Evaluation

This project has been a great experience; it has given me the opportunity to do, as professionally as possible, something I have never done properly before; book publishing. I have always been interested in book illustration among other things. For a long time I wanted to be a professional free-lance book illustrator, and it is something I still consider as a possibility. The world of freelance artists is a tough one but the rewards are great if you really succeed.

I started this project with a clear idea that I wanted to illustrate a book or a comic. I was working on my comic for responsive and was advised against doing something so time consuming. In the end, I think that was definitely wise advice. Although I finished all my work, I definitely felt the crunch towards the end of this module and I would’ve loved to have even just another month to apply myself to it, simply developing more imagery and styles. I had never read The Jungle Book so a lot of my time was applied to reading it, becoming familiarised with the themes and doing research into a whole new culture that I knew little about. As well as learning about book publishing, and researching basic dos and don’ts.

The area where I have made most progress is research and drawing. I researched previous illustrators that worked on this novel, as well as learning about the real life aspect of the novel itself. Learned about its origins, its writers, and the real locations of where it is set. My drawing improved tremendously. Originally I am more of a character illustrator and I never really draw my characters in any environments. In this project I really thought about the characters as well as their surroundings and their place within it. I thought about composition and the way my images would lead the viewer’s eyes through the page. I thought about the context, the scenes described in the books and did my best to bring in all the elements described in the book into the images. It is something that I set out to do from the start and considered greatly in my thumbnails. I am terrible at drawing architecture and perspectives, and with my temple scene I think I truly succeeded in drawing a realistic building as well as incorporating my characters within that environment successfully. Another area where I feel I have done well is researching the animals that are in the story. In the case of Baloo, in the animated film he is pictured as a random grey bear, in the live action rendition he is a brown bear. Although there are brown bears in India, I learned that they are indigenous to higher altitudes and mainly live in the Himalayan range. And I learned that the sloth bear is indigenous to areas near the Seoni region so that is why I decided to use the sloth bear.

Another area where I did well was in application to promotional products. I did not have as wide of a variety of applications as some other people on my course, but the ones I did have came out well. And even though I had less overall, there was more range within the applications. I did multiple canvas bag designs, and multiple bookmarks. The tiger and jackal designs were taken from illustrations I did in my sketchbook, they were expanded on and made to look like a real product, which I think was a real success.

The hand drawn typography for my cover is one of my favourite aspects of my final designs. I am not good with typography and doing a design that involved such an illustrative element was a good way to apply something I’m good at to something I’m not so good at. I do wish  had expanded more on the text. Once applied, it seemed a bit thin and a bit too minimal. But I think the lettering itself was very strong and I want to develop it as a font in the future.

The areas where I didn’t succeed is time management. Because, if I had managed my time better, I would have been able to do more experimentation and I would have been able to design a better cover and slipcase.  Originally I wanted to do an indian floral pattern with animals for the slipcase but I didn’t have the time to develop that idea. I also wanted to include colour in my illustrations themselves, but because of lack of time I failed to do that. I don't think the illustrations are bad, but as an artist and for the sake of my practice I should have gone that extra step.

Project Report 

Presentation Boards

Final Products

Development of Type for Cover and Influence 

I really enjoyed doing the font for the cover design. It was rewarding t obe able to use a bit more illustration within the shapes and I discovered the book New Illustration With Type which was a fun read and exposed me to a bunch of cool new types of illustration and design.

I only wish I had developed the drawing a bit further. All in all a success though. It ended up producing a nice clear, and above all, legible cover. 

Feedback

Here's what people wrote on the last Megacrit

Comment on the quality and quantity of the final images/products and their proposed applications

-Babe you're fab

-Detail on fleek

-Nice level of production on your final images. I like the way your text is coming along, definitely continue with this method

-The large temple scene is out of this world

-You are a bloody magician, these are magic

-Wow, such great illustration. Texture and realism really bring the theme together.

-Images are stunning

-So gorgeous

-I like the mix of black background and detail

-Your work are always super detailed and fine quality. I love all of them 

Give constructive feedback on ways these deliverables could be strengthened

Throw some vines in to the text, I feel it would strengthen the form of the letters

-Yes, vines and leafy things

-I agree

-Design boards and I think they will look nice as posters and prints

I really agree with the suggestions that I should add vines and leaves. It would make the title more dynamic. I will try to include it once I have finished the insects. The insects take a long time and I've invested a lot of effort so far on them that I think I should finish them as is and see once they're done where I can add the vines/leaves. Hopefully there's time! 

Book Slipcase Design and Development

Out of all my images and production I feel I really landed short on this design. I really wanted to do an intricate floral design, super colourful and dynamic which included the jungle book characters. Unfortunately, when I was developing the design through sketches I realised I was going to need a lot more time for this type of illustration and I really rather have a decent one that I could do quicker over a messy rushed one that didn't live up to what I had in mind. 

I do think there are aspects to it that are nice. Its a repeat pattern and the way I have drawn it I think captures a bit of the chaoticness of the monkeys in the story. Although the more I look at it, the more I am not sure about the colour scheme. Perhaps a sunflower yellow would have been more fitting. Or a burnt sienna tone. 

Grayson Perry

Grayson Perry is predominately known as a ceramic artist but has produced works in many media.

I would argue however that the theme that connects all his work is narrative illustration. 

His surface designs combine drawing and collage normally focused on on themes to do with contemporary western culture - celebrity, social media, people's infatuation with football and their own identity and our cultures identity.
But also themes that speak to everyone, love lose and death.

I have always enjoyed sculpture and would like to experiment with surface design.

They way Grayson Perry works on the vases he makes is quite unusual. they are very much contemporary versions of ancient Greek vases that tell stories of the gods and great warriors.

Creating a piece of illustration on another piece of art can be a great way of adding to the work. 

When analyzing artwork and films and music it is important to understand what part of the world the artist was on and when, this allows us to try to see the context behind the work to deepen our understanding of the artists message(s)

I don't completely know what I am getting at but if I were to decorate a sculpture with illustrations I believe I could create some very captivating art.

The stories that his work tells are like that from the media. normally crass and literal. But still he leaves the exploration of meaning to the viewer.

People say, ‘why do you need to put sex, violence or politics or some kind of social commentary into my work?’ Without it, it would be pottery. I think that crude melding of those two parts is what makes my work.”

He is a prolific artist and made a name for himself through post university exhibitions and his flamboyant alter ego.
He won the 2003 turner prize,
He has written books on art. 

Winner of the 2003 Turner Prize, British artist Grayson Perry creates seductively beautiful pots that convey challenging themes; at the heart of his practice is a passionate desire to comment on deep flaws within society. Perry uses pots as narrative and figurative media, a round, curved surface for a bizarre or bitter story

Development of Temple Drawing 

This drawing took me the longest.

I used a mixture of fineliner, pencil, brush, and ink. There was quite a bit of referencing for the temple which I got from a picture online of a temple situated in the district of Madhya Pradesh. I do not intend to ever sell this drawing.

I am very happy with the composition and placement of the characters, foliage and architecture.

I wish I had developed some nice use of spot colour within the illustration to make the front characters pop.