signalarts98clientstudiesblog

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Post 12 – ClothCat animation live brief and final overall thoughts on the Client Studies module.

Cloth Cat Brief 

The Final Major Project with Client Studies was a character design collaborative brief for Cardiff-based animation studio Clothcat Animation. Even though by this point I had done more than enough hours as part of my placement with The Creative Shop (90 hours in total, 20 over the 70-hour threshold), I wanted to tackle a more creative live brief too. The brief specified creating a character and a sidekick from the year 2222 living in a world based on one of three themes: technological, aquatic or floral. Through creating mindmaps and mood boards, I came up with two main designs of which one was a female cyborg cop called with a robotic police dog (which I never completed but did a model made out of blue tac which was to be a reference when I was going to draw it) and the other was a young explorer named Wilder with his sidekick called Ham (a robotic hammerhead shark/jetski/mini-sub hybrid). After meeting up with ClothCat, they really liked both of my concepts which gave me further incentive to continue their development, until I eventually chose Wilder and Ham as I thought these two characters hit its target audience of kids aged 6-8  more effectively than Eva which was aimed at older audiences of 8-12.

However, while I was enjoying the ClothCat brief and continued working on it when we came back after Christmas, an unfortunate clash occurred when, in the week when the second round of feedback was taking place, I would be going on a trip to Antwerp and Berlin. Even if I continued working after I got back from the trip, I would not have had enough time to complete to refine the characters, the key image and come up with the comic in time to achieve a high, polished standard that would be acceptable to the client. In the end, I cut my losses and decided to abandon the ClothCat brief with the key image unfinished and the comic not started. I really didn`t want to do this as I know that to have this on my CV would have been good for me and I had already done some work on it. Despite this bittersweet situation and outcome, I will complete it eventually and include it in my portfolio as another example of my illustration work and how I develop character designs.

Client Studies module overall thoughts 

Overall, I found my time doing the Client Studies to be that of mixed experiences that were most largely positive save for a few issues. Firstly, I was accepted and enjoyed my placement at The Cardiff Creative Shop immensely and developed some new connections with other creatives that work there. I also felt that my confidence was boosted from the social interactions and I feel that I have a good enough relationship with the shop to enable me to sell my artwork and merchandise there later this year.  Even so, I wish that I could have done better on the preparation side of things such as getting a creative CV done in time (which would have helped me long term) and perhaps should have done a bit more searching for other types of placements such as possible live briefs. Secondly, working on the Portal Exhibition went really well in terms of coming up with an interesting exhibition piece relating to a theme that had plenty of scope. I also enjoyed working on the social media team and made a few contributions to getting sponsors and raffle prizes for the exhibition, putting up posters and helping out with events such as the Drink and Draw. However, the drama between a few of the team members plus one of the project managers created a sense of tension within the team which was, at times, frustrating (but which was resolved eventually). The Portal Exhibition, in the end, was a great success and I feel proud of what I and my friends achieved which will stand us in good stead for when we come to create the final end of year exhibition. As for the final project of the module, the ClothCat brief, it didn`t go as well as I'd hoped despite really enjoying it and creating interesting characters and sidekicks. Time constraints, unfortunate clashing circumstances such as the Berlin trip and being overly ambitious in taking on the project in the first place when it really wasn`t necessarily meant that I found find it difficult to complete without sacrificing other more important module projects such as the Final Major Project and Competition Brief. In the future, I will try to plan ahead and think in greater depth when taking on projects to avoid biting more off than I can chew. This is definitely something I need to bear in mind for my Final Major Project.

