Welcome to VisionHello readers! Welcome to the very first issue of Vision.

Vison is a student magazine which is dedicated in showcasing work from both Graphic Design and New Media students at UCA Epsom. Vison will also be giving the readers a chance to see how designers create their own work and where they gather inspiration from. This magazine is also aimed at those who arn’t familiar with the world of Graphic

Design. This will be a great way for them to understand a bit more about the course.

The main goal is to showcase student’s work across the whole campus at UCA Epsom. Every Semester students produce brillaint work which is often displayed on their blog or personal websites. The work done by students never gets displayed anywhere in UCA. This magazine is a great way for both courses to show their work to the rest on the uni-

versity.

About Graphic Design

Graphic Design is a form of communication that allows the designer to use combination of images, layouts and typograpghy to create their messages. Graphic Design is part of our life, it is everywherefrom packaging, to T-shirt design to billboardsand even in the film industry.

Currentley at UCA Epsom there are two Graphicscourses, New Media and Graphic Design. They both usedifferent methods to visually communicate to their audi-ences, but are equally effective in doing so.

About Graphic Design

graphic designGraphic Design is a way of visually communicating through image, typography colour and page layouts. A Graphic Designers aim is to visually solve problems and create something that catches the audience’s eye.Graphics often focus more to publications ,screen printing , logos and branding, advertisements and product packaging. A Graphic Designer will often use a combination of different techniques when designing. Tools are also a important factor for designers, as it allows them to create different styles in their work. Graphics at UCA is a three year, six - semester course. Over time students will be engaging in illustration, branding, advertisements, printing and web based media, photography and animation. Students will also have the opportunity to attend workshops that will help them gain a better understanding and improve their work ability. In addition visiting speakers, studio lecturers and other experts also contribute in workshop practice.

Christian Baranowicz Year 2

new mediaGraphic Design New Media explores ways of communication using various forms of emerging technologies. The course allows the student to explore in both media and design practice. The key topics that is studied in New Media ranges from image, motion graphics, investigations of type and history and culture of design media. As New Media is a very well rounded course, it gives students the opportunity to investigate and experiment in a wide range of subjects.

john aloy biongan Year 2

I make illustrations not only for freelance projects, but mainly for myself, because painting and designing is like a sport- if you don’t train, you won’t get good re-sults. If I’m doing something, I try to do it good, but most of the time I don’t like my works, because after some time you look at it, and realise that some things could be different and better, but it’s already done, so I just create more drawings, videos, etc.

There are various approaches to illustration. One of which being my favourite is drawing by hand then taking it onto the computer and developing the lines, texture and appearance, before filling in layers of different tones and colours.

Another way is the use of a graphic tablet. Some use the ability of drawing on a tablet, which creates the image on screen as you make it. This is handy because all of the details are controlled, unlike with paper, when you make a mistake with ink it is near impossible to remove.

Other illustration processes involve taking existing work and mastering tools such as the pen tool and using pre-existing work in generating your own il-lustration as a result using their outlines or nets.

Christian Baranowicz Graphic Bear illustration. For more work by Chritian Baranowicz visit http://chris.gdnm.org/

Louis White

Your Title HereWe take a look at Graphic Design New Media’s brief, which ask the students to create their own...

For New Media students at UCA, the day has finally come where they get to focus more on what they want to do. The brief given will last 4 weeks, by then students will have to plan, research and develop a project. The students will then present the project to the whole class at the end. They will also have to produce two A4 boards which clearly explain their project supported by images .

We take a look at Dmitir Knyazev’s project as he looks to create a mov-ie trailer composed from various different genre of films. With only a low budget he is armed with just a tripod and camera and a few good actors.

New Media year 2

Your Title HereFor this brief we where given freedom to create what ever we wanted, so i decided to choose something to do with movie making.

My first idea was to make a music video for a band, but i thought that a month is not enough to find a band, choose a track, write a decent scenario, film and edit it. So I decided to create a short movie trailer for a non-existing movie. The movie itself doesn’t really make any sence (like most of the trailers you see today)

I decided to go nuts with it, so there will be giant hamsters in the middle of the road,shooting with bananas and random explosions. In many trailers you see different things like anger, love, philosophy and so on. That’s what I was doing with my trailer...

To make one, I had to learn a lot of new cool things, and not only put everything together, but learn how to do it properly. I got a lot of help from my friends, so I would like to say thanks for all your help!

For more information or to check out Dmitri’s movie trailer visit his blog page at http://network.gdnm.org/dmitrij/

MATHISEASYDESIGNISHARD

MATHEASY

DESIGNHARD

— Jeffrey Veen

No space for GraphicsIf you have ever visited UCA Epsom, then you will at some point probably notice that there isn’t enough graphics work situated around the university campus. Rather there is a large amount of fashion work dis-played on walls and monitors throughout the university. A recent survey started by one of the students of New Media asked if Graphic Design work is showcased enough? and to everyones surprise all the answers said no. We now look for a way to tackle this problem.

