs, factories, music, manufacturing and arrows.

We wanted to make use of all of the facilities MMU had to offer, considering letterpress, screenprint, laser-cutting, photograhy etc. We hopped into letterpress to get inspired.


We took the idea into a structure, ideally we wanted to create this large scale poster with all these mechanical elements to it and photograph it in the studio and produce that as the poster. The time constraint of three weeks really got us thinking outside of the box. We produced giant jigsaw like posters with movable parts. We created 3 looks, a neon one, a bright coloured on white and a re-cycled looking one.



Inspired by these windmill, pin-wheel structures we looked at their nets and tiles and began thinking along the lines of...



Towards the end of the project we did a little art directed photography around the buildings using textures within some square frames which we had made. I really enjoyed doing this, with each shot we considered the placement, distance and layout. We made a little concertina booklet and hope to make a poster of this little assignment.

Design Mark

On Thursday I represented the University as a student ambassador at a workshop at the Big Bang fair at the GMEX. The workshop was organized by The Design Council and Design Mark.

The Big Bang Fair is mainly a Science fair for primary and secondary schools with walking robots, chocolate structures and a Formula One stand! - I was quite jealous that I never got a chance to go to something like this.

Design Mark is an organization which awards specialist schools a Design Mark status. A school must demonstrate a high level of design teaching to obtain the award. During the day I worked with four girls from a Design Mark school.

Working in a group of four we were given the Design Councils 'Design against Crime' brief to tackle. The designer Andy Walmsley (Creative Director) from Wash design was there throughout the day to help the two groups towards finding a solution to the brief. It was really interesting to meet Andy, his design studio work on many different projects some in the field of architecture, animation, advertising and others. His websites pretty cool too.

I never really thought of teaching or working with children but I found it really inspiring. The girls in my group were really smart and came up with a great range of concepts in response to the brief. Keen product design students they really thought about our 'product' a solar powered roll-up mat which charges and backs up data for a variety of electronic devices (camera, USB, mobile.) The girls chose the name 'The Core' and here were some of their sketches.


and some of my logo ideas!


It was really strange performing this supportive role. I had to really stop myself from leading the ideas and being the designer. I had to really identify the moments where the girls had an idea and then encourage them to develop it, push it and question it. Andy gave me some great advice, being a Creative Director he is leading and pushing his team all the time, keep looking back at your ideas but always move forwards. I was quite proud of the work the girls did and they pitched it at the end of the day.

The design and idea process is really incredible and I felt reassured looking at the result of our conceptual development and the mess which we'd made that we'd really pushed our ideas.


A great opportunity which I enjoyed and I'm glad I said yes to.

Morag (Massive-Type) Myerscough

I'd seen some of Morag's work just last year, this...

playful poster caught my eye and I'd been looking forward to her talk since it was announced last week.

The talk was great, it was fantastic to see such bold, colourful and playful design solutions that considered materials and sustainability to shape the executions. To see a designer who thinks like an architect, actually design in 3 dimensions. Even building her own models over 3D digital visualization.
Morag is so dedicated to her work (the fact that her living room is actually her studio) is inspiring and nerve wrecking at the same time. Could i ever imagine myself to be that committed? Well I guess Morag has a more exciting and creatively unrestrained career compared to many other designers. The projects which see works on are interesting and I would say they'd be the opposite of corporate design.

Morags palette and use of colour has clearly been inspired by the work of her artist mother, really loved her use of bright complementary and clashing colours. Layering of patterns and range of playful fonts.

I enjoyed seeing the studio in which she works. How a first stage presentation may appear to her clients, covering the walls in developing ideas.

"Scale is a really important thing." Massive Type.
Type bigger than I think I've ever seen, all I can say is it's a good job she get's it right!


The Westminster Academy redesign really stood out for me as it was a tough job to do. Through the design the children now respect the building and the property of the school. Design which reduces vandalism, now you don't see that everyday.

