Table of contents for October 2016 in Computer Arts

Earth Overshoot Day – the date when humanity exhausted nature’s 'budget' for the year – fell on 8 August this year. As the Earth’s finite resources continue to deplete, designers are increasingly turning to the abundance of waste materials in order to reinvent them, creating new precious artefacts and useful products. One such waste material proving to be an extraordinary resource is human hair. With the population expected to exceed nine billion by 2050, hair is one of the few materials that is increasing globally. Hair Highway by Studio Swine explores hair as a natural composite. By combining hair with natural resin, Studio Swine has created beautiful solid surfaces with an aesthetic evoking tortoiseshell palettes and a grain resembling exotic hardwoods. Growing at a rate sixteen times faster than the…

INSIGHT Strong opinion and analysis from across global design industry BRUCE DUCKWORTH INCOMING D&AD PRESIDENT www.turnerduckworth.com Bruce is founder and joint creative director of Turner Duckworth, which has studios in London, San Francisco and New York. As of 22 September 2016, he is also president of D&AD. LEE YOUNG DIGITAL DESIGNER www.leeyoung.co.nz Lee is a digital designer, developer and producer currently based in Auckland, New Zealand. He has over 10 years’ experience in digital, and has founded his own design agency. DESIGN MATTERS: Designers debate how they judge their design success – page 20 PLUS: Subway’s latest rebrand is critiqued from a trio of perspectives – page 22 Illustrations: Louise Pomeroy www.louisezpomeroy.com This feels like a fantastic time to be a designer. When David Turner and I started Turner Duckworth…

Millennials like me are incredibly lucky. The interconnected world we live in provides tangible global opportunities unlike anything any generation has ever experienced. I’ve spent the last decade living and working in the lovely seaside town of Bournemouth, and in that time I’ve watched the town go from sleepy old seaside haunt to heavyweight contender on the global digital scene. Achieving the accolade of being the fastest-growing digital economy in the UK, a country that is itself a world leader in this area, is certainly no mean feat. The high standards of innovation and creativity in the UK digital sector are internationally recognised, and having a UK degree or UK experience is currently in strong demand worldwide. With this in mind, at the end of last year I said goodbye…

What’s the first step an illustrator should take in setting up the business side of their studio, and how do they build on it? You have to have a monthly budget for your expenses and your life, and also know what percentage of your income will go to taxes. You can then figure out how much you need to make. The best way to build up your business, especially at the beginning, is to keep your expenses as low as possible and build up a cushion of six to 12 months’ worth of expenses. Don’t freak out about the number, it’s just a goal that will help you ride out the ups and downs of your career. As we all know all too well, clients don’t always pay in a…

VIDEO CO NTENT PROJECT FACTFILE Brief: Challenging themselves to develop accessible digital pinball, London-based game and animation studio State of Play mixed analogue paint tests and slow motion player footage to develop a realistic yet artistic take on the classic game. STUDIO: State of Play www.stateofplaygames.com PROJECT DURATION: Four months LIVE DATE : May 2016 LUKE WHIT TAKER Co-founder and creative director, State of Play Based in London, Luke worked freelance in art, animation, illustration and game design before setting up State of Play. He still creates a lot of work by hand, including the design and model making of game Lumino City, which won a BAFTA for Artistic Achievement. He was also named a BAFTA Breakthrough Brit in 2015. THE DESIGN BRIEF Luke Whittaker In our previous game, Lumino…

More than anything, this is a plea for help. Maybe I’m simply looking in all the wrong places, but there’s a particular design history book that I just can’t seem to find anywhere. To make matters worse, it’s quite possible that this book doesn’t actually exist. Let me start right at the beginning. Back in the 1970s, my mother used to drive a spaceship. This was a vehicle so advanced that even its engine was pretty incredible. But it wasn’t the motor that fired my young imagination, it was the styling. Its sleek lines, all gleaming chrome and metallic blue paint, were a thing of wonder. The only clues to its origins were the letters NSU on the front, accompanied by one of those beautiful typographic clusters on the back…

