Tag: me

4D II Project 1 – Alter Ego

February 5, 2017 by Charlotte·0 Comments

Alas, the video for this project has finally come together. The journey to finalising my concept for this 1-min video was not easy at all… but I guess I had the easier hand when putting the video together as it was largely made up of past footages based on my concept (so I did minimal filming). All in all, I’ve learnt a lot from this project – How to write monologues and also developing a story from a tiny little small idea you have at the beginning.

It was a challenging but super fruitful project. 🙂

The Dreamer

password: srt

Alter Ego: Sandra Riley Tang

CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT & RESEARCH | CHALLENGES

Identifying which character to portray was my first problem. I wasn’t sure which character to go ahead with. Even during the first in-class inspiration file exercise we did – writing a letter as a monologue, I was still undecided. I went ahead with Emma Watson, one of the characters I’ve narrowed down under the public figure category because of how I found an affinity with her because of her introverted personality beneath all the confidence she exudes when under the public eye.

Then came my second problem, the storyline. After consulting Lei, she advised me to go deeper into the character. If I was portraying Emma Watson though the quality I’m focusing on is the introvert side of her, I would have to give thought as to why she’s like this. Is it because of her family background? (the reasons behind it) but I was unable to get answers. Especially on the surface she comes of as a feminist with strong confidence but I’m the total opposite of that.

So I gave up portraying Emma Watson as my alter ego and moved on to the character as eventually portrayed in my final video, Sandra Riley Tang from local band The Sam Willows. Somehow it was much easier for me to come up with a storyline and act out the alter ego based on her. As mentioned in the earlier post, my affinity with her was her determination and drive to pursue the things she love and then the achievements you get out of being as such.

The concept: An inspirational one of sorts, with an influencer tone for the monologue. From young to me now present day, the things I achieved through the same passion I had since young using footages from my archives of the interviews I’ve done, the events I partook in etc. It will end of with flashbacks of my achievements and then an open-ended kind of feel for the end.

The underlying message: The last sentence in the monologue “Dream big and never stop trying. Who knows what you can achieve”. Basically being determined/driven to pursue what you love and to have dreams, the qualities of my character.

STORYLINE

Moving on to storyline… Following the identified affinity I had with my character, I came up with my own storyline of my journey in pursuing what I love, the arts and the things I was able to achieve with that same one passion since young across the span of growing up.

FILM/ARTIST REFERENCES

For my particular concept, it was more of referencing empowering speeches, inspirational and motivational videos of sorts given and done by public figures/influencers so as to figure out the right tone to have when writing the monologue.

Count myself REALLY lucky. Sandra recently put up a 2-part motivational video on her Instagram account. It even had a monologue. Thus, bulk of my reference for this project came from these videos. Taking inspiration from her video, I came up with my own monologue based on my story and had myself narrate it in an influencer tone to get the inspirational/motivational effect.

PART ONE: One of my major highlights of 2016 was seeing my own face on Nike.com. TBH I still can't believe it happened; it was seriously a dream come true. I was having a conversation with a friend 3 years ago, and the question was, if you could be the face of ANY brand in the world what would it be? Instead of a like Gucci, I said Nike. Hahaha. And these kinds of questions are always just hypothetical, you know? Like I want a pony as a pet kinda thing. Haha. 2016 was an amazing year with a lot of firsts and achievements. And there's only one thing left to do for 2017, just keep moving. Being a #nikewomen has pushed me to be #betterforit. To accomplish things I never thought I had the guts to do. If you're looking for a sign, that push you need to do something that scares you; here it is. Don't overthink it, just do it. 2017 is your year. ?? P.S Dreams really do come true. ?:@oszkid Special thanks to @najeeb_rahim, @zahidmukhlis, @sarahjusto, @kkbyong, @benjaminkheng, @evolvemma, @fitnessfirstsg and of course the @nike team for making this possible. ❤️ #NikeBeautifulxPowerful

A video posted by SANDRA RILEY TANG (@sandrarileytang) on Jan 1, 2017 at 5:30am PST

