Evaluation of Unit X

At the beginning of Unit X we were given a brief to come up with a presentation representing a trend we had researched and developed. Alice, Sophie and I decided to look further into the problem of overpopulation in today's society. We came up with the name Multiple Division, thus looking into the growth and spreading of things, as a result of overpopulation. We were inspired by the opportunities and areas we could explore from the starting point of this issue. We decided that the most exciting area of all our research was science, we felt as though we could produce refreshing and inspirational images while working with this theme. 

Our aim from the very beginning was to create an inspirational high end resource for creative companies.  Our ambitions were to be innovative and continue to create visually exciting and intriguing imagery.  Continuous research, brainstorming and working together collectively led us to the final outcome. We soon realised our individual skills, from this we worked on separate areas of the book , whether this was illustration , layout or art direction. But continuously coming together to ensure our work flowed and worked as one. Our decisions were always considered, we briskly refined a consistency in our work. This enabled us to maintain a pace and standard of work which we were content with.
Working in a group can be one of the main challenges you face when collaborating, getting your ideas to sync and making sure the workload is evened out but forever maintaining the creativity of the project. Sophie, Alice and I quickly overcame this challenge, we get on extremely well but also have similar ideas and enthusiasm about how to approach a brief like this. We regularly conversed about ideas, supporting and strenthening  each others opinions and visual conception, thus I feel empowered us and was one of our strengths throughout Unit X.
The fundamental challenge we encountered during this project was adjusting to working within a new software, as a group we were determined to build on the skills we had learnt form the workshops. It was extremely exasperating feeling like a beginner. It was difficult to to be creatively productive, being so unsure of how to do this correctly. I enjoyed learning how to use InDesign , but with the short space of time we had to pull the trend book together, I didn't feel we could afford to waste time mastering it.
Before we were able to produce the content of the book, a lot of research was done to contextualise our work and for us to establish the standard of work we wanted to achieve. For me the exploration of the blog 'Federated Unity' was a turning point. The minimalism of the layout allows each image, a lot of which have a twisted nature to them, to speak for themselves. Most of the images in the blog tell a story making you want study them further. I wanted this to be accomplished with our own imagery, constructing a body of work which is innovative, original and contemporary. As talked about previously in the blog we wanted to achieve a book of inspirational imagery, a similar sense to the trend book 'Bloom'. We took inspiration from 'Bloom's' vision which focuses on visual concepts rather than text. Our trend book shadowed this incorporating suggestions of how this could be translated into a trend.
We picked up our trend book from reprographics today, I was extremely happy with it, the pages were of good quality and the images had been printed to a high standard, allowing the colours to be represented correctly. Unfortunately the pages had been printed the wrong way round , which wasn't the original plan. This means the pages don't match up and don't read as a book, due to being so close to deadline we haven't been able to correct this. For next time we have learnt to take the book to reprographics earlier so a test print can be done.
I have thoroughly enjoyed this project and I now feel extremely confident within my practice, I have developed invaluable skills which I can further in future projects. I want to further my knowledge of working with trend books but also involving my practice of digital print for fashion.

Rianna Phillips Pitch

Running alongside our trend project was a live brief. An opportunity to work with Rianna Phillips curating her new look book. Working on two briefs meant Sophie and I had to work quickly and effectively. From Rianna's initial research we chose some key images we felt we could expand on and take further. This research was one of the strengths of our project and enabled us to come up with an original concept. We loved her images of the textured, transparent and reflective surfaces. We found materials and surfaces that translated this same effect , from these we created our own modern and contemporary backdrop. Once we had our concept we worked extremely hard to show Rianna our ideas visually. We created a number of boards every week for her, each one thoroughly covering everything from initial research and inspiration through to styling, poses and test shoot boards.  

We presented these boards in our pitch, we were confident and happy with how it went. On reflection I feel we could've expanded on some of our initial research, looking more into the e-commerce side of the client's brand but also concentrating on the contemporary concept of flat lays and product placement.  

Rianna uploaded one of our boards on her Instagram , which was extremely exciting for both of us! 

                                  

Book Binding Worries

After previously visiting reprographics, we went again this morning. We wanted our trend book to be landscape, bound at the side with a hard card cover. On arrival they told us that this would not be possible as they can't print a piece of card for the cover that big. So our original plan had to be changed, we decided to bind the book at the top so it opened like a flip book. We were all happy with this change of plan and thought it would work well. We were then told that the member of staff who did the book binding only works tuesday and thursdays! We managed to get the book in by 12.30 but were told that we would have to come wednesday morning to see if the book had been binded and dried how we wanted. The drying time is 24 hour so fingers crossed the book is ready in time!

