Project: Hierarchy- Exercise: Reading an image

The constituent parts of the picture from Tom’s Clockwork Dragon by Mark Oliver:

·         Dragon

·         Throne

·         Treasure

·         Weapons

·         Two children or small people

·         Cave

The dragon is asleep in his cave and is curled protectively around a mound of treasure which is topped by a throne.

The tip of the dragon’s tail rests on the seat of the throne, pointing to it like an arrow.

The cave is littered with weapons and two figures look at the dragon that is immense in comparison to them. One hides behind the other suggesting fear and they have their arms raised in expressions of dismay.

The cave entrance is just behind the figures, suggesting that they have come in through it and are not held captive. The figure who stands behind the other gestures backwards towards it as if he wants to go back through it, the other holds his hands out towards the treasure.

The story, as I see it:

The two bounty hunters have tracked down the treasure in the cave only to discover that they must overcome the dragon in order to claim it and the throne.

They can see the evidence of previous battles around them and as the dragon sleeps on they are working out how best to tackle him. One is keen to claim the treasure while the other wants to make a swift exit.

The palette covers a large range; from red right through to purple and the colours are intense. The artist has mostly used differentiation of colour rather than tone to separate the constituent elements.

He has mainly used dark to mid-tones, with lighter tones being reserved to accentuate the details of the weapons, the foremost figure’s hat and the cave opening and very dark tones being used to create shadows around the weapons, the figures and the dragon and his scales.

The colours are mostly hot, even the blues are reddish and the greens yellowish, although they’re slightly cooler on the weapons, in the cave entrance and on the cave wall directly above the dragon.

I’d say the following elements were textural rather than detailed: the rough cave floor, the pile of coins, dragon’s body and the stalactites.

And that the following elements are detailed: the figures; the decoration of the throne; the weapons; the dragon’s claws, teeth and horns.

The hottest elements draw the eye first, so they’re definitely the most important and I’d set the hierarchy as:

• Dragon (largest, hottest object). I saw his back first and my eye was drawn down  to his head by the contrast of the black and white of his horns and front claws, then back up by the line of dark tones shadowing the scales on his back, taking in his back leg, which fills the lower right corner nicely and is accented with white claws, then around his tail to end at the throne.
• The throne and treasure, the use of complementary green for the throne upholstery makes it stand out against the red of the beast.
• The hot sheen on the cave wall above the entrance then draws the eye left.
• The figures then come into view against the lighter tones and cooler colours behind and below them. The front figure’s hat and forelock draw the attention first and then their hands and faces.
• The cave entrance then comes into focus followed by
• The weapons in the lower left corner and then
• The other pile of weapons next to the entrance and finally
• The shadow and cave wall above and to the right of the dragon

Part 3 Exercise: Illustrating Visual Space

I did this exercise with photoshop instead of paper and while it seemed like a ‘cleaner’ way to approach it, it was less flexible because I had to decide through what angle to rotate the images before I pasted them in.

I used 2 sets of images, the first included a running child and bonsai tree that I found through an internet search,

but they were too small to enlarge freely with respect to my building without becoming pixelated,

so I took a photo of a walking child and used one of my photos of a tree and redid it.

When the figure is smaller than the other elements and all the elements are horizontal or vertical with respect to the frame there’s a sense of ‘normality’, of the image being solidly grounded

even when the figure’s in a potentially perilous position.

When the figure is larger than the building there’s a sense of distance even when all the elements lie on the same horizontal line, but actually, looking it at it again I can only see the castle as a toy

Then if I move the building up and add a horizon, it’s big again but far away.

If the elements are at different angles to each other there’s a sense of instability, of imminent movement and energy,

which is exaggerated to the point of chaos if they’re all also at different angles to the frame (as well as being duplicated).

