I’m still a bit unsure on how I’m going to bring together all of the London stories that I’ve read and have found interesting, but I know that one of my ideas involved laying out London as a map and pin-pointing all of the stories at key landmarks. With this in mind, I looked at infographics, maps and illustrations of London.
Another reason why I wanted to look at existing illustrations is so that I could get a general idea of what has been done before so that I could use them as an inspiration but then create something entirely different.
Mood Board
Image sources: Arunas Kacinskas http://www.behance.net/ArunasK; The Design Surgery (2) http://www.behance.net/thedesignsurgery; Simon http://www.simonsgallery.com/001commissions.php; Jane Gardner http://janegardnerdesign.com/; Lizzie Mary Cullen http://www.lizziemarycullen.com/; DxC http://www.behance.net/DeeAit; Chetan Kumar http://www.behance.net/cheism; Mcdonald Gill http://www.macdonaldgill.com/; David Ryan Robinson http://davidryanrobinson.com/; Chris Martin http://mrchrismartin.co.uk/index.php; Charlotte Trounce http://www.charlottetrounce.co.uk/; Dieter Braun http://www.brauntown.com/; Migy http://www.migy.com/; Lab Partners http://lp-sf.com/; Jenny Leonard http://jenny-leonard.com/
Analysis
I then picked out the ones I found inspirational and decided to analyse them. This is so that I could have a look at the techniques they’ve used and discover the reasons behind them.
The Design Surgery - http://www.behance.net/thedesignsurgery
The first thing that popped into mind when I had a glance at this inforgraphic was that it reminded me of the layers in a cake, and I found this really inspirational because it was what I wanted to do for one of my ideas. I was going to portray London as a very decorative cake; cutting slices so that I could reveal the underground beneath the surface. However after looking at this image I think I might have to do it slightly differently so that I could produce something entirely new.
What really caught my eye was the way they had drawn the characters as, judging by their attire, it appears that each one is from a different era. There is the man with a very old-fashioned bicycle, the women in a Victorian dress, and the joggers. This is perhaps to show the diversity of London and how it has taken aspects from all ages and is a mixture of different cultures.
In contrast, the buildings remain the same. This then places the main focus on the characters because they are the only really unusual things (apart from the steam train, of course!) and so the characters are the ones telling the story.
There are specific icons within that sums up the city as a whole: the red buses, the underground, the underground signs… And yet the illustrators have missed out important landmarks such as the Big Ben and the Tower of London. This shows that you don’t need to include the obvious signs in order to show the same city. Each of these objects has been drawn so that they’re facing the front, and if it weren’t for the placement of the buildings this piece would’ve looked very flat. By putting all of the important objects in the foreground they become one of the first things that the viewer would see as they walk past.
Conclusion:
This piece was very much like the idea I was aiming for, so now I think I’m going to go either for a different idea or take another approach to it.
Here are some of their other pieces I liked:
Overall conclusion:
I have noticed that their infographics are very flat in terms of colours, as they use no more than two shades. This is also helped by the fact that they are vectorised images so there is a ‘digital’ feel to them. I really like the way they present their pieces and the way they lay out each aspect.
Lizzie Mary Cullen - http://www.lizziemarycullen.com/
Unlike the other pieces I have on my inspiration mood board, this really caught my eye because of the unusual perspective. Instead of laying all of the elements of London ‘flat’ on the page, the illustrator has distorted it so that it has that sense of surrealism. If Cullen had involved any colour then it would’ve maximised the surrealism but could detract any focus on the intricate detailing.
The amount of detail singles out some of the main focal points by doing them in not as much detail, for example the light around the lamppost, the steps, and the roof of St. Pauls. This makes the piece appear less busy because there are some places where the eyes could ‘relax’ from focusing on the sheer detail of the building and cobblestones.
As mentioned above, the perspective is extremely distorted so that it looks as if the viewer is in some sort of whirlwind, or that the world is spinning around them as it did with Alice as she fell through the hole to Wonderland. With this in mind, the viewer could possibly think of this place in London being wonderland because it’s so surreal and appears ‘magical’. Even the sky is a mixture of swirls and patterns so that it’s hard to tell if they’re clouds or the sky itself. This puts London in a good light as it could portray London as being a place of wonder and that amazing things happen in it.
Conclusion:
This distortion makes it hard to see where the place is, and I wouldn’t have thought it was a part of London if it wasn’t for the buildings (as they had drawn St. Pauls). So instead of drawing London as a whole in one piece she had only drawn a specific building. However I love the style she had adopted and the amount of detail within, and I hope to do a detailed piece as well.
Here are her other works that I found most interesting:
Overall conclusion:
I love the sense of surrealism within Cullen’s pieces, especially the swirls and how she lays out her composition. I would like to touch into the fantasy side of illustration for my piece, so she is a great source of inspiration.
Milly Molly Mandy Map – Joyce Lankester Brisley
During my crit one of my lecturers mentioned the Milly Molly Mandy map when I mentioned that I might put all of London’s stories on a map. Even though it’s a children’s illustration book it’s interesting to see how the illustrator – Brisley – laid all of the houses out.
