OUIL 503 Research Competition Briefs

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Studio Brief 1- First Task

D&AD BRIEFS

The briefs that stand out to me out of the ones I’ve viewed today are from D&AD

Hasbro- Next Generation Party Games,
Fur For Animals
The National Autistic Society

The Hasbro Brief is particularly exciting as this is an idea I have toyed a lot with and looked to making in the past. I like to think of board games as a uniting factor within social situations and they always (if they’re any good) manage to liven up a gathering. My group of friends and I have recently taken to playing board games every time we meet up and always discuss possible game ideas, so it would be a great opportunity to put these ideas to the test! It is not illustration based and therefore would be somewhat irrelevant to my practice, but all the same I think it would be a rewarding and challenging project.

Fur For Animals is one that I feel would be very relevant and for a good cause. I also think it’s a sensitive issue and one that needs to be handled carefully. While I completely disapprove of the commercial fur trade, and fur in high fashion, there are definitely instances wherein owning a fur is the difference between life and death to people during winter or all year round. Where the animal isn’t wasted and is put to good use, feeding, sheltering, clothing and even helping families build tools. These are instances where it is a necessity, the irony being that the people who resort to these measures are the people that would be doing it sustainably if not for the high demand of the fur trade in our, and other first world countries. A very sad topic, but ever the more relevant, and one I would like to address as sensitively as possible. It seems to be a more illustration based project than many of the ones I came across on this website. 

The National Autistic Society an organisation that deserves merit and a well thought out project. I think this would be a challenging brief and one that would prompt me to meet new people, learn about circumstances and gather a well rounded understanding in order to do this brief justice. It is a brief that would require passion, like the Fur For Trade, and one that I am willing to apply myself to so as to give a well thought out concept to the client and customer. the brief calls for an animated sequence and I would be interested in working with animation students for this project.

YCN Competition Briefs

Roald Dhal is an amazing storyteller, and I believe that most people on this course and across the college will agree and will have considered this brief as a contender for their final project. it is purely illustration based and tugs at the heartstrings of many young artists. They are requesting the images to be of one villain, main character and fantastical creature. These images should complement their logos which are sent in the Roald Dhal project pack. I haven't worked out where to find the judges for this competition brief but I can see from their logos that although they say to illustrate to any style they like, they want the images to complement their logos, so they cannot be just any style. The audience for this brief is a young one, they state from 5-11 and they seem to want something quite relevant with the fashions of today, so possibly something more graphic based. They want the images to appear as if they are part of a published series, and I am unsure if these will be for advertising purposes, if so, that also determines the style in which these images should be illustrated, again, I am leaning towards a more graphic design look for these images. They shouldn't be so complex so as they lose detail when sized down. 

the following quote seems really relevant to the objective of this brief, they want something new and hip IMO: 

Recently, we developed a new brand identity to provide a common bond between the many books, films, musicals, and even digital apps based on Roald Dahl’s stories and characters

Key dates are as follows:

Submission deadline: 11.59PM GMT, Thursday 23rd March 2017
Judging: April and May 2017
Commendations published: June 2016
Student Awards Ceremony: September 2016
New YCN Student Annual Launched: December 2017

PENGUIN

I am really interested in pursuing this brief as a set of three images. From my experience Penguins' covers are normally quite graphic and the type on the cover is centre stage to the  design of these covers. The brief calls for covers for In Cold Blood, To Kill A Mockingbird, and The Secret Diary Of Adrian Mole, Aged 13 1/2.

these are all really well known and renowned books with a long history of publications, and therefore a variety covers have already been produced. this is a blessing and a bit of a curse to come up with something original at this point. it is a brief that is strongly illustration based and therefore would be very relevant to my studies as well as an excellent opportunity.  Again, the brief illustrates to be creative and original, but there is definitely a market and image they are after. 

STUDY TASK 3

Artists Who Work with Print

Sophie Lecuyer

Sophie Lecuyer is a print artist that I stumbled upon in my search. She works with all forms of print, but the ones that I find particularly interesting are her monotypes. She also does linocuts, engravings, etchings etc, she is a visual artist, a book illustrator.

I find these series of prints to be her strongest in my opinion. She sets a very strong tone and creates a mystical atmosphere with this type of monotype illustration. It is something that i am looking to play around with during my initial experiments on the print project. 

They remind me of early photography especially daguerreotypes. They are broody and mysterious, and depending on the story plot that I develop, I find these to be a promising source of inspiration.

