Exercise 4.1: Identifying tools and materials

For this exercise students are asked:

Find a range of illustrators who use a particular medium.
Catalogue and analyse the illustrators according to the similarities in their work.
Choose one image and write about the way this illustrator works.
Choose an image created for an earlier exercise and render it using the same tools and materials as the chosen artist.
Choose a very different artwork and repeat the process.

I had no idea where to begin with this exercise. I feel like I can’t name many illustrators off the top of my head except those I found through instagram and I wanted to use this opportunity to expand my knowledge and keep working to push myself to experiment more.
From the choices suggested in the course material I naturally gravitated towards the traditional mediums but wanted to try something new and looked into the digital collage option.

Naturally, I started with a google of ‘digital collage artists’. One of the suggestions was Max Ernst which I found strange due to the fact that he lived 1891-1976. (I later discovered that Google had chosen to ignore the ‘digital’ in my search) I looked him up on Wikipedia and the first thing it mentioned was his creation of the frottage and grattage techniques where one scrapes a pencil over paper which has an object underneath, or the same but with oil and canvas instead of paper and pencil. I found this really interesting and different but could be a bit limited in some ways.

I returned back to the list of suggested artists and next was Hannah Höch (1889-1978). Höch was also a Dada artist like Ernst, and was one of the originators of photomontage.
These were interesting but I was interested in contemporary artists, too. I focused my search and found website page about a book on collage makers.
From this resource I found three artists: Damien Blottiere, Marcelo Monreal and Rocio Montoya.
These artist all use digital techniques to create portraits, with some using floral imagery to create the effect of flowers growing from the face.

The study material asked a few questions to encourage analysis of the artists’ work:
“How do they distort or exaggerate the representation of elements in their work?” I think this question is hard to answer in a specific way just by looking at their work, aside from the obvious photo editing software, but I did find a more detailed tutorial where an artist shows how to create a Marcelo Monreal inspired portrait:

This video really helped me to appreciate the details of what I at first considered a straight-forward image. Making the cut-out section of the face look 3D required a few smaller steps that make a huge difference to the finished piece.

The second question asks, “How do they communicate through use of metaphor or symbols?” Due to the nature of these digital collage artists’ work, I find this question difficult to answer because I don’t know much about portraits and feel that they are quite literal and flowers are added to make the image look more attractive. Some of Rocio Montoya’s images are more artistic than a straight-forward portrait, for example the image below:

I felt a connection to this image; It made me think of nature, our connection to it and how we as humans affect things in nature on a larger scale. I noticed the angle of the ace and the hand are the same, and the lines of the shirt collar and finger draw my eye towards the leaf. I really appreciate the section of leaf lined up with the middle finger, it has been slightly altered to show a sliver of space and adds to the illusion Montoya is creating.

The next step in this exercise asks to recreate a previous visual created for an earlier exercise and to render it using the same tools and materials as the chosen artist. I went back to the beginning to one of my first exercises of producing the image of a hare in the style of another illustrator Katy Scott, with the final result:

I think this image will easily lend itself to the collage exercise. I started by looking again at Montoya’s website and portfolio. Most of the images are portraits and some of them are created with paper and then edited digitally, besides the other collages created by digital techniques alone. I think it’s hard to separate digital collage from traditional as they are mixed together often.

To begin the exercise I found an image similar to the original photo used for the original exercise:

By Jean-Jacques Boujot from Paris, France – Lièvre brun / Brown Hare, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=37547558

I then edited the image following the tutorial and using my own photographs of freesias, and edited the colouring of the overall image also:

So as you can see, the completed image doesn’t match exactly the illustration I was trying to recreate. I found it difficult due to relying on photographs and trying to imitate the style of the artist, too. I think the overall idea is similar to the original illustration in that you can see ‘inside’ the hare where there are, not organs, but plants growing.

