History of Lecture 2 Thoughts & questions

Capturing an image from a quarter of an hour to a fraction of a few seconds. This find took a gazillion times of trial and error.

I like how Meridel refers to current times in making linkages of how photography was a huge part of our lives and how the meaning of it is still … evolving … to different perspectives.

I am curious as to since the daguerreotype was found, how did it impact the art world – when did the transition begin?

I would like to think that history didn’t change – like how selfies capture moments – the underlying process of the everyday photographer remains the same. Just like when the daguerreotype was found; people experimented, there was a huge demand for portraits and people were obsessed with the potential – of capturing images. The motive for each person is different with regards of photography as a medium but the world is changing and influencing the use if this medium.

With technology and research – it became very, very, very accessible.

(equate progress with independence) (association)

Photography as a scientific process – did people separate this from art?

1839. industrial age

Geological time – the energy?

The excitement of innovation

More of the process that separates it as an art form/ everyday use.

Photography is just another medium – why the controversy?

Who were the patrons of photography back then and how did they afford it?

 

Home Sweet Home Emerald Hill

Research:

Overlapping style, line work and a specific colour schemes

Looking at Emerald Hill, I wanted to embody the residential area and how homely it felt, the parts of the houses that was often overlooked, accompanied by a short poem. Wanted to see these tangible objects in my zine. Include some graphic work but also still include the original source.

The focus is also on the obvious variety of our colonial past mixed wit obvious Chinese motifs, a variety.

Layout Plan

Using a colour generator I created a colour combination,  by adding my image into the generator, with some slight adjustments to lower the saturation of the colour

Created some graphics using adobe illustrator when the illustration software did not created crisp lines. This is for the cover.

I traced out this Chinese motif with a drawing software but it does not look “graphic” and more like organic shapes, therefore switched to adobe illustrator.

These are some of the knockers I found and it is illustrated

Wanted the overlapping feel based on my research

Additionally I wanted to present the pristine look and my layout skills, a page is dedicated to the scenes of emerald hill, especially these columns I have seen.

Created some texture textiles with layer masks

 

This zine made me realise that I need to relearn some of the digital softwares. Printing and formats are another concern that I will ave to work on.

Graphical-Typography

This project was one of the toughest I have encountered as graphic design was “new” to me. Conceptualizing was more difficult as compared to execution. I have a few learning points to take note of in future when I work with print and it’s concepts.

Research

Based on a list of a few occupations and some imagery that appeared on my mind. I realized that I haven’t been exercising my imaginative and creative muscle in my conceptualisation. Partly because of my fixation on a certain type of aesthetic. 

I have decided to read up on typography

The main takeaway was the archetypes of typefaces and how it was used in many different contexts. It covered a brief history of how typography came to be, how it evolved and now categorized in it’s respective typeface. Overall an interesting look at placement of letters and how it looks like together. A reminder to read further on typography.

For Inspiration I looked to Peter Jenny’s series of books, this specific one caught my eye. The Learning to See series takes a look at formal elements of art in everyday life.

Here are some snippets of the book I enjoyed

Additionally we learned about Pareidolia, which is

“A psychological phenomenon in which the mind responds to a stimulus, usually an image or a sound, by perceiving a familiar pattern where none exists.”

-Wikipedia

Also know as the alphabet project, it was about spotting letters A-Z in everyday objects.

 

Therefor what I understood from all the exercises were to get viewers to realize the underlying letters in our life and manipulate them for image making.

Here I looked at the form of the letters L,O,K, E and M, U and N. Some more fluid than the other.

Initial Ideas for Bontanist

I realized I centered my illustration based on botanical illustrations from the 18th century which was essential to the botanist research. Which does not embody the occupation of a botanist as a whole. Therefore idea aborted.

(Above images are not mine and belongs to respective owners)

Interior Designer

Chef-to-be

At this point I realized that I am consciously placing elements together to form letters, not really like Pareidolia where the words are not subtle but in fact, it was a very direct way of presenting the letters to the audience.

Therefore coming up with my first piece as a florist as I like the more flowery elements as compared to the scientific part of a botanist

Other ideas for font usage and placement of letters 

Tattoo Artist

Realising that some typeface has a present context behind it, such as traditional styled tattoos.

(Above images are not mine and belongs to respective owners)

Sketch

Final

Criminal Investigator

Was interested in creating a narrative with the medium of tracing paper and mixed media and therefore I experimented with creating a bullet hole effect through the tracing paper.

I then resorted to printing the elements on the tracing paper which when combined eventually did not show my name LOKE. Therefore I had to remake a final illustration.

The placement is still a little awkwardly placed.

Fashionista

Mainly thinking of how to form the word M,U and N with any fashion goods. These are my sketches.

Inspired by Malika Favre’s minimalistic use of gestalt.

http://malikafavre.com

That, did not turn out too well. Need better use of space and three dimensionality.

Overall. I felt that I focused too much on the concepts and should have executed more of my plans. It was, very challenging.

Chapter 1: A Beckoning

She held her arms tightly around her knees,  the cold had numbed her. Silence pierced the wet, slippery room as her vision slowly blurred into place. How long had she waited? What she had just witnessed was almost, unimaginable. There were so many unanswered questions. As she recalled the dreadful scene of her husband being gnawed on by their own kind, tears welled up in her eyes. Cupping her hands over her wet and grimy face, she stifled her tears for she feared that the attacker was still behind the closed door.

She leaned gently unto the door, placing her ear against the stained, opaque glass door. “Wide … panic … across … evacu… north… experiment…” Murmuring from the television could be heard, there was no obvious sign from the attacker from the other side. It seems like a good opportunity to sneak out now.  She slid the door opened while she turned to the left followed by the right.