How do you measure your success as a designer? There’s no set answer to this, although the feeling of delivering a project that exceeds all expectations and delights both the client and its target audience speaks for itself. For some, surviving and thriving through tough times and growing a business in the face of adversity might be the ultimate achievement, or if you’re a freelancer, balancing a steady cash flow with work you love is no mean feat. But for many studios, design awards are one of the best benchmarks to put a stamp of approval on a strong year’s work. In 2016, our very own Brand Impact Awards enters its third year and the core of this issue is dedicated to the projects that rose to the surface. It…

With a full-time job as senior designer at Aardman and an array of side projects run via his alias JamFactory, Gavin Strange already has a lot on his plate. But that hasn’t stopped him from setting up a new online shop with his wife Jane. Launched via a pop-up store in Bristol in August, Strange sells an array of carefully curated products. How did Strange come about? My wife Jane, who designs and makes jewellery, has always wanted a gallery/store. We always knew that if she went ahead, then I would handle the design side of things. It was nothing more than a nice idea until we returned home from The DO Lectures all inspired, and we thought: ‘Let’s just do it, together, as a joint venture.’ We didn’t have…

STANLEY CHOW Freelance illustrator www.stanleychowillustration.com “When my kids, who are four and seven, recognise my work. I took them to see Paddington Bear at the cinema and unbeknown to me there was a scene that featured an illustration for an ad that I did for McDonald’s. When the camera was panning around Piccadilly Circus, my illustration popped up on the cinema screen – both my kids stood up in the cinema and yelped, ‘Daddy, I saw your picture!’ Also, there are a few posters and marketing campaigns that I have done dotted around Manchester. My kids frequently spot them before I do, and ask me, ‘Daddy, is that your picture? Are you famous?’” ROSS BARBER-SMITH Owner and web designer, Electric Kiwi www.electrickiwi.co.uk “When a client’s reply blows me away. I’ve…

NICK CARSON editor After an enjoyable afternoon at johnson banks, Nick spent a long weekend camping in Cornwall to eke the last out of the summer sun. He also took his final British Sign Language exams, results pending. JO GULLIVER Art editor As well as finally finishing decorating her bedroom, Jo also went to Rotterdam, watched Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet at an outdoor cinema and saw The Rolling Stones exhibition in London. ROSIE HILDER operations editor This month, Rosie has entertained an almost constant stream of visitors. She’s now gearing herself up for the next set of guests, her boyfriend’s mother and brother, who are visiting from Argentina. CONTRIBUTORS PETER GRAY video producer Pete took his family on holiday to Cornwall this month, so while Gareth Jones was filming…

SUZANNE GRECO President and CEO, Subway www.subway.com “We are on an exciting journey to meet the changing tastes of our guests. The Subway brand is recognised throughout the world, and this new look reinforces our commitment to staying fresh and forward-thinking with a design that is clear and confident, without losing sight of our heritage.” KEVIN TUCKER Creative director, Collide Creative www.collidecreative.com “Subway has wisely taken the best elements of its brand equity, and remixed them into something contemporary, essentially taking its pre-2002 logo and refining it, with variations on the post-2002 colour scheme. This gives the company the opportunity to shed some of the more negative aspects of its current reputation (which it’s hoping is as forgettable as its current logo), while symbolising a refocus on what originally made…

The ninth gathering of the Illustration Conference (ICON9) took place in Austin, Texas, where illustrators gathered to share ideas, swap tips, and generally talk drawing. Held once every two years, ICON9 featured speakers and workshops that identified prevailing industry trends and imparted indispensable knowledge to help attendees in both their present and future careers. Because most illustrators are freelancers, it’s vital to be organised and plan ahead – thinking not just about how something will affect you in six months, but how it may affect you in years to come. Staying relevant is the obvious answer for having a lasting career. The path, however, is different for everyone. Some commercial artists establish an iconic style and visual language that carries them through decades of work. ICON9 speaker Anita Kunz has…

PART 3 In the third part of our series on the art of typography, we’ll be exploring how to best use spacing as we cover three essential elements of typography – tracking, kerning and leading. A member of the International Society of T ypographic Designers (IST D) and course leader of the Design for Visual Communications courses at London College of Communication (LCC ), our guide Tony Pritchard is the ideal person to show you the way... Paying attention to the detail in typography is extremely important for the professional designer. It is the job of the designer to ensure that adjustments are made to the spacing of letters, words and lines of type to create good typography. Default settings System preferences and software settings have been established to enable…