Yes progress! Moving on, more about the banner layout. As mentioned previously, I wanted to have a central one-eyed goblin figure in the largest scale whilst the rest of the background be just repeated motifs of the various Korean food monsters and food randomly placed around the central goblin motif. I went ahead with this arrangement in mind and surprisingly it was turning out well until… consultations/peer review week happened before recess break. Ina gave feedback on how the inverted goblin motif at the bottom came off as a little distracting and confusing, that I could perhaps do something about it:

Suggestion by my peers was to have it tilted a little/change its colour/add a bit more elements to it to distinguish the motif from the one above  so that the idea of having a central motif is still shown. Those were really valuable feedback!! In the end I went ahead with just having one of the one-eyed goblin motif placed in the centre and upped its scale to further bring out the idea as seen in the following images in the media gallery below.

Another issue that came about for the banner was that since it was rather carefully planned (in terms of which motif should be placed where) the remaining fillers for the background proved to be a problem as I did not know what else to add. To which Ina suggested that I could try overlapping my layers to see if I could figure out a way to have a more integrated background on the whole rather than just following my initial idea of having the bowl of noodles joined to the goblin and it’s noodles spilling out to just flow everywhere across the banner; the wavy organic lines of the noodle spilling about I felt would help create a feel of movement throughout the banner as well rather than it looking too stiff and rigid.

Here are two variations I came up with – One with more of the noodle waves as the fillers and one with less. Eventually I went ahead with the one with less noodle waves (right image) as fillers as I found the one with more (left image) to be more messy:

Subsequently, I played around with the colours of the background. To give it a background little dimension I added a filter/texture of sorts:

 

 


FINAL CHOSEN BANNER LAYOUT

Below is the final composition and background colour that i went for reason being that I felt the dark teal background colour acts as a good contrast to the pastel-coloured motifs in the banner composition. The dark blue background came out way too contrasted, the teal way too subtle. I stuck with blue hues for as the background as I somehow felt it was a cool colour that complemented the vibrant pastel-coloured motifs.

Also, rather than having the organic waves of the noodle fill the background and make it look messy and distracting, I opted to use the egg bread motif  instead as fillers rotated and scaled in various angles and sizes which I think worked out better:

Now to bring the file over to Illustrator, vectorise and refine it so that resolution and file size for printing wouldn’t be a problem! But if all else fails… I suppose the Photoshop file still works as all these motifs were kept as its original quality with no merging of layers/flattening of image. We shall see! Finally, I’m back on track 🙂

I’ve really been lagging behind this whole OSS posting of our process but now that it’s recess week… time to catch up!! Definitely way more progress since the last post! So picking up from where I last left off: My motifs. They’ve evolved quite a huge bit. This was how it looked like back in Week 4 and I ought to have updated about it after consultation with Gillian but…

Anyhow, here’s what went down and how the motifs have progressed since then:

From the consult with Gillian a few weeks back, I solidified my concept further with the idea of having food monsters and food distributed /peeping/playing hide and seek in the background in different scales based on different types of Korean foods (sticking true to the Korean essence as the inspiration was heavily influenced from the Korean mythology of the one-eyed Dokkaebi and how it has this characteristic in which it likes to eat.

Other than the food motifs, I was thinking of coming up with my own interpretation of the one-eyed goblin as the central motif, the largest in scale and centralised as the main motif/element of the banner composition. The idea came about after seeing Gillians banner in class that week – Hers had a central motif (I liked that aspect!) and the composition flowed down nicely with the other motifs complementing the flow .

Layout aside and back to the motifs, Gillian said that they could be more simplified in the sense that currently there’s too much sketchy linework going on (as seen above) and that they could be as simple as placing the eyes and body parts at just random places. As I was sharing how I observed the food form and identified possible spots that for example, where the eye could be at – replacing the egg in the ramen, etc. she said that actually creating the food monster motif can be as simple as  just adding body parts to the existing look of the Korean food.

Thus I went to make the changes, drew more motifs and picked out the colours I wanted to use for the banner. The colour palette and drawing styles I referenced:

Overall I was going for a more cute-grotesque look. What i did next was to sketch out the food items/monsters and traced over it using the Wacom tablet over in photoshop which I managed to achieve a cleaner finish. Here are some of the original sketches and it’s final look after blocking in the colours:

Refined food (monsters) motifs

More about the banner layout in the next post!

Project 2B on the other hand had us exploring freeform type. Sounds fun but at the same time a little daunting… Similarly, we had to think of a phrase/quote/memory/lyric and create our very own organic typeface in relation to the quote and we could only use traditional medium. After creating the type, we have to apply it onto something tangible.


PROCESS
WEEK 2: In-Class Experimentation

The following week after getting our assignment brief we did some in-class typeface exploration with a wide range of materials we brought from home and found in class to create our typeface. Ideally, we had to come to class with a quote in mind so that we could start exploring and creating a typeface that suited our chosen quote. However I was still undecided (just like Project 2A, my ideas just refused to come easily…) so it was really just freestyle exploration for me that week. I experimented with ink, creating thick and thin strokes with a brush/felt marker, blocking letters, writing in cursive etc. and below were some of the outcomes:

While exploring, a quote ‘Take Heart, Be Kind’ suddenly came to mind. It is more of a catchphrase that was used by the host of a YouTube series that I’ve been following. As I wanted to go for a “spread positive vibes” kind of feel I was thinking that this could be a possible quote to use.

However after exploring with various original typefaces for the quote I realised that it was hard to create one that exudes a “positive vibes” feel. Possibly by playing with colours, but I felt that the shape of letters of the typeface had to play a part the sense that for instance: If the type had to be created in black and white, the vibe of the quote should still be visible too. Also, I did not help that the typefaces from the experimenting was all leaning towards the now commonly seen calligraphy look. It did not come off unique:


WEEK 3&4: Slowly Getting There…

Thus I gave up on that quote and went online to search for more. Another challenge faced was that we had to limit our quote/phrase between 15 to 25 characters. I was still leaning towards to the idea of creating an organic typeface for inspiring quotes and I kind of wanted to play with the idea of incorporating flowers since it was my kind of ‘thing’/aesthetic.

