ANIMATION TEST.

 

Over the last week or so, I've been trying to get my head around how I'm going to tackle making my animation. It's based on an editorial I am in the process of doing from an article in NewScientist based on technology. The summary of the text, is about how web browsers and personal item of technology (i.e smart phones/tablets) are taking over the decision making process for many people. It expresses how a lot of people are reliant on comparison apps and review websites to choose their path for them basing it on other people's choices.

I wanted to do an illustration based around the perpetual face in order to show the similarity between people. From this I wanted to create a continously spinning head that will eventually split down the middle, and open to reveal an empty space where the brain should be. I've been making little gifs in photoshop to try and get my head around how I'm going to execute the illustrations but finding it quite challenging. To get my head around the spinning motion, I stuck bluetac on to a wooden ball to make a small stop motion piece. I did this in order to understand the positions of the nose, and when each one is visible after every turn. This also helped with my understanding of the shadow casting as this is going to be the most important element of each illustration in order to make sure that face looks likes it is rotating. As I want to create a smooth 360degree turn, I need to have as many drawings as possible to ensure a slick rotation. I'm pretty sure I'll be able to add some blur and tweak any problems in photoshop/aftereffects afterwards but would rather keep this to a minimum. 

To make sure that I achieve this, I think I need around 5 different frames for this part of the animation to look okay. To get the proportions and scale looking right, I took some photos of my face whilst turning on the spot. I then layered them up, dead rough; to make a quick gif to make sure they number of frames I predicted would work efficiently. It seems to look okay at the moment but I'd rather get a few more frames thrown in if possible. I've found that making these small animations as reference, it has definitely helped me to understand the process. Even though they're incredibley rough, I've found them very beneficial and helpful. The next step is to start making the final illustrations.    

ARTEMIS 2.

Last week I had my second site visit to the Artemis collection in Leeds to finalise ideas for the 'Get Stuffed' project. It was a chance to explore the storage rooms in much more detail, as last time as we were a bit pushed for time and christ is that place big. There were so many things I'd completely missed on the first site visit so given then opportunity to come back was a real treat.

The first task of the day was to unload all the photography gear from the van and set up in a small room behind the workshop in prep for the shoot. During my placement, myself and Lord Whitney had made a rough list of the 10 animals that we believed would work best to bring real charm and life (or not as the case may be) to the photographs with chosen families. Having had a second look round the stunning collection, we came to a decision that 10 definitely wasn't enough as there was so much choice on offer. As a result of this, we extended the animal gang by another 5 pieces. Choosing the final cut wasn't easy though. Pushing a trolley round, grabbing the critters we liked most, was a sort of surreal super market sweep moment that I can honestly say I never thought I'd be doing. I couldn't have asked for anything more though as I was loving it.

Next was the makeover. Some of the poor creatures needed a little sprucing up, so out came the glass polish and dusters along side a good helping of elbow grease and within no time at all everyone was looking suave. This was later a bit of a pain, as they glass was so clean, the light was bouncing of every possible angle creating loads of glare.    

Whilst Amy and Bek starting taking some shots of the animals, I tried to get some quick sketches done, taking full advantage of the different positions I could place things. The photo shoot was for a set of promotional postcards that are going to be made in order to inform families around the Leeds area of the project.  In response to these, families interested in taking part can then get in touch and apply. Once animals have been chosen and allocated to people, an information pack will be given alongside their specific creature, full of facts, illustrations and other little bits about their rented pet. I am going to be using the references that I made, with the photos taken by LW to produce the illustrations that are going to feature in the packs. A decision hasn't been made yet as home the final pack is going to look but I'm stoked to get started on it and it should be finished towards the end of May I think.

It was dead interesting being behind the scenes and helping out at photo shoot, as it was all completely alien to me. What made the day slightly easier compared to photographing live models, was that the animals were very cooperative and didn't move around much. It was quite a peculiar site if I'm being honest but a most enjoyable one. As I mentioned earlier, the only challenge was avoiding the glare and reflection that the glass was creating. The only way of really avoiding the problem was to shoot the images slightly off centre, so that the lens wasn't directly parallel with the cases. It seemed to solve the problem pretty well and didn't obstruct the shots that were wanted at all.

