Advanced Typography - Project 1A

Week 5 | Week  7

Mohamed Hammam Chebel (0342483) BDE's. Creative media (Hons) 

Advanced Typography

Project 1A | Key Artwork

 

Instructions 

References 

Color palettes 

I went with the early 70's color an d style because I was inspired with the first punk rock bands.

Fig 1.1

Color REF_1

Fig 1.3 

Color REF_2

Fig 1.3

Color REF_3

Posters 

Fig 1.4 

Poster REF_1

Fig 1.5 

Poster REF_2

Fig 1.6

Poster REF_3

Key artwork 

In this project we are to create a key artwork with minimal graphical elements, it has to reflect the topic that is about.

I have chosen "All ripped up Punk influences on design",  I want my artwork to feel like punk, so i went ahead and watched several documentaries about punk culture.

I was attracted by the earliest punk bands and their ways of doing concert posters and their types of clothing and behaviors.

I mainly focused on the 70's style of PUNK, So I picked some colors from old posters and banners

I also noticed that they use some textures on their posters so I'm considering to implement that in my artwork.

For the key artwork I wanted it to be as messy and random as possible so I just used random inconsistent fonts  I downloaded after doing some research. here are the fonts I used in my key artwork

Fig 1.7 

Fonts for key artwork

I did several variations for this key artwork before having feedback from Mr. Vinod, I wanted it to be readable but inconsistent and messy at the same time, Here they are.

Fig 1.8 

Key Artwork before feedback

After I got feedback from Mr. Vinod I went ahead and refined my key artwork , I downloaded the vector brushes that he provided in the Facebook group which I found very useful and serves my goal.

 I wanted my artwork to be spontaneous without any rules so I wrote the content manually in adobe 

Illustrator using the vector brushes.

here is the final Key artwork after the feedback 

Fig 1.9

 Final key artwork JPEG

Fig 1.9B

Final Key Artwork PDF.

As you can see I added the anarchy symbol behind the lettering using a brush in adobe illustrator so I give it more punky feel to it.

I added some needles to the word PUNK to add some metal hard rock feel to it, I used a vector brush with 0.25 stroke for the needles.

This is the key artwork after Mr. Vinod's feedback, I refined it following his advice.

Poster

In this phase of the project we have to use our key artwork s in a poster, since the key artwork can be used in pretty much anything, it serves as a logo.

I went ahead and opened Adobe illustrator and started playing with the fonts that I have downloaded earlier.

Also I made some textures in adobe Photoshop and then copy pasted it in illustrator so my poster can get the look and feel of the early punk music concert posters.

Also, I did some exploration and I gathered some tools that helped me achieve that style I wanted.

I downloaded some textures, brushes, fonts in order to do this poster.

Fig 1.10 

paper texture

Fig 1.11

Photo copy texture 

Fig 1.12 

Concrete texture

Fig 1.13

Poster Ai in progress

I added median and ripple effect to the letters on the poster to make them look like a bad print, so the ink is bleeding on the paper, I also made the texture looked like an old cheap paper to reflect the messiness and the culture of punk.

Fig 1.14

Ink bleeding effect

I wanted my poster to feel like it's a paper press print on a real paper, I wanted it to have that look and feel of the 70's punk music concert posters.

The inconsistency and the quality of the printing reflects the philosophy of punk, Also I wanted to stay away from the perfect digital modern look.

Here are my posters before feedback 

Fig 1.15

posters before feedback

After I got the feedback from Mr. Vinod I refined the chosen poster according to his suggestions.

Here is the final poster 

Fig 1.16

Final Poster PDF

Fig 1.17

Final Poster JPEG

Animated Invite 

I used Adobe Photoshop for the animated invite, I opened a video layer and placed the information in order then created a glitch effect for the key artwork only, since it is the most important part in the invite.

I made sure that the content is readable and clear. I kept the text visible enough time so the viewer can read the information in the invite before looping the animation again.

I used keyframes to play with position, scale, opacity, style etc... To achieve the final result.

I also wanted to keep the identity of the original poster that I've made so I applied the same textures and the ink bleeding effect to all the elements in the poster.

Fig 1.18

Photoshop animation, Video timeline

fig 1.19

Final Animated Invite GIF

Feedback 

Week 5

• General feedback
• the key artwork need to be in black and white, If it doesn't stand out in black and white it's not going to work with color.
• set the sharing settings to "not restricted" for your blog embeded files.
• study your references not just look at it.

