End of module - Self Evaluation

Throughout this module I have learnt how to approach a brief and use the timescale to the best of my advantage. I feel I have learnt a lot about brainstorming quick ideas and producing a series of thumbnails in order to generate ideas. From this I draw and re-draw images to stimulate visual thinking and assess my drawing technique. I need to remember to pick up different pens as I am thumbnailing to try out new things. After this module I am going to buy brush pens and experiment with those as well as other media such as watercolour.

I feel that I have progressed from the first brief to the last looking back and evaluating my work I realized coming to the last brief the areas I needed to work on and things that were working successfully for me. I need to draw more, and to a larger scale - which is something I worked on in the last brief using loose sheets of paper rather than my little sketchbook. This gave me the freedom to keep re-drawing things and working on the proportions. I need to consider my composition more in future briefs. 'A day in the life' was a great brief for this and made me realize how framework can actually enhance your image rather than using it as a restriction. I have opened my eyes to other possibilities of working when in group crits seeing how others perceive a quote or an article and the media they use to display their concept.

I think my final brief is the strongest in terms of development, ideas, and putting those into a polished final outcome. I would not consider my body of work as consistent - I do feel in the first couple of briefs I was still trying to figure out what media I enjoyed and prioritising my work load. I feel I have successfully got the hang of this now and I am ready to take on future briefs.

I feel overall if I am being totally honest that I have not been very interested in the briefs up until this last one. Given the freedom to put my own spin on a quote inspired a vast amount of ideas; and the final idea I came up with meant that it could be interpreted in many ways. I became very interested in this brief and with it being humorous enjoyed creating images that would make people laugh. Therefore I feel I was more motivated into spending time drawing images, re-drawing them, working on the proportions, figuring out compositions.

I will buy bigger sketchbooks and draw constantly to show a constant development; as well as being more experimental with media. Working more on Photoshop will allow me to be experimental with collaging textures and exploring shape more rather than detailed drawings. I am going to practice more with paint and creating work that does not rely on humour so much.

From the feedback I have been given throughout people have commented on how I should practice with ink and watercolour for more subtle colouring which is something I will definitely bare in mind in future when creating work with tone. 

A Matter Of Opinion - Studio Brief 4

The Quotes

Thought process - mind maps for each quote that interested me

Adding thumbnails of ideas towards the quotes

I decided my strongest idea was based on the quote 'Designers can make music on any instrument' because it made me think of times as a child when you would pull pots and pans out of the cupboard to make instruments with. I figured this would be too literal and wanted to make it a little more humorous so I decided to come up with a character of a little boy that would then give up on the pots and pans and pick up his cat instead.
After explaining this idea to my tutor and the class I felt it was strong enough to go ahead with and had all sorts of possibilities that could stem from it. For instance I could use another animal or represent the animal as all kinds of instruments. I want to make it as humorous as possible to show the cat being tortured.

Considering format and layout

As our images can be any size, minimum A3 format this gives me a lot of freedom with how I can set out my images and use interesting frames to design my images around. I thought about having frames that were unusual shapes such as shapes of instruments but I felt that this would take away from the concept too much and wanted to keep it a little more simple and let the images speak for themselves. The freedom of having any format is great for one of my images in particular of the cat being tied down because that means I would be able to stretch it out to any size and really reflect the concept of stretching the cat.

Re-sketching ideas

I looked at many images of cats screaming out with their paws in the air to show how they are being used as instruments against their will.

I considered text in my ideas, by making the text look like alphabet magnets on a fridge spelling out the quote; however I don't think I will use this in my final outcomes.

Simplified lines and deciding on final images

Experimenting with colour on photoshop

I scanned in my images adding multiply layers to apply my colour. I didn't want to add much tone because it would make it seem too realistic, I wanted to keep bold colours to reflect humor against torture.

I am not the best at photoshop at the minute and feel I definitely need more practice with it but this was good for me to sit for hours trying out new things and becoming experienced with it. I know that my final outcomes are not polished up perfectly and maybe don't reflect my drawing and digital techniques very well; but for me it was more about the practice and getting the hang of it. I noticed when printing out my images that there were a lot of white gaps that had not been filled properly and so I had to colour these in by hand. Something I definitely need to work on in the future.

Screenshots

Final Outcomes

I received some really nice feedback about my work, and also some helpful criticism that has opened my eyes to new possibilities in future briefs and things I need to work on. Some people commented that they felt digital was not necessarily the best media for this piece and perhaps it would look better in watercolour. I think I maybe should have played around with watercolour techniques in the development of this. I feel I rushed into the digital experimentation too soon and did not experiment enough with other media so I would agree. Lots of people commented on how the pieces made them laugh which means that my concept was conveyed successfully.

Examples of quotes from feedback sheets :

'Such a strange design, nice use of innocent happy colours for a particularly dark narrative - good contrast'

'Humorous, really works as a set, I love how you have interpreted the quote'

'Practise applying digital tone more subtly'

'Try using tone'

'Vibrant, eye catching'

'Hilarious, I laughed so much, love it!'

' Change the background colour or put more objects/texture for the background'

I agree with all of these comments and I feel if I had more time I would practice more with the colour scheme of the piece and adding tone to see if it was necessary or not.

I agree the backgrounds are a bit plain and maybe the colours don't particularly work.

Progess Crit - Peer Feedback

Final Crit - Peer Feedback

Self Evaluation

A note to add : I really feel that I have worked well on this brief; I enjoyed having the freedom to come up with my own ideas and therefore doing something I enjoy has reflected in my work. I had fun with it, I made people laugh, and I learnt new things which for me is what it is all about. I know that my digital skills are not the best and there are things I need to brush up on; but just by practicing with that I have learnt a lot. Considering when I started the course I could not even turn a mac on I feel I have done well to get this far. I need to work on my drawing skills, and stop relying on reference so much. This has been in the back of my mind for the whole of this brief trying to create illustrations based on my own ideas and characters rather than drawing what I see. This proves quite difficult for me and I something I will only improve on by drawing more.

I feel I definitely need to experiment with using different media more in future briefs and working on my composition and using frames to my advantage rather than being scared of them!