Second Draft Sting

First Draft Sting

First attempt at my animated sting! its pretty shit and theres a lot of time where nothings happening but it went better than i thought it would I think? I'll add text next

Study Task 6- Presentation

Карпати /The Carpathians- Kristyna Baczynski:

- work presented online in a range of image formats: scanned whole image, close ups from various angles, and displayed on wall with bulldogs clips

- amount of additions total and available (plus a little thing saying "theres only 3 left so buy quickly!)

- the height and width

- materials and processes used

- gift-wrapping and messaging options available on request

- paper stock 

- a short but lovely description of the peice and the idea behind it

- details of how it will be packaged and mailed out to the buyer

Folk Life Collage- The Printed Peanut:

- work presented in two different formats with high quality images: close up of paper quality and full scanned image (also has the option to scroll around the image for a closer look)

- image height and width

- details behind the print and the inspiration for the piece

- the quality and materials of the print (giclee) 

- paper stock details

- details about it being signed by the artist

- the fact its been locally made

- an estimated deilvery time 

Study Task 5b- Soundtrack with my animations

What I hope to achieve:

• off putting and chaotic feeling
• static buzz, busy noises, complicated like a busy brain
• a sense of isolation 
• Angelas etherialness and aloof attitude

I could use:

• static sounds
• medical flatline sounds? (too morbid?)
• lonely spooky forest noises (too easy?)
• Angelas own voice, talking about her beliefs in interview with Lisa Appignanesi

Study Task 5A- Soundtracks

Shahaf Ram- Separation:

• spoken word over a piano piece
• spoken word pace ebbs and flows with the animation and the feel of whats being talked about, manic in places, silent in others
• the music builds up to manic, quick, and tense in the middle then thins out towards the end
• very effective- emotive and raw, simple music used that highlights exactly what you should be feeling and when 

Separation || פרידה (Spoken word by Arik Eber) from Shahaf Ram on Vimeo.



Malcolm Sutherland- Umbra:

• pan pipes make up minimal soundtrack
• also foley sound used- walking footsteps in sand, wind, crackling
• minimal sound echoes the feeling of wide open space and vastness in the video
• the animation is expressive enough so doesn't need lots of sound of speech
• very effective- general melancholy feel, pan pipes sound quite sorrowful and the sounds of wind and static make it feel a little eerie

Umbra (HD - 2010) from Malcolm Sutherland on Vimeo.

Possible Voice Clips

I found this interview with Angela Carter today on youtube, in it she mentions a lot about the writings of her books along with her inspirations and relations between the bloody chamber and the Marquis De Sade. There are a few bits I think might work well in my sting:

• 6:43- "Well, no. Um I mean I don't mind being regarded as the reservoir of ethical truth. But I would like to think it was because of me, not because of my gender. And I would also like to think that people took seriously what I said"
• 4:03- "One of the great dehoteny of western thinking is that you know, mothers are nurturing. So that we still have this horrid shock of surprise when the earth, when mother nature, shows its natural indifference to us"

Study Task 4- Stings

Lilli Carre:

• fuzzy, mono print style
• ambiguous so grabs attention
• like the ambient music and minimal sound effects
• use of type
• evocative 

Like A Lantern by Lilli Carré from Marilyn Zornado on Vimeo.


Grace Nayoon Rhee:

• Short but so effective
• use of limited colour and blue colour palette is evocative
• great simple sound effects- contrast, crackling fire and children playing
• flickery 2 frame animation reflects flickering of flame

Playground on fire from Grace Nayoon Rhee on Vimeo.


Lawrence Becker:

• simple limited colour palette again
• can see how it would be relatively easy to make, long animated image
• not much going on in each frame but they use up all the space so effectively 
• good simple but thoughtful soundtrack used

More: A Stop Motion Short from Lawrence Becker on Vimeo.

