New talent 2017: Best graduates outside London

We’ve already brought you our favourite graduates from two corners of the UK: Edinburgh and Falmouth. Now discover the rest of our picks of the very best graphic design, illustration and animation graduates outside of London.

Whether you’re looking for new creative talent for your studio or collaborative opportunities, the talented graduates here boast exceptional final year projects that excel in both concept and execution – and are worth keeping an eye on.

And don't forget to head over to D&AD New Blood at London’s Old Truman Brewery, Shoreditch, from 5-6 July to get a closer look at the work from the class of 2017 and meet the graduates in person.

How to shine at your degree show

Want to search by university instead of scrolling through? Just hit the drop-down menu below to skip to: Manchester School of Art, Arts University Bournemouth, Glasgow School of Art, Sheffield Institute of Arts or Leeds College of Art.

First up, Plymouth College of Art...

Jake Williams

University: Plymouth College of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Illustration
Project: Resilient Reptiles

Plymouth-based illustrator, designer and occasional animator Jake Williams produced a fully illustrated 26-page non-fiction children’s book for his final major piece. Focusing on the unique ways that reptiles of the world have adapted to survive, the publication showcases Williams’ shape-based vector style and considered use of bold, vibrant colours.

“This was a challenging project because I’d never created a book before, but an enjoyable one,” says Williams, who will be showing his work at New Designers 2017.

“I created Resilient Reptiles alongside a range of conceptual editorial images about a range of topical and political issues. At university I spent some time at a placement with Creative Hub, working on illustrations for Cornwall Today magazine. It was great experience and has helped me to hone my style for editorial work.”

Josh Fathers

University: Plymouth College of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Social Fabric

Cornwall-based graduate Josh Fathers created a tactile journal to document the “quirks of how people talk in the real world” for his final year project. “I live in a little seaside village and my community is very important to me. Essentially, Social Fabric is about the ways that people communicate when talking to other people is a choice and not a necessity.”

As well as being part of the team that designed the ‘Breaking Through’ concept behind Plymouth College of Art’s 2017 graduate shows, Fathers is also communications director of a community interest company in Cornwall.

He travelled far and wide to record anonymous conversations for the project, putting himself in situations he wouldn’t ordinarily have found himself in. “I hope that the end result is a testament to the varied skills I’ve developed during my time at the college, but also gives an idea of what community means to me.”

Penny Chan

University: Plymouth College of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Fashion Media & Marketing
Project: Girlhood

Penny Chan combined her love of graphic design with her magazine-house experience to create the zine GIRLHOOD. “The concept behind the zine is ‘disrupt the system’; inspired by the punk movement and in protest against the highly polished photography and film in the fashion industry,” explains Chan, who’s currently working as a freelance fashion assistant for GQ Style, and has interned at Dazed & Confused as a junior designer.

She’s helped style, plan and assist two major international Topman campaigns; worked on a Dr. Martens Spring/Summer '18 campaign and a few British GQ and GQ Style editorials; and assisted on Take That's latest UK Arena tour, helping to dress the band.

“I'm currently taking time out from work at GQ Style to focus on my final major project but I'll be back in a few weeks to help style a few London Fashion Week Men's shows,” she says.

Sarah Damo

University: Plymouth College of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Game Arts
Project: Wonder Seekers

Italian game artist and illustrator Sarah Damo specialises in concept art. For her final major project, she created Wonder Seekers – a game concept set in a near-future, post-apocalyptic world. The story revolves around a girl who runs a robot repair shop and travels on adventures with her best friend, a mutated parrot that has grown too big to fly. Together the pair collect materials that they use to fix robots, working to find a clean energy source that can make the planet habitable by humans again.

Damo created concepts for the environments, assets and characters, including 3D models for the characters and machinery within the game. “My personal style is greatly influenced by Renaissance art – in the use of composition, colours and imagery – and impressionism, in the use of light and different types of brush stroke,” she says.

“For Wonder Seekers, I combined these influences and tried to add more vibrant tonality to the colours, alongside restrictive palettes for certain environments. I hope that the end result communicates a strong story and mood with the viewer.”

