People Make Glasgow app

During my first year at college we were to create a Glasgow guide app for People Make Glasgow and Glasgow City Council. The app needed to have a splash screen which I animated using a gif created in flash which then lead to a home screen where the user could either log in or create an account.

 

After the user has logged in they are taken to a home screen where they could find a what’s on guide, useful information, top attractions and trip ideas where users can post their own reviews and suggestions on places to go and visit.

The source files can be found on my GitHub

Advertising

Over the years I have created a wide variety of adverts for press, billboards and online so I have selected a few to show.

Ardardan Estates

Regular advertiser in the Advertizer Ardardan Estates like to have a half page feature for the run upto the festive season. The two above are for their Halloween and pre-Christmas events and for their very popular Christmas trees.

Gibb Stuart

At the Advertizer one of the main clients are Gibb Stuart who are a local hardware store. They like a simple clean, easy to read advert with the product images large and prices easy to see. Over the last few years I have created a range of adverts from large sale double page spreads to quarter page product specific offers. Creating the artwork can be challenging with the range of different sized product images and varying amounts of information and text but it all adds to the satisfaction in the end.

Building Design Alteration

Recently I have been helping a good friend of mine take his building design alteration business online. He originally had a basic site hosted on google sites but to help make the business look more professional we moved it over to a free WordPress based site.

WordPress is a brilliant place to start a website or blog as it gives you a selection of free themes to base your content which is really easy to do after you learn the basics.

The Advertizer

I am currently working part time for a free local monthly magazine in West Central Scotland called The Gryffe Advertizer where I help with the layout of the magazine and any graphics or images that are needed.

I also produce the artwork for some of the clients adverts that are featured in the magazine and recently started helping a few of our clients with online and social media promotion.

Movie One Sheet

Over the last few weeks I have been involved in designing a few movie one sheets. There are probably quite a few of you saying ‘ooooh what’s that?’ and to be honest the first time I read it I had no idea what it was either!

A Movie One Sheet is basically a poster with a bit more information than just the title and release date. The majority of the time the whole point of the one sheet is for publicity and to try to find a backer(s) to either get your movie released or sometimes even made!

The first one sheet was for a movie, Traumatized, that is about to do the rounds at the New Zealand film festival. The movie is a psychological thriller about a lone surviver of a serial killing who is tortured by flashbacks of the ordeal.

I tried to convey the affect the flashbacks were having on the main character by using a cracking effect on the skin. The blood splatter and haunting reflection in the eye are from the horrific experience she has been through. I tried to keep the main film title as legible as possible while also adding to the overall broken and haunted feel of the film and poster.

The second movie was an action/adventure movie set in the Southern California desert. This movie had not been made yet and as such was a double sided one sheet and poster to drum up some interest and funding.

The movie is also being developed as a graphic novel so I was trying to get the look and feel of a graphic novel into the movie promotion. I chose to focus on the loneliness and isolation of the main character as in the movie he caught between law enforcement and outlaws. The purple sky was to symbolise the bloodshed.

Logo Design

Over the last few weeks have been involved on a lot of logo or corporate identity design, some have come off & been successful, others not so much.

I have to say that this area of design has to be my favourite. It has everything from typography and colour to illustration and icons. It’s also the very beginning and can lead to so much more for you as the designer and also the client as this can be their first taste or step into the land of design and what it can do for them.

If you look at the bigger picture of logo design you realise that you are setting the tone, look and feel for everything that comes next. The logo is also the first thing people see and associate with the company. The most successful such as the likes of Coke and recently Facebook have such successful logo’s and brands that the majority of people only have to see a colour (red with coke and blue for facebook) and think of that brand. As a graphic designer it is a great responsibility to given the task of creating all of this.

ButterSideUp

Over the past few months myself and a couple of friends have been working on creating a clothing brand. We currently have 3 lines of screen printed t-shirts in a variety of colours & sizes. The name, ButterSideUp Clothing, had been flying around for a couple of years and our initial attempt had failed to get off the ground (we managed some rough logo designs and a few t-shirt concepts).

Now we have a bit of money, some expertise in the screen printing business and a new found creative hunger we are all guns blazing. We now have a fully working online store, small customer base, a few designs with some promo material and many more ‘ideas’ in the making.

As the graphic designer in the group I have been involved in the branding, creating and finalising of artwork and the online store.

*UPDATE* ButterSideUp has now been going (semi)officially for a year but unfortunately the bulk of our sales are still coming from other areas & not our website so we have decided to switch to a bigcartel shop for now.

New updates

So, I’ve been very quiet for a while but I am happy to announce a few bits of news and new work! I have been working on a few projects for friends recently ant two of these are complete!

The first is for a local Australian speed dating company recently setup in Adelaide, South Australia for your older singletons who have tried all the other sites around and just want something simple where they can meet like minded people. You can visit the site here Speed Date SA. I was involved in the initial branding, design and layout of site before handing it over to a local company to handle the updating and payments for the site. I am still involved in creating promotional material.

online dating website for over 40’s

The second project was for my dad. He has spent the last few years researching Glasgow’s past with tobacco and its relationship with the islands in the Caribbean. He had been receiving many requests from people for information on this and required a site to display his findings and allow other to view them easily. You can see his work here

local history website

I have a few other projects on the go and will update you on these soon…

Media Mentor

While working with Scottish Studios/Direct Media we shared an office with a media training company who were looking for an update to their rather tired looking logo and website. Working closely with the director and other members of staff we created an new fresh look along with a range of promotional material with a brochure, folder and banners that could be used during the live training and at events.