(End of Year Evaluation) Reflective Practice Presentation – Part 2

In part one of this post I had reflected on my performance in my reflective practice presentation, it wasn’t really the best experience, but you can click here if you would like to read more about it. In this post, I will be going through each of my slides along with the script I made, but I have added more detail as I am able to go into more depth on my blog, but in the presentation, I did have a time limit so the initial script was more brief. If you have read my previous post then you will know how well the script and time limit worked for me.

For this final year I had set myself goals that I wanted to achieve.

I created two learning plans for both semesters, the reason for this is that with semester one I had more of a plan than I did with semester 2, for instance I knew which competitions I would be doing and had a better idea of when they would be released.

Starting with learning plan one. I wanted more experience and confidence with traditional mediums, as I have tended to work more digitally in the past.

Another goal was to work with more narrative based projects, creating book covers or illustrating stories, as this is an area my portfolio that was lacking, and I wanted to expand.

If you would like to read more about my learning plan for semester one, you can click here.

In the first project, Inktober, I had created an inked illustration every day for the month of October.

I used fine liners for the line work and then with a brush and water, I bled the ink which allowed me to create tone and shadows within my characters.

I chose to illustrate flower girls as this was imagery I was confident with, and a theme which I believed would last me the full month.

Other than viewing previous art for Inktober, there was not a lot of research needed for this project, but I had used reference images of women and flowers to help inform my designs.

By the end of this project I did feel a lot more confident with the medium. There were a few times where the ink may have bled or faces/features may have been drawn wrong, but I was able to fix these errors digitally and I was able to create a zine of the 31 illustrations which I have sold since. If you would like to purchase a zine you can have a look at my store at: www.melon-r.com/shop-1

Moving onto the next project: the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, I wanted to experiment with multiple printing techniques to give me more experience for potential output methods that I could use in the future. I also wanted to work with more narrative, following the goals set within my learning plan.

For research, I quoted directly from the book so that I could create accurate depictions of the story, rather than creating illustrations from the imagery I already knew. Initially, I was inspired by Sir John Tenniel and his intricate line work but had later found Pauline Baynes, who was the original illustrator of the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, had worked in a similar style, but she had incorporated colour into her designs which I did not want to do with my own design so I felt my designs would still be different from illustrations already created for the story.

When I first started this project, I felt I had started strong, using the wardrobe imagery to test out each of the printing methods, I.e. screen-printing, etching, using a laser cut plate and lino printing.

With the inclusion of more projects, however, I do feel I lost momentum and felt like I rushed the pieces to the right in the last couple of weeks/days.

Given more time I would’ve refined the last pieces by creating them in illustrator, drawing the line work by hand then using the laser cut method to print them, as I had felt this was the best and cleanest methods from my wardrobe print tests. I believe the addition of illustrator would have made the pieces more proportional, fixing the errors within the symmetry and potentially making the linework straighter and cleaner.

My next project was the House of Illustrations Book Illustration Competition. I had to create a set of 3 illustrations and a book cover for howls moving castle. Again this was narrative based brief, so it fit within the goals of my first learning plan. The only research that I had done for this project was just reading the book so that I again, could create an accurate depiction of the story, as opposed to working with content I may have already seen, for instance with Studio Ghibli’s adaptation of the book. (If you want to know my opinion of the original book and the movie adaptation, also listing the differences between the two, you can read about that here.)

Not researching other artists and styles may have been my downfall during this project as I did struggle when creating the pieces as I didn’t have a strong concept of the styles I wanted to use. I did, however, enjoy my choice of colour palette, as it is easy on the eyes and translates the themes of the book well, showing the magical essence without it being too being direct. The palace piece is my favourite, as I love the symmetry and perspective and it is how I had envisioned the king’s palace within the book. I have been able to translate my thoughts onto the page.

For the next project which was also a competition, this time for the Penguin Student Design Awards, I created 2 book covers for 2 separate categories; the adult’s fiction which was Norwegian Wood and the children’s book was Wonder.

For research I looked at entries from previous years, looking for common trends that I could potentially apply to my own work. I had noticed that a lot of the covers were minimal, and some had a noise effect applied, this had led me to think of artists such as Maggie Chiang and Alice Monvaillier as I believed their styles would work well among the other entries, so would be a good source of inspiration for myself during this project.

Again, I had read both of the books as research. This allowed me to get a better understanding of the stories so that I could know the type of content I would be creating for the covers, especially considering both books have completely different themes and audiences.

These are the two covers I created. I did complete them within a short amount of time, but I don’t feel as if they look rushed and I feel like these are a lot different from my usual style, as they are minimalistic within the colour pallets and imagery, which are styles/palettes that I have tried to dip into but have not fully achieved until these two creations.

I had struggled a lot with the text and titles, being able to make them readable against the illustrations. In the future, I will consider the type a lot further in advance so that I can work my illustrations around the text, instead of just trying to work the text around the images as I had in this project.

My weaknesses from the first semester were definitely to do with my time keeping and having too many projects in general which ended up overlapping, causing me confusion and stress.

From the first learning plan, I did achieve the goals I had set, working more traditionally and creating more narrative based pieces, so in the next learning plan my goal was to still try working more traditionally, this time using pencils, but I also wanted to create more thought-provoking pieces, that could potentially lean more towards the area of editorial.

I also wanted to use the last semester to focus on my branding, this would mean making a website, business cards, promo packs, merch etc. So that I had a base that I could grow from once I’ve finished the course.

From this point onwards, I vowed to not overlap any more projects, focusing on just one at a time. With the time plan I created for semester two, I was going to work more loosely with it, not having anything set in stone as at that time I still didn’t know when the competitions would be announced.

These are unplanned side projects which I ended up spending more time on than I necessarily had.

The first on the left was a commission piece for my friend.

The second was a ‘draw this in your style’ challenge in which I had to recreate an artist’s drawing in my own style, the piece here being a recreation of Chelsea Gracei’s work.

Then the final pieces on the right were a collection I created for ‘A Canny Collective’ which was a local exhibition that I was asked to be a guest artist for.

Although I had spent longer on these pieces than I should have, I do feel like I gained a lot of experience from them, especially with the exhibition pieces, as there was a whole process of creating the pieces and setting them up within the space, but I also worked on the stall on the opening night, so I was able to gain more experience of selling my own and others work one to one, which is something I do believe I will do again in the future. All of these pieces will also go towards my portfolio, hopefully allowing me to show more range of style, techniques and skill within it.

My goal with this specific project was to create a more thought-provoking illustration, which links back to the goals I set in my second learning plan.

For the Northern Illustration Awards, a competition by the AOI, the brief was ‘monkey.’ When searching Pinterest for inspiration I came across the image on the left, and in the corner saw an orangutan which had been created in a looser style which helped suggest the animal’s fur. I wanted to work in a similar style to create my own monkey, but I did want to use a stronger theme. Thinking of Orangutans, it had reminded me of the banned Iceland advert, in which it discusses the destruction of rainforests (the orangutan’s habitats) for palm oil.

Within this piece, I wanted to show a role reversal between humans and the orangutans, they being the ones that are destroying our homes with such carelessness instead.

I enjoyed working on this piece as it was more experimental and I was able to work more loosely. I was able to play around with different brushes, (in the end, I had used a gouache brush for the fur and a ‘scratchy pen’ for the linework, both from Kyle T. Webster brush packs) and these, in turn, allowed me to build up my own impression of fur, which helped give a sense of realism but the style was still loose and quite painterly for digital art.

I designed this piece to fit within a white page, so it is more minimal in that sense, but this factor could potentially make it more editorial as I could imagine it fitting within a magazine as an illustration for an article.

With this illustration, I had recorded the process and created my first ever YouTube video which was a speed paint of this piece. I do want to carry on uploading more speed paint process videos, potentially giving more information in the form of a voice-over, but one day I do want to live stream as well as/opposed to recording, as I believe I would prefer to talk live to an audience, having an active conversation as I go, rather than feeling like I am talking to myself in a voice over.

The next project was the Wizard of Oz, my goal with this project was to work more traditionally using pencil and then colouring the pieces digitally as I believed it would give me a better choice in colour palette. With this project, I did want to work with a more fun and vibrant colour palette than I may have used before, as I wanted my pieces to suit the colour themes suggested within the story, such as ‘Emerald City’ and the ‘yellow brick road’.

The idea for the mediums and techniques were initially inspired by Tina Nass, but as my project developed and I moved to a more realistic style within the project, I tended to take more inspiration from an artist named Chantal Hores as she still works with the same mediums and techniques as Tina Nass, however her style is more realistic, especially with her characters.

