Arts Award: Unit 1

for this task i had to learn one new arts medium that i was not confident in or an art form i was unexperienced in. i chose digital illustration and design. using YouTube tutorials and the help from my schools staff to learn photoshop and achieve the effects and themes i desired. my title was movie posters which i used as a medium to learn about my software and obtain the skills required. i though best to make 3 movie posters with multiple drafts each. where after every session i would ask my teacher or another member of staff for some form of constructive criticism which i would incorporate in my next session, until i got the 3 posters you see above.

FMP

Over my time at global i have become accustom to industry standard softwares such as premiere pro, audition, photoshop. i have had my ups and down with each of them however i have made vast progress. premiere pro - a video editing software- has been extremely fun to use however i struggle with some basic features such as transitions and filtering. audition a digital audio workstation was very finicky and un enjoyable. ive had experience with others daws but found this one hard to use. photoshop ,my favourite of the bunch is used for editing and is by far the software i have the most expeirence with ive made tremendous progress over the last two years and have made lots of projects through it. due to this it makes the most sence to pursure the digital pathway as that is the one im most confident in.

choosing fmp pathway

Audio

For --------------------------------------------------------------------------------Against

I have previous experience in music technology -----------------I lack experience in audition

I like music ----------------------------------------------------------------------I don’t like podcast

Digital

For ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------Against

I love movies -------------------------------------------------------------------i struggle with Photoshop

Ive made lots of work beforehand --------------------------------------It can be boring

expeirence

Visual

For ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------Against

My editing skills are good ------------------------------------------------I struggle using premiere pro

I have a passion for moving image-------------------------------------I have a very basic understanding

RESEARCH

My final media project will be centered around a fashion company based on my own designs followed by a custom website and other promotional material such as bus posters and grafiti stencils. Planning willl consist of looking into other brands that follow similar aesthetics and motifs and analyse and potentionally incorpirate there ideas. i will make these mockups with skills i have gained in photography and photoshop. also previous work in gcse art. i will present my final project on my website as a fully functional e shop which be accsessed from a link on wordpress.

The demographic i am aiming for is young adults and older teens 15-18 . the line will be primarily streetwear orientated with heavy uk grime and rave influence. some of the graphics will be similiar to band merch from bands like tool and travis scott. ill also impliment lyrics of songs i like into the design. my promotional material will stay pretty abstract to engage audiences. the genre of fashion willbe quite niche- brands with pop up stores and very limited releases. i gather a folder full of resources i want to use aswell as getting flat packs of clothes i want to design on.

Codes and convetions

For my project I am going to incorperate influences from underground clothing brands and merch from experimental music bands. I find the arstic style intruiging and somewhat ominous enganing the interest of potentional customers.

Big stylised fonts as demonstrated on the right There are many free font websites but I think making your own font is the only real way. I will do this on adobe illustrated and then go onto a font maker
Fine art such as work done by alex gray or francis bacon. I think old merdival art would work really well with what im going for . Also I wouldn’t have to worry about royalties and credit as the work is over 100 years old.
Small text on the back. This origianlly originated in band merch and big tours - having the states the band will be visiting but has since been incorpirated in brands such as cactus jack and svciety.
Having prints on the back has become a popular trends since the emergence of brands like VLONE with the iconic large V on the back. I aim to replicate this in my own work however instead of the V my motif will be large crosses.

Codes are all the ways in which equipment is used to tell the story in a media text, for example the camera work in a film , conventions on the other hand are the generally accepted ways of doing something. There are general conventions in any medium, such as the use of interviewee quotes in a print article, but conventions are also genre specific. i will be looking at the codes and conventions of fashion brands.

The color pallet is basic and therefore versatile making it a approachable option when picking out ones outfit. the importance of a font and the formatting of text will be a key element when creating my own work. unconventional printing in this case on the sleeve engages onlookers and creates a striking design.