Moving Pictures- Proposal

I intend to produce:

• A small sting to advertise a documentary on Carter and her work

The content I will be focusing on:

• Carters bloody chamber writings and imagery
• her own opinions in life
• how the two merge
• a sense of her as a person

I will be aiming to communicate:

• a sense of her and how she was as a person
• her own struggles
• her unintentionally feminist opinions
• something evocative and immediate

The audience will be:

• followers and fans of Carter and her work
• people who enjoy and follow animation
• women/people who enjoy strong characters

Studio Brief 1- Idea Pictures

What went well:

I think the general idea generation stage of this brief was the best part of it for me, as it made me realise I am very passionate about Angela Carter and her work. I found it very easy to select ideas about her and The Bloody Chamber to translate into my editorial roughs, and almost more difficult to decide on which roughs to take forward because I like something about them all! 
This brief also got me excited to do more editorial work because sometimes I really enjoy working within parameters such as size and colour limits, especially if its just for a quick project as I find it limits the time I take to make decisions. I also think I'm developing a stronger visual style which works to my advantage in briefs like this because it means that all three pieces look coherent. 

What went wrong:

One issue I had during this project was time management, which usually isn't something that I find difficult but I think being that it was one of the first practical tasks we were set after summer, I forgot how to pace myself. I went all out at the beginning getting really into the roughs and making lots of work, but then when I'd chosen my final three ideas I lost momentum and didn't experiment or play as much as I could have. I felt I already wanted to work with ink because I'd been enjoying using that in my personal work but I should have trialled it out more in my book as now I can see that the images might have looked good as a collage.

What I'll improve on next time: 

Next time I'll obviously manage my time better, but I also want to try and push the limits of the frame more and be a bit more playful with it. The way my brain works tends to mean that I go for more simple compositions as I personally find those more easy to understand, but the portrait image of Carter herself is maybe my favourite and it has the most sparse composition. Its really out of my nature to go for something so simplistic as well but I really liked the ambiguity of it and would like to make more work like this in the future because I think it looks the most evocative. 

Study Task 3- 3 Print Based Illustrators

Pippa Toole:

• SO EXCITED BY HER WORK
• lots of cool bikers and witches and strong ladies
• BIG into DIY culture so most of her print making is based around risograph printing
• very jagged lines and shapes but LOTS of texture
• opaque
• great contrast between high-key and low-key colours
• SIMPLE but that works well for riso printing

Kristyna Baczynski:

• again, mainly riso and very DIY
• images are like a big jumble of lots of things going on at once
• patterns, repeats, limited colour 
• muted colour palettes, pastels
• LOVE how she fuses character, words, animals, lines and pattern into one zine
• very fluid looking, although they're printed so obviously have to be planned out before hand they look very natural, HOW?
• need to learn about risograph printing

JooHee Yoon:

• Screen print and lithography
• very limited colours
• AMAZING detail, lots of textures to create depth
• plays with overlapping really well 
• some look like they could be lino?

Printed Pictures Proposal

STUDIO BRIEF 2 PROJECT PROPOSAL: Production & Presentation of my Printed Pictures

I intend to produce ……

A set of prints that portray the unintentionally feminist view of Angela Carter, centred around the strong women she writes about. Maybe including herself as one of those strong women. I’d like to identify the motifs, objects and themes that describe the character the most and explore those in each print. I assume these prints will probably end up as screen prints but I’d also like to play around with how they might shape up as lino prints as well as I think this style might suit the dark subject matter.

The content will focus on (identify 3 specific themes, texts or concepts)

1. The loneliness and isolation of Angela Carters life 2. Strong females including Carter herself and the women she writes about in The Bloody Chamber 3. The relationship between animals and humans

I will be aiming to communicate (identify 3 specific messages, ideas, moods etc.)