In retrospect I like the image of the running boy much better than my photograph of the walking child as he adds a real sense of dynamism to the overall scene and I think that the bonsai tree image I downloaded has a more pleasing form than my tree photograph. However, my favourite scene overall is the one in which the child has wandered under the tilting castle - the sense of potential movement and danger here is even more exciting than the boy jumping over the building, and it also makes me chuckle a bit, in a Monty Python way (maybe the child will pop out of the black doorway once the castle topples and scuttle away?). The horizontal line anchors the tree and gives a sense of distance, ‘underlining’ the precarious position in the foreground.

The hand on the child’s head was accidental and I thought of photoshopping it out, but it adds an extra creepy dimension which is interesting.

I forgot about this image (below-also made this morning), which is actually my favourite

It’s a simple composition but quite surreal because both the relative scales and angles of the elements are unexpected. And no child was put in danger to make this image.

I had a look at Kasia Lovick’s work after she was awarded blog of the week http://kasialovickillustration1.blogspot.co.uk/search?updated-max=2012-02-07T11:49:00-08:00&max-results=7&start=5&by-date=false and was inspired by her take on this exercise. Even in their crudest form, her scenes have a motion and elegance about them which I think mine lack. I found that her bright, curious, confident approach shone through in her other work too and hope to emulate her digital skills eventually.

Other Artists

Here are some incredibly skilled illustrators I've recently come across:

Fernando Vicente http://www.fernandovicente.es/

His draughtsmanship is absolutely mind blowing. His pieces are so elegant and beautifully coloured, but a bit gruesome at the same time, which I love. I'm particularly impressed by the Vanitas series in his fine art section which show partially dissected figures...they make me wonder what the hell I'm doing...it's hard to be this impressed without being despondent about my own abilities!

Andreas Preis http://www.designerpreis.com/

Very precise penmanship combined with digital work, these lack the warmth and flow of Vicente's work for me as they are more symmetrical and masculine but are still incredibly impressive in their detail. I particularly like the 'Usual Suspects' series of animal characters (second row of dots in the illustration section) as they're beautifully drawn and coloured and they're humorous. I tried a digital linework cutting technique of his which was posted in Digital Arts magazine...it worked up to a point but I need another attempt.

Dwayne Bell http://www.dwayne-bell.com/index.html

Here's another man who's incredibly skilled at portraying the human form, particularly faces. His pieces are generally much rougher and 'dirtier' than Preis' or Vicente's because he leaves his line work unrefined and in some ways that makes them more immediate. I love his sketchbook trial on his blog http://dwaynebell.blogspot.com.es/2012/04/sketchbook-trial.html because the work is so beautifully honest and rough and ready. Some of his faces have the doll-like look of Egon Schiele's (who's probably my favourite artist, for his confident looseness in rendering the human form in all its contortions and for the fast, unfinished nature of his drawings), I'm thinking particularly of 'Two Women' http://www.artinthepicture.com/paintings/Egon_Schiele/Two-Women/

It's time to use my sketchbook more, or I've no chance of emulating my current heroes.

Assignment 2

I started by making spider diagrams for summer fruit and veg, autumn fruit and veg and quality on the same page (to see how they might connect)

and checked out the following links for my favourite British supermarkets and healthy eating sites for extra ideas.

http://www.localfoods.org.uk/home

http://www.healthy-eating-made-easy.com/autumn-fruit-and-vegetables.html

http://www.healthy-eating-made-easy.com/summer-fruit-and-vegetables.html

Waitrose http://www.waitrose.com/home/inspiration/health_and_nutrition.html

waitrose apple heart http://www.waitrose.com/content/waitrose/en/home/inspiration/health_and_nutrition/jcr%3acontent/par_top/headerandimageonetwothreecol_4.img.jpg/1309443559833.jpg

http://www.waitrose.com/home/inspiration/waitrose_lovelife.html

waitrose fruit image

http://www.waitrose.com/content/waitrose/en/home/inspiration/waitrose_lovelife/_jcr_content/par_top/image.img.jpg/1327477156153.jpg

http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=80943

M&S http://www.marksandspencer.com/Food-Wine/b/199646031

Sourcing http://www.marksandspencer.com/Our-Sourcing-About-Our-Food-MS-Foodhall-Food-Wine/b/56423031

http://www.marksandspencer.com/Fruit-Veg-Our-Sourcing-About-Our-Food-MS-Foodhall-Food-Wine/b/46530031?ie=UTF8&ie=UTF8?

