Computer Arts - March 2018

MARCH 2018 ILLUSTRATOR HOTLIST 2018 01 Julian Glander Whatever You Do, Devices Will Always Be Listening In, http://glander.co for Wired. An illustrator and animator based in New York, with clients including MIT, Giphy and Disney, Julian 02 Glander describes his creations as “acid-pastel A Picture Of You Looking At imagery; bloopy, blobby, purple work. I always like Yourself On The Computer, when people say they want to eat my images.” personal project. “Julian’s humour is what sets him apart, along 01 with his vibrant, RGB pastel colours: Gifastic!,” says Rick Banks, director of Face37 Ltd, while Lara Chan- Baker of Jacky Winter describes Glander’s work as “everything I love about this new wave of illustration: it’s vibrant, bizarre and deeply original.” 02 Stacey Thomas www.staceythomasmakes.com There’s a childlike playfulness to the work of 2017 Brighton BA Illustration graduate Stacey Thomas that feels like a breath of fresh air in today’s fractured world. “My process combines traditional drawing, painting and model-making: lots of gouache paint, pencils, balsa wood and coloured paper,” she says. “There’s a confidence about her drawing, and some keen observations with her diary comics,” says course leader, Roderick Mills: “These are a great example of how illustrators can generate their own content alongside commercial commissions.” 01 Untitled, personal project. 02 Untitled, personal project. 01 02 C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 51 -

SPECIAL REPORT MARCH 2018 01 Eran Hilleli Hyperlink, personal project. 02 www.eranhilleli.com Witch, personal project. A graduate from Bezalel Academy of Art and Design in Jerusalem, Eran Hilleli is an artist, illustrator and animation director currently based in Tel Aviv. His work combines a sense of mythic fantasy with a minimalist approach to colour and shape that results in surprisingly breathtaking and emotionally engaging scenes. Inspired by folk tales, Japanese animation from the ’80s and early video game aesthetics, Hilleli’s simple style nonetheless leaves great space for interpretation, and the efect is to powerfully and unexpectedly draw in the viewer. 01 02 01 Insa 02 www.gif-iti.tumblr.com Innovative London-based illustrator Insa is best known for his animated grafti, which he calls ‘GIF-ITI’. Essentially, he hand paints every frame of each animation full-scale, then creates GIFs from the results. “Originally this was just murals on walls, but I really enjoy exploring new ways of capturing this real-time work in a digital setting,” he says. Sam Summerskill of Bernstein & Andriulli, which represents him, is a huge fan. “Augmented reality plus large-scale murals, plus-large scale animated murals equals WIN,” he enthuses. 01 Self Reflection Is Better Than Self Projection, exhibition piece. 02 Commission for Roskilde Festival 2014. C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M . 52 -

MARCH 2018 ILLUSTRATOR HOTLIST 2018 Rune Fisker 01 www.runefisker.com Based in Copenhagen, Rune Fisker wears a lot of hats. As well as running his own animation company, Benny Box, alongside his brother Esben, he also works as an artist and illustrator on a mixture of commercial and personal projects. His illustrations are characterised by an abstract, surrealist style, which experiments with geometrics, line and tone. Characters with distorted proportions partake in scenes somewhere between fiction and reality. “If do black and white work, I use a steadier pigment liner on paper,” Fisker says, talking about his process. “Colour artwork, however, I do in either Photoshop with a Wacom board, or on an iPad Pro using the Apple Pencil and Procreate.” Represented worldwide by Agent Pekka, his clients include The New Yorker, The New York Times, Wired, The Atlantic, The New York Observer and Cartoon Network. “I love his amazing perspectives,“ says Jozefien Van Beek of Oogst magazine in Antwerp, Belgium. “Quite simply, his work is mindblowing.” 01 Commission for Wired’s annual The Wired World. 02 Commission for online magazine World Positive. 02 C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 53 -

SPECIAL REPORT MARCH 2018 Tianju Duan 01-02, 04 Boy Power!, personal project. www.holaduan.com 03 Jasmine, personal project. In 2018, the idea of masculinity is changing, and it’s 01 a theme beautifully represented in the work shown here by Tianju Duan. Originally from China and currently based in Copenhagen, Duan works as a freelance illustrator for clients worldwide, helped by the fact that he speaks English, Spanish and Chinese. He describes his style as “fun, colourful, sensual and emotional; I usually hand-draw shapes with markers and then colour them digitally.” He ended last year on a high note, having won a big commission from Marriott Hotels in November, and his plan for the coming year is to “just keep working, take part in a variety of projects, and enjoy it as much as I did in 2017.” “His recent collection of portraits, Boy Power!, celebrate male beauty, and he seems to critique the idea of a digital vector image via his use of colour and quivering linework,” enthuses Lizzie Finn, course leader in MA Illustration and Visual Media at London College of Communication, UAL, from which Duan graduated in 2015. He’s also won acclaim for his contribution to the 36 Days of Type project, which combines characters from the alphabet with famous celebrity images in a way that seems immediately iconic and familiar. 02 03 C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 54 -

MARCH 2018 ILLUSTRATOR HOTLIST 2018 04

SPECIAL REPORT MARCH 2018 01 In Praise of the Home Ofce, for Adobe 99U. 02 Last Tango, personal project. 01 Giacomo Bagnara 02 www.giacomobagnara.com Giacomo Bagnara is an Italian illustrator with a background in architecture. Colourful, clean and organised around bold clear shapes, his distinctive work has won him a range of international clients including Sony, The New Yorker, Monocle, The New York Times, El País Semanal and Die Zeit. “I work 90 per cent digitally, although last year I rediscovered some painting and sketching techniques I hadn’t used in my commercial work,” says Bagnara, who’s represented by Synergy Art in London. In fact, it was a pretty good year in general, he sums up, involving “a lot of great projects and collaborations, new clients and my first solo show in Verona, the city where I live.” “Giacomo always finds smart and elegant solutions in his illustrations,” says member of 2017’s D&AD Crafts for Design jury, Andrea Chronopoulos. “His images are filled with the kind of small details that give each diferent element of the illustration its own, strong personality.” C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 56 -

MARCH 2018 ILLUSTRATOR HOTLIST 2018 Jesús Sotés 01 02 www.jesussotes.com Jesús Sotés is a self-taught illustrator based in Pamplona, Spain, who is known for his unique, funky style. His use of intense colours and strong, elegant shapes to create captivating characters works brilliantly on book covers, and he’s also known for his British Airways poster 2016 campaign, and the window display he created for Hermes Paris’ flagship store in the same year. “I think my illustrations are a little dark, a little weird, a little sad, with a light touch of bitter and apparently absurd sense of humour,” he says. “All of these things convey a certain tragic sense of life, although that doesn’t mean I’m an unhappy guy myself!” Represented by The Artworks, he mainly works in digital vector drawing, but has recently begun to incorporate more analogue techniques into his process. “I’m returning to a purer, more hand- drawn approach, at the same time as exploring new ways of creating illustrations digitally,” he reveals. 01 Commission for Radio Times magazine. 02 Cover illustration for Under The Almond Tree by Laura McVeigh, published by Hodder & Stoughton. C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 57 -

SPECIAL REPORT MARCH 2018 01 Sara Andreasson XXXX, personal project. 02 www.saraandreasson.se Petite, personal project. A Swedish illustrator now living and working in London, Sara Andreasson has a confident, distinctive and vibrant style that’s won her a long list of big-name clients, including Apple, Converse, Dolby, Lacoste, MTV, Nike, Samsung and Selfridges. “Sara creates interesting editorial pieces and has a strong sense of style,” says Karen Jane, design director at Wieden+Kennedy London. “We particularly like the still-life illustrations and the personality of the work – it has a great sense of colour and impact.” 01 02 Nancy Liang www.cargocollective.com/nliang Flickering street lights, twinkling stars and wispy smoke are all familiar elements in the work of Sydney-based Nancy Liang. “I create dreamlike images of urban landscapes and sleepy scenes of Australian suburbia,” she says, describing how she illustrates by hand, crafts models with assorted papers, and then brings it all to life as GIFs. “Liang’s work is an endlessly enchanting blend of traditional techniques and digital tricks,” says Lara Chan-Baker of Jacky Winter, which represents her. 01 100 Scenes of Sydney: Festival of the Winds, personal project. 02 Predicaments Of Travelling, personal project. 02 01

MARCH 2018 ILLUSTRATOR HOTLIST 2018   01 Guillaume Kurkdjian www.guillaumekurkdjian.com 01 French illustrator and animator Guillaume Minitel, personal project. Kurkdjian won’t be a completely new face to regular Computer Arts readers. His cheeky, colourful and geometric work had long attracted the team’s attention, and last year we commissioned him to design a studio-themed September cover (issue 270). “I loved doing it,” he reflects. “It’s great to see your work printed and at a large scale, and it’s a very concrete way to explain your job to everyone.” 2017 was good in other ways, too. “I worked on a lot of diferent types of projects, my style evolved and I learnt a lot of new skills,” he recalls. And this hasn’t gone unnoticed. “Demand for Guillaume’s work has increased significantly over recent months,” says Jon Cockley of Handsome Frank. “Clients love how he presents technology in fun and interesting ways. His talent for animation is also a factor, as we’re increasingly seeing demand for work to move and become interactive.” 02 Fast Flood, personal project. 02 C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 59 -