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Post 11 - Arthole Strikes Back  Exhibition

During my time in The Creative Shop, I came into contact with a girl named Kayleigh who was distributing flyers for a then-upcoming pop-up illustration fair she and her friend Elliot were organising. They are a duo known as Arthole and they were planning to hold an event on the 27th of October 2019 at Kongs Bar and Arcade. I showed her some of my work as I am keen to get my work out there and we chatted for a bit. This is another example of how the shop is a great networking place for interesting connections, in my view and what ultimately led me to apply to do Arthole. While applying for the show in October didn’t go so well as I wasn’t accepted due to space issues, I did apply again and got accepted for another event in December. For this art fair, called ArtHole Strikes Back (which was at Cineworld cinema on the weekend the New Star Wars film was on), I had to create completely new stock, consisting of lino printed stickers and larger train-themed prints as my existing supply of stickers had been inadvertently left in the Uni staff office over the holiday period. I did find this experience rather stressful as my elderly cat, Blackie, had just died and as I had just broken up from Uni I was in holiday mode! It was also my first time attempting to organise the display, wrapping and general layout of my work. I had, however, priced my work before for three previous University exhibitions. I based my pricing structure for the Arthole event on that of a girl called Rhian (@rhiexists on Instagram) whose lino printed work I saw whilst working at The Creative Shop.

During preparations for The ArtHole Strikes Back event, I worked very hard to create my linoprints in time. I did, however, underestimate how much work was necessary and ended up staying up until 6am the night before the event. I did not realise how much work was involved regarding the logistics and display of my work. My father Mike had the brainwave to display the cassette tape stickers in old cassette boxes turned the other way around, so the stickers would stand up. This was very effective, in my opinion, as it was a retro-themed display choice.

The event itself on Sunday 22nd of December went really well as I made £43, which, considering the bulk of the stock sold was stickers which were priced at 50p and £1, was not too bad, in my view. It was also great to meet up with Kayleigh and Elliot from ArtHole again,  to chat with the other creatives trading at the event and to show them my work and was a great place for socialising overall. Despite this, there were a few issues with the event in that the majority of the potential audience of movie goers just weren’t interested in buying items from all of the stalls and so the majority of the revenue came from other visiting traders and their friends. Also, on a personal note, due to the frantic nature of my prepping for the exhibition, I didn`t make any business cards which, while it didn’t affect me too much, could have helped me look more professional and would have allowed people to know more about SignalArts Illustration such as social media and contact details. Overall, participating in this art fair was a great experience for me and helped improve my confidence as if proved that I can make illustration work that people like and will buy.

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Post 10 -  The Portal Exhibition and overall thoughts

With all the promotional work done, despite a few issues arising along the way, the time for the Portal Exhibition came around with the opening night on the 24th of October at Jacobs Market. I managed to get my digitally-altered lino print piece, `A Portal to a Troubled Mind' and the AR 'brain sparks' cable function done in time for the night which was something I had been very anxious about. As for the night itself, it went really well with little to no issues for the most part, in my view. Most of us were in attendance along with several of our relatives including my parents who loved the exhibition and thought that the interactive AR features were a hit as they brought a new level of immersion to our work. As for the main exhibition opened to the public, while I was looking after the gallery along with others, I found it to be very thin on the ground at times in terms of attendance, unfortunately.  This could be have been down to the bad weather at the time, the fact that was only on a couple of days rather than a full week and also Jacobs Market isn`t entirely in the centre of Cardiff meant that it couldn't catch the traffic flow of people quite so easily.

After everything was done and dusted, I enjoyed the exhibition part of the module in some respects but less so in others. I liked being part of a team and felt that gaining most of the sponsors helped raise the profile of the exhibition. However, I felt that our team had some problems with communication initially, though it did improve later on. I also think I could have put up the posters earlier which would have helped the promotion of the event within the Atrium. Lastly, while I did contribute a fair bit to the team and helped with the overall promotion of the exhibition, I think I could have done more in helping Kirsty with the social media posts in getting them out there quicker whenever it wasn`t convenient and could have put more posters around other places, not just the Creative Shop.

