Visual Narratives Self Evaluation

Leeds College of Art BA (Hons) ILLUSTRATION	Level	04
OUIL405 Visual Narratives	Credits	20
End of Module Self Evaluation

NAME	Adele Pierce

1.  What skills have you developed through this brief and how effectively do you think you have applied them?
Throughout this brief I think I have definitely strengthened my drawing skills; analysing my line work by drawing and re-drawing images. I have learnt to not rely on reference material so much but rather using it to influence my drawing. For example, I collected photographs of people in lifts, but having done this on the sly some of the images weren’t at the best quality so I would just use them as a starting point to create my illustrations then adapt them and play around with compositions. I have also attended book binding sessions and Indesign workshops to develop skills in book making that could benefit my work in the future. I have learnt to manage my time effectively to stick to deadlines by making weekly plans and targets to hit to ensure leaving time for any mistakes. I feel I have developed my Photoshop skills more as I mentioned I would in previous briefs; I am definitely exploring this more for example adding text to my final outcomes was something new for me. I also feel that I have strengthened my research and development process by having an idea and running with it; developing it as much as possible and evaluating which pieces work best to be included within my final outcomes, and which weren’t up to scratch which I feel is evident within my sketch book.
2. What approaches to/methods of image making have you developed and how have they informed your concept development process?
Initially when researching into the project we were unable to draw what we saw. I found it very difficult to express myself without drawing so I still included a few rough sketches in my little sketchbook which I feel was a good starting point. These sketches were quick and loose and have a lot of character to them I feel. I was including text around them of conversations I had heard and I find that quite interesting; something I may explore more in future briefs. From this I went on to study groups of people entering lifts and created drawings from this. For some of the people stood a while I managed to sketch; there were many that were passing quickly so I had to stick to photographing them and using the photographs to draw from. I feel this lost a lot of the quality of line because I was focusing more and I quite liked the initial drawings being more free and lively. I worked on my drawing style quite a bit but maybe could have done more so; as I was trying to communicate humour through my final outcome I felt it was important to keep my drawing style ‘funny.’ In order to do this, I referenced an illustrator of whom I felt his work was very humorous due to his drawing style. I explored a similar approach within my drawing my using thick outer single lines, and thinner lines inside to represent folds and creases with a thinner pen. Sometimes these did not come across as well scanned in and edited on Photoshop. I decided to stick to one thin line on most of my drawings and will need to explore this more in future. For my final outcomes I scanned in my drawings; opened them on Photoshop and adjusted the white background then erased any unwanted lines. From this I created multiple layers of different opacity as multipliers to add colour. In order to reflect being in a lift I didn’t want the full book to be really bright colours as it wouldn’t reflect the concept; however I still wanted the book to be playful so it took a while to print and re print pages and go back editing the opacities in order to get it right.
3. What strengths can you identify in your work and how have/will you capitalise on these?
I feel that my work best represents the concept that I was trying to deliver and is relatable to an audience. That was the biggest concern for me, that my work would not be funny – but from feedback that I have been given everyone has laughed when reading it which is all I could ask for. I feel that my drawing technique is improving and this is done by drawing something out multiple times. I also feel that using a larger sketchbook has definitely benefitted me. It has allowed me to think about my composition and explore my drawing rather exhaustively. I think my sketchbook is well organised which has been a strength for me this brief. I feel I have used my time wisely and got the most out of my days within the studio. I often stayed behind until 7 which benefitted me a lot to get things done. I kept up to date with my blog and this allowed for me to go back and see which ideas were working well and whether I was still being true to my concept. It helped me organise my ideas effectively and not miss anything out. I feel that my work is strong in its development process which is something that I received good feedback on. There is a clear understanding within my sketchbook, I feel, of evaluating every possible outcome and things that aren’t working so well. I think having to make a book whereby there is a sense of journey, there has to be a clear sense of journey within your sketchbook too of how you got to that final point.
4. What weaknesses can you identify in your work and how will you address these in the future?
Though I felt I managed my time effectively, I don’t think I allowed enough time for any mistakes to occur. There were a lot of hinderences when creating my final product that I hadn’t took into consideration. This set me back time to tweak and polish up my final designs which is something I definitely needed to do. I also restricted myself to a few hours of book binding which I could have spent more time on. My final outcome, in my eyes, is a disaster, because I was so organised and ready I feel I was over confident and rushed into it. I should have created my envelope piece and the book separately and spent more time planning out the net for the envelope to scale it correctly. I also should have took more consideration over the layout of my Indesign file; because when it came to printing my pages were not in order and I had to add two pages which messed up the whole concept of my book. My initial idea was to have a book sliding out of an envelope to replicate sliding doors of a lift. The front cover of the book was to be a man stood facing away as if the reader was immediately ignored. When speaking to an IT technician I was told that printing a saddle-stich book meant it worked as a 4 page format, and that only having 18 pages meant I either had to add two, or take two away. Looking back I should have took two pages away that weren’t as strong and humorous; but stupidly I decided to add two. I added these pages in the wrong place, meaning that when it came to print the book the front cover was a plain grey sheet with text; rather than the illustration of the figure which I wanted. I also did not include a bleed which meant that I lost a lot of my image when trimming. I had to trim my book down quite a bit to fit into my envelope as I must have measured it wrong. I did not realise I had cut off a lot of the text on the left hand side which ruins it. However, I have definitely learnt from my mistakes and feel that in future briefs I need to do a lot more mock up attempts to get things right and analyse just how long things take in order to manage my time. I definitely feel as an image maker, I learn more when I make mistakes and so this is all a learning curve for me.
5. Identify five things that you will do differently next time and what do you expect to gain from doing these?
I will make a conscious effort to plan weekly as I feel this benefitted me a lot towards the end of the project and is not something that I usually do. I feel I spent far too much time researching and not enough time developing my drawing and colouring skills. I need to explore media more when approaching the colouring of my work rather than diving straight into Photoshop. I perhaps could have played around with watercolours or inks as other media outcomes. I will use a range of drawing tools also; rather than fine liners to explore my drawing techniques and ensure my drawings reflect the concept. I will work more on creating images from imagination rather than reference which will help shape an understanding of my drawings and once again create more concept rather than simply drawing what I see in front of me. I think everything that I have said I would do in previous briefs, I have explored in this one other than a broad range of media. This I know is a weakness of mine; as once I get an idea in my head that I want to run with I explore that exhaustively. I need to learn to be more open to other media as digitally colouring my work may not always work out as well. I will also stay behind in the studio more as those extra hours really benefit me. This can be hard sometimes as I work part-time on an evening four nights a week, but I will definitely stay behind on the days where I am not working. I think I work best on evenings, sometimes on a morning it takes me a good few hours to pull round and my image making is not as strong.
6.How would you grade yourself on the following areas: (please indicate using an ‘x’)  5= excellent, 4 = very good, 3 = good, 2 = average, 1 = poor
	1	2	3	4	5
Attendance				x
Punctuality				x
Motivation				x
Commitment				x
Quantity of work produced				x
Quality of work produced			x
Contribution to the group				x
The evaluation of your work is an important part of the assessment criteria and represents a percentage of the overall grade. It is essential that you give yourself enough time to complete your written evaluation fully and with appropriate depth and level of self-reflection. If you have any questions relating to the self-evaluation process speak to a member of staff as soon as possible.

