Photography exhibition

This is a recent graphic design project that I did for Acceleris in Harrogate for their client the Shipwrecked Mariners' Society. My brief was to design an invitation (shown below) to a wonderful photography exhibition and also the accompanying exhibition brochure (front and back cover spread, and inside spread shown above).

The Shipwrecked Mariners' Society put on the exhibition called ‘Celebrations of the Sea’ – the world’s first photography exhibition underwater featuring images of individuals whose lives are dominated by the ocean. It opened at the Sea Life Centre in Brighton on 21st October and then travels around several more Sea Life Centres through November and into December.

It was a brilliant project to be part of - not only was there the opportunity to be creative with the design of the brochure and invite, but the images from the exhibition were, of course, amazing.

The brochure briefly featured each of the people represented in the exhibition, as well as highlighting the work of the Shipwrecked Mariners' Society themselves. As they state in the introduction to the brochure...

'Celebrations of the Sea aims to honour the maritime industry’s unsung heroes. From the fishermen who brave the UK’s stormiest seas and traditional lobster pot makers who keep precious traditions alive to our most talented celebrity chefs who transform fish into some of the nations favourite dishes – all are celebrated in this unique and special photography exhibition.

'Born out of a partnership between national maritime charity the Shipwrecked Mariners’ Society and renowned underwater photographer and TV Producer Kate Westaway, the project is a celebration of those hardworking individuals who work in and around the sea.'

Without a doubt, this is my favourite graphic design project that I have worked on this year and I'm very pleased with the end result.

Please click on the link below to see further examples of my work.

Visit www.howabout.co.uk

Further OCS spreads and design banter

I have attached a couple of further spreads from the recent OCS annual report that was recently completed because, well, I'm pretty proud of that particular job so thought it was worth another shameless plug.

It has continued to be a manic few weeks on the graphic design front and I have done plenty of work in both Leeds and Harrogate as well as for clients in York and London. It certainly makes for a varied and unpredictable working week, which is great. The recent work has included collateral for the banking sector, the automotive sector, the healthcare sector and some nice work for a photography exhibition (visuals to be displayed here soon).

The only downside to this hefty workload is that I have let the blog updates slip a little, but hey, that can't be helped. On that note, I'll sign off here and get back to the next design job, as deadlines are looming.

Over and out.

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OCS Annual Report

It's been busy recently. Really busy in fact. As well as doing some interesting graphic design projects from my base here in Harrogate, I have also been helping out at agencies in Leeds and also on t'other side of Harrogate. The days have been long, sometimes the weekends have been interrupted by design jobs too, but it's been good fun.

Attached here is an example of an annual report that we designed for OCS (feel free to click on the image for a better view). It was a great project to be involved with - a really satisfyingly chunky piece of work that came with a suitable budget to do it justice. It allowed us to use nice (largely stock) photography, use a fifth special colour in the printing process and make use of a nice paper stock. Myself and Tim Moat worked on the design side, while Richard Spencer was the wordsmith - I think we made a great team.

The process was a relatively smooth one too, and once the job had been signed off and gone to print, I worked on an interactive pdf version. We obviously knew this was going to be a requirement, so when I set up the initial templates and style sheets, I created some navigation buttons on a hidden layer in InDesign that could be activated at a later stage. There was some additional navigation to manually create too, mainly from the contents page, as the size of the overall document meant that it was spread over several InDesigns 'books' that were stitched together later on.

All in all, it was a great graphic design job to work on, and I am delighted with the end result.

As ever, music and design have been working in sweet harmony. I recently saw Gruff Rhys (of Super Furry Animals fame) do a great gig at Harrogate Theatre. It was suitably weird, brilliant, unpredictable and enjoyable. Next up I'm off to see Miles Hunt (of Wonderstuff fame) play a gig in Carlisle (I'm a bit of a sucker for all things Stuffies), and then it's Fleet Foxes in Leeds later on in the year. Fab!

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Healthcare examples

Morning world and welcome to a blustery Tuesday morning in September.

Beaucare Medical
Today I thought I'd showcase a couple of recent bit of graphic design work completed for clients in the healthcare sector, starting with a press ad for Beaucare Medical in Harrogate (shown above). Its a monthly full page ad that appears in Caring UK magazine and focuses on a selection of the products they offer.

Bradfern
Below is the front page of a 2 page A4 leaflet designed for Bradfern in Oldham, again it showcases some of the products on offer for care homes and the like. This is the first of what will hopefully be a suite of promotional materials, each one focusing on different areas of the business.

Actually, I haven't listed the tunes that have been spinning on the Howabout hi-fi for a while now have I!? A man can't design in total silence after all. Well I can't anyway. A look on the iTunes 'recently played' list indicates it's Fleetwood Mac, Prodigy, Ozric Tentacles, Rolling Stones, NWA, Fleet Foxes and Dinosaur Jr. Not bad...