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Post 9 - Teamwork and how we all got on

Being part of the promotion team (comprising me, Kirsty, Joanna, Izzy, Felix, Gage, Antonia, and Eleni) was an interesting experience, to say the least. For the most part, we got on really well and carried out our intended roles whilst also being supportive of each other. Another nice thing was the fact we regularly in touch with each other via Facebook messenger which really helped with communication between us all and planned meetings to discuss matters relating to promotion every Friday  As mentioned previously, my role included putting up posters when others hadn't been able to (see post 8) and helping out with the Drink and Draw event plus manning the Art Fair stall. However, there was a source of conflict between two members of the team and one of the management team over certain decisions relating to the Drink and Draw event and tendencies of certain team members to take over. This along with communication issues with the other teams caused a bit of tension and friction within the team that I found annoying. Thankfully, the issues were eventually resolved but they did highlight problems faced when working together as a team for the first time. This needs to be avoided for our final end of year show in 2020, but I’m confident the issues won`t be as bad next time around. Even though the majority of the issues didn’t affect me directly I could well find myself in the future with issues regarding not getting along with certain individuals and needing to deal with these issues in a mature fashion that minimises tension as much as possible.

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Post 8 - Promotion and fundraising efforts

Apart from the usual promotional aspects such as social media (which Kirsty was mostly involved in doing), promoting was also done by traditional means such as posters and flyers. I was responsible for sorting out the sponsorships with other creative places (such as The Printhaus and The Cardiff Creative Shop) and most of the distribution of the posters and flyers throughout the university and in other places such as The Creative Shop as seen in the last image (again making use of the connections I forged there during my placement). Overall, I feel quite pleased as I put my social skills to good use in contacting sponsors such as The Printhaus and made great use of the connections I made with The Creative Shop due to the placement earlier on in summer 2019. They agreed to sponsor us and donated prizes for a raffle. The Creative Shop donated a canvas and £20 towards the exhibition fund and The Printhaus donated three prints and a tote bag which was a really nice thing for them to do and which certainly took me by surprise!! Also, I tried to contact Artivive, the makers behind the AR app we have been using, but they turned down our request for sponsorship, unfortunately. As for the distribution of posters and flyers for both the Drink and Draw and Portal Exhibition, while I managed OK, I think I could have done a better job by putting the posters up earlier as I only did it 3 days before the exhibition which I feel wasn`t enough time for it fully to enter peoples' consciousness. However, in hindsight, I don`t think it would have made that much of a difference really.

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Post 7 - AR Function thoughts

For the Augmented Reality (AR) function, using my AR function thumbnails as a basis (with it being idea 3), I wanted to show the concept of external pressures and how they affect the mind, causing thoughts to become tangled and stress to build. This is represented by the pressure lines pulsating in and out with blue electric sparks flying off the loose thought cables within the brain which activates when the Artivive app is over it. Overall, it's a very simple AR piece that is quite effective in making the piece come alive and reinforces the message of 'Portal to a Troubled Mind' mind more effectively in my view. Even so, I did wonder weather it needed more movement in the brain cables to be more interesting but it would have been too complex to animate for me as a gif in Photoshop in that case, as I generally find difficult to complete when time in creating it. I also think I could have explored other options earlier on and not simply stick with the one idea I went with in the end. I do like the idea of AR though and maybe one day if I can get better at making GIFs, Augmented Reality features could be another avenue I would like to explore in the future.

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Post 6 - Refining and finishing Exhibition Piece

Having finally decided on a design which I assembled in Photoshop, I played about with a few options regarding the composition. I initially decided not to include the pressure rings as I thought they would make the print too cluttered and instead went for the scanned linoprint background with it fading from 'pop colour' dark magenta to red (to signify rising stress and anger) as seen in image 1. After feedback from Matt and Bett about the first design, they essentially suggested that I go back to an older design. I then created 5 more different designs showcasing the pressure rings (while also playing around with colour and compositon) and went back to a more silhouetted appearance. After more feedback from the lecturers, I took a few aspects from all of the designs and mixed them together to create the final design in the last image. Overall, while I think I made a slightly wrong move in refining the design, I'm really pleased with the final exhibition piece 'A Portal to a Troubled Mind', as I think it really gives an insight into my psyche and the stresses one’s mind is put through because of mental health issues. The final design with the faint outline gives it more character while the white cables in the black brain `portal` makes it standing more and attracts the eye better in seeing the portal aspect.  I would have liked the Artivive AR feature to have been more elaborate than just simply the lines pulsating and the brain cables sparking, but I do think the AR feature is simple but effective and that it fits in with the overall design.  