SPECIAL REPORT MARCH 2018 01 Maldo Tokyo Girl, personal project. 02 www.maldo.me Jobs, personal project. Originally from Bratislava, Maldo – aka Martin Malacek – now lives in Prague, working for clients including Time Inc, Travel + Leisure, Surf Ofce and Festival de Cannes. Bold, simple and minimal, his style is defined by basic sketchy line-work, dotted half-tone patterns, stripped down mainly to black and white colours, and high contrast, often with a conceptual idea or using negative space. “Theme-wise, I like working with cool lifestyle brands; anything that’s connected to surfing, skate and urban culture,” Maldo explains. “I also love working with magazines.” 01 02 02 Mark Boardman www.mark-boardman.com Bristol-based illustrator Mark Boardman creates narrative, editorial and advertising work for a wide variety of clients including Variety, NPR and Universal Music. “I aim for a digital style that retains some of the elements I learned in traditional media, particularly oils,” he says. “Over the last few months, Mark’s style has become increasingly popular with our clients,” says Alice Wilkinson of Meiklejohn Illustration, which represents him. ”Mark’s use of colour and texture is a big hit and seems to be especially on trend this year.” 01 Neighbourhood, personal project. 02 Baseball, personal project. 01 C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 60 -

MARCH 2018 01 Hani Abusamra 01 Get Behind Me Miriam, www.haniabusamra.co.uk personal project. Based in London, recent MA graduate 02 Hani Abusamra is known for his quirky, Commission for collage-based work. “It’s a process of Vidal Sassoon. composing, printing, drawing over the top and then repeating until I hit something good,” he explains. “Along the way, they [my pieces] start to pick up visual cues and languages; these probably come from an obsession with comic books, a youth and adolescence spent skateboarding and being in shitty bands, and a genuine awe and love of science, nature and above everything else, religion.” According to Lizzie Finn, course leader in MA Illustration and Visual Media at London College of Communication, UAL, “Hani’s work cleverly frames and layers pattern and iconic symbols with skilled figurative imagery, creating seductive scenes, which are serious in content and pleasing to the eye.” 02 C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 61 -

SPECIAL REPORT MARCH 2018 01 Inner City Blues, from a privately commissioned book Misty The Mouse Catcher, written by Rebecca Walker. 02 Trapeze Swingers, university work. 03 Commission for Praxis. Rosanna Tasker 01 02 www.rosannatasker.com Rosanna Tasker is based in Bristol and has worked on a variety of commissions, including children’s books, editorial, branding, character design, murals, book jackets and album sleeves. Clients include The New York Times, The Guardian, The Washington Post, Wendy’s and The Scout Association. Her style is a mixture of delicate line work and gentle textures; sometimes set of by calm, subtle hues, at other times juxtaposed with bold, punchy colours. “I often choose a limited palette of two or three colours, because I like the striking efect this can have on the composition,” she says. “I naturally tend to draw elongated figures and forms and love to use rich, handmade papers.” There are two main elements to her approach. “The first stages of my work are created using natural media – my grandpa’s 0.5mm mechanical pencil for the line work, and gouache paints for colour – which are created as separate layers using a light box,” she explains. “The final stages involve scanning and composing in Photoshop.” “Rosanna’s illustrations are full of elongated forms, natural settings, fascinating characters and subtle colour schemes,” says senior agent and associate director Juliette Lott at Illustration Web, which represents her. “Her artwork is alive with lines and textures, and has a naturally creative feel to it.” C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 62 -

MARCH 2018 ILLUSTRATOR HOTLIST 2018 03 C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 63 -

MARCH 2018 01 Untitled, personal work. 02 Untitled, personal work. 01 Célestin Krier 02 www.backtothecave.tumblr.com Célestin Krier’s illustrations are certainly on the ofeat side of the spectrum when it comes to our hotlist: spidery lines, quirky shapes, clashing colours and other unusual approaches are the order of the day. But that doesn’t stop the Parisian being in demand. “We loved his work instantly,” enthuses Karen Jane, design director at Wieden+Kennedy London. “It has a super-vibrant feel and a playful energy that feels fresh.” Describing his style as “archaic yet contemporary”, Krier says he often draws directly within software such as Photoshop. His 2017 highlight was working with Berlin’s Yukiko studio on a project for Nike, and he particularly loves working with clients who are graphic designers, as he has a background in the field himself. “This is my visual culture, so we understand each other really well,” he explains. “Most of them are up for trying some experimental things, and that’s what I really love to do.” C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 64 -

MARCH 2018 ILLUSTRATOR HOTLIST 2018 01 Lucia Gaggio i Commission for Carluccio’s. 02 www.luciagaggiotti.com Oranges, personal project. Based in London and Italy, Lucia Gaggiotti doesn’t believe she has a defined style. “I prefer to think of myself as versatile; to listen to the clients’ needs and adjust my style accordingly,” she says. If left to her own devices, though, she’ll usually end up crafting “something that’s joyful and full of optimism, with lots of soft, natural colours”. Gaggiotti’s clients include foodie brands such as Jamie Oliver, Carluccio’s and Costa, as well as educational companies including Walker Books, Templar Publishing and Educational Insights. 01 Brian Edward Miller 02 02 www.orlincultureshop.com Based in Colorado, Brian Edward Miller provides illustration services for editorial, commercial, advertising and picture books. “My style utilises lots of strong shapes, textures, and dynamic lighting to create what many describe as a ‘modern retro’ look,” he says. “I’m influenced by lots of ’40s and ’50s commercial illustrators, landscape painters, and a lifetime of watching cartoons.” One of his biggest highlights in 2017 was moving to a new studio space, while this year he plans to combine client work with opening an online print shop. 01 Commission for Danner. 02 Commission for Sugar Bowl Resort. 01 C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 65 -

SPECIAL REPORT MARCH 2018 Andreea Dobrin Dinu 01 Just Be, personal project. www.andreeadobrin.com 02 Like A Crocodile In A Wallet Born and bred in Romania, Andreea Dobrin Dinu, 01 Factory, for Culture Trip. aka Summerkid, now works in her one-woman 03 studio in Hamburg producing bright, colourful Yo-Yo Man, for illustrations inspired by everyday life and infused Wienerin magazine. with an irrepressible joie de vivre. “I feel the playful approach can be a good vehicle to transmit both serious and less serious messages,” she says. “In fact, combining a more serious subject with an apparently childlike aesthetic can be very powerful. It’s a conceptual dance I’ve been practising for a few years now.” She likes to work with a mix of clients, from cultural organisations such as galleries and small publishing houses to commercial companies and tech start-ups. Her 2017 projects have included work for the Art Safari art fair in Bucharest, German magazine Süddeutsche Zeitung Familie, and several illustrated books for ART publishing house. Dinu’s work was also included exhibitions in Bucharest and Leipzig, Germany. Dinu is represented in Romania by Receptor and elsewhere by Owl Illustration. Andrej Kiszling, design director at Owl, describes her as “a super up-and-coming talent, both represented by our agency and also in quite high demand on our digital platform, Minty. Her work is characterised by a vivid, semi-abstract style that’s new and fresh.” 02 C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 66 -

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MARCH 2018 01 02 Chris Wormwell 01 Cover illustration for La www.chriswormell.com Belle Sauvage: The Book of Dust Volume One by Christopher Wormell is an English print- Philip Pullman. maker, illustrator and children’s author. Born in 1955, he’s neither the youngest or 02 newest face on our list, but his acclaimed Artwork for Dinosaurium storm-swept cover for Philip Pullman’s (Welcome To The Museum), latest novel, La Belle Sauvage: The Book of written by Lily Murray. Dust Volume One – named Waterstones book of the year in 2017 – has meant 03 he’s certainly of the moment. The project Wood engraving for was one of his highlights of the past Bell’s Whiskey. year, along with the launch of his own illustrated dinosaur book, Dinosaurium 03 (Welcome to The Museum), published by Templar Publishing. “My work is created largely using wood engraving and lino cut, or digital work derived from these two methods; or a mixture of the two,” he explains. To date, Wormell has published some 14 illustrated books and acted as illustrator on at least 18 more – and he continues to be busy. “Among other things. I have two exciting book projects on the go at the moment, and another really exciting book illustration job about to start,” he says. C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 68 -