PART TWO: '…and every journey starts from nothing.' I've realised in my life that everything I have or have achieved started from just simply a thought. A little mental note sent out to the universe. And perhaps that's all you need to begin with, faith as small as a mustard seed. And then you start to water it with love, trimming off the negativity and just growing among others that love and support you. Even if you get crushed, don't lose hope, you have to keep growing. I find myself being an optimistic realist, excited by small things, because the truth is, nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm. ?❤️ The journey with The Sam Willows has been incredible and almost unbelievable. Thank you to everyone that has supported us. We wouldn't be where we are today without you. This year is going to be incredibly exciting. NEW MUSIC coming soon. ?? Special thanks to @oszkid for shooting this, @najeeb_rahim and @zahidmukhlis, @benjaminkheng for his writing prowess, @hypebong for shooting the throwback shots, @thesamwillows for being family and the @nike team for making this happen in the first place. 🙂 I am filled with gratefulness. ❤️✨ #nikewomen #Nike #sandraxnike #parttwo

A video posted by SANDRA RILEY TANG (@sandrarileytang) on Jan 27, 2017 at 3:54am PST

As for video angles since I was using a lot of past footages, camerawork was everywhere and somehow I felt that my video comes off seemingly like a vlog… And because of that my references were mostly of YouTubers and how they vlog to get an idea of how I’d like the remaining shots that I’ll be filming to look like.

STORYBOARD

To be honest, I don’t have the habit of doing up storyboards just because I’m unable to visualise my shots prior to shooting them. I think that I’m more of a get-the-feel-on-the-spot person. Meaning I’ll just try out a variety shots on the spot and go with the flow from there. Same thing happened for this project again. Only several storyboard frames went according to prior planning. The rest were spontaneous shooting or already existing camerawork by other videographers since I mainly used past footages of myself.

MONOLOGUE

Growing up,
I’ve always had a penchant for all things creative.

Took up art classes at 5,
the one subject in school I would always score the highest in.
It was my favourite

Flash forward to 17,
I went into media studies.
Dabbled in areas like broadcast and even got to interview celebrities through assignments.
Still, I enjoyed the creative modules most.

That was also when I found craftwork.
I was able to create something out of nothing as friends see it.
I love doing it as a pastime.

Showcased my works through an art mentorship programme
and won my very first design competition all in the same year at 20.

Those were things I never thought I could achieve with that very same passion I had since young. It was self-affirmation for me.
It made me feel like I was doing something… right.

Dream big and never stop trying.

Who knows what you can achieve.

VIDEO FOOTAGE & MUSIC CREDITS
Since my video was pretty heavy on using past footages/online footages of the events that had me in it…(Footages not credited were self-taken)

SHINE Festival Urban Arts Mentorship Programme:
https://www.facebook.com/shinefestival/videos/1026106494092598/
https://www.facebook.com/shinefestival/videos/1021363687900212/
https://youtu.be/NCc65mjjfpA?t=1m51s

*SCAPE The Invasion 2016 (Design Competition):
https://youtu.be/kVwmT33VkoE?t=59s

Music: in love with a ghost – we’ve never met but, can we have a coffee or something?
https://youtu.be/0XZJ5mD6nSU

Alter Ego: The Characters

February 5, 2017 by Charlotte·0 Comments

For the first part of the project, we were tasked to list out 5 characters whom we have a special affinity with from across three different categories – literature or fiction/public figures/people we know or met. It can be qualities that we find similar with the identified characters or qualities that we admire and aspire to have. And so I realised my affinity with most of the characters identified are mostly on the quality of being an introvert…

Here’s mine:

CHARACTERS FROM LITERATURE/FICTION

Piglet from Adventures of Winnie The Pooh
Go Dok Mi from Flower Boy Next Door
Charlie from Perks of Being a Wallflower
Dara Morgendoffer from Daria
8th Prince from Moon Lovers: Scarlet Heart Ryeo

PUBLIC FIGURES

Emma Watson – actress
Audrey Hepburn – actress
Oon Shu An – actress/influencer
Mark Zuckerberg – co-founder of Facebook
iNCH (Inch Chua) – musician

PEOPLE YOU KNOW/HAVE KNOWN/MET IN PERSON

Sandra Riley Tang – musician
Nathan Hartono – musician
Bernadette – friend
Hsien Wei – cousin
Abigail – cousin

Top 2 in each list & my affinity with the character

LITERATURE/FICTION

Piglet from Adventures of Winnie The Pooh

Piglet’s known to be a small and timid character who braves up when when faced with a crisis and given sufficient encouragement from his friends. These were traits of him that I identified myself to have an affinity with. I’m petite sized and I guess more often than not I’ll brave up and step up taking the role as a leader when the situation calls for it. If not most of the time I’ll just stay in my little bubble and shy away.