1. Feminine strength and power 2. Darkness 3. Opulence

To an audience of ….. (name 3 characteristics)

1. Creative 2. Bookworm 3. Ladies?

Study Task 1- Zine

What I'm happy with:

• the overall effect of the zine is pretty dark and evocative, but with an edge of humour which reflects Carters dark humour 
• I'm pleased with the fact that I haven't over worked this zine as it was supposed to be a quick task, I've used methods that I learnt last year like collage and scanning/ photo manipulation to make the process a bit quicker

What I feel I could have improved:

• although it didn't take too long to make it does look obviously rushed and messy in some places. The page with the blood drops on especially offends my eyes as I'm such a perfectionist
• I also realised I literally didn't include any drawings that I'd done in response to the author or her work

My feedback:

• the images and quotes linked well
• really like the paper-cut type
• really clear facts about the author
• good use of colour
• could include more of your own drawings
• not sure who the author is
• include more about the work of the author
• could of cut the edges with a guillotine, to make it look neater 

My Thoughts:

• Although I am mostly happy with the outcome of my zine, I do agree with the more negative feedback. Looking back at the zine it really isn't clear who the author is if you're not me and haven't been researching her all summer! I can also see that although it was good that I included a lot of information about the author, I think I got too wrapped up in that and forgot to put any effort into the craft of the zine. I think considering this was just a quick exercise I'm happy with the outcome as I think its made me realise how exciting and engaging I find my author and it makes me excited to carry on making work based around her and her work.

Study task 2 - Editorial Illustrators

Robert Frank Hunter:

• I've admired his work for a while since I saw a few of his books that were published by Nobrow, as I really liked his blocky, colourful screen-printed style. I was looking at illustrators for the NY times and his really stuck out to me. Although he's only done a few that I could find, I really enjoy the digital but still organic looking effect they have with the tapered lines and the crayon(?) textures. The colour palette is limited in both images I've found but that doesn't make the illustrations any less powerful and emotive. 

Jun Cen:

• His illustrations seem really intriguing and relevant to my practise and this project in particular because a lot of them look like they've been screen printed. His work uses clever perspective, colour and utilises all of the limited space he's given to create effective and immediately compelling illustrations. Even in the brighter, more vibrant ones theres a really sensitive quality to them, I really enjoy the feeling that they give you a little look into a quiet aspect of someone or somethings private life. 

Angela Carter Is A Babe

Lady Authors

Been researching through the list of authors on the list today and decided because of the way my work from last year was shaping up I definitely want to choose a female author. The original list I started with was:

• Susan Sontag
• Ursua Leguin
• Donna Tartt
• Margaret Atwood
• Angela Carter
• Rachel Carson

All of these authors were from around the time frame of literature that I find myself most drawn to, but upon closer research I realised that Susan Sontag wrote about political activism, Ursula Leguin wrote about Sci-fi and fantasy and Rachel Carson wrote about marine biology. Although I find these all interesting in their own right I felt they weren't in keeping with my emerging interests. 

From here I researches the three remaining authors and just wrote down what I found out about them that stood out to me:

Donna Tartt:

Pros:

- her books are really well known and have been read by lots of people so I should be able to finish them?

- like the idea that she discusses social status and aesthetic, not something I'd usually discuss myself

- very descriptive and seems to be a lot of visuals to work with

Cons:

- her books are neo-romantic in style and famously very dense and descriptive

- doesn't discuss female issues or have really any female main characters in her books

- The Goldfinch is 700 freaking pages long

Margaret Atwood:

Pros:

- she does discuss feminism, most of her protagonists being females under patriarchal rule

- her books are slightly shorter 

- she also wrote some poems inspired by myths and fairy tales

Cons:

- Handmaids tale has been adapted to TV recently and I worry this might make her work a little bit over saturated at the moment for me to make anything original

Angela Carter:

Pros:

- Her background is SO interesting, she was born during the war in Eastbourne and moved to Tokyo for two years in her 30's. Travelled a lot, didn't get along with her mum who was very straight laced and was fluent in French and German

- she was fiercely feminist

- a lot of her books talk about sexuality, women, escapist fairy tales and gender

- not only has she written novels, but also books of poems and short stories

Cons: 

- NOPE

So definitley going to be researching more into Angela Carter as so far shes been of the most interest to me, although I'll see how it goes. Currently I've got the most excited and inspired whilst researching her though.

