I'm Moving Blogs!

I've decided to make a new blog as a fresh start for the final year at the University of Lincoln studying Illustration (BA Hons).

You can find the new blog here - http://martynbrownillustration.blogspot.com - it's a bit empty right now but it'll soon be full of my current work.

- Martyn

Folio Society Project

For this short project I was set the task of creating an illustration suitable for letterpress printing made up of black, white and one other solid colour.

The illustration is based on Kurt Schwitters 'The Squinting Doll'. I chose to base the design on doll parts, gads, legs, arms, torsos etc as I found this quite interesting. Below are development photos from start to final piece.

Client visual.

Final line work.

Final piece without crop.

Final piece cropped to required size. 

10 Things To Do Instead Of Smoking Cigarettes

For this 2 week project I had to design an illustrated A3 poster suitable for display in Girl's Secondary Schools (11 - 18 years old). The main objectives of the brief was to integrate ten visual elements and to make the letterforms part of the design rather than just adding them in afterwards.

After a few thumbnails and sketches I came to this dress pattern idea and sixties, psychedelia style lettering. I decided to make the majority of the final piece using card and a craft knife and hand cut the dress and letterforms to be stuck to the darker board.

I decided to use minimal in the piece to make it bolder and eye catching so I mixed gouache to the same colour as the darker board and painted in the ten visual elements onto the dress to create the 'pattern'.

(This is just a quick photo using my iPhone, I'll upload a high res scan soon)

I think I could have developed this project further with more time but I am quite happy overall with the final piece that I produced in the two week timescale.

- Martyn

Queen of Hearts - Anything Goes Apparel Design

Here's something I've been working on for my clothing company, Anything Goes Apparel. I wanted to experiment with busy lines to create the hair along with interesting shapes that could create a frame around the image. This is my heart. I'm also going to develop more shapes in this same format and style.

This was my initial sketch for the idea.

 A cropped shot of my further developed ink drawing.

This is the final design, rendered in Photoshop, as a 2 colour print.

Check out more of my work with Anything Goes Apparel here...

www.anythinggoesapparel.co.uk

www.instagram.com/anythinggoesapparel

www.facebook.com/anythinggoesapparel

www.twitter.com/Anything_GoesUK

http://anythinggoesapparel.tumblr.com

'Loot' Final Piece

When I was first presented with the project I had no idea what to do and, in all honesty, I thought it was going to drag but the six weeks have flown by and I've had a lot of fun working towards my final outcomes.

Here is my final piece, which has somehow turned into a miniature installation, with the idea of creating a bar setting for these items which would be found in 'The Consummatum Estate'. A pack of 'tart cards' advertising the available 'birds' and a jar of 'Hal's Natural Eyeballs' - my quirky twist on Hal's question 'Are they natural?' when talking about the dead woman's eyeballs, as they are different colours.

I used sublimation paper and a heat press to create the repeated fabric print for the top of the jar. This was interesting because I hadn't used the sublimation printing technique before. I hand cut the 'tart cards' to give them a cheap and home-made feel to match the cheapness of the cards you would find in phone boxes.

 

'Loot' - Joe Orton - Rough Work & Photoshop Roughs

Our current project is based upon a play called 'Loot' written by Joe Orton. I've decided to focus on a piece of dialogue from one of the main characters 'Hal', where he is describing how he will open his own 'two star brothel' called 'The Consummatum Estate'. He goes on to describe all of the 'birds' he would have there, in a very blunt, but funny way.

I researched into 'tart cards', the calling cards found in phone boxes which advertise the services of prostitutes. This has led me to begin to develop a set of cards for the girls of 'The Consummatum Estate' in a tart card/pin up style.

Here are some of my rough layouts with photoshop roughs for colour and layout ideas.