Go Dok Mi from Flower Boy Next Door

The character in this show acted by Park Shin Hye is an introvert who refuses to leave her apartment. She hides from the world and dislikes interacting with people. I identified ‘the apartment’ as her comfort zone and her character I dare say is pretty much me 70% of the time. I see her in me after hanging out at gatherings and taking part in socialising activities, drained.

PUBLIC FIGURE

Emma Watson

One of my all time favourite actresses and probably one I’m slightly more biased to too because we somewhat share a bit of the same name. Her full name is actually Emma Charlotte Duerre Watson. That aside, I was surprised to have chanced upon interviews of her revealing that she’s actually quite an introvert behind the confident and feminist image she exudes. (read: http://www.wonderlandmagazine.com/2014/02/the-bloom-of-the-wallflower-by-derek-blasberg/) The introvert quality is an aspect of hers I can relate to, being socially awkward at parties and all and her confidence is definitely something I look up to.

Audrey Hepburn

The classic actress. It’s hard to believe especially when these public figures are actresses and constantly under the public eye, taking interviews and appearing on shows. Especially with the characters Audrey Hepburn played. She was quoted: “I have to be alone very often. I’d be perfectly happy if I spent Saturday night until Monday morning alone in my apartment. That’s how I refuel.” Which is totally me, introverts tend to take time spent with themselves as time to recharge.

PEOPLE I KNOW/HAVE KNOWN

Sandra Riley Tang

A member of local band, The Sam Willows. I’ve interviewed her before for an assignment and through interviews, I’ve got the impression that she’s really quite a talent. She ran her own art collective previously, co-founded a home concept yoga studio, makes music dabbles in acting… She’s also an individual who is extremely driven and motivated to pursue the things she love and she never stops trying, something I find an affinity with in the aspect of my passion. Plus she loves doing hands-on DIY stuff too.

Nathan Hartono

Another local musician I’ve interviewed for an assignment too back in poly days. Through the interviews done with him, I’ve learnt that he’s a learnt extrovert but introvert by nature because of his profession as a musician. He has to perform in front of crowds and mingle with people. And I guess because of that he believes in throwing yourself into situations you fear most and to take on what you think might be impossible to achieve will only make you stronger and you might just surprise yourself along the way. #inspiration

Alter Ego: Inspiration File

February 2, 2017 by Charlotte·0 Comments

Right from the start I had trouble identifying a character as my alter ego for this assignment as most of my shortlisted characters/figures from each category only had small aspects which I felt an affinity to. I was stuck between choosing characters that were public figures at first – Mostly celebrities. Realised it was quite a challenge unlike fictional/literature characters that originally had a story to backup their personality and qualities.

My chosen character for the project is Sandra Riley Tang from local band, The Sam Willows. More about her, the qualities of hers I have an affinity with and also how I eventually got to choosing her as my alter ego in the final post coming up! (it’s a long story)

1. SONG LYRICS

Roar by Katy Perry

“I got the eye of the tiger, a fighter, dancing through the fire
‘Cause I am a champion and you’re gonna hear me roar
Louder, louder than a lion
‘Cause I am a champion and you’re gonna hear me roar’

I identified my character as a fighter, one who always challenges herself to break her own boundaries and come out successful and confident.

Ain’t No Mountain High Enough by Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell

” Don’t you know that
there ain’t no mountain high enough.
Ain’t no valley low enough,
ain’t no river wide enough.
To keep me from getting to you, baby.”

For this song, as literal as the lyrics are it shows that no matter how hard obstacles and circumstances may be, never give up as continuing is the only way to get to the end point. I feel that this song reflected my identified character’s personality well, very driven and motivated to get to the end point.

Survivor by Destiny’s Child

“I’m a survivor
I’m not gonna give up
I’m not gonna stop
I’m gonna work harder.”

This song sings of one staying committed and working hard to reach their goals. Having a strong mindset and to never stop chasing their dreams. The message of the song is very similar to the song above and is very much alike to the character’s motto.

2. POEMS

Dreams by Langston Hughes

Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.

Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.

A Time To Believe by B.J. Morbitzer (excerpt)

To believe is to know that
every day is a new beginning.
Is to trust that miracles happen,
and dreams really do come true.