Book Research Begins

Today I started my initial research into which author I'll be studying for the summer brief, "about the author". In the Persons Of Note brief I found I encountered problems while researching Dr Nakamatsu. I didn't personally identify or agree or was even particularly interested by his life and work, and all of his experiences were very far from anything I've experienced or try to explore in my work. So because this summer brief is similarly very research focused I realised I'd need to identify the author off the list who I most closely resonates with me. I also need to consider the work of the author because due to my dyslexia I find it quite challenging to read certain types of very dense books as I just don't take them in all that well.

Author Criteria:(if possible, should fit a few of these)

• Female
• More recent work, this is both due to the fact that I find less contemporary, denser books much harder to read and I worry I wouldn't be able to read them in time. Also because I have no memory for historical facts and figures and focusing on more recent history makes things easier for my brain to handle
• Discuss gender, sexuality, feminism, nostalgia? 
• Maybe have not only written novels but short stories or poems as again, I will hopefully feel less daunted by these

Evaluation

This module has most definitely had its ups and downs but I can safely say that its been my favourite of the year. The beginning saw us getting stuck into character design which was something that I thought I was already well practised at, but the fact we were given a random song we had to relate the character to made it that much more challenging. I was given a song called ‘Please’ by Blanck Mass which was really not something I’d ordinarily listen too, but I still really enjoyed just taking time to sit and listen to the little parts and pick it apart to try and find a character in there. I ended up making my character a space yeti called Richardo who I have become way too attached too over the last few months, one of the hightlights of this project was the amount of time we were allowed just to get to think our characters personality through and get to know them. I feel like this really helped me when it came to animating the way he would move. Before this module GIFs were an alien and terrifying concept to me, which I’d seen but had no clue how they even worked, but I went in a little bit too determined to learn something new as I feel like I’ve been lazy and stuck my head in the sand before when its come to learning new digital things. Now I can see what a valuable skill this is too have and I 100% think that I’ll be making more GIFs in the future as they really helped make my character that extra bit more three dimensional. They can still be a little bit frustrating because I think they need more accuracy and attention to detail than just drawing but now I know the process its a lot less scary. I also started to feel like a lot more of my personality was coming out in my character designs and especially in Ricardo. 

The sticker brief of the project was my favourite, even if it was daunting at first. The brainstorming and roughing part of this brief was some of the best times I think I’ve had on this course so far as it really made me realise how many things I care about and how I can use illustration as a platform to talk about those things and make them visual so that they can be understood by more people. I ended up going with a few ideas centred around catcalls, body positivity and not being a dick, all of which I talk very passionately about. Making the final sticker on Adobe Illustrator is something I’ve never done before but thought I’d really struggle with as I often find it hard to see the logic in digital processes, however learning how to use Ai in this module has literally changed my practise for good. I don't know why I feel so differently about Ai than I do about photoshop, maybe its using vectors or the freedom you can have with it? Either way I find it so satisfying and simple to use and I think I’m using it well enough now that you still get a sense of my hand of the maker through it, it still looks like something that was made by me. We also had to stick to a two colour palette for the stickers which is something that at first I used to really struggle with but now I can see that it helps to give the work more of a focus and look a bit more professional. I made my stickers black and purple and ended up going with the body positivity theme, it was during this brief that I realised I could see myself making things like this for real in the future.