Time seemed to absolutely fly and I didn't actually get chance to make reference sheets for every animal but made a healthy attempt at it. The process of taking photos seem to be much faster then my hand with pencil but I knew that I'd have to do some extra afterwards anyway. The photos turned out brilliantly and I have no doubt that they'll look even better once printed. I found myself laughing back at most of the close up shots, as it genuinely looks like some of them are smiling or have just been caught doing something. I'm a fool though.  The group photo at the end of the afternoon was definitely the highlight of my day. Organising all the various sized boxes was a challenge on its own and took quite a bit of time getting it spot on. We weren't sure if all 15 would even fit on the backdrop so some had to bunk up on top of each other. There was a real sense of narrative seeing them all together that is going to lend itself amazingly to the project as a whole. Again, it was a bit of a pain trying to arrange everything so that the light wasn't reflecting straight back at the camera, but you're bound to get some glare with that much glass. Non the less, the final shots worked a treat.

I got a real buzz working for a live project knowing that the imagery was actually going towards something real. I didn't go to Artemis expecting anything less than great things to come out of it and it looks like I was right. I can't wait to get cracking on with work for the illustrations and seeing the project develop. Keep your eyes peeled for updates.

EXHIBITION PREP.

With the degree some looming, I thought it's be a good idea to start to think about how I'm going to present my work in a way that represents my work best and more importantly that looks awesome.

Having been down to PickMeUp last month, I got a huge amount of inspiration from the vast array of work on show and the various ways to exhibit. I was especially intrigued by the layout of PeepShow's room, consisting of lots of wooden structures and shelving that contained little models, sculptures, illustrations and textiles. With the variation of both work on the wall, as well as taking advantage of the floorspace available, it really stood out to me as being one of the most interesting exhibits on show.

The Peepshow Collective at PickMeUp 2012

The wooden frames made you interact with the pieces and gave you the opportunity to up close and personal with the work. It made a pleasant change indeed from the usual glass cabinets that we're more familiar with.

Baring this is mind, I've been thinking about how I can combine both three dimensional and flat pieces together that will grab peoples attention. A while ago I'd read an article about an exhibition in Paris, where tattooer (appropriately named) Guy Le Tatooer, framed body parts formed out of latex that displayed his artwork. It gave him the chance to exhibit his tattoos as a form of art behind frames and create absolute striking and eery pieces of artwork on their own. It think they look amazing and would love to incorporate this into my work. 

Latex arms by Guy le Tatooer

As my work, over the last year in particular, has been heavily influenced by the art of tattooing, I intend on trying to incorporate my work onto similar casts made by myself. Rather then using an electrical tattoo gun, I'll probably opt for the less complicated transfer paper, like the ones you used to get in cheap packs of bubble gum. I've no idea if its going to work so by starting early I can afford to make mistakes ( I'd rather not) and work out how to fix them with plenty of time to spare.

With the help of the ingenious John Hind, who is by means no stranger to this at all, I spent today working on making a cast of my hand using dental alginate and rubber silicon. The process was dead easy to do and didn't take too long either but I wouldn't have had a clue where to start without John. We recycled some old silicon that had been previously used by just melting it down again to it's liquid form on a hob, making it completely reusable again and again.

Before all the melting took place we had to make a cast of my hand for the liquid to be poured into. For this we used a mixture of powdered alginate and water that we made a mess with using a kitchen mixer and placed into a container just about big enough for my hand to fit into. I then dunked my hand in and waited for the peculiar substance to set, which only took a couple of minutes.  It's crazy  how much detail the cast managed to pick up from my skin and you could see every wrinkle, hair and crease going. When the silicon was runny enough (technical term), I poured it into the whole where my hand had come out of and waited for it to solidify as it cooled. With me being inpatient, I cut open the mould whilst the cast was still quite warm but all was good and it stayed intact.

