Summer

Over the summer I focused on learning to drive, I went to the beach a lot and other places such as the cinema. I also helped someone with their company logo, using the right text and colour scheme to suit it and that went really well.
 I would like to get good enough grades to either stay on at college for a degree, or go to a good university to get a qualification that will help me start a career. I want to improve my drawing skills and my computer skills, especially photoshop, illustrator etc, because these are the things I use most during designing, from the sketches to the final product. I also want to improve at collecting research, e.g. to obtain it at a quicker rate so it will give me more time to design ideas and complete my projects.

Typography project

This was a project on typography where I was given three words at random, and we had to try and show the meaning of the word using the correct typeface and images etc, but we had to keep images at a minimum, because we weren't meant to illustrate the word we were just meant to give off it's meaning.

My research was to find out about the history of typography, and to research into all the correct terms in typography, kerning, leading etc, so i could then use them later on in the project to explain what i had done.
I did a lot of in depth research into typefaces and tree shapes to use for my design, and when i found one of each which i liked, i decided to try them together, i changed the i to an upside down '?' and then including all of my development this is my final piece.

It is a pencil drawing of the tree which is detailed but not too detailed, with some of the letters partially hidden behind the branches to give off a 'mysterious' feel. To finish it i went over the lines with fine liner just to make it stand out that little bit more. If i did this project again i think i would go with a different approach, maybe masks hiding the letters or some letters missing from the word, but overall i was really happy with the outcome.

Carried Away

This bag design was for a project named 'Carried away'. My primary research for this was to collect carrier bags from any store and see how they looked, what materials were used etc. From the start when i chose Topman as my chosen store, I knew i wanted to try out an aztec design as it's contemporary and suits the store perfectly. I created the bag all digitally using illustrator and photoshop. If i did this again, I think I would experiment more with mixed media and also the alignment of the text on the bag even though I think it looks good it in the centre.

Contextual studies poster

This was for a group project in contextual studies, which we were given an art style different to everyone else to recreate, and we had to do a poster or book cover the style given to us and our style was Punk. Our chosen film was night of the living dead and we decided to create a poster for that.

Our inspiration was the classic punk style of newspaper letter cutouts for texts as well as bright splashes of colour. We wanted to carry on the rough sketchy appearance of punk art. 
When the initial ideas were finished we scanned in the letter cutouts and each separate version of the face. Once we had that done we collated the images and placed them onto a document in Photoshop. We then tested which filters and layer styles created the best looking poster. Our choice was a half-tone filter for the bottom layer and with the ‘overlay’ layer style on the top layer. To finish we added gradients to the poster to allow it to draw more attention to the image in the centre of the poster.

I like the final outcome and feel that we did well in creating this film poster in a punk style, I also like how the shadows give the poster a 3D effect to give more depth. I am happy with the overall poster and if we did this again i don't know anything we could improve.

On the surface

These are magazine covers for a project called 'On the surface'. I researched into a lot of different patterns, artists who created patterns and what sort of objects they placed their patterns onto. I chose the hi-tech category and based my final piece on 'Tron', so i had an idea of what colours to use etc. The shapes are pieces of technology, broken down into their individual shapes and placed together to create an abstract shape that still looked 'hi-tech'. The first one is an ipod, and the second is a camera, i got the ideas for this from my primary research (going into town and taking photographs of any hi-tech objects i could find). I drew the images to create initial ideas then used illustrator and photoshop to complete the pattern digitally. Looking back on it, i think i would rather have used a different gradient or type of colour fill for each instead of the same one, because they look really similar. I think i would also use two objects, which had completely different shapes, for the same reason. Overall i am happy with the final outcome of this project and the two covers complement each other which was the main thing.

Blueberry digital painting.

This work was for the digital skills project. I chose to do this with dry media brushes on photoshop rather than wet media because i prefer pastels to paint etc. I would experiment with the wet media brushes if i did this again to see how that would turn out.

You're a smoothie!

This label was for a project called 'you're a smoothie'. I researched how different shops gave off a healthy message using their packaging; the font which was used, the colour scheme etc. I particularly liked the thought of using an 8-bit style for my target audience because it was something that a gamer, aged 16-35 would immediately recognise. The slogan 'get a life' is another thing that a gamer would recognise instantly. I made this by scanning the logo into a computer and basically following the shape square by square, with the first layer of suares being black, second a light red then the inside with a strong red to make it look more like it is from a game. The rest of the label was made digitally too. If i did this again, I would do a series of different colour schemes and shapes/fruits for a series of flavours to have a wider variety.

First post

My name is Jordan Jennings. I am 17 years old and I study graphic design. I started this blog so that I could post work for college, this allows people to comment on it and give me feedback and criticism for individual pieces to help me improve my work.

I chose a nice and simple layout with one column on either side of the blog to keep it organised. The colour scheme is cream and black because i think they look really good together. The font i chose is a script font to go with the colour scheme and i think it works.

I like mixed media work a lot. I like detailed pencil drawings because of the realistic look they have when they are done correctly.