Website Research

As I hope to be starting up my own website in the coming weeks I have been looking through some existing site belonging to destines and artists I like and gaining some insight on what makes a website look professional but still a reflection of the artist. Here I have chosen a few sites which I feel have both good and bad points which I will use or avoid when developing my own.

To start with I've chosen the site of an illustrator I love, Hye Jin Chung. I think her site is a great example of the kind of simple, clean and concise type of site I prefer and want my own to be like. When you first enter the site it goes straight to a page displaying small windows showing tasters of each project she has produced. With the white background and inconspicuous navigation column on the left of the page I think the whole look of the site is focused on drawing the eye towards her colourful illustrations. She includes a link to her blog where she regularly posts news on her current projects. She also includes a list of past clients and awards along with the publications her work has been featured in. This simple, streamlined approach to a website is followed by to other sites of illustrators I regularly look at, Yelena Bryksenkova and Faye Moorhouse. On all these site the focus is on the work with the rest of the important information available easily. They are all simple to navigate and lovely to look at. Just what I want my own site to be like.

Another type of site I've looked at is Sara Fanelli's. Although I love her work I'm not to keen on her website. She has a introduction page to begin with which you have to click on to enter the site. While this is fine and is kept simple when you get on to her site it changes. The background is now lined paper and the layout of the icons to navigate the site are oddly placed. (Although the titles for these icons are all had drawn type which is something I think I would like to try on my own site. ) When you click on some of these links it brings up the information in a separate window in quite small type which is hard to read. They links to each example of her work also comes up in a new window and has little explanation with each image. Another site which I think is affected by this navigation problem is Stephanie Wunderlich's site. While I really like the way she has used a book and her illustration as a way of navigating the site sometimes it can feel a little strangely laid out. The descriptions for her work are also a little basic similar to Sara Fanelli's. I will try to avoid any difficult or confusing layouts and will make sure it is easy to navigate around. 

Portfolio Feedback: Susan Farrington

After making my first attempt at a PDF portfolio I sent it to the New York based illustrator, Susan Farrington who I had previously contacted in the second year. She was very kind about my work (which I was quite worried about showing her) which gave me a confidence boost. She had a few points of advice in regards to my portfolio which I will use to improve it for the future. Here is some of here portfolio advice which I found very helpful:

• Include contact details on the first intro page and maybe a small illustration as a kind of taster of whats to come.
• Include cut paper textures in with some of my headings (to underline them?) to create a look more in keeping with my style of work
• Don't include a title page before the work as I already have the title of the project above the explanation on each page.
• I want to show as much of my work as possible so they can see what i can do, if a page doesn't have work on (e.g. title page) remove them and add more examples of my work.

Future Self Progress 2

After a tutor led review of my work in the project so far I have started to do work with my mine on the importance of composition. As I was just making collages which were left floating lost on the page I will now start working within a set space an adapt my work around it. So far I have started to created more characters around this idea.

1st Attempt at a Business Card

This is my first attempt at my future business card. Not sure why its so blurry. I really like the idea of using my stones and minerals collage as my main image. Its simple but still represents my working style quite well. I might improve on this simple design my making them from thick, creamy coloured card and maybe letter pressing my details on the reverse.