MTV3 Internet graphics for UEFA EURO 2012 tournament
As Art Director I designed the look for Football UEFA EURO 2012 Tournament using the recently redesigned UI, general Sports styles and official Tournament graphics.
The official Style Guide was impressive featuring detailed instructions of logo usage, broadcast graphics key visuals and mascots – just about everything besides the tournament itself.
MTV3 Mail service ‘Luukku’ has been wanting an overhaul for a long time.
Due to limited screen spaces, it leaves less room for designer to work in. Mobile design is all about function and all aesthetics must be subject to functionality. This means we will be doing quite a bit of more testing than in our other projects. It also means that mobile presence of a brand needs to be boiled down to minimum.
When a service has been untouched for a long time it becomes less attractive for advertisers. Empty ad spaces leave holes in the design—something I did not foresee when designing this layout several years ago.
How did it get left so far behind? Maybe since the original HTML has been rather well constructed—this old work horse has been made less of a priority—But would it have gotten a make-over much sooner, had it been poorly designed?
Color scheme in Luukku webmail was bright – we might either go with that or introduce brand colors with a strong scheme. Microsoft Metro is all about ”Authentically Digital” – Maybe this approach could give the service a bit of a look of a web application?
YL Male Voice choir is one of the best choirs in the world. I’ve had the honor of singing with them for more than ten years. Here are some recent tour clothes that I designed for them.
Babi Yar is the Shostakovitch’s symphony with Yevgeni Yevtushenkos lyrics, describing a massacre of jews in Ukraine by nazi Germany during World War 2.
Unlike the legend of Kullervo, this was a real incident with real victims. With no true connection to the tragedy, I felt insufficient and out of place just to even try to describe these events. I ended up setting the name in Russian (performing language of the piece) in heavy block type, with a bleeding effect from underneath. I do feel I managed to describe the massacre with respect for the victims and without turning a tragedy into gore and splatter.
Despite my inhibitions, the choir seemed less worried to find more practical uses for this garment: White and black shirts are for tenors and basses. Since singers like to play football and floorball, colors signify the teams.
In May, YL had 9 concerts in major chinese cities including Beijing, Shanghai, Suzhou and Nanking.
The garment for Chinese tour is a retro style olympic tracksuit top with the choir’s name arching across the back.
The badge has the choir’s name in english and chinese. The character is a singing panda dressed in a tailcoat.
This is very different – a kid gloves even – approach emphasizing everlasting friendship between China and Finland in culture.
As the concert program is a international smorgasboard of pan-european and chinese songs rather than something built on a one particular piece. When there is little common ground, no touchy subjects are brought up.
In Finnish national epic Kalevala, Kullervo is a tragic hero who ends up throwing himself upon his own sword. Hence the blood. The back of the shirt is a list of concert venues in a classic band-shirt style. Note the Carnegie Hall as the final concert. It was spectacular!