Illustration BA Welcome Pack
Welcome to Illustration BA 2024.
Hello and welcome! My name is Louise Bird, programme leader for the Illustration course. We look forward to meeting you online end of August and then face-to-face in teaching week 1, Monday 16 September at 10am.
You are joining a vibrant course at a super supportive and future focused university that will provide the skills you need to succeed in the creative industries – come with enthusiasm and an open mind and in return we will prepare you for an exciting career!
On our illustration course we take an expanded approach to illustration and put the power of storytelling at the heart of what we do. Over the three years you will explore various ways of storytelling to make ideas accessible, raise awareness, promote, persuade, and entertain. We do this by introducing you to research skills, purposeful play through testing and experimenting, to develop your ideas. Inductions into workshop spaces, a range of media, software and technology, will give you the tools to explore ways to problem solve and hone your own individual approach.
As a team we are passionate about creating opportunities for our students to gain rich experiences and complex challenges. Working in our studio with fellow students, lecturers and industry professionals will develop your individual creativity whilst allowing collaboration on projects that will both inspire and challenge what image-making means to you and to those you are illustrating for.
Programme Leader
Louise Bird BA, MA, FHEA
Senior Lecturer and Programme Leader Illustration BA (Hons)
Welcome and Induction sessions
This is your induction timetable with online session on Thursday 29 August at 1:30pm, covering the transition from school or college to Higher Education teaching – and in-person sessions starting on Monday 16 September at 10am. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact me, Louise Bird: Louise.Bird@northampton.ac.uk
Equipment
We will talk through what equipment you will need more during the online session on Thursday 29 August, but to get you going you will need:
- SD card for using Digital cameras
- Memory stick or external hard drive to back up your work
- A3 or A4 sketchbook – not wirobound
- Note pad
- Stationery – Pencils, fine liners etc
- A core kit of art materials; paints, coloured pencils, oil pastels, range of soft drawing pencils (e.g 8b, 6b,3b) and additional materials appropriate to your chosen ways of working
- Brush pen in black
- Swann scalpel and blades
- Laptops and power cable (if you have one – don’t worry if not, we have Macbooks you can borrow when in our studio). If you are looking to get a computer, we teach on and use Apple Macbooks – this is the industry standard. Windows based laptops are fine too but they are not what you will use the industry)
If you are considering buying a device of your own a Wacom Cintiq or equivalent is a better option than an iPad and similar price. They are also compatible with Adobe software that you will be using on the course (iPads don’t). - Laptops and power cable (if you have one – don’t worry if not, we have Macbooks you can borrow when in our studio). If you are looking to get a computer, we teach on and use Apple Macbooks, which are the industry standard. Windows based laptops are fine too but they are not what you will use the industry)
- If you are considering buying a device of your own, a Wacom Cintiq or equivalent is a better option than an iPad and similar price. They are also compatible with Adobe software that you will be using on the course (iPads aren’t).
Enhancing skills, building networks and engaging in the wider University community
Visual diary, summer sketchbook task for week beginning 16 September
Drawing, looking, observing are essential skills for an illustrator and will kick start your visual library for future projects. The project intends to nurture a cultural habit that you adopt and should be ongoing whilst on your course and continue through the rest of your career as an illustrator. The project will begin to develop your ability to express yourself and discover what you are passionate about – visually and critically thinking and being actively involved with the world around you.
A sketchbook is a fantastic place for artists to generate ideas, note on the go, draw from life and experiment without feeling too precious about the final outcome. They are a personal space for you to draw and doodle freely.
‘My dedication to my sketchbooks made them precious, and this feeling has never left me.’ Grayson Perry
Task
With this in mind we would like you to start looking and gathering visual information, fill out one or more pages of a small sketchbook (size up to you) with one of the following daily, until your sketchbook is full. If you’re on holiday NO EXCUSES… sketchbooks can be taken anywhere:
- Draw on location: draw on the bus, the beach, the park, a cafe, draw the buildings, and everyday objects that occupy the space around you.
- Draw people: Sit in a cafe or on a park bench and study. Look at the way people stand, sit, communicate, gesture…draw a page of different people from life.
- Draw from TV/Film: Pause to study compositions of scenes or create your own storyboard of the film as you watch. Please see the film list below for recommendations.
- Listen to an episode of a podcast and visually respond whilst you listen: pick out words, colours, visualise characters, scenes and descriptions. If you’re not a seasoned podcaster, a list of podcast recommendations are listed below. These can either be downloaded via you iPhone/Smartphone’s podcast app or streamed from the individual podcast’s website.
- Record thoughts, capture images and collect from places and events you visit this summer: gigs, festivals, holidays, fairs, city trips, exhibitions, family and friend gatherings, parties, sporting or cultural events etc.
Films to watch
- Le Jetee – Chris Marker
- Eraserhead – David Lynch
- Mon Oncle – Jaques Tati
- Spirited Away – Studio Ghibli
- Silent Running – Douglas Trumball
- Jim and Andy – Chris Smith
- Get Out – Jordan Peele
- Mary and Max – Adam Elliot
- Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind – Michel Gondry
- Little Joe – Jessica Hausner
Podcasts to listen to
- This American Life
- Radiolab
- Snap Judgement
- New Yorker Fiction
- 99% Invisible
- Death, Sex and Money
- Creative Rebels
- Memory Palace
- Ear Hustle
- Adam Buxton
- NPR.org
- In Our Time (BBC Sounds)
- Mortified
Read about illustration
Spend some time on the Creative Lives in Progress website – this is full of excellent articles about illustration and being an illustrator, along with It’s Nice that – articles and showcase of contemporary illustration, design, fine art and photography. Elephant and Booooooom also showcases art, design and illustration.
Take a look at our Illustration course page and, if you have time, I suggest you read a few of our book and magazine recommendations in the ‘Reading List’ below.
Books
- How To See the World by Nicholas Mirzoeff
- Ways of Seeing by John Berger
- Drawing by John Berger
- The A-Z of Visual Ideas: How to solve any creative brief by John Ingledew
- The Power and Influence of Illustration: Achieving Impact and Lasting Significance Through Visual Communication by Alan Male
Magazines
- Varoom
- Creative Review
- Elephant