.declining virtue

I can’t believe it’s been nearly nine months since I’ve updated! That’s quite shocking. I’m still busy working on the graphic design, though my direction seems to have taken me more in line of book design and book arts. I’ve still time for the ol’ album work though. For the last two months I’ve been in the studio recording a new album, but the classical stuff is still being produced. Here’s the latest cover for my piano-only EP.

One of the latest tracks to be recorded can be sampled on this vid over at YT;

.tea for two, and two for tea

I love making fonts! I say that; I love to design them, but I’ve yet to figure out how to turn ideas into files. Still, over the past few years I’ve built up a collection of letters and type, to be turned, one day, into fonts.

I’ve more to put up but I thought I’d start with Teastained as it’s my favourite font to date. Comprising of over 40 different tea stains, each curve was individually pieced together to form each letter.

It took forever, but the result was worth it. Used in the final project of my “Making Tea Sexy” campaign, it proved to be a great hit, both to lecturers and viewers alike. It was also a great success at my 2006 UWIC exhibition.

But that’s a story for the future.

.pulling the puzzles apart

In the summer of (69… no, no,) 2007, I entered a competition to design a poster for the safety scheme in Dow Corning, a company which is the leading global silicones supplier.

Three places were announced, two of which I managed to win. The final design chosen was a simple mix of the corporate colours and a list of the safety regulations. It’s wonderful to see my work, however basic, being acknowledge by so many people. The campaign has had the poster I designed put up all over the company, even reaching Europe, and each employee must carry a card with it on (soon to be added here) to remember the guidelines for operation.

.the world is our carpet, now

In keeping with wanting to slowly update my past portfolio here, I thought I’d start with a piece of work I did in 2006. It was basically a way to flaunt what I had in my interview for a place on the graphics course in Newport. I’m there which, as you can probably tell, is proof that the DVD I showed impressed the lecturers. I’ve always liked it, mainly because I love photo montage, and also because I got to show my music to an audience wider than the animals in the back garden.

The DVD was quite simple. The main screen, the desk room, hosted a number a frames which were links into different areas of the “house”. Each “room” contained a range of medias and styles that I had worked in, ranging from photography, illustration, side projects, music, etc. The cover was whipped up in a day, hence the lack of professional presentation, but overall I was very fond of this little project.

.love and hatred can exist side by side

I’ve been interested in music for as long as I can remember. I couldn’t live without it, in some form or another, and when my graphic skills fail me, and I don’t feel like writing, I can always fall back on popping out a song or two.

For a few months, I’ve been working on concepts for my first album’s cover. I have a trilogy, each comprising of about seven songs, the first being “Love and Hatred Can Exist Side by Side.” The titles namesake was borrowed from the wonderful quote by Scott Westerfeld;

The human heart is a strange vessel. Love and hatred can exist side by side.

So here it is, in its half finished glory. I’m unsure as whether to add text or not because one, I love minimal and two, I’m rather pants at the typography thing. But I’m rather happy with this design. It’s the descendant of a long line of hair pulling and photo taking. After deciding on abolishing the ol’ snapshots, I landed on this photo montage which conveys the point, even if it does mean that once again my love of playing cards and marble figures wins out.

So there you have it. The central design underwent a lot of changes, until it finally arrived at this. Here’s just a quick example of how it started off life in this test panel;

.i like to live life in motion

I’m quite aware that this was once a great research blog, devoted to the hard-working university student that is Rachael Edwards, but alas I needed the name in.sevens for my own work. Never fear! You can see all the lovely research at a brand-spanking new blog, all.sevens.