Cyclop Bunny

Working in the Design Industry

2014-10-19T01:14:00.000+02:00

Heya!

Now that summer is over, it's time to blog again. During summer, like most people, I traveled. My highlight was probably the US, where I had the chance to observe design elements very different from Europe's design style.
But other than observing, I also had the chance to experience work as a Junior Graphic Designer at E+ Magazine, a Graphic Design Intern at Lulu Liu luxury fashion brand and a Digital Designer at Blue Inc & Officers Club retail brands, where I am currently still working.

So what is it like working in the industry? To be honest, I'm not quite sure yet. I started just a couple of months ago, and there are still lots of things for me to learn. But what I can do, is write down my experiences from these past months, and maybe they will be useful to you as well.
At least I hope so! :-)

E+ Magazine

It's hard to find a job/internship/work experience, if you never had one before. Many say, you need experience to get a job, but you need a job to get experience. This is absolutely true, especially in London and other metropolitan cities, where competition is much bigger and harder. So while I was looking for a graphic designer job/internship, I did freelance jobs, to build my CV & Portfolio, and to gain experience. Still, I had little knowledge of business, and had no experience at working in a corporate environment.
If I'd give any advice, it would be to get involved at your university. Attend classes and do your work. Your tutor might just be the key to get you a job, but for that you'll need to work hard, give a good impression, perhaps volunteer. (To be continued in another post...)

I'm very lucky to be a student at London College of Communication. Our institute has many contacts and can offer many possibilities for us to gain experience. E+ Magazine, was a work experience opportunity with art director Scott King who has previously worked as art director for i-D Magazine and creative director for Sleazenation Magazines.
This is how it went: there were meetings on a weekly basis with work brought from home and minimum talk. Scott would lay out the design guidelines, and we, the junior designers had to test them and do the work. The art director would make the big decisions and we would pay attention to the details. Once we showed our works, he would either approve or disapprove, and we'd move on.
Another thing I noticed, is the slight tension between designers and non-designers, which I guess could be true for any field. In our case there were the journalists and the designers, and it was quite clear some journalists showed distrust towards our knowledge and skills. One of the journalists was especially worried about losing control over the design that would frame their articles. Note that this was the very first time they involved designers for help.
I'm still quite puzzled by this, and am not sure why this sort of tension occurs. Since I have perceived art and design valuable since I was very little, it's a bit harder for me to understand how others view this field and where this distrust comes from. If you, however have any comments on this, please do let me know below this post, in e-mail or any other medium. I would love to hear your opinion.

Lulu Liu

Since most of the internships I applied for during the year rejected me mainly because I wasn't available full-time, I thought I might have a greater shot in the summer. I strongly recommend using social media to your advantage and talking to many people if you're looking for an internship. Even though Lulu Liu could be found on many job boards I found them through facebook.
Lulu Liu is a high end fashion brand based in Shoreditch. They form two small teams mainly out of interns, but whatever they do, they aim to be professional. The teams consist of a fashion designer team and a marketing team. At Lulu Liu I did some tag designs, a lookbook and invitation designs, but my main task was to provide graphic content for social media platforms internationally.

I have to say, unpaid internships have their cons and pros. There is still a chance to get paid, as proven by some paid interns, which means you need to be loyal and hardworking. This sparks a competition between all interns, but this only makes everyone do their best, and being an unpaid intern still creates a more relaxed and friendly environment.
During this internship I noticed the same thing as before with E+ Magazine, where the PR intern showed fear of losing control over the designs. In this case, that intern wanted to control every element of the design. I learned, that in the corporate world designs are approved by non-designers, which resulted in the other intern rejecting more than half of my work for weeks. Luckily, a fashion designer with past graphic design experience stepped in and approved most of that work later on.
In the end, this internship was incredibly valuable, where the PR intern helped me to speed up work and learn to let go of unapproved work, as well as taking less pride in them and if necessary, change the designs in a way that still satisfies myself. The fashion/graphic designer intern taught me a bit more about graphic design as well and I had the amazing chance to attend the fashion show at London Fashion Week.