…

To believe is to know
that wonderful surprises are just
waiting to happen,
And all our hopes and dreams are within reach.

If only we believe.

The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost (excerpt)

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

…

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

The above three poems inspires me to come up with the monologue for my alter ego as my character’s all about pursuing her dreams, determined to succeed. She takes on challenges and is optimistic about life. To which I feel that all these poems have same message in common –to never give up on chasing your dreams and not miss out on golden opportunities as once they are gone, they are gone forever and it’s hard to come by.

3. ARTICLES/SPEECHES/QUOTES

“If you can dream it, you can do it.” – Walt Disney

“Success seems to be connected with action. Successful people keep moving. They make mistakes, but they don’t quit.” – Conrad Hilton

10 Success Tips from Today’s Most Inspirational Women

http://www.lifehack.org/articles/communication/10-success-tips-from-todays-most-inspirational-women.html

These pieces I believe would serve as inspiration for my character to push herself even further, knowing that there are women figures out there who’ve done it/made it possible. Especially with the speeches/quotes by Walt Disney and Conrad Hilton, they speak on behalf of her spirit.

4. PICTURES

Finishing a marathon

Yoga practice

Concert scenario

The three pictures chosen reminded me of my character’s accomplishments in life. Especially the first picture, I felt it portrays one accomplishing something in life – the finishing point being a metaphorical representation and pretty much like my character’s personality, making sure to see that she work on her dreams until their fulfilled. It inspires me to write about my character and her accomplishments. For her story, it was reaching a milestone in her music career, venturing into her newfound passion and also learning more about herself (self-discovery).

5. HEADLINES

These are the headlines I chanced upon while researching and below are my reasons for choosing them and the stories I’m able to come up with based on them.

“Ups and downs of actor-directors”
Being a public figure, what you see of my character may not always be the truth. More often than not it may be all facade/a front my character is putting up to the public. So it can be a story to show the life she lives behind all the glitz and glamour.

“Seven tips to organise your closet”
My character is an avid DIYist, used to run her own YouTube channel project (The DIY Project) and this headline inspires me to write a story based on how this creative side of her came about and how this idea started and branched out into her pre-existent art collective business RileyArt.

“Chameleon of a performer”
This particular headline helps me in coming up with a story riding on the fact that my character is creative and very much all-rounded in different areas not only musically. She’s also a fitness inspiration, takes up BJJ and practices yoga. Plus she’s dabbled in acting, theatre and business ventures too. The headline works as a supporting title.

6. PERSONAL CREDO

I firmly believe that every individual is able to attain success and it’s possible so long you have a never say die attitude.

7. EMOTIONS

Optimistic
Eager
Short-tempered
Intrigued
Stubborn
Bubbly
Challenged
Confident
Spirited
Timid

Favourite: Spirited

I feel this particular emotion encompasses the qualities of my identified character really well. She’s full of energy, enthusiasm and determination and that trait of hers is very much evident in everything she does in life. She dares to take risks, venturing into a businesses and pursuing her interests.

Least Favourite: Timid

It’s the total opposite of my identified character’s personality. She’s one who never shy away from challenges and strongly believes in challenging herself.

8. SENTENCE STARTERS

I love a good challenge.
I have always wanted to do martial arts.
I know what it’s like to have many interests and the struggle to stay committed to them.
I remember my first failure.
I would like to try out new things.

9. FOCUS OBJECTS

Bronze & Gold Medals

Medals signify a milestone in my character’s life, when she won her very first competition in something she was passionate about. It served as her motivation.

Yoga Wear

Yoga wear is important to my character as it’s a representation of a passion she found a few years back that led her to where is she currently, at another milestone/success in her life, the co-founder of a home-concept yoga studio.

Nike Shoes

A pair of Nike shoes. My character’s a strong advocate of the brand and she lives by their slogan – ‘Just Do It’. The brand is something iconic of my character. You’ll find her often dressed in sportswear, sporting a pair of Nike shoes.

Accessories – Gold Rings

Rings are another iconic look of my character. Aside from her sportwear fashion, she would usually accessorize herself with unique looking rings, often in the colour gold.

Percussion Set

The final object that is important to my character is a percussion set, something I believe my character holds close to her heart. It reminds her of how everything started, her beginnings in music. In the band that she is in, she plays the percussion.

