Studio Brief 2 - Acts of Kindness

Brief

• 2 weeks.
• Produce a singular, circular sticker.
• Encourage people to be kind.
• 80mm diameter.
• No more than two colours.
• Made using Adobe Illustrator.
• Focus on shape and reduced forms.
• Arrangement and composition
• List 10 acts of kindness 
• Produce rough visuals of ideas.

Initial Thoughts

• Do I have to be kind?
• This kind of stuff makes me cringe a little bit. I don't want to put stickers everywhere telling people how to be kind.
• Unless it involves being kind to cats.
• Should people be nicer to pigeons?

Luke Drozd

When I heard this brief I instantly thought of Luke's 'Scout Merit Badges'.

These are clearly not vectors with smooth edges. However, the idea of using minimalistic colours and shapes.

The idea of the patches came from merit badges given to scouts although Drozd altered them to make them more 'fun'. Including a patch for Cannibalism and Mind Control.

As a whole these patches will be helpful in the process of making my designs with the thought of minimalism to express my message.

Another strong part to these patches in particular is the humour which is consistent in each design which I may look further into for my own sticker designs.

Kindness List

This is the first bunch of ideas that I could think of which I'm sure will develop further as I begin drawing.

Some ideas stand out more than others. In particular, being nicer to cats and girls shaving their hair off. 

Currently, I prefer the ideas that are more personal to me and other girls. As well as the being nice to cats idea. I hate people that don't like cats for no apparent reason.

I am going to begin visually developing my ideas using the most simplistic shapes possible.

Roughs

I began drawing from my initial ideas from the list whilst thinking about how I could use the most minimal shapes and colours ready for the vector approach.

Some designs appeared to be a lot easier than others when using simple shapes.

I like the cat design with the tail wrapping around the text.

Although, I don't think that the text is an essential part to the brief so I am going to continue developing my ideas further.

The text seems to be throwing me off a bit. I don't just want to place the text at the top or bottom on the sticker. I want it to look good or not be there at all.

Meaning I need to make my design be strong visually to make the viewer understand my message.

I am going to continue drawing more of the ideas from the list and begin to think more about the colours.

I definitely want to develop this further to create a strong message for girls. Shaving your head is liberating and I'm glad I did it. 

This is one of my most passionate ideas but I need to make the visual element of it a lot stronger.

What makes a person look feminine?

Aside from hair.

I developed the initial 'shave your head' idea into 'cut your hair short' making the character look a lot more female with the initial long hair that she is about to cut. As well as the eyebrows and eye shape which seems to have helped the character to become feminine.

This idea could further be developed by simplifying the shapes even further. As well as using the techniques I learnt during the illustrator workshops (especially for the eyebrows).

The idea of being confident with the way you look and making that visual doesn't seem to be working for me. Each variation I have planned isn't striking enough, not even for me, never mind the person viewing it.

I have practised with the scale of different elements and whether I want the design to be full bleed or not but it just doesn't appear to be working.

To develop this further I plan on looking into using more than one character in the singular circle to see if my message is expressed better.

This design is another one of my strongest as a composition. However, when thinking about the colours of the piece I don't know how I will keep it to a minimum of 2 or less.

Does a pigeon look like a pigeon without its purple/green neck?

Is the hand relevant to the design?

I am going to focus on the colours for each of my strongest designs just using basic felt tips and possibly moving onto paper cut to practise with the simplicity of the shapes.

I am the most passionate about the cat idea because people hold grudges against cats for no reason and there's nothing more annoying than that.

I have focused on the colours that I plan on making my design with. 

However, I can't decide if this idea as a whole is too simplistic and won't get any attention meaning people won't be nicer to cats.

When I made the design using Illustrator it looks a lot stronger. The colours are a lot more complimentary and don't blend in with one another. I like the bum hole idea the most. 

Who knew a simple shape and a few overlapping lines could define a cat?

Although I am happy with this design I am going to continue to further develop my other ideas using Illustrator to see which is the best at visually communicating my act of kindness.

The pigeon still needs development because of the amount of colours needed to make it look like a pigeon.

I don't want the text to be the only thing that makes it clear that it's a pigeon.