Again, my research had come directly from the book, finding quotes that would allow me to create an accurate depictions as possible, but in this project I did find it more useful as the movie adaptations were not completely true to the descriptions within the book, for instance, the famous ruby red slippers were actually silver in the story.

These pieces have come a long way from the start, as I had originally sketched them out in a layout that looked flat and boring, I later repositioned and redrew the pieces using my own reference photos, as well as reference images online (more so for the animals) which allowed me to create more organic and dynamic viewpoints within my illustrations.

I’m extremely proud of the outcomes as there is a strong narrative throughout, one that I wouldn’t have thought that I would have been able to achieve at the beginning of the year. I love the colours as they are vibrant and express the themes of Oz. I did try to stay away from the known imagery when working on these pieces, and I do believe I’ve created my own unique interpretations of the story.

I loved the style of work and mediums that I had used and I hope to use them again more often in the future. If I find myself in a spot again where I feel my composition or layout of a piece is a bit boring, I will try to take my own reference images again, exploring different viewpoints and angles etc, so that I can potentially create more dynamic illustrations which are less boring and flat in the future.

Branding has a lot of components within it, for instance I needed to create business cards, a website, a portfolio, creative CV and products and all of these would go into a promo pack which would be sent off to potential clients and or agencies.

As far as research goes, I initially started the process of creating my business cards within semester one, so that they could be sent off with my zines. I was inspired by an artist named Isadora Zererino as on her cards she has an illustration on the front and her information on the back, they are also portrait, which is something that I hadn’t seen very often and this is how I wanted my own to be laid out.

When creating websites, I was researching as I was going, looking at how other artists laid their work out, what their buttons were, how they ordered them, and how they described themselves in their about pages etc. For this, I had used Sophie McPike and Nicole Nicholson’s (who is a student in my class and made her site first) websites as inspiration. I also took information from a talk we had with someone from AOI who had explained that a client will make their impression of you within the first couple of seconds of looking at your website, so it’s good to have 6-9 pieces on display on the front page.

On this slide, to the left, I have shown my current business card with my website included which wasn’t present in semester one.

A mini-portfolio, which is actually a paper fortune teller. I felt this would be an interesting piece for someone to receive in my promo pack as it is a unique way for them to view mini clips of my work. On the back, I did provide links so that the receiver would be able to look at my portfolio more in depth, seeing the pieces that I have cropped down for this mini-portfolio in more detail.

The two pieces on the right side are merchandise ideas. On the top is a sketch of a potential pin. I want to create these in wood using the laser cutter in the workshop as ordering enamel pins is not in my budget or audience range at this moment in time. Maybe in the future, if I do build more of an audience, I could have a pre-order or made-to-buy system which would allow me to make a profit and would ensure that none would go to waste.

The second image on the right is going to be a sticker, potentially a little print.

These are pages from my website. I still have work that needs to be added to the portfolio but I will want them to fit within a layout that is organised by colour or theme, which I believe will make the website more aesthetically pleasing to the eye, so I can potentially catch a client’s attention within the first couple of seconds, as the member of AOI had suggested. The website also has a shop which I do plan to work from in the future.

Going into the future, I have applied for a teaching course within the college that will start in September. Before teaching properly, I do wish to have more experience in the industry so that I can teach from my knowledge and experience that I may have gained.

With my portfolio, I plan to visit the AOI to get a review and more information about which direction it should go, if I need to take anything out, if I need to add anything more and so on.

I will also be applying to agencies hoping to get more freelance based work.

I will be continuing to create products and selling them through my website.

I will still try to keep an eye out for competitions.

I will also continue creating YouTube videos, ones that are more in-depth with voiceovers added. I also want to live stream more, having a more relaxed experience, potentially talking one to one with my audience as I create my work.

Overall my goal for the next 5 years is to be a freelance illustrator, working with clients and potentially have an agent. I will also be creating and selling my own work on the side, as well as hopefully teaching level 3 students within a college.

Following on with more self-reflection, I created a couple of diagrams within the space of the year that are up on my blog. This one is an input and output diagram, it describes the skills, knowledge and experience that goes into my work and what is output from it, being anything to do with business, freelance work, self-development and live briefs.

If you would like to read more about my Input-Output diagram, click here.

This next diagram is my reflective cycle, it shows my process of planning a project, the research that goes into it, my action plan, the actual practical work and the experience from said practical work. This then carries on and the cycle starts again.

The explanations of both of these diagrams are on my blog, as I wanted to have an easier explanation for someone who may not understand these types of reflective practices, but may want to understand my process of working, thinking etc.

If you would like to read more about my Reflective Cycle, click here.

20:

This is my bibliography. Thanks for your time do you have any questions?

Although this was more directed at my presentation if you do have any questions feel free to comment and I will try to answer as best as I can!

List of Illustrations

These are all jpeg images of the slides from my Reflective Practice Presentation. Within the slides, I have cited the images that were not mine, so if an image does not have a caption, it is my own work.

Figure 1.Amazon (1994). The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe: C. S. Lewis. [image] Available at: https://www.amazon.com/Lion-Witch-Wardrobe-Chronicles-Narnia/dp/0064404994/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1ZYCJ0GH8FLC2&keywords=the+lion+the+witch+and+the+wardrobe&qid=1556748222&s=books&sprefix=the+lion+%2Cstripbooks-intl-ship%2C236&sr=1-1 [Accessed 1 May 2019].

Figure 2.Baynes, P. (1950). Narnia Lamppost. [image] Available at: https://www.paulinebaynes.com/?what=artifacts&image_id=532&cat=69 [Accessed 1 May 2019].

Figure 3.Tenniel, J. (1865). White Rabbit checks his Watch. [image] Available at: https://medium.com/alice-s-adventures-in-wonderland/sir-john-tenniel-s-classic-illustrations-of-alice-in-wonderland-2c3bbdca3a77 [Accessed 1 May 2019].

Figure 4.Amazon (2008). Howls Moving Castle: Diana Wynne Jones. [image] Available at: https://www.amazon.com/Howls-Moving-Castle-Diana-Wynne/dp/0061478784/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1U66801S7NAFP&keywords=howls+moving+castle&qid=1556747151&s=books&sprefix=howls%2Cstripbooks-intl-ship%2C219&sr=1-1 [Accessed 1 May 2019].

Figure 5.Chiang, M. (2018). Reflections. [image] Available at: http://www.hellomaggiec.com/2018/3vwq57poq1ezpl0a78wkarcwx3qiae [Accessed 1 May 2019].

Figure 6.Monvaillier, A. (2018). Bouh. [image] Available at: https://www.instagram.com/p/BhdoARQD1jA/ [Accessed 1 May 2019].

Figure 7.Amazon (2012). Wonder: R. J. Palacio. [image] Available at: https://www.amazon.com/Wonder-R-J-Palacio/dp/0375869026 [Accessed 1 May 2019].

Figure 8.Amazon (2013). Norwegian Wood: Haruki Murakami. [image] Available at: https://www.amazon.com/Norwegian-Wood-Tokyo-Blues-Italian/dp/8806216465/ref=sr_1_12?crid=IINWGD0DLUSW&keywords=norwegian+wood&qid=1556746704&s=books&sprefix=norwe%2Cstripbooks-intl-ship%2C259&sr=1-12 [Accessed 1 May 2019].

Figure 9.Kidd, E. (2018). Monkey Business – Trending Characters. [Blog] Emily Kiddy. Available at: http://frame.bloglovin.com/?post=6540277057&blog=3758402&group=0&frame=1&frame_type=none&avpp=true&context=&context_ids=&feed_order=&click=0&user=0 [Accessed 1 May 2019].

Figure 10.Iceland Foods (2018). Iceland’s Banned TV Christmas Advert… Say hello to Rang-tan. #NoPalmOilChristmas. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JdpspllWI2o [Accessed 1 May 2019].

Figure 11.Nass, T. (2017). [image] Available at: https://www.instagram.com/p/BcFQm-hHS6I/ [Accessed 2 May 2019].

Figure 12.Nass, T. (2017). [image] Available at: https://www.instagram.com/p/BcFQm-hHS6I/ [Accessed 2 May 2019].

Figure 13.Horeis, C. (2019). [image] Available at: https://www.instagram.com/p/BuG3ws5F53Y/ [Accessed 2 May 2019].