I observed that most clothing brands present there work in a flat format and that 3d mock up are moreso asociated with cheaper mass productrion brands something i dont aim to be. i also noticed that fonts played a huge role in the design and because ofthat imade awhole folder field with fonts from other brands i like , HERESY, TRAPSTAR etc.

SUPREME

Minimalist web design has become very popular recently with brands like supreme and CACTUS JACK. a feature i really want to include is these shop gallery menus(as seen on the left). made by piecing together little snippets of the product. additionally the lower section is important, with small print and social media links- some brands puting funny phrases at the bottom, this adds personality to what is a very basic design. also having the option to change so easily between regions could be incredible helpful to a internation audience, however i will not need this as i want to my customer base to be very close

NINE8COLLECTIVE

nine8collective is an arts collective based in london its demographic resembles heavily the group im targetting my product too- ie london subcultures/underground scene. there use of neon colors and fonts resembles heavily the aesthetic of 90s rave posters. They maintain a simplicity which helps engaging new audiences as it is welcoming and not too overbearing whilst still displaying their 'creative flare'. whilst i do love the heavy 90s rave scene influences i personally dislike the simpliity of it. i aim to hopefilly incorpiorate some of the convetions of the posters in my promotional material .

HERESEY

heresey is a fashion brand which focuses on hyper-minimilism and clean artwork. they have similar conventions to supreme is the typewriter fonts . however where they differ is the large images on the home menu. i want to include this type of thing in my design as it adds color and interest to the website whilst additionally setting the tone for the type of aesthetic i am trying to replicate. another convention heresy includes is faded and muted tones. this gives off the "vintage" element of the brand and so goes nicely with the clothing they sell

in conclusion there were elements from all of them that i liked and disliked more specifically the gallery menu from supreme site and the home menu from heresy. however unlike the previous two i want to include more pictures and colors- maybe not as drastic as the nine8collective but a similar aesthetic ie UK/London subcultures. something i noticed was either really extreme fonts or hyper simple ones such as the type writer font in SUPREME. i couldn't really indetify with either of them, i knew i didnt want something as simplistic as supreme however i didnt want it to be as extreme as nine8collective as i found it somewhat tacky - plus is didnt pair well with thet aesthetic i was trying to convey.

PLANNING

SCAMPER DRAWING

SCAMPER is a quick, easy and direct form of creative brainstorming. You use the tool by asking questions about existing products, using each of the seven prompts above. These questions help you come up with creative ideas for developing new products, and for improving current ones.

On the left is an example of a scamper i did for one of my hoodie. it features a rough sketch of what i am planning to make with little annotations to remind me of core elements i want to include. some of these elements include;

lyrics of eryka badu "...& on" on the left sleeve
a large medivel cross on the back
an oversized boxey fit
faded black cotton

MOCK-UPS

The mock-ups, ultimately the bit i had been most excited for during this project i decided to use photoshop as that was the app i was most confident with. my first task was to source all the assets for my piece including the blank t-shirts and hoodies i would design on. when finding these i took into consideration several things , such as the quality of the image and the way it was folded- i noticed that higher quality brands would show there clothes as flat and folded up where as the cheaper brands used 3d mockups. once i found flat packs for my mockups i used the saturation in photoshop to color correct my hoodies and made them look more faded. i did this by bringing down the saturation and using curves to bring back shadows in certain places so it looks realistic.

when doing the designs i had to include various different tools to achieve the style i wanted to. to learn how to use these tools i watched various Tik-Toks and YouTube videos one of my favorite channels being @PIXimperfect . by far the most useful tools was the blending tool, where you can blend layers together in different ways. the setting i used for a lot of my more basic drag and drop task was the lighten preset which took away all the black in an image- this was really helpful for dragging in images and getting rid of their background. Another incredibly important tool was the filter gallery - here i could experiment with different aesthetics and emulates the stylistic conventions of other artist. one of the presets ive used in almost all of the designs is noise which adds grain- i did this since alot of film cameras had noise from the dust stuck in the lens and so the grainy texture became synonymous with vintage artwork.

