A friend of mine, living in Paris, trying to make a living creating images of texture and contrast.
If you get a moment take a look and let me know what you think.
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Archive for diary
introducing Miki
the worst coffee i ever had
was in Clisserol Park, Stoke Newington. No it really was, and it was
only last weekend. Don’t go there, Don’t.
London, October 2007
Today I’m having an orange day
I decided to wear my orange rain jacket as the sun hasn’t shinned for three days and it cheers me up. I went to pick up a packet, a letter from annette (I love saying that) and it had an orange letter and an orange sweet tin. all set of on green paper. wonderful. thanks netti.
Crystal Palace, August 2007
My sofa beckons
Like a lot of freelancers, I spend most of my day at the screen either at home or in other peoples studios working on their equipment. Sometimes it just gets too much though and I have to lay down. Yesterday was one such day. I tried, I have my website to update. Some illustrations that I want to do. even finally add the bloody postcards to this blog that somehow disappeared when I hit the wrong button the other week. But no. I couldn’t do it. I’d been out the night before (see below) and I’ve had loads of work in the last months. So when it came to doing my own stuff. nope wouldn’t happen. fingers seize up. Can’t look at another bit of design or illustration. Kerning has lost all it’s appeal and there is only one thing to do. Spend the afternoon laying on the Sofa, reading comics and listening to Danny Baker. Come the end of the day I do have the feeling I should have been working and that somehow the wheels of industry have slowed for a while, but that is just the work ethic that was beaten into me at school kicking in. Who cares about the wheels of industry, I’m a designer and they are rusty anyway. Being a Designer means you can spend the day laying on the sofa and calling it work. Why I come up with my best designs either on the sofa or on the bus. Needless to say I have loads of energy today even if it is unfocused.
So it goes.
Beautiful Noise
Two days ago, (this being a day late because yesterday I couldn’t be bothered to get off the sofa) we saw Electralane at the Scala. WOW! My friend in Hamburg, Lauschi, had told me they were good live, but not how good. It’s been a while since I went to a gig. When you get over 40 all your friends seem to have other things to do, like staying in and looking after the kids and to be honest you get the feeling most gigs are hard work, not having the energy you used to have when 20.
They were great. 4 women on stage playing beautiful, loud noise. The support were also loud noise but somehow nowhere near as clever. I gotta say the best gig I’ve been to in 10 years or so.
In the words of my 1 year old niece, Fandabbidozzy, it is the only word she can say and she’s far to young to go to gigs, but that’s what she would have said had she been there. I still have the hissing in my ears 2 days later. What fun.
Scala, May 2007
Talking of London Bridge
I found this in my iPhoto library this morning.
One of my earliest jobs as a Graphic Designer saw me as part of the team that designed the new street signage for the City of London. My job was to create a fool proof system of letter spacing so that whoever created a new sign they always had the same look and feel. I was 20 odd and this was before computers kicked to save the day. It consisted of a 4 bar system under each letter and the following letter would but up to one of the 4 steps of the bar, a bit like the old Letraset system but more complicated. As the relationship of each pair of letters differ and you have Upper and lowercase letters as well as numbers etc. It ended up with around 4,000 combinations. You would have to cross reference each pairing and see what the step number was to align it. We had sheets of words all over the studio for a month to check the system. It worked, it still works and they still use it as far as I know. Although it does look a little dated now and I would now open the spacing more.
I didn’t do the tag on this particular sign though, that’s a bit naff.
Where are they?
Leaving the Renoir cinema after watching “Lights in the dusk”. The third part of Aki Kaurismaki’s Loser trilogy, a beautiful but bleak film. We were walking down the quite streets towards King’s Cross when we passed a lonely convenience store, lighting up the streets with a green glow. It felt like we were still in downtown Helsinki. Squatting outside was a guy with a bottle in his hand who looked like he belonged in the film, muttering to himself.
As we got closer we could hear him repeating “It’s Saint George’s Day today, but where are the dragons? Where are the dragons?”
Where indeed.
Things to do when you are freelance
I just spent a pleasant 10 minutes eating my first muffin from the new Blackbird Bakery in Crystal Palace, while having a cup of tea, reading the introduction to Zak Smith’s ‘Pictures Showing What Happens on Each Page of Thomas Pynchon’s Novel Gravity’s Rainbow’ (which is mad), with a cat on my shoulder and Danny Baker in the background talking about Haunted Sandwich Fillings’. Sometimes it’s great being freelance. Thanks Jon for the recommendation.
Home , February 2007
