TheElliotWatson.GRILLUST.UK
  • Home
  • About
  • Blog
  • Contact
  • University Projects
    • Year 2 Project Links
    • Year 3 Project Links

A Totally Legitimate Art Blog

ILLU5040 - Lockdown Diary

29/11/2020

0 Comments

 
The lockdown diary should fit these criteria:
  • 8 - 12 Pages including the front & back cover.
  • May be analogue or digital
  • Any size & format.
  • Story with a beginning, middle, & end.
  • Feature a range of drawing skills (interiors, exteriors, & figures)
The story I will be telling in my comic is the cancellation of sword fighting activities due to lockdown, transitioning into doing sword drills in a cramped indoor space, and then the resulting destruction and renovation of the indoor space.

Thumbnails


These are the rough compositional thumbnails in roughly the format I want to produce this book in.
Picture
As I'm going to make this comic digitally, I looked at some tutorials on techniques that other artists use to produce their comics.
A complete view of a comic development process from conception to finished product has given me a good idea on how to proceed with my own work-flow.
The use and adaptation of three dimensional assets can be used to speed up aspects of drawing, and keeping subjects consistently proportioned, but for the moment this technique feels more advanced than I am capable of within this project.

Page Sketches


These are the sketches made digitally in the exact format I will produce the comic in. I will ink all the sketches, adding details and refining the composition, and then colour the resulting linework.
Picture
Back (Left) & Front (Right) Cover Sketches
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture

Illustrated Pages


Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
0 Comments

ILLU5020 - Dynamic Composition

28/11/2020

0 Comments

 

Composition Principles


The way an image is constructed within a frame changes how it is perceived.
Humans have many in-built pre-conceptions about shapes, lines, colours, and their interactions relative to each other, for example straight parallel lines orientated in increments of 90° reinforce the idea of structure and stability, whereas lines that are almost 90° begin to create a sense of instability and tension. The way pieces of art are composed within a frame can reliably exploit these pre-conceptions to change the mood of the work.
Picture
As an example of dynamic composition, I will take a look at a page from The Witcher: House of Glass illustrated by Joe Querio.
This page goes through the beginning of an action sequence, to the conclusion of the action on the final panel.
Diagonally tilting horizon lines add to the tension, each image has an unbalanced feeling because the horizon line is tilting, adding a sense of anxiety to each image.
Close-cropping gives the audience a brief and incomplete view of the action, figures are bursting in and out of frame describing the frantic nature of the action.
Sharp diagonal lines convey movement, particularly the speed of the movements occurring, the jagged form of these lines inform areas of great displacement, as if the movement is tearing through the frame.
Upon the conclusion of the action, the horizon line is straight and horizontal, there are marks in the vertical at 90°, these devices bring order and stability into the image, juxtaposing the previous frames' diagonal marks.
The lines are smooth and rounded, encouraging a calm and relaxed mood, a respite after the prior action sequence.

Thumbnail Compositions


Picture
Thumbnails With Dynamic Composition, Washing Clothes, & Skiing
To explore composition, and thumbnail visuals, we were given six scenarios to create a series of thumbnails for, and then create a more developed thumbnail visual for the intended outcome piece.
  • Ambushed - two figures - a city's back streets - night.
  • Vertigo - a steeplejack - daytime - windy day.
  • Tango - two figures, movement, sexy, close, exotic, café.
  • Systems Failure - one figure, spaceship, physical struggle.
  • A Giant Leap - rooftop chase, three figures, peril, bravery.
  • January Sales - claustrophobia, queuing, doors opening, multiple figures.

Ambushed


Picture
Thumbnails
Picture
Developed Thumbnail Sketch
Picture
Developed Thumbnail

Vertigo


Picture
Thumbnails
Picture
Developed Thumbnail Sketch
Picture
Developed Thumbnail

Tango


Picture
Thumbnails
Picture
Developed Thumbnail Sketch
Picture
Developed Thumbnail

Systems Failure


Picture
Thumbnails
Picture
Developed Thumbnail Sketch
Picture
Developed Thumbnail

A Giant Leap


Picture
Thumbnails
Picture
Thumbnails
Picture
Developed Thumbnail Sketch
Picture
Developed Thumbnail

January Sales


Picture
Thumbnails
Picture
Developed Thumbnail Sketch
Picture
Developed Thumbnail
0 Comments

ILLU5020 - Illustrated Enamel Pins

10/11/2020

0 Comments

 
Within this project we're set to create three enamel badges, based on an already existing pop-culture property, with associated packaging & branding ephemera. These designs are to be limited to a maximum of four pantone colours & line, and to be an appropriate size for enamel pins (I've researched they should be 15-40mm²).