For the next step in the exercise I am to choose an artwork very different from the first image.
I decided on this illustration from Part 2:

As this man in the image is visally based on Clement Attlee, I took a photograph I found that is similar to the above image:

I then tore and scanned some pieces of paper and added some photographs of flowers I took to create the finished image:

I remembered from one of the previous exercises that hot colours are foreground and cool colours are more in the background so I used the red paper to draw attention to his face as the focal point. I tried to create a path to lead the eye from the sunflower, along the paper to the freesia and then down to his face. I was also trying to keep the main feel of the original illustration which was connected to the portion of text, that the man in the room had negative feelings and things were bleak. I think his facial expression in the photograph matches this idea, although the flowers are slightly too happy. I tried altering the saturation but it looked wrong to me. I also tried to make the blue paper a bit more grey to help convey that bleak feeling more.

Reflection after completion of this exercise:
For the first image of the hare, I think I know now why they use people for this kind of collage! They don’t have fur! It looks much more realistic on people due to the smooth skin, but to do this with a furry animal, the fur would need editing more. It seemed quite straight-forward watching the tutorial video on this style of editing but it was really hard to follow.
For the second image I tried to include some scans of ripped paper which seems to be used by collage artists frequently. I feel like it might be a bit simple, but if I add more it might make the image too busy? I have a newfound respect for collage artist both digitally and on paper, after seeing some more process videos, I can see how much attention to little details it requires. I’m not quite sure I ‘get’ collage yet and look forward to trying this more in future.

References:

Rocia Montoya digital collage reference:
Rocio Montoya. 2020. COLLAGE DIGITAL – Rocio Montoya. [online] Available at: <https://rociomontoya.com/portfolio/digital-collage/> [Accessed 4 September 2020].

Collage Makers II reference:
Amellcarolina.com. 2020. Carolina Amell – Collage Makers II. [online] Available at: <https://amellcarolina.com/collage-makers-ii> [Accessed 31 August 2020].

Hare image reference:
Commons.wikimedia.org. 2020. File:Lepus Europaeus (Causse Méjean, Lozère)-Cropped.Jpg – Wikimedia Commons. [online] Available at: <https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lepus_europaeus_(Causse_M%C3%A9jean,_Loz%C3%A8re)-cropped.jpg#/media/File:Lepus_europaeus_(Causse_Méjean,_Lozère)-cropped.jpg> [Accessed 2 September 2020].

Attlee photograph from:
Newstatesman.com. 2020. [online] Available at: <https://www.newstatesman.com/sites/default/files/styles/cropped_article_image/public/blogs_2017/05/gettyimages-3335361.jpg?itok=iESEuMej> [Accessed 4 September 2020].

Assignment three: A poster

The brief for this assignment is to design an illustration for a poster advertising a music event. I chose to design one for a pop group rather than an early music concert or jazz evening as I think there will be a lot of freedom do do a bright illustration compared to my usual ones which don’t use many strong colours.
The first step was to brainstorm and create a moodboard.
I haven’t really ever looked at a music poster before so before starting I googled the subject to see a few examples and get a better idea of this topic.

I decided on Bon Iver in the end. First I looked at their website to check out their style. I took this and their other gig posters and put them into a moodboard:

Once I had got to this stage I felt I had gathered enough data to do a spider diagram:

I then moved on to the thumbnails with the idea of nature and especially pine trees in my mind:

I tried to keep things clean imagining what Bon Iver would actually use rather than my tastes.

I found that the trees weren’t working for me and anything I thought of mostly had already been done with them. I chose thumbnails 8 and 11. Thumbnail 11 is of a river system.
I then researched using Google to find a good arial shot of a similar picture and found this image on the National Geographic website. The picture is from NASA.

Society, N., 2020. *Delta*. [online] National Geographic Society. Available at: <https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/delta/> [Accessed 16 June 2020].