Thomas Shahan

Thomas Shahan is another artist I find to be a good source for print, particularly symbolism in print as his work is riddled with it. There is not a lot of range of his work in print online. Apart from print, he enjoys macro photography, and takes inspiration from his own photography for his work in print. He really like spiders, like, really. I enjoy his loose and very textural monoprint self portrait as well as his very tight and precise linocuts. The linocuts are very much in the style of traditional serial print. I think he really does a fantastic job incorporating all these elements into his finely produced images.  

Ken Taylor

Ken Taylor is a well-known image maker, does work with screen print and digital screen print. He often re imagines or does limited edition re-inventions of movie posters and album covers. Really solid artist with the right mix of originality and technicality. Well jell, quality images. I would buy these prints any day. 

OUIL504

Printed Pictures

I have done a few thumbnails and character designs. I imagine this book would look really nice as a monoprint book.

PRINTED PICTURES

ABOUT THE AUTHOR 

Carl Sagan

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Process and development

Initial ideas for this project are going along the lines of a personal response for this author:

Considering space as not such a literal concept but as one visible in images using scale and proportion. 

Presenting the idea of the universes' indifference to us by illustrating destruction within environment.

Presenting youthful ingenuity through trial and error of main character.

Painting a somewhat lonely image of main character and the struggles she goes through and eventually perseveres to reach her goal. 

Developing idea into thought of a book narrative. Considering a rhyme story to illustrate a whimsical nature. 

Story is more of a metaphor for Sagan's ideas, concepts and motifs. 

Sagan was a teacher who believed in nurturing and developing the inquisitive nature all children possess instead of stumping it. 

He was a cosmologists who searched for life in the universe as well as understood out place within it as one of responsible awareness. Knowing as much as we do and what we are, we should discontinue this path of destruction and learn to care sustainably for our resources so that we can responsibly develop the technology that will eventually take us to inhabit other planets.

Knowing our galaxy has an expiry date, he looked to other worlds that could potentially sustain our life on it. He was a constant optimist. 

These are ideas I want to relate in a not-so-direct message in my story. 

Looking to inspiration in 

Studio Ghibli

As a way to tell a compelling narrative with appropriate arc and meaningful and 3 dimensional characters. 

Margarita Esta Linda La Mar

Ruben Dario was a  Nicaraguan poet that I grew up reading. This story is one that jumps out at me from my youth. About a young girl that travels to the stars to cut one down. I think its beautifully written but its message is too religious and a bit selfish in its morals. I'd like to almost parody this story but from a scientific aspect showing some of Sagans' motifs. 

A bit worried about condensing this narrative down to two images, but if I develop a way of quickly producing quality images I think I can do more than five images and make it a longer book.

Looking to do something with reductive monoprint and monotype. Also interested in doing lino print. 

Responsive

Studio Brief 1- First Task

The briefs that stand out to me out of the ones I’ve viewed today are

Hasbro- Next Generation Party Games,
Fur For Animals
The National Autistic Society

The Hasbro Brief is particularly exciting as this is an idea I have toyed a lot with and looked to making in the past. I like to think of board games as a uniting factor within social situations and they always (if they’re any good) manage to liven up a gathering. My group of friends and I have recently taken to playing board games every time we meet up and always discuss possible game ideas, so it would be a great opportunity to put these ideas to the test!

Fur For Animals is one that I feel would be very relevant and for a good cause. I also think it’s a sensitive issue and one that needs to be handled carefully. While I completely disapprove of the commercial fur trade, and fur in high fashion, there are definitely instances wherein owning a fur is the difference between life and death to people during winter or all year round. Where the animal isn’t wasted and is put to good use, feeding, sheltering, clothing and even helping families build tools. These are instances where it is a necessity, the irony being that the people who resort to these measures are the people that would be doing it sustainably if not for the high demand of the fur trade in our, and other first world countries. A very sad topic, but ever the more relevant, and one I would like to address as sensitively as possible.

The National Autistic Society an organisation that deserves merit and a well thought out project. I think this would be a challenging brief and one that would prompt me to meet new people, learn about circumstances and gather a well rounded understanding in order to do this brief justice. It is a brief that would require passion, like the Fur For Trade, and one that I am willing to apply myself to so as to give a well thought out concept to the customer.