The final brief was defiantly the hardest and I don't just think it was because it was nearing the end of term. I did mine on Yoshiro Nakamatsu, a Japanese inventor and all round crazy person, who I’ve really come to love. But at first I found the research element to the project really hard, even though I’m someone who has always thought I’m quite good at doing extensive research. I think the reason I disliked this brief so much at first was that it felt eerily similar to visual narratives which was really challenging and was mostly self led, and compared to the first two briefs of this project which has been quite restrictive and had a clear direction it all felt really daunting. Its not that I don't like choosing how I lead the project, I really like deciding which parts I’ll choose to focus on and which media and colours to use, its just that in a project like this one where we only had three weeks to research, develop and make, it felt like we had to make a lot of decisions in not a lot of time, and in that situation I’m always scared I’ll focus on something rubbish then only realise when its too late to change it. Luckily we had a lot of crits and feedback sessions which I found immensely helpful, I think when I spend too much time with a project my head becomes a bit cloudy and I struggle to see if what I’m making is any good. I started by playing around with gouache and whilst I was really enjoying the process it felt pretty tedious having used more digital methods for the last few projects. I struggled to come to terms with this change in myself during crits and on my blog, as a lot of people seemed to really like the use of wet media, I just wasn't enjoying making things with it. So I decided to start translating some of the sketches I’d worked up into Ai, this took a while at first and the first few looked horrendous, but after a few goes I found my feet, and felt I was able to put my own spin on the process and make it look my own. I did really enjoy portraying Nakamats in this way

even if I found it hard at first, I think what I’ve learnt from this is that in a similar way to narratives, I need to focus on smaller areas of information during research, and to make what I enjoy creating, because overall thats what I’ll be motivated enough to continue with and learn the most from. 

Overall this has been the module where I have begun to feel most like a real illustrator and there are so many reasons for this such as the sheer amount of hours I worked on the things I was creating, I was working from 9 to 6 every day and feeling really great about it because I could rest easy knowing that I’d put all the effort I could into it, but also it was easy because I was enjoying it. Theres also the fact that I got to put a lot more of myself into the briefs, which I have come to learn from this and the other briefs isn’t a bad thing. Its driven me to be more passionate and involved in the process, as well as more in touch with myself and how my practise makes me feel. Its also led to me finding out how to use some valuable processes which I know I’ll use again, without this brief I might not have found out how to use Ai, and although I know I cant rely on it for everything, I think it has greatly helped me in simplifying my practise where I used to needlessly over-complicate things. I’m leaving this module behind, feeling both sad and relieved that its over, but excited to put more of myself into my practise and get stuck into the next project as much as I have into this one.

Note To Self: TIMETABLE EVERYTHING

Was writing my evaluation and I realised that even though I slipped up a few times like with being a bit tight for time in the last week of this brief, this was the first module I'd properly timetabled and I think you can really tell. Its payed off as I've finished now and feel so much more relaxed about it because I can see that I have everything done, why don't I do this more often? (cause I'm lazy)

IMPROVEMENTS

After finishing the A2 print I realised there was a few improvements I could make to the postcards so they looked more like they were actually part of a series. 




All I really did was add a few more of the wiggly pool lines to the postcards, I think its made then look a bit more dynamic and hopefully makes them look a bit more related to the A2 postcards and stamps. I also changed the image on the right so that it didn't look like Nakamats was under the sea as I realised that it didn't really make sense and I also preferred the 'V' shape of the other images.

Sir Dr's Finished Posters

Today I've been in the mac suite making the images that will be printed out at A2 to become my poster, I did so many roughs in my book because I literally had no idea what I wanted my A2 poster to be. At first I thought it would be something similar to the first image I did of Nakamats diving in that test tube shaped pool as I did really like the composition of that in the beginning, but when I started thinking more things through I realised there was so many more dynamic composition ideas that communicated the idea of him struggling to hold his breath more and the first one just didn't really show any of that. So these are the two that I've made:





Good points:

• I really like the composition of this one, a lot. I like that it means that you can see his full body and the little pair of speedos he would wear whilst diving, and I think the larger image frame gives you more of an impression that he is fully underwater, and how opressive that is
• The colours on this and the others have turned out really well, for some reason I find it so much easier to work within a confined colour palette in Ai than with analogue media? 
• This one is also quite good at leading you into the picture, I feel like your line of sight is drawn first to the figure, then down where the bubbles lead and then to the white explosion of light, so in a sense you kind of follow Nakamats down on his dive

Bad points:

• His left hand makes me laugh a little bit... not sure what happened there or why it looks like a fin, but thats ok? 