Alginate hand cast

I'm massively impressed with how it turned out but there's still a few technical tweaks that need seeing to before anything final is made. The silicon rubber, once completely cooled and dried was still quite soft and flopped about, so before I make a complete model of my arm I need to put some sort of support inside before it sets giving it a skeletal like structure. I'm wanting to fix the arms to the wall of my exhibition space so that they can hold pieces of my work or maybe a sign of some sort. If I use some sort of support inside the arms I think it'll make life much easier when trying to attach them to the board. I'm also going to see if I can add dye to the liquid silicon to get a paler, flesh colour that looks more realistic then the zombie green I used for the prototype. I'm pretty excited to try and apply some illustrations to it later on this week and hopefully make more in the next few weeks.

PORTFOLIO VISIT No3.

On the final day of my placement with LordWhitey, they organised a small gathering of Leeds based designers to visit their newly decorated studio. It was a great way of meeting a group of industry related people that I wouldn't of had the chance to other wise.

The line up consisted of: James & Laura (DukeStudios) It was a great chance to meet the people behind the making of my promotional packs, Seb & Vic (Rising Digital) A business that supports emerging and discovered artist/musicians/athletes by working with industry professionals to help set up a link between the two, mainly through social media (I think), Tim & Mark (RabbitHole) A branding and digital communication studio that combines typography/illustration/photography together that specialise in design for web, packaging, literature, exhibitions and branding. There were quite a few more people there but I didn't get chance to speak to everyone.

I managed to give out the remaining promo packs that I had left, which seemed to go down a storm. I was dead pleased with people's reactions and everyone seemed to favor the hand made approach to my printing and business cards. It was interesting to hear what different pathways i.e graphic designers, animators and furniture designers, thought about my work as I'm usually showing it to other illustrators or clients.

Vic and Seb (Rising Digital) spent some time talking to me about the EP work for SingRamonaSing, as they seemed to like it. We spoke about what direction of work I intend on take once graduated and if CD design and packaging was a choice. They've worked with some huge artists and more recently DeadMau5 and Calvin Harris so it was a real privilege to show them my stuff . They mentioned that like particularly liked the hand drawn element of my illustrations, as most of the imagery they use tends to be either photography or more 'graphicy' pieces. They thought it was my strongest piece and recommended that I progressed in this field of illustration as well as the "style" of working. Vic then spoke to me about how she loved the fact that I included a pack of my process drawings in the back of my portfolio. She suggested that I hand bind them into some sort of hardback book and make them a main feature during a portfolio showing. We spoke about possibly using window mounts so that many images are visible on top of each other but I'm not sure if they might just clash. Since we had a tutorial on book binding, I'm tempted to try and make my own book for my final exhibition that I can also take with me on visits. Seb, on the other hand, wasn't keen on these pieces as there were too many images of birds and he was scared of birds. He liked them, but struggled to look at them as the dear was overpowering. Sorry Seb.

Laura from Duke, had nothing but kind words to say about my pieces. She again particularly liked the tracing paper process work as she said they were full of character and show the delicate nature of each illustration. She agreed with making them a predominant feature along side the finished piece. We discussed how I could present them for my degree show and spoke about somehow mounting light boxes onto walls in order to layer up my illustrations.

I left my work on the table for people to look at in their leisure afterwards, as when I spoke to everyone as a group about each piece, it was hard to make sure everyone had seen it all. I was also dead nervous as LordWhitney threw me in at the deep end and gathered everyone around me and asked me to show my stuff. Over all, I got some really positive feedback and a big confidence boost with my work which was absolutely great. All my packs got taken, so I'm taking that as a big positive and you never know, I might even get some work out of it. I can always hope anyway. I was invited over to each teams studios, so I intend on taking them up on the offers at some point after graduation once I've finished some new pieces. It was a daunting time, but definitely worth the nerves.

PORTFOLIO VISIT No2.

During my placement last week in Leeds, I was given the chance to show Lord Whitney my newly updated portfolio. The last time they saw my work was in December last year, shortly after their lecture at uni.

Looking back, there has been a great deal of changes since then as well as a big reduction in the number of pieces on show. One of the more noticeable differences was the layout of each page. I have completely changed the typeface and positioning of the text to try and help make the text and illustration compliment one another. Previously, I felt like they were fighting against each other that subsequently made the page look almost awkward. In my new logo, I have tried to reflect the use of symbols that often appear in my work, and therefore it seems to fit much more comfortably amongst the illustrations. 

