Illusions

When I was in the final block of my HND year at college we were given a very exciting project, the purpose here was to create a corporate identity for a fictional themed cafe bar that would be called Illusions. The bar was an upcoming magic themed place similar to the Hard Rock Cafe as well as other themed functions, and this would be somewhere were the family can go for a meal or friends and relatives can enjoy a night out.

So obviously now you know it was magic themed and so now onto what the identity was meant to be about. The purpose of the brief was to create a logo for the cafe bar Illusions that would capture what the place was about mainly in just the word as we were told to preferably use typography instead of an image with the name in type next to it, and we were to make the logo an illusion in itself to go with the magic theme.

I started off this project with quite a bit of difficulty as I couldn't find the right type of magic theme that I wanted to incorporate into my design so struggled to come up with a decent idea and saw that most people in the class were creating some really good sketches for their designs, and upon seeing this decided to go back and do a little bit more research and then started to go with an idea of using magic card and knew I wanted to create an image made out of the type, but still wasn't too sure of how `i was going to to this until my tutor showed me some very creative pieces of work where the artist had images of fish, a gorilla and buildings using nothing but type with a very funky 1960's style. This became my inspiration but never did find out who the designer was.

Once I had decided on a theme and style I then had no problem coming up with designs and it was through this that I wanted to design a logo that looked both fun and attractive, that would appeal to almost any age group. I then decided that the shape I wanted was an ace of spade to go with my card idea and so did a few various sketches of how I would fit the text inside the image as I thought that by doing this I could make the actual text/image and illusion so that when someone looked at the logo they would have to look really hard to read what the image said and once I had the final solution I chose two fonts that I would alter to become my logo. The fonts I used were Musicals and Action Is.

So then I had finished my logo but though it needed something else just to make it more peculiar and appealing so I then made the letter O stand out a bit more but changing it to a different colour so that it then became the focal point of the identity and also decided to make it swirl like what you see when someone is being hypnotized.

In the end I was actually pretty proud of this logo and hope you like it as well an feel free to comment on what you think of it.

Ocean Fear

I am now writing about a personal fear of mine, one that I cannot stand and have always stayed away from and that is deep water, I cannot stand to be anywhere near it, I can barely go to any beach and go further than just about knee level before I stop. It is something that I have never been able to explain, as I have no problem with the deep end of the swimming pool but the ocean that is a different story. Like I said I have no idea why I have always been afraid of it, as nothing has ever happened to me in my life such as a traumatic experience to put me off it, so have no idea where this has come from.

What I do not like about it is that I do not feel safe, even if I was with a lot of people around me I still wouldn't feel comfortable be in there, I like to know what is below me and be able to see it. This is different when I am flying as I can see what is below me most of the time and know what is below except when flying over the ocean but I do feel different about it as I trust the captain not to crash the plane as they would not have been aloud to fly the plane if they didn't have the proper training etc. but being in the water just scares the life out of me, it is my one and only nightmare that I do ever get, being alone in the middle of the ocean, floating their on my own, with just nothing but empty space and whatever is down there below me.

I will admit that I do sometimes have a problem with it, not in films as I normally tend to think that the film is rubbish and keep watching not even thinking about the deep ocean but do at times have a problem watching it on documentaries but because I like watching documentaries I will keep watching and just not think about it, this is something I have never properly been able to explain even to myself.

I do have a few memories of being in deep water, the first was when I was about four or five and my family were on holiday in Spain I think and my mum and dad took me on a boat trip, then never being on a boat before and never at the time had any fear of the ocean was very happy to go on but the remember the further we got from land the more scared I got and more I started to cry, and was even worse when a few days later when we went on another boat that went more around the coast with a looking glass to see the wildlife under the water, I took one look and that was enough for me and have never done anything like it since.

The next memory I have was when I was fourteen and we were on holiday in Mexico and were taken for the day to and ancient Mayan temple then onto a cavern where we were all aloud to jump into the cavern pool and me jumping from quite some hight only to resurface to the words this pool goes down 20 meters and travels for miles and miles under the land until it reaches the sea, an this was enough for me to panic like crazy and get out of there immediately, I had never been so scared. I don't even like underwater caverns as I would be too afraid of getting stuck or even lost.

It is because of this fear that I have that I will also be basing my next tattoo on, I am hoping to get a water dragon as this symbolizes protection, just really hope it really works but will be saving up for this and will be some time.

