JULY ‘24 Portfolio Brief: Exhibition Poster
Follow or join this pop at posters
Hi, I’m Libby. I’m trying to find my feet in the world of illustration. I’ve done a load of research and I’m sharing it here, along with my progress on how my illustration journey’s going. I’m so glad you could join me on this bumpy ride!
Hi there!
Today I‘m sharing our JULY portfolio brief and the first as the newly renamed publication ‘The New Illustrator.’
The monthly portfolio brief is designed to inspire new illustrators (like me) to create a portfolio piece that would appeal to potential illustration clients.
The brief aims to provide structure, guidelines and resources to help us push through to completion.
Working on illustration briefs isn’t easy for me but I feel like the 2 briefs I’ve set so far are really helping me shape up my practice - and I’ve learned a tonne!
At the bottom of this post, you’ll see a gallery of the previous portfolio brief outputs for MAY and JUNE.
The July (believable*) brief
At the end of this month, the iconic looks of Taylor Swift will be exhibited at the V&A in London.
As this exhibition will draw a new audience to the museum, they have decided to commission a new poster for the existing exhibit: Design 1900 to Today.
This collection features 250 objects representing design over the last 120 years.
The museum would like the poster to present a new take representing the design collection and would like it to feature illustrations of at least three objects from the exhibition.
The museum is interested in a poster design that draws influence from different design styles from the last 120 years but that still appeals to those visiting the Taylor Swift exhibition and perhaps the V&A for the first time.
Some research shows ‘Swifties’ or Taylor Swift fans as 25-44-year-old females.
The post should be in colour, A1 format or 22” x 34”
*This is a believable brief that has been made up to enable the creation of an illustration suitable for a portfolio and isn’t associated or affiliated with The V&A but you can find out more about them here.
Things to think about
Which objects would be the most appealing to be featured
The scale, which will be quite large compared to previous briefs
Text/font to go alongside the illustration
Switch-up options
Here are some things you could change to make the brief fit your personal portfolio better:
A poster for a different exhibition or event
A smaller format flyer
A poster for the Taylor Swift exhibition itself
Confession Time - As usual I have never designed a poster for paying client! I think the last poster I designed was a recycling poster for high school… So I’m going to be learning as I go. I’m assuming that might be the case for you too. Here are some resources I will be considering using:
Resources
FREE Blogs
How to create a vintage wine poster in Illustrator - Retro Supply Co
How to Make a Poster - This is also a lovely page on the Transport for London website with videos of illustrators they have commissioned for posters talking about their process:
They also have 15,000 poster examples you can view in their online collection!
You can also browse the V&A shop which includes previous and current exhibition posters
FREE Youtube videos
Illustration Masterclass: Create an Art Deco Poster - Kyle T. Webster
Anatomy of Poster Design - Gareth David Studio. Gareth has a whole series of different videos on poster design that might be useful to go through.
Skillshare / Domestika courses
Paid-for courses you may want to try:
Project Timeline
There will be 3 stages of the project:
Week 1: Research & initial sketches (sketch) 1st-7th
Week 2: 3x concepts for the client (black line) 8th-14th
Week 3: Final (colour in any medium) 15th-21st
There will be 3 separate Substack chat threads where you can share your progress if you are interested in joining.
If you are subscribing via email, chat is a feature on the Substack website (and app) where all subscribers to a specific publication can chat with each other.
These chat threads will be free and open to anyone, to share the output from each stage:
Research
Concepts
Final
This way you can follow or join in at any point through the month.
Access the New Illustrator chat thread here.
Thank you to everyone for their votes on last month’s concepts. I’ll decide at the concept stage this month on how to gain feedback and choose which to take to the final design.
I'll also be using a Google calendar to keep me right with the deadlines which you are welcome to subscribe to here.
Report-out
You can follow along in the The New Illustrator chat as the month progresses. I’ll then aim to provide a summary of the project work shared in the chat in next month’s (Aug) portfolio brief post.
The MAY Brief
In May I attempted a map for Visit London…. and it’s still in progress but I’m getting there! Thank you for all your encouragement! I’m much further ahead now that I’m learning things in Affinity Designer.
Next, I’d like to add colour and detail to the site-specific illustrations and bring the whole composition together. I’ll be working on this during our digital co-working session tomorrow.
I’m finding the map project is requiring a lot of graphic design skills which I hadn’t anticipated but I’m really enjoying seeing it progress.
You can catch up on my progress to get to the final in the New Illustrator chat.
The JUNE Brief
Here are my final mindfulness stickers for Young Minds.
If I had any criticism for them, I’d say the colours could be more neutral. The pink may not be appealing to everyone.
The design may also not appeal to the age group 15-18 year-olds but due to the positive feedback, I have a plan to finalise the other concepts I came up with. I think these could appeal more to that demographic. You can see the other designs in the chat.
I plan to have them all printed and may even sell some on an online shop so watch this space!
Feedback
I’m really open to questions and ideas to make these briefs better so feel free to comment or reply with anything that comes to mind!
Also, I welcome any feedback on my final designs.
I’m completing these solo at the moment but keep the invite open to anyone feeling inspired to join or use any of the resources shared for your own project.
Don’t forget I’ll also be posting my usual monthly blog of what I’ve been up to in the 3rd week of the month here. You can catch up on my previous posts in the meantime.
Enjoy July and maybe I’ll see you in the chat!
Libby