Damo wants to work as concept or character artist in the gaming industry, "creating adventures that people can connect with and jump into” – and she looks set to achieve her aim.

“Sarah Damo’s work is truly unique,” says Martial Bugliolo, programme leader BA (Hons) Game Arts. “The way that she merges traditional and digital illustration styles with 3D and VR mark her out as somebody with a bright career in the games industry ahead of her.”

Greg Johnson

University: Plymouth College of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Game Arts
Project: Game environment and characters

Greg Johnson has a background in sculpture, but has spent the last three years specialising in game arts, honing his skills in VR, digital sculpting and modelling, and becoming proficient in software including 3ds Max, ZBrush, Substance Painter and Unreal Engine 4.

For his final major project, Johnson produced an environment and characters for a game in which global warming has created a permanent layer of greenhouse gas, which has wiped out most of the life on the planet. With this dystopian world crumbling into a junkyard, the machines have evolved to hunt down the remaining humans on the planet. All of the assets have been modelled and textured for an Unreal 4 Environment.

Johnson drew inspiration from the work of Tim Burton and Shane Acker’s movie 9. "I used real-world objects, combining them to create my machines,” he says. “The way the machines move and are constructed takes influence from animals – for example, the way a raptor moves was used to animate a creature made from wind turbines, cranes and CCTV cameras.”

“I’ve always liked MMOs, historical games, and strategy games. Total War is my favourite game series to date, and I also really enjoy League of Legends, and the Fallout series has been a big influence on me.”

“The dream is to one day work for Creative Assembly as a 3D artist,” he says. “Character art and asset creation are the areas I’m most interested in.”

Jessica Mehler

University: Plymouth College of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Animation
Project: BabaY

A graduate of the European Film College in Denmark, Jessica Mehler specialised in traditional 2D and 3D printed models with stop motion animation at Plymouth College of Art. Her final project animation film is based on the Slavic folktale of Baba Yaga, an old witch who lives in a house which can walk around on chicken legs. To produce this piece she created an intricate miniature set in her studio.

“Adam Elliot’s film Mary and Max is one of the films that made me want to be an animator, along with Yuriy Norshteyn’s Hedgehog in the fog,” says Mehler, who represented Plymouth College of Art at the Creative Europe programme Euranim in Belgium. “I feel very inspired by comic books, particularly the work of Moebius and Enki bilal, but I am also a huge fan of Calvin and Hobbes.”

Briony Difford

University: Plymouth College of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Illustration
Project: Asian Folktales

Graduate Briony Difford uses a combination of traditional ink painting and digital colouring in her illustrations, focusing on themes of the natural world. Often working with narrative-driven projects, Difford creates Japanese-inspired linework and composition, striving for detail and elegance in her illustrations.

For Asian Folktales, her final major project, she depicted her chosen stories in a way that respects traditional Asian artwork, while also bringing them into a contemporary setting and to a new audience.

“I wanted to capture the distinct charm that has always interested me in these folk tales,” she says. “After graduating I plan to work more in publishing, creating illustrations for magazines and books as well as making and selling my work at exhibitions and events. I always want to be open to new projects and different experiences.”

Warren Curry

University: Plymouth College of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Illustration
Projects: An Illustrator’s Guide To Surviving The Internet; and The Millennial Man

Working in a range of different styles during his third year at the college, Warren Curry illustrated two graphic novels: one a non-fiction title, focusing on the pros and cons of illustrators having an online presence; the other a collaboration with writer James Trotter.

 “It was a real challenge to create a complete body of sequential artwork that did justice to a story written by a collaborator, and a great learning experience,” says Curry, who will be exhibiting his work at New Designers.

“My plans for the next year are to look for in-house illustration jobs, ideally around the Bristol-Cheltenham area,” he adds. “I’m also open to agency offers or freelance work.”

Next page: Our pick of the graduates from Manchester School of Art

Get 5 issues of Computer Arts for £5!

Computer Arts will be bringing you the cream of the 2017 graduate crop in a special new talent issue, on sale 21 July. Subscribe now to make sure you get your copy – and get five issues for just £5.

01. Tayia Dussie

University: Manchester School of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Illustration with Animation
Project: When I'm 6

For her final year project, Tayia Dussie wrote and illustrated a children's narrative, looking at colour, shape, pattern and character to communicate fun while telling different stories.

Recently, she’s been working on a dark tale, O'l Higue, based on West Indian folklore from the villain’s point of view, which was highly commended by The Macmillan Prize for illustration. “In contrast to this,” she says, “When I'm 6 is a brighter, happier tale set in a circus. It depicts a child's wonder at all they see and their desire to become what they admire.”

After graduating, Dussie hopes to create commercial work and further her education.

02. Ben Grimes

University: Manchester School of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Project: MOFO

“MOFO – Mock Font – is a project that explores and challenges the stereotypes associated with the Japanese aesthetic,” explains graphic design graduate Ben Grimes. An Eastern-inspired typeface, MOFO is legible as English when viewed from a different angle. “The work highlights the danger of using aesthetic references from foreign cultures in a superficial way,” he says.

Grimes fell in love with the Japanese language after studying it as part of his degree. “In the Western world, we often receive a very stylised version of Eastern language and culture, with the language being exploited by fashion brands for its cool and trendy aesthetic. I wanted to protest this by manipulating the fluid forms of Japanese characters and making people think twice about what they are actually looking at.”

In a year’s time, Grimes hopes to be continuing to explore the connections between language and design, and combing this with his interest in theatre and set design.

03. Lily Soltanahmadi

University: Manchester School of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Assembly

Graphic design graduate Lily Soltanahmadi put together concept branding for a new creative space during her final year. Tasked with turning a historic building into something beneficial to a city, she chose York’s former fire station – which is under threat of being demolished – and crafted the branding for a café bar, Assembly.

“Assembly celebrates the history of the building and provides a creative atmosphere to help bring the community together,” Soltanahmadi explains. “In a year’s time I hope to be working for a branding agency.”

04. Luke Rowland

University: Manchester School of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Projects: Posters; Europa Std typeface

Inspired by modern European typography, Europa Std features a larger contrast than standard sans-serif typefaces, while remaining clean and accessible. “Throughout Scandinavia and many other European countries, clean, bold typography is widely prominent within the cities,” explains Luke Rowland.

“Typefaces are often very basic, but retain a style that’s intrinsic to their surroundings. Europa Std aims to explore and highlight these subtle styles and express them enough so that the typeface holds the same aesthetic value, wherever its use may be.”

05. Lauren Dugan

University: Manchester School of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Love Letters to Gaia

“My final year project was centred around the theory that Earth is a living, breathing organism,” explains graduate Lauren Dugan. She produced a set of powerful, large-scale monoprints depicting mankind's dismissive, passive attitude to the damage humans are doing. Dugan also created a series of letters written by 'the last human alive', lamenting the loss of the Earth’s spirit.

“I spent a lot of time investigating the relationship we have with Gaia [the personification of the Earth] and finding ways to portray this as being as important as the connections we have with one another,” she says.

“If my Love Letters can make at least one person more mindful about their treatment of Earth, then my work has been a success.”

Next page: Our pick of the graduates from Arts University Bournemouth

Perry Rowe and Steve O’Neil

University: Arts University Bournemouth
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Net identity

For their final year project, graduates Perry Rowe and Steve O’Neil created a flexible identity for an innovative business idea. The concept? Just as different nets are able to define various enclosed spaces, so an experimental division of Crowne Plaza could provide different hotel experiences that could reinvigorate the brand as a whole.

Emily Regan

University: Arts University Bournemouth
Course: BA (Hons) Visual Communication
Project: Dance Type

This experimental project explores the theme of collaboration through the disciplines of dance and typography, resulting in a dynamic, animated typeface. Graduate Emily Regan worked with a dancer to create a ‘dance code’, choreographing dance motifs from the breakdown of letterforms, before recreating the motifs using animated vectors and reconstructing them into final type design.

“In a year's time I hope to be working in a creative agency, constantly expanding and refining my skill set as a creative designer,” says Regan. “My ideal career path is a designer at a fashion magazine or an in-house designer at a fashion brand.”

Saul Kaplin

University: Arts University Bournemouth
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Searchlight

At a time where film audiences might be over-saturated by Hollywood’s slick, perfect CGI, graduate Saul Kaplin’s refreshing final year project revisits and celebrates the quirky qualities of analogue stop-frame methods, suggestive of early cinema. His project – a D&AD New Blood-awarded promotional video for a MUBI advertising campaign – captures the atmosphere of this era, connecting with the movie-literate MUBI audience by using elements of its logo.

Izzi Hays

University: Arts University Bournemouth
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Facebook Fortunes

What better way to commemorate a long-term virtual relationship than with something tangible? Facebook Fortunes looks backwards at the memories shared, and forwards to those yet to come, through beautifully crafted and packaged fortune cookies.

Using Arjowiggins paper, graduate Izzy Hays transformed Facebook into a physical entity that serves as a reminder of friendship in the offline world.

“We all have people we still want to be friends with in five years’ time,” says Izzy Hays. “How can Facebook help us look towards to the future of our friendships instead of just the past and the present?”

Zante Tolley

University: Arts University Bournemouth
Course: BA (Hons) Visual Communication
Project: Tower typeface

Graduate Zante Tolley’s Tower typeface takes influence from the proportions of sister brutalist buildings, Balfron and Trellick Tower, designed by Erno Goldfinger. The crossbars or terminals of the letterforms change according to the service bridge on every third floor, as shown through a slick type specimen book and type specimen posters that showcase the two weights.

“The design reflects the dynamic nature of the Brutalist movement,” she explains.

Sarah Wickings

University: Arts University Bournemouth
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Let’s Say What We Mean

Graduate Sarah Wickings’ typography-led video campaign attempts to capture the experience of autism by overloading our visual senses while presenting a series of everyday conversational phrases. The aim is to do more than raise awareness or even money – the project seeks to encourage people to communicate more effectively with a call to action: Say what you mean.

“Let’s Say What We Mean focuses on the abstract language we use in everyday scenarios and how people with autism struggle to understand it,” explains Wickings. “The aim of this video is to encourage people to consider their day-to-day language choice more clearly to make it easier for people with autism to take in.”

Kieran O’Sullivan

University: Arts University Bournemouth
Course: BA (Hons) Visual Communication
Project: The craft of Northamptonshire

Kieran O’Sullivan’s ISTD-awarded final year project is an editorial piece exploring Northampton’s rich heritage in the shoe industry. Combining original imagery and archival content from the Northampton shoe museum, the book demonstrates several uses of pull outs, dynamic typography and photography to celebrate the history of the recent graduate’s hometown.

"In the next year I hope to take on a number of internships," he says. "Design is so broad – I want to continue learning and expanding my knowledge."

Maarit Koobasm

University: Arts University Bournemouth
Course: BA (Hons) Visual Communication
Project: The Beat

Maarit Koobasm’s project responds to the notion that typefaces are ready for change, and that future discourse should lead to non-referential type design. “How can human qualities be translated into digital textuality – something we see in handwriting and in letterpress typesetting? But, at the same time, how can we challenge typographic choices meant for print, especially the static essence of typography on screen?” asks Koobasm.

Koobasm’s solution was to explore how the rhythms of the heart can interplay with type on screen. “The type is therefore neither bold nor italic, but defined by the human individual. It’s not rigidly set, but develops dynamically.”

In a year’s time Koobasm intends to be continuing to develop in the field of experimental typography. “I’m also keen to secure my first internship.”

Next page: Our pick of the graduates from Glasgow School of Art

Lucy Watkins

University: Glasgow School of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Careful Engagement 150

Careful Engagement150 is a collection of poetry and illustrations that aims to elevate the human traces hidden within the Report of the Iraq Inquiry. “Over 2.6 million words of political jargon make for an incredibly difficult read for anyone mildly interested in the workings behind the Iraq War,” she explains.

Using various methods of investigation, Watkins was able to surface elements of delicate human nature from the report, and a poetic language developed. “The intention is to challenge preconceptions that the document contains little feeling or emotion, and to create an uncomfortable dichotomy between poetry and politics,” she adds.

