University Work
The three years I have spent at Oxford Brookes University have been very demanding yet valuable, leaving me with skills I never knew existed and a better understanding of my own visual style. On this page you will find some of my favourite bits of work I created for some of the assignments, beginning with my final year.
Year 3
The magazine was a side project to the dissertation.
The purpose of this side project was to have a visual representation of the the contents of the dissertation - something which tells the story without the need to read.
I had the freedom to create my own question, so I chose:
"What influence has World War 1 and 2 propaganda had on the understanding of motivational psychology and how have such ways of advertising evolved the way people communicate, shop and go about their daily lives in the modern day?".
I find motivational psychology fascinating so I wanted to further understand the modern tactics behind every advertisement and where it all originated from.
Click here if you'd like to view the dissertation.
Saving the Travel Industry
"Saving the Travel Industry" was a self-initiated project where I was in charge of setting my own brief. I chose to focus on travel due to how important is it to me personally, and unfortunately throughout the pandemic the travel industry was one of the hardest hit industries worldwide.
'Saving The Travel Industry' had in mind the companies which are now struggling to find their feet again due to the uncertainty around travel, mainly through the worry of getting ill while being away.
My research had led me to a forum called "World Travel and Tourism Council" which works with governments to raise awareness about the importance of travel. This council uses a "Safe Travels" stamp for tourism companies across the world, both small and big, as a global protocol. It provides an immediate affirmation that there are common standards in place for safety of both staff as well as travellers.
This stamp needed a desperate revamp so I created a much more aesthetic and meaningful logo. I then tested it out through creating a number of posters, while emphasising safety protocols such as the use of masks and frequent sanitising.
I also made a video of the behind-the-scenes sketchbook work that went into this revamp, to showcase my research and design process. Check it out!
Click here for this project's mood board
Art of Culture
"Art of Culture" was another project I hold dear to my heart. I really love the various cultures we are lucky to have around our world so I wanted to work on something that would help people from all walks of life to learn about each other and come together. I had endless ideas and struggled to choose only one to execute, because of how vast and endless "culture" is.
Through additional research and development, I discovered a new art style which I thought really suits this project due its visual connection to nature. I then combined various parts of my work to create multiple artworks (all drawn by hand) based on the cultures of face painting around the world, trying to tie it all in to their simplest common denominator: nature.
These artworks are all part of a new museum I created, the "Museum of Culture", and this exhibit is represented using the "I Am Knowledge" logo throughout the posters. This is a playful logo with two main elements - half of a heart and the brain pieced together to create a full heart, signifying love through knowledge and open mind. I have included both posters and my artwork on its own on this page as I am very proud of how it all looks.
This project is also accompanied by a video of my sketchbook process, which led me from a blank canvas to a finished product. It also shows the extensive research and development this project had taken me through to get it to its final form. Check it out!
Find my inspo/mood board for this project HERE
Client: ...Me?
This module was titled "Professional Practice" which required me to establish myself as a designer and create a recognisable brand for myself to give me a head start in the industry. I found myself trying to over-complicate the logo, attempting to incorporate as many aspects of my life into it as I could, but ended up needing to take a big leap back to the basics.
Kat Skarpetowska came to life after I accepted my name is unusual yet recognisable, and can be used to my advantage. Kat is my nickname which everyone knows me by, which is the biggest part of the logo, but what personalises it is the twelve letter long surname that follows it. I wanted to create a classy and mature logo because over the last three years I found my designs become much more sophisticated, which I why I decided to incorporate the New York font into it as it screams out individuality, boldness and confidence.
Having a clean and simple logo does not have to be boring. I wanted to use rustic girly colours as my prime identity colours and I tried to incorporate very subtle shiny holographic details because this is not a typical combination.
My intricate drawings accompany the colours in the background to give my whole brand a much more personal touch, to showcase a luxurious look with a healthy balance of wild in the back.
It was a great project but this branding didn't quite make it out into the real world!
Year 2
One of my many second year projects was to create a brand new magazine publication.
Because I was really active working for RawMusicTV at that time, I decided to base this project on making a music magazine, giving me an existing brand image to try and retain consistently throughout.
Due to this being the first time I used Adobe InDesign, this publication is a bit of a stump, however the project opened my world up to magazine/catalogue design.
If you haven't already, check out my year 3 dissertation magazine earlier on this page, as well as my product catalogue on the marketing page.
Motion Graphics & Kinetic Typography
Adobe AfterEffects is a program I used to actively avoid due to how vast and challenging it is, but thanks to this project, I couldn't hide from it any longer.
Having a clear goal to aim for had helped me understand the absolute basics of how this software functions, which was enough for me to fall in love with it and use in future projects (see motion graphics).
My early discovery of Trapcode TAO by Red Giant gave me an insight into just how endless the possibilities really are in this program, making it particularly exciting.
Enjoy my Tool lyric video!
Back to basics - Festival Branding. Coachella has a new sister festival in Stonehenge, UK, and I am in charge of branding. This project was rather difficult for me as it was the first to introduce me to Adobe Illustrator, and as I only had a very limited amount of time for this, there was only so much I could learn!
I came up with the Burning Wrath festival because of the connection Stonehenge has to magic and witchcraft. Those two topics immediately make me think of dancing around a fire in a circle, so I wanted to incorporate this into my design. Due to the nature of the music (which was my choice) that this festival is accommodating, I wanted the logo and background to be rough and rugged to work with the rough sounds.