Circles Of Cambridge
Category: Print, Publication, Illustration, Photography
Year: 2020
Guide: Will Hill, Cambridge School of Arts
Project Brief:
Every city is influenced by its own design style and languages, different emotions, and its relationship with the surrounding environment. The aim of this project is to observe and record the visual qualities of text around Cambridge, and how these communicate within their own environment. Furthermore, use the recordings to experiment with the different elements of compositional design, through designing a book.
Process:
After doing my research on the concept of Psychogeography & Dérive, I decided to engage with the environment by focusing on playing, drifting, my emotions while recording and illustrating. The first step was to buy a map of Cambridge from one of the souvenir shops and then draw circles on the map using a wine glass and pencil. Every day I used pictures and illustrations to cover one circle and recored the time, distance, weather, mood, trail, prime locations, patterns and the typography around Cambridge.
The material that was used to do the recordings was: 1) A square Oxford sketch book, 2) Pencil, 3) VanGogh watercolour pocket box, 4) Micron Pens, 5)Staedtler watercolour pencils, 6)Vakki metallic markers pens 7)Craft knife, and 8)Push watercolour brush. In total I did 30 illustrations, developed 5 new letter drawing concepts and took over 1,278 pictures.
During my walks some of the challenge that I faced were having to draw in the rain, record type in environments where I see no typography & working in crowded places. These challenges helped me in developing new illustration techniques while also learning how to create new letterforms out of the patterns and elements I see around me. It was interesting to notice how the already existing type and patterns in our environment interact with each other to communicate something new, or to create new compositions.
The next step in the project was to use these recordings to experiment with the different elements of compositional design, through designing a book. My initial idea was to design a book that looks more like a travel journal. I created compositions and layout that were crowded, used pencil drawn feature and my own handwriting to communicate my thoughts.
One of the major issues that I found and was highlighted to me was that, all my thoughts were getting merged and lost with each other. The question was, I am removing certain elements from their environment, and then placing them in another environment to give it importance, what is the best way to highlight importance? The answer was space and a more formal approach.
The new layout was designed based on a dynamic grid, with a lot of white space to compliment the illustrations. The font family used in the book is Garamond Premier Pro. The size of the book is A4, with 100 pages. For the book cover and the chapter covers I digitally illustrated a map of Cambridge. I also recorded the route I walked and highlighted that in every chapter cover.
Learning Outcome:
The method of ‘exploring by doing’ helped me to gain an understanding and also explore the relationships between words and images which lead me to create a project brief for myself. Through research, continuous feedback and by recording my process I became more aware and self-critical of the work I was doing. This helped me edit and finish my work in a more self aware manner.
Psychogeography and recording through illustration and photography helped me to understand the relationship between the visual qualities of text and what it communicates. As I progressed through the book I also noticed that my illustration style has improved. Finally by creating the book I learnt more about compositional design, use of space and the value of negative space in communication.
I would further like to print out the book and see how these page layouts are complimenting each other and then further manipulate the space in a way to communicate more effectively.