Welcome

seismik — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 21:19:13 +0000

Thanks for clicking our new logo in your inbox.

If you havent seen our work before please have a click through the site, if you like it you might even think about hiring us

UKYA - Arts Council - Advanced Website Development

seismik — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 19:21:37 +0100

UK Young Artists as part of the UK Arts Council commisioned us to design and produce a new online experience for them. The main goals of the brief were to provide better information presention, better social networking intergration and a website with easier backend tools to help them get information quicker to the public and in a more visually pleasing manner. The site contains alot of data and is a large website so its data needs better categorisation.

We approached the subject by considering this as very much like visiting an art gallery itself. When you visit an art gallery the best spaces tend to be clean and unobtrusive as to let the work itself do the talking. We extended this philopshy to the online space where the personality of the framework must not overpower or confuse the voice of the work itself.

The backend has a multitude of social features, with the site fully intergrating to facebook, twitter and mailchimp. The site has a multlevel role structure and a very clean and well designed backend that is easy to all to use. There is also a custom built mobile site template which pulls the same data as the main site. The site also integrates with paypal to allow submission of work from artists. We made sure the new site was fully 'Search Engine Optimised' and already within two weeks of launch we have seen an incredible 300% increase visitors and this only looks set to continue.

This large multiuser, editable, search engine optimised, ecommerce, socially intergrated website is now live for you to see...

NTU - Environmental Studies Motion Piece

seismik — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 16:09:54 +0100

This animation was commissioned by Nottingham Trent University's Brackenhurst Campus to raise the profile of their unique courses in science and nature.

The script begins by highlighting some rather depressing facts, while becoming more upbeat and ending in a call to arms for potential students to help solve the planets environmental problems. As the Brackenhurst campus and it's courses specialise in a blend of natural and technological courses, the piece had to also be strongly organic, yet suitably technologically advanced.

Every segment and frame was hand drawn and designed as a mini stop motion animation, then photocopied to create natural texture. These mini-animations where then edited in computer software to create a more flowing piece, it was then projected and that projection filmed for the final piece. The film noir style also echoes a mix of old and new/natural and futuristic while boosting the charm of the illustrations.

Music by Film & TV composer Paul Mottram who composed such films as "Rainman". The violinist is Darragh Morgan who plays in The Smith Quartet. Alternative music (not shown here), was produced by Pete Jordan.

Seismik donates website to TheCycleDiaries to help raise money for Warchild

seismik — Mon, 30 May 2011 22:39:06 +0100

TheCycleDiaires consists of Andrew Madeley and Matt McDonald. Their aim... to raise as much money for War Child as they possibly can by using push bikes to travel all the way from London to Sydney. This epic 20,000 km bikathon needed a website to help get their message across and act as platform to help them get press and most important MORE donations (hint hint... click here to donate!). We donated the website (and branding development) to them free of charge to help them on their way. You can follow their progress on site (still about 99 days left before they set off). As the name suggest the lengthy journey will be documented in all its hi's and low's through the website. Please visit the site and spread the word to help them raise money for Warchild. Please tell your friends and if you work in the press please help them get some exposure (contact them by clicking here).

We also helped brush up the branding so that it reduced well to one colour (for tshirts etc) but also so it combined the key elements of their unique take on an epic journey.
The right one is our progression of the original logo.

EM Media Achievements Brochure

seismik — Mon, 30 May 2011 12:49:53 +0100

EM Media help finance many great projects (including "this is England '86"), check out their website for more info.

When creating annual reports it must remembered this is a document that has to get across alot of facts and figures, as such you have to be careful to be creative but maintain a balance such that information provision is the key factor. With this in mind we tried to create a simple overhall theme that did not overpower the information itself. The brief was to create a look at showed the nature of the linking of creative hubs and the dynamic nature of the industry they interact with. We chose interconnected "mini big bangs" (we had been reading alot about the LHC that week) that acted like little localised bursts of creativity which we connected. We also handled all the print sourcing and production.

You can download the document for greater scrutiny here & here

Page Examples:

University Worldwide Design Project

seismik — Thu, 26 May 2011 01:21:14 +0100

We were recently commissioned by Nottingham Trent University to create an iconic cover and keepsake centerfold timeline highlighting design innovation from Nottingham. The lace piece on the cover contains various elements from Nottingham’s creative heritage such as Pugin’s St Barnabus Cathedral and the Raleigh Chopper (among others). The centre spread focuses on the negative space from within the lace designs and acts as a timeline highlighting design innovation from Nottingham. This publication has been distributed worldwide.

