For our education special (Issue 216), we were inundated with exceptional work from young creatives taking their first steps in the industry. Here, we take a closer look at the portfolio of Manchester-based designer Dan Heron
Recent graduate Dan Heron put his name to a number of outstanding works as a student at Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU), and is now busy building up a strong portfolio including a number of striking typographical experiments.
The first work to catch our eye was Heron's Kittinger font – an unusual, creative response to a simple brief. When asked to design a piece of work celebrating a personal unsung hero, Heron chose to focus on Joseph Kittinger, a man who set the skydiving record in 1960.
"The typeface I designed for the project came about from looking at photographs of buildings taken from above and choosing out structures that resembled letterforms," he says.
"The idea being that it reflected the unique view Kittinger had as he fell towards the earth. I traced over a couple of similar looking buildings to create the first few letters then built the rest of the typeface around them."
Another standout student project looks at an idea for posters promoting a fictional Science of Sound exhibition, and was inspired by Heron's love of music. Whilst trying to find ways of creating a visual representation of music, he hit on the idea of using scientific equations representing different elements of sound.
"I like the fact that the information I was using is all factually correct and the posters could be genuinely useful," explains Heron. "I often like to create work that is visually interesting but is also has content or a message which is interesting to read, giving the work a bit more depth and purpose."