OUIL504

Printed Pictures

For this project, my initial idea is to make a book. I would like to write the story in prose and make it about a young girl who receives an SOS signal form a certain star in the sky that always catches her eye. 

The story goes like this so far, Im not very happy with it, I might scrap it and start over

It started with a girl

I wanted her attention, 

I needed her to see me

She was always on her own 

Although seldom got angry

She was just curious 

About the world,

The sky, 

the sea

I thought she might notice me 

So I sent her a plea

Thats as far as I've gotten. This idea made more sense in my head than on paper. Also I feel it would be way too long, I haven't even thought of the ending.

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Idea Pictures
3 Images

I decided to work with traditional media for the final three and I think they came out really well. At Teresa and Bens' recommendation I did pen cross hatching, in this case with a 0.1 Fineliner pen. I then added colour using inks. I never colour my work so this brief has been challenging in that respect. I have a terrible eye for colour and lose media like paints and inks make me hyperventilate a little bit. 

OUIL504


Idea Pictures

I have chosen a few ideas and developed them on Photoshop. I am happy with them, I am not very good at photoshop but thankfully all this took was a bit of levels adjustments and adding colour with minimal layers. Still, it kept the grittiness I really like in my pencil and made the drawings look better in the end.

Below are some more variations that I didnt decide on but tried different themes and colours

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Editorial Images Progress

Below are some more finished examples of my editorial progress. These are done in pencil and I really like the gritty quality to them. I am still considering my colour choices and in what media I should develop these. Although I admit I would really like to stick to pencil.

The image of the boy raising his hand is to illustrate the fear of speaking up in a class room. I am playing with shadows a lot in these drafts so i thought why not draw as if the shadows are attacking him. This details the fear of your classmates and the fear to speak up because in class of what they will think

OUIL504

Idea Pictures
Editorial Brief

For this brief I chose to work from Carl Sagans' article Why we need to understand science. 

Here is the LINK

The article illustrates the issues in education for the future generation and the divergence of scientists working on beneficial technological advances into the arms race and nuclear weapons development.

I have selected a couples of pages of my thumbnails, I dont think I should upload 60+ thumbnails so I've chosen these. 

From These I picked a few Illustrations to pursue and the following were most relevant to the article. Studying editorial art I am focusing on word association and simple symbology as well as very straight forward images.

Below are a some Drafts

My favourites are the scientist with arms raised, meaning the arms race and also their back against the wall as they have no option but to commit or lose their jobs.

I like the ants as well as they are a symbol for organisation and a sort of hive mentality. One breaks away and finds a reward in seeking knowledge as he the donut is on the book.

And finally, the children with question marks. This almost seemed to be Sagans' worst fear in the article, the complacence of children and the stunting of curiosity. Their silence in the classroom. So I did the emptiness in their minds replaced by the question why? and also I used the animation chart to have them spell out why. An example below

Study Task 2

Study Task 2

First Artist

These images are part of a collection uploaded by Nasa on their webpage. They are available for free download and the images are large enough to be printed as posters. They are designed to illustrate a vision for future space tourism. They have taken influence from tourism posters of the 20th century, generating the "hand- rendered" style that is evidenced in posters of the time. They use a fairly limited palette, with a theme of 3 main colours and their gradients within. I really enjoy this aesthetic, it illustrates in a very exciting time in space exploration, which is happening now, and translates its hopes for the future all in a very heartwarming way. I enjoy the fact that they are available to anyone who would like them. The three images I have chosen are by Joby Harris. The artist has worked in film, television,  music, print, fashion, theme park and aerospace industries. Film projects include Pirates of the Caribbean, Bruce Almighty and Solaris. Currently employed by Nasa on an on-lab Studio specializing in supporting scientists and engineers with visual strategy for their missions and instruments. In the artists own words they "creatively communicate current and future JPL/ NASA space missions to the public for inspiration and education."

The project began as a celebration of Nasa's study of Exoplanets (planets that orbit other stars) and during a trip to the Gran Canyon an artistic director of the project, David Delgado, saw a poster that reminded him of the exoplanets they were researching. They decided to give a similar feel for their posters. The images were a result of a collective of artists know as "The Studio" 

The Studio is composed of the following artists:

Creative Strategy: Dan Goods, David Delgado

Illustrators: 

Liz Barrios De La Torre (Ceres, Europa)

Stefan Bucher (Jupiter Design)

Invisible Creature (Grand Tour, Mars, Enceladus)

Joby Harris (Kepler 16b, Earth, Kepler 186f, PSO J318.5-22, Titan)

Jessie Kawata (Venus)

Lois Kim (Typography for Venus and Europa)

Ron Miller (Jupiter Illustration)

Second Artist

Mark Smith is an editorial Illustrator who does somewhat provocative images with a buoyant aesthetic. I appreciate the themes of these three images as well. The first image was for Johns Hopkins Magazine detailing Families living in poverty. I like the simple straight forward visual choices to represent the serious topic, and the strong use of metaphors.