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Post 5 -  Starting pop-up exhibition and exhibition piece initial ideas

Starting pop-up exhibition

For one of our modules in the 3rd year, we had to organise a pop-up exhibition centred on a theme that will incorporate an Augmented Reality (AR) function into the artwork using the app Artivive. We all decided on the theme of 'Portal' and then got into teams. I was on the promotions team which was responsible for promoting the event through social media and helping to run fundraising events (the exploits of which will be discussed later). Although, as is often the case when starting a project, I was a little nervous,  I soon got into it and was feeling excited about working as a team which was something I hadn't done in this way before. As for initial ideas for the piece, once the venue people had decided on the brief, I had no issue coming up with ideas when creating a mindmap. The reason was mainly that one of the ideas I was particularly keen to work on was to feature a railway tunnel `portal` (the word 'portal' means a tunnel mouth in architectural terms). After coming up with two other ideas such as a space portal and a cutaway into one’s mind, I developed the three ideas and made them into thumbnail sketches.

Exhibition piece initial ideas

I had a few ideas for the exhibition piece and I started out by comprising a mind map of initial thoughts. After selecting the best ideas, I moved on to the mood boards and then on to thumbnails visualising my ideas.  All were to be created using lino printed techniques which will have a fading effect between the two colours. This idea was inspired by the work of Linocut Boy (a linoprint artist based in Margate who created the colour shifting diver on the mood boards). The three main ideas I came up with are the railway tunnel, a space portal and a silhouette with a head opening using the portal idea as a metaphor for looking into one’s mind and seeing the chaos within. Out of the three different ideas, I choose the side-on view of the head with the opening as I think there’s a lot of scope there where I can develop the design further to show what’s going on inside one’s head. I took the third idea and developed it into three working roughs with the head and pressure lines drawn in much greater detail. While they are all very similar to each other, I eventually went for design 2 (but have cables inside the mind like design 3) for further development and soon made the parts of the head, cables and background from lino printed parts which were relatively straightforward. This was to be assembled later by being scanned in and changed in Photoshop to create the chosen design.

In hindsight, I think I went with the best design as it speaks to me on a personal level (having mental health issues and all) and in my view it appears to be potentially the most interesting for viewers to look at and interact with the AR features. I didn`t go for just one whole design to develop initially but picked what I thought was the best design at the time and take other aspects from other designs to develop it even further.

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Post 4 - Weeks 4 - 6 of work placement

My time at The Cardiff Creative Shop in weeks 4 - 6 of my work placement went from strength to strength for me as I became more proficient in managing the till and other retail tasks. It was also more enjoyable than the first couple of weeks (even though I still enjoyed myself then) as I got to do more creative activities and gradually got more used to the shop environment. I asked if I could bring a few of my model trains into the shop and they were so impressed they allowed me to display them beside the till which was FREAKING AWESOME!! I also made a relatively simple laminated sign for a trader called Literally Made, which, while basic, is still effective. One of the absolute highlights was to do with the `Kids Club', a series of workshops that the shop organised during the summer. While the first one I helped out with, the willow weaving, was fun, it was nothing compared to the next one I took part in. On 12th of August the shop was planning a workshop in making clay animals and needed someone to make the animals quickly. Having played with clay a lot when I was younger I agreed to do it and made a giant snake, a rhino and a man-eating crocodile and I was surprised that they come out so well considering that it had been a long time since I had modelled with clay. Later, I decided to help the kids out at the workshop. I have never really liked the idea of working with children as I thought they would misbehave terribly and it would be a hard time for me. However, all of the kids were really well- behaved and enjoyed myself immensely teaching them how to make the animals. (See the pictures above of me helping a girl make a clay model of a seal). I also had a bit of time to play and made a model of a Demogorgon from Stranger Things which was a step-up in terms of building from the clay animals due to the complex shape and thin parts. Overall, it was a brilliant experience and was the best day out of my entire work placement. I also rediscovered my love of clay modelling and this is a method of model making I want to develop further as part of my personal practice towards my dream of becoming a modelmaker. After that experience, until the end of my placement, I continued to do the more mundane tasks such as serving people at the till and tidying which was a bit anti-climactic but I still enjoyed it nevertheless. In fact, when I left, I missed working there as I enjoyed it more than I thought and the fact that I completed it during the summer meant that it didn`t impact the third year too much when it started. As an added bonus, I managed to meet all of my objectives for Go Wales (as seen in the employability progress form from Go Wales)  and I felt like I have accomplished and learned many things with The Creative Shop overall. This is especially the case regarding pricing as I plan to sell my work there at a later date and so I will sort out the pricing of my work based on what traders creating work similar to me were selling.  As another example, I think my communication skills have improved and I am able to interact with the public effectively. In the future, these improved skills will be ideal for retail style jobs or if I'm giving a presentation about my work.

