Latest / WiseNoise: The Creative Practice Podcast / WN10: Tegan & Charlotte-Ann
Transcript
- speaker-0: But as Charlotte said, it's a tool. It's not something that's gonna completely minimize design or make any designer feel smaller. ⁓ I think our brains are much powerful. our ideas are gonna be far more advanced than whatever technology comes up with. speaker-1: Hello and welcome to the Wise Noise Podcast, a podcast about creative practice with me, Pierce O'Halrren, founder of Wise of Studio, a graphic design studio based in the heart of Aberdeenshire in Scotland. I am in the studio recording this. I have vetoed the usual walk outside where I record this. For the indoor studio setup, because I have done plenty of walking already today, and also I'm in a tiny bit of a rush to get this edited and out there for your audio delectation and visual delectation. I'm chopping up some YouTube videos as well as we speak because my guests today on Wise Noise episode 10. We've reached double figures, a tiny celebration is in order. I might have an extra cup custard cream with my afternoon tea. ⁓ my guests are the inaugural winners of the Wise Love Emerging Talent Award. As you'll tell from the podcast, I keep forgetting what the actual title of the award is. Something like that. It was basically me picking out my favourite projects of the Tom Design Degree Show 2026 in Gray's School of Art in Aberdeen. I was kindly invited by Nicola Watson, one of the lecturers there, to come in and yeah, basically the projects and pick a favourite. And the two stand stood out for me are my guests today. Her project Reimagining Football really struck me with its punchy designs and immediately getting that sort of really nice nostalgic warm feeling of football of yesteryear ⁓ coming through in her work and she's done some excellent research into the field of programme football, programme design. And yeah, I loved it. I absolutely loved it. And also Charlotte Anne Grant is the other recipient of the award. And again, a both both had printed projects, printed elements to their design work. And I'm always a sucker for my first love of print design. And Charlotte's project was Feel. One of the main ⁓ pieces of the work was a magazine which subverted the ⁓ 90s loaded magazine, nuts magazine, lad culture vibe into more of a feminist take on it. So doing all the sort of crass things they were doing there, but in a flipped feminist style, and yeah, absolutely loved the concept and loved that playful subversion using a bit of humour, but there was obviously a chunky political statement to be made behind that. So yeah. Absolutely outstanding and as I was just generally pro ⁓ generally impressed by the high standard in the projects across the board and these two p parti particular projects struck a chord with me in terms of their fun and imagination and attention to detail as well. You could tell especially in the printed ⁓ aspects of the project, every little detail ⁓ all these little ideas just popping and fizzing throughout the ⁓ designs which really kept me smiling all the way through. ⁓ yeah, so this is the record. I will flag up the fact that ⁓ it was technically a very one of the one of the ⁓ wobbliest records I've had in a while. ⁓ I s first started off with realizing I didn't have my proper microphone so I had to start it again. And then when I restarted again I was like worried it was a recording. So we actually had to like Take three before we started finally recording. Teagan's neighbour's dog shows up as a special guest barking in the background. And also, yeah, Teagan's the last of Teagan's recording didn't come up, so she's absent for the last ten minutes of this record. But anyway, through it all, they were brilliant. Absolutely love talking to them and getting their perspective from ⁓ You know, it's exactly twenty years ago that I graduated, so the the the the eyes of somebody in this industry and how quickly it shifted over that twenty years was a fascinating discussion. I would also point you to the YouTube channel to we'll we will discuss the work, but ⁓ it is worth having a look at the actual work they've put in because yeah, as I said I can't I can't stop saying how much I'm impressed by it. Yeah, thank you very much to Charlotte Anne and Teagan for coming on this record. Yeah, I also it is Charlotte Ann. I think during the podcast I kept referring to her sh just plain old Charlotte. So my apologies, Charlotte Ann. I it's another one of the wobbles of this whole record. But yeah, it is a good listen and they're fabulous. And Before we actually go into the podcast, why not stop off at wiselove.shop and buy yourself some wise noise merchandise where you too can help the podcast. There you go, there's the advert. And now you get the content. ⁓ But then when you actually see, you know, it's nice that you get to see like ta everybody's final piece and like stand back and admire it yourself. speaker-2: Yeah, it was great just being able to see everyone's stuff because like we've been with them for four years and just being able to see everyone's progress and seeing their interests and stuff like that was speaker-1: Yeah. So it was really refreshing for me to just go in and see a range of hungry young designers just like all passion projects and ⁓ tapped into be seeing a lot of that reconnected with my own love of ⁓ communication design. And you know, i it it's ⁓ it's one of those things that it must have been ⁓ pretty inspiring for you guys seeing the rest of everybody else's ⁓ work as well. ⁓ I was a quite hard work getting the degree show together. speaker-0: Yeah. I it was a a very stressful period. Painting the hall, painting the floor, getting everything ready for submission date, 'cause it had to be ready for when we submitted like everything coursework wise. So it was a few weeks before it actually opened up to the public and yeah, it was more frightening and more daunting when you were maybe a little bit behind everyone and you were seeing everybody put their their balls up and You're just panicking, like, ⁓ no, have I done enough or have I done too much? And yeah, it it was awful. speaker-2: ⁓ a hundred percent. Especially when you you've got your deliverables at the back of your mind and you've got ⁓ my god, I've got to paint the floor now and then I've got all this other stuff to do and it's just so stressful and then you it's basically just all your everything you've got into this project and it's like the end of the year, you're starting you're tired, you're just like putting everything into it, you're not sleeping and then it's just it was a massive relief. Day of hand and we're like But yeah, it was definitely speaker-1: Crazy stress and then a big adrenaline rush once it's all kind of done, you know? ⁓ yeah, and I I suppose it's just how the the actual four years have gone in terms of why you decided to take that subject on in the first place and just overview of how you've developed speaker-0: Okay. ⁓ when I left secondary school, my goal in my head was to be a journalist. So I actually studied journalism for two years at RGU already. ⁓ it was through that course that I kind of fell in love with design 'cause there was a lot of ⁓ creative modules and through the lecture comments and a lot of my classmates basically telling me, Well, like, why are you not doing this? And wasn't the case that I didn't enjoy journalism. I did, but I just kind of could see myself excelling at more of the creative based modules than the actual writing and theory based ones. So I was like, ⁓ this is interesting. So I met a former well, a graduate ⁓ a job I was at, just a part time job, and he was telling me all about communication design and graze. and he saw some of my work 'cause I did freelance, well I say freelance but it was basically just I was on social media posting football graphics and weird kit designs and things and people were just kind of getting back to me being like, Can we do something? This would be really fun. So it was really a weird way of getting into it. ⁓ so then I changed my course, ⁓ went into communication design and that's kind of how my journey at Grays and University went. It was a bit of a roller coaster to be honest. Mm-hmm. ⁓ I came in very late to first year. I was a little bit older than everyone, so I felt like I was a bit out of place in that sense. ⁓ and first year's really weird because it's just like being back at art like an in art in in high school and it was just so not what I expected. But It was kind of a nice b introduction back into that space again. 