MARCH 2018 ILLUSTRATOR HOTLIST 2018 01 Power To The People T-shirt design for The Club of Odd Volumes. 02 What Goes Around Comes Around, unused print stamp for Amnesty International. 03 Page from sketchbook, personal project.   01 02 03 Biff www.biffstudio.co.uk Bif, aka Philip Smith, is an illustrator, designer and art director living in London. Represented by Jelly London, he eschews taking himself too seriously, in both life and work, and his honest yet playful illustrations have won him a roster of international clients, including Wieden+Kennedy, Razorfish, Studio Moross, Print Club London and Wired. Of his process, he says: “Usually I’ll just go straight at it with a pencil and paper, roughing out how I envisage it in my head. The outlines and areas of black are then inked up with either fine liner, paint markers or brush and ink (depending on the piece or how brave I’m feeling). It’ll never come out exactly as planned, but I quite like that. The mistakes don’t look like mistakes because I’ve embraced them and allowed them to be part of the work.” “As a type nerd, Bif’s work really stands out for me,” says Rick Banks, director of London design studio Face37. “You have to love his big, bold lettering.” C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 69 -

BACK TO BASICS MARCH 2018 _DIGITAL DESIGN SKILLS WHY WE NEED USER EXPERIENCE In the first of a new series focused on digital skills, Tom May explores how to develop your knowledge and understanding of the increasingly important discipline of UX design PART 1 E  very designer needs to know about user Matthew Cockerill, creative director at Swift experience, commonly abbreviated to UX. Creatives, agrees. “I don’t think it’s about graphic Our first part looks And the first thing to understand is exactly designers doing a UX role,” he says. “Instead, it’s at user experience what user experience actually is, as well as about graphic designers and UX designers being – what it is, how being clear about what it isn’t. able to understand each other’s processes and it intersects with UX is not web design, which is about the nuts work together harmoniously and effectively.” graphic design and and bolts of making digital interfaces function. It’s how designers can also distinct from (though closely related to) UI And that’s less about learning a whole new get better at it. design, which is about designing the visuals of an discipline or methodology than taking what you app or website. Instead, UX is about making the already know and applying it in a different way, PART 2 NEXT experience a great one for the user – which means says Alec East, founder of Narrative Industries. MONTH that in theory someone who can neither draw nor “Going back to the Bauhaus, they taught students The second part of the write code could be an expert in it. to eliminate the idea of the individual, and to series examines how focus on the productivity of design instead,” he to transfer your print UX is most commonly associated with making says. “This means they had to understand how typography skills into apps and websites, but as Matt Theakston, their designs would be used: the notion of form the digital realm. experience design director at TH_NK points out, following function. For instance, in print design, it goes way beyond that. “UX lives beyond the if the typography is too small and dense, the web,” he stresses. “It already flows, end-to-end, reader’s enjoyment of the story is impaired.” through the customer journey: from designing apps, shops, showrooms, cars, chairs or voice UX involves applying similar principles to assistants like Amazon Echo. In the future, who digital, East continues. “It means, for example, knows where it’ll take us?” knowing the importance of removing cognitive load, whereby too much information on one WHERE UX MEETS DESIGN screen can disorient the user.” You’re probably already more aware of UX than you realise, and as Spencer Buck, founder of Taxi Lee Carroll, senior interaction designer at Studio, says, getting on board doesn’t necessarily Seymourpowell, offers more advice: “Placement, mean you have to become a fully fledged UX position, proximity, language, movement, colour, designer. “It’s about adding another layer to the learned behaviour, bad habits, context, audience: thought process – being curious about how these are all things user experience design draws humans behave, and how we can influence that on to achieve a goal,” he explains. “The biggest behaviour through good design.” mistake you can make is going straight to the ‘idea’ or ‘concept’ – diving into designing how the interface should look and feel – without a deep C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 70 -

MARMCAHR C2H0 128018 DIGITAL DESIGN SKILLS CASE STUDY BATCH ORGANICS CO-FOUNDER MAX OTTIGNON EXPLAINS HOW RAGGED EDGE HELPED LAUNCH A START-UP BASED ON ‘PLANT-POWERED HEALTHY FOOD’ “Like a lot of start-ups, Batch We introduced pre-filled journey through the site that Batch Organics is a Organics was launching its boxes for quick purchases and would work seamlessly across health food service product in key phases. The first also limited the number of both desktop and mobile, aimed at busy people, was boxes of frozen smoothies smoothies in a bespoke box to six, adjusting accordingly. so user experience was delivered to your door. Phase two 12 or 24. This had the benefit of paramount. Ragged focused on soups and breakfast helping simplify order fulfilment With Batch Organics being a Edge took pains to craft bowls, while phase three was on the production line, too. digital-first brand and product, a customer journey that about creating a one-stop shop the website is critical to its would work seamlessly for all your health food needs. The purchase process also success as a business. Every across multiple devices. needed to be versatile and robust UX decision we made had the We needed to simplify the enough to work for a range of potential to have an impact on process of building a box full of products, which the team could the company’s profits and losses. different flavoured smoothies so then build upon with each new that there weren’t an infinite phase of the business. This led to us introducing the number of possibilities. It was option to up-sell to customers important that the choice didn’t To help guide our UX decisions, throughout the purchase process. become overwhelming online; we we created a series of device- We did this in a non-intrusive way did this by limiting the options. specific user journeys and user so that purchase completion profiles. This led us to create a rates weren’t affected.” C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 71 -

BACK TO BASICS MARCH 2018 DOLPHIN SOLUTIONS “The challenge with bringing Dolphin Solutions, a supplier of washroom products, online was balancing the premium nature of the brand with complex functional requirements. The key was to identity ‘moments of truth’ that resonated with the brand’s audience and beautiful design details and interactions that would make the experience pleasurable and memorable, as well as effective. After conducting in-depth user research with architects, we created a confident and targeted experience based around how they specify products. This meant deliberately using space to help them focus on the product details, and building bespoke curation and budgeting tools to make their lives easier – establishing Dolphin as an expert partner that truly understands their needs.” SPENCER BUCK TAXI STUDIO 3 RULES OF UX understanding of the functions and processes that are required to make it work.” Spencer Buck of Taxi Studio outlines the three C’s of Context, Consistency and Content The most effective way to develop your UX skills is by communicating and collaborating more “The most effective design across any discipline stems from insight. You can closely with people working in the field, says Buck. wax lyrical about UX principles and theory, but if you haven’t taken the time to “So our print designers will collaborate with UX understand how your target audience behaves, what you want them to do and how and digital designers on certain projects, and this you want them to feel, then there’s nothing to validate your thinking against. Once works well as a way of expanding their thought you know the audience you’re targeting, the three C’s of Context, Consistency and processes with a real problem on the table, rather Content are a good starting point... than through theoretical training.” _CONTEXT Marta Lisboa, digital designer at CBA, agrees Thinking about where the piece of design fits within the overall customer journey is that improving your UX skills is less about essential. When is this design being consumed? What have they done before? Who studying and more about doing. “Like creativity, are they with? Where are they? What do they believe? What are they doing next? UX is a hard-earned skill, and like any other skill, it improves with practice,” she reasons. _CONSISTENCY Once you’ve built familiarity with a system, use of language or set of visual codes, LOOK AROUND YOU you need to make sure you are consistent. This helps your audience feel reassured But that’s not all. Another important thing you and allows them to move through the design with less anxiety or confusion, can do is stay alive to the user experiences that are meaning they are more likely to focus. part of everyday life, says Max Ottignon, co- founder of Ragged Edge. “You’re interacting with _CONTENT UX every day anyway, whether it’s posting on The best user experiences ensure that less time is spent thinking about the Instagram or streaming a movie on Netflix,” he interaction or mechanism, so that more time can be spent on absorbing and points out. “So try to engage your design brain understanding the content.” while you do it. Analyse why the interface has been designed that way. Think about the techniques the designer has used to create a seamless, engaging journey. And as with anything else, it’s practice. Try to get your hands on some digital briefs and show what you can do.” Also, be aware that the ground is constantly shifting. “Today’s users, especially mobile users, C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 72 -

