Coins & Nooses goes live!

March 2010 sees the launch of the 'Last Coiner' movie website and game in the run up to production starting on this feature film project from Duchy Parade Films. The film will follow the lives and fortunes of the Yorkshire Coiners in a 'Western' style story based on real events. Unlike most period dramas, this tale follows the poorer members of society as they struggle in a bleak North Yorkshire setting.


The Coins & Nooses game can be accessed through the movie website and will give you snippets of historical information, interviews and production notes as you navigate the Snakes & Ladders style board. See how many counterfeit coins you can collect before reaching square 100 but don't get caught red-handed by the excise man or you'll surely hang by the neck!


Be sure to enter your name and email address to enter the high score table, updated regularly on the Last Coiner Movie blog here.

Oh and check out more of my creative work at www.trumpetcleaner.co.uk!

Animalation

We went for a trip to Manchester Art Gallery today and came across a beautiful exhibition called 'Animalation' by artist Andrew Bracey. The animation below was playing on a projector and really caught our eye.



There were several flip-book inspired animations like this including a slippery snake scuttling around on the floor and penguins swimming around in water.

Check out Andrew Bracey's website here.
Read Andrew's recipe for making your own animation here. Scrummy!

Parrworld

Well, we've never seen Creative Networks so packed full to the rafters! A huge turn out of eager creatives all there to hear Martin Parr, famous British Photographer.

The audience were given a choice between three talks: (1) Martin's Career (2) Parrworld (3) Martin's Books.

The touring exhibition 'Parrworld' won out and we were all treated to a talk which reveals Parr's collection of unusual collectibles (photographic tea trays for instance), retro postcards and much much more besides.

"With photography, I like to create fiction out of reality. I try and do this by taking society's natural prejudice and giving it a twist." - Martin Parr


This image from his latest book made us giggle. Apparently Martin had to follow this guy around the art exhibition to catch him standing in front of this Pollock. The book is entitled, 'Luxury', and explores the lifestyles of the rich, including quotes from his subjects.


We bumped into our friends Dean Vipond and Helen Harrop during the evening too and then we took a quick tour of one of the regular art exhibitions held by the college.

Dean has written a great write up of the event on the Culture Vulture website: Read it here.
Visit Martin Parr's website here.

Masters Show gets DOM-inated!

Collective member and expert dancer Dominic invited us over to Patrick Stewart's fine Uni to view the Masters end of year show. Once we had sorted ourselves out with free booze we took a look around the exhibits which covered all kinds of creative design disciplines from 3D vis and textiles to VJ motion graphics and graphic design.


Dom's project explored the design challenge of finding fun and creative ways to deliver scientific data, perhaps to be published in book form. In celebration of his achievement we awarded him with the grand prize, a whole Kinder Egg Surprise!

Apparently the Kinder offspring is now on guard duty?? Well you wouldn't want to mess with him ^^ now would ya!?


It was ace meeting up with Dom's chums and great to chat with Melissa again. We ended up dancing the night away (some really top-notch dance moves we might add, though not enough robot for my liking).


Unfortunately we didn't spot Picard whilst touring the exhibition :(

Invasion of The Alien Snow Bears

Apparently "a White Christmas is unlikely" or so the news told us! Today we woke up to an even more snowy landscape than yesterday so it was straight down to Kirkstall Abbey to throw the white stuff at each other and build the monstrosity you see below:


Our efforts did not go unnoticed too as a random passer-by asked to take this photo to send to their Aussie relatives as proof that snow DOES in fact fall on our green and pleasant land. Seems like years since we've had proper snow :)

Happy Holidays

We're sending out a message of Kooji cheer to all our friends. Happy Holidays everyone :)

Katherine & Johnny XX


Check out previous Kooji Cards from Katherine & Johnny here

Kilo-Ho-Ho-75

We had a fantastic night out last week with the gang from Kilo75: Matt Seward, Monica Tailor, Pawel Dubiel, Dean Vipond and Mohsin Ali. After a delicious meal, some great conversation, lots of Xmas crackers (of which we had most of the prizes) Matt and Monica handed out groovy goody bags containing a moleskine, doodlebook, sharpies and sweeties. Here's to Kilo75 Hurray!


We've promised to have another get together to compare moleskines. Who's gonna have the best cover?

TrumpetCleaner is live!

That's right my brand new, interactive, mechanical portfolio site is finished. Inspired as much by cosy (dingy) pubs as it is by Blackpool, the site should also give you an idea about what bounces around inside my skull when I'm staring into space :) For me there's a wonderful nostalgia attached to Blackpool, particularly the Illuminations so what better way to decorate my creative work showcase?

Come take a nosy, see what you think. Point your browser to: http://www.trumpetcleaner.co.uk

Lord Whitney's Circus Sideshow

Last month we mentioned that during Culture Vulture's Holey Moly Arty Party we took part in a circus sideshow photography session by Lord Whitney. Well here's the result in all it's glory! Are we not beautious?


'Siamese Twins' © Lord Whitney http://www.lordwhitney.co.uk

Lord Whitney are a creative duo specialising in photography, illustration, set design and art direction. To see more of their fantabulous wonderfications check out their website, blog and photos on Flickr.

Holy Moley Arty Party

Last August we bumped into our friend Helen Harrop who told us about a Travelling Moleskine Project she was involved in. What's a Moleskine we hear you cry!? Well...

"A Moleskine® is an iconic black book, beloved by creative types (Picasso, Van Gogh, Hemmingway etc) It can be a notebook, diary, sketchbook, city guide or planner." - The Culture Vulture.

Helen was in charge of one of the 80 moleskines that were dished out by the Culture Vulture (who teamed up with The Big Draw for this collaborative project) and she needed lots of talented people to contribute words/poetry, art, photos or doodles. Each moleskine had a theme, Helen's was 'Chinese Whispers,' and each of the participants were asked to make their own creative interpretation of this.

We've heard a lot about these travelling moleskines and collaborative projects like this are always fun so we thought we'd add our creativity to the mix. Here are our contributions:

'Oobly' © Johnathan Gallagher http://www.trumpetcleaner.co.uk'Me to You' © Katherine Moss http://www.quantempus.co.uk

The ones below were drawn on the train after our trip to the London Design Festival. We both took turns to describe the features of a character: eyes, nose, hair, mouth and then each drew one half of the face.

Image © Johnathan Gallagher and Katherine Moss

Image © Johnathan Gallagher and Katherine Moss

Image © Johnathan Gallagher and Katherine Moss

Image © Johnathan Gallagher and Katherine Moss

The moleskines were exhibited in their full glory at an Arty Party held at the Culture Vulture's HQ, Temple Works in Leeds, to help raise funds for the Campaign for Drawing.

The night's festivities included a line dancing hoe down by Axis, a circus sideshow photography session from creative duo Lord Whitney (more about this later ;)), an entry in the Year Book, some conversation ear-wigging/ under cover work for Helen 'Chinese Whispers' Harrop, some naughty caricatures by Alex Hughes from The Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation, some wicked wall drawing by Helen Entwhistle a.k.a Memo and a nifty networking room called 'Chumspace' from Numiko.


Related Links:

The Culture Vulture >> Travelling Moleskines®
Culture Vulture Travelling Moleskines Flickr Group
Lord Whitney
Memo and Memo Blog
The Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation - The Bloghorn
Axis - The Online Resource for Contemporary Art
Numiko