essays and coke bottles...

Just a short update of the past few days I've had while I have the chance. Handed in my last module a few days ago so I've had a few days rest before the next one started up today! More about that in a sec. First I wanted to talk about something I found in London when I went a few days ago...

You know it's christmas when they release the new christmas themed coke bottles! Now I haven't been able to find any information on it like who the designer is, but I will keep looking. I just love the designs around the bottom:

Not the best picture I'll admit, but you can sorta make out the swirls representing snow/wind, against a purple skyline. I actually had trouble getting hold of this, as the barman thought i was gonna bottle someone with it. I don't think he bought my 'I'm a designer!' story. The lengths we go to.

Anyway. I'm currently writing a 1500 word essay for my course on the designer April Greiman. Never heard of her before she was bought up in one of my lectures, and shes a pretty interesting woman. She was the first designer to embrace the use of the apple mac for design so that's gotta at least put her on the map! And she works in all medias as well including posters, t.v, 72ft. tall murals ( http://www.xymara.com/inmyx/index/inmyx408/act-200804-index/act-200804-mural.htm) but trying to condense down her life into 250 words is whats causing issues. She's done a lot of stuff! If you like abstract, and pretty random looking stuff then I'd advise you to check out her work sometime. Or even get hold of one of her books!

Even though Monday's are usually my day off, we all got called in for the day today to kick start our next module: 'moving image'. We had 2 people from Aardman Studios (Creature Comforts, Wallace & Gromit etc. check their website for more info: (http://www.aardman.com/) and we spent most of the day watching the first 5 or so minutes of animated films, and a few shorts such as 'Oktapodi' (http://www.slashfilm.com/2008/09/02/votd-oktapodi/) and 'Pib and Pog (http://www.atom.com/funny_videos/pib_pog/). We were given our brief which is to create a 10 second animation featuring some kind of communication between a bird and a human, and we ended the day doing some very quick scrapbook type collages of our initial ideas for the brief. It was so interesting to see everyones different interpretations, done in the same 3 colours (we only had 3 different coloured papers) and when put together in a slideshow by our tutor they looked a lot like a storyboard of their own!

Talking of storyboards, one of te guys from Aardman bought along some of her sketchbooks showing her storyboards and character designs. They blew me away. And she started off doing a graphic design degree. Another career possibility added to the list!

Lastly, I bought a fantastic book when I visited London called 'The History of Advertising'. It may not be brimming with information, but it has all the basic features of each timeframe from the 1800's up to 2005. It's got amazingly clear images, and at the start of each chapter it lists the pioneers of that time frame i.e design agencies. Either buy it, or find it in your local library. Either way it does have some useful information in it, especially if you are feeling drawn to a career in advertising (obviously).

Next update will probably be an update of the list of books, websites etc I've got running, seeing as over the next few weeks I will be doing a lot of animation based research, so keep checking back for that update!