Logo Design | Ortús Chamber Music Festival

Final Logo Design

Very excited about this project! Back in June, a friend of mine - super talented cellist, Sinéad O Halloran - approached me about an idea she had. Together with Mairead Hickey, she plans to launch a brand new chamber music festival, called Ortús, which will be based in East Cork in February 2016. It was an absolute pleasure for me to get involved by designing a logo for the event!

Very loose and sketchy initial thoughts.

After discussing the project with Sinéad, I learned that the name of this festival - Ortús, pronounced "ore-toose" rhyming with moose - originates from two words; the latin word, ortus, meaning rising, beginnings, origin; and the Irish word tús which means beginning, start. The overall idea of the festival is to encourage young Irish musicians who have studied and performed abroad to come home and share what they've learned from their experiences with our local communities. Three concerts are planned, as well as open rehearsals, and outreach in schools. With all of this, Ortús really wants to make chamber music more accessible to the public, and hopefully inspire the next generation of musicians to broaden their horizons too. 

Colour studies.

With all this in mind, I began drawing up sketches in various styles and colours. I considered a wide range of symbols; inspired by everything from the passion that these musicians had for their craft and the cultural significance of returning home to share their experiences, to the dawning of their careers and the idea of crossing oceans and moving mountains with their talents. I also considered more physical elements of the project; including elements of string instruments and music notes, as well as waves of the ocean and the colours of the sea and land. 

Final design.

After various experiments and revisions, the final design that we came up with was this. Encompassing the idea of crossing oceans, and returning to the island of Ireland, I included waves and 'bubbles' in a deep blue design. I also used four "strings" to represent both the instruments that will be played during the festival, as well as the sheet music the musicians will play according to.  The curving shapes were inspired by the scroll at the top of those instruments, as well as the treble clef used in sheet music, and the fluid motion of music as its played- both in the sound, and in the musician themselves, as they pull the bow across the strings.

A few photos I took of the musicians involved.

Sinéad was also kind enough to let me tag along during a photoshoot at the end of June, which gave me the opportunity to meet with the musicians involved, take a few photos, and listen to them play. They're impressive, to say the least! I can't wait to see them perform again next February, and I'll share details as the event approaches on my social feeds, because I think you might like to see them perform too!

Taken while I was waiting around on the day of the photoshoot.

I was also fortunate enough to meet with Richard from Creative Productions, as he recorded a promotional video on the day, and with Bríd O Donovan, who handled photography.  Go and like the Ortús Festival Facebook Page to keep up to date on all of the Ortús Festival details. It's gonna be good! 

Kinetic Text | God's Away on Business

It's done! My kinetic text project is officially complete. So here it is! 

Please do click through to see the complete process, from start to finish! 

WIP 4 | Kinetic Text | God's Away on Business

The deadline for this kinetic text project is fast-approaching, and so are the deadlines for everything else! But it's pretty satisfying to see a big project like this one creep ever-closer to the finish line, so I'm pretty happy with it. There are still a few little bits and pieces about this section that I want to tidy up, but done is better than perfect, so right now, I'm planning to get everything finished to a standard I'm happy enough with, and then I'll go back over to tweak it to the best that it can be.

WIP 2 | Kinetic Text | God's Away on Business from Alice Coleman on Vimeo.

WIP 3 | Kinetic Text | God's Away on Business

I've been feeling a little unwell for the past while, and it's been a struggle trying to balance college work, appointments for this that and the other, and general life. It's funny which projects become more difficult to manage... This kinetic text project is one of the more complicated projects I've got in the pipeline, but it's one of the only projects I seem to be able to wrap my head around lately. Hmm...

Anyway, here's a little update on the project so far! I'm having fun with it!
(Sorry for the kinda terrible quality though!)

If You Have Enough Book Space | Terry Pratchett

Terry Pratchett...

I started reading Discworld when I was around twelve years old, and while that series instantly became one of my favourite collections of novels, Pratchett immediately became my favourite author. The characters, the worlds, the stories that Pratchett created and showed to his readers were incredible. His creativity, imagination, and wit have always inspired and delighted me, and his quirky, ever-positive outlook on life, and death, and everything in between are so mind-bogglingly brilliant that that they consistently leave me in awe. The more I read, the more I learn, and the more I appreciate the wisdom and intelligence of Pratchett’s view of our world.  And so, more than just an author, but as a human being; Terry Pratchett will be missed. Quite terribly. 

WIP 2 | Kinetic Text | God's Away on Business

Okay, so here's the first "proof of concept" I can show for my Kinetic Text Project. I took out a lot of the textures for the sake of simplicity for the proof, but I will definitely be bringing those back, as soon as possible. (I miss them!)

This is actually the - what? third? - time I've tried to pull this little section together. It's been frustrating, but now that I've figured this out, I feel like I'll manage the rest of the project without too much stress. It's just a matter of sitting down and getting it done, second by second. 

Curiouser And Curiouser

It's no secret that I'm a fan of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. I love the characters, the environments, the utter bizarreness of it all. I recently started reading the book again, and had a sudden urge to draw up the famous quote "Curiouser and curiouser!" and I also thought it'd be a good way to kick-start a bit of activity in my shop. So click here and check this design out on t-shirts and mugs and all sorts of other fun things! Please do!

Flash Game | The Getaway

BIG post today! I spent a solid chunk of last semester working on this interactive programming assignment. Weeks and weeks of drawing, animating, and coding, all working together to create a short and sweet little game called "The Getaway." Click HERE to play the game yourself!

"The Getaway" is a single-level flash platform game, which I made with my friend Kirsty. What I'm showing you today is the game bible, which basically shows you every element of design that became a part of the game; including character designs, environment layouts, user interfaces and start/finish screens. I also wrote a short(ish) backstory to give the game a bit of meaning, and added a few of the early sketches. Be sure to click on the images below to make 'em bigger, and click HERE to play the game yourself! :D

Colourisation

I'm back in college! This is one of the first assignments of the year; to colourise a black and white photograph that has something to do with the 1916 Easter Rising. The photo I chose was taken in 1915, in Cork City. It's of a group of the Irish Volunteers, including my great-grandfather, Sean Scanlan (second from the right in the back row). Click through to see the original photograph and my progress with it.

Competencies Performance and Development Programme Icons

Three things: Dublin is cool, icons are fun, and working full time in a graphic design company is a curious experience.