George Hardie

This is an image I really like from an album cover of a band I really love. It is the 'Dark side of the moon' cover for Pink Floyd designed by George Hardie. It is a bold image using shape and colour with an intersting use of black space. It has been an influence on my latest illustration on 'The office party' in which i've used a black background rather than a white one as Ive been doing for a while now

Blaikie's Guide to Modern Manners

This is another book I'm reading for my major project- 'Blaikies Guide to Modern Manners'. It is written in a different style to 'Debretts Modern Manners' which I'm reading too. It is more stories and accounts of people's experiences relating to manners and etiquette rather than dictionary style definitions like Debretts but I find both books useful and have used them to respond to visually. This book seems quite humurous which is an important element of my work.

Ben Jones

During the formation of my 'on the spot' illustration I was looking at the YCN agency website and after being told about an ex student from Stockport College- Ben Jones being part of their agency when we visited the agency office in London, so I looked him up. This illustration caught my eye, I'm guessing that Jones is saying that a company will bend over backwards for their employees but I didn't get that at first. I was drawn to the hands which I mistook for forks and then when the image is turned to portrait length it looked like the character had its hands up.

Mr Bean/ Band on the run

This cover from the 1973 album 'Band on the run' by The Wings was an influence on my 'On the spot' illustration mainly because of the spotlight catching the characters out. I was suprised to see a few well known faces including Michael Parkinson and Christopher Lee dressed up as prisoners.

Also I used to love Mr Bean as a child particularly because he behaves like a child so there was an instant ifinity with the character. Mr Bean tended to be very slapstick in humour and I remember finding his behaviour, mannerisms and expressions funny. What was interesting is that I thought that Mr Bean is hinted at being alien because of the intro seeing a spotlight and the character hitting the floor as if dropped from a UFO. This is also what has influenced my 'On the spot' illustration particularly the spotlight.

On the spot!

This is an illustration I have produced for my major project to do with table manners. When you go to a restaurant especially when in the company of people you don't know that well it can feel like a daunting experience and we often say we feel "on the spot". I felt a good way to show this was to use a spotlight like in film when a prisoner would be escaping they would be caught out by the spotlight and they would freeze. I like combining objects associated with a subject and composing them in what loosely resembles a person- they become a character.

Matrix

When film and TV is so successful to a mass audience like Doctor Who and James Bond they are christenend 'Cult'. And one cult film that enjoyed success in 1999 was 'The Matrix' which I remember feeling was so different especially the idea that were are all part of a computer simulation. What stood out to me most was the green codes that has become one of the defining aesthetic elements of the film. This also was going through my mind when composing my dress code illustration.

Never say never again intro

While composing the idea for my dress code illustration one of the things that was going through my mind was the intro to the Warner Bros remake of Thunderball in 1983 called 'Never Say never again'. The film's ok but not in my view brilliant but what stuck in my mind was the way the film began with a pattern made out of 007 numbers, I thought this was an interesting way to open the film where the traditional gunbarrel would have been used. In actual fact this was because of a dispute between the rights to the original Thunderball so because of copyright it was not allowed to be used. Entertainment wise the things I like are programmes and films that are popular to a mass audience so they become long running like household names but I also like to see challenging of tried and tested ideas within them so long running programmes and films can appear fresher and more rounded.