By chance, the quote ‘No Rain, No Flowers’ came up and I felt it was a really simple yet powerful quote that I think everyone would resonate well with, even myself. I feel it speaks of how everything is cause and effect and life’s not all rainbows and butterflies, just like the flowers, we will definitely experience the “rain” – the bad days in order to grow as a person. And they key to overcoming these ups and downs is to embrace it. It felt meaningful. Additionally, I realised that I could incorporate flowers in the organic typeface too 🙂 Here were some of the works I found online and got inspired by / referenced a little:

I then proceeded to experiment on the typeface for this quote at home and came up with a few ideas:

Then came the problem, I could not seem to execute my idea of having the flowers line the sides of the letter while retaining the visibility of the letters (as seen in the image below). The flowers seem to overpower the letter instead of my intention of having it complement the typeface in the sense that it subtly depicts the meaning of the quote as well of how without rain there would be no flowers, the flowers will not bloom. I wanted the letters in the organic dripping-looking form to stand out more than the flowers reason being that it is the rain is the cause of the flowers. It allowed the flowers to grow.

Brought my experimentations to class for the following week of consultation to see how I could tackle this problem and the suggestions given by my peers were really helpful!! They suggested that I could perhaps melt wax crayons / use the glue gun to create give the letters more dimension so that it stands out from the flowers. As for the flowers, I could perhaps do paper folding or another technique I thought of – paper quilling.


WEEK 5: It’s Finally a Work-In-Progress!!

Now that my final execution direction was clearer, I went into creating the typeface based on the suggestions received that week. For the letters, I tried out the Glue Gun method eventually as I already had the materials at home but unfortunately it failed to create the depth and I did not like the uneven texture it created as I had to layer the glue over and over again because of its little output each time.

Managed to resolve the problem by using some leftover styrofoam I had at home from past projects (perks of being a hoarder after each art project haha)

And it worked!!! YESSS. As for the flowers to surround the typeface… due to the little time I had left to work on the typeface, realistically it was not possible to continue with my initial technique of folding /paper quilling the flowers as both techniques required quite a bit of time and cost of course.

Hence I went with the idea of using of fake flowers instead. It was a much cheaper and faster alternative too!! I got them from Daiso and boy their selection of flowers was huge! I was initially at a loss to which kinds of flowers I should choose, which would actually complement the typeface. I eventually went with a vibrant mix of flowers since anything colourful doesn’t hurt right!! Especially since the letters were white in colour.

Here’s how the typeface turned out:

Look of the typeface before digitalising

Thanks to the styrofoam that created the dimension for the letters, the flowers were able to be placed around its sides without overpowering it as initially if both letter and flowers were on the same level, the flowers would definitely have stood out (as seen earlier).

As another requirement of the project was to have the typeface applied onto something tangible, I had to have the typeface digitalised in order for that to happen. Scanning was not an option for me as the typeface had dimension. It was not fully flat and some details of the typeface would have been lost. I did try to scan though! But as anticipated, some details were lost. Thus, I had to take pictures of the letters individually against a black sheet of paper/background and then manually photoshop erase the background of each letter and rearrange them on a blank canvas thereafter. Individual letters reason being that I had to create large letters of the typeface in order for the flowers to surround each letter nicely without looking too crammed or sparse.

The editing process after shooting the letters individually:
It was a rather strenuous process of zooming in, removing the black areas bit by bit and arranging them thereafter on a blank black canvas to achieve a clean finished typeface. And voilà!


APPLICATION TIME!

As mentioned, part two of the assignment was to have this typeface be applied onto something tangible and I came up with a few ideas! It being kind of like an inspiration quote, the options were endless. Here were some ideas but I eventually went with the poster 🙂

Tote Bag Design

 

Notebook Design

 

Poster (Final Selected)

 

So glad the ideas finally came through! Being a person who really enjoys doing craftwork, creating the typeface was an extremely fun process and I would love to try my hands at such a project again in the future!!

For Project 2A we’re tasked to head down to a favourite area of ours and create a typographic composition that reflects the spirit of the chosen area. The typographic composition should be a phrase, quote, memory or lyric that we would associate with the area. When I first heard about it and when examples were shown to us in class, it looked like a lot of fun! Especially if we took up the challenge to identify letters of our selected quote through the structures, objects, almost about anything and everything that can be found at the place to capture it’s essence instead of just looking out for found letters on signs.


RESEARCH & IDEATION

The following week after getting the assignment brief, we dived into our first week of consultations for the assignment together with Project 2B which I will share more about in a separate post so as not to confuse.

Back to Project 2A here, I went in still unsure about my choice of place and the quote to resonate/capture the essence of it for the assignment on the day of consultations but somehow after the consult with Shirley, I managed to lock down my idea!  I was deciding between two places and it was funny how they suddenly came to mind – Botanic Gardens and Haw Par Villa.

Botanic Gardens reason being how I really like the flora and fauna there, the quiet yet scenic view I get every time I am there; healing. On the other hand Haw Par Villa, a place that I have never been to but heard so much about as it is known for featuring giant dioramas of the Chinese folklore, mythology, history and more. The theme park used to be bustling with visitors in the past but have now resided to a quiet place of visit in Singapore. It’s most famous attraction would probably be the 10 Courts of Hell which features gruesome depictions of Hell in Chinese mythology and Buddhism for various kinds of sins committed by people, how they would get punished for it.  I guess the colourful dioramas and mystical vibe of the place overall was what eventually led me to deciding on this place for my project.

The quote I had for the typographic composition of this place was largely inspired by it’s famous attraction (stated earlier) and also because growing up, my parents and grandparents would occasionally share with me stories of these mythologies so I already had vague ideas of it prior to visiting and researching. Especially when we were much younger, they would scare us off us with these tales – telling us not to lie and all if not we would end up like what is depicted in the 10 Courts of Hell.

Hence the quote: “Do Not Commit Sin”


PROCESS


Off to shoot the typographic composition that same weekend on a Saturday morning. First thing that caught my eye about the place or rather the first impression I got of the place was: Colourful, majestic, yet scary. The sculptures and architecture were really vibrantly coloured and intricately crafted!!

