Composition Continued

Overlapping, Arrangement, Size, Location, Focus & Cropping

• Filling the page with subject matter - blocks of colour
• Graphical simplified combination of elephant, butterfly and person
• Two different perspectives - subject matter combines to become elephant facing straight on, or is a human and elephant separated into butterfly's wings
• Constrasting tone suggesting edges - where one surface ends and another begins
• Butterfly's body leads eye down the middle of picture - central, balanced

Final Resolution

Rough scamps & Initial Ideas

End of Module Evaluation

During this brief I have developed my Photoshop skills by manipulating images digitally, I have been able to do this through practicing with my scanned images and taking the time to get to know the tools. A lot of what I learnt was by accident, playing and observing how others use the software. I made use of the lasso and brush tools to add depth and texture to my final illustrations, I believe there is a marked improvement over my previous digital work. My compositional skills have also improved due to my focus on laying out pages in my book and working out how well they relate with one and other. Drawing has become a lot more intuitive for me and less of a way to get ideas onto a page, but more a method to finalize them which I haven't done enough previously.

Working in Photoshop with analog drawings really gave my work a quality I have not achieved in the past. My work is visually much more striking than if I just presented it with no digital manipulation. This gave me confidence in making a book of just nice imagery to begin with, I was thinking this would be enough. My compositional skills and occasional use of depth and perception has made me more critical of why I am doing things, getting me to think of ways my process of working can become better and sometimes easier. For example working with the lasso tool to digitally highlight areas of colour was very simple and easy for me to do however on it's own would not work that well aesthetically. When repeated and combined with highly detailed analog work, the simplicity is balanced out by the labour that went into my sketchbook.

One of my biggest realisations in this project was my drawing process. By making use of different types of media I am able to solve problems as I go along, I can layer things up and hide other things. I can spend ages on a drawing but that is because I am finding ways to improve or fix the problem areas. It nearly always starts off kind of bad and the rest is just me trying to rectify the problem. In the drawing below I constantly made changes to the line work and the shapes on the faces with new pieces of paper and masking tape, or simply just redrawing a line. It has resulted in a series of faces that detail the journey of my image making. I realised after finishing the image that there needed to be an area highlighted on the cheek, so I ripped a layer of paper, I didn't like the shape of his forehead so I stuck paper over it and started it again. These areas of fixing and reworking the image have become part of the general aesthetic in my work, something that was picked up on in my final crit.

A big problem for me with this project was decision making. I think I need to stick some things out until I can appreciate the processes I used to resolve issues I come up against or at least make them work for an audience, rather than move on and do work entirely for myself. Wanting to make a book of just nice drawings of Rjukan was a mistake in that I completely forgot about the initial purpose set out by my brief, it had to be seen by other people and if it lacked any real substance then it would not resonate with them on a deeper level other than 'looking nice' which catches attention but then what else is there to look for? I am pleased I had just enough time to try and fix some of these issues although not completely. If I had realised my mistake and listened to advice given in crits then my book would have been a lot better. In future I will definitely use crits as an opportunity to take a step back and face the problems with my work, whereas during this project I was very passive and undervalued opinions given to me.

I am very pleased with the overall level of quality to my work that I think has taken a step up from my previous attempts at final pieces. A lot of my planning went into aesthetics and despite the negative impact this had on the message, I ended up with a better way of working and a more distinct line between what areas of my work are developmental and final. I would previously sometimes try to blur those lines which in some ways added a sense of character to my work but also created doubts and questions in my mind as to what my work is for - the purpose. I am definitely going to continue combining digital and analog processes. I have become really excited thinking about the possibilities my new skills could bring, I am thinking a lot about texture and line and how these are transferred from paper to screen, I need to buy a scanner.

In future I will take the time to listen to people's opinions more carefully and plan more thoroughly based on those opinions, which will help tackle my problem of choosing easier routes and just skimming the surface of ideas without fully exploring their potential, in this case it was a narrative. My drawing is somewhat limited by the sketchbooks that I work in, and this is definitely something that needs to change. I am going to make sure I start to work outside of the safety net that my books give me and transfer the same processes I have always used but onto loose paper, I will have more space and less limitations, this will definitely improve my practice. I am going to keep up to date with my blog, something I didn't keep on top of this time around, little and often is key and is something I have already been told many times. I suppose it comes down to listening properly and realising a problem doesn't just go away with time, you have to face it as soon as it arises otherwise anything you do is in danger of going off on a tangent that can be difficult to rectify.

I want to try new things digitally, learning the basics in Photoshop has made learning other tools like Illustrator and video editing software like After Effects seem less daunting. I have been seriously limiting my progress up until starting my degree course, hopefully I will continue to improve using what I have learnt and everything I still have to learn.

Two Final Books

 To print the adapted version of my book I had to use the digital printing facilities at the Vernon Street campus which was the only place available this morning. Unfortunately the quality is not as good as Blenheim's printers but I am satisfied with the more pastel colour palette despite some pages looking a bit dull compared to the previous book which looks really nice and rich on matte paper.

Adapting my book - narrative

After my crit and feedback I got regarding the lack of purpose I have decided to adapt my book and us what I have to create some kind of narrative. I have had a limited amount of time but have been able to include a short story that speaks about the sad town Rjukan becoming happy again with the installation of the mirrors on the valley side. There is a clearer divide between happy and sad atmospheres - kind of links in with my visual journalist observations - environments affecting our mood.