"DON'T GO TALKING THAT SH*T BADU"

What good do your words do
If they can't understand you
Don't go talkin' that shit Badu, Badu

Said I'm a Pisces
Zika deka del
Well well I'm raising hell
People always tryin' to find the world I'm in
I'm the envy of the women and I rule the men

Two fish, one swimmin' up stream
One swimmin' down livin' in a dream
But when she loves she tends to cling
When incense burns, smoke unfurls
Analog girl in a digital world
The rasta style flower child
Zip dip dow, zip dip dow
The gold tooth smile
Split them vowels
Bling bloom bling, melinated
I'm 'bout ta give birth to church
But everybody want to ask this earth
What'

What good do your words do
If they can't understand you
Don't go talkin' that shit Badu, Badu

THE BLACK HOODIE. For my first design i wanted to pick a colorway that was acceseable and versatile in anyones wardrobe. i thought if i were to pick outlandish and extravagent colors i would be limiting my audience a fare deal so i picked the obvious choice, black. though despite its basic color i still tried to impliment certain niches. i turned down the saturation and curves on my hoodie to give it a faded cotton effect, found in vintage clothing. i used lyrics from one of my favourite erykah badu songs "... & on" a song about identity and what it means to be a poc in the 21st century. the font i used for my main logo was judas caps, i found its gothic aesthetic and clean lines were in theme with the rest of the hoodie

"IF YOU BLOW IN HER FACE SHE'LL LOVE YOUR FOREVER"

CREW NECK JUMPER. for this i though ide get more extravagent with the color pallet. i had previously made a piece using old 60s horror comic books such as "Chamber of Chills" and "Tales from the Crypt" to create what you see on the lower right. to go balance well with this design i looked through old archived 60s posters and found this hilariously out of date cigarette commercial. however at first the colors were too similar and that it all merged into quite a messy hodge-podge of warm yellows and oranges. so i inverted the colors of the poster as well as some quick color corrections as to compliment and excentuate the print on the back. another theme i also started to include was the focusing on one sleeve , i originally did this in the first hoodie to create some interest as asymetary was a common theme in my product analysis however now i realised i could use this as a part of my brand, somewhat similar to OFF WHITES quotation marks or GUCCI granny sweaters. have a common theme or noticable feature in my clothing could be extremely helpful in building an audience and creating an image.

"A GREEN TRACKSUIT"

The heptagram was used in Christianity to symbolize the seven days of creation and became a traditional symbol for warding off evil. to make the star i used adobe illustrater, as it is vector based it is great for creating shapes and geometric art. the KANEKI logo is also on the front however this time it in glossy black to create a mroe subtle effect.

When you wish upon a star
Makes no difference who you are Anything your heart desires
Will come to you If your heart is in your dream
No request is too extreme
When you wish upon a starAs dreamers do
Fate is kind She brings to those to love
The sweet fulfillment of Their secret longing
Like a bolt out of the blue
Fate steps in and sees you throughWhen you wish upon a star
Your dreams come true

"QUATER ZIP JACKET"

QUATER NECK JACKET. Looking at the collection i had so far i realized i needed a summer/spring option. the jackets color pallete has a noticably brighter color pallete compared to the previous pieces whilst still mainaining the "kaneki" codes and conventions. as you might have noticed a lot of the pieces feature roman catholic imagery. though i am not religious i cannot dismiss the huge impact religion has had on my upbringing, things like the heptagon and medival depicitions of the crusifix. Due to the intergral impact its had on my character and outlook on life i thought it was a good way to translate me and my being through clothing, plus it looks cool :). and thats what i want the brand to be about an extended part of me and with that people like me, my favourite songs intergreted into the design , cultural iconarphy. i want a sense of intamacy with this brand.

