Doodled
Thursday, March 22, 2012
"I graduated in 2005 from Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design in Dundee with my degree in Printed Textiles and a portfolio stuffed with monochrome silk screen prints and drawings. Following that, I set-up my little studio and began on my mission to vanquish the vector and champion the (wobbly) hand drawn line.
Every piece I create starts life as a simple pencil sketch, evolving into a rambling pen and ink drawing usually spanning several sheets of paper. I love the tactile nature of the materials I use and the joy of smudgy fingerprints."
At the risk of sounding like a lame-o design blogger (sorry, I mean "curator"), how beautiful are these pieces by Johanna Basford? So delicate, but with such depth and richness. I could look at them all day. Her work has graced everything from candle packaging to Starbucks cups to the brochure for the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, as well as the branding for one of my favourite florists. Oh, and she went to art college with one of my favourite people.
I know very little about the intricacies of producing art in the digital era, but it makes my heart happy to know there's still a place for the humble pencil and paper, and for the uninhibited joy of a good doodle.
Johanna's aren't the only good doodles I've been admiring this week. Phase Two of Project Bridesmaid has commenced: time to start planning the hen party. The bride, being a fun and sociable sort, has zillions of friends. This is a good thing. But when it comes to finding a date at the height of summer that is going to work for more than two dozen women from all over the country, this can also be a stressful thing. Enter Doodle.
You might already be familiar with Doodle, but it's such a genius concept I thought I'd share it anyway, in case anyone else, like me, is struggling to a conjure a convenient date out of a tangled mass of emails. Basically, you create a little poll (it takes two seconds) and then the attendees can click the link, fill in their name and tick the dates that suit them. The good dates are shown as green, the bad dates are red, a mutually convenient date magically appears and your brain is no longer about to explode. You're welcome.
Have you found anything online worth sharing recently? Feel free to curate your suggestions in the comments...
{All images by Johanna Basford. You can purchase prints of some of her pieces in her shop, you lucky things. By the way, thanks to this post on ESB, all links on the blog from now on will open in the same browser window by default. If you decide you want to open a link in a new tab, just hold CTRL (or command for fancypants hipsters, or "Apple users" as they're otherwise known) + click.}
6 boats moored
Doodle is a great thing. We use it for arranging meetings at work.
ReplyDeleteOn the other definition of doodle, have you seen this guy's pictures? http://paulcadden.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=53&Itemid=54
They're called hyperrealism and he draws them all with pencil but they look like photos. I'm slightly obsessed by them
Holy shit those are amazing! They look exactly like photos!! Wowser.
DeleteI particularly love the peacock. I'm utterly useless at drawing (even my stick men are suspect) so really admire it all the more in the people that can do it.
ReplyDeleteI love the intricacy - I definitely don't have the patience to produce something like this (never mind the skill)! There's a lovely Swedish illustrator called Mattias Adolfsson who does great whimsical sketches (largely involving robots and geese, although to date sadly no robot geese) - http://mattiasa.blogspot.co.uk/
ReplyDeleteTotally. I came across Johanna on Twitter one day and was instantly captured. It's all just so beautiful and so carefully done. Amazing.
ReplyDeleteI have used doodle polls to get students for interviews and arrange meetings. I love doodle (I can't use it at work anymore but can for fun!)
ReplyDelete