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"The best brochure I have ever had designed."

What a successful and enjoyable graphic design project I have just completed for YorkTest Laboratories in York. I was asked to design a guidebook (page samples above) and diary (page samples below) for their DrinkScan programme, which helps to establish whether customers are intolerant to various ingredients in drinks. Obviously they needed to have the same theme running throughout to make it clear they were sister publications and as the subject matter was drinks, I decided to use a nice, clinical image of clear water as an striking cover (which also reflected the tone of the DrinkScan logo nicely).

The turnaround on the job was very fast - just under a week from the initial brief being taken to print ready artwork being delivered for printing. Not bad for one 16 page A5 document, and one 28 page A5 document. But even better was the feedback from Laura Seaton, Senior Project Manager at YorkTest Laboratories...

"I have been working in marketing for 13 years and it is the best looking brochure I have ever had designed."

Praise indeed!

















The graphic design process was helped by virtually faultless copy being supplied by the client, and we selected a nice array of images to work with (although we padded them out with some additional ones from my archives that I thought would work well). I think it's a great example of the quality of design work that can be produced by Howabout Creative Solutions even when time is of the essence.

We now have a little more time to produce a DL size sales brochure to accompany the diary and guidebook, which again will follow the same theme, so the end result will be a really nice suite of publications.

I really hope to get more projects along these lines as I love doing them, and when I get feedback such as this from clients, the buzz is amazing. Check out my website for further work - the link is below.

Visit www.howabout.co.uk

Wales, Led Zeppelin and art.

Good Monday morning all. I'm back in front of the Mac after a weeks camping in mid Wales. It was awesome despite the mostly rainy weather - a nice mix of culture and campfires, beaches and barbeques, nature and nonsense.

I was pleasantly surprised to find we were camping just a stone's throw from Bron Yr Aur - the cottage made famous by Jimmy Page and Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin and where they wrote much of 'Led Zeppelin III' and various other tracks that appeared on 'Houses of the Holy' and 'Physical Graffiti'. Of course I had to play the song 'Bron Yr Aur' on my iPod while standing round the campfire (on more than one occasion actually), in homage to one of the greatest bands of all time.

We made a visit to the Museum of Modern Art in Machynlleth too (http://www.momawales.org.uk/) which is a fab place. As well as featuring a wonderful exhibition of paintings by Matthew Wood, the place was also gearing up for the Machynlleth Festival and our visit coincided with some great folk music from Chile, which my daughter adored and (rightly so) insisted we stop and listen to a while.

The Centre for Alternative Technology (http://www.cat.org.uk/) was another inspiring place to visit. It's one of those places where, as well as the expected green and eco-friendly solutions for sustainable living that are on display, you will stumble on nice, quirky pieces of design such as slabs of slate featuring typography and carved elements of trees; sculptures of hares out-running a fox; and living-willow tunnels for kids to dash through. I would love to return (and I would love it not to be raining when I do!).

Aberdyfi is gorgeous, the mountains amazing, the sandy beaches fun-filled and the wildlife spectacular. For now it's back to designing and creating though...

Visit www.howabout.co.uk

Work, music and holidays

Busy, busy, busy... that's what I've been lately. Which is great. Hope it stays that way. Actually it will definitely stay that way for the next six weeks or so, what with it being the school holidays. It definitely adds an extra dimension of complexity to the working day when you have a young daughter requiring attention, but its a nice problem to have. It means there will be enforced breaks from the computer screen too, which will be welcome, and also a couple of breaks away from home, starting with this weekends Deer Shed Festival in North Yorkshire. I'm really looking forward to it - I do like my festival fix each summer and this one sounds like a lovely family-friendly, chilled out affair. Despite the fact that we don't get there until Saturday, it's already started well, as I won a Deer Shed hoodie in a competition this week. Fab! I'll be suitably branded when onsite then!

There has been a flurry of graphic design activity with York Test Laboratories (in York) this month with a swathe of mailers coming through the studio (a selection are pictured above) - they are always nice things to work on too.

As well as that I have been helping out at Kariba in Harrogate, and continue to work with Acceleris MC, also in Harrogate, and Bradfern in Oldham. Oh and I've created a logo and collateral for Red Cat Property in Harrogate as well. One of the 'To Let' boards is shown here, so look out for them dotted around Harrogate and the surrounding area.






















Almost as important as the work I've been doing is the tunes I've been listening to. This week, Fleet Foxes' 'Helplessness Blues', Gruff Rhys (who I saw at Harrogate Theatre this Monday playing a suitably brilliant, unpredictable, funny and unique gig. He's a talented fella, that man), Thievery Corporation and Death in Vegas.

Visit www.howabout.co.uk