Tigerprint christmas type competition

I was excited when reading the brief for this months Tigerprint competition because I have been needing an excuse to work on my hand drawn type and this seemed like the perfect project! I spent a lot of time working on different phrases in different styles and played around with different drawing implements. The photos below show some of my sketchbook work using brush pen, graphite pencil, italic markers and rotring fineliners to create different lines and textures. 

I played around with 5 different phrases for final designs, two I just couldn't get to look right so I scrapped them, these 3 are the ones I will be submitting for the competition:

This was my first design, I like the type, still not entirely sure the colour palette is quite right - I think I work better with a smaller selection of colours!

I loved drawing the frame for this image, I wanted it to be quite decorative with simple colours.

This one is my favourite - I love burgundy and I think the type fitted the shape really well.

Shapes and flowers collection

Yay new work! 

I have been working a lot recently (at my "normal" job) but I get two half hour breaks so have been doing doodles in the staff room when I have the energy! 

I used this colour palette from my previous blog post because I like the range of different colours and wanted to branch out from always using shades of purple and blue (yes there is still purple but I pretty much never use red, yellow, or brown. shh...)

These four are based around different shapes, the two below are focused on natural forms and using the brighter colours to make the linework pop. 

I would love to know your thoughts on these and if there are any products you would like to see them on? I am thinking of making some coasters and mugs when I get the right materials in :)

All Of The Colours!

I have been using this website a lot recently to come up with new colour palettes for my work, you just put in the URL of a photo online and it generates a dull and a vibrant palette. 

I do a lot of photography in my spare time and I love looking for colourful things to photograph. These palettes are all taken from my images over on Flickr here. Feel free to use these for inspiration in your own work and let me know if you come up with anything :) 

Tigerprint Gifted Competition 2013

Hey everyone! so I have been very busy recently working lots and spending time down in Plymouth for graduation so haven't been posting as much... sorry! Getting settled in now back home though so I will have more to show over the next few weeks.

For the past few years Tigerprint (who make greetings cards and gift wrap for M&S) have run a design competition for new graduates called "Gifted".

This year it ran over a whole month, each day had a new theme and you had to make a square design based on that theme. You could enter as many as you wanted but obviously the more variety you could show the more likely you were to win the prize which was a 3 month placement creating a range for Marks & Spencer.

I managed to create 13 designs and was selected as one of the commended winners (yay!) - you should check out the rest of this lot they have some lovely work :)

Anyhow, it seems like forever ago I did all of this work as it was back in July and I had to keep it secret until the end of the competition!

"Alphabet"

"Express Yourself"

"Back To Nature"

"Typographic"

"In Bloom"

"Freestyle"

"All About Colour"

"Make Your Mark"

"Spot"

"Summer"

I am hoping to release some of this work as prints and put some patterns on products soon. This may take a while as I am saving up to move out currently and working a lot but doing well in this comp is definitely motivating me to keep making stuff :)