MARCH 2018 DIGITAL DESIGN SKILLS REALITY WORKS are becoming less tolerant, more demanding, and 5 TOP UX TIPS they always want to be surprised,” says Lisboa. FOR GRAPHIC “We created a new VR design “The challenge is to continue being an innovator DESIGNERS programme for designing cars and develop experiences that are more relevant, called Reality Works. A UX delightful and memorable. To provide metaphors EXPERT ADVICE TO HELP YOU challenge here was to work out that make screen-based interactions feel a bit RAISE YOUR UX GAME how the user selected and moved more real. And to do all of this while adapting between different features and to rapidly evolving tech and digital trends.” 1 STAY NIMBLE tools: select from a digital menu like on a computer, or use physical To help you stay ahead of the curve, learning While the principles of graphic design may gestures. We tried creating a VR resources abound. East recommends books be immutable, UX is a different beast. As design experience that only used such as Don’t Make Me Think by Steve Krug and Matt Theakston of TH_NK puts it:“Print gestural movements, but we quickly Ends: Why We Overlook Endings for Humans, design is like tennis, it’s individual and realised that sometimes it felt more Products, Services and Digital by Joseph Macleod, heroic, even. Digital service design is more appropriate to use familiar, digital as well as following people such as @skrug, like football, but played on a constantly interactions in combination with @wasbuxton and @jnd1er on Twitter. moving pitch, without a fixed playing time, these movements.” where the rules keep changing.” Theakston is a fan of The User Experience LEE CARROLL Team of One: A Research and Design Survival 2 IF IN DOUBT, REDUCE SEYMOURPOWELL Guide by Leah Buley, Carroll urges you to attend a UX gathering such as the monthly London event “Design for strong centre-of-use first,” says IxDA, while Lisboa likes to keep up with new Theakston. “Every service and product has a developments via Uxmag.com, UsabilityGeek.com core journey, so start here. Ask ‘What is our and the Invisionapp.com blog. user’s intent, at every point?’ and design for it. And if you’re stuck, take as much out of But always remember one thing, concludes the interface as you can for it still to East. “There are a bazillion books and blogs that function. Adding is easy.” will give you loads of rules, but the only person that counts in UX is the user; that’s why they’re 3 PSYCHOLOGY IS the first letter in UX.” THE FOUNDATION Ottignon agrees, and adds the following: “Put As UX is focused on users, understanding the user first, by using as little design as you can. psychology is crucial, says Seymourpowell’s UX isn’t about flashy creativity: it’s about crafting Lee Carroll. “Graphic designers already use an experience that’s intuitive and stress-free. psychology in visual design – in Gestalt Don’t let design get in the way.” theory to name an obvious example – to communicate a message or direct a viewer. So they could arguably be very well placed to use the same principles to design a user experience with a machine.” 4 GOOD UX IS INVISIBLE “Most of the best user experiences work so seamlessly in tune with your expectations that you barely notice them,” notes Alec East of Narrative Industries. “So the goal is to understand what the user wants and expects from interacting with your design, then make sure your design helps them achieve it.” 5 STAND UP FOR UX You may need to fight for UX within the process, adds East. “Sometimes it gets overridden by other, more tangible commercial factors. But anything that performs better than its competitors must, in some way, be better designed for its purpose. As Enzo Ferrari said, ‘Race cars are neither beautiful nor ugly. They become beautiful when they win.’” C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 73 -

BACK ISSUES ISSUE 275 FEB 2018 NEVER MISS AN ISSUE! Conquer obstacles and realise your Catch up on anything you’ve dreams in 2018 missed by downloading our digital back issues on iPad, Why you should quit Android and more... your job this year How to use brand guidelines effectively ISSUE 274 ISSUE 273 ISSUE 272 ISSUE 271 JANUARY 2018 DECEMBER 2017 NOVEMBER 2017 OCTOBER 2017 We reveal the hottest colour Create brand 'you' and learn Discover the top 50 studios in this Branding at its best: we reveal the palettes for 2018. Plus: how to to harness social media in our year's UK Studio Rankings, explore winners of this year's Brand Impact succeed as a designer-maker, self-promo special. We also share four different routes into freelance Awards. Plus: we tackle diversity in build a global reputation overnight advice on conquering creative life, and find out how to improve design, and DixonBaxi explains why and get better at typesetting. block, and thriving without ego. your artworking skills. it pays to be creatively restless. GOT AN APPLE DEVICE? Download Computer Arts for your iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch and enjoy streaming video and bonus image galleries. PREFER TO READ ON ANDROID, PC OR MAC? A digital replica of CA is also available on Google Play and Zinio, as well as Kindle, Nook, Windows 8 and more. www.bit.ly/CA-iPad www.bit.ly/CA-iPadUS (US store) www.bit.ly/CA-GooglePlay www.bit.ly/CA-Zinio

MARCH 2018 PROJECTS PROJECTS Computer Arts goes behind the scenes with world-leading designers as they reveal their working processes… VIDEO 76 INSIGHT HOW TO IMPROVE YOUR ONLINE PORTFOLIO A senior agent at London-based agency Handsome Frank, and three of the illustrators on its books, share their advice for creating a better online portfolio. In association with Wix 82 88 92 PRINTING THE TUBE VISUALISE A SPACE MISSION ROBOTS TAKE OVER HULL Carter Wong’s fourth edition in its Information designer Paul Button Jason Bruges Studio takes us behind series of specially designed notebooks explains how he crossed the final the scenes on its large-scale robotic explores the iconic tiling that adorns frontier of data visualisation with his installation to celebrate the final the London Underground screenprint detailing Apollo missions month of Hull UK City of Culture NEVER MISS AN ISSUE OF COMPUTER ARTS SUBSCRIBE TODAY FOR PRO INSIGHT AND PRACTICAL ADVICE EVERY MONTH – SEE PAGE 34 C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 75 -

VIDEO INSIGHT MARCH 2018 IN ASSOCIATION WITH VIDEO INSIGHT HOW TO IMPROVE YOUR ONLINE PORTFOLIO In association with Wix, an agent and three illustrators from London-based agency Handsome Frank share their advice for crafting a better web portfolio O nline portfolios can be tricky to show as much as they possibly can. Some beasts – while there are certain commissioners see an example of what they tried-and-tested rules that all want before they commission it – you can’t draw creatives can swear by, when it everything in the world, but you can cover certain comes to presenting on the web, bases like people, or objects, and use these sort each body of work comes with its own set of of things to evolve your style. challenges, frustrations and opportunities. How does Handsome Frank help its illustrators In a video insight special in association with put together their online portfolios? website building tool Wix, we spoke to Stuart SW: It’s a collaborative process. First, we Whitton – agent at Handsome Frank – and review the artist’s existing work, and their three of the illustrators he represents – Sarah newest work. We discuss that as a team to Tanat-Jones, Thibaud Hérem and Tim McDonagh see everyone’s thoughts and feelings, and – about how to tackle some of those challenges... get a well-rounded response to the artist. Stuart, do you have any general portfolio We then bring the artist into the equation. advice from an agent’s perspective? We ask them what work they’d like to keep, Stuart Whitton: Lots of people are still missing or get rid of, and what kind of direction they’d the fundamentals. My first bit of advice would like to push their work in –whether that’s a be about style, and style consistency. As particular client, or sector of the industry – a commercial illustrator, you’re going to be and then we put together an action plan. working in a style. Obviously the more unique the style, the more you’ll stand out from the crowd, It could simply be uploading the new work but it obviously still needs to work for clients. and then sending them a link to approve, or it could be them sending edits of existing From a portfolio point of view, make sure work because we feel it could be stronger with that everything you’re presenting remains a few little bits changed, or even suggesting new in that style. If you upload work using lots things to work on that could hopefully lead to of different techniques, clients won’t know more work. It all comes together, and then we what they’re going to get, and that may mean have the updated portfolio. you don’t get the job. Sarah and Thibaud, can you talk us through If you do work in a number of styles – say, how you’ve structured your own folios? you work in children’s publishing but also do Sarah Tanat-Jones: I know that most people fashion illustration – that’s obviously fine, just aren’t going to spend a lot of time on my website separate both portfolios into different sections. (www.sarahtanatjones.com) – they’ll scroll down to get the essence of the work. And when I look at My second tip, and I know this sounds obvious, the metrics, people stay on the home page rather is to show your best work – and show work you than going into detail on projects. So I try to keep want to get more of. Your online portfolio is your it as shallow as I can, like a bouquet of images. shop window, where clients and commissioners come to see if you’re the right person for the job. I want it to be bright, colourful, interesting and If you’re not showing work that has your best bold. If a project has multiple images, I’ll often do abilities in it, and it’s not work you like to do, you’ll a GIF that moves through them, so you can get end up with enquiries that will possibly lead to a sense of it without clicking through. some disappointing experiences. I have two columns of large images: it’s nice to Thirdly, consider subject matter. We’re really move from left to right and absorb the detail. big on that as an agency. You want an artist LOCATION: HEIST BANK, PADDINGTON www.heistbank.com C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 76 -

MARCH 2018 HANDSOME FRANK HANDSOME FRANK UK-based agency Handsome Frank represents some of the world’s best-known illustrators – including Jean Jullien, Malika Favre and Hey – for advertising, design and publishing clients. www.handsomefrank.com Watch the videos on our YouTube channel: www.bit.ly/ca276-handsomefrank C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 77 -