Enamel Pin Examples


The conventional packaging for enamel pins is a piece of sturdy backing card to which the pin is attached, and often incorporated into the design so that the pin and the card compliment each other in their aesthetics. The degree to which the pin design and the backing card's design match can vary.
Here's a collection of hard & soft enamel pins that were strewn about in various drawers and cupboards throughout my house. There are a few examples of different line colours, a brass/ gold colour, silver, and black. Some of these pins have only one colour painted on them, leaning on the line work to help the design work.
The importance of silhouette clarity is being made more and more clear to me as I view a wider range of enamel pins, given the small size of these pins, intricate details will inevitably be lost to the audience at any reasonable distance. Bold colours and recognisable shapes seem to be the way to go.

Subject Research - Moomins


Picture
The modern 3D animated Moomn TV series, Moominvalley (2019), continues the soft & squishy look of its predecessors but with a new animation style. The 3D rendering uses lighting and gradients to describe the soft nature of the world its set in. While this style isn't something I'll be able to achieve with flat-colour enamel pin designs, the vibe is certainly something to aim towards.
Picture
Picture
Picture
The animated Moomin TV series in the 90s, Moomin (1990), has a very soft aesthetic to it, using pastel colours in a fantastical setting, the greater use of flat areas of colour allows a more direct translation from this iteration to enamel pins. I can see how certain solutions have already presented themselves in the way they are drawn & animated for some problems I might have in my designs.
Picture
Picture
The absurd contrast between the soft and gentle design of moomins and the presence of knives in the setting is very amusing. Very chaotic vibes.
Picture
The pastel colour pallet of pinks and purples adds to the mystical nature of the setting. It's definitely a combination I want to explore with my packaging treatment.
Putting weapons in the hands of soft and round children's characters is a tradition that Moominvalley (2019) upholds.
Picture
The monochromatic design of the packaging is reminiscent of the original books & comic series of Moomins.

Enamel Pin Designs


The design restrictions are:
  • A maximum of 4 Pantone colours & Line (Brief).
  • Line colour may be Black, Gold, Silver, Or Blackened Silver (Researched).
  • Appropriate size range of 15mm² - 40mm² (Researched).
  • 0.2mm Minimum line weight (Researched).
  • 6pt Minimum type size (Researched).
Picture
Design Size Specifications Visualised
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
In my research into enamel pins, there are very few examples of hard edges. Even when they are present in the design, the outline die-cast of the pin is often rounded out around such elements so there are no hard points.
All the lines within an enamel pin have a rounded edge on them, so in my designs within illustrator I altered the stroke properties so that all my lines would have rounded ends and corners to match the style.
Picture
Quick Pin Mock Up Using Design Assets From Illustrator Imported To Photoshop
Picture
Backing Card Design
I've tried to keep within the aesthetic of pink/ purple pastel colours for my backing card design. Leaving a central area to display the pin, and having a fairly balanced composition that draws the eye to the center of the frame. Now that I've got a template piece to work from, I have the option to alter the gradients slightly from piece-to-piece to hint at a handmade aspect to these backing cards.
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Having these mock ups scaled to their designed size of A6 helps judge the areas in which they succeed or fail much easier. It's very easy to get hung-up on tiny little details when working on a digital image that can scale dynamically, but taking a step back to look at the work as it's intended to be seen is important.
0 Comments

ILLU5040 - The Underpinning Knowledge

10/11/2020

0 Comments

 

Perspective


These sketches explore the understanding of perspective, using a diagrammatic approach to break down the technique. Light sources and cast shadow are considered in some of these drawings as well as the impact of directional mark making to describe form.
Picture
In this exercise I looked at tonality in the form of an ink wash. Directional marks are more subtle in ink washes, but they still add to the sense of form and structure within the piece.
Picture
Picture

Figure


Heads

Getting the head and its proportions right can make or break an illustration.
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
There's a slow progression through these six heads in using a wider range of tones, As I go through them I become more aware that I'm using mostly mid-tone greys and I try to use darker tones. In the examples where I have used darker tone I feel there's more weight to the illustrations.
Picture
Picture
I feel like using coloured pencils encourage me to explore a greater range of tones, instead of hovering around the mid-tone greys as I'm like-to-do with standard graphite pencils. Using the full range of tonal variations is something I've tried to be consistently aware of throughout this process.
Blending areas of tone would make this head feel less geometric, the hard edges on the areas of tone make it look like it's chiselled from stone rather than made of flesh. The geometric look does however help define where the areas of tone sit on the face, it just needs smoothing out in the final rendering process.
Picture
0 Comments

    Author:

    Elliot Watson, Illustrator with a background in historical swordsmanship and all the weird and wonderful trappings that entails.

    Archives

    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Site powered by Weebly. Managed by 34SP.com
  • Home
  • About
  • Blog
  • Contact
  • University Projects
    • Year 2 Project Links
    • Year 3 Project Links