Book Fair~

For the 13th annual book fair at Leeds university. I actually really enjoyed doing this, despite having to cut the characters by half. There's an equal number down of the 2 major competitive publishers (marvel and DC) as well as some small company's. (and I cheated a little bit, one of them is my own but he was drawn as a last resort and came in handy at 1 in the morning when I only had 19 instead of 20.)

I've had allot of interest in these, one of them is being shipped to the states next week. Hopefully they'll sell well at the fair.

(I don't have a picture of the tags however...)

My YCN Boards

YCN Boards

Illustration depicting the old London town scene with the chimney sweeps and the Mary Poppins esq character in the background.
Shop windown mock up that I created with the scene inside. I made it, Kate added it to the boards with the annotations and the general board making. It took some time to get it made and mocked up so it would look right, and I had to fiddle with the angle a little bit. But I think it turned out ok.


And lastly, the inside merchandise that I don't patticualry think worked very well. The idea behind it was pretty sound. Have keyrings with the characters and edible soot as well as the bag's that the clothing would be handed over to the customer in.

Sky Lines

This brief has been a bit of a struggle. Luckily thanks to a productive day in the mac suites we ironed out our design direction, bit the bullet and got down to some design decisions.

Up until that point we had both designed scenes for our window displays which looked completely different. Both were good, and we didn't want to compromise either design so the challenge then was to somehow tie these two designs together. I then tried to merge the two designs and I think it some what works.

A Step Back~

From our crit last week, Kate and I realised that our concept was not strong enough. It also wasn't clear enough. We miss read the brief and where not getting the right kind of feel for it. So today was another brain storming day and we're confident that we've cracked it this time.

Brief: Create a autumn/winter window display for Ted Baker. Must be scaleable, British and eye catching. Running with an alternative autumnal theme.

Concept: A British autumn is not just dead leaves

Theme: Windy London, Edwardian Era, Sky-scrapes, Movement, Mary Poppins, Bowler hats, kitsch.

To do List (for my own state of mind) : Why Mary Poppins? - Not a blatant rip off but a themed idea, something to focus upon. Needs more clarification.

Blog, make cardboard mock- windows, design sheets, clarify design direction.

Chim Chiminey~

Crit Feed Back

Feed Back for wednesdays crit.

Our crit feedback was really really useful.
There were only two main points we went away with and those were:
- Clarify concept
- Pin point a specific type of British Humor (e.g. Doctor Who)


After the crit we had a bit of a separation period, I think we'd spent the week getting all into what we were doing so we couln't see things from the outside. It was like we'd spent a week decorating a really big pretty box and we got so into it we ended up inside the box and couldn't get out.

We knew what we had to do next but didn't really get around to it as quick as maybe we should have done!

Finally we've come to the realisation that we need to totally re-think where we were coming from in terms of design direction.

Brief: Create a autumn/winter window display for Ted Baker. Must be scaleable, British and eye catching. Running with an alternative autumnal theme.

Concept: A British autumn is not just dead leaves.

Theme: Windy London, Edwardian Era, Sky-scrapers, Movement, Mary Poppins, Bowler hats, kitsch.
We are now going to be looking at a Mary Poppins inspired window display and in-store merchandise.

Book Fair:

A couple of the characters I'm planning to have on a poster to sell at the book fair in the upcoming week. The theme is blue superhero's be it there skin/fur/hair or even armour. I was going to try and pantone their colours but as each depicaion of them is differnt theres not really any way to do it so I'm simply going to state who they are and what book they come from.

(Sketch pictures to go here)

Maggot:

Nightcrawler:
Beast:

I'm going to re-do Maggot. The blue is too sky blue.

Poster Mock Up:


I have a lot more to do before next week. I was hoping to packgage them in poster tubes but I don't want to over spend if no one is going to buy these.

Edit:

That's better Maggot.

Kates Info Graphics

So we did some survery's asking people what they thought of both being british and their views on Ted Baker. We had both a British audience and an American audience as both Kate and I have friends in/from the states.




Overall, people didn't think to much of Ted Baker and this is a problem we have to address.

Idea 3:

3rd rough idea for the TB shop windows. From here we'll go onto designing the in-store material to tie in with the theme outside. It's easier to start with the bigger thing first. The bit that's going to drag the customers into the store.

Autumn = Windy weather! Lots of umbrellas and leafs floating around the place.

Idea 2:

Because Kate has Idea one for reference at the moment so I'll start with this one!

Window display theme for Ted Baker. We're trying to keep with the autumn theme as that's what they're after as well as trying to add a little humour and that quirkiness they seem to think they have.


Rough Idea first of what we're proposing. A very surreal setting with adult mannequins displaying the new autumn winter collection amongst a very odd setting. The background to the whole window would be a red wallpaper with possible flecks of gold. The gold paper would also be worked into the model tree on the leaves. We're not quite sure at the moment whether the tree would be a d model of a cut out.


I have never drawn a horse before. not bad for the first time. Yes, strangely enough when I think of autumn I think of fair grounds and carousels. (as does kate) We're umming and arring whether or not to have a manequin on this. Whether or not TB wants to invest in a carousel horse...we'll, we're waiting on their email back to us. (that's if we get one)

Kate has sent of for some wall paper samples for the back drop to the window. This is also a theme we would have running through the entire shop. I had an an idea for give-away freebies that TB like to do such as Cinder toffee or candy apples (Bonfire and autumn seem to run together. Bonfire being a very British thing.)

My very pitiful tree that would be either 3d modelled or cut out. I like the idea of it being a 3d model so it would stand out a bit more. Especially with the idea of fallen leaves scatted along the ground in great big piles. It's a shop window I'd want to play in instead of a shop I'd want to shop in.

More to come~

Idea 1:

(Will upload the images when Kate puts them onto her blog)