Friday, 1 July 2016

Greetings Cards Inspiration

I personally think that greetings cards are a great illustrators 'bread and butter', similar to that of editorial imaging etc. I usually make all of the birthday cards for my friends and family so thought it might be a good idea if I get a set of designs ready to sell either online via Etsy, or in a broader perspective potentially selling to different retailers. Also, I would be really interested in taking up an internship or even just arranging a studio visit to a design house to get a feel of how they operate and the role of an in house illustrator.

Paperchase inspiration

Whenever I need inspiring, paper chase is my go-to place for ideas (besides pinterest). The other day I spent a while looking at their range of designs/illustrators work they supply and wrote down a huge list of the creatives that appealed to me. Here are just a few though or this blog post would go on forever (mainly people that I hadn't heard of before!)

Black Olive Studio



Black Olive hosts a whole range of different collections of greetings cards displayed by a wide variety of artists. I get the feel that they wish to showcase diversity in the artists ways of working, thus communication to the tastes of different audiences. For example the 'Huge and Co' collection is largely aimed at children, having quirky fun animal characters communicate an exciting birthday message. 
My main point of interest for the Black Olive studio is their range, this makes me think of the following questions:

  • What advantages do you see in showcasing a range of different artists work?
  • Do you ever consider the prospects of your brand being more recognisable by sticking to a singular distinctive tone of voice?
  • How does your studio operate? Do all artists work in the same space/collaborate?
I definitely need to add Black Olive to the list of people to contact!

Ashley Percival

Ashley Percival is a freelance illustrator who graduated from Falmouth in 2010, since then his illustrations have been licensed worldwide being printed on a range of products from album covers to stationary.

Percival's charming illustrations of animals and people really appeal to me. I love the sense of freedom that he creates by using a range of different materials and intricate methods of mark making; this helps to give the sense that each character has an individual personality. 


The images above are supposedly directed to an audience of parents purchasing artwork for children's nurseries, which surprised me somewhat as I believe that the visual language within these prints speaks to audiences of all ages, which in my opinion is an extremely valuable skill to have as an illustrator.

Percival is represented by www.brainboxcandy.com, a company which sells 'well funny cards and that', in other words a range of tongue and cheek, sarcastic, and humorous greetings cards. He has his own range under the 'funny cards-wild style' section.

Predicament

I would be so keen on applying for any vacancies/placements that come up in design houses such as tiger print and ukcards, but I feel like I don't have a good enough portfolio or enough work to show them? It's not me being negative or self destructive, as I normally jump to as many opportunities as I can, but I just don't have a strong enough range of images that I would feel confident enough to put forward to any companies. Yet, this somehow de-motivates me to work on anything specific because I want to try out as many different things as possible and find it hard to concentrate on one thing. It's so frustrating!
In the upcoming weeks I will just try and draw as many different things as possible to try and get some inspiration of some sort, which will hopefully start me off in a good position. Greetings cards are definitely something that I want to further explore within my practice; I would even consider setting myself briefs within the extended practice module in third year for example 'a greetings card per week' to push myself and develop my skills.

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