Designer. Illustrator. Creator of Stuff.

Folk tale Lenore illustrations

2011-07-22T22:29:00.000+01:00

This was an illustration project based around a folk tale. I chose one called "Lenore" based on the Edgar Allen Poe tale of "The Raven". This was a project I greatly enjoyed as I could use simple graphic images with nice big thick black lines. I can't actually find the story online any more but it must be out there somewhere...

Back through typographic time...

2011-07-08T21:51:00.000+01:00

Going through my old hard drive I stumbled upon my very old college work.
I didn't really find my feet, design wise, until I reached late third year and fourth year. So looking back on some of my projects from before that is a little cringe worthy!
There are one or two interesting pieces I managed to put forward though. I believe this project was about typography and Dublin. I wasn't a particularly inspired art student at times.

Welcome to my World

2011-07-01T21:17:00.000+01:00

As an image making project this was the first photographic project I really felt like I owned. Finally in fourth year I began to understand what makes me tick as photographer - of sorts. I love to over emphasis the ambient light to the cool/warm boundaries.
This was a biographical project which allowed me to step inside my good friend, Paddy's life. The full project and the background can be found on my Flickr.

Bruss

2011-06-24T21:02:00.000+01:00

"Bruss" was my response to the ISTD project in 2007/2008. The project aims were to create a typographic ‘celebration’ of language in its local and in the vernacular of a particular region. The inspiration was an article written by my father and his brother about words they remembered from their childhood that have now fallen out of usage called "Mid-Carlow Words of the Nineteen Fifties".
I used this project to indulge my love of printing, namely copperplate and screen printing. The large uncial letters have been embossed using copperplate and the text then was screen printed on top. It was a complicated and laborious process, but it was in all ways a labour of love. All the processes of creating the plates with bitumen and acid to almost being heart broken when the ink was drying to quickly to come through the screen print was worth it.
In the end myself, my uncle and my father all have a copy - the only three that will ever exist.
Hiberno-English is still a passion of mine and speaks to the history and humour of the Irish people.

The Penguins

2011-06-17T20:57:00.000+01:00

The Penguin book covers that follow were a response to a self directed project in my final year in college.

The brief was as follows:

A large publisher iscommissioning the production of 6 book covers for a collection of books in alimited edition set. The books are of very different and unusual subjects, butmust show the unity of design for the purposes of being part of the collection.

Baron von Eissman's Ice-cream

2011-06-10T20:48:00.000+01:00

This was a response to a design brief in which the goal was to create a concept ice-cream line that would incorporate reusable containers. Given the name of "Baron van Eissman's Flavours of the World" I developed a container that was shaped like a large matchbox. Thus the boxes could be reused as storage containers that are stackable. As there were no flavours stipulated - half the fun was thinking of new exciting flavours!

A resurrection...

2010-11-09T00:01:00.000Z

This blog has been dead for quite some time, reflecting how I abandoned the design world myself.
It's now been two years since I finished my degree in Visual Communications, and two years that I have worked in the museum world. I seem to have reached a point where I can contemplate a return to art and design, and hope to derive some enjoyment from it.

So here's hoping!