These were the few images that I took eventually to use for cropping to form the letters of the composition (click on image to enlarge and view):

The biggest challenge while shooting at Haw Par Villa was to avoid continously shooting and using the organic wavy looking forms there for the composition as they were just everywhere since most of these forms were used as decorative elements to complement the sculptures and structures or used as platforms to raise them up. But I went ahead using some anyway as the wavy organic design it had helped with wavy letters like ‘S’ in my quote. Otherwise, it was really fun trying to spot letters for the quote through observing the form, structures and sculptures at Haw Par Villa 🙂


Now that the shoot’s done, time to get started on the typographic composition and put the quote together! As I was doing, I realised that some of the objects that I shot did not exactly show the intended letter of the quote and I had to fall back on other images taken. Luckily, apart from only shooting forms for the letters for my quote I was shooting everything and almost anything I could spot at Haw Par Villa from various angles – That meant I had other pictures to fall back on. Phew!!

Here’s the first version of my typographic composition:

The problem about some of the letters not being that visible in the composition as mentioned above was addressed during the second week of consultations as well by Shirley when we showed her our progress for the composition. She shared about the Gestalt principle, how when seeing things we tend to group them together by colours to for easier and quicker viewing. Hence if there are too many things going on in that cropped frame, it will be hard for the viewer to identify the letter as compared to a frame with only probably two colours involved (less details/a contrast in the background and foreground).

She pointed out that these two Letter ‘O’s in the composition were cropped well and good examples of that because of the clear contrast/distinction between the letter and its background in terms of colours and little details:

Bulk of the advice given for the first version was either to crop the image of each letter tighter,  make the background/foreground of the letter’s cropped frame lighter/darker to help better distinguish the letter form. Also, it was mentioned that the image used for the Letter ‘T’s were unable to stand out based on the same principle. There was just too many things going on so it would be good to use other images for those letters. Probably just working with images that are made up of subjects/objects that uses just one to two main colours. These were the changes made:

And here’s the the revised version done based on the previous week of consultation (a week before submission):

Shirley and my peers’ feedback helped! I do get the feeling that the letters of the typographic composition looked way clearer than it was before now! Just some slight amendments, a bit more cropping to be made for some of the letters and I was good to go 🙂


FINAL

Here’s the final look of the typographic composition for submission:

I was a little reluctant to repeat the image used for letter ‘m’ but eventually I guess I did not have a choice as some letters were really hard to picture. Some letters that did not make the cut as seen below:

Overall I enjoyed working on the project and it really trained my observation skills, to constantly be aware of my surroundings while at Haw Par Villa in order to identify my letters for the typographic composition. Also, thanks to that trip, I now have a better insight of the place too!

Group Members: Charlotte Low, Cheong Yu Ting, Ng Xuan Fei, Nur Mariyah


(click on thumbnails to view presentation slides)


History of Comic Sans

  • It was created by Microsoft designer Vincent Connare in October 1994.
  • Microsoft Bob was a program designed to make computers more accessible to children.
  • When Connare saw a beta version of Microsoft Bob that used Times New Roman in the word balloons of cartoon characters, he felt that the result was a formal look inappropriate for a program intended to introduce younger users to computers. “That’s wrong! I like comic books. I have comic books. They don’t talk in Times New Roman.”
  • Connare had already created child-oriented fonts for various applications before
  • His decision was to create a new face based on the lettering style of comic books he had in his office, specifically The Dark Knight Returns (lettered by John Costanza) and Watchmen (lettered by Dave Gibbons) as well as the artwork he saw in the ’80s in New York’s SoHo galleries.
  • He drew letters manually with a mouse over and over again to get something that resembled the raw handwritten speech like that in comic books.

Comic Sans was never meant to be used for a font that is commonly used. It was merely a perfect solution for a corporate agency.

  • People choose Comic Sans because it is loose and friendly. People don’t know how to use type. Type in the past used to be a mere way to show a text. Eventually, people realised the way text is being shown in a font affects the meaning it wants to portray.


Interesting Facts

  • The main designer at Twitter tweeted that the most server space is used by complaints about: first, airlines; second, Comic Sans; and third, Justin Bieber. So not even The Bieber can beat Comic Sans!
  • “I was having trouble changing my broadband to Sky so wrote them a letter in Comic Sans, saying how disappointed I was. I got a £10 refund.” – Vincent Connare, creator of Comic Sans.
  • Part of the reason Comic Sans is so unappealing in a professional setting is its irregularity. Unlike most typefaces, letters such as the “b” and the “d” are not mirror images. For most people, that means it is also more difficult to read. For people with dyslexia, the situation is completely reversed. Irregular letters actually facilitate reading, since the characters are easier to tell apart from one another. Today, several national dyslexia associations list Comic Sans as a recommended font.
  • Connare had to defend Comic Sans to his boss at Microsoft, but once released, it took off.
  • As well as Comic Sans, Vincent Connare is the creator of Trebuchet, Wingdings and the now iconic Ministry of Sound logo.
  • When you Google “most hated font, Comic Sans’ Wikipedia page comes up.
  • Holly Combs, the founder of Ban Comic Sans, told the Guardian that using the font is like “turning up to a black-tie event in a clown costume.” Combs even started a petition to have it banned from Google applications. Savage!
  • The Vatican used Comic Sans in a 60-page photobook for Pope Benedict XVI. Regardless of anyone’s opinion on Comic Sans, it is difficult to go against papal infallibility i.e. a dogma of the Catholic Church that states that the Pope is preserved from possibility of ‘error’ in virtue of the promise of Jesus to Peter. The more you know…

 


Collaterals we had

 

Moving on from last week when we had to present our concept(s) together with our moodboard and collection of images to reference for our designs, it’s on to designing the motifs based on our concept! So over the past week, I’ve been sourcing further for more reference images and ultimately narrowed down to the Korean mythology I would like to develop my project concept from – The Dokkaebi.

The artwork below is by Korean illustrator Dayoung Cho was one of the reasons why. It was one my reference images for my moodboard with colours that stood out and also one with a unique take on the particular Korean mythology, portraying it to be fun/quirky instead of scary – what I intended to achieve for my concept for this project.