I really think Morag has a penchant for reflective surfaces, she's used this to create illusions of space and light and to make exhibition stands appear as if they're floating on air.

Saatchi & Saatchi Summer Internship Programme

So back in January whilst I was sifting through jobs and internships on the net I came remembered Saatchi & Saatchi. I checked to see how to apply for a summer internship for this year. Man was there competition! So in true S&S style a competition bonanza was held to weed out all unworthy applicants....I think there was around

Challenge no.1 was to create a Facebook Group and get as many people to join as possible...well! This was a toughy as I came into the competition a little late but I managed to get a good following.

You can see the group I created here...
I remembered there was around 800/900 groups some about loosing biscuits in your tea, a lot about Cheryl Cole, some claiming to giveaway freebie Uggboots and such and others actually claiming to be the Saatchi & Saatchi Summer 2010 Internship group - well def some genius ideas there!

The group which did the best was 'YOUR OWN LEGO MAN:FREE'(approx. 249,00 members)
The group which came second was 'Secret London' (approx, 201,00 members) This group actually became a start-up business thanks to its success!

O.k so I had like 200 members! o.k so actually 265 current members. However all I needed to do was be in the top 50% which was actually achievable. I resorted to pure creativity and interaction to try and overcome so of these uninspired groups. I managed to wangle myself through to the next round. 800 went down to around 400. Second round....

S&S posted a quiz, a special quiz that had Saatchi specific questions (like what is written on the stairs at the London offices) some Advertising questions and some random ones (like if Facebook was a country where would it sit in terms of population...)

So in result although I did the quiz within the time my score wasn't high enough to put me into the top half....then along came wildcard round....

Are you familiar with the recent 'we can't go on like this' (heavily airbrushed) David Cameron billboard. Well if not here is the original.



The poster was heavily criticized and the online world took it upon themselves to design their own versions, plenty to see available here. BACK TO THE CHALLENGE! So wildcard round posted (meaning if I re-made my own decent witty, funny and brilliant version I could still go through.)

These are some of the idea's I'd come up with...



My final submission being...



Witty? yes, clever? yes, funny....probably not so i wasn't surprised to find I failed this hurdle. I was surprised however to see the winning ideas (Alistair Campbell chose two himself.) Little disappointed but onwards and upwards.

Alexandra Arts

Jenny (Davies) and I decided to work together on the Alexandra Arts brief. A quick(ish) turnaround of about two and a half weeks, we've just completed it and I'm happy to say its off to print! The brief was to design an identity for Alexandra Arts (An organization which provides accessible arts and crafts workshops for local communities in Alexandra Park.) I think Jenny and I worked really well and didn't quite know each other before it but soon realized we had a similar style and could work well together.

We had to produce on A3 poster along with a double-sided A5 flyer. After seeing some work which Lotte liked (by Miami design)

We also knew that she liked the work of Si Scott. This is the solution we came up with...

We designed this logo which references the historical importance of the park and also by using a circular shape to reflect the unique eco-system of the park and its community.

D&AD Autumn Term Showcase

OK, so I know it was a while ago, but as these Jpegs overflow my screen I thought it time for a little clear-out!
It was quite daunting and exciting sumbitting work and 'putting it out there' but I'm glad I did. I submitted a four minute short film and an A2 poster for the Don't Panic 'Resistance brief'. (Yes I may have desaturated the img a little so you can see it, and it was pretty bright in dayglow pink but I was happy with it.)
I enjoyed seeing the other work around and I think The Holden Cafe is a great little venue. I hope other people related to my little short film, the audio really made the movie make sense and seeing it on those big old tellies was great!

Chemikali

In-between working on the Degree Show Identity project and a live brief my friend asked if I could do him a quick logo which he could use for his mixes, which he wanted to put onto YouTube. A quick few hours on an evening and we came up with this after some experiments which I'm quite pleased with.