Kiss FM UK- existing example

Kiss FM is a radio station that is a part of the Bauer Passion portfolio and specialises in hip hop, R&B, pop, urban and house music, broadcasting on FM and National DAB. This station also has digtal broadcasts on DAB Digital Radio, Freeview, Sky, and TalkTalk TV.

Kiss FM started in October 1985, broadcasting only to South London, and then expanded over the whole city on 94 FM. The audience for Kiss grew in 1990 when it 
achived a licence. It has been said that it had 500,000 listeners when operating as a pirate station, with no licence. This station was published by Gordon Mcnamee, Tosca, Pyers Easton and George Power. Kiss FM used a launch of a party theme: 'Kiss Nights' at the Wag Club with the help of a London Club promoter: Guy Wingate. This relates to my personal project as I am using a different form of music to promote my new radio station; live sessions. In 1998 the station was rebranded and the logo was officially changed in 1999. In 2006 there was a second revamp of the brand where ODD designed the new logo. At the launch of this logo the radio station begun to focus on one genre in particular which was dance music.ODD which is a group of people that specialise in a number of things; identity design, brand relaunches, event design curation, visual merchandising, etc.. This brand opened in 2002 and since the launch they have worked with a variety of clients such as: Westfield, ASOS, Nike, Vodafone, Uniqlo, Sony etc.. The ODD brand was launched by a man who is now the creative director of the brand, and is named Nick Stickland. He is a graduate of Architecture from Royal College of Art. He begun his career by working for other architects such as: Eva Jiricna, Richard Rogers, ORMS and FAT. After searching for a compay that specialised in design and communications, he decided to create his own in 2002. 

1990-1998

This logo reminds me of the BBC Radio 1 logo that was designed for the 90s due to the fact that they have both been made for that particular era which is obvious due to the use of bright colours. However the shapes in this logo have been used differently compared to the BBC Radio 1, as this logo uses a symbol/icon. This type of logo represents the radio station visually and creates a direct link between the company name and imagery. I think that the reason for this choice of logo was made as it makes the station highly recognisable to the public from various view points, for example: being far away from the logo where the typography is unclear, but the shape of the logo is still visible which is also supported by the use of the bright colour.

1998-2006

This modification of the Kiss 100 logo uses lettermarks rather than a symbol, but has been creatively designed using typography to add imagery to the logo, which also links to the name of the station, like the logo above. A lettermark form of logo usually uses a symbol that represents the company using its initials or the first letter of the company, whereas kiss have cleverly incorporated this logo type with the last two letters of the brand name by turning the second 's' around and merging it with the first 's' to create a heart shape which is what people would associate with the word 'kiss'. This association with the word 'kiss' has also been thought about regarding the choice of colour as the colour palet for this logo revolves around shades of pink and purple, which is commonly linked to the name of this radio station.

 This logo is the design that has been used by the radio station since 2006 to now. It has evolved from using symbols relating to the name of the company, to the use of this large dynamic shape with points in various directions. I think that the purpose of this was to visually convey the idea that this radio station plays music of a variety of genres (even though it has a main focus; pop) and therefore connects to a wide range of people within an audience. Although this station now uses a ‘combination mark’ type of logo rather than a lettermark or symbol type, the use of a colour relating to the name is still present. A combination mark is a type of logo that combines a symbol with typography.

Sketch Note Task

As a class we did this sketch noting task by placing random items on a large piece of paper. We then had to write words associating with each item in a particular way to create a visual aspect of the word. In the end, we had a piece of paper containing names, descriptive words, and associative words. The purpose of this task was to learn a technique of brainstorming words to do with a subject, so that we could do the same with our chosen artist and song of the summer. This allowed us to gain knowledge of our chosen song and artist to create an informed outcome. 

CD Artwork Analysis'

I think that this album cover was made using Adobe Photoshop; the portrait would have been placed on a new document in photoshop and cartoonised with a texture added to the portrait as well as the background of the whole album cover. A popart effect has been created where the main aspects of Madonna's face have been coloured. 