Dokkaebi Food Truck by Dayoung Cho

 


Starting with an exploration of the original form of the Dokkaebi: Based on reference images of the mythical creature that I found online, I tried adapting it into my own design to make it look less scary than its original look. What I did was to round the edges of its features, making it rounder in volume and reduced the details to make it look more simplified. Colours wise I used more colours and upped the vibrance of it. However I realised that it was hard to tone down the scariness of the Dokkaebi with this features.

Image Source: http://aminoapps.com/page/mythology/9450197/focus-korean-mythology 

 

Hence I decided to take another approach. As mentioned last week through research I found out that there were different types of the Dokkaebi and one of the ideas I had was to come up with my own interpretations for some of these types of Dokkaebis while referencing existing imageries of them online as I thought the end product might look quite fun and interesting.

Types of Dokkaebi

  1. Kind (참도깨비)
  2. Evil (개도깨비)
  3. Dumb farmer-looking (김서방 도깨비)
  4. Daylight (낮도깨비)
  5. Good at fighting / handling weapons – especially arrows (고도깨비)
  6. One-eyed that eats a lot (외눈도깨비)
  7. One-legged that likes to play Ssireum
    (folk wrestling) (
    외다리도깨비)

I looked through the various types and decided to explore the Dokkaebi type that is One-eyed and eats a lot and this was partially because I was really drawn to the Dokkaebi artwork as mentioned at the start of the post which happens to be an illustration based on this Dokkaebi type – the Dokkaebis are one-eyed and the artwork is food themed – a food truck.

To start off the exploration, I brainstormed a bit for ideas on how to approach this characteristic/type of Dokkaebi in a way so that I can make my motifs fun and quirky, ridding the idea of scary and to follow Ina’s feedback last week of going along the lines of traditional/grotesque yet cute. After much brainstorming, the idea of the Dokkaebi eating a lot made it closely associated with the theme of FOOD. And from food I thought it would be cool to have the food Korean (Korean food), making it stay true to the mythology’s cultural roots – Integrating the features of the Dokkaebi being one-eyed into the particular identified Korean food to form a character-liked motif.

Following which I started searching more indepth and specific reference images of the various Korean food (as seen in the following two images below), analysing their forms and look to see how the features of the Dokkaebi could be incorporated to come up with this motif that captures the essence of this Dokkaebi type entirely.

Image Sources (corresponding to the number labelled images):

  1. https://www.dramafever.com/news/korean-food-12-different-varieties-of-kimbap/
  2. http://xihanation.tumblr.com/post/67631472243
  3. https://evydraws.blogspot.sg/2016/07/korean-summer-survival-makeup-favorites.html
  4. http://heegyum.tumblr.com/post/75659750811/old-drawing-i-did-for-school-project-did-you#sthash.twDCaHia.qjtu
  5. http://xihanation.tumblr.com/post/70297486954
  6. https://m.blog.naver.com/PostView.nhn?blogId=xihanation&logNo=70184489013&proxyReferer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.pinterest.com%2F

 

Below is another Korean artist apart from the already mentioned who worked on a Dokkaebi art project and this was how he interpreted and came up with a character for the Dokkaebi type.

Image Sources (corresponding to the number labelled images):

  1. http://www.para-young.com/Dokkaebi-Food-Truck-1
  2. https://www.behance.net/gallery/11266477/DOKAEBEE-Korean-monster-identity-character-design 

 

Apart from exploring the appearance and forms of some of the various/more common/popular Korean food, I also went into searching for reference images on how to draw some monster/creature-looking features as I had to figure which eye or mouth feature would best suit and integrate with the chosen Korean food. (some sketches and exploration done on the right hand side of the image)
Image Sources: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/How-to-Draw-Monsters-917949 

 

So,,,, after a few hours of developing and sketching out ideas, these were some of the motifs that I came up with! (as labelled)  Not sure if these motifs are kind of finalised, but I think that this is the style that I’ll be going for and that I’ll be playing around further with the explorations if any!

The one-eyed feature and several other prominent features of the Dokkaebi (devil horns/sharp teeth/mischievous look) integrated into the Korean food.

KOREAN MYTHOLOGY

Being interested in Korean culture, I was drawn to start my research for the project in the context. I found quite a few mythologies and the three that caught my attention or rather those I heard of before/the more popular ones is the Gumiho (Nine-Tailed Fox), Dokkaebi (Korean Goblin), and Haetae/Haechi (Protector Spirit) and the one thing in common among these three Korean mythologies that their subject matters are classified as supernatural monsters.

Reading up on these three mythologies sparked a thought and idea for the project. At the mention of the word ‘monster’, most if not all. Even I myself at times would associate such beings with the idea of ‘scary’, ‘evil’ and ‘terror’ especially if one were to search up images of these mythologies online. What if all these supernatural monsters in the Korean mythology are seen as scary only because of the way their are portrayed/depicted through image? Would cute and innocent imagery change the immediate association that people have for supernatural monsters?

Thus for this project, across all three concepts/mythologies that I am focusing on, I am looking to apply techniques like watercolour or illustration together with the use of vibrant colours to re-create the subject matters of these mythologies and hopefully convey the opposite conceptions of what people might have about supernatural monsters. They need not necessarily be all that scary.


Concept 1: Gumiho 구미호 (Nine-Tailed Fox)

This mythology originates from the Classics of Mountains and Seas, an old Chinese text; before it was introduced as a Korean mythology. It tells the tale of how a fox that lives a thousand years is able to turn into this form and it’s able to freely transform, often into a beautiful woman out to seduce boys.

