Key to the door

This week was my 21st Birthday and I wanted to celebrate it in style, with my family before my departure for China and possible traveling for the year. As keep sake the women in my family and close family friends gave me this to forever remember the memories with them from my birthday celebrations.

I also had a photo booth set up with props to hand to capture some snaps. I later turned this into photo strips which I plan to send to people as thank you cards.

 

 

NAP x

Sky Arts Ident

My entry for the Sky Arts Ident 2014 competition.

The brief was to produce a short 20 second film to sit within their programming schedule to remind viewers which channel they are watching and give the sense of what Sky Arts stands for creatively. 

 

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IDP Architects

We were given the opportunity to work with a residential care home specializing with people suffering from dementia in Coventry and an architects design team. For this project the care home wanted to to uplift some areas for the residents with some stimulating visuals to help with their condition. There were three areas of the home to concentrate on in particular, a connecting hallway, a cafe and additionally a room where the residents will relax in and socialize with one another. 

This brief was also set as a competition so the panel (IDP architects and a member of Coventry City council representing the care home and works to care for people with dementia) were to award a group the possibility to see their ideas implemented in the residential home. 

Below our my groups ideas for each area. My first proposal was to turn the connecting corridor into an interactive street 'memory lane' with iconic and memorable artifacts from British history.  The 'corner shop' concept was to have news main articles and headlines from the 1930's to the present day as to remind the residents of days gone by. Interactive elements such as current newspapers, televisions sets and radios were to be introduced as a way for the residents to talk about their memories and share their experiences in a happy and social manner.

 

We later changed our proposal for memory lane and each had input into all elements presented.

For the cafe area we proposed the idea of creating tiles and metal signs of iconic British food brands and advertisements to display on all walls. We created some prototypes ourselves using the facilities at the university, this was a great learning experience to see the process' of our work. Below our some visuals I created for the presentation to show our idea in context.

We also created some placements and coasters using records and menu designs as the record sleeves.

As an added artifact, we decided to include a game for the residents, to help with their memory and social skills, to be placed within the living room area. I choose to redesign a pack of playing cards as many games can be played using them and residents will already know how to use them in many ways. On each playing card a familiar face will appear or event with a short caption or headline with dates. This is to help with memories and hopefully become a talking point amongst residents whilst interacting and involving with one another.

I have always loved to design interior spaces and feel this project has enabled me to think about mixing my love of interior design and graphic design.  I hope for more chances to express my skills in interior design and furnishings with my work and plan to branch out and develop my love of designing spaces.

NAP x

A year of travel ahead

Recently, I have been planning on taking an enhancement year whilst deferring my third and final year at university here in Coventry. This will allow me to gain some international experience studying or working in a placement and aid in building contacts, my portfolio work and my self-confidence.

I have officially applied for my year studying abroad and narrowed my choices down to Cyprus and (my second choice) Madrid. It has become clear that I will more than likely be studying in Cyprus therefore I feel some language skills would come in handy. As the university doesn't offer the chance to learn Greek the second option will be to learn Turkish, with classes starting this week hopefully I will be able to build upon learning the language in hopes it will come in handy whilst living in Cyprus.

Recently meetings have been arranged to talk about the China exchange trip and what we can expect and what arrangements need to be made. Some information about the trip is as follows:

Central South (CSU) Chang Sha, 2 week exchange likely to be last week of term in March and first week of Easter holiday. Taking part in lectures, seminars, exercises, activities such as exhibitions/workshops etc whilst in China, following their typical schedule, which will be in the studio everyday 8/8.30am - 7pm. Some excursions to villages, tourism sites new and old China, trips to studios, exhibitions etc. will be scheduled and published however these plans do get changed and altered. A short video was shown of a past trip filmed by a student. Here is the video part 2, which was shown to us. I have also watched part 1 and part 3 to see the whole film and trip. A blog will be set up for us to document our experiences relating to all aspects of the trip.

This year is looking like a year full of once in a lifetime travel and work opportunities for myself.

NAP x

A Hard Rain

For this project I created a book based around the title 'A Hard Rain'. I focused my 1000 word story around Storm chasers Tim and Paul Samaras and Carl Young and the final events from their last chase.

I decided to show the movement of the storm and its power by combining the typography with the ink-like stained illustrations of the tornado and rain. I kept all colour to just black and white for a very bold contrast representing the the dense clouds and dangerous sense of the events unfolding.

I stitched every page edge together to create a concertina format, so the reader may follow on to each page uninterrupted. Each page has been perforated so as the stitching is hidden, the front and back pages perforation have been purposely left to keep a sense of fragility.

 

The only requirement in the brief was an A2 piece of material must be used. To comply with the brief I used an A2 piece of white tissue paper to keep that sense of fragility representing the lives of the storm chasers. The very thin and opaque characteristic of the tissue paper also creates the sound of rain and a storm above when unwrapping the book.

 

NAP x

A year of possibilities

The last week of uni before the Christmas break and already I'm starting to make plans for the new year ahead. This week I have been talking with an adviser, part of the international experience faculty, about the opportunities and offers that are available to me whilst at University. I also wanted to find out more about the module spoke about recently in one of our lectures on ERASMUS and the possibilities of placements in a working studio abroad or studying at a faculty in Europe.

He suggested to research some potential opportunities in Europe suggesting to look at Scandinavia, Finland, Sweden, Cyprus, Madrid, Milan and France in particular for Graphic Design. With a link to the application needed to fill out and return by January, this will be task to complete over Christmas as well as applying for a passport and emailing my portfolio and CV along with a covering letter to possible work placements to undertake.

Many students on the graphic design course have been talking about an up coming visit to China with our course. I wish to find out a little bit more about this chance to experience their culture, universities and the creative industry out there. I believe that taking part in this trip will help me get to know my peers and tutors more, develop myself and work and help my CV and experience of graphic design globally.

NAP x

Portfolio & CV

With my recent plans in the making I have redesigned my creative CV and put together some portfolio pdf's which I aim to send out to creative agencies and studios in the UK in the hope to gain some work experience or feed back on my work. Below our my details such as online portfolios, contact details, skills, experience and how I have displayed these in a pleasing format to represent myself.

I have yet to compile more portfolio pages such as these below.

NAP x