VIDEO INSIGHT MARCH 2018 IN ASSOCIATION WITH My old website had small pictures in rows of Left: Sarah Tanat- four or five, which was probably overwhelming. Jones’ Chicken Shops Thibaud Hérem: I went for a thumbnail approach of London print proved for my website (www.thibaudherem.com). It’s unexpectedly popular, a bit like a ‘social media’ approach for showing and she’s made it into work: quite quick and general first, and then a sweatshirt (below). people can select a project to go into detail. Above: Projects for Having that general view also helps give a The Washington Post proper vision of what my practice is, rather than and Costa Coffee, focusing on one drawing. demonstrating the punchiness of Do you have any frustrations with your folio? RGB and the power Are you able to change the bits that annoy you? of animated GIFs. STJ: My website cuts everything to a uniform height, which allows for a more uniform layout See both of them as but means that portrait images get squeezed they were intended at: down to fit that height restriction. I don’t really sarahtanatjones.com know a way around that, because you can’t have every image dimension displayed ideally whilst WATCH THE VIDEO NOW AT also having a uniform landing page. www.bit.ly/ca276-handsomefrank Sometimes things get squashed down SARAH TANAT-JONES ATTRACT POTENTIAL CLIENTS so you can’t see too much detail – always Illustrator a problem with digital work online. You can Brighton-born, London- In our first video, illustrator Sarah Tanat-Jones spend hours on an image, but then someone based Sarah has been with shares how she combines a simple two-column might only see a small thumbnail, and that’s the Handsome Frank for four layout with bright animated GIFs to pique the only experience they have of it. This is a problem years. After graduating from interest – and keep the attention – of anyone for all image makers I guess. Edinburgh she won a D&AD browsing her online folio. TH: My main problem is not being able to zoom in New Blood Award, and now and out of my drawings. I didn’t find the right tool illustrates a broad range of to do that. In a way it would be good for people to subject matter for clients be able to download it to use as a background or such as Costa, Te Guardian something, but I also need to protect my work as and Crabtree & Evelyn. someone could use it in a professional capacity if they wanted to. So it’s a thin line between protection and showing as much as possible. Tim McDonagh: I agree it’d be cool to be able to zoom in. As it stands, if I’ve done a really detailed piece I might leave it off my website (www.mcdonaghillustration.com), because it might look a bit odd at a smaller size on the screen. It might undersell it. How are artists’ portfolios presented differently on the Handsome Frank website? SW: Some artists have favourite projects they’d like to show themselves; some do it chronologically, and that’s up them. We like to think we have a well-rounded approach to it. Recent work, notable projects, range of subject matter, and also highlighting their skills as an illustrator. We could also feature pieces because we’ve had a lot of enquiries for certain subjects, and we want to make sure they’re in the portfolio to expand their target audience as best as possible. Apart from that, it’s just about making sure the whole thing works cohesively, and that it’s the best possible offering we can have for that illustrator. C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 78 -

MARCH 2018 HANDSOME FRANK Above: The jewel MAKE THE MOST in Thibaud Hérem’s OF THE SCREEN portfolio, his Grand Budapest Hotel took Sarah Tanat-Jones shares her 600 hours to complete, three top tips for giving your plus 50 more to colour. online portfolio a boost Right: Another super- 1. Create eye-catching GIFs detailed drawing – of “I read an article about this: people King’s Cross station. are attracted to watching GIFs for a long time, because the human brain WATCH THE VIDEO NOW AT looks for tiny differences in a pattern,” www.bit.ly/ca276-handsomefrank explains Sarah Tanat-Jones.“So, you’ll look at a GIF and even though you know THIBAUD HĒREM SHOW HAND-DRAWN ORIGINALS nothing’s going to change, you’re still staring Illustrator at it, expecting something to change.” Specialising in architectural Our second video sees hand-drawn architectural studies, French illustrator illustration specialist Thibaud Hérem discuss the Her top tip for creating eye-catching GIFs Tibaud has been refining intricacies of his practice, and how he presents for your portfolio? Don’t move too quickly. his cross-hatch pen and ink his painstakingly rendered drawings – which take “It’s overwhelming if it whizzes through technique in London for the hundreds of hours each – in his online folio. loads of images,” she insists. “Keep a last 15 years. His work is a steady, slow procession. Then you watch true labour of love, and one it for longer, and it’s more interesting.” of his portfolio highlights, a huge illustration of the 2. Show WIP if you have it Grand Budapest Hotel, took Tanat-Jones finds other illustrators’ work- 600 hours to complete. in-progress shots fascinating.“When you’re interested in a particular person, you want to see how they work,” she says.“People who just work in digital formats probably won’t have shots of drawings, but they might have a time-lapse in Photoshop or Illustrator, and that’s interesting as well.” While she doesn’t go over the top with WIP on her website – “I work quite quickly, and often I just want to present the image and move onto something else” – Tanat- Jones makes it count when she does. “It’s an occasional thing for me, but it usually gets a good reaction,” she reveals. 3. Use the screen as a light source “Make the most of the fact that a computer screen is a source of light,” is Tanat-Jones’ final gem of advice.“Bright colours and bold lines work really well when you’ve got light coming through from the screen. It’s amazing how different something can look from a screen to a printed page.” She cites the example of a piece she did for The Washington Post, featuring a glittery dress and a high-heeled shoe. “On my website, it really sparkles, but when it came out in print, the colours were very different,” she reveals. “I was still really pleased with it, but it was duller and more muted. So, make the most of having that light source – and be bold.” C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 79 -

VIDEO INSIGHT MARCH 2018 IN ASSOCIATION WITH DO YOUR WORK Left: Tim McDonagh is often JUSTICE ONLINE frustrated when his vibrant colour palettes are translated Tibaud Hérem and Tim McDonagh into print – luckily, this cover share their advice for showing off for Hops features a rainbow very detailed work of fluoro Pantone inks. 1. Preserve the imperfections Below: Appropriately entitled Working at large scale with pen and ink, Neon, this piece is fizzing Thibaud Hérem needs to scan his images at with bright colours. the highest resolution possible to preserve the painstaking level of detail in his images. See both RGB originals at: mcdonaghillustration.com While he’ll clean up dust and dirt from the scan digitally, he’s keen to make sure WATCH THE VIDEO NOW AT the hand-drawn feel remains, rather than www.bit.ly/ca276-handsomefrank giving it a clean, vector feel. “The original piece has to be the final piece,” he insists. TIM MCDONAGH GET MORE FROM COLOUR “That’s important to me, so I try to preserve Illustrator that as much as I can in the scan.” Brighton-based Tim has been Influenced by graphic novels and a lover of a freelance illustrator for very bright colour palettes, Brighton-based 2. Show bright work in RGB seven years. Like Sarah, illustrator Tim McDonagh shares his advice Bright, vibrant colour palettes are a running he won a D&AD New Blood for displaying vibrant digital work in glorious theme throughout Tim McDonagh’s Award after graduating, RGB in our third portfolio advice video. portfolio.“I go through phases: at the and was one of Handsome moment, I like using yellow, orange and Frank’s first signings soon bright pink,” he explains.“Because of this, afterwards. His comic-book most of the time my work looks better in style is defined by heavy line RGB rather than CMYK, because you get a work and vivid colours, with more vivid colour experience.” often bizarre subject matter. As a result, he tends to show the original digital file rather than a photograph of a book or magazine, for instance; even if, as with his Hops cover (right), it was printed with zingy Pantone inks. “In my mind, that’s how the image was intended to be seen – digital is the medium I work in,” he shrugs. 3.Make the most of social platforms For Hérem, social media has opened up many different ways to display your work, over and above his online portfolio itself. “Things like close-ups, work in progress, maybe some tests and sketches,” he says. “The website is where I show my final pieces; things I’ve pushed as far as I can.” Social media is particularly important for hand-drawn illustrators like himself to draw attention to the work, adds Hérem, as his final pieces are unique, individual and irreplaceable.“It’s harder to have your work online and circulating digitally,” he adds. Watch the videos on our YouTube channel: www.bit.ly/ca276-handsomefrank C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 80 -



PROJECT DIARY MARCH 2018 PROJECT DIARY TO THE TRAINS: PRINTING THE TUBE Carter Wong’s fourth edition in its series of specially designed notebooks explores the tiling of the London Underground C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 82 -

MARCH 2018 NOTED BY CARTER WONG SARAH TURNER MARTYN GARROD Owner and managing director, Carter Wong Creative director, Carter Wong Sarah has been with Carter Wong for 17 years, Martyn’s passion is creating brand languages becoming sole owner of the business in 2016. that go beyond just a logo, building brands that Inspired by a love of time-honoured crafts such are memorable, timeless and have just the right as printing and typography, she has worked for amount of attitude. His work has been recognised clients including Cornetto, Te National Trust, by several awarding bodies including DBA Design Lloyd’s of London and Unilever. Effectiveness Awards and D&AD. THE CONCEPT Sarah Turner Noted is a collaboration we have worked on over the last four years with Boss Print. The project started when they approached us to help with marketing their print business to designers, showcasing their high-end design print projects. We came up with the idea of a notebook that had a design-led theme and contained collated ephemera or things that show off creativity – something that a designer would like to keep. The first one was a promotional notebook, but we both loved the idea so much we went on to make a series. So far the series has included found fonts, Italian razor blade packaging, and a collection found at an ephemera fair in London. This year, it’s London Underground tile patterns, beginning with architect Leslie Green and including more recent interpretations by the likes of Alan Fletcher and Nicholas Munro. Normally, with this project, we ask the team a few months before we start to think about things they have spotted or subjects they like, and bring lots of ideas to the table. We then explore these and decide democratically which one has the most support and is to go forward. With this year’s theme, we were keen to do something very London-based, hence the Tube, its art and the tiles. The navigation via colour PROJECT FACTFILE BRIEF: In collaboration with Boss Print, each year Carter Wong creates a notebook to showcase high-end design and print capabilities. Each one elaborates on a new idea, collating ephemera and highlighting exceptional creativity. To the Trains is the fourth in the Noted series and for this edition, the team at Carter Wong set out to explore the creative ceramic tiling patterns found in London Underground stations. CLIENT: Self-initiated COLLABORATOR: Boss Print, www.bossprint.com AGENCY: Carter Wong, www.carterwongdesign.com PROJECT DURATION: Four months C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 83 -