The second image illustrates work and travel and he titles it Keeping a check on employees travel expenses, for Entrepreneur Magazine. Again, very simple design with minor detail, yet a very strong, and anatomically correct image which I find stimulating and very direct in its message. 

Lastly, and I picked this two because they have subjects I am using in my projects, scientists. This is to represent the funding cuts to scientific research, a topic I find to be relevant to my project, and one that Carl Sagan Illustrates a point of concern for the future. Boy was he right. 

I found a webpage where he describes his processes. He begins all projects with initial sketches that wait to be approved. He then describes how his images are 50/50 digital and hand illustration, something I find to be very appealing as I would like to preferably keep as much of my hand illustrations as possible in the future. This is what I think now anyway. he puts it well by stating which just about satisfies my need to create something tangible while also allowing easy editing with last-minute changes on a tight deadline.

On the subject of metaphors he states it well in the following extract

I see the metaphor thing like a puzzle to work out in the form of an illustration, and once created, I want it to be a bit of a puzzle for the viewer to find out that meaning. The perfect balance is in creating something that is intriguing enough to maintain someone’s attention just long enough for the meaning to become clear. If the puzzle is too complex, the image won’t deliver its meaning; if it’s too simple, it’s boring and loses its appeal quickly. It’s this balance that drew me to editorial illustration in the first place 

Id like to apply some of these principles to my work. Glad I found him and other artists while researching for this task!

Summer Sketchbook Review

I really enjoyed this persons' work. They had a very individual approach to their summer sketchbook, that I found, distinguished their work from others. The sketchbook was completed as a true visual journal, they documented their surroundings over the summer. Additionally, they added narrative to some images which made the journal seem  like a story that guided you through this persons' summer life in a few pages. Really genuine and quite whimsical, and I enjoy the use of fineliner. Also they experimented with pencil and pen to relate temperature through drawing, doing a few sketches of summer light on balconies, houses, and trees. Which really added an additional element to the experience when reading through. They did a great job with mark making and bringing elements to the fore ground in their landscape images. I could sense the temperature, mood, and feel of these drawings as well as taking a lighthearted peek into these lazy summer days.

STUDY TASK 1

ZINE

 


Please skip ramble below. Its an explanation of the idea behind the Zine. Sorry. 

This project was a great kick-starter for the brief. It allowed me to balance a range of ideas that I had in regards to my chosen author into a series of images that represent the duality in Sagan's teachings and our own beliefs. He was an extreme realist and struggled with humanity's constant fascination and gravitation towards the supernatural. He of course understood and respected peoples cultures and age old beliefs, but begged the question that in a world where we have a system in place that can prove and disprove theories and hypothesis with stone cold evidence and facts, why did people still seek out pseudoscience as a benchmark for their beliefs?

It is a question that I think is more rhetorical than proposed. I believe humanity's search into mysticism is something that stems from our love of the unknown. There is a mystery and romance within uncertainty, and a bleak belittlement in accepting some of the facts proposed by science. I believe this is the same reason why people are prompted into religion, because, even though everything has been written out for us to a certain extent (e.g. guidelines for living and a very authoritarian manner in which religion governs our everyday actions) religion still leaves so much to faith, and faith, or hope, is something that is integral to give meaning in our lives.

 I'm sure Sagan was aware of all this, but he also saw that there is meaning in science, and with it a perfectly reasonable moral compass to guide us through all these hardships. He passionately sought to discard humanity's system of punishment and reward. Why be a good person for fear of spending an eternity in hell? Why not be a good person prompted by the knowledge that we are all one with the universe, all made of the same starstuff, and all fighting the same battle to survive on this tiny speck. It is like when a person gives to charity, is it really very charitable to donate solely for the purpose of self gratification and expectation of reward in some other life, or karma? When our actions are prompted by the gravity of punishment and reward, are our actions truly meaningful? Or just a perpetuation of a society that gives only to expect something in return?

