Animal Logic

Animal Logic was established in 1991, it quickly earned a reputation as on the worlds leading design, visual effects and animation companies. Animal logic continues to produce award-winning work for a diverse, international clientele, with studios in Sydney Australia and an office in Los Angeles California.

Animal logic has worked successfully with leading advertising agencies and television commercial directors which enabled Animal logic to expand into feature film work including, Babe, The Matrix, 300 and culminating in the release of Australia’s first digital animated feature Happy Feet.

Animal logic has done a lot of ads, some you might recognise as the Optus ad, the target colours ad, Honda jazz ad, Mars bar ad, Pure blonde ads, Carlton draught and Toohey’s ads. Animal logic is famous for their digital animation; I guess it’s why they are as famous and popular as they are. If I were to choose a company to do digital animation or commercials I would defiantly recommend animal logic.

Not only does the company Animal Logic have a vast client base throughout the world they also have a long history of developing and supporting software products. They have created and built on software products such as Mayaman, Maxman, Softman, PRman. By developing these programs and software animal logic has made 3D programs and software available to not only big businesses but one-man businesses from home.

Animal Logic has worked on many high end visual effects for commercials and television programs. They have worked and designed projects for clients such as Cartoon Network and Spicks and Specks they have worked on the award winning film Happy Feet. In November 2009 Animal Logic ranked 447 in the Top500 super computer sites.

Animal Logic's online presence is wide and varied. Information found on Wikipedia is the same as what is provided on their own website. Contact information is provided on the Fox Studios Australia website; filmography is listed on the Internet Movie Database (IMDB); and they have accounts for people to follow on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.

Their own website is quite impressive. It is a Flash based site with stills from movies and commercials they have made looping on the background; is quite interactive (particularly in the section where you can 'meet' some of the people who work there) and has a lot of images, film clips and information about the movies, commercials, designs, jobs and products (software) they develop.

Their style, based on their portfolio, is impressive, varied, interesting and memorable. Their work is different and 'outside the box' which is why is it is memorable, although most people would never have heard of them.

Animal Logic has several studios in Sydney, Los Angeles and Santa Monica.

Their work targets several different audiences from children with films such as happy feet, babe and legend of the guardians to adults with films such as 300, 28 weeks later and world trade center. It is hard to develop a single opinion on them as if there is something you don't like made by them then there will most certainly be something else that you would like. This is a result of several unique advertisements and filming effects that adhere to everyone's likes and interests.

Bauhaus

Walter Gropius was the man who founded the Bauhaus School in 1919 and was director until he stood down in 1928, when Hannes Meyer became director. He was fired in 1930, and replaced by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, who was director until the schools close in 1933.

Gropius was born in 1883 in Berlin. He studied architecture from 1903 until 1907. After this he worked in Peter Behrens' practice until 1910 when he opened his own. Around this time he became a member of the Deutscher Werkbund, a group whose aim was to promote creativity in design. He founded the Bauhaus School in 1919 and was director until 1927. He stayed in Europe and England until moving to America in 1937 to take up a teaching position at Harvard. In 1938 he opened a joint practice with Marcel Breuer. He died in Boston in 1969.

Meyer was born in 1889 in Switzerland. he took over as director of the Bauhaus school in 1928, and it was under his Communist beliefs and influence that many of the students followed, thus bringing unwanted political attention to the school. He was fired as director in 1930 by the Mayor of Dessau. After his sacking, he and several students formed a group whose projects included architectual structures and urban planning projects. He travelled a lot after this group was also forced to quit, but returned to Switzerland where he died in 1954.

Mies was born in 1886 in Germany. Before opening his own practice in 1912 he worked for several years at the practice of Peter Behrens, and studied his craft. He designed many buildings, including skyscrapers. He became the director of the Bauhaus School in 1930 and stayed on until the school was forced to close in 1933 by the new German Nazi Government. In 1937 he moved to Chicago where he became the head of Architecture at the Illinois Institute of Technology. He also later designed this Institutes new campus, as well as many structures in his style of open space, steel and glass. He died in Chicago in 1969.

Zoo Advertising

Zoo Advertising has been around for over 10 years, working out of their Canberra based studios.
The team of designers have quite a number of years experience working in the Graphics Industry.
Although there isn't a lot of information about the formation of the studio their web site is beautifully produced, with a finish that keeps you going back and looking for more within it.
Their portfolio of work is very impressive and the quality of the work is very clean and attractive. They offer skills of design, branding, web design and corporate image. Their logos and poster work are exceptional and very creative. There work also includes interior design work as well as work that is seen outdoors (such as banners and posters), one of the designers has also created his own clothing brand (Spader) where he incorporates many of his designs.
Much of the work the agency does stems from local and federal government agencies although it is not limited to this area.
The design team has a vision of where they want to be in the now and in the future and they do this by keeping abreast with current trends and having a dynamic team of creative minds who want the best for their clients.

My opinion
Zoo Advertising has a very classy, clean style, their work is beautiful in its simplicity when required but can also be out their and innovative. I love their logo work because of its use of simple typography rather than clutter with images and they seem to be really in tune with the clients needs.