on a more technical note whilst makeing this it came to my attention how i would print this if i actually made that and so came a whole midnight journey on the internet of diffirent printing techniques. the two that i found most important were DTF printing and vinyl. DTF or "direct to fabric" uses ink to dye the the material- this methof was most common in the vintage band t shirts i was trying to emulate. on the other hand you had vinyl printing and more modern and ultimatly cheaper way of printing which leaves a plastic cutout glued directly onto the fabric. upsides of vinyl is it adds great glossy texture however it can rip off overtime.ultimatly i wanted to use a combination of both i though the contrasting textures would look great and add a real depth

THE WEBSITE

i knew if i was going to treat this as a legitmate clothing brand ide need a good website to go with it, however my expeirence wit website design before this was next to none so i struggled heavily when making it. i went through countless youtube tutorials from creators and wix directly to figure out how to create what i had in mind. simple things like uploading media and create strips and so forth. i knew that if i could understand the fundamentals i could just focus on the design which i was confident in so that even if the features arent insanly advanced the overall aesthetic and artistic themes would still be inline with the rest of the brand. i did some product analysis on brands that had similar demographics as mine and took certain features and design convetions , putting it into my own final design.

before anything i knew i wanted a home page similar that of HERESEY a brand i had analysed during my planning stage. i though it would make navigating the website easier. practically it wasnt too hard to make i just added some images the logo( made with the same fonts from trapstar , a popular uk underground brand- same as what i wanted) i also added grain and black bars on the side to add to the 'vintage' apeal.

another feature i really like when doing my product analysis was the gallery from SUPREME i thought it was a really creative way to showcase the clothes. made it by using the background images for each of the clothes and then turing them into buttons with links to their retrospective product. at first i found it hard to line things up and make everything clean and symentrical however after searching on youtube i found a snap to grid feature which was immensly helpful when making everything look neat amd presentable.

for the crew neck jumper i wanted something clean and plane as to not clash with the colorful nature of the jumpers print. at first i was going to use the same poster i used to making the actual jumper however when i tried it it looked too jumpled and messy so instead i used an image i had found frmo on an old archived 60s cartoon i found the calm colorpallete complimented the extravegent nature of the jumper well.

for the black hoodie i knew that i needed something dark and gothic as to compliment the design of the hoodie. finnally i found a dark forest that i though would go quite well. if there was something i could change it would be picking a slightly simpler background , i think the forest whilst tonily correct it is so messy that it makes the text of the website somewhat hard to read.

i also made a couple more items of clothing i though not to include as technicaly they were very simple to create. for example this turtle neck was just that with a image of the crusifix blended ontop. however though i chose not to include the turtle neck i do think that the webstie design for it is note worthy. just as i had made the background simpler for the crew neck i though to make this one colorful as to constrast with the rather simple design. used imgs from menace to society a niche 'stoner movie' popular with my demographic and then used the content aware fill to create a large image that could fill my webisite.

after finishing all aestheic elements my final task was to make it a fully functional shop. this was very daunting as i had no previous expeirence of making a shop before however with help from youtube and wixs built in shop tool i was able to create something effecient and to my liking. i also added a contact page where you could send quereys to 'customer service' directly aswell as writing a terms and conditions for buyers. i looked at T&C from other websites in particular CACTUS JACK and used theirs as a blueprint for mine. also on the bottom bar i added some quick access links whilst also including the line "dont steal mine sunshine" i thought these subtle detaills would really add character and personality to the website differeinciating itself from corporate brands. as no matter what i still want to push the concept of a self owned brand with an intimate customer relationship.