ie=UTF8&pf_rd_r=04YN6DV6W995GAZRYGBF&pf_rd_m=A2BO0OYVBKIQJM&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_i=46524031&pf_rd_p=475115433&pf_rd_s=left-nav-2

http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/02/00/00/00/32/43/66/32436622._V192203024_.jpg

M&S food labelling image

http://health.marksandspencer.com/uploads/images/our_health_ranges/our_food-labelling.jpg

All of the food images on the websites are photographs, I particularly liked the images on the Waitrose site; there’s lots of stacking of items and brightly coloured backgrounds.

Summer Part 1

I had a pretty fixed idea of the image I was going to make- involving strawberries and Union Jacks (as a reference to local producers) but I wasn’t really happy with any of the strawberry images I made in my sketchbook and deep down I’m averse to flag waving. All the materials apart from guache and watercolour lacked the ‘lightness’ I wanted to convey the feelings of summer and freshness and I was not inspired to take these further.

I applied bleach spots with a dip pen over the watercolour strawberry in the seed positions expecting them to turn yellow, but it removed the colour completely. This could be a useful technique instead of using masking fluid, which I find unreliable and difficult to apply well.

I then played around with painting some watercolours of summer veg from life, and found these images much more effective so I decided to put them together as a salad, which has summery connotations.

I love patterns and had the idea to arrange the separate components like images on wall paper

I’m also fascinated by the exquisite drawings of Ernst Haeckel https://encrypted-tbn0.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQkXrTxA3BAMkk_D6IC1MPsoo7LV71vuRaKgs2NY7rQMqiZf8bcYA

Then, by coincidence a friend sent me this link to the website Mad Pattern http://madpattern.com/ and I was off to experiment.

Having scanned the water colours, I used photoshop to cut out each object, enhance the colours and then I grouped them together again.

I started simply

And then made more complex patterns

And tried other colours

I’d show the client some colour ‘swatches’ at this stage and allow them to choose the combinations for the finished piece.

My favourite is the pepper/avocado/ spinach/ cucumber image on a black background, although it’s not a traditional colour choice for summer.

This was great fun and I definitely had a sense of the edibility of the images while I was manipulating them so they work for me in that sense. The images have a lightness and softness to them which I think makes them summery and the individual items look fresh but not perfectly symmetrical or over stylised which makes them more realistic.

They have the feel of botanical drawings and are elegant which I think gives an air of quality.

I think as well as the point of sale display these patterns could be applied to a range of napkins and table covers for barbeques and picnics.

Summer part 2

Since I made patterns I wanted to apply them to something summery...possibly:

· Sails on a boat

· Picnic blanket

· Table cloth

· Summer dress

· Fete bunting

I happened across the pin up style drawings of Lucy MacLeod www.lucymacleod.co.uk/ and was inspired to apply the vegetable patterns to a pin up style summer dress, having already made a series of pin up portraits of my friend Louise last year.

Louise also recently posted a picture of herself on facebook wearing a monster print dress which was further inspiration, and her surname is Pepper....

I made a summer/pin up moodboard using some of the following images, I particularly like the way that Natalie Pascoe http://www.nataliepascoe.co.uk/gallery.html uses pattern in a naive way on bunting and to clothe her buxom seadside ladies.