Hello My Name Is …

January 17, 2017 by Charlotte·0 Comments

Charlotte 🙂 It’s back to the grind of conceptualisation and we’re greeted with our first project brief and an in-class assignment already, talk about uni life!

We had to introduce ourselves by coming up with 3 different Hello My Name Is… name tags with the drawing materials that we were asked to bring before class on Thursday.

If I knew we the colouring/painting/drawing materials we were asked to bring was for such an in-class exercise I would’ve brought more! No choice, I had to work with whatever I had. There was definitely a period of artist block for a while but alas I came up with my 3 name tags just in time for the sharing session.

To be very honest, I am pretty sure the ideas behind each of my name tag was only conceived as I was designing it but somehow they clicked. On hand I had markers and pens in my favourite colours plus colour pencils. So I started off by deciding to have the three name tags someone consistent in colour and it’s probably pretty obvious what my favourite colour is – Teal/Turquoise/Mint (along these lines)

#1: Hello My Name Is Charlotte

Story behind this first name tag… Over the holidays I got intrigued by the fine details of hand-lettering and decided to try my hand a little at it especially the letter shadowing bit. Something I’ve always been curious about and could never figure out without the help of the internet. So here’s my name in a handwritten, calligraphy style to reflect the story. Conclusion on my hand-lettering skills: Not there yet, needs way more practice.

#2: Hello My Name Is Charlotte

This second design was pretty much conceived from my favourite mediums and environment (nature). I love watercolours and nature and more often than not the combination you get out of these two are watercolour florals found mostly in hand-lettering border designs for cards, invitations, motivational quote designs etc.

Was trying to achieve the watercolour effect by blending colours and using really lightly coloured felt markers which helped create the translucent/transparent effect of watercolours.

#3: Hello My Name Is Charlotte

For the third and final name tag, it was really pure doodling, something I often find myself habitually doing and of late it’s always memphis inspired patterns or geometric shapes thus what you see in the above name tag; another of my favourite thing.

Well I guess one can conclude that my sharing was about a few of my favourite things 🙂

Final: Ego In Different Settings | The Artsy Wallflower

November 13, 2016 by Charlotte·0 Comments

Oh no, I realised I missed out quite a bit on what I wanted to share during the presentation on Thursday… The one project where I’m supposed to be the most calm since it’s something really personal. Guess my nervousness got the better of me, especially since I was the second last to present (for the first time)… Thankfully there’s still this OSS post. Hopefully it makes up a little for the lost content. I felt that the presentation could have been so much better if I did not momentarily blank out! ???

CONCEPT

For this project I knew I wanted to focus on tactility and textures. Thus my initial idea was to do different interpretations based on one same equation using the mediums and colour theories as the varying factors which Joy said was possible. But after going into the brainstorming process, I realised that it wouldn’t be exactly feasible. It’ll probably turn out too monotonous by just having repeating motifs throughout with the change of colours and mediums used.

Scratch that idea, I came up with another based off the project brief that is You + A Setting = You and The Setting Interacting. I decided to make the 12 compositions very me and personal by sharing 4 THINGS ABOUT ME with the application of the colour theories learnt and exploration of mixed medium/techniques that I personally enjoy.

EXECUTION

The basic approach for each of the 12 compositions was to do up a digital “base”/surface first and then treat the surface using various traditional mediums/hands-on art techniques. I vectorised a drawn silhouette of myself to establish a recurring motif of sorts throughout the 12 compositions as well as to use it as a representative motif of “ME” in the equation.

There was also the use of geometric shapes in the background for the compositions for consistency as I didn’t want the background of the compositions to be too plain. On the other hand, colour theories used were mainly analogous, complementary, triadic and monochrome harmonies with some colours used intentionally because of it’s colour symbolism which would be subsequently explained in the respective equations created.

EQUATION 1 – Me + nature/floral = A Calm State Of Mind

I had in mind colours of nature while working on this first equation. I felt that muted light “woody”-brownish colours would best for this as I intended to treat the surface using nature related materials such as dried flowers, leaves, potpourri and wooden chips.

For the first composition I slowly established the theme of the equation by surrounding my silhouette with some of the nature related materials and the second is pretty much establishing the nature setting. In the final composition, a zen and calm state with the leaf patterns being spatially spaced away from one another and a zen symbol surrounding the silhouette is used.