'Cause I hadn't studied art since third year in secondary school, as I said, so it was nice to kind of get back into it in that sense and be around so many creative people and you just kind of felt in it at home instantly. And it wasn't until maybe second year that I started to kind of find my ways an actual like, ⁓ I think this is what I want to do. being able to have briefs to about branding and advertising and creating videos about storytelling and that was kind of where I fell in love with the course and the staff as well were just really supportive throughout, regardless of what was going on in your life. speaker-1: Yeah, brilliant. I mean, ⁓ it it's f fascinating what you say about creative writing, 'cause I do I've been speaking to a few people where you know, that love of language, you know, ⁓ I I I I also had intentions of being a journalist, but I do think that love of language that's fundamental to communication. And then if you expand that, if you if you're interested in art generally, those things overlap and communication design is a perfect sort of ⁓ niche in between the two ⁓ in that little Venn diagram. ⁓ and yeah, I I was also like twenty four when I went back to college. So I know that feeling of like being the the mass between twenty four and the seventeen, eighteen year olds that are just out of high school was just like a massive gap. but yeah, and what about yourself, Charlotte? ⁓ what was your ⁓ journey into the on it communication design? speaker-2: Yeah. ⁓ so in school I actually wanted to be an engineer or an architect, which is not really communication design. and ⁓ I grew up in France. ⁓ in France art is not really a class you take. It's more like a half hour lunch break. Well in my school anyway, there was no art. It was very scientific subjects and that's basically it. ⁓ and I was very much over the maths. ⁓ so I Obviously wanted to move out of the house and for some reason chose to come to Aberdeen because my mom grew up here and I went to college because I I've always been artsy, I've always been drawing, I've always been I've always been like a visual learner and all that sort of stuff. So I was like, why don't I do a visual like course? So I did ⁓ visual communication at the college here in Aberdeen ⁓ for a year and then from there I was supposed to do two years, but I actually applied a year early. ⁓ just 'cause I was getting bored. And I got into Greys, which was great. And ⁓ honestly I have no idea how I stumbled into communication design. It's just I liked being Arty, so I tried an Arty course. speaker-1: Well yeah, sometimes the that the strategy isn't as deep as that, you know, when you're when you're just kind of like just speaker-2: No. I mean I was really struggling with choosing what I wanted to do because my all my family, they're quite they're very smart people and there's engineers and there's ⁓ we've got friends who are architects. So my parents were like, ⁓ you have to do that. I mean, they never pushed me into anything, but it was very much like, ⁓ you'll do that. You're smart. I'm like, hmm, no. ⁓ but yeah, getting to graze was great. ⁓ as Teegan said, first year is Very odd, ⁓ because everyone's doing the same thing. You're drawing for hours and hours and hours. ⁓ and it's not really communication design until like the very end of the first year. ⁓ and then definitely going into second years where I also fell in love with it. It just I was a lot more comfortable. It was like I was honing my skill. I could really I felt like I was really getting into it. speaker-1: I I I and I Yeah, and I and it's funny how that goes because like you're completely you're almost taking pot luck. Let's do this thing. But it's funny but you're both saying it wasn't until second year that you felt like, ⁓ I'm comfortable with this subject now. I've kinda got my groove. And ⁓ yeah, it's one of those things that it's definitely been the right choice because ⁓ I was so impressed with your ⁓ work when I was going around the degree show. I felt When I was posting about it, the you guys winning my kind of picks, it felt bad because like there was so many other great projects and and the other people that w ⁓ form studio were there and Marns and Gill and I was chatting to them. So I could see that they were taking a shine to other projects. But ⁓ what we'll do is we'll share ⁓ just now and we'll I'll get you to chat through your ⁓ year end projects and ⁓ I'll I'll maybe chat then a bit about what I liked, particularly about the what the projects w were themselves. ⁓ let me just share, Tegan, I'll share your video ⁓ first and I'll let you talk about that. so yeah, that's come up. Let's ⁓ I'll just play this and if you just wanna talk over it and just let me know. speaker-0: Yeah, no worries. So my main project, ⁓ I kind of called it reimagining football because it stemmed off the back of my dissertation topic. I have received a book for my Christmas, ⁓ for which was called One Shilling. It was to do with football program designers and over the years from like the sixties to the s eighties, I think it was. And I was introduced to designers called John Alvin and Donald Addison, who you can kind of see on the screen about Aberdeen, who actually taught at Grays. So it was through this book that I kind of just well fell in love with the the old era of design within football and how different it is to today. ⁓ so my my dissertation kind of spurred this project which I've split into two. ⁓ the main part which was re reimagining programs, taking a program from Liverpool Football Club and Scotland and just completely redesigning it to my my own design and my own thoughts and feelings. so a lot of my research for both of these projects kind of intertwined. It was looking at old ⁓ advertisements, looking at old ⁓ front covers, going in deep, as I said, with ⁓ research into John Alvin and all these designers that not a lot of people are familiar with and it was really fascinating to kind of to introduce myself to them in that sense. yeah, brilliant. And these w these pieces of work they were Yeah, they were producing such incredible work without laptops and of Adobe, so it's incredible to kind of see ⁓ that come to life. speaker-1: Yeah, no, there there's real craft in this old stuff because I think the not having this kind of like easy kind of ⁓ layers or whatever like that, you had to make sure things were set properly and right and accurate and to the grid and all that kind of stuff back when you were because it took such a long time, you had to make sure it was right. So there was a certain all that kind of old