Here is an example of what I produced at Lulu Liu. Click here for more.

Blue Inc

How did I go from unpaid internship to a designer job that actually pays more than minimum wage? My answer here again, is social media. More specifically, LinkedIn. If you don't have an account, go now and make one...and add me! :D
This all is kind of a funny story, because I have worked in a Blue Inc store next to my college before, which meant I already knew the brand and customers in person. Bonus points for the interview! In this company I'm surrounded mainly by native English speakers, which improved my English, especially in understanding jokes. Other than that, I have experienced sitting in meetings and presenting/defending designs. I also have a manager, who needs to approve of all the work I produce, and there are so many more tasks apart from my basic responsibilities, that I've learned to re-prioritize everything in short notice, sometimes more than once a day.

I started to believe it's impossible to work in industry next to being a full-time student, but there seems to be a trick to it. I started at Blue Inc during summer, full-time, and only switched to part-time when college started. Not all companies will do this, so I feel quite lucky and thankful for this as well. My work is valued and my capabilities trusted.
My main responsibility is designing the homepage (web, mobile, app) and e-mail designs for Officers Club weekly, as well as occasionally doing press material, affiliate banners, landing pages (men, women, boys), social media content and lookbook for Blue Inc and Officers Club. As I am still working in this company, I can't write about my experience in an overall analytical flashback. But I'm still in my trial period, so fingers crossed and hope that I can keep this job for a long time.

Finishing first year at Uni

2014-06-11T13:35:00.001+02:00

Hi there!

I haven't posted in a while, as I was quite busy with many things these past few months. So many things happened: I finished (I hope) the first year at my course in college, finally started working at a retail shop, and am Junior Graphic Designer of E+ Magazine, our university magazine that will launch in September.

When I started this blog I had really hoped to keep on posting a lot, but Uni life is SO busy! :)
If you want to receive posts more often, you can check my tumblr, where I post my works, but don't write much. But now, I will show you what I had done the past months.

First, let's get through with the least exciting part, theory class. Yes it is interesting, but design is not only about thinking, it's about doing as well. We had to write eight short essays and one extended essay of 2000 words referenced with an annotated bibliography. Above all, we had to create a publication, design and print for the hand-in, even though they won't grade that part. You can see the entire publication here:

The design is probably not the best, but because it does not count at all, I felt like experimenting with layouts and colours. I don't regret a thing, ha! If you have any comments on it though, please let me know. It's always nice to learn from other people.

Next is project info/expo, which was about inforgraphics. We learn the many versions of infographics and had to pick a theme and mode of enquiry. My theme was Light and I chose to view this from a scientific aspect, as it was the main focus of my secondary school. I decided to create many small infographics and connect them in an animation, because I couldn't choose between chemistry, physics, biology and technology. I had this huge story and started storyboarding, but didn't plan on creating it all. In the end, I did make a 30 second animation, so I'm happy.

Also, we are required to create a 25-30 page research document for all of these projects, so that's what I did. This one had to be printed, so I will show you through issuu.com again.

Next project went horribly wrong, but I managed to save it in an OK way...I think. Anyway, I'm not planning on publishing this one. It was planned to be an online game, but turned out to be a booklet. The point of it all was to raise awareness of a chosen discrimination, which I did about racism. You can view the research document below, so you might get an idea of the end result:

Click here to download interactive PDF.

The third and last project of this year was the most fun, as we got the chance to choose one of four classes. I picked motion typography class in which we had several workshops around typography and for this project I decided I want to learn After Effects and Premiere Pro.

It's worth downloading this research document, if you are interested in seeing the end results for the typography workshops. There are about five: 3D Type, Time based and sound based ones are the more interesting ones in my opinion.

Download here.

In the end, I think the outcomes could be so much better, but I learned so much, that I will forgive myself for this. My second term outcomes were more refined and there was so much work in them, but I changed. I decided to lead a less stressful and more healthy life. This doesn't mean I'm not open to critique. If there is anything you feel like saying, please do in the comments below :-)

Love,
Sophia

Ruinpubs on issuu

2014-04-28T17:53:00.002+02:00

I registered on issuu.com and now you can flip through my ruinpubs zine and read it!

