Assignment 2 “Nursery Rhyme” – Working and rejected compositions

The cow jumped over the moon

The cow jumped over the moon

This was my initial composition before more design principles were implemented

I tried to juxtapose the scale of the moon to the globe, and to stack the cows while varying size and opacity to suggest hierarchy but I felt that it was too literal an interpretation of the nursery rhyme which made it less interesting and dynamic.

There was an old woman who lived in a shoe.

There was an old woman who lived in a shoe.

For this composition, I tried to play around with the idea of “living in a shoe”  – thus the stacking of shoes to create a house where the old woman lived. Personally, I like this interpretation of the nursery rhyme but I felt that the composition was too static and boring so I decided not to use it.

The little dog laughed, to see such sport

The little dog laughed, to see such sport

This was my initial concept for this line of the nursery rhyme – I went with a more comic book/graphic novel-esque presentation by using a dominant “speaking figure”, lines pointing out from the figure’s mouth to indicate speech or movement.The little devil was alliterated to point outwards to indicate fun or mischief, and 2 rubber duckies were also put together to create a little bow tie for the dog. However , I felt that this composition was too simplistic so I decided not to use it.

Assignment 2 “Nursery Rhyme” – Final

The cow jumped over the moon

The cow jumped over the moon

For this composition, I wanted to juxtapose the scale of the moon and the cow to emphasize the difference in size – I also decided to choose a realistic looking cow (instead of the cartoon ones) to contrast with the cartoonish style of the moon.

Initially, I tried to overlap the moon with the cow (to show the cow jumping OVER the moon) but I felt that it covered too many details of the moon and made the image very awkward. Hence, I decided to just use the cow to cover the space between the edges of the crescent moon, with many cows in different sizes to evoke the motion of jumping/falling.

The little dog laughed, to see such sport

The little dog laughed, to see such sport

For this image, I decided to combine an image of a baby figurine and the dog head to create a humanoid/animal figure instead of a simple dog as I wanted to bring out the fun (and almost bizarre) feeling of the poem. I rotated and reflected elements of image to create a kind of pattern similar to a kaleidoscope – to evoke the feeling of fun, light-heartedness and absurdity like that of the poem.

The rubber duckies along the side were also added to add to the fun feeling, to express the dog’s laughter and amusement. The opacity of the rubber duckies were toggled to make them part of the background pattern, preventing them from taking attention away from the dog humanoid, the dominant figure in the composition

She had so many children, she didn't know what to do.

She had so many children, she didn’t know what to do

To evoke the feeling of “didn’t know what to do”, I tried to juxtapose many children hanging over the old woman’s head to create a looming, overwhelming effect. The stacking of the baby patterns was also done to create a feeling of dizziness, to emphasize the dilemma of the old woman. The babies right in the middle of the composition, however, were not stacked but instead gradually increasing in size as they near the woman’s head , stopping right above her. This was to create an overall dominant figure in the composition in spite of the distracting patterns in the background and also to emphasize the relationship between the old woman and her children (children>old woman, overbearing and overwhelming).

The size of the baby patterns in the back ground were also varied to a smaller extent as they became further away from the woman’s head to create and emphasize the radial symmetry in the image; it was also to emphasize the woman in the middle of the composition but creating implied lines that lined up to point at her head.

 

Hey diddle diddle, the cat and the fiddle,

Hey diddle diddle, the cat and the fiddle

For this composition, I didn’t want to do the most instinctive interpretation of the nursery rhyme – which was to depict the cat holding or playing the fiddle in some way or another. While I was playing around with the different images, I realized that the image of the upright cat somehow resembles the thin, tall silhouette of the fiddle hence I tried to play up that similarity. By lining up the cat with three other fiddles in the foreground, I wanted to make the cat the dominant figure by making it the break in the lineup of fiddles. I decided to align the cat slightly off center, as well as to increase its size such that it was bigger than the fiddles beside it, to emphasize it even further. The organic, irregular nature of the cat’s silhouette also contrasts highly with the symmetrical, regular silhouette of the fiddle, bringing out their differences even further and thus making the cat even more obvious in its similarity yet difference from the objects around it.

In the background,the lineup concept was used again to echo that of the foreground and to create an overall pattern and harmony in the image – the opacity and size of the fiddles were manipulated to ensure that it stayed in the background as a pattern instead of dominating the foreground. The lineup was also made tighter in the background than the foreground to imply horizontal lines across the composition to create a strong, stable composition. A slight overlap was used as well between the foreground and the background to make the foreground stand out more and to make the break in the regular pattern (the cat) more obvious.

Assignment 2 “Nursery Rhyme” – Project Prep 2

07 06 05 04 03 02 01 080910

These were the images that I prepared and submitted onto the shared folder for this assignment. Apart from the first and the last image(which were taken from vintage illustrations and dingbats fonts respectively), everything else was shot by me on my camera with things that I found around the house. I decided to use this hands on approach with objects that were not directly related to the nursery rhymes as I wanted to introduce variety into the collages made. In retrospect, the objects that I chose might have ended up to be too tangential for people to use them effectively.

Assignment 2 “Nursery Rhyme” – Project Prep

Principles of Design 

The principles of design that describe how artists use different elements in their art/images to create visual interest – and can also serve as a very general guideline for designers to understand design elements. Of course, there are other sets of guidelines that might be equally if not more applicable in conscious design (a personal favourite being the 5 Principles of Flag Design), and artists often break or contradict these rules, but it is interesting to see these common elements to present in different artists’ works nonetheless.

 

Figure-ground (gestalt)

gestalt

The figure – ground element of design consists of the relationship between an object (the figure) and the negative space surrounding it (the ground). The relationship between them is mutually exclusive, but their relationship inseparable – either must be viewed in relation to the other.

 

Balance – Symmetry/Asymmetry

51436b345a54b49313d2073810db43f0

Balance refers to the distribution of the visual weight of objects, colours, textures, and space. In a symmetrical balanced composition, the elements used on one side are similar to the other side; in an asymmetrical balanced composition, the elements used on each side are different but still weigh out to provide an overall balance in the composition.

Contrast/ Emphasis/ Dominance

3404713829_d39defbc70_z

Contrast refers to the juxtaposing of drastically different (and often opposite) design elements to draw the viewer’s attention to a particular point in the composition. It counteracts monotony in the composition by generating a particular point of interest.

Cropping

croppingwww

Cropping refers to the intentional discarding of certain portions of an image, either to reduce the amount of distracting elements or to generate visual interest on a particular point in the composition, thus emphasizing it. Effective cropping of letterforms, images and shapes can be used to make an image more visually dominating.

Hierarchy

bigboldred

Hierarchy can be created in an image by manipulating the aspects of design elements (e.g. size, shape, colour, contrast, arrangement) to create an order in which different elements in a composition are to be viewed. By varying these elements, the viewer’s eye can be guided along the image to view it in a more coherent manner.

Scale

13c

Scale is the size of an object in the composition as consciously chosen by a designer – it can be magnified to provide emphasis or to provide a different way of perceiving an object (e.g. the difference between a large circle and a dot).

Proportion

magrit

Proportion refers to the relationship of two or more design elements in a composition and how they relate to each other in terms of scale and size. Similar to scale, this can be manipulated to create an illusion of realism (in balanced, harmonious compositions) or distorted to create a sense of disharmony or surrealism.

Repetition/ Variety

79ede1210abf59bd7bf10770efb9f5e7

Repetition refers to the repeated use of particular design elements in a composition, though not necessarily in a particular order. It helps the composition become more active and creates a greater sense of unity in the work. Conversely, a wide variety of design elements can be used to create a sense of discordance and chaos.