Both Amy and Bek thought that these changes to the presentation of my work looked better and made my imagery stronger. The usage of negative space was another thing that mentioned and complimented me on as beforehand; each illustration was quite flush to the page. They spoke to me about how sometimes the space around the illustration is just as important as the art itself. If the work is too big on a page, it can look cluttered and not do the artwork any justice. You focus on the layout being wrong rather than the image being right. This is exactly what I had intended on doing so was really happy to hear this. Another thing that they mentioned was the evident progression over the last 4/5months. They really liked the work I had created for my major project, especially the Raven pattern. They suggested that I play around with the combination of shapes more and further this way of working as they thought it was a visually strong piece. Using patterns in my work seemed to come really natural to me when I made this and have every intention to do more pieces based on geometry. I enjoyed creating it and it was something new to me as well, which is always good.

Other then that, the only other thing that was mentioned was the promo packs that I made. Having something tactile seemed to go down well as they were inspecting it for a good few minutes. The whole intention of me making the packs was so that whoever I gave them too would take a bit of time looking at them rather then just throwing a business card to one side or deleting an email. I hoped that because it was evident that they were hand made, people would be less likely to cast them to one side/the bin. They said it was a fantastic thing to be able to send them out to clients/studios that I was interested in as it’s something they can keep.

I’m glad I showed them my portfolio for a second time, as I wasn’t sure whether to or not.  It confirmed that I’m heading down the right direction and was clarification that the little attention to detail really pays off.

TOM GILMOUR.

With the pressure of tying up loose ends and the last minute rush upon us, I've begun to actually sit down and think what the hell am I going to do when I finish uni? I've put a considerable amount of time pondering this wormhole of a question and seem to end back where I started if not slightly more confused and out of breath.

I've been meaning to blog about Tom Gilmour for a while now as I've been following his blog for an age and we seem to be influenced by similar interests. Not forgetting the fact that his work is sickingly good.As well as finished pieces, he regularly posts process shots of current projects which I particularly like. It's nice to see artists that aren't afraid to show their method of working as many sites seem to just show the polished final pieces which is all well and good but I enjoy seeing a project develop. I could do with taking a leaf out his book and update my blog more as I forget to post about my work.

He specialises in hand drawn artwork but dabbles in digital rendering. He work is fueled by black tattoo art and early 80's skateboard graphics and heavily influenced from the five years spent studying graphic design and art history. His work seems to have exploded in the hardcore music scene with his work everywhere ranging from tshirt designs to promo posters. Amongst all of this he is the founder of King Noir clothing company, a member of the Black Line Collective with three other amazing artists, as well as being one half of Wood & Cloud, a art/music/publishing company producing limited edition runs of prints. books and Cds. Not bad to say he's only 26.

After finding out about all the different things Gilmour is part of, I thought I'd drop him a quick email asking him how he got to be involved in so many diverse fields of the art industry and the steps he took getting there. He was polite enough to reply with a dead helpful and motivating email explaining all that I had asked. It went as follows.

 

Visiting London a few weeks ago opened my eyes to realise that work isn't going to be handed on a plate as soon as I step out into the "real world". Don't get me wrong, I didn't expect anything to happen over night but it definitely made me realise that this is a career that I want bad enough to put all the hours the day has to offer into it. Reading that Tom worked full time in a shop and then fit his artwork around just shows if you're passionate enough about it, you'll find time.

 I've watched both the YouTube links and they're both worth  having a gander at. To sum up, they both talk about how BennyGold and Eric Elms have built their way into creating a self employed businessby turning art into a career they love. Dead good. And finally Beautiful Losers. If you haven't seen it already, go stream it here for free now. It's an amazing film that I bough about 3years ago now that documents the careers of low-brow and street artists grouping together to create a movement focusing on the D.I.Y aesthetics in their work from things like graffiti, skateboarding and underground music. It features artists like Barry McGee, Ed Templeton, Shepard Fairy, Thomas Campbell and tons more. I'd highly recommend it and think that you should go watch it.