An example of popart, which inspired this album cover: 
The use of this technique highlights Madonna's personality as she is a self concious person who cares about her appearance, so would therefore enhance specific areas of her face. There is also a 'paint splash' effect on the cover as a 'background' for the album cover for the title: 'CELEBRATION' . This could have been made using a stencil and coloured ink. This album cover relates to the potential outcome for my album cover as I intend on combining a handmade experiment using coloured ink ot create the same 'splash' effect. The composition of the colour in the hair in-particular as well as the bright colours on her face visually emphasizes Madonna's outgoing personality, which is a complete contrast to the personality of the model (Marylin Monroe) in the original popart image (second image) the designer was inspired by. I like the way that this album cover has been has been designed as it was clearly thought about before it was made, allowing the designer to create a meaning, eventhough only a few techniques were used. This has inspired me to not incorporate too many effects to my cover. This is because using too many effects will make the idea im trying to portray become unclear.   

 This CD cover was designed for the artist Notorious B.I.G's album 'The Final Chapter'. The portrait on this album cover was placed onto Photoshop to then be edited using various textures, patterns and a colour scheme of red shades, black, white and grey shades. The colour scheme links very well with the album name. This is because the different shades of red can be seen as a representation of blood/death, which is a theme that relates to the title as it is called 'The Final Chapter', which could be a metaphoric phrase to do with the end of someone's life for example. This theme also incorporates with one of the song titles from the album which is: 'Just A Memory', which is what a dead person would be. The placing of the colours with the portrait used are appropriate to the design because it gives the cover a masculine type of vibe. This is due to the way it looks as if it was designed to be 'messy' which is unlike the stereotype of females that like designs to be neat and tidy. I think that the messy look almost compliments the emotion on B.I.G's face as his expression seems as if he is carless, which seems to be the same type of mood the designer of the album was trying to portray to the customers. The use of the newspaper prints placed at different angles relates to the album title as it creates a sense of detoriation and something that has been left alone for a while as it had come to an end, for example: a shop that has been shut down and had newspapers placed over the windows. The use of the font represents the artist as it is bold and standard, just like how B.I.G is very standard with his meaningfull lyrics and gets his views across to his listeners. The composition of the font alos relates to the masculine effect as it hasn't been placed straight. 

 This is an album cover made by Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin who are a Dutch fashion photographer duo who are known for their work in fashion magazines and advertisements. They were both born in Amsterdam, Netherlands; Inez was born on 25th September 1963 and Vinoodh was born on 29th September 1961. The name of this art piece is Bjork Vespertine Album Cover. It was made using a piece of acetate and placing it on a piece of photopaper on the board of an enlarger while the negative of the Bjork was placed in the 'neg carrier', then image created was exposed to light to appear on the photopaper. I have chosen to to analyse this picture in particular because these two artists inspired me to make my own acetate & negative prints. The contrast between the black, white and grey soft tones resemble the way Bjork is calmly resting which I think creates an effect on the public as it allows them to view it in a particular way.

I would say that this picture ties into two themes; doodling and portraiture. This is because the acetate image is done as a doodle, and the picture of Bjork is clearly a portrait. I think that the work has been done as a symbolisation to convey a calm image/message to the public informing us on the type of music featured on the album. This is because firstly, Bjork is calmly resting on the front cover. Secondly the drawn image of the swan also conveys a peaceful message as those birds are known to represent peace and calmness which I think was done to outline her personality.

This is a picture that I made after being inspired by the Bjork Vespertine Album Cover. First I took a photo of a scenery outside using an SLR camera. I then made the design using tracing paper. The settings I used for the photo that I took were: F.8 and I used 2 seconds to expose it to the light. Unfortunately this picture came out too dark therefore I did the experiment again using the same negative and pattern using F.5.6 and 1.5 seconds which allowed the image to look alot clearer and brighter.

Logo Designs

Def Jam Recordings:

Def Jam Recordings is an American record label that mainly focuses on hip hop and urban music. It was founded by Isaac Rowlatt- Harrod who released the first single from the record label with is 'punk-rock group'; Hose. The record label is owned by Universal Music Group as well as a part of The Island Def Jam Music Group. The record label is also operated through other places such as the UK, where it operates through Virgin EMI and is known as Def Jam UK. It also operates through Universal Sigma Music where it is named Def Jam Japan. Def Jam has signed many singers, and five in particular who helped it become the number one record label in 2012, for having seven number one hits. These artists are: Kanye West, Jay Z, Ne-Yo, Rihanna and Justin Beiber. 