craft ⁓ that was put into ⁓ typography like this comes through. But yeah, sorry to interrupt, but yeah, ⁓ but I'll I'll I just love how you've kind of taken those references and not just ⁓ not just done a poor copy, but you've kind of interpreted ⁓ their sort of that kind of craft into your own work. speaker-0: ⁓ yeah. That's the Liverpool programme especially was inspired by John Alvin 'cause I really wanted to kind of go in deep with and when I started the project I really wanted to to do it analogue and I think I kind of freaked out. ⁓ 'cause I I don't really do a lot of that. I'm very much just a laptop and a dream sort of thing. ⁓ so the The Liverpool cop-out calling one was definitely inspired by John Alvin trying to think of ways to make black and white look good. ⁓ huh. I'm so sorry. My neighbour's dogs are like barking. So loud, I'm so sorry. speaker-1: Yeah, that's alright. That's alright. I'll I'll I'll I'll maybe kind of have they probably have like a anti dog bark filter in the ⁓ i in the audio kind of thing. I'll I'll I'll scrub it out in the final edit. speaker-0: I was hoping we were gonna be okay, but they just they're are really Yeah. Sorry. speaker-1: Don't worry about it, it's cool. But yeah, this is the Scotland programme then as well, which I was w ⁓ well impressed with as well. I mean like striking cover, but you've continued the theme all through the pages as well. speaker-0: Yeah, so the Scotland one was a l a lot different compared to the Liverpool. ⁓ the Liverpool one I spent most of the time on at the t ⁓ at this duration of the project because I was just getting into it. I wanted to really do it justice 'cause I'm a Liverpool fan. I've been since I was born. It's like my second home, so I know how important that city is and it has a lot of connections to working class roots and a lot of the advertisements that I included in within it were ⁓ actual businesses because I feel like that's one thing that Liverpool's programs nowadays don't really do and I miss that. ⁓ So the Scotland one was a little bit different. It was more just me playing around and seeing what I could come up with. And graphically it was just a bit crazy. I wanted to really include lots of just three the three colours, just the ⁓ weird corally salmon y colour that they used on the kit. And then the navy blue which just complements it so well. So a lot of it was just kind of me playing around and seeing what I could come up with. ⁓ which I feel like is when your best work comes out. I started it kind of weird. ⁓ I just I worked on the John McGuinn graphic first and I just kind of worked from there. So it was a weird mash of things. ⁓ and then the cover just kind of came about through messing around with layers and overlays and it just kind of came together from there and I found I found a theme and I just ran with it. speaker-1: Yeah, fantastic. Yeah. I bet I mean like that's where like the most fun in design is where you just have a ha a bit of a half notion of something and you just you know, you're kind of experimenting and you know, ⁓ a lot of it will find the cutting room floor, but then you'll just hit upon something where like, ⁓ this is and I and it is more of an artful process. But once you kinda hit that then ⁓ yeah, y you you've done well well. And I think that one of the impressive things was that Sometimes you do get these magazines or like ⁓ booklets and it has like a really lovely cover. But then once you actually get into it, like the actual finesse of the typography and the hierarchy just kind of goes out the window and it just all you know, it's almost like you spent loads of time on the cover, but then, you know, you just kind of like dashed off the inside pages and ⁓ and that's what I love about if if I kind of scroll back in terms of like the actual the all the little puzzle pages and everything, it's all kind of really tight and the whole theme ⁓ just fits along with so that that's that's the thing that kind of stood out for me. ⁓ was just how the the i in the typography and even just it get getting into the smaller d more detailed bits like the puzzle pages or the actual articles that the typography was kept true to the actual to to the style of the whole ⁓ program. Yeah, it was really impressive. So yeah, we're on to the ⁓ turnstile correction then. ⁓ you wanna talk about this? speaker-0: Mm-hmm. Yeah, so it kind of came about whilst in conversation with my lecturers, they were just kind of interested in to see where this could be taken further. So my my head I was like, ⁓ it's became Fibballs became so commercialized and it's sad that not a lot of people are buying programs anymore. Or if they are it's speaker-2: Yeah. speaker-0: The it's like they're buying the same version of a program every week because it's templates and I know how the demands are with how many games there are a week. Sometimes you're in Champions League, sometimes you're in Premier League or Cup Tournaments, so it's it's hard to to create fresh content for that every single match. ⁓ so my idea with the turnstile collection was essentially a memory box. bringing it back to the good old days of football where you would just turn up to a match with your scarf or your bucket hat if you were later on in later on in the the decades. But I wanted to give give fans kind of an option to remember that match that they were attended. It would be the case of that they would still receive the the original program from that game as well as a completely remade ⁓ program by a designer or or including an original if it was a reference because my plan originally for the turnstile collection was just to do a John Alvin edition, ⁓ just celebrating his career and ⁓ introducing people to his work because of how much I fell in love with it. So speaker-1: Yeah. Yeah, no, it's a it's a beautiful idea, really nice. And I I I take it it's like w you you sometimes get ⁓ special editions of album releases where little and I suppose it's like that thing where you get like the a nostalgic hack of ⁓ football memorabilia from from a particular era. speaker-0: That's exactly it. That was kind of that was kind of my my idea process behind it. Bringing fans back to the nostalgia of football and what it used to be. If it was maybe ⁓ a granddad or a grandma or a dad or a mum bringing their child back to what football used to be like for them growing up or just somebody introducing it to someone. And that's kind of what I had in my head when I was creating it. was thinking about how the programs themselves could be included within this. ⁓ 'cause I felt like it was really important to give it more of a life than just here's a program I designed. ⁓ it's not the original, but it's got more meaning behind it and more depth. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. Yeah, no, I love it. one one aspect is ⁓ as you're kinda t touching on there, there's a certain social aspect and harking back to football before the mass commercialism that's going on now where your football club was the heart of your community and as you say, the working class community and it was kind of built around there, passing down from tradition to tradition tradition and collecting the programmes and all that kind of stuff is has ki has been lost, you know, and ⁓ football clubs are global institutions now and there's so much money in the game, etc., that it's like, yeah, it's the working class are getting squeezed out. So I do like how it's statement on that sort of social aspect of how how much they've changed. The dogs are back. No, that's fine. And the what I ⁓ and on a technical level then as well, ⁓ as I was saying with like you can see there with the typography and how you've even styled The layout of the boxes, even those kind of colour choices, they're all kind of taken sort of the Donald Addison, John Elvin ⁓ style, but you've you've you've incorporated it into your own kind of thing, you know? And I I think that's really clever, really, really well done. And the scarf, where did you get the scarf done then? Because I'm a big fan of like ⁓ branded scarf. speaker-0: So it was a real struggle. ⁓ my goodness. I am so sorry. I was thinking my dog was gonna be the issue. He's in the living room. but no, it seems to be next door's dogs that are being the issue. speaker-1: Wow. Not even in the same building and they're like, you know, wow, loud dogs. speaker-2: Yeah. speaker-1: No. speaker-0: Okay. speaker-1: Yeah, but so the scarf, where did you get the scarf done? speaker-0: So the scarf was actually printed from a company in Germany. It was a re a really weird process. So when I was looking into getting scarfs made for it because I really wanted to just go ham and just like really ⁓ just create it visually and just create it in person because I fell in love with this concept and the idea of it and I thought I'm gonna try and produce it the best I can. Originally I wanted to sell the boxes ⁓ I just ended up selling the programs instead because I wasn't sure if people would buy it or get the concept. But it took so long to try and find somebody that did singular or just small orders of scarfs because everything had to be multiples or hundreds. So it was a lovely company in Germany that prints singles or as much as you want. So thanks to them I managed to get my scarves. speaker-1: Amazing. I might I might get their number off you because there's a few ideas for like, you know, turning some designs into scarfs that I have. Just one off kind of scarf just to just just to test the water with it. But I think it's so cool when you kinda get like a really funky graphic on a scarf ⁓ going. ⁓ it looks brilliant. But yeah, ⁓ yeah, fabulous Tegan. ⁓ I I I was I was so impressed as I said, it it really spoke to me 'cause I'm a football fan as well and I I do love anything that ⁓ kind of ⁓ because there's a certain kind of shiny sky sports element to all football stuff these days, a shiny, glossy kind of thing. But this ⁓ immediately I was kind of like, ⁓ this is like warm nostalgia for all like that getting back to that c community sense of football. I loved it. ⁓ a deserving winner of the Wise Love Emerging Studio Talent. ⁓ I I I I don't even think that's the correct name of it, but I'll I'll keep I'll keep saying a different title every time. So ⁓ the second winner of the ⁓ wise love ⁓ new talent emerging twenty twenty six. ⁓ I'll share your project here, Charlotte, and maybe get you to discuss that. ⁓ we get back at the Controls. So yeah, I was just ⁓ again. This is one that struck me on the way around in terms of like ⁓ a bit l like Teagan's where you could just tell that you were just trying to show off, you know. I love a designer that's just like you know, like it really throwing loads of ideas into it. And you know, it was like brimming with ideas and brimming with like ⁓ confidence. So ⁓ the Philly magazine and all the every time there was a new page there was like a whole new kind of like a great idea on each page. So yeah, I was well impressed. You wanna tell me about the ⁓ how you came about this project and why why Philly? speaker-2: So ⁓ fear is ⁓ the French speaker-1: How ignorant of me. speaker-2: That's okay. so the concept of the whole project came from my dissertation. ⁓ so the dissertation that I was working on was based off of the male gaze in modern media. So originally it was just about magazines and how that's kind of evolved and ⁓ imagery within magazines and I kind of fell into like lads mags and loaded. Loaded was like one of my main references that I had the whole way through. And it also came from I was just kind of sick and tired of being second guest, ⁓ undermined. ⁓ just like every day, I'm sure everyone, well every woman at least, has experienced like a comment that wasn't necessary or just something that's a little bit annoying. Like for example, I used to work in a distillery and all most of the clients are men. ⁓ and I was a tour guide and I would always get second guessed if I actually knew what I was talking about, even though I was trained and it was my job. ⁓ so it's just stuff like that that every day just started to build up. On a daily basis, it's not that big a deal, but then it builds up to a bigger thing and it just starts being really annoying. And approaching feminism can be very daunting. if you don't know all the politics, it can be like I don't know what I'm talking about. It can be quite just very confusing. And also a lot of people have a bit of stigma around it. It can be like, ⁓ we hate men, but that that's not really what it is. So it was kind of a way to approach it and feel heard and be able to vent about something that ⁓ you might not be able to on like the small level like this. So the magazine itself is just one part of a bigger thing. ⁓ so the magazine has like articles and ⁓ like photos and all that sort of stuff that has to do with the topic. of feminism, but with different articles that I I I've chosen and ⁓ curated. and there's just it's a bit of fun as well. It's just a creative output to basically me venting. ⁓ and then there's a few other parts. So there's a zine in there that I've called the culture section, ⁓ fee culture, which is just ⁓ exploring like different topics, for example, food books, films, activism that's all female based as well. ⁓ there's different articles about what it me what pink tax is, because ⁓ some people might not know what that is. And there's a whole section in the middle about pink and why I didn't want to use it for the branding and what it means within female issues and stuff like that. And then there's also funnier bits, like right at the end there's a whole page of stupid hotline numbers. Because in old lad mags ⁓ you'd find like sex numbers in the back. And I just thought, let's make it funny. And I just made stupid hotline numbers. I also made a website. if you just scroll down just onto that video, yeah. ⁓ so I made a website so you could have all the different sections of the company, so to say. So just the first section going through like buy your magazine and then like a whole section about the magazine, where you can find it. How to buy it, all that sort of stuff. And then there's the community, culture, and events section. ⁓ so the community, that's my that's the whole basis of the company, is kind of like a chat section where you can just vent about what happened, not be judged and just have your voice heard about something that's annoyed you that day. ⁓ there's also right at the top, there's like a vent of the day. So it's like a little animation about something that's annoyed you that day. ⁓ there's also the culture zine, which I intend on expanding on. And just exploring like ⁓ different female-led businesses and topics and music and all that sort stuff. ⁓ and then we have the events. So obviously you're talking about feminism without really saying feminism. I still wanted to be able to connect with people. ⁓ so there's the event section where I'm hoping to maybe do some event stuff like that. But the the Gree Show was the event, so to say. So it was just a blackboard so that everyone could event and share a story. that has happened to them and then that's