Figure 14.Horeis, C. (2019). [image] Available at: https://www.instagram.com/p/BuG3ws5F53Y/ [Accessed 2 May 2019].

Figure 15.Amazon (2015). The Wizard of Oz: L. Frank Baum. [image] Available at: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Wizard-Oz-L-Frank-Baum/dp/1604335424/ref=sr_1_14?keywords=wizard+of+oz+book&qid=1557071553&s=gateway&sr=8-14 [Accessed 2 May 2019].

Figure 16.Zeferino, I. (2019). Business Cards. [image] Available at: https://www.instagram.com/p/BqSkrJllskE/ [Accessed 2 May 2019].

Figure 17.Zeferino, I. (2019). Business Cards. [image] Available at: https://www.instagram.com/p/BqSkrJllskE/ [Accessed 2 May 2019].

Figure 18.McPike, S. (2019). Work — Thistle Be Nice. [online] Thistle Be Nice. Available at: http://www.sophiemcpike.com/mywork [Accessed 2 May 2019].

Figure 19.Nicholson, N. (2019). WITCHITA. [online] Witchita Illustration. Available at: https://witchitaillustrations.com/ [Accessed 2 May 2019].

(End of Year Evaluation) Reflective Practice Presentation – Part 1

First thing I should explain is that I am bad when it comes to presenting within a specific timeframe, for this presentation it needed to be within 10 minutes. At the start of the year, I had given another presentation based on my proposal for the year and although I do believe I did well, I was told that I had gone over my time (not by how long though), so from this experience, I already had the fear of going over my time limit but little did I know of how much more of a concern this should have been.

In prep for this presentation, which was basically a review of the whole year, discussing projects, research outcomes and swot analysis throughout, I had tried to practice with my boyfriend, but he had noticed how long I was taking to get my words out just with the first slide, so suggested I make a script. We did this by having me first write out my information for the specific slide, then he would go in and brief it down, taking out any information that I may have repeated or rewording sentences so there was less babble. We had gotten the script done at half 12 in the morning of the presentation, so we had one run through before we went to bed. He had timed himself reading through it at his normal pace and it had taken him 10 minutes and 27 seconds, but this was without any breathing space between points and section so it was concerning. When I had read through it there were certain words I wanted to change, I didn’t add anything more, but I wanted the script just to sound more like me again, so, I decided I would make these changes once I had got to college.

I got to college at half 8 and my presentation was at 9:45, so I believed I would have enough time to make the changes and read through before I started. I believe this would have been the case if the colleges PC’s logged in at a normal speed, and did not have a Microsoft updating/loading screen every time anyone tries to log in. I tried turning off the computer from the plug socket, as my tutor normally suggests, I tried logging into another PC but the messages just ended up on that screen as well, so eventually, I ended up just moving to a Mac, which logged me in instantly. I’m not trying to put blame on the computers, but I do believe I lost practice time due to these issues. As well as making changes to the wording I had decided to highlight specific words or phrases from the specific slides and points so that I wouldn’t be reading directly from the script but I could look down, see the highlighted words and know what I’m talking about.

By the time I had finished making my changes ready to print my cards off, my tutor had come in and told me it was my time, meaning that I did not have time left to do my run through. I was panicking because of this, but I hoped with the addition of the highlighted words that I would be able to follow the script without having to constantly look down at it.

This, however, was not the case as I ended up going completely off script, using the highlighted words as starting points which I ended up expanding on. So, the whole night of myself and partner working on the script, shortening it so that I wouldn’t be babbling or going over my time limit was completely thrown out of the window, as I did go over; I had in fact gone on for 37 minutes.

When going back to my peers and talking about my presentation, we did all have a laugh at my timing as no one could believe it, I could barely believe it! It definitely did not feel that long to me at the time! Once more and more of my peers had done their own presentations and had come back with such good results though, I was extremely proud of them but it made me realise how better I could have done myself. I was told that from my presentation I had still got 60% which is a 2-1 (which could still be changed when others come to mark it) but I started questioning if I had lost a certain percentage due to going over my time and how much that percentage was? Could I have gotten the first if I had just been within time or would I still have gotten a 2-1 because I had missed information? Before this presentation, I had gotten a first in both modules I completed, so although I know 2-1 is still a good mark (especially for going over my limit by so much) I did build a higher expectation for myself, so I am gutted that I couldn’t achieve that level this time.

The presentation was 30% of my reflective practice module, my blog being 70%, so a 2-1 is not necessarily my overall grade for this module as of yet, but I was told that I would need to achieve 75% in my blog to pick it back up to a first, so I hope that I can make it to that level, making sure that I have hit all the criteria within the brief, but have also gone beyond and above that so that I can potentially achieve the higher grade.

What I wish I had done:

Started writing my script sooner.
Started practising with it sooner.
If it could have helped me more I would have just read directly from my cards, which could have allowed me to finish within the 10-minute mark as my boyfriends run through had, but I believe that this wouldn’t have shown good presentation skills and might’ve taken my marks down further.

What I can learn from this experience:

Start making my presentations sooner. This would allow me to potentially write a script, practice with it, and possibly learn it off by heart so that I wouldn’t even need any cards.
I need to babble less. One of my teachers once said to me that I write very directly, I get to the point but I wouldn’t necessarily expand. Since this comment I do feel my written work has gotten more detailed, I am still direct with my points but then I do expand on them further now. I feel this has translated to my communication skills as well though, so although this habit may be good for my written work (or may not as it may just come across as more babble, but I haven’t had any complaints?) it may not be good when it comes to a presentation, especially one with a time limit, as I evidently will babble on.
I do believe I have taken more priority with my blog this year than I have in previous and I do feel it is strong, but I will make sure that I have been hitting the criteria within my brief and I will try to go above and beyond so that hopefully I will get my mark back up.
It’s not useful to focus on everything that went wrong and what more you could have done, but it is good to reflect on that experience and refocus on the things you can still do. I do wish I could redo my presentation but I know that I can’t and it is done, so what I can do now is focus on my blog, as well as my other projects, to make sure I am still working at the level I want to be at within those modules and hopefully achieve my goals of a first overall.

In part two of this blog, I show the slides and script of my presentation. I have expanded on the initial briefer script, going into more depth with the specific projects, discussing my goals, overview of the projects, outcomes, self-reflection and so on. What will be ironic about this is that the expanded version of the briefer script will probably be closer to what I had said within the actual presentation, allowing me to go on for 37 minutes.

Reflective Cycle

As a class, we were asked to produce a reflective cycle based on ourselves and our working process, to the right is an example we were given which was created by my tutor David Hails. I have created my own as you will see when you scroll down, and I’m going to try to explain it in a way that would make sense, but the particular wording still confuses me so bear with me.

Following the example, to make it my own, I imagined the circles as two eggs so wanted to try convert the diagram into that imagery. So in my piece, in place of the two circles, I have made eggs (I tried to differentiate the two slightly, one yolk being pink and the other being more red) and coloured the centre where the two overlap as that indicates to a specific section within the diagram. The pan that holds them is significant of the outer circle, then the inner circle that connects the eggs is formed from pepper and salt.

Starting with the red egg, it represents ‘on action-reflection’, which is the more research-based side of my working process. This egg includes two factors, ‘reflective observation’ which is self-reflection, assessing my strengths, weaknesses, threats and opportunities. You then move onto the next factor ‘abstract conceptualisation’ which is almost like an action plan. Looking at your weaknesses or threats based on the last factor, you make a plan of how you can improve on them, what you can do to better your process/craft.

Moving onto the pink egg, which represents ‘in action-reflection’ meaning the more practical side of the working process, it also has two factors, the one following the last being ‘active experimentation’ which I believe is the execution of the points you had made within your action plan. The last factor following that one is ‘concrete experience’ which I believe is the experience from work you create, ie what skills you’ve gained, whether its with commercial work or personal, traditional or digital etc. Your experience then follows back on to the reflective observations, reassessing your strengths and weaknesses so onwards the cycle goes.

The inner circle of this diagram otherwise shown as the salt and pepper, represents ‘learning plan objectives’ and I believe this shows how the cycle of the elements within the eggs works within a project setting, for instance, when you get a brief you may do a SWOT analysis first, noting what you want to work on, then you will create an action plan and set your targets, then you will do the practical work, achieving the goals you set, and afterwards you will have the experience from working on the project, and will be able to start all over again, giving yourself SWOT analysis of the work or project you’ve just completed.