I am much more pleased with this solution, but am annoyed it took me until the final crit to realise the mistake I made in trying to create a book of pictures that had no real flow or story line. 

I had to create a new starting page, this one communicates the sadness of the town in shade quite literally. I wanted the colours and composition to contrast with the rest of the book - when printed it will hopefully show the faces disappearing into darkness, now I know the printer will over saturate my work.

Rerarranging a few pages, for example "We are sad because we live in darkness" allows me to split the book into a sad half and a happy half, rather than the confusing mix I had before.

Trying to be factual - haven't given the whole story in summary to the reader as I did on first page of previous book

I think the bursts of colour in the final two images really end the book on a happy note - in stark contrast to dark first page

Ending with a smile - logical

Final Crit

During a peer assessment crit I was told that the research and work in my book integrated well and my note taking seemed to form part of the imagery. I am unsure as whether this is good or, sometimes it distracts from the actual research and stops me doing more. Speaking to Emanuel about problem solving made me realise the problem solving I do that he had picked up on. I have never really looked too far into the process in which i make pictures but in hindsight a lot of the images I constructed for this project were done so as solutions to problems I had created. For example I don't intentionally mean to put masking tape over some stuff to just look nice, but often I made a mistake and need to cover it up. My drawings usually start off on the wrong foot and I have to somehow fix them as I go along. This process is part of the reason I have noticed my slow pace of work during the project.

I am very pleased with the finished book and the quality of the print, it really shows of the colours I was able to overlay digitally.

It was written down on my sheet during a group session that my final book has a lack of message, which is something I completely agree with. I am annoyed at my self for not working hard enough to try and make a narrative work within my book and for some reason hoped nice imagery would carry it instead. But I am starting to notice the  importance of message in a series of images, I am kind of asking myself why I made the book. What if someone else wanted to look at it? I suppose it wouldn't mean anything? I went against a lot the notes given in my crit sessions telling me to focus on the story line of the book. I think this 'book of art' I've made doesn't really meet the project's criteria. I mixed sad and happy imagery in a non logical order which confuses the audience. A lot of my journey up to this point is quite unorganised... poorly managed?

Producing Final Book

I am really pleased with level of finish I have managed to achieve with my book, I think it was key to be patient and to take my time with binding it. I did make a small mistake when cutting down the pages, cropping them too close before it was saddle stitched together, which then meant I had to lose about 2mm off each edge when trimming despite the bleed. I probably need to write a reminder list of things to to in future.

Test Book

Printing out my test book has given me confidence in the imagery, I think it works really well when everything is brought together and the colours are striking. I am pleased with the sizing and format, it is big enough to give the viewer nice double page spreads but the details are further amplifed by the small size, some areas appear more complex when condensed.

Indesign - Laying out a book

Because I have gone with a saddle stitch bind I need an even amount of pages since each double sided page takes up 4 pages. I have made sure that my final resolutions are 23.3 cm wide and 19.3 cm in height giving 3mm bleed, so my final book when opened will be 19cm x 23cm and about 11.5cm wide when closed. The dimensions of the pages fit inside an A4 sheet of paper, to make sure both sides are lined up I will need to centre the pages before printing.

Final Pages

A combination of work digitally collaged together - busy - vibrant - draws you in - contrast between harsh cut lines and textures - diagonal lines - pointing - shining - light - moving - beaming down - heaven

A short introduction to Rjukan - makes up for lack of story?

I added texture behind small elements like the windows and small white houses, these really bring it to life, the white town and 'Rjukan' in white are nice areas of focus, the diagonal lines pull your eye towards them

A sudden burst of colour - instant - light is fast - constrasting hues - almost looks like fire - high energy - overlap - lines intersect

I really love the texture I was able to achieve with a digital brush on this last page, soft and muted - delicate - thin veil of darkness - shaded by mountain

Test Printing CMYK

Paper & Colour Quality

I have been testing out how my work looks printed on different types of paper, I have noticed there is a quite a noticeable difference/variation in how colours are represented on screen and on paper. I didn't realise until recently that you can colour proof in photoshop before printing. On some papers the colours appear warmer and others they appear cold and washed out. cartridge paper is quite nice to print on but makes the colours appear less vibrant. I want them to be really striking, I am hoping the professional printing facilities will give me this quality.

I really liked this piece of work on screen but after printing I realised the blues I was using are not completely replicated when printing with cmyk. It is a shame the transparent qualities displayed digitally do not show up quite as well on paper.

Because the transparency of my photoshop layers doesn't show too well on regular paper I tried printing onto tracing paper, almost like taking an idividua layer out of photoshop. It kind of works when layered over other work but it need a light source to really work aesthetically. This method could be implemented in a book with lots of paper layers that you have to peel back to see a image.

Composition

Area, Depth, Line, Frame & Value

• Trying to create a sense of perspective - looking up towards a tall mountain
• First time I've really stopped to think about foreground, mid-ground, background - layering an image to create points of focus and depth - dynamism
• Definite improvement in the effectiveness of the message - the difference in scale between the mountain and person is clearer
• I don't think there is necessarily a right or wrong way to compose an image, just more and less effective/successful ways of doing so

Final Resolution

Test & Initial Ideas