 

Image Sources (corresponding to the number labelled images):

  1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kumiho
  2. https://saraais.deviantart.com/art/Nine-Tailed-Fox-355026288
  3. https://seandonnanart.deviantart.com/art/The-Nine-tailed-Fox-at-the-Changing-Tree-Oji-432454219
  4. http://jonlaustudio.com/Kumiho 
  5. https://www.etsy.com/listing/224328863/print-from-my-original-watercolor-page?utm_source=OpenGraph&utm_medium=PageTools&utm_campaign=Share
  6. http://genevrabell.tumblr.com/post/120665596302/ok-one-more-little-fox-before-bed-fox
  7. http://liekeland.nl/latest-work/

Concept 2: Dokkaebi 도깨비 (Korean Goblin) 

Dokkaebis are monster supernatural beings that are formed by the spiritual possession of an inanimate object or objects stained with human blood. Interestingly enough, what I found out was that there are various types of them, some of which I found rather amusing. I tried searching online but apparently no physical appearance has been given to these types. The most common depiction of how a Dokkaebi looks like is based off ancient roof tiles that had Dokkaebi patterns on it. I feel that it would be interesting and fun to come up with my own interpretations for these types of Dokkaebis while referencing existing imageries of them online.

Types of Dokkaebi

  1. Kind (참도깨비)
  2. Evil (개도깨비)
  3. Dumb farmer-looking (김서방 도깨비)
  4. Daylight (낮도깨비)
  5. Good at fighting / handling weapons – especially arrows (고도깨비)
  6. One-eyed that eats a lot (외눈도깨비)
  7. One-legged that likes to play Ssireum
    (folk wrestling) (
    외다리도깨비)

Source: https://www.revolvy.com/main/index.php?s=Dokkaebi

 

Image Sources (corresponding to the number labelled images):

  1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Devils_(supporters_club)   
  2. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/08/arts/design/silla-koreas-golden-kingdom-at-the-metropolitan-museum.html?ref=design
  3. https://espressocomsaudade.wordpress.com/2014/10/10/honest-mythkorean-dokkaebi/
  4. http://aminoapps.com/page/mythology/9450197/focus-korean-mythology
  5. http://www.para-young.com/Dokkaebi-Food-Truck-1
  6. http://www.myseoulsearching.com/2013/10/korean-ghosts-goblins-gumiho.html
  7. https://albinogoth.com/category/stories/meet-dokkaebi/

Concept 3: Haetae/Haechi 해태/해치 (Protector Spirit) 

This is a mythology that originated from the Classics of Mountains and Seas (an old Chinese text) before it was introduced as a Korean mythology. It’s about this mythical beast that protects Hanyang (now Seoul) from natural disasters and it maintains law and order among the people.

Image Sources (corresponding to the number labelled images):

  1. https://www.flickr.com/photos/38635642@N00/3050733114 
  2. https://i.pinimg.com/originals/e9/9b/7b/e99b7b78963dce97cdbd30796b2b38f1.jpg 
  3. http://m.kenterin.net/article/3921e
  4. http://terms.naver.com/entry.nhn?docId=3574483&cid=58840&categoryId=58854    
  5. http://blog.naver.com/39270613
  6. http://www.blogto.com/city/2012/10/what_if_toronto_got_itself_a_mascot/   
  7. https://www.behance.net/gallery/23767305/Haetae_mythical-unicorn-lion 

So all in all, I would say that my concept is fuelled by the intention of portraying these supernatural beings (in particular, monsters) in a different light, setting them apart from their usual association with words like ‘scary’, ‘evil’ etc. but I definitely feel that there’s room for further exploration and that better ideas can and derived from these mythologies identified.

By Charlotte and Lee Hwa

Project Proposal

This project is an interactive soundscape installation that allows participants to experience a series of sounds that are built-up progressively through overlapping and layering techniques to evoke anxiety. This installation is created to show that participants are able to experience anxiety using solely the sense of hearing instead of the commonly paired senses of sight and hearing (Horror Films) or hearing and touching (e.g. Haunted Houses).

This installation would have participants placed within a brightly lit confined space, blindfolded for 2 minutes. The created space would be empty, with just only a stereo speaker in place for projection of the soundscape. Participants will be split up into smaller groups of four to five people each for maximum experience and asked to put on blindfolds to remove their sense of sight. They will then be guided by the curators to the installation space to experience the soundscape. Once the soundscape ends, participants will be asked to remove their blindfolds so that they can see the space and realise that all the while they were in empty space with nothing but just a soundscape playing in the background; realise that one is able to experience anxiety with just his sense of hearing. Participants will be allowed to stay on and quiety observe the rest of the participants’ experience and all will be invited to share their afterthoughts of the installation experience at the end of the session.

The anxiety-evoking soundscape would be made up of sounds produced and recorded by the foley technique or copyright-free sounds found online. Also, the reason for allowing each group that has experienced the installation to stay on is because alternatively, they can use found objects around them to help contribute to the soundscape they hear. This brings about interactivity in terms of role reversal – From participant to having a reign over the creation of sounds. Overall it is a soundscape created by repetition. Based on David Sonnenschein’s seven categories of sound, the sounds used in the soundscape will be soft to loud in intensity, slow to fast in speed, tonal in timbre and reverberant in shape. The interactive component comes in where participants get to interact with the space as they are able to move around freely while experiencing the installation. Alternatively, they can choose to stay in the same spot; it is up to them on their next move.


Process

Research & References/Material Samples
These were two soundscapes we chanced upon on youtube and used them as reference and inspiration for ours thereafter. For the idea of repetitive sounds in the soundscape:

For the idea of building up on speed of the sounds (fast and slow) in the soundscape:

Inspiration for the ringing noise:

A scene from the movie Saving Private Ryan that we viewed in class where at that one particular moment, the noises become muffled. In the case of our soundscape we got inspired to introduce a high ringing frequency noise. Another reference we had when creating our soundscape for the installation is a sound artist whom Lei suggested to us to check out to get an idea of working with surround sound for our sound installation: Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller – The Murder Of Crows (2008) http://www.cardiffmiller.com/artworks/inst/murder_of_crows.html Some of the sound excerpts from the installation:

Challenges Faced
We intended to book a four-walled space initially and these are the places we had in mind ranked in order to match our ideal set-up that was submitted in our original project proposal.