The outer circle, or the pan, represents ‘knowledge in action’, which I believe just encapsulates all of these elements and the cycle as a whole, as it is a process which you learn to do automatically whilst working and I personally believe its how you grow as an artist, as you learn to be critical but then you learn to improve and then you gain more experience and more knowledge which will better your strengths onwards in the cycle. I believe that an artist should never stop learning or trying to improve, they can be amazing at what they do, but that shouldn’t mean that they should just stop trying out new skills or techniques or expanding their genre of work/themes as they could become more informed on certain topics, which would then allow their work to reach new audiences and so on. With this theory in mind, the reflective cycle would never stop.

eggkey egginfo

Within the diagram, I have added my own information stemming from the steps within the eggs. Hopefully, with my explanation, the diagram is more understandable, as I know from an outsiders perspective it may just look like a lot of information.

Reflective Observation: In this section, I have just listed some of my current strengths, weaknesses, threats and opportunities.

As of strengths, I feel my work is very open, I don’t necessarily have a set style or colour palette and I have been told that I have quite an editorial eye, possibly within the way I layout my designs or how I have thought about the composition and set out my work within my portfolio and book. So I feel these qualities are good in terms of employability with potential agencies and clients.

My weaknesses and threats seem to link a bit as I believe my biggest threat and weakness is myself at times. I’m not a big fan of change so it often holds me back from moving onwards (on a bit of a tangent, I’ve been in education for all of my life so I’m so scared of when it comes to finishing this course because when I say I’m leaving the comforts of college, I’m really leaving the comforts, I have to find work myself, I will have to apply to agencies, I will most likely need to create more work for them, its just having that incentive to do so. I don’t want to leave college with a degree and just do nothing with it, I do want it to have had a purpose) I have linked some of the threats to my opportunities as they could prevent one another, for instance one of my opportunities is that I could go down to London and have my portfolio checked by the AOI, I however have a fear of travelling as I don’t really travel, the only times that I have is when I’ve had other people with me who were more in charge of things like travel bookings, hotel booking, how to get about etc, (I have planned a couple of trips this summer with my partner, so hopefully I may overcome these fears) I’m basically scared of becoming an adult, but I know I need to overcome that and fast, as I don’t want to be living with my mam forever. I guess I will grow and learn more with experience, so I guess I’ve just got to jump straight in head first, I just fear that I’ll lose the motivation to keep growing and I’ll find myself in an endless job I don’t enjoy.

With my opportunities, as I mentioned, visiting the AOI to get my portfolio checked would be a great opportunity as they would give me advice on what direction my portfolio should go, they could suggest me agencies or find me, clients,, so although I’d have to pay for the membership, it would definitely be worth the money in my eyes. Most of the opportunities I thought of included travelling, whether it was for illustration fairs like the one in London, London Illustration Fair, which runs in winter but applications open in summertime. If I were to apply for this, I would like to go to one of their events first just to see what I’d be getting myself into, but I believe it would be a good networking opportunity. I would also like to go to some American conventions at some point as well, not to sell but I would like to see and purchase art from some of my favourite artists firsthand, one convention in particular that I am most interested in is DesignerCon. I’m not sure if it changes destination each year, but for 2019 it is being held in Anaheim, California in November time. Again I see this being a good networking experience, but it is where I aspire to be, creating my own work and products and selling them in conventions or fairs as well as online.

Active Conceptualisation: Networking links onto the next step within the egg, my action plan, as I do plan to visit more fairs and conventions in the future, I want to get more involved in the illustration community whether it be in person or on social media. I feel artists are the most aware of the algorithms on social media, especially on Instagram, so I really respect the artists I follow supporting one another, whether its sharing their favourite artists or pieces, like some I follow, have a ‘feature Friday’ on their Instagram stories, but you can also show support by just commenting or liking a post. You could also become more involved in the community through challenges, there’s one coming up called Mermay where you would draw mermaids for the month of May, or there’s Inktober which I participated in last year, or there is #DrawThisInYourStyle challenges. I do believe the art community is very open, it’s just a case of becoming more active, posting more, communicating more and becoming apart of that community which I do aspire to do.

The rest of my points for this step relate to knowledge and growth, learning new skills, whether it is with new software like using procreate, or whether it is developing my knowledge with current programs I use. I do feel I know the basics of illustrator, but I could always learn more, who knows, maybe some of the things I do now could be a lot easier if I learnt another way to do it? I do want to gain more experience with traditional mediums though, a lot of the artists I follow use gouache or have recently started to, so I would like to try out the medium for myself. I know it is quite pricey so I have held back from purchasing it before, but I have been recently working with a gouache brush in photoshop, but I obviously don’t believe it gives you the full experience as I believe it is supposed to dry lighter and you build it up? So I would like to experiment and experience the true qualities of gouache for myself.

Active Experimentation: As I mentioned before, this group is based on the more practical side of the cycle, it is the doing part of your action plan. So, in my own process, I usually research for inspiration, whether it is from artists, social media, or blogs and companies like pictoplasma. The sources I use I feel are regularly updated so it is easier to keep on track with trends within the industry, whether its specific colour palettes, patterns, a method of working etc. I believe last year risograph was a big trend and I did see a few riso prints in Berlin for Pictoplasma. This year, I believe I was noticing a trend of the comic halftone effect coming back after the release of Spider-man: Into the Spider-verse, but have not really seen much of it since. I have still tried to incorporate it into my illustrations though, for example in the diagrams the effect has been used as shading to the egg yolks.

In my projects, especially personal ones, I do try to develop my skills, whether it’s working within new areas of illustration, for instance, more editorial as I have tried to do with my Orangutan illustration, or learning new digital techniques, or experimenting with more traditional mediums like pencil as I have done in my recent Wizard of Oz project, mixing the traditional linework and textures with digital colouring.

As I had mentioned in my action plan, I do want to become more active on social media so this would mean posting more often, whether its final pieces, initial sketches or W.I.P’S. I only tend to post finished pieces and don’t really show my audience the process so it may give unrealistic expectations, or just make it seem like there’s no human behind the account, so if I were to post more, giving updates of how a piece is developing, it may make my audience feel closer to me, more connected and possibly more relatable if they could see that I do make mistakes during the process. By building an audience it does give me a higher chance of potential customers. As I have a little following I do overthink when making or ordering products, especially when recently looking into making enamel pins, as the minimum amount to buy is 50 pieces but if you buy more it would make the selling amount per pin cheaper, but I doubt I could even sell 50, so I feel like I would end up under profit and with product still left over. I am going to try to make the pins through college using the laser cutter, but if one day I do have a bigger following, I would feel better about putting more money into my products, especially if I could make a pre-order system so that I would know all of the product would definitely sell and I’d be making money back.

Concrete Experience: Although I feel I gain more skill when working on personal projects, I definitely gain more experience when working on commercial projects. Whether its creating commission based work, working one to one with a client, working on live briefs and competitions, I enjoy these projects more as it’s not just me creating my own brief that I can be as lenient or as harsh with as possible, I’m actually working with a brief or a client, creating concepts and pieces that I would never have imagined creating. I feel with personal briefs the work is what I want to create, but with commercial projects, they open me up to new content, working with new subjects or new styles, forming work that may be new to the work already in my portfolio but could potentially show a client the areas/themes/styles I can work with. If I was left to my own devices, I would just draw women and flowers all day, whereas with my commercial projects I have been able to work with a range of themes and audiences. In this year alone I have created 3 book covers, a set of illustrations and an editorial piece based on deforestation and the loss of habitats for Orangutans, and these were all from live briefs.

Relating back to current trends, I feel I also gain experience when researching as I take in the knowledge from looking at recent artwork, whether it in a magazine like Juxtapoz or just on social media, I keep note if there are any particular trends that I can spot then I feel I start adding these to my own work, whether subliminally or not, using the comic halftone pattern as a reference again, I don’t believe I would have started incorporating it into my own work unless I had seen other artists using it and noting how they apply the pattern to their designs. Another way that research helps is with themes, especially when creating a more thought-provoking piece, as you could use social, economic or environmental themes, using current stories that are potentially affecting a lot of people or the world, themes that you feel strongly about but maybe need more information so that you can best communicate your views.

Networking is also a good method of gaining experience, whether it’s going to local events/exhibitions, or travelling further, like to Pictoplasma in Berlin or New York as an example. I feel it may be a good place to meet others with the same interests, potentially in the same position as you, so in a way, it would allow you to find new artists but also sell yourself/work to them in an indirect sense.

