Thursday 30th April 2009

Today and last night i have been completing all the last minute things and tasks that i needed to complete for this project i have now completed everything and when i get to college i will be taking photos of the final pieces.

I have enjoyed working on this project it has been time consuming and difficult at times but i am pleased with the final outcomes.

Monday 27th April 2009

Today is the first day back after the holidays and i have managed to complete quite a few tasks, however these tasks related to my portfolio rather than my final major project, as i have the portfolio assessment on the Wednesday. I have found out that everything has to be completed and handed in on the Thursday before the end of the day, which means that i have an extra few days then i thought.

I manged to do a lot of journal work, as it is important that it is nearly finished for the Wednesday, so that it can be completely filled by the Thursday. I have also started sand-papering down my plinth for my final piece to sit in, but unfortunately due to the time scale i don't think i will be able to paint the plinth before Thursday; therefore i will have to complete this after the assessment.

I am very nervous about completing all my tasks on time but hopefully i will be able to manage mt time well.

Tuesday 28th April 2009

The deadline is drawing even closer! and i am still completing prep tasks for my portfolio, however one of these tasks was finishing my design sheet for this project. 

I received m poster today and i am very pleased with the quality and the aesthetics of it. However i was left with the daunting task of mounting it onto the foam board, without making any air bubbles or ripping it. Luckily i managed to get one of my friends to assist me, as the poster is A1 size. 

I am quite pleased with my progress, however i still have a lot of tasks to do and my portfolio day is tomorrow, but hopefully i will be able to do this on time.

Wednesday 29th April 2009

Today was my portfolio day at the London College of Communication and i had a very late night last night trying to complete the majority of my coursework, as i knew when i got back it would be quite late and i would be struggling for time.

The good news is that all i have to concentrate tonight and tomorrow on is journal work, as well as a few other things and on Thursday i will have to take photos of my final pieces.

Friday 10th April 2009

Today i have handed and paid for my poster to be printed, so when i come back from the two week Easter holiday it will be ready. This means that i should also have it before my portfolio day at LCC. Before i hand in my work this poster will need to be mounted onto foam board.

As i said yesterday i have made a list of all the pieces that i want to complete over the holidays and i will continue with this blog when i get back.

Thursday 9th April 2009

Today i have been continuing with my acrylic box, the glue has all set and i am currently in the process of making the square piece of wood that my model will need to sit on.

Also i have finished my poster design and beside you can see the finished idea.

I have planned out all the tasks that i will need to do over the Easter holidays for my final major project, but i also need to work on my portfolio as i have a interview with LCC on the Wednesday we get back from college. 

Wednesday 8th April 2009

Today i have mainly been concentrating on my journal work, on previous experiments i have created. Also i have been noting down the steps i have taken to get to my final pieces.

Tomorrow i will need to hand in my file of my typography so that it can be printed onto an A1 piece of paper. Also i need to finish making my acrylic box to display my final piece.

Tuesday 7th April 2009

Today i started creating the acrylic box for my 3D final piece. I had a discussion about how i was going to create my acrylic box. First of all i had to work out how much acrylic i will need, i then bought the right amount. It was then time to measure the acrylic and cut it into the five squares to create the cube. I then at an angle the acrylic needed to be cut so that when it was joint together it would stay flush against the plinth.

I managed to set up the acrylic into the cube shape and started binding it together with plastic welding solution. However some of the sides weren't binding very well, and realised that i had no more plastic welding solution, so on Thursday i will need to go back to the workshop and finish gluing the box and creating the platform for my piece to sit on. 

Monday 6th April 2009

Today i continued with little tasks, as i realised when organising tasks that i had left to do that i have nearly completed my final pieces, and the tasks that i have left to do relate to preparation of presenting my final piece along side journal work and design sheets. This i found to be very comforting as i still have three weeks left.

Tomorrow i will need to make arrangements with Mark Wells the 3D Technician, as i want to present my sculpture on a plinth and i need help creating it.