Good Points:

• I think this one really captures the expression of running out of air/ panic on his face, I think its partly down to his eyes and the bubbles where his mouth would be but I really like that. 
• This one is more closely cropped but I think that also helps with portraying the expression on his face, as it means you can see it in more detail

Bad points:

• I don't know if this one is too closely cropped, maybe it looks a bit too much like the postcards? Its the same kind of format just in a bit more detail and I don't know if thats interesting enough for the poster format
• I don't like that we can't see his full body in this one

Conclusion?: 

• I think I'll probably end up printing the first one at A2, although I like them both I think the first one is a bit more dynamic and interesting, its also the only one where we can see his body in full so it gives you a bit more of a sense of what he was like as a person

Stamps!!!!!!!!

Finished my stamps today! I ended up just going with making tiny little zoomed in sections of the objects that we see Nakamats wearing/using underwater on Ai. Now I'm looking at these I know these might not have been the most clever idea I've ever had, but I think that sums up this project for me, I'm nearly through it and I've made some OK work but I wouldn't say any of it is the kind of work I could see myself seriously making for myself or in the future?

Good points:

• They are really in keeping with the rest of the things I've made for this module and theres a really distinctive visual style with them all
• I think they tell the story of Nakamats's underwater creative process quite well? These are the fundamental elements of his thought process and all play a part behind his inventions so I guess they're quite important to this project
• I shockingly really liked working to this size, especially on Ai because you can work at a normal scale and the scale it down when you're printing it. Theres no way I could have got this precise detail using analogue methods at this size, it would have been way too fiddly! 
• I've also found the process of working digitally really satisfying in that it makes it easy to make a lot of work really quickly that looks really high quality, it also makes it really easy to make changes to work you've already done if you change your mind about it (something I'm thinking about with my postcard designs)

Bad points:

• As I said before I am fully aware this isn't my most developed work and there maybe isn't much of a story behind this? But thats due to me managing my time quite badly and running out of time to generate any more ideas
• I don't know if I've done as much as I could have with the frame of the stamps? maybe I could have filled the frame more and played with composition a bit more

Breakthrough?

I've spent the whole of today in the mac suites plugging away at my postcard designs and making them look... not so shit. 

So far this is what I've come up with:

I'm still not 100% on all of them and I'll most likely hate them by tomorrow but for now I'm pretty chuffed with them.

Whats gone well:

• The colour scheme is pretty damn good in my opinion, the yellow and blues look really sharp and dynamic, and the black detail helps to outline the basics of what Nakamats looks like whilst he'd diving
• The media fits the purpose of the illustration really well, because its all been done digitally, not only have I ended up with beautiful clean lines but I was also able to make some of the details slightly more translucent to convey that sense of being underwater
• I think (hope) that these are more evocative than what I was making before, partly down to the colour scheme but also the jagged shapes that you can create on Ai, also I've been trying to think a lot more of composition in these last few drawings which I think can be the difference between something look flat and unrealistic like the first few Ai drawings I did to looking more dynamic like these

What I need to do now:

• Now I need to put my efforts into making the stamps and the poster which I really don't have a clue what I'm doing for, but I need to start brainstorming in my sketchbook
• Decide whether to carry on with working digitally (I'm tempted, its quick and really satisfying and I think looks pretty effective for what I'm trying to show here) or to experiment with monoprinting? 

Breakdown

I woke up this morning absolutley panicking about getting everything done on time for this submission next week because I realised that it wasn't just one piece of work that needed doing it was 8 and I really haven't prepared myself. So I started early and went on with what I'd been doing yesterday which was using gouache to paint Nakamats diving for ideas. I did one painting and realised that A) it had taken me about 2 hours to do, and B) I wasn't even that happy with the finished thing which was so disheartning. So i started roughing the ideas for my stamps and postcards just to kick my brain into gear a bit. I actually liked a few of the outcomes that I came up with during this little brainstorm so I went into the Mac suites and started trying to create it with Ai, this is what I got:








Obviously these are no where near complete but I think they're massively more interesting and dynamic than the paintings I'd been doing, AND it means I'd be using a material that I don't always use (unlike gouache). The composition of these is making me a bit happier so I'm going to go back into the studio tomorrow and keep working on these. I'm also going to see about going into the print room and trying to do some monoprints.