In this section, I had included A Canny Collective, a local exhibition which I was a guest artist for, and although I did not necessarily network much, (as I was mostly selling work) I did gain a lot of experience from doing this, making the work, setting it up, then even selling on the night. I have never sold one to one before, but I have imagined potentially having a stall one day (inspired by my Aunty who use to have a stall at different markets but now actually owns her own shop in Stanley, ‘Purple Dragon’ if you’re ever in the area) so having the experience of selling my own work, as well as others, I feel will be very useful in the future, possibly in our final show, as I believe we will be having a stall there on the night too.

List of Illustrations

Hails, D. (2012) Reflective Cycle.

All other images are my own unless stated otherwise.

Reading List

Designercon.com. (2019). DesignerCon – November 22nd-24th 2019. [online] Available at: https://www.designercon.com/ [Accessed 30 Apr. 2019].

The London Illustration Fair. (2019). Home — The London Illustration Fair. [online] Available at: http://www.thelondonillustrationfair.co.uk/home-1 [Accessed 30 Apr. 2019].

I’m a Youtuber?

Recently, since getting a new laptop and having a better download speed and stuff, I had been thinking more and more about streaming, possibly creating a twitch channel, as I would ideally like to have a chill channel where people could come along, listen to music with me and watch me working on projects, occasionally answering any questions if anyone had any. I know I personally love watching other artists processes so I thought it would be fun if I could stream or record my own, and potentially have my own audience who enjoys watching my process.

After discussing Twitch with my boyfriend, who has his own channel so has a better understanding of all the elements and components I’d need before starting, he told me that I would need to think about alert messages, banners, layout designs etc, that I could redesign to make my channel look more professional. Although I could do this, and still plan to, when he had explained youtube in comparison, it had sounded a whole lot easier, as all I would need to do is create a banner for my channel and an outro screen for my videos. So, with this, I had created both, and I started recording my process whilst working on a few projects. I had ended up using a program called Streamlabs as it would allow me to stream when I eventually get round to designing all of the components, but it also allowed me to just take screen recording whilst I was working on my illustrations.

The video above was my first and it is a speed painting of my monkey illustration for the AOI’s Northern Illustration Awards. In these videos, I do feel a sense of vulnerability as you are able to see mistakes that I make, but with that, you are also able to see how I work around and correct those errors. In a sense I feel by showing my process it would help the audience connect with me on more of a personal level, as they’re not just seeing a finalised product that I would usually post on my Instagram, they are seeing the full journey of the specific illustration, showing my thought process from sketch to the final outcome and the choices, mistakes and fixes I make throughout.

The next two videos are speed paints whilst working on my Wizard of Oz project. These are just two of the five videos that I have planned to create as I am generally recording, then forming the videos together as I go. I plan to have each of these videos in a playlist together, so once I have published them all, someone would just be able to go to my playlists and watch me work on this series of illustrations all in order, one after another.

I currently do not talk in these videos as I don’t really enjoy the sound of my own voice and I would probably end up babbling or something, making the video longer than it needed to be, so I don’t really have the confidence to talk within my videos yet. I believe it would be different if I were streaming as it would be more of a back and forth conversation with the audience as opposed to having to plan out what I’m going to say within the video first. I do plan to try talking more in future videos as it may help keep an audience interested and watching onwards, as just playing music might feel a little cold in a sense, or just boring in general. But as I do hope to grow with this channel, and in future with online streaming, I will be learning as I do so, hopefully growing with my own confidence in myself and my art, whilst my new audience hopefully grows too.

As of music, me and my partner both find royalty free music online, ones which I feel best fit the specific themes and tones of the illustrations, and he helps me add them into my videos. With both the video and the music compiled together, my laptop was not able to handle it within the specific program I was using, so Liam had offered to add the music using his computer and we would send the files back and forth. As he has helped me so much in creating my channel and videos, neither of which would be possible without him, I always try to credit him in the outro’s and recommend that my viewers should have a look at his channel. It is the least I could do for him in return.

In the process of making my channel and posting my videos, I had found and read a blog post which suggested: “25 Tips for a Successful Youtube Art Channel” (very much ‘nail on the head’ in terms of tips I was looking for). A lot of the points made I felt I had already known either because they were a bit obvious to me, maybe from all of my years using other social media platforms and learning how they work, but I may have also known about some of the points from watching other YouTubers and listening to their views about youtube and its algorithms. There were however a few points that I did/will try to learn from, for instance, using SEO techniques and putting more thought into my titles as I would want my videos to be found within peoples searches. Another tip was to make use of the playlists, which I am trying to do right now with my Wizard of Oz illustrations, as once they are all completed, people will be able to find them all together in one convenient playlist and will be able to binge-watch one after the other if they really wanted to.

Bibliography

Chie, T. (2016). 25 Tips For a Successful YouTube Art Channel. [Blog] Parka Blogs. Available at: https://www.parkablogs.com/content/25-tips-successful-youtube-art-channel [Accessed 4 Apr. 2019].

Russell, M. (2019). Monkey Illustration. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4Ib2r6xXyU&t=50s [Accessed 20 Apr. 2019].

Russell, M. (2019). Dorothy’s Room – The Wizard of Oz Illustration Series. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iN5KEVSCA_o&t=22s [Accessed 20 Apr. 2019].

Russell, M. (2019). The Deadly Poppy Field – The Wizard of Oz Illustration Series. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OiRIKs9f_24 [Accessed 20 Apr. 2019].

AOI Monkey

The project:

This was a last minute competition suggested to the class by our tutor who thought it would be a great opportunity for us to submit a design to. When he had suggested it, I believe there were only a couple of weeks till the deadline, so it would have to be a quick project and turnaround.

The competition is run by the Association of Illustrators and is called the Northern Illustration Awards, so only northern-based emerging/established illustrators could apply. The theme of the competition is monkeys, which is inspired by a local story in Hartlepool, wherein the time of the Napoleonic Wars, the people of Hartlepool had hung a monkey as they believed it to be a French spy. You did not have to illustrate this story, all you had to do was illustrate a monkey.

Following the themes of my Cheltenham Illustration Awards project, in this one, I had also wanted to work with deeper themes, I did not just want to make a pretty picture of a monkey to submit, as I felt countless of illustrators will have done with such an open brief, I did want my design to have more meaning.

When scrolling through illustrations of monkeys on Pinterest, I had discovered one that I had liked and it was of an orangutan and had been created in a loose tactile style which helped in creating an impression of the monkey’s fur. This piece had actually reminded me of the banned Iceland advert which had gone viral around Christmas time, which was about deforestation for palm oil, which in turn means the loss of habitats for orangutans.

This had inspired the direction in which I wanted to take with my monkey illustration. For my piece, I wanted to show a role reversal between the orangutans and us humans, showing what it would be like if they were the ones destroying our homes and livelihoods for their own benefits, whether it be for food, drink or even shower products.

With this illustration, I wanted to shed more light to the issue, maybe in less of a direct way than showing the audience an image of deforestation, but instead, creating more digestible imagery which is prettier but is still able to get the message across. Most of the time people will ignore images of problems going on in the world, such as deforestation and loss of habitats for wildlife, as it is easier for them to go on with their day imagining that its not actually happening, but with my piece, it is more vibrant in terms of palette, so will attract the audiences eyes, and the content is not so violent the the audience want to ignore it, but instead they may take in the message easier, especially if they have a fresh perspective of the issue.

My message with this piece is ‘How would you feel?’. How would you feel if your home was destroyed without a second thought, if your livelihood, memories, comfort or even the feeling of safety had been taken away in the blink of an eye? I imagine it would not feel good, so why can we not show this empathy towards animals and in this case the orangutans. They may be animals, but they need homes, stability and a sense of comfort within their daily habits and needs, as much as we humans do.

If you would like to see how I created this illustration, I had recorded the process and made a speed paint video which I had posted to YouTube as my first video, hopefully being my first of many and my first step towards a successful YouTube channel.

Strengths

I do feel this illustration is unique in comparison to any piece I have made before. I had worked in a more looser style, experimenting with new brushes from Kyle T. Webster packs, and I feel I was able to create the impression of fur by building the tone, stroke and textures up gradually, which I feel helped my monkey look more realistic in a sense, but he does still have a more painterly look to him as well.

I loved my colour palette in this piece and it was actually inspired by a free paint swatch booklet, (the current Crown colour guide) that I had gotten from Homebase in the weekend before creating this piece. I had loved the pale toned blues within one of the room guides and I felt the orange of the orangutan would complement the tones well, so these were my main tones and I tried to work around them to make a cohesive design that would attract the eye and be very pleasing to it.