Journey to the Edge of the World

Now I am writing about another Christmas present I was given this year but instead of a book it will be a DVD this time. The DVD I got was Billy Connolly Journey to the Edge of the World which was on television just over a year ago I think but am not sure about that one. This documentary took place over a period of 10 weeks as Billy travels on a once in a lifetime journey through the North West Passage, a legendary route deep within the arctic circle that had perilously thwarted explorers for centuries.

What the program does is show people what life on the Passage is really like, the weather conditions, the work, lifestyles, the people and just how much has changed over the last 50 - 70 years and it really is quite extraordinary to see just how much has. The first few placed he visits first are more city populated where he learns to fish and see the gravestone at the Titanic crew and passenger burial site of a J. Dawson, with a very funny scene where all of these Japanese teenage girls are all taking their photographs next to it thinking it is Jack Dawson from the film but is really a Joseph Dawson who now has a case of mistaken identity. Other places he visits are a scarecrow museum where he sees even a scarecrow version of himself and meets quite possibly the craziest but funniest old man alive.

The next step of his journey is through the towns and villages of the Inuit people and how much their way of life has changed the most, how they basically live in little shanty towns trying to adapt to modern day life but still keep their old traditions alive so that they can keep going for many years to come, and it is here that Billy experiences a very emotional story when he is in the local museum and watches a film from over 50 years ago of what live in the area used to be like and saw that back then all the people were smiling, but not any more, and found it even more emotional when he discovered that the old man who was sitting next to him watching it had family shown in the film and went in there every day to watch it just to remember what life used to be like and how he will never live it again.

The show then goes further up the passage following old explorers trails and we discover just how many had failed an never returned due to the river and sea freezing up with ice forcing them to abandon their ships and eat themselves to death due to lead poisoning from the tins for their food and eventually reverting to cannibalism. Eventually Billy travels to the old gold mines and sees old ghost towns where the gold was eventually drained and the people moved on but learnt how to mine for gold from one surviving miner who family have kept it going over the years.

Towards the end of his journey we see him being initiated into a tribe by sharing a steam with others to earn their right of something which I have sadly already forgotten and then meet a 75 year old women who looks strangely crazy walking about with her massive riffle living on her own in the middle of nowhere before reaching the his last destination ending his truly amazing experience.

This entire program was as you could see very emotional for him and seeing the wonderful landscape and seeing what like really is like in these areas does make the person watching it respect and be thankful for what they have. What I liked about it was that Billy Connolly was speaking to you as though you were really standing beside him, just with the way he would talk to the camera and tell his jokes making you laugh with him. What I found really funny was that he carried with him throughout the entire tip and can of repellent bear spray to keep of Grizzlies away as informed by those well known to the areas who themselves are carrying riffles instead, it made both me and my family laugh at this. Another thing I liked about it was the landscape and just when you looked at it yes some of it was very similar to Scotland but it made me want to go to these places at just how different the whole place was from home, and I really enjoyed seeing the difference in cultures that we are well known to compared to the culture in the program and just how different they really are.

I would recommend this to anyone who likes watching documentaries or people who enjoy Billy Connolly and hope he does another one similar to it but will be buying his other DVD's where he travels around Scotland and another one around New Zealand where it is both stand up and documentary of him traveling to each gig and sharing his experience with the audience he is performing for.

Moving Pixels

It has been a while since I entered my last blog so many apologies and will try not to let it happen again. But saying that this will be a short blog entry. So for this latest entry I am going to be telling you about a book I got from my mum and dad for Christmas called Moving Pixels - Blockbuster Animation, Digital Art and 3D Modeling Today by Peter Weishar. The book is about basically what it says in the title and is an informative book on how these sorts of art are created and how difficult they are as well as how experimental each of them are.

The book explores various parts of CGI (Computer Generated Image) and how they are used across a wide vary of film and television, these ranging from mega blockbusters to the latest documentaries and goes into all the different companies who spend a lot of time and very hard work trying to make the CGI the best they can. All images shown in the book are from film, TV and computer games and fine art from the 21st century.

What I like about the book is not all the images taken from screen shots of the big films where more money than can be imagined was spent in the process of making them but the independent artwork from those who are making all the more obscure and strange images instead of the over the top CGI that we all see but what certain individuals consider to be an art more than say a big giant elephant from Lord of the Rings or a massive battle scene from Star Wars but just little objects etc seem to have a little more detail in them.