Visual Research

I have now started to gather some visual research on design projects with a high focus on texture and pattern, the Oliver Bonas brief states that their designs often focus on texture and surfaces inspired by daily surroundings. My insect concept will focus on the textures and patterns found within the actual insects and their forms as well as the 4 individual insect's home textures and surroundings.

I came across two different design projects which I found use texture and pattern in an interesting way: Material Exploration by Hamburg-based designers Vincent Schwenk and Vitaly Grossmann and the work by Illustrator Meg Fransee.

The Material Exploration project by Hamburg-based designers Vincent Schwenk and Vitaly Grossmann is an animation that falls into lifelike renders. The animations focus on incredible specificity of the textures that they use within the imagery and precise materials. 'there’s the sort of hairy thread balls you’ll know intimately if you use a sewing machine, that mutant expanding foam you find in the loft, the soft waffle of microfibre cloths and some very lifelike lasers'.

I found the detailing of the textures within their animations extremely fascinating and impressive as the objects and surfaces in the animations look so real, almost as if you can imagine feeling them whilst watching. It would be interesting to create textures within the designs that I create that actually look how they feel, this may be quite difficult but would definitely be interesting- this would also give each of the candles a more personal feel in terms of communicating the insects home and aesthetic/looks.

Oakland-based artist Meg Fransee creates fun-loving characters that immediately communicate joy and energy. Her work focuses on interesting colour combinations, overall eye-catching and aesthetics which focus on humans, animals, nature and shape which is relevant towards my approach to the Oliver Bonas brief (focus on nature, texture and insects)

The aesthetic of her work centres around playfully exploring colour and texture in a variety of media from paint to print to digital. “My illustration is influenced largely by my work with Floss Editions and the parameters that come with print-based projects by exploring flat, bright colours and grainy gradients,”. The way the textures of the paint are apparent in her digital work is really interesting as it adds more detail and personality to the block colour shapes and illustrations. 

The Oliver Bonas brief also mentions to focus on subtle and interesting colour combinations which follow the colour palette they have provided within the project pack, Meg's illustrations always use a consistent colour palette which use clever, contrasting and eye-catching colour combinations which I find work really well.

Oliver Bonas SS20 Tierra colour palette: