How long ago did you guys leave LCA?
three years ago, but it doesn't feel like that.
Does it feel like longer, or not?
Yeah it feels like way longer I think.
How did you guys manage to formulate The Hungry Sandwich Club and come together collectively to form your vision?
So we pretty much did all of our projects together in third year, in fact we got in a bit of trouble with Amber really when we were about to submit our work because it was a lot more difficult to mark, which makes sense now but at the time didn't make much sense. We were searching for a placement like you and were trying to do it together and one idea we had was to send people a paper craft of their favourite sandwich - we thought asking for a placement was scary, but asking a studio what their favourite sandwich was was a lot easier. We were trying to get into Duke Studios and we used that project at Duke and we didn't get it, but that's why we have that name. We just kept that stupid name from that stupid project. We weren't ballsy really, a lot of people think that it seems really nerve-wrecking but I think we were more naive and stupid than ballsy. We just kept doing it.
How did James join the team?
So I joined you around a year ago and I came straight from an internship. I didn't go to LCA, in fact I didn't go to uni at all so I don't have degrees or qualifications. I luckily managed to get an internship at a design studio in Manchester called Raw design. I did a year long placement there which might be the longest placement anyone has ever done there. That gave me a leg up, and then I went straight into freelance. I hit Hungry Sandwich Club up asking if they needed any freelance work and they said to come in for a chat - they brought me on for one project, so I did a month with them and said goodbye. And a month later they contacted me saying they have another job that they want to get me in on so I came back, and they asked if I want a job. So the way to do it is to stay relevant, stay motivated and keep your name out there.
Our key thing for when people contact us is to know your research - if you can name them by their names it works a lot more. When James contacted us it was a very short email and very informal, however this wouldn't be appropriate for some other studios. Definitely do your research.
What inspires your creative process?
We get inspiration from anything and everything - cartoons, comics, video games. We try and stay relevant so we keep updated with whats going on in the world we work in. Watching what other people are doing. We draw inspiration from all sorts - I try to follow as many people as I can just to keep up to date with different styles.
What is your opinion on websites such as Behance?
It's really different for different people, because we do mostly motion work it's not really appropriate for us and we're really shit at photoshopping nice mock ups. Behance is very mock up heavy which can make your work look amazing. I know a lot of people that do really well off Behance and get a lot of job enquiries, but for us it's never really worked as there's a lot of time wasters who call up fishing for prices so that they can base their own prices on their work. It's a wicked world because you end up spending more time designing a project for Behance than you do designing the actual project. It's a weird fake world. We generally get more work through Instagram and Twitter as it's more accessible.
What's the biggest challenge you've faced in the industry?
Probably right now is the biggest challenge we're having. James is leaving us in a few weeks time and we're trying to replace him, whilst still working and manage the work that is coming in, and how the future of our business is looking. Our business might change direction a little, we don't know. The start is pretty tricky. You get a lot of hard clients that really do work you for all you're worth because you don't invoice the same amount of money when starting out so when you're making multiple amends, they start to take the piss when you're already working with a tiny amount of money. Once you've built up your portfolio people know exactly what to expect from you, so you start to attract the right kind of clients with the right amount of money.
What do you think is the best thing for me to do to get myself out there?
It's worth going to meet people because they end up giving you work. We did okay when we first started out because we'd already made loads of contacts in Leeds. We were helping out at Duke for free, we'd met the guys at CMV and Lee Goater. It definitely helped us hit the road running. Going to loads of events; such as at Village. It helps to get your face out there.
What did you display in your end of year show?
We had a theme and the theme was shape, everyone got given a shape and we got given circle, and that was the whole theme basically.
Are you guys hoping to come to see the show?
Yeah, we come every year so yes we'll definitely be there.
No comments:
Post a Comment