  • Empty space outside 2D Animation Lab (ART B1-4a)

  • The next backup location would be the meeting room on Level 4

  • Lastly, our Foundation 4D II Classroom (ART 02-23A) as a last resort

But you know, we eventually settled for our last listed location. Our 4D II Classroom we use for weekly classes only because when we wrote in to check the availability of location we did not get a reply. Not sure why though but settling with the classroom turned out for the better for so many reasons, logistics especiallyWe made use of the classroom to create a more confined installation space rather than using the whole class space. Mainly for safety precaution as participants would be blindfolded it would be less hazardous if they are kept in a smaller area with obstacles cleared. The
“confined space” as seen below.

Our test-trial

We tested out our installation according to our original set-up prior to installation day and here was how it looked like as a scale drawing:

Our scale drawing of the original set-up

Here’s the documentation of our test trial. We had 3 of our friends who very so kindly spared us a little of their time to help us test out our installation, whether the soundscape had any effect and if the installation space worked.

For the test trial we used just normal bluetooth speakers that didn’t have the surround sound effect so feedback from our friends was that it would be good if we could use stereo speakers instead, like the one in the classroom. Great thing was we happened to find a portable one that was placed below the television set in class and we need not go through booking procedures to use it. The sound system was awesome. The reverb was amazing and the soundscape effect was much stronger.

The soundscape wise, they suggested to make it less monotonous in a way that the one we originally tried out on them sounded very flat. There wasn’t much sounds that would make them anxious, the loudness and softness of the sounds in the soundscape could be more varied and also the ringing noise towards the back could be more intense. There was also suggestion for us to carry out the installation in total darkness as when they put on the blindfolds, they can still vaguely see the light source from below; being in total darkness helps build up the anxiety emotion.


Execution

How the sounds were created:
Our idea for soundscape was to create a tonal background contrasting with a high pitch sound to evoke anxiety. Foreground sound is created by hitting against the stairs rail that moves away from cliche Anxiety soundscape that utilises heartbeat or breathing. Our background tonal sound was created through garageband, that starts from a high note to a lower note. We then overlay it with the sound we recorded from the stairs, the reason why we chose the rail is because of the reverb that it produce and contrasting it to a low tonal background would create a tension. Further editing was then done in audacity.

Additionally to have a more immersive soundscape, we edited the sound perspective to give the feeling on the sound coming closer and to the back, the speed is also increase to build on the tension. We also added a ringing sound as to break away from repetition sound pattern, which helps to intensify the entire sound at the back.

The day of installation:

What went well: The impromptu decision of having the front groups of participants stay on to help contribute to the live sounds using found objects made the soundscape sounded even more real and thanks to the favourable weather conditions that day (it was raining). That made the installation space really dark and the extra sounds made by the thunder added on well to the reverb of the soundscape which really helped us achieve the emotion we wanted to evoke through our soundscape, anxiety as most felt fear which is an emotion linked to that. Our initial plan was to have participants stay on so that they do not return to the holding space and discuss it with the rest who haven’t experienced it. It would have spoiled the anticipation and also it would have been too boring just to sit there and observe the rest so why not contribute to their experience?

Some documentation of our installation: Before entering the installation space – giving instructions, leading the way




During the installation – the experience, interactivity between participants and the installation (contributing to the soundscape using found objects in the room)

Pardon our blurry and pixelated images (after editing) as this was the best we could get for our installation that happened in total darkness. Video footage wise it was way worse, nothing could be seen only the sounds can be heard thus we settled for image documentation this time round on the official installation day.

What could be better improved: We should have worked out a way such that all groups would be able to experience role reversal interactivity bit of the installation plus have the live sounds created be equal across all groups for a fair experience of the installation. For our case of execution we could have personally added the live sounds for the first group.

Overall, we felt that working with sounds for an installation to begin with is already a challenge what more creating sounds to evoke a particular emotion without trying to go for the narrative style/flow. This soundscape in particular as the emotion we were trying to evoke from participants was anxiety which could seemingly fall under as a sub-emotion under bigger emotions such as depression, stress etc. How one interprets a sound that they hear is very subjective but we think we managed to pull it off thanks to our classmates’ live sound contributions, our impromptu decision and of course the gloomy weather that day which made the atmosphere even better. Even though the deadline was tight, and the stress levels were high especially when it came to logistics, it was still a fun project to work on an explore!

Concept: An informative guide to bring out the best of Everton park, its quaint charm and how it boasts a mix of old and new businesses. The purpose of the guide is to entice people to come visit Everton Park, showing readers what they can check out there, do there and also some facts about the place so that they will have a better understanding of the place as well.

Art direction: Overall I took on a consistent pastel colour scheme for the zine and the original colours were inspired by the architecture colours of Everton Park. However, the original colours of the architecture seemed a little too bright and a bit of mismatch as a publication look thus I took to playing around with the intensity and colour harmonies and went for a more pastel and warm colour scheme eventually. (see image below)

Apart from the use of a consistent colour scheme throughout the zine, you will notice later on that I have also used speech bubbles on most of the pages and spreads for some of the headers and subheaders to bring out the personal touch even further.

Content – I felt that the mix of old and new businesses in this quaint neighbourhood, Everton Park was definitely one of it’s unique charm and I wanted to feature it in my zine so I brainstormed a little and listed down a few things that could be worth including in the zine prior:

  • Ji Xiang Ang Ku Kueh Confectionery
  • The various cafes
  • Unique stores
  • Anecdotes from the residents (for that personal touch)

Curation – I decided to go from broad to narrow after consults and finalising the content I wanted to have in the zine. As for imagery to complement the content, I decided to go for a mix of digital photographs to retain the textures of the food features and used illustrations for the rest.

Typeface – For the typefaces used, I was going for those that were more nostalgic/handwritten to complement the warm colour scheme of the zine.

 

Inspiration (aka Moodboard)

These were some of the inspirations i got from pinterest to help with the designing of my covers and design layout of the pages and spreads:

The above are some examples of illustration styles I wanted to try out in my zine and the image on the right was an early inspiration I had for the cover design – something simple and minimalistic. Riding on that idea, I came up with a cover design as seen later on in the next section.

As for the above inspiration, it was for the layout design in particular the background. Since I was going for a illustrative look I felt that the background should be left simple and I happened to chance upon this inspiration – geometric looking borders and dual-colour background fills which you can see appearing in my zine later on.