Amir Saidani

University: Glasgow School of Art
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Micronation

“We live in a world in which our borders and how we exist within those borders are constantly being brought into question – Scottish Independence, Brexit, Donald Trump to name but a few,” says Amir Saidani. “In response to these hardening borders, I decided to define my own.”

He wrote to Theresa May and declared independence for the Republic of Maktaal’amra, a micronation located at his desk space at GSA. “The project exists as a satirical, yet honest lens refracting current events through my perception. Through that process, I’ve added a little bit of my personality to them.”

Next page: Our pick of the graduates from Sheffield Institute of Arts

Jasmine Welsh

University: Sheffield Institute of Arts
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Projects: Young People in Politics and Ballot Box

Jasmine Welsh spent three months planning and producing a Question Time event that brought five politicians from the major parties face-to-face with Sheffield students. In a packed venue, Nick Clegg, Natalie Bennett, Paul Blomfield, Spencer Pitfield and David Kurten answered questions on education and immigration, and the event generated a great deal of press including an article on the event by Nick Clegg in the Evening Standard.

“Young People in Politics is a campaign designed to encourage 18-24 year olds – who repeatedly have the lowest voter turnout – to make their voice heard,” says Welsh.

“I also created Ballot Box, an educational board game intended as a free teaching tool for universities and colleges. It explains current political policies and can be updated with each election to help make voting more clear, combining fun with politics.”

Holly Whetnall

University: Sheffield Institute of Arts
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Explore

Holly Whetnall’s final year project Explore aims to encourage walkers to stick to the footpaths within the Peak District National Park and reduce the impact of erosion on the landscape. “Within my research,” says Whetnall, “I found that positive engagement has a greater effect than negative enforcement, such as ‘keep off the grass’.”

To promote this positive engagement, Whetnall created a series of large letters spelling out the word ‘explore’ to be positioned along designated paths, creating places to stop and take photographs, and subconsciously drawing walkers along the preferred route. “The letters create a feature whilst also blending sensitively into the environment,” she adds. “They have a dark wooden frame and are filled with a species of moss native to the Peak District.”

Seb Gardner

University: Sheffield Institute of Arts
Course: BA (Hons) Illustration
Project: Narratives in the Everyday

Narratives in the Everyday saw graduate Seb Gardner finding different ways to create a story around ordinary subjects. Taking inspiration from BBC Radio 4’s The Listening Project – which records segments of conversation between ordinary people – the project aims to make visible the “un-noticed and mundane”.

For the Sheffield edition, Gardner focused on the idea of redundancy and identity to develop an animation. “Although very personal subjects are normally only held between family members and friends, being able to visualise this audio conversation brings a whole new perspective to the matter,” he says, “whilst also engaging a still wider audience.”

Anna Terreros-Martin

University: Sheffield Institute of Arts
Course: BA (Hons) Illustration
Project: Felix the Fox and the Rainy Day children’s book

Graduate Anna Terreros-Martin believes it’s important for all children to have an equal opportunity to read, learn and enjoy illustrated children’s books, so she produced a tactile illustrated storyboard for blind and partially sighted children, and their families.

Using a range of different fabrics to create raised images, as well as Bare Conductive Electric Paint – which, when touched, triggers sounds – the storyboard brings the story of Felix the Fox and the Rainy Day to life by prompting readers’ senses. The storyboard is also accompanied by an audio version of the story, so children can read and use the storyboard on their own.

“I have developed a strong interest in children’s book illustrations and how they play an important role in childhood development,” explains Terreros-Martin, “in particular, their importance in educating children and developing a strong bond between parent and child.”

Ashton Moran

University: Sheffield Institute of Arts
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Project: By Order of the Committee

By Order of the Committee is a brand and style guide that can be used to recreate the distinctive aesthetic of a Working Men’s Club. Ashton Moran used original photography and a collection of family photographs to understand the unique interiors, decoration and signage of these venues, and the shared memories they hold.