it. Fee is like this whole collective thing of just being able to have speaker-1: Amazing. ⁓ absolutely. ⁓ I as you were saying there, I think the fee concept is brilliant. Mainly one of the things I loved and you touched on it there about ⁓ being subversive, u using subversive humor. So you know, w sometimes when you have like a political thing it can be a bit too shouting and a bit too like, you know, here's a lecture you're lecturing at somebody too sharply. But this kind of makes a strong point about ⁓ that those everyday sexism ⁓ that that you were talking about and uses the lad culture ⁓ magazine, but you subvert it and you have fun with it, which I which I think is brilliant. And it's ⁓ yeah, there's so many funny little bits in it. that you know, even when I picked up the magazine and you have on the cover it was like sexy man included and And I just thought like brilliant. I just like, you know, straight away I was just like, I'm in. And all these little bits, yeah. speaker-2: Yeah. Well, you know in like old lads mags, you find like some naked woman in there at one point. So I was like, let me flip it, take a a so one of my friends, ⁓ he works out quite a lot, so I was like, You lay over there, I'll take a photo. I can just put it speaker-1: So like yeah, and I love it. I love e even the photography and like, you know, I I take it you've shot all that yourself, ⁓ all the photography and just using all that and the kind of crops of like the various body parts and stuff like that. I just thought it was like i i it it it just showing off like, you know, your own ⁓ art direction and being able to put all that together into this like really brilliant sensory ⁓ mix. And I I think what you're not getting off the video here is the fact that a lot of it was cut out and pull out pieces and you know, which which I quite I liked interacting with the actual print itself. It wasn't just like eight four pages, you were actually having fun with kind of ⁓ cutting things out and putting ⁓ zines within the zine c almost, you know. speaker-2: Well kind of my my biggest inspirations have always been like ⁓ film props. So I love being able to like actually hold something and like Mina Lima and Annie Atkins have been like my biggest like inspirations, like basically whole my thrill design life, I guess. ⁓ so ⁓ just being able to have something that's not just a page to me is quite important. speaker-1: Amazing. Yeah. So that that ⁓ it the interactivity of it all. we we I was just talking to my last guest about Annie Atkins. That's the second time she's come up. ⁓ and I I don't I don't want to kind of go on because I I I love her as well. ⁓ so I don't want to go on too much into case of just entirely repeating myself. But yeah, she's fabulous. And in terms of this kind of the actual the style of the what was your inspiration for that or was there Particular publications that you were looking at in terms of like lads mags are speaker-2: ⁓ so there's a few ⁓ obviously the lads mags, so loaded was definitely one of them. A lot of collage, a lot of just photography. ⁓ there's also I went through a lot of GQ and a lot ⁓ a lot of ⁓ it's called Crack magazine. It's ⁓ a music magazine mostly, but they go about a lot of like the culture around it, so like a lot of Berlin culture, ⁓ a lot of London. like street stuff. I also had a lot of inspiration. I went to Berlin and there was just a lo load of graffiti everywhere. So a lot of the branding as well for the the website and all that and the brand itself was based off of like street art and ⁓ just like imagine going into a public bathroom and just someone's writing on the wall. That's kind of what it was supposed to be like for the branding itself. speaker-1: ⁓ it it it does feel that as though it does have that vibe as though is it's slightly kind of like ⁓ graffitied or like vandalism, you know. ⁓ yeah, it's amazing ⁓ and brilliant and and I think it's like it's also hard to do that sort of s corrupted kind of ⁓ street stuff as well. You know, sometimes it just looks really bad, but I think y ⁓ I was impressed with like getting that kind of that level where it's corrupted but it looks really cool, you know. and and it and it doesn't just look like you know really poorly laid out graphics. It's just like, you know, even the these little design elements that you have, the hand, you know, all the all the sort of almost as you said they're like kind of graffiti elements that kind of play and interact with the actual text and the type just yeah it gives it gives it a a lovely trash speaker-2: Most of these are actual graffiti that I found out and about. ⁓ and then there's there's a couple there's a couple that I obviously have changed. Like the the one at the bottom where it says Vera with like the hello my name is, it's like a neat little name tag. That's actually my grandmother's name. there's like bits and bobs, like the the heart the heart with the wings was I found outside. some of them I asked people to write in a book and then I digitized them and Just like all these little things are mostly found outside. speaker-1: Love it. taking the toilet cubicle. The the the the very inspiring art you find in a toilet cubicle t to life. Amazing, love it. yeah, that's brilliant. I mean we are going to move on to the bingo wheel of wisdom because I think we've ⁓ talked about series design a bit too much. So here's the bingo wheel of wisdom. Yeah, it it's like a quick fire round ⁓ of questions. Some d ⁓ design related, some not so design related. I what I'll do I'll get the questions up. I've ⁓ normally like I I'll just show you I do actually have the balls already drawn. I don't want to be making well I don't want to be making too much noise on the camera as but that's that gives an example of the wheel turning around, although like ⁓ with ⁓ Tegans barking dogs out there, I don't think there's been ⁓ more distractions for this body. speaker-0: There's now building going on, which is really fun. I think I've got I think I've got the worst luck in the world, I'm so sorry. speaker-1: ⁓ brilliant. speaker-2: Yeah. speaker-1: Yeah, I I hope there's some sort of ⁓ I'll I'll be fine. There's like a magic EQ thing we can kind of like drown it out. I can dial down the low end we're totally fine. ⁓ yeah, I'll get my quiz questions up because the first number is if whoever whoever fancies it just jump in with the question. So, eighty four, what was your favorite cartoon as a kid? Good we do. speaker-0: God, why is my brain not working? ⁓ speaker-2: SpongeBob. speaker-1: SpongeBob, okay. I I was trying to see if like ⁓ either of them have kind of made it into your work, but I don't think so. ⁓ no Scooby Doo elements to the work. ⁓ twenty five, most underrated design skill. speaker-0: I will say layout, I think. I think if you're good at layout then Yeah you're fine. I don't know, maybe that's speaker-1: No, no, I'm with you. speaker-2: I will say typography. It's so difficult. speaker-1: Well, b both of those things you're speaking my language now because I do think there's a w with both of them, I think it's e it's not easy to be good, but you can make the difference between good and great is quite a bit of a jump it in the both of those. Like you know, you can have or like just nice, you can have a nice layout, you can have nice typography, but like amazing typography. Yeah, the sweating the small stuff is like, you know, so important. But yeah, and ⁓ it it Doesn't get enough credit the underlying technical skill. Right, number forty nine. well this is worse clein story in exactly three