Weaknesses

My biggest issue with this piece was trying to get the orangutans anatomy and proportions correct. Everything that I knew about the human anatomy had to be thrown out of the window for this character as their limbs are longer, bodies are more round and they barely have a neck. So, every time I tried to draw this orangutan, he would look wrong, but that was because I was comparing him to a human, so I just tried to get him looking as correct as I possibly could, which in the end, I do think I did a pretty good job? Maybe. I won’t really know until I’ve seen a real orangutan sitting in that exact position for myself.

Opportunities

By submitting this illustration to the competition, I may be able to get more recognition from the AOI, who I do plan to work with more in the future when I become a member with them. If I were to win, my work would be showcased within a gallery space in Hartlepool, being seen by other illustrators, both who I assume are also emerging or established, but it can also be seen by potential clients, but either way, it would be good publicity which could help my audience grow.

When I post the piece on social media, once the competition is over and the winners have been announced, as I’m not sure if you’re allowed to have it online beforehand, I will be using hashtags to reach a wider range of audiences, but this may allow me to reach more activist based groups or people who have the same views on the subject, so I may be able to learn more about the issue from them and ways in which I can help the cause, whether it’s swapping to alternative products that do not contain palm oil, or going out of my way to do even more. Since creating this piece, I have become more passionate about the issue at hand and I would like to make a change, so I would like to be more informed about the problem so that I can help more and inform others about the issues with more confidence.

Threats

The main threat I feel I would have from this illustration would be that I am a hypocrite with the message, as I do still use products that contain palm oil, so from the audience’s perspective, if I myself am still using the products, why should the audience stop. In response to this, I would say that with this piece, it’s not really aimed at the common public, as palm oil is in so many products that it would be hard to just stop buying them or find alternatives, so I aim this illustration at the people higher up, such as the companies that make the products, as I feel they need to start finding alternative methods rather than using palm oil as consumers don’t really know what is in the products they are purchasing half of the time, but the companies know what ingredients are going into their products and the devastation it has caused within the rainforests. It may cost time and money to remake the products with an alternative ingredient, but in the long run, it would be worth it, as it would not just be saving the homes of thousands of animals including the orangutans, it would also help in saving our planet.

Future Goals and Targets.

I loved working on this piece, with the style, techniques and stronger message behind it, so in the future, I would like to create more illustrations with stronger messages, ones that I do feel passionate about and can get behind.

With the style and techniques, I feel I had discovered my direction with this illustration just whilst experimenting, so I would like to treat more projects like this in the future, trying out multiple brushes and colour palettes before I even start working on the illustration, so that I have a better idea of the direction I’m taking with my piece and I have more confidence in doing so.

Bibliography

Crown Paints. (2019). Colours. [online] Available at: https://www.crownpaints.co.uk/colours [Accessed 9 Apr. 2019].

Iceland Foods (2018). Iceland’s Banned TV Christmas Advert… Say hello to Rang-tan. #NoPalmOilChristmas. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JdpspllWI2o [Accessed 9 Apr. 2019].

Russell, M. (2019). Monkey Illustration. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4Ib2r6xXyU&t=50s [Accessed 9 Apr. 2019].

All other images are my own unless stated otherwise.

We need to talk..

Ok, so since the end of Semester one I feel I have been slacking on my blog and not posting as regularly as I had. I believe this is because after the last hand in, I was so stressed that I felt I needed a bit of a break, one that I didn’t necessarily have the time for but kind of took anyway.

In the first couple of weeks I did create two pieces of work, one which was a commission (I believe I mentioned that I would be working on this in a previous blog post, ‘Evolution of the Cat’ click here to read) then the second piece I had worked on was for a ‘draw this in your style’ challenge on Instagram which you can also read about by clicking here. So technically I had been working, but not on the projects that I was supposed to be concentrating on, such as the live briefs and personal projects I had planned, like illustrating The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, focusing on branding (creating a website, portfolio, promo packs, merch and products, etc). brow2

At the start of the year I was also given the chance to have my work in a local exhibition ran by ‘A Canny Collective‘ which I felt was a great opportunity as I gained a lot of experience from both creating illustrations and setting them up for the show, then on the opening night I was working on the shop, so I also gained the experience of selling work in a more personal setting, selling one to one with the buyer as opposed to over a website. If you would like to read more about this exhibition, what I created and how the night went, I have made a blog post about it so again, please click here if you want to know more.

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We still open until friday for anyone who didnt get to see the space on Monday! Merch will stay open as well 👏🏻💫 No more beer but we replaced that with some discounted items!

A post shared by A Canny Collective (@acannycollective) on Feb 13, 2019 at 5:02pm PST

SO, now with the work that I’m actually supposed to be working on. I have currently been creating illustrations for the Wizard of Oz but throughout I have been struggling with the styles and techniques that I’ve wanted to use. I did initially create 5 basic sketches which at the time I did see some flaws, but with the pressure of time, I got lazy and just ignored them and thought I was ready for the next stages and that maybe the flaws would get better once I coloured the pieces and added more textures. After a well-needed discussion with my tutor, he knocked some sense into me and I knew that I had to stop being lazy and make the changes that I was choosing to ignore.

From this discussion, I started taking photos of me and my boyfriend to use as reference for the characters and I started using more images of animals and floral elements where needed. It’s fair to say that my sketchbook became a lot fuller as I was sketching different poses, angles and options for each illustration (I think this will be the first sketchbook in a while that I’m actually proud of, as I more recently I have just been going straight into digital work as opposed to sketching traditionally first). Once I was happy with the sketches, I started to create new layouts for each of the illustrations, keeping in mind my talk with David and how I should think about the narrative of the piece when trying to compose specific characters or elements.

After the thumbnail layouts were down, I started sketching the pieces digitally once again and the reference photos I had taken did come in very handy during this process. I then printed the pieces off, showed them to David, mostly for reassurance before I took them any further, he did make some suggestions, for instance with the Tin Woodsman piece, he suggested that I reframe it so that it would be more of a closeup shot, which I do feel helped convey more action between the characters as the previous layout did seem quite open now looking back, which may have looked more calm than what I was intending.

Once I made the adjustments suggested I went to the light box and started transferring the sketch to paper and once lined I’d add in the textures. For this process I used pencil, I started with a 4H for both the lining and the textures, then when I needed darker areas I used a 5B. After testing multiple pencils in my sketchbook, I mostly liked the H’s as they gave more of the texture I wanted, whereas the B’s were more soft so they gave more of a smooth texture.

After I had completed the traditional part of this project, for now, we shall see if I need to go back and do anything else, I scanned in each illustration, set it within the document size that I wanted and now they are ready to colour.

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This is the point I’m currently at, but during the colouring phase, I do want to record the process as I feel it may be satisfying to watch and I do want to start posting speed painting videos online, potentially streaming the process online as well through twitch.

The main elements of my to-do list at this moment in time is to:

Complete my Wizard of Oz illustrations
Start working on AOI’s Northern Illustration competition (more on that coming soon in a separate blog post)
Create an illustration or sequential piece for Cheltenham illustration awards (I will go into more depth and make a blog post about this too)
Focus on self-branding, this leads on to the next point which is..
Creating a portfolio book. I still have the pages from the one I made last year, so in the new one I will just be adding my more recent work, but I definitely want to change my old cover, hence how this links to the previous point as I need to focus on what my brand is and how best to communicate that through a cover.
Creating a website. I hope that I will be able to show my portfolio and have a working shop on the site.
Making work for the final show. I don’t necessarily know what I want to create for this yet or if I’m just going to use work from one of my current projects, but once I get a better idea of the space, how/if we’re framing our work, I may have more inspiration as to what I can create.
The last on this list is merchandise. For the final show, I did want to make new products that I could potentially sell on the night, whether this is new prints, T-shirt’s, enamel pins, badges etc. The reason this is last however is that I feel it should be my last priority as the work above has more consequences if I don’t manage to complete them.

Bibliography

A Canny Collective. (2019) [Online] Available from: https://www.instagram.com/p/Bt19GO7lEG5/ [Accessed on 03 April. 2019]

All other work is my own unless stated otherwise.

Little Journey Home

On my little journey home from college, when the bus goes across the high-level bridge, I have recently noticed some artwork on the side of a building that now always catches my eye.

business cards woman

The piece is of a woman wearing a fabric formed of multiple patterns and she has a blue circle behind her head which helps attract your eyes to her face. I believe what initially attracted me to this art is that it had reminded me of my own work, a piece I had created for the window in my classes studio last year, of a woman with a floral pattern of tattoos running up her body. (This piece is also currently being used on my business cards too).