A copy of your end of module self evaluation should be posted to your studio practice blog. This should be the last post before the submission of work and will provide the starting point for the assessment process. Post a copy of your evaluation to your PPP blog as evidence of your own on going evaluation.

Notes

Visual Narratives - Group Crit

Still Life

I set up a still life in front of me to work from. In the past whenever I have done this I spend hours and hours constructing an image getting the proportions right, drawing everything exact and making the drawing look very realistic. This can sometimes overlap into how I make images and draw figures and the one thing that I have tried to do since being on the course is free up my drawing; rely less on reference and draw an image as I imagine it and want it to be. So this time, I approached still life with more of an open mind and thought I don't actually have to draw what I see. Or how can I make this image interesting without being completely realistic? I really wanted to challenge myself. I chose ink as my media because I am not necessarily comfortable with it, for me it doesn't feel safe or something I may not have control over. Ink bleeds, it makes mistakes, and sometimes just come across as messy. I painted patches of it on my paper in areas where blocks of colour may be, but not necessarily in the correct place. 

I really liked this process because I was just relying on little bits of the still life and using my imagination for the rest, trying to imply shapes and lines rather than drawing them, leaving more for the imagination and keeping it minimal.

For this one I was just taking symbols from labels or patterns and playing around with those. I think it is vibrant - not the best drawing I've ever done but theres some life to it and you get a sense of juice!

These ones didn't work so well, too focused and the composition was not good.

I experimented with a thick brush and black ink to try free up my lines and then go back into the others. 

This was playing around with proportions making them incorrect to see if it really mattered.

Overall this still life session was incredibly successful for me because it is the first time I feel I've made real risks. I was whipping out so many drawings just doing really quick ink splashes taking parts of a still life adding them here and there and trying to make sense of that madness rather than sitting for hours doing a really perfect proportionally correct realistic yet dull drawing. 

I must try to adapt this notion to my drawing more often selecting important areas of what I see rather than just replicating something