words. I mean this is a question normally for seasoned professional designers, but I I take it neither of you have to take it work on professionally yet. speaker-0: ⁓ speaker-1: No speaker-0: Say professional But some work, yeah. speaker-1: But ⁓ but yeah, ⁓ but it did you say you toured around the distillery, Charlotte? Do you have any horrible distillery tour stories? speaker-2: ⁓ Just you'd be you'd be surprised at the stories I've got. ⁓ no, it's usually just asking me a question about thing I just explained. Yeah. speaker-1: It's just that they were just totally not listening and then they just ask you ex exactly what you just yeah. It's not listening. S speak into a lot of tour guides there, I think. ⁓ forty two, what's your favorite place in Scotland? Yes. speaker-0: I'll just be generic and just say Glasgow because of all of everybody goes to tour there and concerts, so it's just speaker-1: For the culture culturally at Glasgow, yeah. Yeah, no, absolutely, Glasgow is like a brilliant buzz. speaker-2: I like I like going up to Murray a lot. Like going up to the whiskey country. There's just something about it I like. It's just so peaceful. But yet there's still like a community and then speaker-1: I I went up to Cullen recently for the first time. We sp spent a couple of nights there and I thought like, ⁓ wow, this is magical. It's really lovely. And then all along that bit of coast is really some really nice ⁓ the bullfiddler's rock and stuff like that. And then you've kind of got places like Finthorn, which is like, you know, has its own hippie c hippie commune. Stayed there for a few nights as well. And ⁓ so and because it we hung around there and they actually have like zines ⁓ all all these like old hippie dudes kind of got together and like they were produced a local free zine that was all these mad sci fi stories. And I was like, I could I could this is where I'm gonna retire. I'm gonna go to Finthorn and write loads of mad sci fi stories and produce a zine for all my mates. You know, it was a lot better, you know, you kinda have your community magazines around here that are all kind of like local events, but this was like, you know. Wild psychedelic basically old acid burnouts basically when retired. ⁓ seventy five is favourite sandwich filling. speaker-0: Okay. BLT, simple, yeah. speaker-1: B L T classic speaker-2: Depends on the mood, but I'll see I'll just say tuna ⁓ tuna. speaker-1: Chuna Mayo, yeah. Classic, absolutely. I I think we've kind of maybe a couple of more balls in us and then we'll ⁓ I'm just trying to ease the tension before we have to move on to the heavy dessert menu. ⁓ seventy three, what's your favourite movie of all time? speaker-2: ⁓ don't you dance then? speaker-0: I'll say Grand Grand Budapest Hotel by Wes Anderson. ⁓ speaker-1: ⁓ yeah, of course. Signal to Annie Atkins, yeah. Yeah. speaker-2: I think Jerry Downson is overrated for the wrong reasons and underrated for the other reasons. speaker-1: Very strange though in terms of like ⁓ eight really eighties music and theme but set in the nineteen fifties. It's like ⁓ very jarring. speaker-2: Yeah, it's all speaker-1: But yeah, I haven't seen it in quite a while. Slightly traumatized. And ⁓ Grand Pudapesto Tel is it Whes Anderson, is that your bag, Teagan? speaker-0: Yeah, I just adore ⁓ I just yeah. I could say like any any of his to be honest, but yeah. I think that was the first one I ever saw. And I whenever I'm on on a plane I just always watch it. Like it's just yeah. speaker-1: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I've got my my daughters it's great because my daughter's kind of getting into we're progressing away from the sort of like the Pixar era into actual films, you know. And we put on and we watched Grand Budapest Hotel and she was like, This is really fun I was like, Great. Like I I've kind of got an excuse to re watch all the Wes Andersons again. one more question. So ⁓ Top of the number one, top ⁓ serif or sans serif? Tough choice. speaker-2: I'm gonna say Sans or speaker-0: Fan Sarah. speaker-1: I think that yeah, I think that's like again ⁓ a pr pretty much like sandwich fillings, depends what mood or what context. So some some ⁓ some weeks I'm all like, ⁓ get these seraphs away from me, they're just too much, too much baggage, and then I'm like sand seraphs just so boring sometimes. I need I need a speaker-2: I did this whole like typography course and I was just not getting the seraphs right and it drove me nuts. So I think from that I need a big break from Seraph. speaker-1: Good, good. You're traumatized ⁓ by serifs as much as I'm traumatized by dirty dancing. ⁓ we're gonna move on to the heavy dessert menu. ⁓ did you have a look at the heavy dessert menu? So on it, it's basically like ⁓ eight topics. They haven't changed from the last ⁓ season of this podcast. So I should update them maybe. But ⁓ one is how to price your work, the a a two the AI elephant in the room, ⁓ the red flags of a nightmare client, specialist versus generalist, the self promotion without the ache of avoiding burnout, your design and how to sell it, things they never tell you about in design courses. ⁓ so yeah. Is there is there topics of that that you feel inclined to talk about? speaker-0: I was gonna opt for the burnout one. I don't how do how do we get about discussing speaker-1: Right, okay. Well, I was reading the list there and I'm actually kind of like I should have made like a more tailored one for like ⁓ graduates because I think a lot of ⁓ lot of the subjects there affect like a p profess like a lot of times when I'm doing this podcast I'm interviewing people who run their own creative practice and ⁓ I was kind of reading through them there and I was like these are largely things that are like you know that you you come across ⁓ as the consequences of running your own creative practice. So I think I can I could s I could throw out a different subject where kind of just asking you guys about like ⁓ your next steps in in the career and like your perspective kind of graduating in this year, you know, because I I graduated like twenty years ago where like, you know, it's like even social media was wasn't even that big a thing. It was only slowly kind of coming in type of thing and like, you know, so it was a completely different like landscape. So I suppose I'm kind of interested in terms of like how you s you're you're seeing a route into the career from your perspective just now, you know? Okay. speaker-0: Okay. I need to shut the window. speaker-2: so I'm going into doing a master's next year. so I'm excited about that. However, I will say trying to get into industry feels very, very daunting. we've had quite a lot of opportunity through our tutors to do quite a lot of internships and have exposure to be able to talk to other designers. And just go to loads of events. So I'm really grate grateful for Gray's being able to do that for us. ⁓ But it it just feels very daunting. And also on that list was the AI elephant in the room. ⁓ I feel like that is it's like a way of like it's there where you don't have to use it. I personally think you don't necessarily have to use it. ⁓ But it is a tool and it's there to be used if you need it. And I don't think it's gonna like it's gonna change the industry either way, but I don't think it's going to be like, ⁓ my god, AI's taking over. I don't think it's we're quite there yet. but yeah, I think it it's daunting trying to navigate all this stuff right now. ⁓ i it's scary. and yeah. Very excited though. I've never been more wanting to design. So I'm I'm