Girl on a fence: http://cemetarian.com/images/p157_Girl_on_Fence_1.jpg

50’s pin up 2 https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7hJ9TdptuYRjRE867WpEbv2Haz-EiQ22w56BkzXe81_ZOCq57jngtDTqUZ9YpaRfoLXaoRf-ljH6o9PdZ1qRi3jUx-EyiSozF4iCWmoDGzvV-wtJwDRrIL3eECL3gPQeMOLUfguxSkoC_/s400/50sPinup2.jpg

Fete https://encrypted-tbn0.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTA1nxGNRonDdizVG_GQ9HVJ6fGnqE9kCUldaryJwK24tDcnkkeLg

Chase William Merrit at the seaside https://encrypted-tbn2.google.com/images?

q=tbn:ANd9GcSKPmtonGn9xbZYWiOOUrbrISaM1rO_ZrGa5wVZ652oYcxWuLIu

Seaside bunting https://encrypted-tbn0.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSj0p7AXdY_qE8mZpt8hdN5ZyPY9XyM5990p49wd1wp95PkAI1RWg

At the seaside https://encrypted-tbn1.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcS3-X0xgV4kJSWiMKBhqe4ovfwVdyP5AlPgp_qPl63IAfXZDyJmOw

Natalie Pascoe: seaside, patterns and bunting http://www.nataliepascoe.co.uk/gallery.html

How nice seaside pin up https://encrypted-tbn0.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTTnGwDz95x-XPEqKrdsGkO-BsVX_K9yg9Y54SJn5zK56l1McKBpQ

Blue beach hut https://encrypted-tbn2.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRNCy9m813SdENVtBSjU5pMTwxwyGVEEw0lQjzCHrCt6QeZSMBr

Picnic https://encrypted-tbn2.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSfyIbbuDNazX9DsK34TLHTsX_3CGCoLnObVuuE1MahIWSr_9f-hQ

Picnic pin up https://encrypted-tbn2.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSfyIbbuDNazX9DsK34TLHTsX_3CGCoLnObVuuE1MahIWSr_9f-hQ

I made a line tracing from a photo of Louise I had taken in preparation for the original pin up series and also took some photos of summery skies at the weekend and experimented with photoshop and illustrator to combine these with my vegetable images.

I did play about with the hat and sky, but in the end I went for simplicity and opted for a cloudless sky and a close cropped image, so the dress could be a swimming suit.

Autumn Part 1

I thought it best to continue with the same format for autumn so I started by making some watercolour sketches of veg, concentrating on squash and broccoli. I tried the bleach trick again on the squash skin but it didn’t remove the blue paint in the same way it had the red.

I manipulated the sketches in photoshop (as for summer) and played with some combinations:

And settled on the squash and broccoli combination as my favourite.

Autumn Part 2

I made a mood board for autumn, using the pin up idea again for continuity.

URLs for images used:

Autumn leaves http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRvRheHzlY0WO9FzIupkrtiW2JtT3ZGuWNHPiybWfH--5YKXGC_e1Yy4LKWtw

Autumn sky https://encrypted-tbn2.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQOkkcsCcgRTWFWS2TjcwQUBgD8T57_1r-6I8QfcAPBrze9PQuB

Art nouveau https://encrypted-tbn1.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSbTDnWkFi66GkKD-IgFvFf3r1CIXZS-pBDBgndf6sJAPykhZSb

Autumn cloudy day http://www.paintingsilove.com/image/show/171802

/autumn----windy-day-new-photo

Windy tree http://depositphotos.com/4190434/stock-photo-Abstract-colored-windy-autumn-tree.html

Windy day walk http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-2124091/stock-vector-taking-a-w

alk-on-a-windy-autumn-day.html

Autumn girl http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-60149725/stock-vector-girl-autumn-vector-illustration-over-white.html

I approached the autumn pin up in the same way as the summer one, but I also used illustrator to distort the squash image so that it was more beret shape and this is the image I came up with:

Something had been troubling me about the facial proportions while I was working on it but I didn't think to check it under my original paper trace until the end, when I saw that it had somehow been elongated so I corrected that in illustrator.

My final autumn image:

Reflection:

I got a bit carried away with the summer part so decided to rein things in a bit for autumn as my energy and enthusiasm were waning a bit. I think this shows in the quality of the work.

