Twenty Seven Creative

Great day up a ladder, in again! .oldfruitshop more to do Monday but for now everyone knows what’s going on!

I was looking for some doodled style artwork yesterday for a client that envisaged large projections for a festival venue. I came across these and thought they might be perfect for illustrating the vision. Turns out they were and they have influenced the clients direction.
I love the ideas stage of every project and love clients that engage with ideas in an open and creative way.

IR35's
Is it as good as it sounds for us freelancers? Will clients start using us again like freelancers and not part time staff on the pay roll or has it changed the landscape for good?

To early to say I guess but on the surface I'm ecstatic! It was a massive blow to me personally as to be honest most clients I spoke to found it just too big of a headache to ask me to jump on a quick job to help out or even to plan in a project that I was the perfect person for short term. I can't help but feel IR35's damaged my employability but also damaged the employer and the versatility businesses could tap into creatively.
Let see what happens and where this announcement takes us over the coming weeks and months? Hopefully 'UP' for us freelance creatives and the businesses that rely on our unique services.

Completed a few weeks ago 😀 thanks for asking me to paint this!

Little job updating the town Mayors board for the local council. 3 years in one!

💯 Happy days! Even if it’s a bit ‘hot’ in the studio today!
A little ‘warm up’ sweat design from this morning (no pun intended).

I wasn't going to share this. It really hard to share the work that doesn't work!! This is awful, so many mistakes and technical disasters. But hey, it's how you learn and I felt the need to share it as deep down I've achieved with this piece, tried things out and actually like it in someways.
Nothing is really 100% failure or success it's just a stage in the process of life.
Today has been an aaaaarrrrgggghhh kinda day. But I'm determined to nail this gold leafing lark.

Busy start to the week! Japan seems to be the flavour of the month with several clients so I thought I'd share this personal warmup piece based around Toshima. It's always a gamble using characters that I'm not familiar with, translations can go horribly wrong! I often use typefaces designed with the essence of the continent they originate from as I makes the slogan or wording readable with a little work and captures the feel in this case of Japan that clients are looking for.

I'm very much ideas driven as the image illustrates, I drew the artwork on the iPad one evening, will be releasing it as a Ltd Edition print sometime next month and though it might work well on an oversized sweat. Produceable probably, costly probably, but would I wear it? Hell Yeah!! Anyone want to make me a sample?
Concepts and spontaneous design excites me and fits my way of working. The fact I can see my work in multiple settings just fires me up to try more uses!

A quick personal project this morning to start before the day designing menswear graphics. Inspired by a trip to Norwich last weekend, a cool sweat I spotted and a licensed sweat shirt I've wanted to purchase for months but know I won't as I don't need another sweat shirt till one wears out and is no longer wearable.
Norwich had some really inspiring independent shops and after a conversation with a friend yesterday it looks like we missed a whole street of them slightly detached from the main part of town! Definitely going back now to suck up the visual stimulus and the coffee, sun and atmosphere.

Installed these today after painting them last week. The brief was to use the existing typeface and size boards but add an extra one for ‘ceramics’.

What seems a long time ago now (at the sometime as feeling like yesterday) I was working in house for a now long gone design studio designing licensed graphics for boyswear. Genuinely one of the most social, busy and fun work environments I've had the pleasure of working in. Being freelance I've worked in a bucket load of offices and studios over the years and while most are great some really stand out and everything clicks for a super creative and uplifting 8 hours (this one was a 1 or 2 day gig, every week on and off for a year or so).
Getting let loose on licensing, being asked to just go for it and see what happens is always a win, win!! These might be old graphics, might never have seen the light of day but when I came across them just now I realised 1)That they packed a punch, 2) They still look good and 3)How lucky I am to do what I do, everyday!

Image 1. The starting point for a re-launch.

Image 2 & 3. The end result.

I love the variety of work that comes my way, keeping my mind active as always! This project involved a really open mind on my part and the clients, when you get a brief that is open and brave the end results can really go 'BANG' in a good way. Thanks Still feeling it with the colour and style! Absolutely disrupting the market.

Too much fun working on food related posters! Here’s a sneak peak at one of the set. I can see these in a take away near you soon 😂

Posting warm up pieces has certainly become a theme lately. The only problem with this is it doesn't show much variation in style, subject or colour and I'm not answering a brief.
The best place for that would be my portfolio's or my website: www.mattkeeling.com
Feel free to contact me for specific folio's and a broader range of my work or swing by the website for a quick look!

Another placement warmup this morning before I got stuck into some pretty interesting POS boards. It's always great to have a client that lets you be creative, tell a story with illustration and branding rather than just slapping logo's in the middle and not giving any thought to the product on the shelf below. As soon as it's printed and in place I'll share it here!

In the meantime if you'd like me to be creative for your business please don't hesitate to get in touch!!

Public meeting re. Brightlingsea Sports Centre

Have you been affected by Tendring District Council’s decision to stop funding Brightlingsea Sports Facilities?

Are you interested in retaining community access to our local Sports Centre?

Please come and share your experiences and contribute to the debate.

8pm, March 8th at Brightlingsea Community Centre.

Details here: https://brightlingseatowncouncil.gov.uk/public-meeting-re-brightlingsea-sports-centre/

He is Buzz, one of my many 'favourite' characters! It changes daily to be honest with you. There are so many awesome, interesting and diverse characters out there that it is incredibly difficult to have just one favourite. Today it's Buzz.
I'm very lucky to get to work on designs with these characters almost daily. It never stops being fun and is usually a 'pinch me' moment when I stop to think about it!