New Layout

 

Things have been going a lot better this week, after reviewing our layout we decided to try and make it more inspiring using photoshop but also switching it to landscape. This enabled us to use a wider range of imagery but also enabled us to team them up with other images.  I think the mix of a more minimal page against a busier more stylised page works well. We have limited the amount of text allowing the imagery to stand out, we have added symbols, key words and colour palettes to suggest how this trend could be translated. There is a consistency running throughout the book, allowing the pages to flow from one to another. 

Module Removed

Previously we had talked about splitting our book into sections called modules, after working on our layout we realised this was no longer necessary. As we have decided to combine images of contamination and containment together, the idea of 'Modules' no longer makes sense. The contamination and containment imagery will now be distinguished by symbols. 

Magnifying Glass Imagery

We have been planning to do a shoot with the magnifying glass, trying to recreate an image of containment. During our test shoot for Rianna we saw the perfect opportunity to carry it out. Katie was also perfect for the role, in keeping with the minimal and clinical effect we had wanted. These images have been very successful I feel, they also bring something different to the trend book incorporating features but distorting these to add something contemporary and original.  

Test Shoot for Rianna

As planned today we went into the photography studio with our model Katie. We wanted to have a range of simple relaxed poses against a white background. The test shoot was mainly for experiment ing with poses and stances, seeing which worked best with the bags. We had two different looks, one casual and the other more dressed up , we felt these would relate to Rianna's clientele but also would show the diversity of Rianna's collection. I feel the shots that work best are the mid body shots, the ones on the roof terrace also worked well. It was difficult to carry out a true test shot due to not being able to have the large scale textured surfaces as the back drop. 

Please see print outs for more images.

InDesign Meltdown

And everything was going so well..... We have had a very stressful day today, every possible thing that could've gone wrong has. As a group we are new to indesign and it was very hard to get our head around, we felt the layout wasn't working very well, it was almost too minimal and boring. As we weren't extremely confident with using indesign ,  our abilities were limited thus meaning we weren't able to let our creative skills loose. We felt this was holding our trend book back. Little things were also becoming very frustrating and problematic such as pages not printing out and matching up correctly. Too much time was spent on the logistics of the book rather than the layout and making it look refreshing and exciting. As a group we have decided to go back to photoshop, a software we all feel we can explore fully to create a layout which we feel best represents our trend. 

Learning InDesign has been very fruitful and inspiring, I feel I have a good knowledge of the basics which I can go on to further in third year.

InDesign Layout Progress

Sophie and I have been working on a layout template in InDesign.  We wanted to create a minimalistic, clean and clinical feel to our book but with a consistency running throughout. As a group we had decided we didn't want the pages to be too busy as we wanted the imagery to speak for itself.  We decided to carry on the idea of the textbook theme so we decided to page the numbers 0.1 onwards. We have had the idea of using symbols in our book to reduce the need for masses of text. Each symbol representing a different key word. Such as environmental, contamination, containment etc. 

Federated Unity Blog

I came across this blog 'Federated Unity' and have been keeping updated with it often. It's content is full of inspirational images, but the images aren't about the beauty a lot of them have an eery aspect to them. It follows the concept of finding beauty in the unexpected.  The blog is very minimal, clean and clinical which is what we want to achieve with our own trend book.

Rianna Phillips Boards

See our print outs for concept board for Rianna. We did a mini mock up of our backgrounds in the studio space. We also did a test flatlay shoot, this type of shoot is very popular with bloggers and would attract Rianna's customers. We couldn't get into the studio till tuesday and so we decided to do a mini test shoot just to show Rianna. We thought about poses and positions how we held the bag , trying to compose the geometric shapes into the shot.

We have finally found a photographer! Rosie Wood a third year photography student. We had been looking at her work. (3 top images on board) The colour quality and composition of each of her shot are beautiful, they have a hazy effect to them which Sophie and I really liked. Her work is exactly what we wanted for the lookbook. The bottom images are example of makeup looks we hope to achieve. Natural skin complexion with a heavier smokey eye, with a silver/gold highlight and a hint of lip colour.

A board of poses and positions for the model. A mixture of awkward angled poses concentrating on placement of bags. Side shots and body shots, model with natural face but not looking directly at camera.  Our test shoot is on tuesday with our model Katie who is blonde, we aim for an all white look in a white studio. We want it to be clinical, sleek and clean. The model will look sophisticated and sharp with a hint of casual. 

Context

In our tutorial Alex talked about context. After creating a series of abstract, art direction focused and stylised imagery, our body of work seems to be directed towards a high end market. A large established creative company could use the book as initial research, before expanding and brainstorming further to create their own innovative and exciting project. 

Layout Inspiration

Today we went to the book binding work room and spoke to the tutor, talking through what type of book binding we could use. After looking through these examples we came across the book above. The simplicity of it really inspired us, I liked how it was all about the images and their placement. How images were put together, usually these were contrasting , ie colour and composition. The book also used symbols as a key for certain key words that the images were associated with. We don't want a lot of text in our trend book so I think we could use symbols to make our trend clear to readers.