Liverpool street sketches

2014-04-04T19:48:00.000+02:00

So I sat down in the Liverpool street area and grabbed my sketchbook. I haven't drawn in such a long time, it felt great. There were a lot of people especially because it was lunch break. Most of them were moving around a lot and some of them were standing in the same position for 5 minutes. Heaven! Tried to mainly grab the interesting poses.
The funny thing is, when people notice you are drawing them and start fidgeting because they feel uncomfortable being watched, or when they just try to stay still for the sake of it. I also came to realize, how almost everyone in London is so addicted to their mobile phones

Adobe 'New Creative'

2014-03-28T19:10:00.000+01:00

Ok, so in the end I wasn't part of the Creative Jam contest, because they turned out not to have enough money to cover 10 contestants per group, so they reduced the number to 5. Of course I am disappointed by that, but maybe what really caused the bigger disappointment was, that every week someone from either INT Works, Adobe or Torpedo called me up on my cellphone so I would confirm that I am free that day from 2pm. And maybe the fact that I was super tired from all project work and only had a 20 minute nap on that day, which was disrupted by the fatal phone-call didn't help either. It is not only the loss of 75£ (yes, they pay people to take part), but also the publicity and contacts I could've built. Anyway, they managed to keep me happy with free drinks (yesss!!! Open bar at Fabric - this is a massive 3 level nightclub in London), free snack, dinner and deserts.
There were some great talks, met some new people, danced with them on the afterparty until midnight. The whole dancefloor was ours. Amazing! I also had an opportunity to give an interview, and hope to be in the video. Of course, all of this wouldn't have been as much fun without my friend Alma, who also took these amazing pictures.

Photos by Alma Rosaz

Zine photos and Creative Jam (?)

2014-02-27T14:04:00.006+01:00

I managed to take the pictures of my zine and am finally uploading them now. There will be a fair next week at LCC , where all of us will have to sell their publication. I think I'll just make it really cheap, because that's what zines are about and anyway, I just want it to spread and have people read it.

Last week I got a message in my inbox that I am invited to a Behance event called Creative Jam. Yesterday a woman from INT Works called me up to confirm my attendance and apparently, this event is a contest for designers. There will be known designers having talks and critiquing the works. Especially looking forward to meet Chris LaBrooy, who does amazing 3D illustrations and graphic design. If you live in London, you might have seen his 3D Transport for London poster.
About the contest, I have no idea what to expect but it sounds really exciting. I asked if I can bring along people I know for the contest, but was told that it's invite-only, so I will be surrounded by total strangers from 2pm-11pm...yup, that's 9 hours, lol.

Anyway, here are the zine photographs. (I decided to put them on the end of the post so you wouldn't miss half of the text)

For dynamic photos go to my Behance. I just wanted to show the overall layout of my zine publication. A bit of variation so your visit isn't a total waste.

I've also uploaded to my Facebook Page (Cyclopbunny) recently. If you're new, click on the contacts tab on top of this page, where you can get all my social platform links. This way you can follow wherever you like most.

T-shirt

2014-02-16T12:38:00.000+01:00

Using my animated robot character design, I outlined it in black and created a mosaic pattern to screenprint on a Primark t-shirt. Hope you like!

Check out my animated robot HERE.

Zinefestation

2014-02-12T15:26:00.001+01:00

One of my school project results was exhibited yesterday at The Flying Dutchman. The event was called Zinefestation, where many donated zines could be seen. There were some zines made from very original materials, others just used paper. Not many from my class submitted theirs, but the ones who did, made great zines.

Here are some shots of the exhibition. I have booked a photo studio for next Monday, so proper images of my zine will come.

