The Restaurant shoot

The design part of producing a website for a restaurant is just one part of the whole job. Once a design route has been chosen and signed off we have to undertake a photo shoot which entails a hell of a lot of co-ordination and organisation, not to mention a bit of luck. Here you can get an idea as to what exactly is involved - which can often run over several days.

Getting that "natural look" often requires a bit direction...and some red wine

The dress rehearsal is over and now it's time for the real thing, so it's off to see the stylist...

To get everyone in the mood we take a few test shots, so both the designer, the photographer and the models can see how everything looks.

It's not just models that we're shooting today, we also have to work our way through a large part of the menu too. 

And that requires some discipline, especially when you're working up a real appetite.

Now were are all ready to roll, so it's time for the real shoot to begin.

Time for a quick bite to eat before the post-production begins....

You can see the finished pictures on the live website [here]

UPDATE: Retro train posters from the Thatcher era

On a recent visit to Richmond station, I was surprised to notice that some of the posters that had been uncovered during the station make-over last summer have been preserved and placed in their own frames. These can be seen on the stair exit from Surrey bound trains. I am not sure how long they will be there, because I'm sure it's valuable advertising space. But it would be lovely if the original posters could be duplicated, because these aren't in the best state. Still, they're interesting timepieces from the bygone era of British Rail

------- The original post from last summer -------

Here is a selection of late 1980's railway posters recently uncovered during a re-fit of Richmond Station earlier this year. All the pictures were taken hastily on my smartphone. When I went back there with my SLR camera sadly were all gone. They provide an interesting glimpse of late 1980's design, made in the pre-desktop publishing era.

Silhouettes & Icons

Over the last few years the application of silhouette icons in design and advertising has gained more and more popularity to the point where it has now become a bona fida trend. And like any good design trend it has evolved, morphed and mutated into something completely new.

The latest posters for Vinopolis at London Bridge

Here is another wine glass themed design spotted at Green Park Underground station

Graphic icons as a typeface - in the latest campaign by Aviva, showcased at the Jubilee Line/Waterloo station interchange

CBS having running this campaign (in many incarnations) to sell their space

Ludlow Thompson adorn their beetle's with that much used London Panorama...but with some added wit...always the key to a good design

I first noticed the use of silhouettes as icons and their attraction was obvious - they were ready made off the shelf alternatives to much hard graft spent creating your own from scratch. And you can modify and customise them with ease. For while, a generous stock library even gave free clipping paths for lo-res images, provided you added "path" to your search criteria.

Zipvan keep it nice and simple with their livery

But as any icon dabbling designer will testify, it's not just any old photo that will make a good silhouette. To be really effective a good silhouette has to be custom drawn. Sure, packages of silhouette icons have existed for years, but their subject matter was often restricted to the usual suspects of pineapples, basketball player and butterflies - not great if you needed 100 for a corporate identity and fast. That said stock libraries soon soon reacted to this trend and a huge variety of them began appearing in all manner styles for the pret a porter end of the market.

Buxton went for another London themed design for their Jubilee advertising

Now like any good design trend, it may well have run it's course. Over the last year Silhouette icons in one form or another could be spotted everywhere be they upmarket, downmarket, budget or bespoke. Because they are so versatile you can do practically anything with them, as illustrated by the further examples below:

Sainsbury's at Whitechapel went back to basics on the Crossrail hordings

John Lewis have taken it to a whole new level with their recent advertising

...also with this Olympic themed poster

Models Plus website and logo

A new website and identity for Modelsplus will be launching soon, but in the meantime here is a sneak peek of the site...

New website for albphoto.com

The new website for photographer Angus Leadley Brown has now gone live. It features a homepage built with the Supersized plugin and a gallery made with Slideshow Pro

The London Particular website almost ready...

The London Particular website is all ready and primed to go live. This is a really great little website for a great little café that's thinking big! Thanks to the superb photography of Matt Cheetham and the the design input from Becky and Kanji. The site is reponsive, which means it won't only look great on your desktop, but also on your smartphone too.

Affordable Art Fair poster re-visit

This is my Affordable Art Fair design proposal from a few years ago that I have decided to re-visit and remix...

I'm working on a landing page for Albphoto's new website
we are planning on using the Supersized plug-in for this page
the rest of the site is made with SlideshowPro

New Café website

Here is glimpse of a new website that we are working on for a café here in South London. It's a small cosy place with a great interior and really good locally sourced food.

Wiltshire Daniels logo

This client was keen to have an illustration of the London Skyline as their header and logo, but wanted something with a hand drawn feel. The use of the skyline as part of a logo or supporting graphic is quite a popular choice for London based companies, especially property companies. But often a sharp vector style is used, here I tried to make it more soft and human. Hopefully I have succeeded !

Workshop photo shoot for Deburgo

We did workshop shoot at De Burgo kitchens last week and here is a picture from the making of that shoot. The actual pictures can be seen below...

The photographer Angus Leadley Brown (above right) took some really great shots as you can see below.