Eric Villacarlos

Chantelle Caghan

Alice Smith Allen

Nile Hamilton

"as an athiest i feel that mabey there is too much religous imagery... i really like the colorways and asymmetry "

"I like it but it looks expensive, I also feel that perhaps I am not part of the demographic"

"i admit i am not the target audience however i think for who it's meant for it fits perfectly... i like the more colorful designs"

" i really like the jacket i think it goes well with my wardrobe. it might be too loud for work"

i thought it would be helpful to include the opinion of people who perhaps were not part of my demographic to understand how the general public would perceive the brand and product. i tried to pick people for all different backgrounds so i had a more realistic understanding of my brand . which i could then compare with my own target audience to make evaluations and maybe make changes. a general consensus was that the religious imagery could perhaps throw people off from engaging with the brand. there was mixed opinion with the color pallet however nothing was overarchingly negative - at most they said it just wouldn't go with other clothes from their wardrobe which is as expected when choosing people outside of the demographic. another comment that was recurring was that they felt as if the clothing brand wasn't meant for them or it looked expensive - although this was meant in a negative way what it tells me is that my clothes are specifically made for my demographic and that it looks high quality which is what i wanted.

for my target demographic i used four people and gave them the rough mockups of the clothes to see what the consensus was and if there was anything i could do to improve upon the designs. one of the most common comments i got was that it needed more colorways as people would like the designs but thought it wouldn't go with everything in their wardrobe which was fair. Apart from that most of the comments were so specific that i decided not to take them into consideration- mabey ide use some less obscure deisgings and something thats would be more widely received.

Vanessa

Oli

Olivia

Demi

"EVALUATION"

"i like the sleeves, i dont like the neon-geens"

"more colorways for the same design, dont like red and blue"

likes the more simplier deisgns- likes jacket alot. doesnt understand link between the dice and angels

"i think there should be more colorways , too much is going on with the dice"

FINAL DESIGN - at first i decided i was going to redo each of the deisgns according to the feedback given by people from my demographic but i decided that this would be limiting and it would be more productive if i instead created an entirly new new designs incorporitating all the feeback i had gotten.

my first deign i dicided to keep it simple i used to same blank canvas hoodie from ladywhite.co added the signature logo to the front to keep in touch with everything else ive made. i cut out one of the faces from the skepta album ignorance is bliss (staying with the whole theme of uk subcultures and rave culture) i did this with the pen tool make a selection, then i used saturation adjustment to take out some of the color so that it fit better.

i asked some of my friends for feedback to which an overmelming ammount of responses stated that it was too simple and didnt go with the other stuff in my collection. so taking this in i decided to add details and l;ittle artifacts tp add tp the "complexity" of the deisgn. i used artwork from traditional thai tattoos - firstly invirted them (turn the black to white and vise versa then used the 'lighten tool' to take away the blacks.

after making the second draft i got the impressino that it was now 'too much' and i needed to tone it back abit so i took the majority of the thai artwork away leaving a badge on the right arm. i also left a 3d rendering of a skelington i had found online. i used a thermal overlay effect to go with the skepta image on the back. i asked for feedback from people i considered in my demographic and it was ultimatly hyper postive .

after the initial feedback i had gotten from the orignal deisgns i looked at some of the most popular recomendations and noted that the most asked for change was diffirent colorways for the same design. taking this into consideration i made three colorways; the orignal khaki green, then a black/gray designs i did this by adding a black overlay and used the saturation blending option, then finally a red overlay i did by adding a mask and using the blending tool aswell as curves to change the color of the hoodie to a burgenday/red colorway. i found that the orange skelington didnt go aswell with the red cotton so i used to the hue adn saturation tool to turn it into a blue and purple design.

in conclusion im very happy with what i was able to create. the clothes ive designed have fit the aesthetic i was reaching for whilst still being unique and niche. the website ive created is clean and sophisticated incorpirating some of the ideas from websites i analysed in my planning. i think my ability in photoshop has jurasticly improved in particular my ability to blend layers and manipulate them with the filter gallery and the hue/saturation tool. aswell as this ive become far more confident in website design- where as before i had never even attempted to make a website, with the help of youtube videos and wix tutorials i was able to get a great website for my brand making it fully functional whilst mainiting the functionality and pracitcalitys of a clothing store. if i could do it again i wish i created some promotional material for it ie. some posters and social media promo.