Showcasing work is important for all courses, not just for displaying work but also for exposure to the course. it would seem that Graphic Design and New Media have been pushed aside by the dominance of fashion. But is that the case? or is there simply no space for their work to be displayed? We took a closer look at UCA brand new building located at the end of the campus. We noticed that there was infact a few Graphics work displayed on standing boards but that was all. There also seems to be a lot of free space in the surrounding areas. We spoke to a few students to get their opinion on the subject. Speaking to Mat-thew Finnie and Konrad Ziemlewski both year 2 New Media students. Matthew says “ We get bits and pieces of are work up, not a lot just a few like on the graphics floor. But nothing by the entrance thats all Fashion! so it doesn’t feel like we get any exposure”. Konrad says “ We dont get to see other students work from graphics and vise versa. The only time we get to see anything from them is on their website or blogs”

We then spoke about a possible solution to tackle this problem. Matthew says” We could probably have like open areas, where we can put our work up. And we could probably use monitors to show are work on a slideshow. It would also be good for us to have some space out by the entrance, as i think it would be nice for people to see our work when they come in. I also think in the new building theres a lot of opportunity for us, as there is a large amount of free space there”. Konrad said “ maybe if we can’t get work up we can probably make a website where we can put our work on, then maybe we can get more people from outside to look at it.

No space for Graphics

After speaking with the students it was clear that they felt like this had to be addressed. But since the arrival of the new building there has been open spaces for Graphics work to be displayed along with work from other courses. We can only hope that work gets situated in the future, as UCA holds some talented designers.

Q Can you start telling us a little about yourself, where did you previously study? Why did you choose to study New Media?

A Hey, well Im Konrad Ziemlewski a polish “designer” living in London most of his life. I studied graphics at Graveney School for Alevels, while also doing it for my GCSE’s. I feel like I have been interested in graphics for years, definitely before my teens, with it being mostly about the aesthetic side at the begging but then for a number of other more developed reasons. I chose New Media purely on the basis that I didn’t really know what I was getting into. I have always felt confident in my ability with Photoshop, Illustrator etc, and this course would allow me to continue using them, but at the same time it would let me dabble in pro-grams like After Effects, 3DS Max etc that I would most likely never have touched otherwise.

Q Why are you interested in design?

A Well I do like making and looking at pretty things, who doesn’t? But mainly its what design can do, it can help with so many problems; be it with charities, companies or whatnot, while spanning a myriad of pro-grams through a number of mediums. Design to me is art, but for a reason; yes you can design for the pure aesthetics of something but I find usually you’re either given a brief, or say recently with the Japan earth-quake, you want to help so you design a poster, info graphic, whatever.

Q What inspires you to be a creative designer

A I find it really hard to motivate myself to work on self initiated briefs therefore I do tend to need a hell of a lot of inspiration to get going. Firstly I want to be a designer because its something I love, I’m passionate about it, want to improve at it and help people out using design. I also find a lot when I see something, I feel I can do better, improve it, change it/alter it, but also at the same time looking at blogs and other peo-ples amazing pieces of work inspire me; it’s the same with events (such as euro 2012).

Q What equipment do you use when designing?

A I don’t really get to use anything fancy, I don’t exactly have a large budget. I have a standard PC, with a 24inch BenQ monitor, with a wacom intuos4 tablet which I recently bought (trying to get a hang of the dammed thing). Software wise it tends to be Photoshop and Illustrator, although I have been using After Effects a lot more lately and at times Premiere. Besides that I think a sketchbook is a designers best friend; that’s where a lot of my initial ideas come up, and the benefit of having it with me most of the time allows me to develop and come up with ideas on the go.

Q What design/artist do you like?

A Well theirs a hell of a lot of artists/designers I like, but I don’t know most of their names haha. I guess I should get Drew Struzan out of the way because he’s most likely the best known (the guy behind the Indiana Jones, Star Wars posters), purely because of his skill with the airbrush, mixing realism with fantasy; his Hellboy poster is bloody fantastic. Then there is Bansky, purely for him having the balls to do what he pleases, speak what he feels whilst at the same time having some incredible pieces of work. Then I guess it would be Peter Jarokowski (the man behind Ars Thanea), just a great director, designer and mind, creating some fascinating 3d/2d pieces. Lastly I guess I should mention Jurryt Visser who is a craaaaaazy illustrator that mixes vector graphics with photography and pencil work, its beautiful and extremely well thought out.

Q what is your favourite artwork and why?

A I don’t have one, the amount of artworks hanging around my room would prove that. Jurryt Visser’s Portrait is something I’m loving lately though, his portrayal of his split personality/struggle is extremely personal and also presented brilliantly through its visuals. So yeah… that.

Q What are you plans for the future?

A First of all I want to on concentrating on getting my degree from UCA, whilst continuing to develop and produce my magazine. After that I guess its interns and ideally work in a small studio or freelance while earning a good wage whilst doing what I love, and hopefully getting the opportunity to work with some of my idols.

Q What are your strengths and weaknesses?

A I guess I will start of with the weaknesses. I find it extremely hard to motivate myself as I have already stated, but once I get going, I get on a roll, which is good. Besides that I would love to get better at “motion graphic” software, develop my skills in writing some more, and improve my ability at mixing 3D with 2D. Personally I don’t really like talking about my strength’s since I don’t feel its good to be big headed, but… I do feel I have a great design mind, coming up with ideas most people wont come up with straight away (al-though a lot of the time I struggle to make what I think of). I feel I have a strength in a lot of editorial stuff which is commercial also and I guess I know how to make “pretty stuff”, but for me its about making stuff that’s good on the eye but for a reason

Q Has being on Graphic/New media course helped you improve your skills?

A Well I feel the course has definitely helped me put through my reasoning behind each project, and give it more substance. From a practical skills point of view, the course has got me to use programs I would of avoided and not bothered with; but now I have a lot more skills in 3D and motion software, so I can mix my 2D work both with motion (which I really do love) and 3D.