August '24

Monthly design roundup for August 2024.

Hello everyone good to see you! August has felt like the longest month ever but I have some things to share with you. Thanks for sticking around!

DESIGN

I had the immense honor of designing a very special poster, and I know I say it’s an honor but I mean it x50 this time. Nation of Language is one of my favorite bands, constantly my top played artist and has been for the past two years, so when they asked me to make a show poster for their NYE show in Brooklyn, of course I said yes. I knew I needed to illustrate a synth + disco ball, I wasn’t exactly sure how, but the imagery popped in my head when I was thinking about synth pop and New Year’s Eve.

As I mentioned in my post last month, I’ve been really hyper-fixating on synths lately — music made with synths, the machines themselves, Wendy Carlos, the history of women and synth music, etc. and knew I wanted to illustrate/build my own modular synth. Modular synths, at least from my knowledge, seem extremely customizable and there are infinite options for combining gear to create something new, so I wanted to create NOL’s very own NYE modular synth (the NYE 12-31 if you will). This is one of my favorite posters I’ve ever made and drawn, and I really can’t wait to hold the actual prints (which I think will be at the show??)

Here are some things I referenced when designing this!

MOVIES

Blow Out ☆☆☆☆☆
I really can’t believe I had never heard of this movie, especially because I really like Brian De Palma (Carrie, Phantom of the Paradise)… if you’re not familiar and I can try to entice you to watch it, this one is a murder mystery about a sound effects technician who, while recording sound effects for an upcoming horror film, records a real murder that then causes him to spiral into curiosity about who the killers are. Had a great time watching this AND it’s gorgeous, seriously not to get annoying about ~the cinematography~ but wow everything felt so meticulous and intentional. I’m also just really intrigued by older styles of filmmaking, so seeing the technical work for old films and how they recorded and edited sound peaked my curiosity. Very much recommend!

Alien ☆☆☆☆
Like many others, I am watching the Alien movies right now since the new one is out. I actually had never seen the original Alien, which is strange because I love movies like The Thing which I found to be very similar and came out just a couple years later. I knew of a few iconic scenes going in but I didn’t know anything about the universe. I did follow it up with Aliens which I liked less, and so far I haven’t watched any more. EXCEPT the new movie which I will talk about in a second

Alien: Romulus ☆☆☆☆
Okay! I really liked this despite everyone I know seemingly hating this addition to the Alien universe. Maybe I’m feeling swayed because I love this director. The Evil Dead remake is one of my favorite horror movies, and I just really enjoy how Fede Álvarez makes movies. This one was gross in ways I wasn’t expecting (loved it), and definitely brought a lot of body horror moments in that felt so insane that it almost leaned more horror than sci-fi. No spoilers, but I feel like Fede also put his own unique twist on the Alien world and expanded on the creatures introduced to us in the first few movies, which I thought was fresh and fun. The ending is burned into my brain for the next 3 months I think

Other movies I watched:

I had never and I mean never seen any of the Spider-Man movies. BUT they were on Netflix, so I watched the Tobey Maguire ones and genuinely liked them. First two were really fun, the third one I watched but definitely cringed the whole way through and I don’t think you can pay me to rewatch it

Went to the movies and saw Trap and Cuckoo… Trap was so bad that I couldn’t even hate watch it the way I did watching Old. I actually had to go rewatch Old so I can appreciate a good-bad M. Night movie. I didn’t think we could get lower but then I saw Cuckoo which was so bad it made me somehow want to watch Trap again. Two very forgettable movies. Do with this information what you will.

MUSIC

Albums I’ve had on repeat:
Reality Check — The Teenagers
S/T — Elastica
Memorial — THUS LOVE
Remote Control — Discovery Zone
S/T — The Pains of Being Pure at Heart
Persona — GEL
Sod’s Toastie — The Cool Greenhouse

INSPO

I stumbled upon this brilliant artist Yukino Ohmura, who creates these beautiful nighttime cityscapes using a bunch of dot stickers. Her work is so detailed and referential to bokeh in photography, and I can’t even imagine the amount of work that goes into each of these. One of the ways I always approach working is by creating illustrations with just very basic shapes. So seeing an artist work with my favorite shape (circle, hello) to create gorgeous landscapes from something that could otherwise be very monotonous, is really inspiring to me

That’s all for now, see you next month!