Glitch Images

In our tutorial Alex had said all of our illustrations and collages had to come from our original images. From this I did a photoshoot concentrating on head shots from different angle. This allowed us as a group to create a surge of interesting and abstract artworks we hoped to inspire creatives. We looked into glitching which worked with the idea of distorting the human figure. After working on our illustrations  we wanted to create something as effective but still in keeping the idea of deconstruction and contamination. At the same time also creating something that wasn't as overpowering.

Jil Sander 2011 Campaign

Collage Illustrations

Over the past few days I have been playing around with photoshop, as a group we collectively like the style of collage illustration. I like the cut and paste effect I have created with these two images. I wanted them to be very abstract and not too obvious like my previous attempts. I tried to use contrasting methods such as block shapes against soft, textured backgrounds and darker colours working over lighter soft pastels.

Alice's Illustrations

Alice has created some illustrations from her own drawings and our group imagery. I think the business of the illustrations and the contrast works well. After reviewing these and teaming these with our other work , we agreed that the top image is the most in keeping with our concept and style. Alice has also produced a series of colourful foils and seer sucker prints, the colours of the fabrics and their textures work well with the top image.  

Rianna Phillips Progress

Our Rianna project has been taking shape recently. Sophie and I have been working in this brief together. We have come up with the idea of using different materials such as Perspex , plastic , foils and films to create a background in a white studio from which we have built ourselves. Above is a mini mock up. We also did a face shoot of a friend to show make up ideas. The colours if the Perspex and plastics have been picked out carefully to compliment Riannas bag designs. We are extremely excited by this project and are working very well together to come up with an original and exciting idea. Our next move is to have a test shoot in the studio with a model.

Time Stop.

Containment of Contamination

This images is of milk being dropped into water. It is a very simple idea but very effective. We wanted to show the process of some of our experimentation and so we put the into a sequence. Documenting the change of shape and form of the heavier liquid over time enabled us to see the step by step transition of the experiment.

UV REACTION

HUAJIA STUDIO AW 2014

In our tutorial we had discussed the issue of creating reactions. Science is a wide concept but can be identified by a number of chemical reactions. Huajia studios have created a collection where UV light is used to trigger colour. We have previously looked at the idea of creating reactions within jars and petri dishes. Upon seeing Huaji's collection we want to try combining a fabric with a process of reaction. We have bought glow sticks and are going to try recreating a similar concept.

Petri Dish Responses

I decided to create some response drawings to the petri dish paintings. I wanted to be loose and free with the paintings. I recreated the concept of spreading and contamination, letting the colours bleed into one another. The colours also ran out of the original oval shape creating interesting shapes and forms that representing growths within the petri dish. I have incorporated one of the drawings into a collage. I tried incorporating a body into the petri dish, I don't feel this works as well  as the painting on its own. I feel it is too obvious with it's suggestion, furthering this idea, I am going to strip it right back. Working with layers to create a more contemporary and original piece.

Petri Dish Contamination

It was decided that  trying to grow fungus and bacteria within a Petri dish would be too difficult, so we went for the DIY approach. As a group today we sat in the studio using a range of materials such as oil, water, water colours and acrylics and started to paint and create shapes and forms within the dish. The most successful images we took were ones that were almost accidental and messy. Projecting the dishes onto the wall was interesting , the light box created a range of colour we hadn't  discovered within the Petri dishes. The projection highlighted various shapes and forms within the dishes.

Fabric Experimentation

Seer Sucker

After experimenting with the soap and creating 3D images with the material, we decided to further this in the print room. We tried to recreate the idea of creating a chemical reaction. We used the printing technique seer sucker. The samples didn't look how we imagined but we scanned them in and that enabled us to see closer and the fabric form closer up. We edited these in photoshop and like how it looked rustic and worn but also how it looked like it was spreading, linking back to our idea of contamination. 

Bloom

After looking at bloom in the library ,  I have a clearer idea on which direction we want to take the book. Bloom focuses on visual concepts rather than text. Imagery takes over full pages and double spreads, text is only used when necessary and when it is used it has been extremely considered. Bloom uses suggestions such as colour palettes or key words to suggest how it could be translated into a trend.

Containment - Jars

After the test shoot went well Sophie and I photographed the jars in a space where they could be seen to their full potential. This space was perfect, I liked the contrast of the textured concrete wall with hints of black and linear lines adding to the final images. The strip lighting behind the jars created a vibrancy of colour and the contents of the jars seemed to jump out at you . The light enabled us to see the forms and shapes within the jars.

Containment- test shoot

    

Sophie and I created a series of compositions within jars, trying to cross over the idea of Contamination | Containment. We filled them with 3D manmade and natural objects such as plants , rope and tubing. we then dropped inks and paints into them, the contrast of colour against the 3D objects created something very inspiring and different. The visual of containing the contaminated has worked especially well and I feel this installation illustrates our idea and concept fully.