The illustrations for the centerfold where cut from green paper by laser and lifted away from the cutter, the negative space which remained was then photographed while un-composed and turned black and then worked into contemporary timeline. The result is an illustrated, organic tapestry of Nottingham’s design history in a style which fittingly blends tradition with contemporary design. Chronologically the illustrations flow from bottom to the top, highlighting design ranging from 14th Century alabaster through to the new Nottingham Contemporary building.

London University Interactive Map

seismik — Tue, 24 May 2011 23:22:53 +0100

We were asked to create something fun (and a little abstract) for the Queens Mary University to give students and staff a unique way of showing how all the campus locations are connectioned and where they sit in relation to each other. You can see this in situ on their website by clicking here or you can click and move the mouse around our simcity inspired vista below...

[Your browser does not support frames or is currently configured not to display frames. Please use an up-to-date browser that is capable of displaying frames.]

New Nottinghamshire Flag Design

seismik — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 15:57:17 +0100

We were asked by the BBC to be part of the design panel creating the new flag for Nottinghamshire. We helped stear the public submissions and shortlist the designs given over to public vote. We cleaned up the public design's and combined various elements of submitted work to help create and tidy to a final look. In essence this flag is designed by the people for the people and is a excellent example of crowdsourcing. Many people would probably think Robin Hood is an obvious symbol to use for Nottingham but that is exactly why it was chosen. It is probably one of the very few county flags in the uk that would instantly be recognisable from anywhere in the world. A flags main purpose is show its location using elements associated with the county, to not do this with a worldwide recognisable symbol (Mr Hood) would be folly as a flag is purely supposed to be symbology (and not fine art). A flag must also be very simple using simple shapes and geometry such that it can be seen clearly from a distance. Its also incorporates the St.Georges cross and with Robin at its centre just goes further to illustrate Nottingham at the geographic centre of the UK.

The flag is available to buy here

The flag was simultaneously raised across the county in both Mansfield and Newark Castle as well as Nottingham Castle

We were aksed along to the flag being hoisted at Nottingham Castle with the Major and the BBC, May 2011

Gail Dandy Website

seismik — Sun, 28 Nov 2010 23:35:24 +0000

Gail Dandy are a unique boutique style food company. Family run, they provide a contemporary catering service using all locally sourced produce. Their rustic charm is woven into this premium company and they wanted a website that beamed this same message. Using illustration and a mix of flash a simple website that tells people exactly what they do and how they do it even before you read a word of the site!

www.gaildandy.co.uk

Drag it around...

Dance4 E-Marketing Design

seismik — Fri, 12 Nov 2010 00:55:07 +0000

Dance4 is the defacto international centre for the development of extraordinary 21st century dance. An internationally recognised, experimental dance organisation and a unique voice in the UK dance sector, Dance4’s work supports artists and practitioners who are interested in the development of dance within performance and learning environments.

They required a simple and effective email marketing campaign to inform their audience about their latest international dance festival.

Upcycled's Upcycled Branding

seismik — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 20:45:00 +0100

We were invited to create new identity and branding for London based upcycled.co.uk - a place for designers, artists, shops and students to submit their upcycled products.

The branding/logo was created by collecting items that represent different areas of upcycling, from furniture to art and fashion. Though each individual item is worth very little, when arranged together they're worth more than the sum of their parts and are in turn upcycled.

In true modern style, most of the items were purchased from the internet, the largest car boot sale there is! (this was after alot of exhaustive non-internet based searching!). The "c" was kindly made by local upcycling artist "yum-made-this". All the items were then photographed and arranged to create the upcycled, Upcycled logo.

Do visit the site and submit some work... www.upcycled.co.uk

The Sweetshop Music Video

seismik — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 00:14:38 +0100

"We've uploaded a music video about uploading a music video"

"The most libelous music video ever made.."

Everyday we need to login and inform our followers of our latest meander, we have to do this across multiple platforms... twitter, facebook, myspace, bebo, habbo, msn messenger ... etc... and all whilst checking out the latest youtube video of a pando sneezing. The bewildering nature of modern online communiation makes a good starting point for a music video about someone uploading a music video to get fame.

The medium of the video is media itself. Social networking becomes the canvas to create this landscape. We wanted to emulate that slowly boiling panic of having to keep on top of all your outlets of social networking. We noticed in developing the idea that we are hit by probably more branding and advertising than ever on screen but we seem slightly unawares of it taking it more for granted than we ever did with television. Branding and advertising sit directly next to, in and on the content itself in a woven way that tv never dared do. we wanted to draw attention to this fact so started to subvert that brands themselves also by which drawning attention to them.

Ironically this is being promoted through the very avenues it lampoons, reaffirming further just how much we are slaves to the new age of social networking. The video was shot around London & Nottingham in 2009 and the song and video are both available in itunes. The devil is in the detail and if you have time look out for the 3000+ in jokes!