“This project is important in playing a role in the documentation of this once booming industry, which has a place in so many people’s hearts,” he explains. “It would be a great shame to lose such important places that have their roots in working class culture – although sadly I feel that this will eventually be the case.”

“I’d like to think that this guide will inspire someone to start up a fresh club,” he adds, “or will encourage WMCs of the present to update into the 21st century.”

Oli Wallace

University: Sheffield Institute of Arts
Course: BA (Hons) Illustration

Revolving around themes of bias, emotive language and censorship, Oli Wallace’s final year project uses editorial illustration to engage and communicate. “I wanted to navigate the reader through the different methods that media outlets use to sway or influence opinion,” he explains.

“It also serves to contrast the difference in tone from an article that has been deconstructed and stripped of its leading language. The different illustrations were constructed by creating metaphorical concepts that support and further inform the reader.”

Chris Winter

University: Sheffield Institute of Arts
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Project: For the Love of Books

Chris Winter's final year project celebrates the format of the book and the pleasure of print through an experimental exploration of ink and paper. Each exploration was documented and designed into a full-colour, large-scale publication, For the Love of Books, which features double-sided folded inserts with duotone images of magnified ink.

“It got lots of people collaborating and needed a lot of tests, failures and research,” recalls Winter. “For one aspect, the unconventional Paper Collection, I created my own paper out of unconventional materials: the ultimate test was if it would print through an inkjet printer, which resulted in nearly breaking the printer several times.”

Nikitha Pankhania and Amy Hart

University: Sheffield Institute of Arts
Course: BA (Hons) Graphic Design
Project: The Chocolate Box Company

Graduates Nikitha Pankhania and Amy Hart collaborated to create The Chocolate Box Company, which addresses a brief to create, brand and package sustainable, Fair Trade chocolate.

“We wanted to make Fair Trade exciting, interesting, accessible and educational so we developed a personal experience designed to simulate curiosity and excitement,” says Pankhania, adding that the brand ethos extends care to farmers, the people who produce the packaging and those who transport goods.

“The packaging communicates information about the Fair Trade producers through the use of Adinkara Symbols, which are a very important part of the farmer’s Ghanaian history and culture,” explains Hart.

Next page: Our pick of the graduates from Leeds College of Art

Hattie Windley

University: Leeds College of Art
Course: (BA Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Zero

Zero is a wholefoods store that aims to cut down on packaging and waste by encouraging customers to use their own reusable packaging.

Charles Worrall

University: Leeds College of Art
Course: (BA Hons) Graphic Design

This project by Charles Worrall highlights the charm of the North of England, listing many of its characteristics to communicate why fracking doesn't belong in the North.

Isla Pearce

University: Leeds College of Art
Course: (BA Hons) Graphic Design

Graduate Isla Pearce created a comparative visualisation of the chords in different songs from a range of musical genres for her final year project. Each ring represents an individual chord and its proportional use within the record.

Emily Kaye

University: Leeds College of Art
Course: (BA Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Saltaire Festival branding

This contemporary, eye-catching branding was crafted for Saltaire Festival, an exciting, family friendly 10-day event hosted annually at the local heritage centre.

Florence Packer

University: Leeds College of Art
Course: (BA Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Strong and Stable

Strong and Stable is a screen-printed poster series about items that are strong and stable. According to Florence Packer, the Conservative government based its recent campaign on the idea of this, whereas the poster is based on fact.

Alex Robertson

University: Leeds College of Art
Course: (BA Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Chunk On Limited

Chunk On Limited is a publication that makes you want to go fishing and take along your camera. It showcases the very best of professional and amateur angler’s stories, interviews and photography, from anywhere and everywhere.

Joel Sleet

University: Leeds College of Art
Course: (BA Hons) Graphic Design
Project: Certain typeface

Certain is a typeface for uncertain times. Designer Joel Sleet aimed to build trust between the communicator and reader by taking a step away from a corporate style, while still remaining visually consistent and grounded.

Taime Newton

University: Leeds College of Art
Course: (BA Hons) Graphic Design

These screenprinted montages utilise a punk aesthetic, with high contrast imagery – both found and original – juxtaposing architecture and retro figurative photography.