My fictional journal through Ruinpubs

A zine about Pei's passion

Introverts by Jenelle

3D buildings and maps

2014-02-08T13:02:00.000+01:00

Hey all! I haven't posted much content for a while because I was enjoying holiday and had a bunch load of projects to do at once. Here is a preview of one of them. I created a 3D view of our college and a basic mapping as well, because people have been frustrated by the horrible wayfinding system at our institute.

More posts to come soon! Until then, hope you enjoy :)

Robot design

2014-01-09T18:09:00.000+01:00

I have been working on this animated character design the past month and during school (aside from school projects). It is a design done for Opencommerce's new website.

First project

2013-12-10T03:23:00.002+01:00

The first project we had to do at London College of Communication (University of the Arts London), was to make a timeline for the school itself. It's because LCC turned 50 years old in 2013.
We had to pick 10 years and represent our school in any form we choose. Our team decided on making a parralax website.

Team members:
Thierry Nahayo | Michael Speakman | Kristina Lam | David Hayman | Sophia Tai (me)

Enjoy the video below. (There is no sound.)

Over The Hill

2013-12-01T22:52:00.000+01:00

I created some illustrations for 3rd year Film&Television students at London College of Communication for their graduate short film Over The Hill.
They need some funding for their film. Click here to find out more about the film and support them.

BFI Film Festival

2013-11-28T20:45:00.001+01:00

I went to the BFI Film Festival this year in London and took the film making masterclass (by Ryd Cook). We learnt how to film scenes and how to edit the footage in Premier Pro. It was a very short course, but a nice introduction to the film world.

Here's what I mashed together on a whim:

I didn't edit the sound and it has two other clips on the end because we didn't have time to finish. It was really fun though, I recommend going to BFI to anyone! :)

And check out everyone else's video on Ryd's youtube channel. Most of them were studying films, so those are probably better than mine, haha.

30 day challenge

2013-11-23T20:00:00.000+01:00

Hey all!
Anna and I decided to do the 30 day challenge, but in 30 weeks. Here are my sketches for day 1 and 2.
These are going to be posted (hopefully) every Saturday at 8pm.

day 1: yourself day 2: Someone you like

Foldit (font)

2013-11-15T11:37:00.000+01:00

Foldit was originally inspired by a folded paper strip.

My main goal was to create a font that is the total opposite of my first font (isolated). As a result it is less linear, has depth and is a more masculin font.

This has actually been sitting around on my computer for a while now. The concept and view of it was done long ago, I just needed to complete the alphabet. Glad it's finally finished!

Someone did an interview with me

2013-11-10T11:24:00.000+01:00

A very sweet guy called Richard asked me if he could do an interview with me for his graduate program at Portland State University. The website is meant to help other people find their passions. This isn't fully launched yet, but is open for everyone to view.

http://www.passionhow.com/sophia-tai-graphic-and-media-designer/

Panorama

2013-08-24T00:23:00.000+02:00

I've been taking a huge break this summer before the start of something new. Now that I have the required IELTS test, I am officially going to be a student at the University of the Arts London. Going to study BA (Hons) Graphic and Media Design.

Please enjoy the view from my window until I start off blogging again! :)

A hundred likes

2013-05-31T12:09:00.002+02:00

Facebook Page reached 100 likes. Thank you all!!!

Zsennye Workshop

2013-05-27T03:33:00.000+02:00

Hey all! Design Terminal has real grass and mushrooms "planted" along the exhibition and it looks awesome! So if you're around Deák Ferenc tér in Hungary, check it out. Entries are free.

Basically, the exhibition introduces Zsennye summer camp/workshop and came along with a mini-workshop organized by Fanni Csernátony last Friday.
The workshop was international and most participants were Erasmus students who came to study at Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design, so we all had to talk English. I didn't mind the practice and also had a chance to talk dutch a bit.

