Return to Tigerprint.

I returned to Tigerprint for my last week of the summer I felt comfortable going into a familiar environment and I was welcomed back into the toys team. I spent the majority of this second placement doing mock-ups and developing 3-D products, which resulted in me getting a proper stiff scalpel finger on my right hand, although I did fair amount of other stuff in between times. I felt a lot more useful to the team this time as I was given work by everyone rather than being assigned work from the managers, one of the guys I was supposed to be working with had to leave on maternity when his wife gave birth I took on some of his workload at the end of the week, which was a 3-D card Buzz Lightyear kit which was well challenging and took a lot of time and revisions to finish, I felt very proud when I was finished and I took a few photos. I also worked more on the dinosaur projects and did some designs for a Peppa Pig jigsaw one of which was chosen to be the final product by Marks & Spencer’s.
Over the week I learnt a lot about packaging, 3-D kits and working on cutters on illustrator, since I caught onto this kind of stuff fast they just kept giving me more of it to do, so I was busier and more useful than I was in the previous placement. I just got on with it and apparently my can-do attitude impressed people so I have been invited back for the Christmas break and on any reading weeks I can spare. Since they were not able to pay me I was given an Amazon voucher and a load of toys at the end of the week, which was awesome.
The best part of this week was finishing the Buzz Lightyear kit I am definatly going to work on something similar in my 3rd year. Another of my best bits was when I had a meeting with the management when I was asked if I would consider coming back again, it was great to feel useful and respected by my peers.
The worst part of the week was Wednesday night when I was picking blisters off of my cramped cutting hand. But I was most gutted when I had to leave on Friday, despite leaving with a load of toys and an invite to return.
All in all it was fantastic to return to that creative environment I really enjoyed every minute of both weeks I spent at Tigerprint, I have gained a lot of experience as well as a few contacts to keep in touch with over the course of the year.

Tigerprint placement. Summer 2008

For my second placement this summer, I worked for Tigerprint, which is a part of Hallmark that produces cards and toys specifically for Marks & Spencer’s. I worked for the children’s toys division, which included board games, craft kits, jigsaws and packaging. Generally placements at Tigerprint are sorted out through winning one of their design competitions to gain access to the card design areas, although I didn’t enter I managed to get a placement through a friend, which was quite cheeky of me.
I found Tigerprint to be a lot more creatively challenging than my previous placement at New Vision. Tigerprint had me doing a lot of conceptual work for their autumn 2009 release as well as some mocking up and testing products for research or to help assess them after printing and a bit of photography and photocopying. I came up with some pretty mad ideas and helped to develop some ideas of theirs further, I found this all to be very fun and challenging.
The studio as an environment was fantastic it was very creatively diverse in the specialisation of each individual designer working there each of them was surrounded by objects and imagery from which they would draw inspiration. Everyone was very friendly and welcoming, they were used to unfamiliar faces due to the constant presence of freelancers and placements throughout the year. At lunch I would play halo 2 with some of the lads (I got thrashed every time) or wander about the studio and chat with people about what they were doing and how it was to work at Tigerprint, I was never told to go away, so I got a good experience of what it was like to work in that studio on a daily basis.
I proved my worth when they started to work on the new dinosaur project since I was a big dinosaur geek when I was a kid, and I haven’t changed much since, I got given research and concept development for the dinosaur project to get on with for the final part of the week.
The worst part of the week was finding all the faults in the fully printed Christmas tree craft kit on my first day, when I told Sarah the manager she had get a few other people up to see and I had to show them all the miss-cut slots, this resulted in them running about hysterically checking the files sent to the printers and then phoning them to try sort it out. Apparently money was lost and it was the worst day so far this year!
The best part was getting to show off my dinosaur knowledge halfway through the week which made me feel valued and got me a large workload for my final few days, I also enjoyed the fuddle we had on Friday for someone’s birthday, everyone on the toy team bought in something to share like cakes and sausage rolls, one of the blokes who had been travelling around the wild for a while bought in a huge slab of beef jerky that everyone avoided, I had a bit it tasted quite nice.
All in all I really enjoyed my stay at Tigerprint as I got to be creative and useful to them they weren’t allowed to pay me but they have told me that they want me to come back after Leeds fest. I will be looking forward to returning.

New Vision placement. Summer 2008

I did the first of my summer placements at New Vision signs & graphics, in Bradford. Over the course of the week I found out a lot about the harsh reality of the design world. New Vision is a company that has struggled over the last few years for various reasons (for example the banning of smoking advertising on shop fronts caused a considerable loss of clients). They operate with a small workforce of 4 or 5 designers who do everything from designing and printing to metal and plastic working, often they fit the products themselves as well.
When I arrived I didn’t feel particularly welcomed by the team, it seemed that some of them felt I was going to be a bit of a nuisance, no one wanted to baby-sit the placement, I ended up assisting in the print and vinyl room for the majority of my first day. I got stuck in to prove I was a fast learner who wasn’t worried about doing a bit of hard graft, after helping to put up some large vinyl signs in Bradford city football stadium I felt my presence was more welcome around the studio. After proving my worth I suddenly had a lot of work coming my way, from polishing and assembling to some mocking up on Photoshop, and a little bit of design, mainly I spent the week doing a lot of manual jobs around the studio and workshop.
The best part of the week was putting up the sign in the football stadium, as I had a great time with the team and It was nice to see something I had worked on the previous day finished, now every time I go see city I get to say ‘I helped do that.’
The worst part was taking down a huge window display with one of the designers, it involved a lot of stinky mentholated spirit and scraping glue off stuff, it was really tedious and the fumes made me feel sick to the stomach, I got stuck in and we got it done in an hour or two.
At the end of the week I got paid a few quid and told I would be welcome back if I ever want to do any more placement work. Overall it was a week where I did a lot of grafting and felt very comfortable and respected by the employees, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to leave on Friday, but Tigerprint awaited.