When seeing this artwork by ‘Hushartist’ on my way home, just sitting on the bus, it made me think of the potential I could have with my own work, possibly working on a larger scale and one day, another person may find it, do some research into who created it then they would find me.

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Recent mural I made for my friends at @bytheriverbrewco . These guys always keeping Newcastle interesting and moving forward. #mural #hush #hushartist #painting #newcastle #quayside #bytheriverbrewco

A post shared by Hush (@hushartist) on Sep 3, 2018 at 8:28am PDT

I like this piece so much as yes it is a style I relate to, I love soft illustrations of women combined with bold patterns, especially in this piece how the artist has made the woman black and white with the pop of colour surrounding her, not drowning her out but helping draw your eyes to her beauty instead. But I also like this piece because I saw it on the side of a building underneath the Tyne bridge, which led me into researching it, finding out which building it was on ‘By the River Brew Co’ which is a brewery and tap, a restaurant and so on which I never even knew existed, and finding the artist and seeing their other work. So with this one piece of art, it did a good job in advertising, both the place and the artist, as it was able to grab my attention from two bridges over on a moving bus.

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THE LADY DON'T MIND… Massive thanks to @hushartist for this incredible addition to our container community… She's in safe hands here x . . . #streetphotography #buildinggraffiti #graffitiart #art #streetart #handmade #instagraffiti #street #graff #animation #urban #wallart #spraypaint #aerosol #spray #wall #mural #murals #painting #arte @sarahzarstudio #color #streetartistry #artist #grafiti #urbano #rue #guerillaart #tag #mytag

A post shared by By The River Brew Co (@bytheriverbrewco) on Aug 30, 2018 at 9:52am PDT

List of Illustrations

My own work. (2018)

Hushartist. (2018) [online] Available from: https://www.instagram.com/p/BnRNyrhBq4g/ [Accessed on 01 April. 2019]

By The River Co. (2018) [online] Available from: https://www.instagram.com/p/BnHESTnFK66/ [Accessed on 01 April. 2019]

Cheltenham Concepts

For the Cheltenham Illustration Awards, with the theme of ‘unity’, I wanted to create an illustration with a deeper meaning and a stronger message behind it. I had not created a lot of illustrations like this in the past, so had wanted to gain more experience with that type of illustration in this project. A lot of these ideas were thought from the perspective of a group of people coming together to fix certain issues, showing the theme of unity through group efforts.

Concept 1 – This concept was a little basic in a sense, I feel like it would be expected from the theme of unity. I had sketched a silhouette of two people holding hands and inside the shape would be layers of people of all different backgrounds and walks of life, differentiating by their gender, ethnicity, job role, sexuality, etc.

I did like the idea behind this concept but did not feel the message was the direction that I wanted to go with as I did want to look even deeper into worldly issues, bringing light to them through my illustrations.

Concept 2 – This idea was inspired by an illustration I had found on Pinterest of a figure trapped within a glass dome, so I felt this would be a good representation of what it may feel like to be trapped within your own mind, and for my piece, to better express the theme of unity, I wanted the piece to be sequential, showing the figure getting help from others in the end, whether it be from professionals or just his friends. When putting more thought into the specific type of glass, as that could have more symbolisation in itself, it had made me think of a campaign called ‘Be in your Mates Corner’ ran by Time to change, in which they had made beer mats with the message:

“Is there a mate missing around this table? Reach out to him.” – (Time to Change, 2019)

This campaign was directed at a male audience as suicide is the main cause of death in men under 50, and this campaign was directed to fight the stigma behind mental health in men as some may feel that they shouldn’t talk about their problems as it may make them weaker. This advertisement was fighting the stigma and opening the conversation about male mental health issues, so with my own illustrations, I wanted to try to do this too, carrying on that conversation and potentially showing that there is light at the end of the tunnel if you allow others in, whether it is from professional help or just from friends.

Concept 3 – This concept was inspired by an artist named Lauren Carney, or DizzyLittleDotty on Instagram, who had formed a portrait of a character made from multiple characters of different backgrounds, ethnicities, etc. The artist had created this piece to celebrate international women’s day of 2018, so the piece had consisted purely of female figures, so with my own piece, I wanted to take her concept and try to be even more inclusive, having male representation as well as women, showing unity through all people.

In my version, the character had ended up looking similar to Frankenstein’s monster, so scarier than I had intended, as opposed to empowering as I feel Carney’s piece is. I did decide that I would not be taking this concept any further as I believe the illustration shown below is already a great representation and is uplifting as opposed to a horror show like my version.

View this post on Instagram

Happy International Women’s Day too all my fierce females out there celebrating womanhood! (ps zoom in on all those itty bitty details – all unique identities, but all united)

A post shared by Lauren Carney (@dizzylittledotty) on Mar 7, 2018 at 3:31pm PST

Concept 4 – Is based on another illustration I had found on Pinterest, which was of a woman in a social setting, but inside of her was a curled up figure who seemed to be scared of being within that setting and had anxiety that she would have to communicate with others or potentially feared that everyone was looking at her or talking about her.

With my own piece, I had the idea to show multiple people holding hands, people of all different shapes and sizes, but within them, all was a scared little version of themselves. This was supposed to symbolise that no matter what you may look like on the outside, whether you’re a big buff guy like Terry Cruise or have the figure of McLovin (I know he’s a fictional character but that is the only name I will use for that actor), all of us have that person within us that is scared, maybe who has anxiety, problems with overthinking, depression and so on. Despite these versions of us, however, we still need to overcome them, no matter how long or hard that challenge may be, and together we stand in union ready to help one another through our struggles.

Concept 5 – This concept was suggested by my partner when I had asked him for ideas of illustrations that I could make with deeper meanings to them. He had suggested that I draw a beach with the waves gently washing inwards and back out, but as they would do this, they would wash up children’s toys. This was to symbolise the children that may not have made the journey when escaping Syria on the boats/rafts, the toys having belonged to those children.

This concept is very deep and it does make me sad when thinking about it. Before my partner had mentioned this idea, I do think that I was blissfully unaware of this issue, but by creating the visuals, it has given me more perspective on the situation and more realisation as to the horrible problems going on within the world.

Although this was a strong concept, I did not feel it had a lot of connection to the theme of unity, (which was solely my fault as I had not mentioned the theme to my partner, I had just asked for ideas for an illustration with a deeper meaning, which he had come through on) so, I had not decided to carry this concept onwards. I do however want to potentially come back to it at a later date, as I do believe that by illustrating this piece, I could bring more light to the topic, making more people aware of the issue.

ugh

With these concepts, I had chosen to take concept 2 further, illustrating the piece in more detail. However, this had not worked out well as I felt I had lost connection with the original theme, and whilst illustrating it, I did not have a style in mind that I wanted to achieve, so I had lost more and more confidence in the whole piece as I was going. With the timeframe and still having other projects to complete, I felt myself caring less and less about this project and with the direction that it was going, I had not enjoyed the thought of it at all, so I had made the decision to just cut it off before I spent any more time on it. When I had tried to make the piece better, I just felt like I was polishing a turd, so just felt there was no point in carrying on.

I do like the concept behind this piece as I do feel it is strong, but I feel I need more time to play around with the imagery within, illustrating something that I am proud of, as opposed to just getting the piece done and out of the way. I believe as it is a strong message, it does deserve strong imagery as well so that it is able to best communicate the specific message to the audience.

As well as this concept, at a later date, I would like to come back to the others as well, maybe working more outside of the theme of unity, as I feel I will have more freedom, being able to play around a bit more with the imagery as I will not need to try to make the concepts work towards the theme and be confined to it.

Reading List

Russell, M. (2019). All together now: Tales of Unity. [online] Pinterest. Available at: https://www.pinterest.co.uk/melon628/all-together-now-tales-of-unity/ [Accessed 21 Mar. 2019].

Time to Change (2019). Be in your Mates Corner. [online] The Independent. Available at: https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/men-mental-health-coaster-twitter-viral-time-to-change-campaign-suicide-depression-a8319796.html [Accessed 21 Mar. 2019].

List of Figures

Carney, L. (2018). International Women’s Day. [image] Available at: https://www.instagram.com/p/BgCmATIjtVb/ [Accessed 21 Mar. 2019].

All other images are my own unless stated otherwise.