Waking it to this email, and re watching Beautiful Losers as I work, seems to have put the fright of getting a job at rest for the time being. I'm getting exciting about the prospects of what the future has to offer and the work I'll be making whatever career I take to pay the bills etc. Just got to give it once last push for 4 weeks then its the start of something new. Exciting times.

PLACEMENT.

With this being my final term at uni, I thought that it would be good to get some sort of work experience under my belt before graduating. I'd kept in touch with Lord Whitney quite a bit since their lecture last year so thought it would be worth a shot asking if they'd have me for a week over my Easter holiday. I got in touch and thankfully, they were happy to  have me as an intern. Having contacted them about this, they approached me with an offer of working with them on a project with Leeds council call 'Get Stuffed' as I've mentioned in a previous post. It just shows that risks can definitely pay off as I'm dead chuffed and flattered that they'd consider working with me. They said that because they knew I had a slight obsession with taxidermy, that they thought I'd enjoy working with them. They were right!

So during the second week of Easter, I spent my time helping Lord Whitney out in their Leeds studio. With the week starting on a bank holiday, I only managed to get 4 days there but made up for it by going back to Artemis with them the following week. I honestly didn't know what I was expecting the week to entail, but I was up for getting my hands stuck in with whatever they threw my way.


FATUM

Lord Whitney have been asked to do visual curate a short film, entitled Fatum by WeAreBoxhead. As far as I'm aware, WeAreBoxhead are a design studio based in Leeds and good friends of LW. Consisting of  David Sorely and Giles Smith, they aim to work with other businesses and individuals that want to better their communication as a brand, I think. The film Fatum, is to be shot on Sunday 22nd so ideas for props needed to be sorted asap. The film focuses on a couples relationship and is shot in single perspective (like the diner scene in Pulp Fiction). However, the view from the males point of view is their first date, and the female is viewing their break up meal. To suggest the passing of time we were thinking about what items we could use that would relate to this. These would change in each sort i.e fresh flowers in one, wilted in the other. There was also some weird cut away shots to think about that had really weird and random things going on. One possible shot was to consist of wool coming out of the woman's ears I think but I didn't really understand it too well. There was to be an underlying theme of red so things like lipstick, candles, necklaces, wine and roses were required as well as clothing. We looked through LW's collection of fancy dress and sorted through some red items that could be appropriate. I enjoyed helping with this, as its much different from the process of generating ideas for an illustration as they need to communicate differently. We sorted props,clothing and our ideas and put them to one side as David and Giles were popping over in the next couple of days.

THE PRINCES TRUST

Having spoken to Bek and Amy about my path after uni, they suggested if I was to freelance, it might be a good idea to go on the Enterprise Program through the Princes Trust. The five day free course covers aspects of how to set up your own business, taxes, money issues and promotion. It sounds like I've covered a lot of the bits during my last few months at uni but sounds like a worth while opportunity as you get a bursary to help you on your way on completion. They also offer reasonable loans if machinery or any other items are needed to set you up. Its definitely something I shall look into I think!


ARTEMIS

As I'm helping out with the 'Get Stuffed' project, it was a great chance for us to discuss what needed to be done over the next few months. I was going to be involved with illustrating the packs handed out to each family that contained info on their specific animal. Before anything could be started on, we needed to clarify the final list of animals that were going to feature in the project. After a long debate, we decided on the following: 1. Water vole 2. Marsh Tit 3. Stoat 4. Rabbit 5. Jackdaw 6. Fox 7. Squirrel 8. Puffs Fish 9. Pangolin 10. Hedgehog 11. Barn Owl 12. Chameleon13. Teal (Duck) 14. Tortoise 15. Hare. I then spent my time researching into species habitats, Latin names, characteristics, anatomy and other interesting things that could feature in the info packs.This took up the majority of my placement and I was searching through nature books and the web but making sure I had everything noted correctly. I had to double check a lot of the information as some pieces (on the web) were complete crap and had just been made up on the spot. As these were being handed out to the public, they had to be 100% accurate.

I helped out with work on two other projects, but, I can't mention them as they're still under lock and key at the moment. As well as the above, we visited charity/junk shops to find items for the un-namable projects, met up with WEAREBOXHEAD to discuss FATUM and had a small gathering on the friday night with Leeds based designers and studios.