 

My ego

 

The styles that I was interested in was an illustrative style, less focus on details but more on colours and the gestural look, here are some examples I found on pintrest.

Surprise, surprise, I did all my work on Autodesk android drawing application, I liked how I used a dry brush to go over with the colours, to give it the illustrative style.

Other than associating myself with an animal or an object, I didn’t personify myself but I gave 2 separate elements to create a narrative.

My Ego-centric story

Project Ego reminds me of cause and effect, an interesting comic strip about my personal tendencies.  I have faced many technical issues in this project especially with file sizes, rendering and printing issues. Before I get into the details of my research and process, lets take a run through of my final that none of my classmates managed to see my hand-drawn effort (because I couldn’t print a hard copy) and my concept execution. (sadly) Ok rant ended.

Also personally loathing my mistake of dragging everything to the last minute.

Very self explanatory, rabbits are herbivores is a representation of my diet, usually healthy and full of veggies. However my temptation proves me wrong sometimes and I end up feeling unnatural thus the distorted rabbit.

I’m nocturnal in nature, but I am not the only one, I end up sleeping when I am supposed to be doing work, unofficial hours.

The shadow animals represents different types of thoughts (worries) that crowd around me when I am on my own. They are not necessarily bad thus the animal form. I want to get distracted from my thoughts once in a while, but I do know my worries would follow me where ever I go.  I do believe I worry so that I expect certain things to happen, in a way, my worries would save me in the end, from trauma. Therefore a biblical reference to the arc, where my animal friends would be saved from a natural flood.

In this strip, I wanted to suggest the me who loves plant but is ironically, plants indoors as I dislike the weather outdoors.  Therefore I am a more stay in sort of person.

 

Final for Forrest Gump & Processess

I basically fell in love with the treshold button because that’s what happened to most of my graphics. For the first design I worked with was from

They called it a “Royale with Cheese”.  

They were referring it to the burger at first and I was thinking of I can incorporate a narrative into the design. But we had to take the quote entirely out of it’s context, thus I followed with the cheese as the final composition, although cliché and direct, I liked how the mouse came out. I also printed this as my tote design.

#1 composition

#2 composition

#3 compsition

I was trying to go for a children book’s style, I treshold the mouse’s parts separately, overall I liked how it came out.

You are tearing me apart, Lisa!

These are the images I used and were inspired with while making this

I pictured a skull keeping his mouth ajar while expressing his disdain, but to show the tearing him apart from his flesh to his bones, I just  added some essential organs such as the mouth and the eyeballs. Also added a silhouette of a woman and a doorway to add to the dramatic effect.

There is excellence all around you. You need only be aware to stop and savor it.

This is one of the most difficult quotes I have had to deal with, due to the fact that it is so general but it has some relation to food or the ‘yummy’ factor. I thought it should encompass ‘life’ as a whole and somehow, this person was enjoying herself, while consuming ‘life’. This licking an ice cream idea definitely gave a subtle yet direct meaning of what I wanted to say. I used theses images in this collage design.

Lastly,

Behind this mask there is more than flesh, Mr Creedy. Beneath this mask there is an idea… (and ideas are bulletproof)

#1

was thinking of choosing a wooden figure as it’s body to show the inability to control oneself due to the control from others, but the pairing of the human head and an inhuman body didn’t seem like a good visual composition.

#final

I liked how this mask came out nice and crisp looking.  This piece is pretty symbolic too. I was thinking of using a mask but not the usual kind. I guess for this piece, or for all the overall work that I have done, I try to avoid using imagery that was’fool-proof’ – that would look good in any design because it was trendy. Unfortunately, the gas masks one of these widely used trendy imageries.

However with this quote in mind, I was thinking of how the human subject could either protect himself with the mask, from being contaminated by the outside world or it could have been him containing the monster he is with a mask. The overall piece looks intimidating. Another symbolic imagery was the use of locusts which has a biblical meaning, as based on the seven plagues, the locusts ate every plantation in it’s path and the vibe this imagery gave off, was how ideas consumed everything in it’s path. (That could end up a bad memory) This was a tough one to compose due to the placement of the locusts which in this case, looked very awkward and cramped where they exit from the mask. But with the limited type of images, that was as good as it gets. These are the images I took my inspiration from.

Overall I am proud of the last few images because the concept was well-thought over compared to the first few.

Forrest Gump Project Quotes

So the prompt is clear, choose your favorite movie quotes and work with it and so I have decided to work with these few.

Firstly,  Pulp Fiction 1994, a film that has been widely discussed about, only to be recently watched by me. One of the most unique line just from this movie is

They call it a “Royale with cheese”.

 

Fantastic quote, now moving on to the next one.

The Room 2003, one of the “worst” movies made in film history and some of the most infamous lines by Tommy Wiseau himself, awkwardly delivered, this line sends cringes down most spines. In this scene, the actor’s ability is equivalent to me when I am trying to get out of trouble.

You are tearing me apart, Lisa!

 

 

And the next, Ratatoullie 2008 holds a special place in my heart because firstly I love good cooking and, good food nonetheless; I ultimately love French culture. This animation has also one of the most interesting plot ever written, though unrealistic. But it brings me so much joy and awe as a creator myself, it’s quotes are actually very applicable to most artists.

There is excellence all around you. You need only be aware to stop and savor it.

Lastly I wanted to work with a quote that showed a parallel of individual and society, therefore, from V for Vendetta. I left out the bulletproof part, mainly focusing on the idea and the mask part instead.

Behind this mask there is more than flesh, Mr Creedy. Beneath this mask there is an idea… (and ideas are bulletproof)

LET THE MAKING BEGIN! cool