Black and White Print; photos to apply products in context.

www.google.com/images

Originally I was going to apply my own design to these photos that I sourced from google images but I have now decided that all my products would be located on a stand in the middle of the shop so this is nescessary anymore. Collecting these photos however, wasn't all bad because they are a form of visual inspiration seeing as I'm creating products for this shop. 

Black and white print; Paperchase.

Paperchase is the UK’s undisputed leader in innovative, design-led stationery, cards and gift-wrap. We have been around for over 40 years and are now firmly established as the top destination for customers looking for new and different gifts, cards and stationery.

Much of our merchandise is exclusive. We love to innovate so our collections are constantly changing yet all are specified to our high quality requirements. Visit our stores or online and each month you will find new arrivals – so for birthdays, Christmas and Valentine’s Day........indeed, for any occasion or celebration, there will always be new and different ideas to be found.

There are now over 100 Paperchase outlets in the UK as well as stores in Denmark, Ireland, Holland and the Middle East. You can find us in many House of Fraser and Waterstones stores as well as Selfridges and Harrods.

Our online store offers a large selection of our products across all our categories, including new collections and firm favourites.

www.paperchase.co.uk

Being a regular customer in Paperchase stores seems enough research in itself but I have researched the company further via their website just to see how they describe theirselves and whether what i'm creating is relevent enough to their brand. 

Black and White Print: paperchase.

Another way of exploring the product range is looking at Paperchase. For the sort of thing I am proposing, Paperchase are the leading competitor so this was again something to look at so that I didn't repeat what has already been done. A lot of Paperchase's products include repeat pattern and come in a range so you can have this pattern applied to pencil cases, notebooks and bookmarks etc. The difference between this and what I am proposing to do is that a lot of their products are bright and colourful so how can I make my designs appealing?
www.paperchase.co.uk 

Black and white print; print processes.

Pad printing is a printing process that can transfer a 2-D image onto a 3-D object. This is accomplished using an indirect offset (gravure) printing process that involves an image being transferred from the cliché via a silicone pad onto a substrate. Pad printing is used for printing on otherwise impossible products in many industries including medical, automotive, promotional, apparel, and electronic objects, as well as appliances, sports equipment and toys. It can also be used to deposit functional materials such as conductive inks, adhesives, dyes and lubricants.

Physical changes within the ink film both on the cliché and on the pad allow it to leave the etched image area in favor of adhering to the pad, and to subsequently release from the pad in favor of adhering to the substrate.

The unique properties of the silicone pad enable it to pick the image up from a flat plane and transfer it to a variety of surfaces, such as flat, cylindrical, spherical, compound angles, textures, concave, or convex surfaces.

Rotogravure (Roto or Gravure for short) is a type of intaglio printing process; that is, it involves engraving the image onto an image carrier. In gravure printing, the image is engraved onto a cylinder because, like offset printing and flexography, it uses a rotary printing press. Once a staple of newspaper photo features, the rotogravure process is still used for commercial printing of magazines, postcards, and corrugated (cardboard) product packaging.

www.wikipedia.org

The Production Manual by Gavin Ambrose and Paul Harris. 

I learnt about these print processes within the second year of the course but this was during the first module so although I had an idea of what they were and how they worked I felt I needed reminding of this and because I'd like to be a print based designer it's of upmost importance that I know the ins and outs. I had a copy of the print production manual where I managed to find most of the processes but there were a couple missing so I researched these online. 

I've looked at these processes because some of them are things I'd like to experiment with within my brief and also so that I can understand how different elements of my product range would be printed in bulk and professionally. Although not all of them are possible at this stage because I won't be needing bulk orders, when I become an industry professional, I will be using these processes. 

Black and white print; product ranges.

www.google.com/images

Paperchase is well known for being a company thats products consist of ranges using illustration and design as the main aspect to this. I've got a few examples of the ranges that have been in Paperchase stores before to inspire me and show what sort of things I could include in my own product range, if I haven't already considered some of the things that are here. This also shows me that things can still work as a range as long as the artwork is applied to each object somehow, so everything can link together but have a different layout. Although Paperchase's ranges are usually quite bright and colour, seeing as i'm working in black and white I need to consider what I can do or design to make my product range desirable as it will even be competiting within its own store. 

Black & White print; stationery.

"I love stationery" 

I found this book in the library on stationery products and thought it was quite relevent to my black and white print brief. It's given me ideas of ways I could apply designs to products and how I can make them stand out from what's already exisiting. Due to the fact i'm also exploring print processes with this brief there a few different ones in the images above so this has also inspired some of things I might try with my work. The thing I really loved about this book was the fact that everything in it has a handmade element to it which most of my work includes.

Black & White Print: patterns.

Patterns: New Surface Design by Drusilla Cole

Print & Pattern 2 by Bowie Style

These are some examples of repeat pattern print from books found in the uni library. I chose some favourites to photograph based on the use of colour, shape, line and illustrative themes. Although colour is not a factor that comes into my personal project it has made me think more about using tones instead within my work. The examples I have chosen range from really complicated to very simplistic and I feel that a more simplistic approach works better because its easier on the eye and more enjoyable to look at. Theres also an example of products that pattern can be applied to which is also relevent to my project. The top examples give me more of an idea of how pattern can look interesting but use very little range of colour.