The accompanying text is quite interesting:

A river moves more slowly as it nears its mouth, or end. The slowing velocity of the river and the build-up of sediment allows the river to break from its banks and develop new channels, called distributaries. This process is called avulsion. Here, the distributary network of the Lena River delta undergoes avulsion as it empties into the Arctic Ocean in Russia.
National Geographic

I found this subject really interesting and gave me a feel for how I would like to proceed with the illustration. So here are my two line visuals:

I wanted the river system to cover the entire page and to add the text on top so I added the text after I scanned the image using photoshop. Before completing the line visuals I favoured the leaf image but it didn’t look so interesting next to the river image so I chose to create the colour visual of the river:

I think it’s turned out ok, a few things to fix but it’s not bad. I used photoshop to add the colour. I chose the blue and green colours from the moodboard I produced earlier, but I think the blue may need to look a bit more blue as it almost looks a bit green especially in a smaller image like a phone screen. I sent it to my mum (of course) and she said it looked a bit green on her phone, too.
I also found an actual concert date for Manchester on Bon Iver’s website so I changed the date and time to match that.
In terms of title of the event, on Bon Iver’s actual concert posters they don’t give them a title so I wasn’t sure what to do about this but in the end I decided to produce another image for this option.
So let’s imagine that my mum is Bon Iver’s creative director or whoever is in charge of these designs. She sees the colour visual and says “No, it’s too green.” So I edit things again and submit my final design:

I then created an additional one with an example of where the event title could go but it looks like I have reached my upload limit for this website so I’ve had to awkwardly embed it from Flickr:

The image is in high resolution and would easily be reproduced in an A3 size. It looks more like ice this way and the water is more blue. There is more contrast which helps to draw the eye. Listening to Bon Iver’s music again whilst looking at the finished illustration, I think it matches well too.

On reflection after finishing the poster I’m much happier with this illustration than my previous assignment! It did take ages but a lot of that time was spent looking at fonts, researching and planning and downloading Photoshop brushes. I shy away from colouring using photoshop so it was a bit out of my comfort zone. I definitely felt the pinch not using a Wacom tablet and would like to invest in one for future.
Looking back on the moodboard it looks a bit basic and I could have added some outside examples of the feel rather than Bon Iver’s other concert posters.
It threw me a bit to create something whilst having what the ‘client’ would like in the back of my mind and so I focused on what they had already used. I’m not sure where the illustrator’s style and what the client wants fit together. But overall, I’m happy with the image.

Exercise: Making a mock-up

This goal of this exercise is to mock-up a book cover.
The book I have chosen is called The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. I have owned this book a long time and haven’t read it in years.
I first re-read the blurb.

The curious incident of the dog in the night-time is a murder mystery novel like no other.The detective, and narrator, is Christopher Boone. Christopher is fifteen and has Asperger’s Syndrome. He knows a very great deal about maths and very little about human beings. He loves lists, patterns and the truth. He hates the colours yellow and brown and being touched. He has never gone further than the end of the road on his own, but when he finds a neighbour’s dog murdered he sets out on a terrifying journey which will turn his whole world upside down.
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. Blurb

Noted at the bottom of the page: Cover illustration copyright Marc Boutavant; cover design copyright Suzanne Dean; hand lettering copyright Tim Marrs.
I gather from this that Suzanne Dean, whose job title is Creative Director (stated on her instagram profile as there was nothing in the ‘about’ section on her website) possibly created the client visual herself and then Marc Boutavant created the final illustration for it.
In any case, the next thing I considered was the brief that would have been given for this book cover.

So here is my attempt at the brief:
Create a book cover for The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.
Follow the client visual provided by Suzanne Dean but in your own style. (Optional, to be included if she did make the visual)
Leave space at the top and bottom for text to be added later.
We want the image to perform the function of prompting curiosity and to draw people to it when they see the book on sale in stores.
Keep in mind this story is supposedly written by a teenage boy. This may influence style.