I have always been a mystical person at heart, but I have also never allowed it to come before what I know is proven by science. This has always created an internal battle within my psyche. I have always wanted to believe there is an afterlife, but at the same time I completely understand that there is no solid evidence of there being one. This duality of thought has led me to appreciate Sagan greatly, because even though the prospect of not having another chance to live, to see my loved ones that have passed, to understand our purpose here is extremely depressing, it also prompts me to stop diddling. It kicks me in the face and tells me with the full gravity of its truth, 'I may never get another chance' today is today, and live it for all it is as there may not be another. Love the ones you love with all you have, don't hold grudges, forgive and understand everyone is fighting their own battle and surround yourself with people who exemplify this and help you achieve this goal, to just live. These lessons are much more grounding than anything religion can propose, which is, in my experience, normally to physically put the fear of god into you in some way.

This sounds like a ramble but these are the questions and thoughts that helped me make the Zine, as far fetched as that sounds. Because science can be so dry, so above me that I don't understand what is being proposed, that it makes me want to search for simpler, kinder, more forgiving notions about the planet we live on. And I know Carl Sagan knew that because he stated

Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were, but without it we go nowhere.

Without outlandish ideas and notions, science would never have been born. And so I sought to combine multiple elements of my personal experience, of Sagan's wonderment with our nature and the attraction there is to both. I wanted to create a parallel of meanings, and the beauty in them both. This was crazy ambitious to do for a two day project, but despite the quality of my drawings, I quite pleased with the outcome.

Visually there are methods I wish I had chosen over others.

Like polishing up the images on photoshop or not using pencil for grey tones. But overall I wanted to convey the history of words, what we now understand them to be and the visual associations we tie to them.
To show how far we've come, yet how little has changed and above all to show the irony of how much more poetic the fantastical images seem, when they are the meaning to the words we use daily and don't even realise it.

Science is poetic, and Sagan let me see this with his multiple writings on the subject, his eloquent narrative of our history on this planet, and his childlike wonderment and appreciation which to him gave meaning, but to other insecure souls shakes the foundations of everything they know and emasculates the ego.

As visual reference for the Meaning of Words, I used a deck of tarot cards that my mother owned when I was little. I loved these cards and thought they were beautiful, I also loved the notion of tarot cards, and of the divine. I wanted desperately to know what my future would be, and realised this was what I relied on before I realised that my future is my own to create. This shift from passivity to action, to empowerment is something I am forever thankful I have managed to develop.

I began to correlate these ideas to what Sagans' message was relating to all this, and how true it rings. Its almost a form of brain washing to feel that you have no control of your future, and therefore you don't harbour the will to change, and are forever the victim of your fate.

To think how old these words are, dating back to Greek philosophy, and mythology, is ironic in a way, because they are words that we use because they are what we have used forever.
To me this is a perfect serendipitous reflection of our society being so rooted in the mystical, it is so much in the essence of what we fall back on, the easy comforting answer, yet the answer that allows us to dig our heads into the sand and not take responsibility for the state of affairs.

I wanted to give as little information in my zine as possible, I wanted the viewer to make these connections on their own, and in a way it is a reflection on something I hold to be very true, and its that the power of suggestion is much greater than stating everything neatly and presenting it as an argument.

Like a person going to rehab; they genuinely have to want to go, you cant force them. So I presented these ideas in a way that I thought would be whimsical yet thought provoking. How provoking they proved to be is up to the viewer to decide, but I think that if we continue down a path that as a society that has to be told what to think, not develop ideas on our own and ask why, we are just creating sheep not healthy, intellectual human beings.

An example of Les Tarot de Gruyeres

By Jose Roosevelt

Examples of his paintings

I toyed with multiple ideas for images before deciding on tarot cards and association. Below are some examples

Carl always judged religion, not to ridicule but to say it is unreasonable and illogic so I made these two thumbnails as an idea for that 

Carl Sagan had an asteroid named after him and so I thought of this simple and literal illustration for it. I used graphic markers for the asteroid and face and different powdered inks for the background. It really worked well to create space

This is an idea I drew simply because I liked the effect of outlining lines over lines, trying to incorporate starts in there too

This one is the idea of man and woman against the void of space. Really quick idea, not a lot of thought other than try and keep it simple to see what comes out and can look good or be the start of an idea

Lastly I thought I might do a comic strip paraphrasing one of his quotes