Anyone else sitting at their desks feeling stressed listening to the devastation of the wind outside? We've acquired an extra trampoline (now tethered to the tree with ours till the wind dies down.
My Japanese influenced dragon graphic didn't make the cut this week. I'm loving the reference for all the dragons I'm being asked to draw at the moment. It feels so graphic and almost 20th century. Just goes to show nothing is new. It's all been done before.

This Peli case has been my 'mobile studio' almost as long as I've been freelance. Interestingly it's a little like my studio - really Important to my work for some of the same reasons and some totally different. It has a comfort to it. I know the equipment packed into it inside out and also the internal layout of gear. I feel confident I have everything I need to complete any brief thrown at me when I work in-house. It travels everywhere with me and carries the battle scars to prove it. I love it's character and often feel the need to add to the collage and do sporadicly. It's another creative outlet and adds to my inspiration by default.
What a product. If I hadn't covered it in stickers and paint and beaten the living daylights out of over the last 20 odd years it could be new! It's as solid as the day I bought it. Thank you PELI Products

One from the vaults! #2011

Back prints, usually dismissed as the customer misses them in store. I love them, I don't see enough of them. I don't own enough of them. I could go on. Skate and Street seem to be the last hiding place of these full back placement t-shirts and sweats.

I remember many moons ago on kidswear anything with out an obvious front placement graphic had a sticker on the chest with 'look at my back' or 'interactive' when the t-shirt had interchainable, velcro shades or eyes so the customer couldn't miss it. Now it seems that a back placement is just dismissed for the most part. I see it as an opportunity for variation in product adding interest to a range.

This is just a personal piece mocked up from a doodle last night but I can see some milage in this for future exploration!

Did someone say Younger Boys Graphics? Love the fun element to this - picking up on something we've all done, colouring by numbers. Some might say I've turned it into a living!
Originally for a well known high street department store.

It's crazy sometimes when I dig out an old hard drive and realise how many fun projects I've been privileged enough to design graphics for. Also I'm alway surprised by the range of graphic types/styles I come up with and the licenses I've worked on! I honestly forget whole batches of work and the surprise is genuine when I come across them! Early this morning I was looking for something and found all this licensing work from 5/6 years ago, what a trip down memory lane. I didn't find what I was looking for but I did find a stack of inspiration for future projects. Happy start to the day!

A quick post from the studio today as we are a ‘covid’ house this week and it’s not be hugely productive. Blast from the past but we are still getting briefs for lots of gaming graphics on boyswear so thought I’d share this created for a client a few years ago!

Made me chuckle the hound modelling the cycling cap we printed before Christmas! Go Bella! Ride like the wind!

An old one, reimagined on a charcoal hoodie. Originally created for a supermarket boyswear t-shirt. Love the simplicity and crisp/clean lines in this contrasted with the faded sweat and wilderness.

Lots going out the door before the holidays. So much so we didn’t have the headspace to post! It’s been a busy time right through this year. This Oar blade was a real rush job, turned around and completed the day before the big day!

Delivered this week. A development to a new business name. A fresh start without losing the connection and the momentum built by the old logo. Keeps an essence of the original with the typeface but a new format gives it a new silhouette to differentiate from the old.

The studio a few months back! It’s a bit more organised and tidy now but still quite cosy as it’s got colder. Oil filled radiators are doing the trick and keeping it up to temperature. A real mix of stuff going on this week, tees, signs, brand logos and clothing graphic designs.

Small job delivered to earlier this week. A couple of cotton cycling caps and some shirts. Nice to use 3 colours and work at a relatively small size.

Made myself a sweat, now everyone in the club wants one 😂😂😂 perks of the job working as marketing 👌 If your sports club needs some gear we design and print here in house on organic cotton and with eco vinyls as standard 👊

Another set of 5 T-shirts off to a new home. 5 different designs designed. 5 T-shirts printed.

I love my step! It goes with me to every job but I rarely use it! You can’t fake that wear and tear, that steps early it over the years 😂

Second post of the day! 90% of my work starts on paper. Whether it's layout marker pads, trace or a piece of scrap from the pile of 'not quite up to scratch' paper.
I find the most successful designs come to me that way, procreate is good and I often work straight into the iPad before finishing designs in Adobe but the work that started on paper is usually my best. Some might say that's old school, others out of date but I'm a believer in using every tool in my box and the right tool for the job. For me it works, for others maybe not. But you can't beat the personality that comes through and the character of the line when it's drawn with real pens and pencils. There are times when everything needs to be perfect, vector lines and that's great but I like to inject some of 'me' into the final piece instead of letting the computer dictate the finished look, feel and style.

Got an idea? Need a t-shirt? No job too small, we can print just one! Birthday surprise, Business promo, or sports team MVP! Short run and one off t-shirts start at £15 with organic cotton as standard!

Made myself a new tee 😀 perks of the job. Anyone looking for one off and short run printed tees? We might just be what you are looking for! Sustainable organic cotton, pvc and nasties free vinyl, produced with the environment in mind. Design service also available.

Still printing orders. Playing with a few for .02 and designing for myself! The order book is growing for one off design and print! Loving it!