I just want to be good at making pictures

What is successful?:

Immediacy, being able to understand and identify with something as soon as you see it. Whether this is through a really clever idea, or really striking visual style, or both? Simplicity usually seems to be a good way to achieve this? Also anything that makes you feel something is a success in my mind, whether you can look at it and feel a sense of the mood the person was trying to get across in that work is really important but hard to achieve, its something I'm really struggling with at the moment. 

What is great?

The thought process and consideration that go on behind work are what makes it great, anyone can make something that is technically good, but it takes experimentation with different methods, iterations, roughs and mistakes to actually learn whether what you're putting together is the best it can be. I guess a big part of what makes something look good is selecting the appropriate way to tell your story to best make the point you're trying to make

How is this project exceptional?

At the moment, I'm not feeling too much like its exceptional, which is really making me sad. But I know is largely down to my rubbish mood and feeling so overwhelmed, and it really is a shame because what makes this project so exceptional is that we get the opportunity to tell someone Else's life story through our work any way that we choose. And more than that the people we've been given are fascinating and theres a lot of really amazing information to be conveying in our images. Whilst I've been seeing this as a really scary thing as it means the pressures on to portray as much information as possible in a short amount of time, also doing it in the most effective way possible and do this person justice, I do need to start seeing it as exciting, because it is. And just like with visual narratives which started off so broad and overwhelming, I need to look at what I can do to narrow down my area of research so that I'm only trying to show one small aspect that makes up this mans life. In my head I'm worried that no ones going to understand the outcomes if they're not these all encompassing, complex masterpieces which is ridiculous because we can be as abstract as we like. As long as there is a sense of emotion and feeling that reflects this amazing man and his life in the work I produce then surely the work will have succeeded? I'm just not sure if thats the same thing as it being great.

Feedback session (negative moodiness)

Today we had a very long and very scary feedback session for the work we'd done so far, which in my case was not as much as I could have done simply because I've been so stuck on this project so far. 

What I learnt:

• people really liked the analogue stuff that I'd done and didn't seem too fussed about the illustrator work, which is good because I also liked the way the analogue things looked and the general consensus seems to be that wet media works better to portray the feeling of being underwater
• however, even though people seem to like the use of gouache, and I really enjoy using it too, I feel like I tried to push the boat out with the digital work and it still hasn't worked out? Anything I could do on Ai I feel like I could also do using analogue media if not do it better. Maybe I'm wrong but that's what it feels like at the moment and I'm worried it looks like I've not experimented at all and always play it safe using the same materials
• the swimming pool idea has been a success and will 100% be the idea that I take forward, which is good because I've run out of time to think of trying much else
• I need to be more specific, honing in on certain feelings I'm trying to evoke using an image and focusing on smaller scenes at once and in less detail. REMEMBER, things can be abstract

After the session I went home and just roughed up a lot more compositions of a similar thing I'd been doing before but focused on a smaller section of it. I wanted to show the feeling of desperation and near death state that Nakamats would be in, and the oppressiveness of being surrounded by water:

The second version is a bit better in my opinion as it actually looks more like him, the skin tone is better and the gestures stronger. I've realised its really hard to show someones reaching really determinedly underwater, none of the arm gestures look strong enough so that's something I need to work on tomorrow. But in terms of composition and process I'm chuffed with this, its a bit more evocative than the things I was doing before which is something I'm striving for. Tomorrow is a new day, and hopefully this will all be less of a struggle then, I'm going to go in to the studio and work more on making this image say something important, and maybe the rest of the brief will start to follow on from that? really not feeling too positive about this project. Maybe its because its close to the end of term and I'm mentally exhausted or maybe this topics too broad for my weird organised brain but I'm really finding it a struggle to make anything I like and think of as good illustration at the moment which is very disheartening. I think maybe I need to rest on it, think about what I'm trying to do with this project and then try again tomorrow? ahhhhhhhhhh help