Our programme
It started with a presentation mainly about design activism followed by a big group talk discussing this topic. Then we were divided to four groups, mainly based on our profession. Our task was to design and plan a movement that will make Hungary better in any way and keep this movement sustainable.
We started brainstorming later at lunch and I don't know why it came to me as a surprise, but almost everyone had noted how grumpy and unhappy the people look on the streets, especially the old ladies. (I must be too used to it.)
So in the end we decided to make people smile and perhaps make them interact to strangers as well.
After getting back we got our place at the window and some special chalk to do our planning and to sort all the information we had gathered at lunch. We moved on to more specific ideas as well.
At some point a guy from our group started waving to the people outside and it made people smile and in some cases wave back. It was a funny experiment. We tried to wave with a sad face to see how it works, but there were too many of us and there was always someone who couldn't hold their smile. :)
We noted various reactions. Some were confused and weren't sure who we were waving at, some were freaked out about us. Many just smiled and around a half of them waved back as well. It was funny to notice how many people turned around and came walking by again to see if we would give them a second wave. Three teenage boys came as close to the windows as ourselves were. We kept waving at each other for 5 minutes! And I am proud to announce that there was one guy, who even came inside to participate for a while.
Later on, I drew some signs and instead of waving, we showed people these. Compliments made them smile or sometimes wave and funny messed up ones like "You Pretty" sign for a guy and "Cool Moustache" for a girl made them laugh. We even went outside our comfort zone/the streets and got more interaction, like people saying thanks to us, which was quite nice. The guys tried to follow around some girls with "Love You" and "Pretty" signs. It made the girls walk a bit faster but at least it also made them laugh.

Flash Mob
After all the experimenting we went to take part in a flash mob. A Buddhist group located next to us organized a 5-minute meditation flash mob at the Deák Ferenc square. We all got a balloon and sat on the ground. The meditation seemed far shorter than five minutes but it was, though. And after that we all let go of our environmental friendly balloons and looked at them fly. It was nice and peaceful, everyone respected this movement. No one started screaming and the phones that started to ring were put silent immediately.

Presentation
In the last few hours we had to finalize and present our project of the day.
I had this idea though, that I pity we did not carry out. It was about sticking post-it notes with nice messages to the back of some pedestrians thus making other people interact with them and delivering the nice message as well. It would make strangers interact and make people smile as well. I guess our group just couldn't build up the courage to do this, because we also planned on making photos of it.
While I wrote our presentation onto the window, the rest of the group sticked up all the signs. No one wanted to do the talking, so I did the "(sigh) Okay...I'll do it"- thing and started it all, but got some help by the end, thankfully.

Unforgettable experience
This was my very first workshop and it was an amazing experience. I have also learnt a lot about roles and team work. I got more inside information on the differences between MoME and foreign universities as well.
It was also my first flash mob. I was nervous and thought it would be embarrassing but it was really friendly and peaceful.
I really loved this and might participate to take part at the summer workshop as well!

Picture was taken from this facebook page.

Behance Portfolio Reviews

2013-05-20T03:17:00.000+02:00

Hey all! I've been away for some time. Busy making a final decision Uni-wise and doing all kinds of arrangements! I decided to go study in London feeling scared and excited at the same time.
If you know someone who is looking for house mates in London let me know, we're looking for one at the moment. For any details message me on facebook or contact me on any platform listed on the right sidebar.

Today's topic
So today I am going to write about an event that turned out awesome and somewhat makes a part of my life now.
Basically Behance is an online platform for designers to showcase and discover creative works. Since I am member of this site, I received a mail about the event called Behance Portfolio Reviews organized by Super Channel. It is all about gathering creative people and showing our portfolios to each other and receiving critique from a mentor.

So I went
I already knew someone who had been there before and he told me there were some harsh mentors as well, so I kind of tried to keep my attendance as much of a secret as possible. In case my mentor would ask me what the hell I'm doing here, no one would need to know.
The one I attended was on the 14th of May in Budapest, Hungary. It was all mysterious, nobody knew what was going to happen. There were four tables set for us; 3 for graphic design and 1 for photography.

We had a great table, everyone was nice and friendly. And on top of all that, we got a mentor who works at Carnation Group, the one I had hoped for, Károly Királyfalvi (Drez).