This has developed massively when using 2 colours to create the design. I have focused on making the lines as straight as possible. Although, will it look more hair like with a wavy line? Especially on Illustrator.

The wavy lines in the hair reminded me that one of the points on my list was having a bath (which I'm extremely passionate about) so I looked into different angles of someone in the bath. 

I love the top angle design of someone laying in the bath which I have managed to create using just 2 colours.

But will this be a lot harder to create using illustrator?

I am going to try to create both perspectives and see which looks best digitally.

I used paper cut before making any of my favourite designs digitally which helped me in making the shapes as simple as possible before jumping onto Illustrator.

Some of the designs are a lot stronger than others.

I discovered that the cat design needs simple features such as whiskers to make it clear. I like the use of negative space that I have used to make the whiskers as well as the orange of the heart adding colour to the nose.

Using paper cut has made me realise that some designs may be too complex to make when sticking to basic shapes.

I am still most appealed to the cat's bumhole idea because of how the text will intertwine with the design.

 The pigeon is still doing my head in. It doesn't help when I don't have a lot of coloured paper.

You still can't tell it's a pigeon without using text to make it clear.

Maybe if I use something other than grains it'll make it more clear.

What's a pigeon's favourite food?

 Probably bread.

I am trying to capture the best way I can make bread using paper and one colour.

Would it really be eating a full loaf of bread?

It would probably try.

The first design is my personal favourite because of the simplicity of the shape whereas the others seem to be a bit more complex and possibly confusing on a small sticker design.

 This needs something more.

Could I limit down even further?

I've been thinking about the pieces of hair alone without having to use the head shape and eyes.

Should I separate it into strands?

Are the eyes really needed?

I am going to focus on making the design more of an action with separate pieces of hair instead of a whole head.

 This is so much stronger but would I be able to make this clear when the dimensions of the sticker are a lot smaller?

I like the use of the strands of hair in different directions making the piece more of an action with just a few simple lines.

The only problem is that purpose of this sticker design was to make it a female cutting her off which isn't clear in the limited design.

Maybe the eyes are definitely needed. I am going to try this when I make a digital version on Illustrator.

I'm a little bit unsure on this one because of the lack of making use of the 2 colours.

Is using gradient cheating?

But if I didn't use gradient the scissors don't look like scissors.

What I like about this design is the waves in the hair and the how I created her eyebrows using the scribble effect on Illustrator which makes the design look more complex than what it is.

The eyebrows and eyes also seem to make the character look more feminine which is what I wanted. 

If I was to make this design again I would consider using full bleed filling more of the sticker with colour and also think about what different colours I could use to possibly add colour to her skin so she isn't washed out by the background.

Mono-printing 

The mono printing workshop has allowed me to further develop my shapes by creating quick designs that can be altered through using different coloured inks and stencils.

I enjoyed mono printing but started to get bored as I felt like I kept repeating the same process over and over and drained myself of new ideas.

The man in the bath seemed like the best idea to develop when mono printing because of the simple shapes as well as the possible effects I could make with the water ripples.

 Some of the designs are clearly a lot stronger than others. On this one I tried to make the whole design blue thinking that the thicker areas of ink would make the shapes stand out more against the background.

This is one of the stronger designs I made because of the different elements being different colours which stops them from blending together.

However, it could have been made stronger by making the wave elements a lighter blue shade than the background and the skin a light pink/red tone.

I tried to achieve this multiple times but I couldn't work it out.

This piece in particular has given me ideas when it comes to making a sticker design on illustrator because of how the ripples in the water can be layered underneath the body parts that are on show.

This is my favourite design out of the three practices I have made on illustrator. 

The fact that such a simple shapes can create the head and knees of the character to make it look like he's in the bath blows my mind. I like the use of the ripples in the water which further emphasises the bath.

If I were to make this design again I would possibly try to add colour to the background of the sticker to make it full bleed. However, this might make the text blend into the background too much making it unreadable.

 Final Design

I have decided on this design as my final printed sticker because it's the one I am most passionate about. 

The use of the circular space is the strongest in this design because of the tail with the text which slots in around it.

I can't wait to stick them around Leeds and hopefully people will read them and take action on being nice to cats.