Some more inspirations for the colour and design. I initially wanted to go for a risograph feel you can see but after hearing how it costs a bomb, maybe not. But I really like the neon colours and the very comic/sketchy feel of it. Next section will be the digital look of my zine.

 

Flow of Zine (What each page/spread features)

  • The Front Cover (right) and Back Cover (left)

For the front and back cover design I initially intended to have it look like a cropped/framed view of one of the HDB block floor in the front with the hint of potted plants and all with the back cover a back view of the block like what you would see – the hanging of laundry, balcony etc. but eventually felt that by having such a design the architecture thing would be too overwhelming as you can tell that on the subsequent pages there’ll be hints of the HDB block again. Plus, doing up the details would’ve been too time consuming and having too many objects to look at takes away the main focus on the covers – the credits and title of the zine.

Thus I only kept the idea same for the front cover, suggesting more levels of the HDB block in the design instead of going with my original look which made the design look more like a frame/border surrounding the potted plants. As for the back cover, I decided to go with just a simple look, the credits: my social media handles and something like a logo design? (i’m not sure what that looks like but i’m very sure i’ve been excessively using that silhouette of mine since last semester’s final project for 2d; i think it’s becoming like an identity of sorts hahaha).

  • Now diving into the contents of the zine. When you flip the cover, the first 2 pages you see forms a spread layout with the contents presented as an infographic.

Going with the idea of having the content flow from broad to narrow, the first spread featured an overview of Everton Park, what the place has to offer in a quirky fun infographic form using phrases, quotes and numbers and making use of the box grids from the architecture silhouette of the HDB block. You would have probably realised that this is an expansion of my earlier infographic for Part 1 of this project (visit the link at the bottom of the post to read more). In addition There’s also a small part which provides readers with directions on how to get to the place by MRT and what they should look out for in order to find the place after.

  • The next spread. Instead of having a second spread, I decided to make them as pages. Continuing the flow of content, from an overview I started narrowing down firstly to a brief history of Everton Park for the page on the left and Ang Ku Kueh for the page on the right.

For the left page, I felt it would be pretty nice to start off with a brief history of Everton Park as with all other publications or anything whenever there’s a subject involved, there would be background information about it in the beginning. As the year it was established and how old the HDB estate was was pretty much all the historical information I could gather online about the place, I decided to pair it up with some anecdotes from the residents who have lived there, store owners and those who are living there to make it more personal and a little nostalgic. One of the interviewees I managed to get an anecdote from was Mr Yip Yew Chong, the local artist whom I have constantly mentioned throughout my past few posts because of the 2 wall murals he has painted just round Everton Park – They look super gorgeous!!

Whereas for the right page, I decided to do a feature solely on Ang Ku Kueh. Why Ang Ku Kueh you may ask, it is because of an observation I gathered. I realised when mentioning Everton Park to others, first thing they would mention about the place would be that it is home to the famous Ang Ku Kueh confectionery, Ji Xiang Confectionery that has been around for close to 30 years to date (since 1988). And rather than having a full boring page of information just dedicated to the store like an interview feature of quotes by the store owners, reviews and what flavours they have to offer etc. I thought it would be more fun to have it as a thematic feature page with Ang Ku Kueh as the theme. So I started with a brief description of the confectionery followed by fun facts and Ang Ku Kueh related content after. How I came up with the fun fact idea was from online research I chanced upon on Ang Ku Kueh. Turns out the Ang Ku Kuehs that you receive at a baby’s full month comes in different shapes and it is determined by the newborn’s gender! For baby boys, the Ang Ku Kuehs you get are in a simple pointed shape whereas for the baby girls, the couple will give out the normal round ones with the intricate mould design that you will usually see when you buy the confectionery. Thought it would be an interesting fun fact to know! I personally was fascinated by it! For the remaining space, I featured some Ang Ku Kueh themed merchandises like keychains, totes, plushies from local designers and their brands like Ang Ku Kueh Girl, wheniwasfour etc.

  • The final spread and the last content for the whole zine features 5 cafes to check out at Everton Park. As simple as it looks, it is really just a quick food guide to follow up on the previous page’s theme of food.

Curation of the content on this page wise is really just the address of the place, its opening hours, and ratings shown through the commonly used stars symbol. I had intended to add descriptions of what each cafe has to offer but to prevent the page from looking too wordy and making the information hard to digest, I settled for simple and short phrases to describe the food place and it surrounds the circle-cropped image for each cafe. As to how I decided on these 5 cafes to feature: Uniqueness (e.g. different country’s cuisine how they prepare their food) and of course, the ratings! This definitely required some researching… and ah, spot the speech bubble that I mentioned early on under art direction too!

Change(s) in idea/execution 

Actually there weren’t much changes in ideas and execution along the way. Overall it was more of change in the order of content (going for a old to new/broad to specific), which content goes onto which page and also playing around with the design layout.

If there were any major changes it would be for this page as during group consults, most of my classmates and Joy brought up the issue of not knowing where to look (the visual hierarchy was missing). The “Did You Know” seemed like the header for both the fun-fact and the “Ang Ku Kueh Companion” bit.  Eventually I went ahead with a classmates’ suggestion of colour blocking since I had this consistent geometric background thing going on as my background and it worked! Thanks Yi Ling 🙂

Challenges

One of the challenges faced was definitely printing the zine. Having printed a publication before in polytechnic, I thought printing wouldn’t be a problem at all.  As mentioned during the inDesign workshop, some printing shops are able to help you settle printing just by saving in pages but some you had to save in spreads and with spreads came proper visualisation of the pagination like which page match would match with which.

A visual aid for better visualisation – Basically what you see in inDesign vs the layout you’re supposed to have when you export as spreads to achieve the correct pagination:

A HUGE HUGE PITY: Firstly, I think I’ve wasted quite a bit of money as I couldn’t get the printing right in terms of alignment (the bulk of it) and pagination (initially) and because of these continuous errors, I eventually got so focused on getting them right that I overlooked if all my content was printed out properly. Only till presentation day and after the silent round-table peer critique did I realise that an image on my first spread got cut off after reading my classmates comments AHHH. Internal panic but I guess I had to acknowledge that, if not the zine would’ve been perfect. The printing shop was super nice to actually help manually align the pages for me so that when printing on double sides, the alignment wouldn’t be off. Lesson learnt!

