Waves

Through researching into the word collide, I ventured into looking at waves colliding with cliff faces and coast lines and came across this rather interedsting research into the earth's 'hum'...

"You can’t hear it, but the Earth is constantly humming. And some parts of the world sing louder than others.

When two waves of opposite direction but similar frequency collide, they create a special kind of pressure wave that carries energy to the ocean bottom. As these waves pound against the sea floor, they generate a constant vibration with a frequency of about 10 millihertz, much too low for humans to hear but easily detectable with seismometers. By comparing the intensity of the hum with the height of waves around the world, scientists can track where the buzz is coming from."
Source -  wired.com

This could be an interesting angle to approach the Silent Movie brief, although I couldnt communicate the 'humming' sound due to brief constraints. Something for the pin board...

Top Ten

Graphotism

This is the Graphotism homepage, it is arguably one of the most popular online hubs for graffiti and urban/street art - offering pretty much all there to know/need in the field. The area I'm most interested in is the advertisements for spray paint down the side, again I know it isn't linked to the printed side of things, but it did spark an idea and an area to look into.
Graphotism themselves produce a magazine that is full of recent artwork from all over the country/world, inside they often have full page advertisements or artwork promoting paint and other artistic products. I'm going to get my hands on and photograph some of these in context and look at applying my own advertisements to the scenario.

Colour guide

I went to the local record shop/spray paint distributor in leeds to see if they had any printed media relevant to the guide I'm going to be producing as a final printed product. They had a newer version of the MTN 94 spray paint range. This fold-out guide is 4 colour process, most likely offset litho and folded.

KOBRA

Looking at the branding and identity of new KOBRA LOW cans. The colour chart is very limited and only an online version, but I can gather an good idea of what they're offering, it's a shame about the disgusting  type heading above the colour swatches but the can design is extremely crisp.

Simple clean can designs, 3 colours including a metalic gold. I'm unsure of the printing process this design would undertake, maybe a rotay screen print or litho? I would think looking at the can, the accompanying printed media would be particulaly crisp although looking at the online graphics it doesn't suggest that its as nice as I was expecting.

Printing

Ive been looking into the different processes that can be applied to aerosol products in order to achieve the desired graphic effects. Depending on the scale there are a few options that can be offered.

Silk Screen Printing
Using this method for printing cans is usually done in small volumes to individual customer requirements. I doubt it would be a consideration for a company like Nike to produce cans of paint on such a small scale although it is a process worth documenting

Litho Printed Cans
I found this little source documenting the process of these two methods used by James Bridges ITW Ltd


Labelled Products
No need to be tied to producing thousands of labels for your products…we have the facilities to finish the cans we fill with self-adhesive, thermal transfer or hot-melt labels that we'll produce batch by batch for you.

Symbols

After researching various paint brands and the production of aerosol cans in general, I couldn't help but notice regulatory symbols everywhere, many of  which I've grown up being told mean harmful, flammable or recyclable. Some are pretty self explanatory to an extent but I want to get a clear perspective of how and when they're used. I came across this rather rudimentary but helpful source.

In order to have a crisp (size adjustable) set of these symbols I'm going to spend a little time vectoring them opposed to using pixelated pictures from various sources. In order to gain a better understanding of how and when they're used I'll be doing some more primary research looking at existing cans.

Vintage

I found a rather hefty collection of spray paint can designs from over the years at TWBE. Although initially appearing very colourful, many of the cans work with few spot colours plus stock. Colour for print has been a large consideration recently when thinking about any design, I'm still undecided about how I'm going to go approach applying colour for the can identity.

Print process

I found these interesting printing methods from tubex that are rather quite innovative, especially the debossing of an aerosol can.

Special Flitter Coating. The new developed effect-coating with flitters opens up another perspective of layouts. With this it has been achieved to combine a top-dressing dark-blue fond with a partial omitted field which highlights the brushing of the can and which visually shows up the flitter coating only onto the dark part of the can.

 

The worldwide first aluminium aerosol can which is debossed in a separate machine inline is introduced exclusively by TUBEX Rangendingen. The process allows debossing of outlines as well as whole fields, which could be combined with an embossed writing or logo.

 The latest innovation is the can “What a feeling”. The aerosol can has been improved by a special haptical (partial) effect on the can surface – you can feel the sand! As well other materials like i.e. rubber, velvet etc. are possible.
















The Thermotransfer process is a completely new decoration process. The main advantages of the Thermotransfer process are: • Photorealistic designs • Highest print quality up to 8 colours
• Whole can surface can be printed
• Combination of offset and flexoprint possible
• Via digital printing a personalization of the
product is possible
• Haptical effects possible by over varnishing
• Small lot sizes can be produced in an
economical way

Blue

A really strong visual campaign from nike for foot locker promoting the longevity of the Nike Air Force 1. Really simple visuals with crisp glossy type, a common visual style to expect fom nike, always searching for the most eye catching  advertisments. I feel the style I have gone for with my designs for this project try and incorporate this strong simple visual.

Remedies

Designed by Alex Lee, University of Leeds. 

Spacial

Nike have one of the most powerful advertising campaign, and wouldn't have got to the stature they hold in the worldwide markets today without it. Sequential advertisements like this are impressing to say the least, particularlythe top example of the two. Only a little point but the designer must have had a firm idea of exactly where it was going to be in the public eye, sampling the colour of the buildings for the broken wall to have a high impact effect.

MTN 94

Again from the Montana group, MTN 94 are one of the companies more recent endeavours. A project to craft a paint that would be far superior to what the industry had seen before. Released in 2009, the paint was named after the companies launch in 1994 and has by far one of the best aesthetics in terms of current paint cans on the market.

The 94 6-pack boxes are simple, but at the same time very representative of the identity. Partcularly feeling the die-cut 94 stencil in the side of the box, I want to produce packaging for my cans that visually correlates with the brand and I'm definitely looking to keep the visuals of my design to a minimal, most likely using only 2 or 3 spot colours in order to keep the costing low. I still have some development to go before I can start mocking up designs. 

One thing I have noticed on all cans across the market is a LOT of very small text, presumably for safety and legal reasons (something ill be looking into), and usually in various languages. An aspect of the design I can't dismiss if I want to get my product looking as professional as possible.

MTN

In terms of recent (last 10/15 years) paint brands, montana cans have been at the forefront of the market, offering a wide variety of paint. Established in 1994, MTN are renound for their quality of paint, with a large team of artists representing the brand. Montana GOLD is the highest end of their range and really does offer very high quality paint, I feel the recently re-branded graphics represent its quality well.

Their colour chart is laid out a lot more professionally compared to other guides I've looked at, moving away from the standard rectangle and grouping the colours in a much more visually appealing way. A point I made earlier about a smaller selection of colours isn't apparent here (seeing as Ive only screen capped about half the selection), Montana offer a very wide and professional selection of colours.

I'm contemplating the range of colours for my NikeCromo range, too many colours could feel as though the range hasn't been considered although too little could look unprofessional.

Ironlak

Ironlak are a recently introduced company to the aerosol paint industry, they have a really strong visual identity, solidly sticking to spot Black, Pink and White. Their Trademark logo is white text with their spot colour pink for the K. Price wise they are placed quite reasonably amongst it's competators in order to fight in the market hot spot.

This the online colour chart I found for Ironlak, not a particularly massive range of colours but I feel it is the quality of the selction that makes the difference. A larger colour range is possibly more attractive to the average user, but a well considered range of colours can go a long way for a professional artist.

Design

I love these designs from Nikki Farquharson, created for the NIKE78 project using the sole of Nike running shoes. Again, this doesn't directly correlate to my project direction but I want get an idea of other ways Nike has influenced projects. The designs themselves are very decorative, especially considering they came from a sole design. Something along these lines could easily work as a logo or pattern design for the spray can fascia I want to design.

Colour guide

After brosing the Montana website, looking at the various brandings for different types of spray paint, I came across their online .pdf version of a colur guide. I want to find some physical examples of colour guides to look at how they work with regards to print, but in terms of layout, colour names and range, these are definitly a good starting point. I'll be looking at other examples from different companies to gain a wider understanding of what I'll be producing.

Promo

Promotional video for MTN 94's new range of flourecent colours, collaborating with a legendary artist APEX its this kind of viral advertising and promotion that attracts interest in the spray paint industry. Although it bares little relevance to design for print, it's good to get an idea of how other companies go about promoting their products.

NIKE78

NIKE78 is an exciting new project created by Paul Jenkins and inspired by NIKE. Creatives involved will receive a brand new pair of NIKE shoes and will be asked to use sport as inspiration to challenge their function.

I love these visuals below using vibrantly bright colours with an overprint style effect. I'm pretty sure most of the shpaes are made up from parts of nike shoes, an area I could look into for can/poster graphics?

Green

This is a limited edition run of signature LRG Green spray cans designed in collaboration with Australian based paint company Ironlak, LRG design, and graffiti artist Pose One. The concept of the project was to create a retro American stye spray paint can with Ironlak paint quality and coverage in LRG's signature green color. Every detail of this can was fine tuned and knit picked- from the lids, to the matching green nozzle, to the scumbag smoking giraffe character on the front.

Infrared

Another beautifully simple advertisment for Nike trainers.

Generation Press

Generation press came in for a visit, the presentation lasted a while but was filled with nothing but absolute design gold. Paul and Anand bought along an abundance of ridiculously gorgeous printed design, more stocks and finishes than I could comprehend in one afternoon. I got a load of photos but not nearly a full documentation of what was there to get our hands on.