Imperial War Museum & Design Museum - London

The Imperial War Museum bursting with life

Jared Taylor and Dan Dalli met us up in London for some culture filled exhibition visits to the Imperial War Museum (Elephant and Castle) and the Design Museum (London Bridge Tube - but closer to Tower Bridge). At the Imperial War Museum we took the opportunity to sketch people observing their surroundings, people working, people being taken in a tour group and young children - as it was half term there were plenty - and how they and their parents interacted with one another while looking around the museum. As well as looking at all this I had a good look around the exhibits myself and found some useful textures in the 'Trench' experience part of the museum. Found that really nice to look around with some great imagery involved. Was very enjoyable.

  

  

I took the opportunity to gather these textures while at the Imperial War Museum.  Very interesting ones I think you'd agree.  I took three of these in the 'Trench' experience which I loved.  The atmosphere and style this was done was brilliant.  After being taught by Dan Dalli (lifedrawing) I knew it was very important to be observant... and I was!  I didn't draw anything as I took my time taking it in.

Thought this boat could be handy for reference in our Docks.  Got other angles of it too but thats not really necessary for the Blog so I'll keep it simple :)

 

 

Here's a few more quick snaps I got while on the way to the Design Museum .  A beautiful day with the Thames relatively calm and a few clouds in the sky - perfect for reference yet again!!

The Design Museum itself I found really interesting. The exhibit which was being displayed was by Alan Aldridge.  Unfortunately there were no photographs allowed to be taken inside.  I really loved some of his Graphic work he has done. So impressive and so interesting. Original thought was my God how much time did this guy have on his hands. Then I settled on the idea that it was just very impressive. After reading a fair bit and attempting to take in all the work he'd done - including very impressive story boards - I had to leave unfortunately to go to work but while on the way to the Tube Station I managed to get a few snaps to help us out with our environment project (I hope).

Heres the website of Alan Aldridge incase anyone else is interested:

http://www.alanaldridge.net/

Here is just a taster of some of Alan Aldridge's work he's done:

I really love these story boards that Alan has done. Such high detail and he really catches the emotion and the characters expression in these. I've only included two of them as I think they speak for themself really. As I said his storyboards are really inspiring me to work harder on our current project!! Excellent work Alan!!

Just thinking about environments makes me look at these and smile. A soldier at war. Fighting through the debris and bullets to make it to the enemy. The atmosphere really exciting here with what looks like an explosion going off infront of him with an orangey glow and the fog of war surrounding him as things are being set alight and exploding. The image on the right is just hilarious but still as terrifying. Mr Fantastic there is on the run and it would appear that all the houses are against him and his acomplice. The houses are personified to resemble evil characters. Ahhh the beauty of animation...

Two words "Don't Mess"

Ok so this guy doesn't have too much to do with what we are doing but I just love this character. There was a friendly version but I don't know why... I just prefer this one. A little bit hard a little bit rough... Would not want to mess with this bear down a dark alley.