Friday 3rd April 2009

Today i have been completing lots of little parts of my project rather than one particular section. I focused on creating a background for a design sheet, as well as going over a previous on so that it stands out. Also i have been documenting a lot of my experiments in my journal and making sure that they have been presented nicely.

I am slightly disappointed in my output of work today, however hopefully i will be able to continue with this and complete some more over the weekend.

Overall i think that i have had quite a successful week, as i have been able to organise and plan what i am going to do with my final piece and hopefully i will be able to complete my final pieces next week.

Thursday 2nd April 2009

Today i have been able to stick on and present my 3D typography pieces on a A1 piece of paper. I think the outcome of them was really good and i am very pleased with them.

As i mentioned i spent most of today sorting out portfolio and organising what i needed to complete and add to it. However i will be continuing with my final major project tomorrow alongside the pieces i need to do for my portfolio.

Wednesday 1st April 2009

Today i have finally completed my 3D typography pieces, which i will mount on a A1 piece of paper tomorrow.

I have also been trying to find materials to use for my portfolio, which i will be spending most of the day tomorrow doing.

The photos on the left hand side are from the book 'Altitude' Contemporary Swiss Graphic Design. These images are part of my research, to help inspire me to present my typography.

I am slightly disappointed that i haven't been able to complete all the tasks i wanted to, but hopefully i will be able to do much more tomorrow.

Tuesday 31st March 2009

Today i have been able to complete all of my designs that need to be laser cut, so hopefully that will be done very soon. Also i have continued with my 3D typography, i have decided to call it 'Fragmenta', as each letter is a fragment of a letter. I am very pleased with the outcome of my typography and will soon be able to develop it further.

I have also had another discussion with my tutor Chris on what i should create for my final piece. Our thoughts at this moment in time are to present my typography in an interesting way as well as to use the 3D sculpture that slots together as this influenced my 'Fragmenta' typography.

Tomorrow i will concentrate on completing my 3D miniatures of my final piece, alongside trying to review my portfolio as well as catch up in my journal.

Monday 30th March 2009

Today i completed more of my fragmented typography up to the letter U, which means i will try and complete the rest tomorrow. 

I had a discussion with my tutor Chris today about what i could do with my final piece. I either wanted to use the letters that you can slot together to create a word or phrase or whether to use my typography and create a word or phrase. When i spoke to Chris, he suggested that i take my ideas to the next level and create my typography in illustrator, making a regular and an italic font. Once i have completed this he suggested that i could cut it out using the laser cutter and research ways in which to present my typography. I found this to be a good idea and development. 

This means that i will begin to research different types of layouts as well as creating my typography in illustrator. 

Friday 27th March 2009

Today was fairly productive. I was able to complete the final part of my screen prints, which i was really pleased with.

Also i began to created my design on illustartor, so next week i will need to book the laser cutter and get the design cut out. I had a talk with a few of my peers in my class to get their opinion on whether i should have the phrase "Can You Read Me" or "Reading Id Difficult.". I chose these two phrases because the typography i have created is quite difficult to read anyway. From my responses i had both were split. People liked "Can you Read me" because it is relating to the person directly, where the other one isn't. However the others liked "Reading Is Difficult." because people who are dyslexic find it hard to read anyway and also my typography is difficult to read in general. In the end i decided that i will try experimenting with both and once they are completed i can evaluate them both.

Overall i thought that i have had a fairly productive week, as i have been able to decide upon two initial ideas and have began to experiment with them both.

My plans for next week are to catch up with my journal, continue experimenting and developing my initial ideas and by the end of the week have my final idea.

Thursday 26th March 2009

Today was fairly productive. I received my pieces of my design which were laser cut, they all looked really good and they all fit together well. I started experimenting with the different shapes and words i could make out of the letters.

I can now evaluate my design and see where i can make improvements and develop it, as it may be one of my initial ideas.

Also i continued creating my fragmented letters out of card, the are coming out of ok, however some of the shapes are quite difficult to make, so some don't look as good as others. I managed to create the letter J,K,L,M,N,and O, i will continue with these tomorrow. I didn't manage to transfer these ideas onto illustrator, i will try and start this tomorrow.