excited, but yes yet. speaker-1: It is I mean, you know, as I said there about when I was starting out, you know, ⁓ social media wasn't even a thing, you know, the the internet and and I ⁓ I was only thinking the other day, we're still not even as a society, we're still not even fully coping with just this internet thing that just started at the turn of the century, you know. You know, in terms of like we're just only now getting social media bans and realizing kind of like how toxic it is for like ⁓ young people to be ⁓ on various aspects of the internet and we're we're still kind of struggling as a society with that invention that that that happened and now AI's come on and it's like ⁓ wow this is like you know so I I do think I do get that where we're struggling as a society to kind of like how does this fit in now, you know and it will, you know, we have to we have to it it it it is here and it's ⁓ interesting seeing the reaction I and there's many facets in terms of like ⁓ not just in the creative industry to AI, but speaking about that, you know, there is a reaction to AI slop and ⁓ I do feel as well that like ⁓ it it would I I think I was speaking about craft when I was talking to Tegan his work there. And I think that craft element, you know, the more you can get a bit hands on And the more you can get a bit more human feel to it, I think that stuff will really stand out because like everything else will be so saturated by this like generic AI slop and people taking shortcuts that anybody that does take the take the long road and use an actual professional designer to to do their work, then they'll obviously will have an i ⁓ in a weird way, I think it might become more valuable as a designer. I'm hoping because it's kind of taking a dip now where we all think ⁓ but I think people will come back around and it's just be it'll be so saturated. ⁓ I think naturally society will come back around and kind of go, everything looks the same and crap and businesses will start to kind of go, you know, we're just looking the exact same as our competitors or whatever like that. We need to kind of get that ⁓ that edge in terms of our visual comms. the the the thing from your perspective and the w thing I worry about AI is the fact that when I graduated, ⁓ you know, there was loads of ⁓ to pick up kind of work, there was loads of ⁓ places, agencies that would ⁓ they just needed like a a a junior body. Like e I was even thinking about ⁓ Photoshop, how, you know, as a junior designer, a lot of times you were just cutting out things on Photoshop, you know. And and now it's like there's an AI tool and you can just click bang and it's like cut out. And there's a lot of that the grunt word work for a lot of but the the all that stuff where you just get your start where you're doing a lot of the mechanical kind of elbow grease stuff and ⁓ the not sexy stuff. And even even in terms of small businesses, like you know, you would there was like everybody like from small plumbers or whatever, they all needed they needed to hire somebody to kind of do their logo or take somebody on. And that was a regul really good ⁓ gap in terms of like if you were just out of college or graduated, you could start doing like logos for like a couple of hundred quid. Just like do a small little business logo and they didn't have much budget and you were just trying to prove yourselves. But now because they're all going like ⁓ Chat GPT can knock me out ⁓ it's it's a terrible logo. Like even even the results of that. But ⁓ I ju I just worry that the the that lower level of stuff there is ⁓ to go from being a graduate to where I am now where I I kind of feel as though ⁓ I've built up the skills over the years to kind of produce work that can stand apart from what's been produced by AI. But you sort of need a good five to six years of figuring out who the heck you are and building up that skill set to kind of get to a place where you could maybe ⁓ well but as I said from your degree show projects, you know, I think it you've already kind of built up a good ⁓ language with what you're designing. It's just been finding a place to apply that commercially in the big bad world of business so that you actually get a ⁓ paid jobs. So that there that's my from my perspective, I I kinda worry about what AI is doing to a lot of the junior design roles, you know, I I I I feel as though they're getting smaller and smaller. We're ⁓ agencies a lot of the pr work processes are being sp sped up by AI or just completely covered where you don't need that extra body in there doing a lot of the ⁓ a lot of the running around, you know. How are you feeling about it, Egan? Sorry to cut. speaker-0: Yeah, it's definitely scary. especially when you're walking in Aberdeen currently and every single business on Union Street's pretty much using AI or generative posters and it's all the same and it's it's so sad to see. ⁓ because if you gave that brief to a newly graduated college student or university student they would probably fall in love with the concept or think about something that a a robot or a technology couldn't even come up with. but as Charlotte said, it's a tool. It's not something that's going to completely minimize design or make any designer feel smaller. ⁓ I think our brains are much powerful. our ideas are going to be far more advanced than whatever technology comes up with. ⁓ so it's it is a scary time. I think a lot of people maybe, as you said, are opting to do that as opposed to hiring someone to make them a logo for their business. ⁓ but I don't think it's going to be something that will completely take over. speaker-1: No, no. ⁓ and ⁓ but yeah, I do feel as though the industry in terms of like ⁓ jobs will shrink ⁓ over the next few years. And that's kind of maybe worrying. Charlotte, ⁓ you're you're saying about using it as a tool and to try and have a like a positive approach in that respect. speaker-2: I mean, I think you kind of have to now. I mean, ⁓ I've spoken to people who work in agencies who do use it not necessarily obviously not as their finals, ⁓ but as just as the background, as in a way to be able to do stuff faster for the client to give them an idea of what's going on. ⁓ and e even like as a copywriter filler, just until that gets done, just to get an idea, not to necessarily just to to give the the client an insight into what you're doing, not necessarily just leaving it blank and leaving a the full thing of text of in Lauren Ibsen sort of thing. Not necessarily using it as ⁓ this is exactly what it's gonna be. It's just like a filler it for the time being. ⁓ I mean I think it it's it's gonna be used more anyway. So I don't think you have to use it. If you don't ha want to use it, I don't think everyone's saying ⁓ I think you have to get with the times well but I don't think that's necessarily a thing. I think if you want to use it you can. ⁓ but I think sometimes it's just a good way for it. speaker-1: I know i did you go to like Jimmy Turrell's talk as part of Kin at all? He's always been analog, and I think he's been speaking recently about like ⁓ you know, he's almost AI proofed his work because it's all analog, but you can you can see there ⁓ and that's what I mean about getting back to handcrafted processes and ⁓ a a little bit I I think w w we were speaking about John Elvins and and how they were like working back in the pre Photoshop kind of days and how they were like actually you would actually handset things and hand place things out and you could see that w like I go into record shops and ⁓ and and you see these old