Colour theories used:
Monochrome: Different shades of Brown
Analogous & Triadic: Yellow, Orange, Green , Brown

EQUATION 2: An Uncomfortable Me + More Purple, Less Yellow = A Happier Me

The idea for this second equation came by surprise. I was trying to think of one while exploring the complementary colour theory on Adobe Kuler and these two colours came out which led to my idea!

My favourite and hated colours by coincidence haha. Yellow’s a colour that I dislike because of how in Primary and Secondary School I was placed in the yellow house. Yes, that’s 10 years of being in the same house… ? and not forgetting my hate for anything cheese (cheese is yellow too) which often turns out to be an irony since I still take some cheese foods like pizza… So yes, this was a super appropriate colour. And purple for no particular reason is my favourite colour, 80% of my items owned used to be in this colour.

For the first composition, I flipped my silhouette upside down so as to show discomfort with my disliked colour and by creating a various sized textured circles in the background, I wanted to bring across the idea of a cheese patten. In the second composition I start to balance out the colours on both sides, introducing my favourite colour and my silhouette orientation slowly going back to a normal orientation. Then the last composition, the silhouette’s finally in a normal orientation (a happy me) since it’s totally now in my favourite colour 🙂

Colour theories used:
Complementary: Purple and Yellow
Monochrome: Different shades of Purple and Yellow in the geometrical background

EQUATION 3: Me in Korea + Taiwan = My favourite countries (fusion)

For this equation, I used the medium of collage to bring out tactility and I wanted to share my favourite countries. I’ve travelled to a few countries over the years but these two are my ultimate favourite of all. I think I generally favour Asian countries more.

For this equation in particular, there’s the use of blacks and whites as I wanted to balance out the layers of colours when using the collage medium. I felt the use of the neutral colours made the composition look less messy and helped placed emphasis when necessary (the last composition)

?? Korea (Composition 1): I used the colour red here as it symbolises passion, my passion for the country. I love everything Korean, from the food, the culture, their shows, fashion, music… I guess that’s partially why my friends used to call me “Oriental Korean” haha. I was occasionally disturbed on how I resembled one because of my tiny eyes. Jokes aside, I used magazine and brochures collected from the country, browsed through my old magazine stash to cut out items that are Korean in analogous/monochromatic harmony to fit the colour theory. Collaged it at the bottom of my silhouette.

?? Taiwan (Composition 2): My other favourite country would be Taiwan, similar to the first composition, I made use of tickets, brochures and magazines collected from the trip to create this collage as well.

The Fusion (Composition 3): So since these two countries are my favourites, I decided to make it into a fusion looking composition for the last one. Different elements from each countries are scattered across the composition mixing with each other showing a fusion. For instance, the Korea images that were in line with red monochromes can be found in blue monochromes as well, similarly for the Taiwan images, they can be found in red monochromatic colours too.

Colour theories used:
Monochrome: Different shades of Red and Blue
Triadic: Red, Blue, Yellow (a.k.a. the primary colours)

EQUATION 4: Artsy + Wallflower = An Artsy Wallflower

Last equation! Prior to doing it, I was worried that the first composition of the representing idea of ME with the word Artsy would not be clearly shown as the compositions done up so far have been looking rather artsy because of the textures added using various craft materials. I brought it up during group consultations but Joy and my classmates said that it shouldn’t be too much of a concern that I was overthinking. (I guess I tend to do that all the time haha..)

Guess they were right as eventually I established the idea of Artsy in the first composition by having art splatters all over and the mediums used over it to bring across the idea were craft materials that have appeared in the 9 compositions before this – e.g. dried leaves and flowers, felt, gravel, embroidered patches etc. ?

The second composition had to establish the idea of Wallflower. My personality and since it had to be a setting, I tried to create a visual of it by having a wall dimensionality of sorts in the digital “base” (also like a literal representation of the ‘wall’ in Wallflower. Scaling down my silhouette to fit it inside the square that extends out to form the wall to portray the idea of retreat, with the flower symbol hiding behind the flower/square encasing the silhouette. ?

After completing the composition I realised that the “wall” was not expressed well, it lacked something. Aha, to add dimensionality and emphasis of the idea, I eventually grabbed some suede strings of the similar hue and glued it over the lines forming the wall.