• Specific feedback
• no problems there relatively good job
• It makes no sense if you use 50's style on the key artwork for punk topic

Week 6

• Specific feedback 

• Variation number 8 looks good, 
• Improve it and keep the style
• move it to illustrator a key artwork must be a vector
• start working on the poster 

Week 7

• General feedback
• Specific feedback

• Reduce the spacing between the letters in the phrase "all ripped up, Influences on design."
• Do your poster in adobe illustrator.
• interesting 
• 2020 looks like it's a part from the key artwork, try to move it somewhere else on the poster 

Week 8

• General feedback

• General Feedback applicable to all. Based on what I’ve seen pertaining to the animated invite (1000px x 1000px) most of you have not tested whether the invite text) is readable ??? Have you read the text, on your own phone, to see if you can read the body text? Test your work!
• 1. Poster layouts don’t seem to be aligned and in line with the style of the key artwork
• 2. Key artwork is slapped on all the collateral without much thought or imagination. The key art has not been imaginatively used while retaining its core identity.
• 3. Animated invite is what you are suppose to complete BEFORE doing the other collateral.
• 4. Textual information in the animation is too small, and is not readable on mobile device. Most of you access social media and websites on your phones thus the challenge in the animated invite is not just the animation but the format too, which means desktop and mobile device.
• 5. Animation does not reflect the mood/style/or layout. It seems to be imposed onto the art and has no bearing or relationship to it.

Week 9

• Specific feedback
• Stay with the green theme white and black lettering  
• Do the pin badges and stick it on a cardboard 
• Do the back of the t shirt anarchy logo 
• Change the background of the T-shirt to grey or another color

Reflection

Experience

I had a good experience doing this project, thanks to Mr. Vinod's advice I did some research first before I dived in to doing the actual tasks, the research was basically knowing what punk is. For a long time I just thought it is a music genre when people are messy and doesn't have a specific clothing style which turned out to be a culture ! 

I tried to reach a certain level where I can feel what a punk designer feels, view the world as a Punk. It was really fun knowing about this amazing culture, I think a lot of us are punks in a way, take me for example, I am a person who doesn't like to be trapped by some rules I wanna be free in my art style, I am the only one who can explain my art because there is a whole story behind it which I am the only one who knows that story.

The overall experience was good and fun, I learned how to do research before starting on any kind of design. It is crucial to make research and see other artists' works. I think a designer should see the world from multiple point of views and should try different styles, be objective and know the reason behind any art style.

Observation

I noticed that this task is preparing us for the real world experiences, preparing the designer to do a certain project, creating it from scratch. It teaches us the first step to do before starting on executing ideas.

I noticed that the lecturer made minor feedbacks for all of us so we can do things ourselves, but he emphasized on the research phase since it is a new thing for us.

Findings

While doing this task I found out that every designer should have a good understanding on the topic he is addressing before starting working physically on the project.

Also, I found new ways of applying textures and realistic feel to my artworks both in Illustrator and Photoshop which will help me lot to do future artworks and projects.

I found that I didn't struggle doing the text formatting and adjusting the type so it's readable, I focused more on the look and feel of my artwork.

Further reading

Documentaries

25 Years Of Punk Documentary

The Exploited - Punk Documentary

Reading materials

In order to further understand punk culture and meaning, I searched for some reading materials using google scholar.

I found this short book so I skimmed through it to get a better idea of what i am dealing with. 

Punk Style 

by Monica. S. (2013) 

This book helped me gain more knowledge about punk principles, and origins. The author wrote about how punk culture has it's own art style whether it is music, clothing styles and fashion, visual art and illustration etc. Punk has it's own art.

Despite being a culture that can be labeled, Punk art styles are various and not consistent some times, the style depends on the artist himself or the person who is dressing that way, that person has to explain the meaning behind his style because he is a punk he is in control of what he does, there are no rules and boundaries, anyone can custom make his own punk style it just doesn't have to follow another existing style.

This is the most important information I obtained from the book and documentaries I have watched about punk, being free as a punk designer and reflect my own feelings and ideas into my artworks.

The book helped me to be a PUNK for two weeks so I can create the key artwork that will look and feel punk. Having that mindset smoothened my workflow and made it easy for me creating the key artwork and the following artworks related to it.