I thoroughly enjoyed my placement with Lord Whitney and can't thanks them enough for giving me an insight into their work. I've learned a lot over the last week and its given me a real insight in how things work for freelance artists. By experiencing this through watching others, its given me a sneak preview of what I can expect in the future that has swayed me towards the idea of getting a studio and working with others. All in all, a fantastic week that I've gained a lot from. Thanks again Bek & Amy.

EDITORIALS.

Where to go next? A question that I've been pondering over for some time now as I'm not sure what line of illustration I intend to go down once completing uni. I dabbled in working on a couple of editorials last year when the majority of my work was digital based but haven't touched on it since. I seemed to struggle to complete the briefs on time as I tend to work quite slowly but this is something that I need to over come.

Having spoken to tutors about it all, they suggested that for my final part of the major project I give it another shot. As the last part of my project has about 7 weeks in total, I aim to produce about 4 editorial pieces, with one consisting of a short animation if possible. The previous editorial pieces I worked on were given to us by tutors as part of a project so this was a chance to work on pieces that I could later benefit from. I intend to visiting the Guardian and New Scientist during our London New Blood visit in June, so I thought it would make sense to choose articles from their issues rather then publications that aren't really relevant to myself. To prevent the finished work looking like a collection of random scribbles, I have chosen the theme of health and science to work around. This body of work is something that interests me and would like to further working on such topics in the future if possible. I've always been inspired by scientific etchings and illustrations from various places including Dover publications so working similarly excites me.

I'm currently working on three editorials with still having the intention of completing another one before my hand in date. I've enjoyed the faster pace of working but still could do with upping my game a little. Working in this manner has made me avoiding working too literal as my work sometimes seems to turn out. In doing this, I've tried to give the pieces more depth and think more conceptually. I've found this way of working more challenging but definitely a rewarding process at the end. I tend to slip into the trap of making illustrations that have little meaning or depth too them and feel I could push myself to do more. By think more about the concept being the illustration, I've found myself generating many ideas at the start of a brief, where sometimes I'd be a little stumped. It seems to have set the ball rolling and I'm finding it harder to settle on one idea rather then just settling with the few I've got.

Creating work to fit in to awkward dimensions has been a difficult challenge that I'm not familiar with doing. I usually play safe and work to standard paper sizes or the odd square if I'm feeling adventurous, so having to adjust an idea around boundaries has been hard. You can have a really clever idea but sometimes it feels impossible to make it fit comfortably in the given size. This has subsequently changed my work to look different as intending and I've found it massively frustrating at times. I think it has been beneficial to try my hand at this way of working because in 'the real world' if I'm being realistic, I'm not going to have a say behind the format of work. If I do choose to try and work as an editorial illustrator, this is something I'll have to get used to. My time management seems to have got slightly better due to this body of work but I feel like I still need to work quicker. I can sometimes find myself being a bit of a perfectionist and this seems to drag me down at times. Rather then getting on with the work, I tend to redraw bits that don't necessarily need editing but I won't be content until I've done it. I suppose it could be seen as a good quality to have but recently I've found it a hindrance. I'm confident that in time it will hopefully become a much smoother process and come naturally to me driven by the adrenaline and fear of client.

I'm finding this way of working very challenging and wouldn't rule out the option of a career in it but I still prefer more freedom in my work. I think it all depends on how the final illustrations turn out and if I'm happy with them but when it comes to it, I don't think I'd turn down work if it pays the bills.

HANDS.

Over the past few days I've been trying tackling the reoccurring obstacle that keeps cropping up: drawing hands. I've always found hands pretty hard to draw and remember spending a lot of my foundation year attempting to over come this problem. Needless to say, I didn't. To get a hand to look spot on, you need to have basic drawing skills and sometimes more importantly, in my opinion, a general knowledge of the human skeleton and muscle anatomy. This of course depends on the overall look you're after. I came across a helpful little GIF on Matthew Woodson's blog explaining his work process when that I thought was pretty cool.

With me having to produce a short animation it was good inspiration that got my cogs turning.With this in mind, I've been looking through books and trawling the web for anatomical drawings and studies of the human figure, as well as drawing my left hand many lots. Fun times.