PROJECT DIARY MARCH 2018 ROGER JONES EMILY THACKRAH Senior artworker, Carter Wong Middleweight designer, Carter Wong With over 25 years in the creative industry, in Emily joined Carter Wong last year and is a key recent years Roger has worked on a diverse range of member of the design team, working on projects products including press advertising, catalogues and including the delivery of two illustrated sub-brands packaging for many different client groups. Never for global fisheries company Norebo. A Loughborough flustered by tight deadlines, Roger is always keen to University graduate, Emily spent three years at LPK keep learning and adapting to the changing industry. before joining Carter Wong. and pattern in the early Tube stations reflects 01 To the Trains graphic communication in its purest form. proofs back from the printers, THE DESIGN featuring richly coloured tile Emily Tackrah and Martyn Garrod patterns. While designing, it is always important to think 02 Aiming for the of what the final product will be, and part of the highest quality, the brief was to show off the finishes Boss Print can designers at Carter achieve. The idea of the tiles leant itself really Wong inspected well to embossing – which brought another the colour dimension to the design. reproduction and registration of the Each member of the studio was tasked with project’s proofs. making notes of any outstanding tiles they 01 came across when using the Underground. We found information at the stations, for example, 02 Tottenham Court Road has information about Eduardo Paolozzi and Holloway Road has information about Leslie Green himself in the ticket hall. We then looked online to find out more about the history of the tiles, the designers, facts and dates of installation. The format itself followed on from the previous three editions in the Noted series. We ordered the imagery like a journey through the Underground, starting with a cover inspired by the ox-blood tiles of the station exteriors. This leads through into the green tiles of the ticket hall, then to the platform tiles before following the Way Out signs to the exit. The platform tiles are in chronological order, starting with Leslie PAST EDITIONS A CUT ABOVE HEIDELBERG EPHEMERA COMPARE After the succcess of the first Volume three consisted of a NOTES edition, the next Noted showcased collection of items that all belonged Italian razor blade packaging from to one woman during her one-year Sarah Turner on the 1950s and ’60s, which was stay in London, found at a car boot previous Noted editions found in a Rome flea market. fair in the city some 40 years later. FOUND FONTS The first edition featured images of our in-house lettering and font collection, which used lots of print techniques such as embossing, die cuts and varnishes. C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 84 -

MARCH 2018 NOTED BY CARTER WONG GETTING THE MOST FROM EMBOSSING Roger Jones details the many practical elements of creating a notebook that highlights innovative print and finishing techniques The first step was to plan the pagination in order to The emboss plate for the front cover of To the Trains (top) and an example of determine how many images would be needed to complete how Boss Print can reproduce the tiles in relief. the book. Each book in the Noted series is split into 11 sections, consisting of either 16 or 20 pages. To balance then cropped into the layout and we then determined which out the book, the imagery only appears on the 20-page imagery would benefit most from being embossed. sections, with four images per section. When this selection was agreed, it was back into To make the book different to the preceeding three Photoshop to manually create the embossing layouts. All volumes, Boss Print printed the embossed images using embossing areas were individually cut out from the images a French fold technique which meant we could emboss and merged into separate channels in Photoshop. The Bank two different images front and back on one page, doubling station image has two embossing levels to enhance the 3D the number of images we could use and simulatenously effect and improve the depth on the coat of arms. enhancing the look of the book. The front cover was created in Illustrator without using We selected 24 final images. Raw files were transformed any imagery. All elements were drawn and supplied to so they would appear flat and not curved on the finished Boss Print as a vector plate. From here Boss Print sent the shots prior to being opened in Photoshop. Here they were images off to the block makers and received a 3D image for cleaned up, colour balanced and, where needed, additional approval prior to the block being made. bleed and background was added. After liaising with Boss Print, we decided that all the images would be supplied as RGB files and would be printed using its vivid colour print process, which extends the colour gamut for more vibrant prints. All the images were C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 85 -

PROJECT DIARY MARCH 2018 03 04 05 Green’s original designs at the beginning, and “Te beauty of self- more recent works later on. initiated projects is we To capture the imagery, we did a pre-shoot plan to determine locations, crops of tiles we have complete creative wanted and planned the best route for the shoot day to avoid crowds. While on the platforms, we control to explore had to pick the best tiles with regard to marks, dirt, cracking and lighting. anything we wish” It is a collaborative project, highlighting paper printing and typography. This proved to be a draw by Fenner Paper, printing techniques and special for guests who also wanted to learn more about finishes by Boss Print, and high-end design by the foundation. We held a small exhibition to give the Carter Wong team. Once we’d settled on the more in-depth information about the project and paper stock, we made suggestions for the print to engage our guests. techniques for the tile photography – including the embossing on the cover that wrapped around In our day-to-day jobs we generally work the front and back to mimic the outside of one to a tight client brief, using our skills to solve of Leslie Green’s stations. We used the typeface challenges and problems. The beauty of self- that is used on the Underground (Johnston) initiated projects is that we have complete throughout the notebook as a further link. creative freedom to explore anything we wish. These are always inspirational for our designers THE VERDICT and help them to think wider in all they do, which comes full circle when we come back to client’s Sarah Turner work. We have had a really positive response to This year’s publication has been the most this year’s notebook, and we always find the first successful to date. We launched it at the St Bride question is: ‘What’s the next one about?’ Foundation, which houses a vast collection of historical type and has workshops in letterpress, C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 86 -

MARCH 2018 NOTED BY CARTER WONG 06 03-04 Baker Street’s famous Sherlock Holmes mural could not be omitted. 05 There’s no way out at Warren Street, it seems. 06 The bright mosaic found at Tottenham Court tube station. 07 This design is located at Oxford Circus station. 08 The tunnel tiling at Russell Square subtly assists with the wayfinding system. 09 South of the river and Vauxhall has the most elaborate foilage included in the design. 10 The finished cover was produced using a top secret cover stock showcasing Boss Print’s capabilities. 07 08 10 09 C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 87 -

WORKSHOP MARCH 2018 NEXT MONTH MASTER COLLAGE Eleanor Shakeseare shares the secrets of her craft WORKSHOP HOW TO VISUALISE A SPACE MISSION Paul Button explains how he crossed the final frontier of data visualisation with his screenprint detailing Apollo missions C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 88 -

MARCH 2018 VISUALISE A SPACE MISSION PHOTO PAUL BUTTON Senior information designer, Signal Noise Paul Button is a London-based graphic designer specialising in data visualisation who is currently working as senior information designer at Signal Noise. His personal work has been featured in publications such as GQ, Wired, and the Financial Times; his Apollo screenprint got an honourable mention at 2017’s Information Is Beautiful Awards. www.madefromdata.com 01 02 01-02 Close DATA ILLUSTRATION DESIGN DECISIONS ups from the finished poster, Paul Button I knew I wanted it to be screenprinted as that printed on GF I’ve been working in the data visualisation hand-crafted angle was something I was going Smith Colorplan field for close to a decade now – in my day for. I wanted the colours to be visually really Amethyst. job I go by the role of information designer, rich with one metallic accent colour, a neutral but I sometimes feel data illustrator may be base and a strong deep paper colour. I chose GF a more accurate description. Smith Colorplan in lovely Amethyst, which suited metallic gold and flat white inks. Made from Data is a personal project that I’d been thinking about undertaking Visually, I needed the design to have a journey for a long time. I felt that there were classic that matched the trip to the moon and back, stories that I wanted to visually portray through which necessitated a loop of some kind – I also data visualisation, and then combine that with had the issue that a lot of Apollo flights didn’t more bespoke production techniques. The even leave Earth orbit, so I had to also be able end goal was to produce something that was to have a way of showing that too. beautifully designed, informative and a limited edition high-quality object in its own right. I started off with a circle at the bottom of the page for the Earth and a smaller circle at the top DEFINING THE MISSION for the moon. As every mission involved orbiting around one or both of these bodies, it made When choosing a first subject, the Apollo sense to do the missions as rings extending programme immediately came to mind. I’m outwards in chronological order so I started definitely a bit of a space nerd, but the Apollo working on those first with the plan to solve missions in particular have always fascinated how they were connected later. me – the sheer determination and bravery required to carry out what still seems like the I do as much as I can with grids in Illustrator, impossible in today’s world, yet alone using in this case using a 1pt grid with subdivisions of technology of that era. It also ticked all the 10 as I needed a bit more resolution than a 1mm boxes of being reasonably easy to research, and grid provided. I then locked the document origins having a finite dataset – I wanted something to the centre point of the Earth. This helped people would want to hang on to and that me position things with absolute precision wouldn’t go out of date. and I typed coordinates into the Transform panel. I then start blocking things out in 10pt C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 89 -