Much like the infographics I have previously looked out, Brisley has laid out all of her houses so that they appear flat on the page. This is much like a tourist map of a famous town, although instead of placing a number by each building there is enough room for the names to be displayed by them. The type used is very ‘cute’ as it reflects handwritten type without serifs. What emphasises the overall ‘cute’ look of these labels is the way they have described each building by using words that children would such as the “Nice White Cottage with the Thatched Roof” instead of just saying “Milly Molly Mandy’s house”.
Despite it being an illustration aimed at children, this is actually quite detailed because of the way she has drawn the hedges surrounding the houses. The houses are quite detailed as well but everything is well balanced due to the simplicity of the fields and type.
Conclusion:
The stories I looked at our quite in-depth so I think that I won’t be able to display the names and places of famous buildings in London as it would just clog up the page. However it was still interesting to see how one can illustrate a town as a map, which is actually quite effective. I could achieve something similar to drawing buildings with the characters running through the streets but don’t include any labels (or only those for very significant stories).
Mcdonald Gill - http://www.macdonaldgill.com/
I looked deeper into maps and came across Mcdonald Gill, another illustrator mentioned during my crit. The amount of detail in his maps is overwhelming so there is always something to look for at each glance.
Due to the way he has illustrated each building it’s quite hard to figure out if it was a map of London, as none of the key landmarks are highlighted. This could be due to the sheer size of the map as it’ll be hard to highlight them all if he was doing the whole of London. This means that this map would probably be used as decoration more than a tourist guide as the streets are so small as well as the buildings.
This amount of detail could bring up connotations of medieval paintings, especially those shown in illuminated manuscripts. This idea is supported by the way he has drawn the border of the page with type that resembles the serif style that is shown in those books. At first it appears that the words are in Latin because of the way they’re portrayed, but at a second glance the viewer would realise that it’s all in English. Another aspect that makes it appear inspired by medieval paintings is the little dots between each word instead of gaps.
Conclusion:
For the first time I have found a detailed piece that I find too detailed for my liking. I think that this is mostly due to the amount of buildings he had crammed into one piece and the fact that London – being our largest city – is very hard to squash into a map. The tourist landmarks are all but invisible, and for my final piece I would like to highlight these.
However I do like the link between this and illuminated manuscripts, and if this were set in a museum of such paintings then this would fit in perfectly.
Here are some of his other maps:
Overall conclusion:
As I have mentioned above, the link between these maps and the illuminated manuscripts is shown by the way he has illustrated the borders and the type style he uses.
Migy - http://www.migy.com/
This illustration has certain aspects as an infographic such as the flat colours, two-colour shading, and overall flat appearance. This is mostly because the characters and objects are drawn in 2D rather than 3D, and they have that ‘vectorised’ appearance.
Yet compared to all of the other infographics this one has a very traditional feel to it, as it isn’t ‘strict’ in the sense that everything is perfectly aligned and proportioned, as if the illustrator had drawn everything by hand. This then creates a very original feel to it as it could quite possibly be a one-off design and that it’s more personal to the illustrator. This shows a perfect combination of traditional and digital media: the traditional side is shown by the hand drawn illustrations, and the digital side is shown by the final outcome (so the type of software he used). The typography is another sign of this piece being quite personal as it appears to be hand lettered, and as I did a bit more research into his work I found that he is very fond of hand lettering.
There is a sense of this piece being very authentic because of the use of ‘traditional media’, but also because it’s clear that he had done some research in order to piece some of the stories of London together. For example he has drawn Sherlock Holmes, wrote the phrase “mind the gap” which originated in London, as well as other landmarks that aren’t as popular as those such as the Big Ben.
However due to the colour choice I would say that this illustration is aimed more at girls and those who knew about London more rather than the general tourist population. This is because colours such as pink and red dominates the illustration, and they are stereotypically ‘girly’ colours. There are quite a few illustrations of women within this piece as well (my focus being especially on the girl who appears to be on a shopping spree).
Conclusion:
I really like how he amalgamated hand lettering and illustration as well as being able to take both of these ‘traditional’ forms and producing something digital.
Here are some of his other pieces I liked:
Overall conclusion:
Due to the overall ‘cute’ appeal of his illustrations I would say that they’re more aimed at women rather than men, which might be a problem for me if I decided to take inspiration from him as I would like to target the general audience rather than a specific gender. However I do really like his technique and that personal touch he adds to his illustrations.
Overall conclusion of research:
Most of these illustrations done of London are vector-based, safe for the one done by Lizzie Mary Cullen. It’s interesting to see this, as it seems that it’s now a current trend to mix “done-by-hand” media with digitalised illustrations. Overall these illustrations range in different styles and it seems that all mediums are accepted by the audience (online users).
I would like to do my image traditionally but it would be nice to do a little bit of experimentation with digital softward, as I would like to increase my knowledge of it.
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