Finishing Illumination

Today we had our feedback session and final crit of our illumination editorial brief. I have to admit, this ones been really hard, and its really not been something I felt I've excelled at, but considering this my final images went down well.

What went well:

According to my peer feedback sheet, the elements of my work that were the most well received were the colour scheme used ( and how this matched the article), the materials and processes (the collage) and the simplicity of the images. I was SO chuffed with people commenting on the simplicity as this was something I really had to remind myself to do, to simplify what normally would have been very complex images in my work. Its shown me that it is possible and therefore I will do it again.

What can be improved:

I actually got some really interesting critical feedback from this session, with a number of people suggesting that I used digital process to enhance the hand- drawn images. This is something I briefly did on the computer but only to neaten. Maybe now I could try editing colours and textures. Someone else suggested using textiles and sewing which was a suggestion that made me really excited. I've used this kind of process in work before and forgot how much I'd enjoyed it but can't wait to use it again soon!

The final suggestions were that I scanned in my images to flatten them which is actually something I had done but now realise it would have been more helpful to lay both handmade and scanned versions out side by side maybe for people to decide which worked better? As when put next to each other me and Holly both agreed we liked the handmade ones more.

Overall this project went much better than expected and I surprised myself by working successfully within size and colour constraints. I was also pleased that my peers managed to work out the themes of the images and didn't seem too confused by them.

Finally Finishing The Collage

TODAY I FINALLY FINISHED THE COLLAGE PORTION OF MY PEICES FOR ILLUMINATION. I'm so relieved because they actually turned out better than expected and I didn't even need to scale them up!

What went well:
I think the colour palette and the different textures really work well together and help give an otherwise simple image some interesting layers. I also think that the characters within those images work well together whilst still having different themes, you can still tell they correlate and belong to the same set. 

What could have gone better:
I was a bit messy and managed to get some glue marks on a lot of the paper, theres also a little crease down the middle of one of the pages. 

What next:
Now I'm going to scan these images into the computer both to enhance them in photoshop (get rid of the glue and creases etc), and to print out to look more finished.

Using New Lines

After our seminar about line quality I've been trying to encourage myself to use my sophisticated line qualities and generally just give more consideration to what kind of lines I'm using and where. I chose to use the motif of some wrestlers faces in all my line drawings as I think they're quite interesting and enjoy experimenting with the colours and features of each different character. 

These two were some of my favourite outcomes. I used some thick graphite and quick, hard lines in conjunction with soft shading for detail. This was both quick and effective to do which is a mega bonus. However, I'm not quite sure how you would go about adding colour to this, maybe this is something that could be done on photoshop?

Photoshop Task

Today I finally managed to feel confident enough in what I was doing on photoshop to edit my favourite ink drawing from the other week. I mainly only messed with the colour balance and the hue/saturation but I think they turned out ok! 

My original image

Edit 1:

For this one I mainly edited the levels of the image and ended up with this nice paler version of the original image. I think it would look effective for a children's book or maybe something with writing layered over it.

Edit 2:

For this one all I did was moved the hue and the saturation up. I'm not sure if this looks very good as it kind of gives the leaves a mouldy effect but its ok.

Edit 3:

I thought this one worked really well as it got some of the mouldy colours and some nice blues and pinks in there too. On this one the hue is at the highest level that it can be.


Edit 4:

I only really left this one in because the leaves in it look really autumnal and thats really fitting because its October now. I think this edit gives the most realistic life to this ink drawing and could see myself using it to colour other plant drawings. The hue is relatively low on this one. 


Edit 5:

On this one all I've done is gone to colour balance and upped the green and the yellow to get this nice leafy green. This one made it a lot more obvious that what I was working with was in fact a drawing of some leaves. I like it. In another edit I also used the brush tool to draw around some of the leaves which I quite like although its really time consuming.







Edit 6:

This ones a lot more stylised but definitely one of my favourites. I upped the magenta and red in the colour balance and it turned this really nice pink colour which I think brought out the line detail more. I also did another edit where I tried to fill in the blank space on the page with more leaves by copying a section of them and pasting. I need to work on this a little more but it looks ok.



In conclusion- I'm really still not proficient on photoshop but I am getting there. Practise makes perfect.

Line Quality Is Ace

Today in our SP groups we learnt about quality of line and how important it is in making a quality drawing. We started off by learning the principles of line quality, which were very interesting but hard to wrap your head around (for me anyway). We then sat and made three different sheets of marks, one straight lines, one circle, one square and one zig zag, this was really challenging but made me realise that I really only ever use either a fine pencil line or a thin fine-liner line. 

We then made a few portraits of people in our class using our marks, which was so interesting, I only made two as I realised it takes so much longer to make a decent image using a method your'e not used to. But my favourite one was the one using the end of a paintbrush and ink. I really like the varied line thickness and the shaky effect it gives. This method also makes it really easy to build colour starting with light strokes and adding more ink to create depth.

Using a thick square brush and quick strokes

Using the end of a paintbrush and ink

Illumination Briefing

My quick-fire drawings to describe 'measure'

Yesterday we were briefed on the editorial unit were going to be beginning called illumination. First we did the quick fire drawings to try and describe a word we were given (mine was measure), in small squares. Everyone guessed my subject within a few second which hopefully means I might do ok at communicating the subject in the article? We were then given a random article and are being asked to make three illustrations in response to the article to illustrate what is being said. The article I was given is called 'Why the age of loneliness is killing us' by George Monbiot. Sadly he doesn't sound like the kind of man I'd get on with in real life because for the most part I thought his article sounded like he was making a problem out of not much, however he did make some good points. I'm going to start with my roughs tonight and see how it goes.

Final Typology Poster

Yesterday we had our mega crit where we all handed in our typology posters for the visual skills brief. Some of the feedback I received was lovely and I really enjoyed looking at everyone Else's work, there was such a diverse range of media and crafting.

What I think went well:

Personally I really enjoyed creating and developing all the characters that featured on the poster, especially the basket lady, and giving them all their own personality's and quirks. I think they were quite effective as they seemed to make people laugh which is ace! I also really enjoyed the quality of the paper that I worked on (haha that sounds really sad) as it allowed the fine-liner and pro markers to have a much better flow and made the colours look a bit more interesting. 

What I think could have gone better:

I think had I not been so panicked about the way my poster was structured and just taken a bit more time and care mapping it all out, ironically it probably would have looked better structure wise. It was OK but some of the vignettes that I didn't like as much ended up being bigger on the page than some of my favourites. I also fudged up the end of the calligraphy style title at the top of the page which was annoying.