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Post 3 - Weeks 1-3 of my  placement at the Cardiff Creative Shop

To help familiarise myself with the folks at The Creative Shop, I visted them a week before I started my placement  My first three weeks with The Cardiff Creative Shop were not as bad as I thought they'd  be and I got used to working there very quickly despite having to travel from Neath to Cardiff for the days I was working which I found very tiring. This had the knock-on effect of me not being able to make proper notes on the experience but luckily I was able to remember pretty much everything from this experience to reflect on it here. Most of the time I was rearranging displays, serving people at the till, adding prices to items and tidying up the back storage room. Even though a lot of the things I did were typical of working in retail, I really enjoyed interacting and working with the shop owners Gem and Nicola and full-time shop assistant Zar. I also met several resident artists that work on certain days. I met a different artist practically every time I worked there which was fun as we showed each other our work and chatted together which I really liked. I also found that I was more proficient than I realised on the till (despite finding some things difficult such making sure I counted up the cash accurately at the end of the day) and I felt that I interacted well with the customers, making sure they felt at home and trying to answer any queries they might have. Overall, it was a great start to my placement in my view and I felt comfortable doing every task I was asked to do. I feel in retrospect that the placement boosted my confidence and social skills due to the interaction with the resident artist traders and customers.

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Post 2 - Deciding on Placement and securing it with Go Wales

After chatting with the Careers Officer, Laura, I had two ideas for my placement. These were: The Printhaus as a print assistant/ technician and the Cardiff Creative Shop as a part-time employee. The reasons were that The Printhaus aligned with my interests in printmaking and working in The Creative Shop would provide a potential source of contacts, help my social skills and would be an insight into how people price their work as well running a small business. My initial intention was to do a week at The Creative Shop and then another week at The Printhaus. To help me with liaising with my potential placements, I signed up to the Go Wales organization where mentors Anthony and Kim would help me secure the place and put in place a set of objectives that I hope to achieve while completing the placement. However, at the time (May 2019), The Printhaus premises were threatened with closure and because of this, I didn’t pursue this avenue. Therefore, I decided that I wanted to do a two-week placement at the shop instead (so did not contact The Printhaus as a result). However, due to the paperwork involved the week when I wanted to start the placement was delayed and the placement would also be 3 days a week over a month instead of a two-week block. At first, I didn`t like the idea of this as I thought it would drag out too long, but in hindsight I was wrong!

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Post 1 - Before placement

Before the Client Studies module, I didn’t have much relevant work experience apart from undertaking the live briefs which are part of the course. In general,  the only job I had previously had was working as a cashier for Liberty Stadium. Therefore, I wanted to gain more skills in order to improve my employability and to develop my social skills by interacting with the general public. When the opportunity for the 70-hour work placement came up in June, I wanted to try and get it done as soon as possible so that it would not affect my studies later in the year. As a result, I went to visit The Creative Shop on the same day we had a presentation about the placement, which was May the 23rd. I introduced myself to the owners of the shop and told them I was interested in coming there for my placement. In retrospect, I feel that I was a bit too hasty going straight to the shop and should have perhaps considered more options than just the shop and my other choice, The PrintHaus, such as pursuing live briefs.