This is a murder mystery novel so I think something similar to the original illustration will be good.
Here is the cover of the book I have:

So I started. I thought first of all about doing a spider diagram but the parameters are more strict for this stage, so the next thing I moved on to was thumbnails. I used a vertical rectangle to keep the thumbnail the same proportions as the finished illustration and keeping this idea in mind- Victim: dog, murder weapon: rake, location of murder: Outside garden, and time of death: night-time.

Here are the thumbnails:

I chose to use thumbnail 4 as it would create contrast and be more eye-catching. I then made a line visual of this thumbnail layout:

I then thought about what materials to use. I have been trying to use different materials and wanted to avoid watercolours as I use them often. I decided to use watercolour pencils, take a scan and then add water and overlay the dry image onto the wet one to preserve texture.

Here are the wet and dry images:

I then used photoshop to edit the image and add the text:

I don’t currently own a printer so I was unable to test out a printed version but the digital image is in proportion to the book.
As you can see, the final image is quite different to the first drawing. I’m happy with the night sky and the house silhouette, I didn’t expect that to turn out so well. I’m a bit annoyed with the horizon line and I would have liked to use different font. I think the fonts I used were ok, I couldn’t find the perfect one to use so I will need to buy some more fonts.
I think there isn’t so much contrast as I originally hoped but it looks pretty!

Exercise: Client visuals

In this exercise the main task was to choose two finished illustrations and work backwards gradually creating more basic line drawings.

I used the book ‘Animal’ for the two illustrations. It is a very large, heavy book so I had a bit of trouble scanning it:

And here are my line drawings for Smokey Bear:

Next are the line drawing for the United States $10 Bill:

I made things hard for myself choosing currency as the whole point of the detail is to stop people copying it. Even in this simplified form it is still recognisable as a ten dollar note.
I found it fairly straightforward working backwards, and it was an interesting exercise in reading an image and working out what is the most essential aspect of it that gets the main point across and it has helped me to know more clearly what to look for when I see an illustration in future.
My last task was to find more images that show art direction and to explain the thinking behind them.

I picked two of Yuko Shimizu’s illustrations as I can see the art direction in a many of her illustrations.

SHIMIZU, Y., 2020. *The Chronicle Of Higher Education #Metoo*. [online] Yuko Shimizu. Available at: <http://yukoart.com/work/the-chronicle-of-higher-education-metoo/> [Accessed 15 June 2020].

You Can see from the illustration above the message is very clear and instantly recognisable. This illustration was created during the Me Too movement and shows a professional business woman or office worker and the environment she is in. It gives you an instant feeling of what her own feelings are too, even though you can’t see her expresssion. I think showing the back of her head indicates that this is any woman. It represents many women in the workplace rather than a specific woman in particular.

SHIMIZU, Y., 2020. *Boston College Law Magazine –The Shame Of Guantánamo–*. [online] Yuko Shimizu. Available at: <http://yukoart.com/work/boston-college-law-magazine-the-shame-of-guantanamo/> [Accessed 15 June 2020].

In the second illustration by Shimizu above, it doesn’t contain a wide range of content but once again the meaning is very clear, by his appearance we learn some information about the man, and the fact that he is looking directly at the viewer tells me there is a sense of responsibility they want you to feel, that you need to be aware of this problem and connect emotionally. The inclusion of the dove in the top right helps the composition as it draws the eye in a diagonal fashion along with the wire fence to point towards the man, and it gives a sense of freedom and lack of freedom, as the bird flies away over the fence, the man is left behind.

Reflecting upon completion of this exercise, it was fairly straightforward once I started as mentioned earlier but it took me a while to fully grasp the concept. I feel more like I know what I’m looking for now, and how I could quickly create client visuals that get the client’s message across clearly.
I found it easy to scale up the image but the line drawings were actually harder than I thought they’d be. I think I would prefer them to look more professional of course and will keep practicing this idea in future when I come across other illustrations.

References:

n.d. Animal: Exploring The Zoological World. Phaidon, pp.20, 222.

Exercise: Viewpoint

I have chosen ‘Summertime’ as my theme and used a cap, a couple of sunglasses, a face mask and some climbing and wildlife books, although this year’s summertime could be summed up with a tv and some pyjamas for those of us stuck at home because of that whole virus thing.

