New term, new project!

Hello! So yesterday was the start of a brand new shiny term and it's all very exciting at the minute because that means that having handed in our visual communication and design & technical modules now, we are starting a whole new project! It's a design-only project and we are going to be working with a company to their brief. The project is on sportswear and we will be working with a UK-based company called More Mile, and designing for them a range of sportswear and running shoes. To do this, we will be completing another sketchbook like our previous design project and composing range plans on boards using Adobe Illustrator. Now I'm not usually a big sports person myself by any stretch of the imagination (however I AM forcing myself to the gym tonight!!!) but I am actually really really excited about this project! It's a short one lasting only 5 weeks but I feel really inspired and have already picked out my theme and started working, and we aren't even receiving our intro talk from the company until Thursday! I just want to throw myself into it and really knuckle down and produce a lot of different ideas. I don't know why I'm so suddenly enthusiastic but I am really glad that I am! Maybe it's because I'm excited about the opportunities working with a client to a brief could bring. Maybe all the tea I drink has gone to my head. Alas, it's a good thing either way.
Updates to follow!

Lauren xoxo

Connect with me on LinkedIn!

Hi everyone! Just a quick post to let you all know that I'm now on LinkedIn, so feel free to add me as connections! Click here to go to my profile :)

Lauren xoxo

Visual Communication: The big hand-in!

Hi everyone! really sorry I've been a bit quiet for ages again, hand-ins have been hectic! The big ones are done now though, so I thought I would just write a quick post to tell you about it. Okay, so the first hand-in I had was for visual communication; the module that the work in the previous post was for. This one was made up of two parts, hand-rendering and IT, which eventually came together in three final boards depicting a chosen collection, garment flats of it made on Adobe Illustrator, and your final illustrations of the collection which were made by hand-rendering first and were then scanned in and coloured digitally. If any of you missed my previous posts on this module, they can be found here and here! There was such a huge rush towards the end of my time up until the deadline and I was like a woman possessed trying to get it all done! I managed it in the end though with a whole three minutes to spare!!! (Time management isn't my strong point at all as you can tell!) Here's my final three boards for the project!

I'm really pleased with them, especially the last one with my final illustrations on!
Alongside this we also needed to hand in a sketchbook showing evidence of hand-rendering work and experimentation with different media. This bit was the worst and I didn't get much sleep getting it done! There was loads of work in it by the end though so I can't post every bit of it on here, but here are the best bits, and a few edits of them I did on photoshop as experiments!

Josephine Bowes' Dress, Bowes museum, from life, Oil Pastels.

Kate Moss, from reference, watercolours and fineliner.

Vanessa Paradis, from reference, ProMarkers and Adobe Photoshop.

Photoshop experiment from a reference of an Estee Lauder magazine advert.

Final Illustration 1, Photoshop.

Final Illustration 2, Photoshop.

Final Illustration 3, Photoshop.

Final Illustration 4, Photoshop.

Experiment in drippy inks, from magazine reference.

Hand studies, from life and magazine references.

Feet studies, from magazine references.

An eye, Biro Pen, from reference.

An eye, graphite pencil, from reference.

Negative drawing of a bird's nest done on a workshop at the Dorman Museum, Middlesbrough. Graphite crayon and eraser, from life.

Montana Forbes study, ProMarkers.

Freya Flavell study, Watercolour.

Freya Flavell study, ProMarkers.

Ilse Valfre study, Oil Paints.

Hajin Bae study, coloured pencils.

Sabine Pieper study, Oil Paints.

Sky Ferreira, Biro pen, from reference.

Edits, Adobe Photoshop.

Hope you enjoyed seeing my work! I'm really pleased with how it all turned out. I'll be updating my art blog with it soon. I also had deadlines for my technical folder and my design project too, but I'm still yet to get decent phots of it, but I will make a post on it when I've got some!

Lauren xoxo

Christmas catch-up

Hello everyone! Really sorry I haven't posted in absolutely ages, I've been so so busy with it being Christmas and everything I just haven't had time. I hope everyone's had an amazing Christmas and New Year! I have, but the downside to that is that I now have a LOT of work to do for uni before Monday... one of these days I will learn not to leave it until last minute! Nonetheless, I've had a really productive night so far. I'm trying to catch up with my work for Visual Communication because the deadline for the module is really soon after we go back after Christmas. Something I've been meaning to do for ages is do my artist research, so I've been focusing on that for the past few days. I have to do 5 studies of the same piece in different media, for 5 different artists/illustrators. I've chosen Ilse Valfre (one of my favourite illustrators!), Sabine Pieper, Freya Flavell aka. Doodloodloo, Montana Forbes, and Hajin Bae. So far I've got through all five for Montana Forbes and Sabine Pieper. Here's a look at what I've done so far. I'm only posting one of the Montana Forbes ones though because it's the only one of those five that I really liked; I just don't think that the other media I used really lent itself very well to the image. I guess that's why you experiment though, to find these things out! Anyway, here they are:

Another thing I've been really excited to tell you guys is about my Christmas presents. I know what you're thinking: how is that relevant at all? Stay with me though! There's two that I'm particularly excited about. The first one is this baby...

ISN'T IT GORGEOUS?! (Like I needed to ask!) This is the Nikon D3100. I've been lusting after an SLR for quite some time, I've been sick of distorted and pixelated and blurry images and I thought that since I run a blog now and my course is one that will involve photography at some point, it makes sense to have an upgrade. Courtesy of Santa, of course... (ahem, thank you Mother!!!)
I also got a long distance focus lens and a tripod for it off my Dad. So expect better quality images hereafter! Yay for great cameras!
Onto the second thing. Here she is...

(Excuse the hairy carpet, I have two Jack Russells and no motivation to hoover.)

How gorgeous?! I'd be over the moon if I got this just as a pretty ornament, but I'm particularly excited because it's fully serviced and working, so I can actually use it!!!
Which brings me onto my exciting news! I shall be using my new machine very soon, because over the holidays my inner entrepreneur has been niggling away at me, and I am very excited to say that I am opening my own online shop! I'll be selling handmade things, however I'm not going to spill the beans on what that is until it's fully up and running, but a post is to follow announcing the launch very soon I promise! Eeeek! :D
I'm wondering if I've missed anything to tell you all... I've always had the memory of a goldfish, no doubt I will have missed something. Oh well, if I have it will come to me. I'd better go now though because I have to be up in eight hours for work! No rest for the wicked...

Ciao for now,

Lauren xoxo