Guest Artist at A Canny Collectives Exhibition

This was an amazing opportunity I was offered, to be a guest artist with a group named ‘A canny Collective’, who are running an exhibition showcasing their work within a gallery space, all pieces of which have the theme of Valentines, as they planned for it to run on the same week, starting on Monday the 11th.

The group themselves had planned everything out, viewed the space, cleared it out, fixed it up a bit, thought about how they were going to advertise it, made posters/flyers and stuck them up and handed them out around town and within the college, made social media pages and posts, and they just planned out everything that you could think of, that they wanted to have done for the opening night and the gallery space in general.

If you want to read more about their process or experience, you can read about it by clicking:

here for Katie Marshals experience
here for Phil Hughes
here for Nicole Nicholsons
and here for Adam Rowlinsons

In a couple of weeks running up to the exhibition, the group had gone to see the place and had tried to plan out where their own work would be set up. They had then realised how much open space they would still have, so had decided to recruit guest artists to fill the extra areas. This had meant that me and another artist called Igor Tavares, would showcase our work at the event, Igor actually live painted on the opening night so there was a next level of entertainment in a sense.

So with the theme of Valentines, I wanted to focus on self-love in the form of body positivity. Although I feel strong in the message of body positivity, everyone having confidence within their own figures, there was an ulterior motive with these designs, as I wanted to use this project as to better my skills with anatomy, but as I had a shorter timeframe to work with, I decided to illustrate in more of a minimal style.

Using reference imagery and following a tutorial/guide from a video by an artist named Chelsea Gracei (which I had discussed in a previous post, click here to read) from my base sketch, I had formed simple lines to suggest the individual bodies, showing the curves or muscle tones of the specific character. These would then contrast well against the white silhouette of the figure, which was composed against a floral pattern in a circular or diamond shape which would best fit the specific figure.

I do like these illustrations as I feel they are strong, very feminine and I believe they are empowering as they celebrate women of all different figures. I enjoyed working on these pieces as they are more minimal than my usual work, and I feel they are strong, focusing solely on each specific body shape. I did not give these figures any facial features, as I wanted the audience to potentially relate themselves to a certain figure, whereas I believe by giving them faces they would have been less interpretable I was proud that I was able to create these pieces within a short amount of time as this opportunity, to have my work exhibited within a local exhibition, was too good of an offer to pass up and I’m so appreciative of the group for giving me this chance.

In the future, I would like to expand on this mini project, creating even more body types, potentially drawing more men, as people of all genders, ages etc, do struggle with body positivity, so I would like to make my work all-inclusive, representing people of all different body shapes, no matter what gender, age, ethnicity, etc.

The opening night was good, I was happy to be working on the stall, selling my own work as well as the other artists. I am more of an introvert, so I enjoyed taking a backseat with all of the social interaction. It would have been a good chance to network with other people, but I had enjoyed gaining the experience of selling work one to one with the customers, as it is something I would be interested in doing again in the future, setting a stall up within a market, or even selling at a convention. By working on the stall, I was still able to interact with the people at the event, especially when they would ask if I was ‘Mel, the artist behind the figures’ (I believe they got my name from the zine catalogue that the group had made, so I was taken aback at first like ‘waiiit, HOW DO YOU KNOW MY NAME?) so I feel I did still gain some of the networking side of the experience, but maybe in a less forward sense, meaning that I was not making an effort to go out and socialise but my social interactions ended up happening more naturally.

In conclusion, I do feel I gained a lot of experience from taking part in this exhibition, whether it was working to a shorter time frame, working with themes I do feel strongly about and showing a positive light on all body shapes and sizes, printing and helping set up the space or selling one to one on the stall. I loved being a part of this exhibition and I am so grateful to the Canny Collective group for giving me this opportunity.

If you would like to follow the group, I have shown one of their posts below, but if you would like to follow the artists individually, you can click here for Katie Marshall, here for Nicole Nicholson, here for Phil Hughes and here for Adam Rowlinsons. They are amazing illustrators, so I do recommend giving them a look.

View this post on Instagram

We still open until friday for anyone who didnt get to see the space on Monday! Merch will stay open as well 👏🏻💫 No more beer but we replaced that with some discounted items!

A post shared by A Canny Collective (@acannycollective) on Feb 13, 2019 at 5:02pm PST

Reading List

Hughes, P. (2019). Week 22: Ready to Rumble. [Blog] Vonfrankenstank. Available at: https://philhughesillustrator.wordpress.com/2019/04/19/week-22-ready-to-rumble/ [Accessed 20 Apr. 2019].

Marshall, K. (2019). A Canny Exhibition: How it went. [Blog] Nostic Art. Available at: https://nosticart.wordpress.com/2019/02/20/a-canny-exhibition-how-it-went/ [Accessed 28 Feb. 2019].

Nicholson, N. (2019). The Team Behind A Canny Collective. [Blog] Witchita Art. Available at: https://witchitaarts.wordpress.com/2019/01/24/update-a-canny-collective/ [Accessed 28 Feb. 2019].

Rowlinson, A. (2019). Valentine’s Exhibition – Set Up. [Blog] AHROW Art. Available at: https://ahrowart.wordpress.com/2019/02/04/valentines-exhibition-set-up/ [Accessed 28 Feb. 2019].

Anatomy/Poses

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=alamCiqsIb8

For a recent local exhibition ran by A Canny Collective, which I was a guest artist for, with the theme of love, I decided to focus on self-love in the form of body positivity, so in my pieces, I wanted to illustrate multiple bodies of different shapes and sizes. I am confident with the message behind these pieces as everyone should learn to love and appreciate their own body shapes and sizes, buuuut there was also another reason why I had wanted to draw bodies for this mini project, as I wanted to use it in order to get better at drawing anatomy. Luckily for me, an artist named Chelsea Gracei had posted a video on youtube discussing and showing how she specifically draws anatomy and poses.

Chelsea Gracei is an illustrator who I have followed on social media for a while now. This was the artist who I had taken inspiration from in the #DrawThisInYourStyle challenge on Instagram a month ago when I had redrawn one of her characters. Her style is more cartoony so her figures are not exactly anatomically correct, but she does have enough knowledge on anatomy that she knows how to manipulate it so that her characters are still pleasing to the eye.

In the video, she discusses how she uses oval shapes to form her characters, as it gives a more flowing sense, creating more movement within the character than using a more blocky shape would. Following the artists tutorial, as well as reference images so that I would have a better idea of anatomy, I had tried drawing the first of four figures. The reference image I had used was of my friend and was posted on her private Instagram in confidence, so it would be inappropriate to show that reference image within this post.

The figure I was drawing had bigger hips but a slim waist so I tried to convey this within the oval shapes I was using. The proportions did look a bit off, but I decided to just leave them until I cleaned up the sketch a bit. In the original reference image, both hands were positioned on the hips, but I eventually chose to move them both behind the figure as I wanted the woman’s curves to be the focal point of the piece. I did initially just have one hand on the hip, but I felt the proportions looked weird within the arm without any shading and I had not intended to add and shading as to keep my design minimal, so I ended up just positioning both arms behind the woman’s back.

Once I had an initial sketch down, I tried planning out the background elements, positioning a shape behind the specific character of which I felt would best complement their figures and positioning. I had ended up only creating four pieces as I was working with a short time frame, but in the future, I would like to draw even more body shapes and sizes of all different genders and ethnicities as I would like my work to be inclusive to all. I still had further refinements to make at this point shown in the images below, but I wanted to have minimal line work, so from the sketches, I had created a white silhouette, which had cut out the figure against its background shape, then I would later line the characters, quite boldly but only using the lines to help define the bodies. The linework would taper off and not exceed the specific shapes as I wanted to keep the characters quite clean and confined to their shapes.

I plan to carry on this explanation of my process within an upcoming post, but as well as discussing my own work, I will also be talking about the exhibition as a whole and my experiences with that.

Moving back to the topic of this post, anatomy and learning from a video by Chelsea Gracei, I do feel that I had learnt from her personal process, creating more organic and flowing body proportions and positions, but I do believe I will still need reference imagery if I am to create more figures in the future, as I feel without, my proportions would end up being very off. I do plan to work on my anatomy skills and knowledge more in the future, but I feel, for the time being, I can work well with Gracei’s process whilst using reference imagery. I do believe that in future projects I will refer back to this artists tips and techniques as I did find them useful whilst working on these figures.

Bibliography

Gracei, C. (2019). How to Draw Poses that Look Natural and Flowy. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=alamCiqsIb8 [Accessed 25 Feb. 2019].

All other images within this post are my own unless stated otherwise.