WORKSHOP MARCH 2018 03 04 05 increments so it was also really easy to see launch and landing dates, I needed to find a “Getting the when something was the wrong size or out of way to join the two bodies together. I settled angles right for position. The other reason is that I sometimes for a figure of eight format where missions the loops around use scripts to batch repetitive tasks for me, launched from Earth looped out around the the Earth and and having the coordinates locked down meant moon and back again, crossing over in the moon was one I could more easily precisely place objects. middle. Getting the angles right for these loops of the biggest was one of the biggest challenges. I started challenges” CALCULATING TIME off with big spiralling organic looping designs but it was incredibly hard to get them not to 06 Time was the backbone of the data – the look too messy. In the end, I went for circles connecting point of all the missions – and that seamlessly flowed into straight lines, but I wanted to give a timeline of all the flights, the joins were very tricky to align and looked starting from JFK’s famous line ‘We choose to really ugly if they were even the slightest bit go to the Moon’ to give context to how quickly out. I tried to script it in AppleScript but it never these events all happened. Running the timeline quite looked right. I was about resign myself around the ‘bowl’ of the Earth was a natural fit to spending ages tweaking them all by hand as it was a nod towards a clock face. I refined when I came across an Illustrator JavaScript the launch dates into lines shooting up straight called Common Tangents that did exactly what out of Earth and then connecting with the I needed. All you had to do was select the two associated ring, putting a small mission number rings and it would connect them – perfect! label at the connection point. ADDING DEPTH For precise positioning of the mission dates, I wrote a small AppleScript that converted the Finally I felt that the lines needed to have some number of days between missions into degrees kind of depth. I also wanted to have some thicker of rotation and accurately placed markers elements to take advantage of the metallic ink around the rings that I could join up by hand. I was looking to use. I solved it by having the Making up a script probably took more time than lines increase in thickness as they depart the just doing the calculations and positioning by Earth ring and then reduce back as they join the myself, but after repositioning and changing moon. I did this by building up multiple layers for the diameter of the rings so many times as I each line – first a narrow weight baseline, then tweaked the layout, it really paid off. I also made another line on top using a funnel-shaped profile it a design point to have Apollo 11 always at 90 to build up the weight along the curve with a degrees to the Earth and the moon so it ran as thicker straight connection line. I then added a perfect line straight through the middle of the new thicker strokes to the crossover lines using design - further complicating the calculations! the background colour to cut through the rings. CONNECTING THE ORBITS For the representations of the Earth and moon, I half-toned public domain images from Once I had the orbits around the Earth and the NASA in Photoshop and dropped them into moon and the connection points to indicate C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 90 -

MARCH 2018 VISUALISE A SPACE MISSION 03-05 Work in 06 Button’s 07-08 Close up 09 The finished INFORMATION IS progress shots visualisation of the finished artwork poster, BEAUTIFUL AWARDS as Paul Button depicting curved lines and which received was working out every mission details of the an honourable DISCOVER 2017’S WINNERS the curved lines sent to Mars, missions. mention in the Celebrating excellence in data visualation, between the Earth their planned most recent infographics and information design, and the moon. objectives and Information Is the awards have eight subject-based outcomes. Beautiful Awards. categories. See the winners online at: www.informationisbeautifulawards.com 07 08 Illustrator. I later learned that your printer can 09 usually handle the half-toning for you when they produce the film positives so next time I’d definitely go down that route. I wanted a typeface that felt suitable to the subject, both in period and with the appropriate degree of gravitas for this epic story. Futura Demibold was something I kept coming across in NASA documentation from the ’60s, but it seems to be a rarer weight as I couldn’t find it at all in my collection. Eventually I bought just that single weight, and used it for everything, using uppercase and generous tracking to help tell my story with quite a classic, authoritative voice. And with that I sent my baby off to print. For printing I went with K2 Screen in London. The only problem that we found was getting the white to sit nicely on the fairly coarse-grained paper. The ink had to be at exactly the right consistency, too thin and it would be quite blotchy on the paper, too thick and it would start to dry and clog the screen. It was so finicky that it turned out practically impossible to do a wet proof. The printer asked me to put my trust in him to get it right – he’d work the ink to get to the exact consistency needed and get them all done at once. The first time I saw a complete print was when all 100 were couriered to me two days later, and thankfully, they were perfect. THE SKY’S THE LIMIT I’ve definitely learned quite a lot working on this project, mostly in terms of production which was a bit of a learning steep curve. Overall the response has been fantastic, I’ve sold out all 100, to customers in 16 different countries and it’s amazing to think my work is sitting in people’s homes and offices all around the world. I highly recommend giving it a go. If you’ve a compelling idea and the attention to detail to pull it off - the sky’s the limit! C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 91 -

PROJECT DIARY MARCH 2018 PROJECT DIARY HULL LOOKS TO A ROBOTIC FUTURE Jason Bruges Studio takes us behind the scenes on the large-scale robotic installation it created to celebrate the final month of Hull 2017 UK City of Culture C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 92 -

MARCH 2018 JASON BRUGES STUDIO FOR HULL 2017 JASON BRUGES Founder, Jason Bruges Studio Jason Bruges is a multidisciplinary artist based in London with an interest in high-tech installations and interventions that use a palette of architecture and interactive technology to create time-based, site-specific spatial experiences. He trained at Oxford Brookes University and the Bartlett School of Architecture, before working at Foster + Partners and Imagination. He founded his studio in 2002. GETTING STARTED Jason Bruges Hull, the UK City of Culture 2017, had an installation called Blade at the beginning of the year displaying a 75-metre wind turbine blade in the middle of the city. The organisers wanted to bookend the year with something equally audacious, not as an ending but as a springboard looking towards the future. Part of the brief for Where Do We Go From Here? included encouraging Hullensians, visitors and workers to visit the Old Town in the city, which has some amazing medieval heritage, rich architecture and vibrant public spaces. They were interested in light-based artwork and installations, and were envisaging people promenading around the town, exploring and finding these installations – artworks that would transform the Old Town. Looking at the city’s heritage in fishing, its maritime history, the docks and renewable energy such as the wind turbines, we were particularly interested in the idea of creating beacons and almost a navigation system that would take people through the Old Town. THE DESIGN APPROACH Kristine Jaeger We visited Hull and spent time there, getting to know the people and the beat of the city. We were interested in doing something on street level, but that would look outwards and be visible from afar. There were a range of ideas at first like dirigibles, inflatable beacons that would float above the city like markers, and large-scale shooting stars firing across the PROJECT FACTFILE BRIEF: As Hull 2017 UK City of Culture came to a close, the organisers wanted an installation that would look to the future, and one that would attract residents of the city and new visitors to Hull’s Old Town area. Scale and the use of light were two of the things they were looking for in the finished intervention, which was entitled: Where Do We Go From Here? STUDIO: Jason Bruges Studio, www.jasonbruges.com CLIENT: Hull 2017 UK City of Culture, www.hull2017.co.uk PROJECT DURATION: 8 months LAUNCH DATE: 1 December 2017 C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 93 -

PROJECT DIARY MARCH 2018 KRISTINE JAEGER Designer, Jason Bruges Studio Kirstine joined Jason Bruges Studio after obtaining her degree from Aarhus School of Architecture, Denmark in 2014. As a designer and project lead she has worked on projects ranging from temporary light interventions and performances to permanent museum installations, including Digital Ornithology and Light Masonry. square. But it came down to this futuristic the trees. The Museums Quarter had some approach of making people aware of technology really great surfaces to cast some really big and its presence in our lives. We spoke to some robot shadows, amplifying the space, and next robot manufacturers and got to know a company door is Wilberforce House, which is much more called Robotraders, who were quite keen to get intimate, with a small garden space and a statue involved. They assisted us in acquiring 25 robots of William Wilberforce. and developing programs for them. CONTROLLING THE ROBOTS SCOPING LOCATIONS Adam Heslop Jason Bruges Traditionally, these industrial robots are At the same time, we explored how to actually designed to move their arm from one place to implement the artworks in the four public another as fast as possible to get the job done spaces in Hull. Beverley Gate is the site of the as quickly as possible. We really wanted to add Old Town gates, so creating an intervention that as much character as we could to the robots so represented gatekeepers matched the context we designed our own system to control them. here. Trinity Square has an open space with Hull Minster as a medieval backdrop, so it was about We spent a lot of time in Hull getting to know the spaces, and we brought a lighting designer 01 on board to work with the layouts and designs, and help us come up with lighting schemes the figure-ground relationship with reflection for each context. We used lighting products pools, boundary lines, vistas, view lines and similar to ones we’ve used before for large-scale installations. Some of the robots are holding MAKING MOVES narrow, soft spotlights, and others hold mirrors to reflect the light, so there’s this interplay. ROBOTIC MOVEMENT We got pretty much everything into the studio and mocked it up as best we could. So we were Adam Heslop explains how off the shelf 3D software was adapted to building 3D models of what we’d install, using make the robots do their own unique dance the models to visualise how things would look, and to program the robots and choreograph how We regularly build plug-ins for they’d move. We were able to map everything out Cinema 4D that allow us to directly in terms of the spaces, seeing how the shadows control and manipulate real-world worked before we moved the operation to Hull. hardware. Normally, we build a real-time link so that we can scrub SOUND AND ATMOSPHERE the slider and see how the hardware behaves. These robots Kristine Jaeger are a lot more complex and In the same way that we designed the lighting for potentially hazardous so we the spaces and the narratives, we had a sound decided to design choreographies designer in the studio. We explored the robots’ in Cinema 4D. We built our own native sounds and recorded them with contact inverse kinematics plug-in so that mics, and we explored the sound of the spaces we could apply all the motion in Hull. Jez Riley French is a recording artist graphics tools to design each from Hull who has recorded different spaces in robot’s choreography. We were the city, and the Minster’s bells. We used some then able to press a button, which of his recordings to create layered and textured would export a robot program from tracks to work with the robots’ choreography. Cinema 4D, which we could then load into the robot’s system, press In the end, we’ve created a time-based robot Go and watch it unfold. choreography that considers the moves of the robots in relation to the space and the audience. For us it was about people being able to get close to the robots. There is a lot of variation and people can experience it in different ways. C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 94 -