I took 30 photos but chose to put 12 here:

I tried placing the items in different positions and tried taking photos close up and at different angles and flash to try to improve the backlighting issue.

I then repeated the exercise with drawing rather than photos as instructed:

I chose the picture 8 layout and drew from life rather than a photo, and used the scaling system to recreate the thumbnail proportions for the larger image:

I think the image is successful although I asked my mum to guess the theme and she said outdoors which could also work, but outdoors is what summertime means to me, anyway.
In the course material we were asked a few questions:

Which viewpoint best fitted the word your objects illustrated? Why was this?
I feel that the eye-level (thumbnail 8) viewpoint worked best as mentioned earlier, the subjects of the books was clearly visible this way which allowed me to show different subjects and thus give more clues as to the theme.
Which format best illustrated your words?
I struggle to understand this question. Words as in my answer to the previous question? Words as in the theme word summertime? In terms of the best format I think the rectangular format worked best as it meant I could include the whole length of the books and the objects were arranged in a rectangular fashion. This allowed more information and as mentioned in my previous answer, more clues about the theme.
Did changing viewpoints make you think differently about your choice of objects and arrangement of them?
Some of the photos show a neater arrangement which seemed ok whilst I was taking photos from a lower angle, but when I began taking photos from above it showed it wasn’t a visually pleasing arrangement because of the bare space on the desk and it didn’t feel like a great composition.

Now that I have completed the exercise I am relieved. I found it hard to decipher the individual steps required to complete it and the thumbnails took me a while to do. I’m happy though because this exercise gave me a chance to draw from life rather than a photograph which is one of the things I received in the part 2 feedback to work on. It was a workout for my brain but I definitely need a lot of practice in this area! There also ended up a fair amount of space in the picture above and below the objects which isn’t great. I will look out for this next time.

Exercise: Giving instructions

I chose ‘Making a cup of tea’ for this exercise on instructional illustrations.

I first looked around my house for reference materials. There were no illustrations on the tea boxes I had but I had this book for different kinds of coffee:

Jobst, M., n.d. Coffee Drinks. pp.50, 55, 60.

I finally have applicable reference material in my house! This is the first exercise where I actually have paper references that I can use. I like these illustrations as they are showing the coffee in a diagrammatic way and they show the temperature by use of colours and shapes. I like the simplicity and clarity of the 2D shapes.

There weren’t many illustrations available when I googled ‘how to make a cup of tea’ but there were a few in a style such as the example below:

https://www.ochaandco.com/pages/how-to-make-green-tea

The illustration above uses a nice homely style which I think is a great choice for this kind of subject. Even the background looks like tea-stained paper, and the illustrations could stand alone without text.

The information I need to impart is quite straightforward the essential things are communication that the water needs to be hot and there needs to be a teabag in the cup! Extras would be things like milk and sugar and an order to the steps. The illustration above uses 7 steps but I think we can reduce it to 3 steps at the least.

The next step was to work out how much space on the paper is needed for each step and how to display them. The course material mentioned to try as many possibilities as you can. Here are the different layouts I tried. Most of the layouts could be used to get the point across but it took a while to make a nice looking one.

I then made a final draft for the layout I wanted to use:

Drew it again on watercolour paper and used watercolour pencils but I didn’t add water to it:

I added the yellow lines next to the cup to both add feeling and aid with the composition to point towards the instructions. It crossed my mind to add writing below for the ingredients but I think people will know to use sugar rather than salt!
Finally, I edited the image in photoshop:

On reflection once I finished the image I felt like some things didn’t stand out much, such as the tea bag in the cup. I tested out a new style of marking which worked well for the water coming from the kettle but other things like the actual kettle would have benefitted from a solid colour. Even the earlier pencil image looks cleaner and easier to understand. But at the very least it gets the point across! It was an interesting process, too.