Tuesday 24th March 2009

Today i started by making a few small experiments such as the letter 'A' that is layered and creating a tessellated piece with one of the letters coming through. Afterwards i began looking through my research and work for inspiration and i revisited my fragment drawings of the alphabet. I thought that i could make these into 3D models, which i could then develop into a final piece, so i began to make the alphabet, i managed to complete the letters A,B,C and D, which means i will need to continue with this tomorrow.


Wednesday 25th March 2009

Today i continued with the 3D fragmented alphabet, i managed to complete the letters E,F,G,H and I. The letters are taking quite a lot longer than i expected, as i have to make the components for the letters individually and create a net for each. However at the moment they are all looking really good and tomorrow i am going to create the designs on illustrator, so that they can be laser cut. This will mean i will have a more accurate idea of if this can be developed into a final piece.

Monday 23rd March 2009

Today was a fairly productive day. I created a few extra experiments, including tessellate letters, making a layered letter and finally creating my own fragmented alphabet, which i would use as one of my initial ideas and maybe even my final idea. 

I found out that my designs for the alphabet to be laser cut should be done on Wednesday. Tomorrow i will be developing my fragmented alphabet by making them into 3D blocks made from card. 

Once i have completed this and evaluated my laser cut my design i will be able to develop and finalise my idea for my final piece. However i have quite a lot of unfinished research and journal work, which i need to catch up on at some point. 

Overall it looks like quite a promising start to the week.

Thursday 19th March 2009

Today i was able to complete my 3D structure of the word form and cover it in gummed paper. I was quite pleased with the way it turned out and it has inspired me to create more experiments. Unfortunately i wasn't able to finish my screen printing, as the Simon the technician didn't have time to make up the board, so i will have to see if he will be able to do it tomorrow.

Overall i didn't feel i accomplished as much as i wanted to, but i was pleased that i finished my 3D structure. Tomorrow i want to create my design of the alphabet to turn into a 3D structure, so that i can get it laser cut next week.

Friday 20th March 2009

Today i was quite pleased with what i accomplished, i managed to write up some of the experiments in m journal and i also completed the design to be laser cut, so hopefully this can be cut next week.

I will need to continue with experimenting over the weekend, as well as catching up with my journal. I feel that i am a little bit behind compared to my timetable i created for this project, but i feel that i may need to spend an extra week experimenting so that i can be certain of what i want to create for my final piece.

Overall i feel that i have had quite a productive week and hope that i can continue with some of my tasks over the weekend. Also i will need to work extra hard next week to create some more experiments.

Wednesday 18th March 2009 

Today i made a start on creating a 3d structure of the word 'form', this will need to be completed by tomorrow. I also made a short stop animation with some letters made from sweets, seen opposite. 

I think that i had quite a productive day, as i was also completing work in my journal. However i really need to continue making more experiments.

My tasks for tomorrow is to complete my 3d structure, finish screen printing and complete my designs to be laser cut.

Tuesday 17th March 2009

Today i was able to make a start on my screen printing, as Simon he technician had already made up half of my screens for me. The screen printing went quite well and looked really effective on top of my research, as it made the research flow. However on some of the pages due to some of the layering some of the ink went a bit thick and uneven, so it smeared and hasn't dried properly. 

After i screen printed through my book, i thought it looked quite effective so i decided to screen print both the symbols and arrows over my design pages. This again looked quite effective but i need to add something, as i feel it is not complete yet.

Overall i think the screen printing went quite well but it was quite time consuming as it took me the whole day. I will continue with the est of my screen printing on Thursday and i will continue experimenting and trying to create some 3D objects.

Monday 16th March 2009

Today is the start of week 4 of my project and according to my project i should be creating my initial ideas and final idea by the end of the week, but so far i am still in the early stages of experimenting.