Enjoyable moments, etc.

Pretty sure that majority would’ve found this particular part of the zine project rather dreadful but as much as inDesign was a “pain” I believe to many, I really enjoyed the process! And especially when you print the zine, that feeling when you see your own fruit of labour… :”) Personally I really enjoy designing, editorial design so this project felt like my way to destress except since we were given a tight deadline it felt rather pressing at times when you get art blocks.

All in all, I really enjoyed 2d so much, those sweet post-it messages of feedback my classmates for every critique session, and being under Joy for the past 2 semesters have been so fruitful. I’ve learnt so much. Thank you Joy for being so encouraging and nice!!

I’m bummed, my utmost favourite foundation module is officially over 🙁

And finally, here you go! The links to Part 1 my of Zine: Neighbourhood Explorer (Infographic): 
Research: https://oss.adm.ntu.edu.sg/char0066/neighbourhood-explorer-zine-research/
Final: https://oss.adm.ntu.edu.sg/char0066/neighbourhood-explorer-infographic/

Before coming up with a proposal and a solid idea to execute as a group effort for this final project for 4D II we are asked to do individual research on works on either video/sound/performance art and analyse the respective artists and their works, how some of them might be controversial. I am leaning more towards the exploration of using sound for the final art installation project.

Before searching up some examples, I searched up the meaning of sound installations and got the impression that it is a time-based art which sometimes can involve the element of visual to help support/complement the installation as a whole or change it to become a video art installation altogether. With the intention to explore the idea of using sound for the final project’s art installation, below are some that I’ve found interesting and possibly usable as references and inspiration.

I couldn’t really find much sound art installations that were deemed as controversial but my personal take on this would be that the whole idea of a sound art installation itself is actually controversial. Reason being that if you were to take in a sound art installation that is purely made up of sounds only, sure it’s meant to evoke a feeling in the consumers through the listening experience however the sounds are subjected to one’s perception as it’s pretty abstract. And because of that, artists that work with solely sound for their installations are able to get away with touching on controversial ideas. Unless the work includes the other elements like visual in the form of a video/image accompaniment where the audience gets an even clearer idea of how they are supposed to interpret the installation piece.


Haroon Mirza

Here’s one sound artist that has faced a little controversy though with his work I suppose – Cross Section of a Revolution (2011) which has two films being juxtaposed. One on cultural tradition and the other, a political movement and accompanying the installation is an electronic sound that gives a sense of anxiety to the work as the whole. Looking further, one is of drummers at a ceremony in Kenya and the other is about a man in Lahore making a speech about terrorism.

Quoting an article by theguardian on his work:

Mirza recorded his drummers at “a stick-fighting ceremony where the groom has to fight for his bride. My attention shifted to the drummers, who provided the driving force to the ceremony.” They drum on plastic bottles, anything that comes to hand. “A subtext,” he says, “is the place of music in Islamic culture. In some Islamic cultures, music is forbidden. An underlying theme to my work is a criticism of religious faith, and the dogmas involved in religious faith.

Easily when there’s culture/religious faith involved in a work of art, there’s bound to be controversy involved, people questioning the work as it could be sensitive to the identified groups. In this case, the people of that religious faith. It could get a little touchy with how the artist portrayed his topic through the installation piece.


John Cage

Taking a look at his famous or rather infamous piece 4′33″ (1952), this work of his probably fits the idea of performance art more since there’s a subject involved during the performance but I’ll be looking more at his interesting take on the use of sound in this piece.

Cage’s intention with the piece was to have the composition be made up of sounds present in the environment encouraging people to listen to the sounds around them but the impression they got in return was that they were subjected to silence because there was an a pianist present but he did not play anything after taking his place on stage. The sounds of the piece were actually made by the whispers that came from them which became louder as they grew more curious about what was happening in front of them.

Cage’s intentions eventually sparked controversy about the piece since the audience thought they were treated to silence for the whole performance duration of 4 minutes and 33 seconds.


Susan Philipsz

Next looking at how sound art has developed over the years, the public has definitely become more receptive about it possibly thanks to Susan Philipsz who was awarded the Turner Prize in 2010. One of the most controversial awards around because of its history, the questioning on how some past awardees works could’ve possibly been that good to actually have a meaningful effect on the reputations of well-established artists because of their actions and approach.

Philipsz primarily works with sound and her works often consist of nothing more than an empty gallery and a recording of her own singing and sometimes she would build soundscapes into unusual locations i.e. playing a entirely unrelated recording at her selected site for the installation. Nonetheless, her receiving the award helped sound art gained increasing exposure and is now in a better state of reception.

Lowlands Away (2010) is one such example of Philipsz’ style as mentioned above. She recorded three versions of this particular song which is of a man drowned at sea returning to tell his lover of his death and it was first performed under three bridges over the River Clyde in Glasgow and later on in an empty room at Tate Britain.


Jim Green

Leaning away from the controversial side of sound installations and looking at the idea of having an environment as part of a installation just like Cage’s intention with the use of environmental sounds,  I came across sound artist Jim Green who does it rather well.

For instance with his work below, Talking Fence (2010). How the installation functioned was when people walked past the installation site lined with fencing, activated by a sensor, it would trigger the fence to talk and interact with the passersby giving them compliments etc.as they walk by. Below’s a documentation of the installation piece and the responses from the public were great.

While browsing through more his works I chanced upon another of his installations which was amusing and brilliant – Laughing Escalator (2004). What I get out of this earlier dated work of his is that it has  the same intention like his later piece, Talking Fence above which aims to encourage greater interaction from the public with his works and bring across the connection with everyday life.

What I like about these two particular works of his is his attempt to make relatable and approachable to the public with that light-hearted and amusing touch to it. Keeping this in mind, it’ll be interesting to explore the idea of making our final installation art work based on something that the audience can resonate with.

 

References: