Creative Profile
Gavin Strange
Originally from Leicester, Gavin Strange is a 26 year-old graphic designer, illustrator, web designer, photographer and budding film maker working and living in Bristol.
By day he works as Senior Online Designer at Aardman Animations. By night, he retreats to the Jam Cave, covertly producing stellar work in the form of his alias JamFactory. ‘Jack of all trades, master of none’, as he likes to say.
Gavin also formed the Xynthetic Family – a creative collective of artists, designers, skaters, photographers and film makers, all collaborating on various projects and exhibitions.
On top of all this, he somehow manages to find time to prepare and give talks at various Apple stores around the country, including London’s flagship Regent Street store. Jealous? You should be.
Tell us about your creative background.
Well then, I studied Graphic Design for 2 years in my hometown of Leicester, then went and got taken on as a junior designer at a local design agency (I wasn't interested in going to University). I worked there for 4 years, learning the way of the web, and also developing my own online persona of 'JamFactory' in my own time, trying to replicate what I’d learnt at work with my own projects.
After those 4 years I decided to pluck up the courage and work for myself, so I quit my job and started 'JamFactory' as a proper company! I worked for myself for nearly 4 years, moving down to Bristol in the process and freelancing on a lot of different projects, until one day I got an email entitled 'Hello from Aardman', which was an opportunity to work with the online department on a big web project for Channel 4!
Of course I said yes and worked on the project for 6 months, then the position of Senior Designer came available, and one thing lead to another and I filled that role and have been there ever since
What's the reason for doing what you do?
That's a good question! I'm not sure really, I've always been drawn to the aesthetics of things. Ever since I was a wee nipper I can recall just being totally obsessed with drawing and colouring, but even then I was really anal about things. I'd be distraught if I'd go outside the lines or if someone crumpled up the paper I was drawing on! So to answer your question, I do this because I don't know what else I'd do!
Where do you get your inspiration from?
A lot of places really, there's obviously the wealth of hyper-talented creatives out there that I'm huge fans of that constantly inspires me, but I love just stumbling across time little things that trigger a thought in my mindtank, like a little graphic I see on ffffound.com, or an interface design on an Xbox game. It's all those little bits of inspiration I love.
I tend to find a lot of inspiration in words too. I keep a text file of funny quotes, sayings and phrases I hear and quite often I open that file up again to have a look as I like to start with a word and then make a graphic around it. It's a fun way to work. Lyrics are good for that too, especially as songs deliver the words to you with their own interpretation anyway, it can really inspire you to do something new.
Do you have a particular type of music you like to work to?
I like a mish-mash of music, and love everything from metal to indie hip-hop, so it depends what mood I'm in really. I don't tend to listen to anything mellow when I work though, I always find it surprising that I get bored if I put something mellow on when I’m working. I need something with a beat or a finger-shredding solo to keep me going!
What are you currently working on?
Oh man, too much to be honest! At Aardman I'm working on the new website for Timmy Time, our super cute new pre-school show. I'm also working on new enhancements to WebbliWorld, an online world and lots of other things that I'll be killed for talking about!
In my own time, as JamFactory, I'm working on: 2 brand identities, a magazine cover illustration, an online store, a bike film, 6 tee graphics and 2 vinyl toys! There's not enough hours in the day I tell you!
Tell us a little bit about working at the legendary Aardman Animations.
It's awesome. I genuinely get excited every day I go to work! We are really spoilt though, we work in this beautiful big purpose-built studio which is filled with giant characters all over the place, not to mention the 40-seat cinema! Being surrounded by these reminders of how being creative and ambitious really has no boundaries just makes you want to give your all and gives you a really proud feeling.
How do the ideas for your projects manifest, and what tools do you use to make these ideas come to life?
My normal workflow is starting off with good ol' pen and sketchbook - just doodling ideas down and getting those thoughts out your head and onto paper is a good feeling. Once I'm happy with the direction of things I fire up my tool of choice, my Macbook Pro aka The Silver Workhorse Of Doom. I use a wide variety of tools on the Mac but it's the usual suspects: Adobe Creative suite, Apple Final Cut etc.
Whose work are you particularly feeling at the moment?
My inspirations regularly change, which I like to think is a good thing, but my current favourites are Benny Gold, Emil Kozak, Niark1, Hoefler & Frere-Jone type foundry and Marc Bessant
If you could have any job in the world - what would it be (what you're doing now at Aardman doesn't count!)?
Oh man, that's a tough one! Ermmm, I'm really not sure! I can't imagine what else to do if I'm not being creative. I fell in love with film when I was young, direction or cinematography would be a lot of fun I think, that'd be a lot of fun.
What can we expect from Gavin Strange in the future?
Lots of stuff! I'd like to do more talks / conferences as I really enjoyed doing my Apple talks this year. Hopefully more vinyl toys too, I've got Series 2 of Droplet on the way for the end of the year as well as Shirley Creamhorn & Shithawk but I'd love to carry on and make more. I love what I'm doing and am very lucky to be able to do it, so hopefully I can carry on and see what happens!
For more on Gavin and his JamFactory work, check out his blog and website