However i did create a range of photograms, i started by getting all my stencils as they are semi-transparent and relate to typography. I then experimenting wit the amount of light and the exposure time the photogram needed, with the technician Mike. Through experimenting i found that the best quality was with a magenta filter through, this made the objects have more contrast and made the photogram clearer and crisper. After creating a few good negatives with the magenta filter, i then created positives of each one to see the comparison.

I think that my photograms came out really well because of the stencils i used, as the were semi-transparent and once layered on top of each other they became almost opaque apart from a few details of the lettering coming through.

Overall i think i had quite a productive day, i was extremely pleased with how the photograms came out. I have also handed in my designs to place over my research to be screen printed, so hopefully they may have been placed on the board for me to screen print with.

Over the past few days i have encountered some technical problems and have been able to post any comments, however below is the last 2 days worth of posts.

Thursday 12th March 2009

Today i have started carrying out some experimenting on A3 paper using the stamping set i bought the day before. I experimented with paint and inks and found that the inks created a clearer print. Opposite you can see the series of prints that i had created. 

I'm still quite behind on the experimenting part but over the next few days i will try my hardest to catch up and get back on track.

Friday 13th March 2009 

Today i have created more of a three dimensional experiment, using pieces of different thicknesses of card. I started by using my new stencil and drawing the letter on a square 3inch X 3inch big and did this 4 times. Once these were drawing out i cut out the letter using a Stanley knife, afterwards i placed the 4 pieces on top of each other and stuck them together. I then repeated until i had all the letters of the alphabet. Opposite you can see a photo of the experiment.

Wednesday 11th March 2009

Today i went to a open day at LCC, and spent most of the day in London. I went into the Graphic Design Centre shop looking for media for my project. I bought a few items that i thought would really help me with my project. The items were stamping kit for t-shirts, which i could transfer onto paper instead and i also bought a larger size stencil to also experiment with. 

Overall tomorrow i will have a two new medias to experiment with, which should be quite fun and interesting. 

Tuesday 10th March 2009 

Today was more of a reflective day of the work i have completed, to see how i could improve it. I spoke to my tutor Chis about how my research was coming along. As i have done quite a lot, we decided that the current journal should just be for research and that i should get a new one for experimenting and developing my work. We were discussing that something needed to be added to my research pages to make the research flow, so we thought about screen printing something on top to give it a bit of identity and branding. A few designs we thought of were; arrows, post it notes, symbols etc. 

Therefore over the next few days i will be trying to plan and organise the designs to be screen printed over the pages. I will also need to create a front cover that should be screen printed and i will need to continue filling m journal with research, as well as start experimenting. Overall i have a lot of tasks to do over the next few day, so hopefully tie together, the only problem i have is that i have a open day tomorrow ad i will be spending most if the day there.

Monday 9th March 2009

Today has again been quite productive i have nearly completed presenting all my research, which is looking quite good. However I'm a little bit behind schedule, as i should of started experimenting today, this means that i will need to complete the research as soon as possible. 

Tasks to complete tomorrow:

 - Finish Presenting all Research

 - Make a list of experiments i will need to do

 - Start completing the list of experiments. 

Friday 6th March 2009

Today i managed to complete one of my design sheets, i was quite pleased with it, as i think the writing looks better in yellow wool, however if i had the opportunity to do this again then i would have written the title using a stencil and then placed a bit of yellow tracing paper on top. I thought this looked quite effective, so i will try and continue the theme of coloured tracing paper on my other design sheets. I was able to carry on with some of my research, it took a very long time to present these pieces seen opposite, but i hope it shows the effort i put towards it.

I also had a talk with one of my tutors about my project, which was Lucy, she gave me some very useful ideas about a phrase or meaning i could have for my initial idea of a 3D sculpture. We spoke about what language i could do e.g colloquial or vernacular. The artists i have been told to research were Jenny Holzer and Fiona Banner which i will shortly research into.

However looking at my progress i didn't anticipate how long it would take to research and present my findings, so according to my timetable i am a little behind, and as i have been told to research more i will have to spend the beginning of next week catching up on the coursework.