Attempts of typographic tutorials

Above was the first attempt. I found the tutorial very confusing, and added to the fact that I really don't use photoshop enough to honestly get through a tutorial such as this. I would like to go back and attempt do this again to completion once I get more experience.



I had fun doing this and enjoyed getting to completion with it. I showed it to my kids and they thought it was cool and looked like jelly.



This textile tutorial I enjoyed because I could see possibilities using different textures and words, I could also see how I could introduce this into my quilts and designs.

Joshua Davis

Joshua Davis is a New York based artist, designer, and technologist. He produces both public and private work for companies, collectors, and institutions.

Since 1995, Davis has been using technology and computers as a medium to create infinitely interesting projects, and he also utilized Chaos Theory () to establish a new, unique perspective on visual communication and creative expression which had been an otherwise unexplored area in graphic design.

Davis was strongly influenced by abstract expressionist Jackson Pollock, and incorporated Pollock's random technique of splattering paint and other items across large canvases into his coding. He was also influenced by his love of classic video games, such as Space Invaders.

In 1995 at the Pratt Institute David began to delve into HTML, working under Thomas Noller, and afterwards began to experiment with Macromedia Flash and ActionScript programming. Davis' work became influential in graphic and web design in the Y2K era.

In January 2001, Davis posted an autobiography in K10k.net which revealed subjects on his personal life in the NYC art/club scene in the early 90's, his drug addiction and how he overcame it to pursue his goal of being a full time artist. He aspired to be a writer and illustrator of children's books.

From 1998-2001, Davis worked with the web production company Kioken. When the company folded, he became an independent web designer and artist.

In 2002 Joshua Davis teamed up with developer Brandon Hall to form a media development studio, The Department of Notations Studios. It was disbanded in 2006, but despite this Davis and Hall continue to collaborate on various projects.

In 2003, Adam Jones from Tool asked him to take over their website. He designed an intro page, but the site has since been changed.

As of 2007, Davis resides in NY with his wife and daughter. He is a professor at the NY School of Arts, runs his own design studio, and continues to lecture and lead design workshops.

Joshua Davis STYLE is well known for his computational, generative-art known as Dynamic Abstraction. “ Most of his designs are generated with mediums like Flash and Illustrator. His unique style has a flavor of randomness. “Working this way allows me to generate an infinite number of compositions. I set the boundaries and the rules, but whatever comes out at the end is a surprise. It could look cool. It could fail. It could be life-changing.” (-Joshua Davis, 2007, Apple.com interview).

Operates -Joshua’s designs have taken him around the world as well as speaking at conferences and workshops, creating his own projects and as a professor at the School of visual Arts in New York City.

Davis has become a best selling author to “Flash to the core: An interactive Sketchbook”. One of Joshua’s more conceptual projects is “once-a-forest.com” this website show cases the works in a unity way, The art work moulds itself together with every piece added as you scroll through the pages.

MY OPINION

If you have a love of illustrative art Joshua Davis is definitely an artist to look up to. His art has a unique randomness that is very appealing. You can see a lot of his work on Brands such as TOOL, BMW, Canon, Universal Records and many more.

Jules.ang

Style
Joshua Davis has a very distinct abstract vector based style using geometric shapes along with the more commonly seen vector swirls and swishes. Joshua's artwork has that strong vector look using blends of colours to achieve extra dimensions to his work.
His design work appears on home decorating items such as bed linen, cushions, dinnerware and personal items such as backpacks and notebooks.

• Joshua describes his work as being "dynamic abstraction".
• Joshua sometimes calls his work a "beautiful accident waiting to happen".

His style may not appeal to everyone as it is a very abstract style, with colours not necessarily harmonious with one another.

Opinions
I personally don't mind some of his work, but I think that you would have to use it and view sparingly as it is very strong. On the other hand his work has obviously been emulated often so there is a flood of similar style art on offer around the world.
I enjoy the blends of colours and the combinations of colours that he uses. He really shows what you can do with colour when you don't restrict yourself to any rules.

Recreated Poster - Universe & Truth

Web Designs That I Like And Dont Like

http://www.impactfolios.com/danagray/
I like this site once again because of its simplicity and style. The imagery is enough of a drawcard to make you want to explore the site further. Maybe simple is best.



http://www.impactfolios.com/johntol/
I really like the look of this site, the colours used are so attractive that it draws you in. However I think I would change the type font to something more classy than what has been used.



http://www.juliewills.com/
I really like this site because of its simplicity but functionality of the site. Its clean and crisp and does the job with style and grace.



http://www.blakejwilliams.com/
I like this web site for its class and elegance. The whole site just seems to say come and look at what I have on display. It shows that Blake has put a lot of thought into what he wants from the web site and I think that he has really achieved this.



http://www.thomasboswell.co.uk/
This web site to me is rather boring, its if he didn't want to spend any time making it look attractive, maybe he just thought keeping it basic would do the job.



http://oliverjohnquinn.com/
I like this web site because it is clean simple and fun. The artist has made this a simple site to use but has added a touch of playfulness in the artwork that he has chosen.