MARCH 2018 JASON BRUGES STUDIO FOR HULL 2017 ADAM HESLOP 3D visualiser, Jason Bruges Studio Adam has a BA in Industrial Design and has extensive knowledge of Cinema 4D, Open Frameworks, Adobe CC, DMX Lighting Control and custom visualisation tool development. Adam leads the visualisation team at the studio. He works across all projects from initial concepts to research and development on integrated control systems and innovative use of programming in activating interactive installations. 02 03 05 01-02 Jason Bruges Studio created previsualisations of Where Do We Go From Here?, capturing the lighting and atmosphere. 03 In the studio, the team had to 04 create a controlled environment in order to work with the robots within safety regulations. Here, Adam Heslop is programming a robot in C4D. 04 The robotic arms were used to play out various different dances and light shows. 05-06 The installation at two locations in Hull’s Old Town. Each area had its own choreography, light show 06 and audio. PROBLEM SOLVED One of the most important an animated assembly line aspects of the installation robot in the environment of LAW AND was meeting safety Grade II listed architectural ORDER requirements relating to the treasures, structural use of industrial machinery. engineers were called on Jason Bruges on how the Even in the studio, the team to ensure the stability of the project adhered to health had to demarcate the robot’s robots and the forces they and safety regulations space with a safety cordon. generated through their And, when it came to placing choreography. C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 95 -

PRHEEODTOWGORRADPSH Y M E E T S DE SI GN MARCH 2018 The Association of Photographers (AOP) was first formed in 1968. It aims to promote and protect the worth and standing of its members, to vigorously defend, educate and lobby for the interests and rights of all photographers, especially in the commercial photographic industry. www.the-aop.org DOUBLE VISION In a new series in partnership with the AOP, we explore how photography and design complement each other – first, the value of a shared vision... PHOTOGRAPHY: © Ilka & Franz T he majority of the AOP’s What’s your creative process? our work is heading, we often Do you often disagree? photographers operate For us, taking a picture is really have different directions in We disagree all the time, and alone. Of course, there are just one of many steps. Before we mind – different, but still within that has just become part of the invaluable teams of people shoot we work on overarching the remit we have created for process. The important thing involved in a shoot, but ideas and concepts, then we ourselves. Sometimes we argue is that once we are on set and the vision derives from the produce a shoot list, sketch each it out, other times one of us just shooting, all of those differences photographer. So what does shot in Photoshop or with pen and takes a step back and says, ‘Fine, have been ironed out. That is the creative process look like paper, work out a colour palette, I see you have a clear vision here, what the planning phase is for. for a photography duo? We source and make sets and props; just take the lead on this one.’ catch up with Ilka and Franz, only then we finally go into the What are the best and worst partners both professionally and studio and shoot. The final phase Do you have certain arenas that parts of working together?  personally, to investigate how a is post-production where we put you tend to stick to? The worst thing is probably that shared vision helps them both everything previously planned on We both really do everything and our relationship is linked to our design and photograph sets... its head and change it around, and are pretty interchangeable, but our work life. But the good definitely where we refine colours and make skills also complement each other. outweighs the bad. It is great that How did you first meet? everything straight, even, uniform Franz is very crafty and great at we can challenge and push each We are from Germany and Austria and clean (an agonising process). set and prop making. He is also other. One of us might think a originally, but have been living in great at finding practical solutions shot is done when the other says, London for a number of years. We How do your visions differ?  for shoot-related problems. Ilka is ‘I think we can still make it better.’ met in London after Franz had Overall, we have the same vision. better at, and usually has the final Also, always having someone to just arrived in the city to work as a Of course there are individual say in, all things post-production. watch your back is priceless, when photographer’s assistant. We were questions where our opinions She maybe is a bit more ideas, a shot becomes challenging, the both very much at the beginning differ. Or when we have our vision and taste-oriented: in other other person can often approach it of our photographic careers. regular big talk about where words, what we do and don’t like. (literally) from a different angle. C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 96 -

NEXT MONTH UPGRADE YOUR DESIGN SKILLS SPECIAL REPORT Discover the best independent magazines of 2018, according to Stack founder Steven Watson VIDEO INSIGHT How Here Design juggles branding and packaging for clients with its own range of artisan products Plus: new projects, current trends and expert analysis from the global design scene ON SALE 6 MARCH C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 97 -

DESIGN ICON MARCH 2018 Australian digital designer, creative director of London agency Mr President and co-founder of SheSays – a global creative network for women – Laura Jordan-Bambach shares how her dreams have inspired her. PHOTOGRAPH: Tom Kavanagh LIVING THE DREAM As creative people, our job is to set Extracts from Laura Jordan-Bambach’s dream diaries include musings on time travel and crumpets. visions of the future for others to follow, but where do these visions come from? Where do we get our inspiration? It’s the question I’ve probably been asked most in my career. Well, looking inwards for inspiration in my dreams has given me an inexhaustible well of new ideas, as well as a sense of time travel, the courage to face fears and find ways around them. My dreams mean I have someone to ask and to trust in, who’s always at hand. The subconscious is a fascinating place to become an adventurer. My dreams have always been vivid and expansive. My earliest memories aren’t real events, but dream stories burnt into my psyche through repetition and wonder. And since my year six teacher (Mrs Turner) suggested it, I’ve kept a dream diary to explore them. I haven’t recorded every night since then, of course, but enough to explore dreaming as a tool for creativity through the last 30-plus years. Over the course of that time, I’ve built up a wildly detailed living geography. My dreams are a place of great emotion, whose streets and precincts I know well – I’ve ‘lived’ there longer than any other had thoughts of such hilarity I’ve woken place. I sometimes just go for dumplings myself up belly laughing, and have played under the canopy of my favourite Chinese out presentations over and over in the market, sometimes the same streets days before a big gig in a constant and are the backdrop for the melodrama inescapable rehearsal. of a horror film. I have a house (always changing shape), a basement (always Recording and reflecting on my dreams flooding) and have taught myself over regularly has opened up a world to me that the years how to fly (which is handy for still astounds me with its peculiarities, the horror film nights). where these visions of the future seem to come towards you from behind and In this virtual space, I’ve dreamed of ambush you. Sometimes you strike it lucky someone a week before I met them in and receive an idea, almost fully formed, real life – they flew me over the rooftops ready to plug into a project the next day. of Paris before I’d ever left Australia for the first time, and named my son years Of course not all of what happens there before he was born. And I’ve also come makes sense straight away, and often across some of my greatest creative ideas you think are brilliant turn out to be ideas – solving everything from ad nothing of the kind once you wake. But concepts and design issues to uncovering training the subconscious to report back the theory of time travel (which I’m still on its clashing together of inspiration is sure works, though I can’t prove it). I’ve one of my greatest joys, and damn good entertainment too. C O M P U T E R A R T S . C R E AT I V E B L O Q . C O M - 98 -

Make print memorable Celloglas is the UK’s leading specialist in decorative Ask us about: print finishing. Decorative print finishes can be used - Lamination to deliver innovation and added value, increase user - Foil Blocking interaction, demonstrate brand category leadership, - Varnishing enhance sensory experience and even stimulate debate - High-Speed Coating in social media circles. - Mirri - Die Cutting To find out how our creative finishes can make your - Folder Make-Up publication stand out on the shelf, call Steve Middleton - Special Effects on 0116 263 1010 for a free consultation. - Embossing Reading Leicester Leeds T 0118 930 3003 T 0116 263 1010 T 0113 271 1320 F 0118 932 3656 F 0116 263 1111 F 0113 277 3936 E [email protected] E [email protected] E [email protected] www.celloglas.co.uk

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