Of all the images I think the peas and butternut squash are probably least effective as I had trouble with the colours and, in one way I’m a bit disappointed that I opted for watercolour as usual but it did seem the most appropriate way to render the veg in a fresh way.

I had fun with this assignment; in fact I’ve lost my fear of the course work now, which is a relief!

I like combining hand drawn/painted and digital images; my photoshop and illustrator skills are improving as I’m doing some online tutorials and experimenting more with the techniques I know.

I don’t like the results of the live trace feature in Illustrator as much as hand tracing because the line is less smooth, but it’s quicker and maybe I just need to experiment with the settings more. I tried a different method (which I found in Digital Image magazine) for cutting out linework for the autumn illustration but it wasn’t entirely effective so I went back to live trace.

I think the final images work well; the curvy shapes of the fruit and veg are very feminine and in that way they sit well with the female form and I think both illustrations for summer and autumn are suggestive of health, freshness, vitality and confidence.

21st March 2013

Tutor feedback for the 'Autumn' image: the squash/brocolli motif could be warped in photoshop using the free transform tool to follow the contours of the woman's body.

I tried that and this is the result, I'm not sure I really pulled it off but I'm glad I had a go.

Exercise: Visual Metaphor

First I collected visual metaphors in general, using books and an internet search.

I've listed a few of my favourites below.

Frida Kahlo's work is rife with metaphor, for example in 'Autoretrato con mono' http://juancarlosboverimuseos.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/frida-kahlo-autorretrato-con-mono-museos-y-pintruras-juan-carlos-boveri.jpg she painted herself being embraced by a monkey, which in Mexican culture is a symbol of lust and the lord of the dance. Due to her physical disabilities she couldn't dance and she kept monkeys as pets and substitutes for the children she couldn't have.

In 'El pequeño ciervo' https://encrypted-tbn1.google.com/imagesq=tbn:ANd9GcRLEmw3RJCqVj5wH15QmRxi8Np7NO7zmDL4wT2tcPhmGkpgNtBfVQ

she depicts herself as a wounded dear, again symbolising her injured body and in

'Lo que me dio el agua' http://www.fridakahlofans.com/c0270.html she combines images from her previous works, floating them in her bathwater to tell the story of her life.

Art Spiegelman (as I've said in a previous post) uses visual metaphor to stunning effect in Maus https://encrypted-tbn1.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRXou3u5Z7kFJzYJORAStSk0xZ9makKf0oSWBZxoGieKxV_6E3axQ depicting the Jews as mice, the Germans as cats, the Polish as pigs, the French as frogs and the English as fish.

I also love these images by Iri5 who has created portraits of musicians using cassette tapes as her 'Ghost in the machine' project http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3441/3398016972_b84afb86aa_o.jpg

I chose censorship of the press from the list of subjects and made a visual list of rough sketches:

I showed the sketches to a friend who thought they illustrated censorship of the internet, so that was pretty close. If I were to develop these further I'd choose to start with the 'news as a puppet show' theme.

I then did an internet image search of censorship of the press to see how other people had illustrated it. Here are my favourites:

http://www.contrib.andrew.cmu.edu/~vvadyar/

I really like the humour and simplicity of this image of a man being spied upon by the military while he's surfing the net.

http://www.noomizo.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/censorship1.jpg

I found this deceptively simple image of a man being prevented from seeing or speaking to be very powerful and I like the 'woodcut' style.

http://www.graphic-design.com/Gallery/luba_lukova/posters_1_t.gif

This image of a man with his fingers nailed to his flute by Luba Lukova depicts censorship in general and is wonderfully evocative of the pain caused by suppression of expression.

Her beautiful graphic designs are quite ‘crude’ and woodcut-ish and are coloured very simply and, perhaps because of that, they convey her social comments in an incredibly powerful and direct way.

http://www.graphic-design.com/Gallery/luba_lukova/index.html

http://www.lukova.net/