He was really relaxed and friendly to my surprise and not strict at all. Mostly giving out compliments instead of critiques, sometimes asking tricky questions.

The guys were already experienced, working as graphic designers and the girl next to me is a second year college student with amazing illustrative skills. I was so nervous that I planned to literally run away or just announce that I came to watch only. In the end I chose to fight the coward inside me. While showing my portfolio I received an unexpected response. They liked what I made and showed interest and respect. I really appreciate that.
To round it all off, each of us had to pick which portfolio we liked best. Almost everyone, including me, chose the illustrative girl. She picked me though, which really made me happy. But to be honest, I really liked everyone's portfolio, and picked her subjectively, because I love illustration.
Of course the last word goes to the mentor and he picked the last person I would have expected, me. I was shocked and surprised and confused, but somehow I earned it and it still feels unbelievable. His pick came with a coin which I find really beautiful and need to look at every now and then to make sure it's real.

Translation:

RECOGNITION

Thank you, for taking part at Behance Portfolio Reviews on the 14th of May at Design Terminal.

Our professional mentors found your presented works outstanding, congratulations.

Best of luck, we wish you many more recognitions!

Open presentations

After the portfolio reviews, several acknowledged creatives held presentations about one or some of their projects. These "talks" are open for all to visit for free. I recommend it to anyone interested in art and design. The presentations are really interesting and engaging and sometimes funny.

The mini butterfly effect

Next Tuesday Portfolio Night will be held, which is kind of like speed dating with fresh designers and experienced professionals. Since I am not looking for a job at an agency yet, I asked them if they needed a volunteer to help, because I was quite curious about all this. Turns out they heard of my achievement at the Behance Portfolio Reviews and want me to show off at their event too, thus offered me an honorary ticket. Can you imagine how honoured and happy and lucky I felt at that moment? All this is like a dream to me. And let's just end the post with this thought! :-)

Photos from the event were taken from this facebook photo album.

DesignAcademy

2013-05-05T22:22:00.000+02:00

The academy I thought I wanted to go to the most is the Design Academy in Eindhoven (the Netherlands). Seemed like a great place, near to my close relatives, great website. Of course I couldn't have known the school very well; I don't know anyone who goes there and didn't have the chance to visit and look around. I did admissions to several schools thinking I'd be accepted to only one or two of them (now it seems I dug my own grave) and I don't think anyone has time or money visiting all of the schools they applied to.

Admissions day
First of all, the entrance of the academy can be found on the third floor of the Witte Dame, which to me was pretty tricky. I asked at least three or four pedestrians where the hell that Witte Dame can be found, but that's just me.
After arrival I took a place in the waiting area and found someone to talk to. I also met a guy who I got to know on the admissions day in Utrecht and he was accepted there as well.
At some point two women appeared and gave us each a number ranging between one to six. I got the prettiest number, 5. In each section there were eight tables where we could put our projects on. We had to wait a quite bit, so I started looking around. Our section had seven people including me, but they weren't very talkative except for the Belgian guy with the table in front of me. We also looked at the tables at other sections and had some great talks. Some had very serious works.
Some time later the judges appeared, teachers, a man and a woman. The man was clearly very dominant and did all the talk. We had to introduce ourselves and then each had to present our projects. I found the man very rude and disrespectful towards all of us, and felt like he took advantage of the situation, as he said the admissions will go like a normal lesson at their school (but of course noone was going to start a debate since we all wanted to be accepted).
After the presentations we quickly looked through everyone's works again and got a tour around the building. I left feeling insulted and misjudged.
Of course this doesn't mean noone would like this school, after all, all I'm doing is telling this from my own perspective and my own experience. Their education is highly respected and everyone should form their own opinion on them.

Outcome
To my surprise, I was accepted. I still am not sure why.
Maybe they made a mistake, maybe there weren't enough applicants, so they had to take me is what I thought. But I know someone who wasn't accepted (though, I thought he would be) and I also did some calculations. In total, there were around 300 applicants and they should be taking around one class (20-30 people?) a year or something.
After doing al these calculations, I would feel crazy not to take their offer, but maybe I am crazy. Or not. They do not offer graphic design as a course, only communication and also I noticed, that their expectations conflicted mine very much. I might feel very uncomfortable and/or unhappy if I went and that's something I really want to avoid.