sixties, seventies albums and they just amazing. They look so good. And I do think it's just that extra bit of human handcrafted ⁓ type. And I I think like designers maybe like Jimmy Jimmy Turrell ⁓ and getting back to that analogue. I even feel it myself where like there was a poster design recently, and I was doing I was doing like the usual Photoshop tricks with the with the main images that I was sent over. But then I actually I actually just printed off the the the photographs and then as that was over that desk there and I just started cutting them up and like putting out cutting out little stars and stuff. I was like, ⁓ man, I absolutely love this. And when I brought it back into Photoshop then just to sort of like tidy up some of the type, it was it was far and away the better option. I sent them across and even the client was just like, ⁓ this is fantastic. And I do think more and more of that kind of stuff will really stand out against like what's what's out there. Who is the other student in your years and ⁓ is it Moffat was her name, but she did like hand painted Like all the the animation was all like a r Caitlin, yeah, yeah, Caitlin. ⁓ yeah, but ⁓ I I w then I was looking at all these gorgeous ⁓ boy paintings and then I realized that up on the frame it was it was all animated, so it was wow, it was just lush, rich colours. And there's a lot of things even before AI there was a lot of th things where ⁓ you know, ⁓ a l ⁓ you can get a bit too sort of digital heavy, you know, start and finish in all kind of software. Whereas then if you can kind of take it out of the laptop a bit. ⁓ and I forget myself when I was back in college ⁓ and when I had time to work on projects and it be in that lovely bubble of college where it's like you you can do whatever you want and you've got all this time to do it, it's great. That that the laptop or the computer or all the software, that was the end process. That was a lot of what I was doing with layout and sketches and mood boards and all that stuff was all just away from the laptop and This I was always about the strength of the ideas that you actually put into the software w is is the is is what makes it. The actual software is just a tool, as you said. but it's always about the ideas. And I think similarly with AI, it's the idea is the thing. And and AI can spit out a thousand ideas, but whether they're good or not, that's up to your own judgment. And I think having that ⁓ judgment is the thing that will ⁓ separate us out. ⁓ and as you're saying, Charlotte, people are using it, I've heard ⁓ term springboarding that will just get AI to fire out ten different ideas. And it's not necessarily the one idea that you kinda go, ⁓ brilliant, it's like nailed it. It's maybe like a ⁓ this thing's good over here, this thing's good over here, that you use those and then you you develop them into final concepts. So there are ways that like the usefulness of AI that it can be used as a springboard. But it but it's always your own human judgment is the thing that's needed to actually ⁓ you know, make this thing really good, you know. ⁓ and if AI is left to its own devices, then it's a really poor designer in that respect, you know. speaker-2: But I also think that in our class it really shows that most of our designs are really like people based and like physical stuff that we can connect with the audience with or like the client. ⁓ I feel like that's been part of like our tutoring in a way. Our teachers are really strong on being able to have that making making and connection. And so I think most of us wouldn't necessarily go to AI as our first like tool. I don't think that's necessarily what we would do. I mean I don't know what it is in industry just now, but I don't think that's where we want to go anyway. speaker-1: I I yeah, absolutely. I you know, I'm still a classic notebook and pencil guy when when I'm figuring out a project, you know. And like there's a few in terms of actual running a small business, you know, as I'm doing, there is definitely like AI tools that are really handy. And that those those the sort of back end of running a small business is where I'd probably use AI in the studio. And it's not to say that like There's been a few times where I I suppose like placeholder kind of things and sometimes working on an image and before where you'd have to go off, I was like, ⁓ I really need to like make this look as though it's like in the kitchen. And before where you'd have to kind of go off and get a stock image of spoons and like, you know, flour or something like that, you can just quickly do that in Photoshop where I'm just telling it like put a bit of flour here, put a spoon up here and it's it is magic, but like that's But that's like sort of using I'm I'm the art director there. Like, you know, I'm I'm you know, it's not AI is just splitting out an image all of its own or I'm just relying on that to completely just like shortcut to do ⁓ product photography in a kitchen and just use those images straight off the bat. There's little little areas within within a project where I'm like, ⁓ actually I'm just little filler bits. ⁓ just you just quickly need something to fill a corner or whatever like that. And I I suppose I'll That's that's the only time that I I'd properly use like generative AI in that respect. But ⁓ yeah, very rarely. ⁓ but yeah and that is the thing. I do love some of the AI powered tools that Adobe have ⁓ brought in. ⁓ but yeah. I definitely ⁓ I definitely think you're better off with a a notebook and pencil to start every project. But yeah, that this has been great guys. ⁓ thanks to you guys and thanks to Tegan's neighbour's dog for being the main participant. Are you are are you heading away soon, Charlotte? Did you say you're off? Are you he heading back to France or something? speaker-2: ⁓ yeah, ⁓ I'm literally moving tomorrow. ⁓ moving back ⁓ moving back to France tomorrow and then I'll be moving down to London. speaker-1: Whoa, nice, lovely. ⁓ but yeah, you look remarkably calm for somebody who's in the middle of moving. Th thanks very much for A facade. speaker-2: ⁓ It's not it might be complete chaos. speaker-1: That was Teagan and Charlotte on there. Many thanks to them for coming on the podcast. And yeah, it w I I should have kind of changed things up a bit because I did basically fly into the format set up for creative professionals and expect two young students to sort of answer the questions. So yeah. Give them a follow on the instas at Tyler the Cre no, I was about to say Tyler the Creator. That'll be an entirely different Instagram account. ⁓ Tegan the Creator is Teagan's handle. And at C A G underscore design is Charlatanne's handle there. I'm very excited to see what those two do next. If you enjoyed this podcast, please give it all the likes and the shares and the reviews. And if you have any actual direct feedback, hello at wiselove.studio. The email is open. yeah, and wise love.shop, I have put some wise noise merchandise in there. There's a cool groovy t-shirt, which I've yet to do a proper photo shoot up of and put it on my Instagram. and in the shop generally, but ⁓ yeah, really cool. It's a green cream, blue, or black are your options there. And you've got a magic mug that reveals the wise love branding ⁓ every time you put in a hot beverage. It is magic. So treat yourself, wise and oise fans, and support the podcast, wise love dot shop. There's other bits and bobs there. ⁓ but yeah That would be very nice of you to do that. Thank you. And I'll see you on the next episode. God bless your lovely lobes.