Thursday 5th March 2009

Today has been a fairly productive day i have nearly completed my design sheets, which can be seen opposite.I have taken a long time trying to plan out where everything is going to go, as i have tried to go for a more contemporary approach. I think it is heading towards this style.

Again i carried on sticking in research, however i am a little bit behind schedule on researching which i will have to make up in the next few following days. 

Tomorrows tasks are:

 - To complete design sheets

 - Try and complete research

Wednesday 4th March 2009

Today i went on a visit to the Magma Book shop and Product Shop seen opposite. I thought that the books in the bookshop were really inspiring, i really wanted to purchase some of the books but Ive decided to order them online, as they would be cheaper.

I found the product shop to be amazing, the layout was really good alongside the products they sold. There shelving was made out of cardboard, which i found to be really economical and also a good choice of design. I bought a few little bits in there that i thought were interesting and hopefully inspire me for my project.

Overall i had a really good day that i found to be very influential especially the product shops, my influences and ideas will be noted in my journal alongside some pictures i have taken.

Tuesday 3rd March 2009

I have again continued to experiment and stick in research in my journal, which is taking me a long time as this is not my usual approach for presenting my research, but i think it is beginning to look much more effective.

I have also managed to start my design sheet for this project. Again i have tried to use a different approach, by scanning and sticking pictures that i have found in my book i have began to cover the A1 design sheet, so that i can draw my ideas on top and gather inspiration from it.

Again i feel like I'm taking too long on the research but i plan to tie it all together by the end of the week. Hopefully tomorrows study visit to the Magma and Product shop will also be helpful and inspiring.

Monday 2nd March 2009

Was able to complete some more research tasks, however still haven't been able to create a design sheet, but i have decided that i will complete one tommorow. Also i will need to start planning my study visit to the magma and product shop. Im a bit disappointed that i haven't been able to complete more tasks and i will definatly need to catch up tomorrow.

Thursday 26th February 2009

Todays tasks were to continue with Artist research and imitate a few techniques through the research i have found. 

I was able to email the typographer Ewald Spieker, who experiments with forms of typography. I was fortunate to visit him in Amsterdam at his studio, and i was so inspired by all his pieces, that i have based my project on the way he experiments with the form of typography. I am hoping that he will email me back with information on where he gets his inspiration and ideas from. 

Above is a photo i took while in Amsterdam of outside of Ewald Spieker's studio.

I managed to do a few sketches from some pictures i have found in books but i have been unable to create any design sheets. However i will persist in researching artists one i have been advised to look at was Eric Gill and Bob and Roberta Smith.

Wednesday 25th February 2009

Tasks to be completed:

 - Printing out Photos of when i visited Ewald Spieker

 - Scan more pictures from books

 - Research Artists

 - Print any research found

I have been able to complete the last three tasks. I was able to find some interesting research especially from an artist called Takenobu Igarashi, who combine typography and sculpture, which is something that i am planning to do. I also looked at Jasper Johns and a few others. I was unable to complete the first task as i couldn't go to a photo center. This means that i will need to complete this task either thursday or friday. 

Im pleased that i completed most of my tasks and i feel that im on schedule. Tomorrow i would like to continue with my journal and start a design sheet. 

Tuesday 24th February 2009

Todays Tasks were to:

 - Research some artists relating to the project

 - Photocopy/scan and print pictures for research

 - To stick them in my journal 

I was able to start all of the tasks and compete them, however some may need to be continued with, such as research.

I felt that i could have probably done more in the way of tasks, but it took quite a long time to find a few artists, as a lot of them do not create pieces that experiment with the forms of typography and typographic structures. 

I will continue to carry on with research and i have been able to begin by imitating a few of the techniques used in my journal. I will continue this further and try and make my journal more contemporary.

Monday 23rd February 2009

I have started my final major project, i have decided to call the title 'Typomentation'. It is based on experimenting with the form and aesthetics of typography, as it is a piece of graphic design that is seen in everyday life and most of us don't realise its form and function.

I have decided that i will need to research typography through books and websites this week, so that i can take some inspiration and experiment with my own forms of type.