In 2001 the record label became increasingly relevant around the world, which was when Lyor Cohen announced Def Jam Germany as the first international Def Jam Company. After that, another international Def Jam label was announced and was named: Def Jam Japan, where artists such as: Al, Nitro Microphone Underground and Teriyaki Boyz were signed. Then in 2003 Def Jam recordings was known as an overarching record label with Def Soul below it. The following year, Roc-A-Fella Records was sold to the company at the same time Kanye West's career had launched. Before the record label had launched world wide, in 1998 and 1999 rapper DMX helped the company as he was able to sell millions of records and made hip hop become relevant again. During that period Cohen had left IDJMG to join Warner Music Group and was then replaced by L.A. Reid. Whilst this was happening there was a 'bidding war' for Jay Z's contract and L.A. Reid announced Jay Z as the president of Def Jam.

Out of the record label's my class and I analysed, my favourite would be Def Jam because the genre of music it has is more relevant to me, as I listen to the music by the artists signed to the label. 

The logo has an urban look to it due to the graffiti effect of spray paint which shows that the label supports urban music mainly. 

Another record label that we analysed was Ministry Of Sound. Ministry Of Sound is a London based night club as well as a record label and t-shirt brand. It came seventh in the 2013 DJ Magazine. 

Ministry of Sound is owned by Versha Ministry who shares the buisness with a man named James Palumbo who is the Chairman. The record label has sales up to £80 million, globally and has 500 employees worldwide. The statement they have created as an aim for their company is: "to create the moments that people live for. The company co-owns Ministry of Sound Australia Hussle Recordings and also owns brands such as: Hed Kandi, Euphoria and Hard2Beat. 

Ministry of Sound has a network of international labels, having offices in Australia, Germany and the United States. The record label was established in 1995 and released 'The Annual' which is a compilation album of a range of dance music tracks, mixed by UK DJ's; Boy George and Pete Tong. 

The actual logo as well as the name seems as if it relates to the British King due to the symbol at the top, which then relates to a phrase 'ministry of justice' which may be a message the label is trying to bring across. The 3D style makes it seem more contempary, and urban due to the style of music released with the label. I have also noticed that the colour of the symbol depends on the music the record label is presenting/supporting.

Logo Types

In class we used this sheet to help us understand the different logo types there are. Using this we created our own logo based on one of the types. I decided to create a wordmark type because it reflects the simplicity of The Weeknd and his music. 

Egg Packaging Task

To test our packaging skills, we had to create a container to protect an egg when having a heavy book being dropped on it, we were only allowed to use specific material; paper, staples, glue or sellotape. In order to create good packaging I had to know which areas of the egg were most vulnerable to breaking and discovered that it was the top and the bottom. Therefore I created a triangular prism with a squared bottom to mainly protect the tip of the egg, preventing the bottom for getting damaged. 

I also researched different kinds of interesting egg packaging designs to help make my decision. Here are some examples: 

These are all examples of triangular shaped packaging that influenced my design. Unfortunately my packaging wasn't a success as the egg broke after the first trial of dropping a book onto it. I believe that it would have been a success if I had used stronger material, for example: card. I will apply this knowledge to creating my album case and use card to ensure that the cd is well protected. 

V&A Illustration Awards

This is my favourite illustration piece from the V&A Illustration Awards exhibition. This piece is a part of a collection called The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories. It's my favourite due to the idea it portrays. I love the way that there is a faint portrait in the background which the women holding the bars has 'come out of'. The different tones of paint colour suggests that the women has come out of the painting and brought to life, but as she cant realistically come out of the painting, it's as if she is trapped in the painting, like someone in jail behind bars.

The illustrator of this painting has quoted 'As part of my final year negotiated illustration programme, I created illustrations to the brief set by the House of Illustration competition - illustrating three of the short stories from Angela Carter's The Bloody Chamber. The three images depict scenes or quotes from The Bloody Chamber, Puss-in-Boots and The Company of Wolves.'