Julia Baranova

Posted by Julia Baranova Posted on Sunday

Video Graphics: Charles Bergquist

Charles Bergquist is a director, designer and a photographer who lives in California. Seems like he is not a fan of exposing himself online or anywhere else, it’s all about his work. He seems to do a lot of design photography and music videos for non mainstream musicians. Even though I have never participated in any video graphics, a good video always seems to get my attention. I quite like the way all of his work has a connection with each other, there’s a dreamy feel and similar soft colour schemes throughout photos and videos.

My favourite piece of work is a music video for Viernes called “Liquid Tunnel”, it features an octopus making its way through the water and weeds to the spacey and echoed musical sounds. The greatest part about this video is that there were graphics overlaid over the footage, grid paper effect with mixed water colour effects. I thought that’s what made this video unique and it also works with the music.

video screenshot

Viernes "Liquid Tunnel" from Charles Bergquist on Vimeo.

Posted by Julia Baranova Posted on

Feature Film Main Titles: Danny Yount

Danny Yount is an internationally recognised designer for the feature film main titles, with impressive pieces of work and multiple awards to show for it. He is also a creative director, but I don’t find that part of his career as interesting.

After watching a three and a half minute video filled with film titles and very bass music, I felt quite over whelmed because each film title is different from each other. It seems like he almost over considers the story line for the film, because the titles have such a powerful representation what you are going to get out of the upcoming film.

My favourites were the opening logos for Warner Bros Pictures, when you see such an effective logo at the beginning of the film you know the rest is only going to get better. I also really like the way the logos connect with the theme of the film, it’s actually an important element of the whole picture but not that many people pay attention to small details which is a shame.

Opening Studio Logo

DESIGN & LIVE ACTION REEL 2010 from Danny Yount on Vimeo.

Posted by Julia Baranova Posted on Thursday

Printmaking: Sapling Press

I stumbled across these humorous greeting cards on paper obsessed website which lead me to looking in to Sapling Press, which is run by one woman called Lisa Krowinski. At this press everything is printed on recycled materials and all of the packaging is also recycled. Letterpress printing method has been around for a very long time and since it was first used none of the recycling issues were around, and now we see the world recycling pretty much everywhere. I thought it was quite interesting the way old methods are being adapted to the new conditions by trying to be more sufficient and environmentally friendly.

Apart from the smart way of printing, I think the simplicity of these cards and witty humour results in a successful piece of printed design.

Sometimes less is more.

cards produced by the press

http://saplingpress.com/

Posted by Julia Baranova Posted on Sunday

Mural Art: Stephen Powers

After watching Beautiful Losers film, which I would advise to watch because it gives you a great insight in to the artists lives and way of thinking about design. I felt inspired to blog about a guy called Stephen Powers who was a graffiti writer in the past and has now become an artist. He is mostly known for his spectacular typographic murals all over Philadelphia, 50 different walls were painted to tell a love story by Powers and other artists.

I have always been passionate about hand painted signs and murals, so his work stood out to me straight away. He has managed to keep the old fashion techniques of mural painting and at the same time given it a modern appearance by using bright colours and inspiring words. I know if I was to see one of them in the morning on a train journey it would definitely put a smile on my face no matter how bad of a mood I am in.

"Your Everafter"

"Nice Dream About Us"

Photos taken from: http://www.aloveletterforyou.com/

Posted by Julia Baranova Posted on Wednesday

Printmaking: Detctvo Design Tendem

I came across this great design duo while looking through a Russian Design group on Behance Network website, I’m starting to think that them being Russian has a lot to do with me liking their work due to my heritage...I’m going to ignore that thought and tell you what their name stands for instead, detctvo means childhood and here is a quite funny quote from the designers “As well as children don’t have problems in life we don’t have problems in graphic design”. I thought that was a really good explanation of why they have called themselves detctvo, and with that slogan they must power through a lot of problems!

The project I liked best was Perm 2011, mainly because they used silkscreen printing technique (which I enjoy using myself) and all of the pieces have a lovely vintage feel to them because they were printed on recycled card as well as using two colours. Using a children’s book font at the bottom for months and dates brings the whole calendar together, because it complements the child like illustrations.

"Russian astronauts Leonov and Belyaev landed in Perm disctrict after the first successful EVA in 1965"

"Three side cannons on «Avrora» cruiser were buit at Perm factory"

Photos taken from: http://www.behance.net/gallery/Perm-2011/928552

Behance Network (2011) Available at: http://www.behance.net/detstvo (Accessed: 4 May 2011).

Pages