Utrecht

2013-04-27T17:39:00.001+02:00

I have been away for another couple of admissions, but let's continue with a chronological order. Today I'm going to write about the Hogeschool voor de Kunsten Utrecht.

Home Assignment
So, after doing London stuff, I had four days to do my home assignment before flying to Scotland and to the Netherlands after.
We had to choose a socially relevant subject, that is somehow personal, and we had to create a poster with just typography and ten images that go with it.
I tried to make a basic idea and concept on the airplane on my way back from London. Research took pretty long at home, because I wanted to make infographics.
My theme was about immigrants because well, my looks, my nationality and the place where I grew up and still live are all very different. I did my research on Hungary, the place where I live and the Netherlands and England, which are places where I might go.

Since I am very illustrative, I had a hard time using just typography to create a poster. I chose to make an image from letters and made an infographic using a hundred letter of "i"s which each represent a person (1 %) and colour them by using my information on immigrants and a skin colour map.

My main introduction is about being an outsider because of one's looks or nationality. By choosing my theme I was mainly influenced by the changes in the educational system and the rapidly growing anti-foreighner mentality in Hungary (in 2013, 40% of Hungarian residents are said to be racist by tárki.hu).
In the next three images I colour coded each country and used their own language to show information. These images were drawn to show stereotypes, introducing the countries.
The last six images are all infographics showing some information on immigrants. The left pie chart shows all residents and the right pie chart shows immigrants only, which holds the exact same information as the bottom three images.

Admissions
After arrival we all had to wait in the canteen. I had a great chat with other participants, mostly with Product Designers. My first thing to notice, was that I really stood out. The school was full of people with wild looks (piercing, vibrantly coloured hair, daring clothes, etc.) and it kind of felt like I didn't belong there. Also, I didn't get a chance to talk to other foreigners (if there were any).
After waiting for 15-20 minutes, they finally called all Graphic Design participants to go upstairs and put down our portfolio on a table with our name card for the first round, then we had to return to the canteen and wait for a few hours. They provide free wifi in the building, but a book would've been nice to keep my mind away. Waiting for the results was quite nerve-racking.
After those few hours they call us again, and we are led to a room where a speech was given. After going back to the portfolio-room we had to grab our portfolios and go home if the name card was still on it, or otherwise go back to the canteen and wait for the second round, which was the interview. I honestly looked through everything to make sure I don't unnecessary wait in the canteen. Heck, I even looked under the table and searched a bit around the portfolio that was next to me.
I started to panic after waiting for 1,5-2 hours in the canteen. All my chat-buddies went home and the place started vacancy. Still I assumed they either forgot about me, or there was nothing to forget, because I simply didn't make it to the next round. In the end a few second year students sat with me for a chat and helped me figure it all out. Turns out I was last to go (I waited 6 hours total that day). They gave me some tips on the interview, for which I am thankful to this day.
The interview went pretty well. The teachers were very polite and listened to what I had to say. I'm happy they liked my home assignment and they appreciated my works in the traditional media as well. They also told what parts of my portfolio they didn't like, which I really liked.

Results
After a week or two I received an e-mail that I was accepted. I still haven't decided which school I want to attend. All I heard and know about HKU is that the first year is traditional media only, the teacher-student relationship is great, but the school is a bit messy and unorganised. Also, what I know is, that animation students tend to want to go there.

Oh, and I got on the wait-list at Edinburgh College of Arts, which is pretty neat.

PLEASE READ! I will be infinitely thankful for any help!

2013-04-14T18:35:00.000+02:00

Starting september I'm going to be and art student. My problem is, that I am very indecisive. So far I have been accepted to London College of Communication Graphic and Media Design (Hons) and Hogeschool voor de Kunsten Utrecht Graphic Design.
If you go to one of these schools or know anyone involved or have some inside information about student life there, please contact me!
E-mail: cyclopbunny@gmail.com
Facebook (message me)

I have more information on dutch education and don't know much about english or scottish schools or their goals/view of life.

You can also help me by spreading this on google+, facebook, twitter, tumblr, etc. or just asking people who might know more about this subject.

Thank you so so much in advance!

Sophie

Sketchpile

2013-04-08T15:53:00.000+02:00

Castles... Castles everywhere!

2013-03-25T18:34:00.000+01:00

After I got back home from London -see previous post- I had to get ready for the next admissions in Scotland and in the Netherlands. Luckily Edinburgh College of Art didn't have any home assignments, Hogeschool voor de Kunsten Utrecht on the other hand, had a quite massive one compared to my situation.
Admissions day of the HKU was in around two weeks but my flight to Scotland was in five days and I wasn't going to come back home before flying to the Netherlands. That meant I had to do the task in four days instead of thirty. Why? Because I didn't have a laptop to carry around all the programs needed. On the contrary I didn't work for the next two weeks, so it really felt like a vacation with a tiny bit of stress.
But let's keep all the details on my experience regarding the HKU for another post. It's time to talk about Scotland!

First impression
My first significant experience in London was not long after arriving to the airport. I quickly found my Easybus with no driver, but a guy sitting on the seat next to the driver's place, reading a newspaper or a magazine. The moment he saw me, he jumped out of the minibus, let me in and sat right back on his seat. I couldn't figure out why the bus driver wasn't there yet. Suddenly, the guy in front starts the vehicle and we set off. It took me half an hour to figure out that it wasn't an exceptional minibus I was sitting in, but that the steering wheel is in fact on the other side in each and every vehicle in this country.
Well, arriving to Edinburgh I forgot all about that. I even attempted to walk onto the roadway, because I thought maybe the bus has it's door on the other side.
After a while I noticed there are no signs on the bus that would announce the next stop, so I had to ask the driver to warn me when we get there. He had such a strong Scottish accent, that I made him repeat every other sentence. I still had no clue of what he was saying.

Where I slept
Just like I know someone from London, I have an acquaintance in Edinburgh as well. But not just any acquaintance, we were classmates in secondary school and most importantly, she is one of my closest friends, Emmy. Funny thing is that one of her roommates attended the same secondary school we did.
Not long after my arrival, exhausted from working on the home assignment for the HKU and from the flight itself, I went to sleep. We indeed did some catchup talk beforehand, but Emmy had essay deadlines and had to pull an all-nighter. The next morning I awaken to her still typing on her laptop, not much later she went to sleep...for a half an hour. I'm starting to doubt whether she is human at all, because apparently, she doesn't sleep much.

Experience
After receiving an invitation per e-mail, I immediately answered I'll attend the admissions day. Later I found out there was not going to be an interview, just a tour around the school. I was quite sick, so I couldn't pay much attention, but I did get a good amount of information on their education, and the students they have are really good at whatever they are doing.
There is no news about the outcome yet, but I'll make sure to write about it either here or on facebook.

What I saw
Ok, so at first I was pretty surprised that the capital of a country could look like a friendly little town with castles. I mean, I get that cars and buses are exactly the same here as in England, but there are some things I just can't leave out of this post. In Edinburgh there are castles literally everywhere! All the hotels are castles, all the restaurants are in castles, shit even the schools are in castles. When I stepped inside one of these schools I felt like there was a crown missing off my head. It's that serious!
Another thing is the kilt. I truly thought that they only wore kilts on formal occasions and weddings, but that's absolutely not true. Every single day, I saw at least three or four men wearing a kilt just because. I also found out that they aren't supposed to wear anything underneath.
As I mentioned before, I can not understand scottish accent, which disappointed me, because I believed understanding each and every word of this years Academy Award winner for best animated feature film 'Brave' would mean I'd be alright in Scotland.
What I truly was excited about though, was seeing red beards. I even saw two of them and have no idea why that made me happy, but it did.