The colour used throughout as the base for the equation is the colour orange as it symbolises creativity which is closely linked to the idea of artsy. There you have it, Artsy Wallflower 🙂

Colour theories used:
Complementary: Blue and Orange
Analogous: Yellow, Orange, Red, Pink, Blue, Purple
Monochrome: Different shades of Blue and Orange

CURATION

This time round for curation, it was based on the big overarching theme that I had in mind: The Artsy Wallflower ??. Friends who follow me on my social media handles or visited my OSS blog might have noticed that under the description bios, I never fail to put the words “artsy wallflower”. At least that’s how I see myself – A wallflower that’s artsy. I’m an introvert by nature and I really love artsy stuff.

I intentionally arranged the equations from the lightest to the darkest shade and I realised they each equation are linked to one another by the analogous colour theory of yellow, red, orange. With the equation of the Artsy Wallflower being the last as I feel it sums up the concept of my project well.

Not sure if you realised but my silhouette is faceless and my facial features are created by a variety of embroidered flower patches taking into consideration the colour theories used in each equation. In some, my face is just covered by a single flower in the centre/they are used to form the cheeks, eyes or even hair accessories. I intended to take the Artsy Wallflower idea up another level by showing it through silhouettes decorated with embroidered flower patches.????????

CHALLENGES FACED

Challenges were inevitable for this project too. Finalising the concept was one of it as I started off shaky and we were working with a really tight timeline of 3 weeks. I had to re-consider my options of wanting to work with various mediums in particular embroidery and patchwork which would definitely take up a lot of time and I managed to find a solution!! ?? I ended up using similar mediums like the already embroidered flower embellishments, patchwork pieces, felt etc.

Another challenge was that as I went ahead to treat the surfaces using the traditional method some of them did not turn out to what I envisioned them to be as my materials did not exactly match the hues of the digital “base” that was designed. I gotta admit the compositions came together pretty much by the feels I got as I did it.

OVERALL THOUGHTS

I loved the project so much as I finally got to do some hands-on craft work again. Thanks to the freedom of the project brief! It didn’t feel like a project per say more like a therapeutic process rather. Just that there was the added slight pressure of a deadline.

I’m so glad I got to bring bring my love for craftwork and my default social media bio to the table for this haha. Personally, I think I’ve gotten way more inspirations and ideas on how to go about doing the project as compared to the previous two.

Also, I think I was lucky with the materials used. As they were all from my art stash, they were one-off materials and I wouldn’t knew if they’d fit the colour theories for each equation but they all did nicely. Thanks to this project I realised how much craft materials I’ve amassed over the years ?

(BONUS) FINAL THOUGHTS ABOUT 2D 1

I SUPER SUPER LOVE 2D 1. It has been such an intense journey of medium exploration and conceptualisation yet it’s still my favourite foundation module of all. Thank you Joy for being such a wonderful teacher to the class. You never fail to provide some of the best suggestions/solutions whenever we’re stuck with our ideas and your inputs on how we can improve are really helpful!

Also, thank you Joy for the class pizza treat last Thursday! 🙂

2D 1, I’ll see you next sem for sure. ?❤️

Process: Ego In Different Settings | The Making Of

November 13, 2016 by Charlotte·0 Comments

I shan’t reveal much about the equations as I’m leaving that for the final OSS post where I’ll let you in on the full details on my overall concept for the project. ? Meanwhile, here are some quick snippets of The Making Of (title of project) haha. You’d probably figure it out anyway.

I was too engrossed while working on the compositions until I lost track of time and almost forgot to take shots of my progress. ? Before that, here are the digital “bases” for the compositions that I came up with for the respective equations.

And here are some of the behind-the-scenes work to get to the end product. Insane amount of hours spent on this. Some materials… (Only through this project that I realised how much art stash I have at home, it’s no joke). Figured that it’d be apt to finally put them to good use.

The first two rows of compositions that I done up for our group consultations and to my surprise there were no issues about it, they went through! I was so worried that I would have to do them from scratch again if there were improvements to be made. As I only had one-off materials (I didn’t have backups they were all pretty much leftover materials collected and kept over the years) and also the cost of printing and time invested… It would’ve been terrible.

One more! Now let’s get down to the tiny details of this final project that I had tons of fun doing 🙂

Process: Ego In Different Settings | The Early Stages

November 13, 2016 by Charlotte·0 Comments

Prior to the execution of the project, Pinterest was my go to site for inspirations. You can pretty much call it a heaven/library for art inspirations. I’ve never used it so Pinterest intensely before and every time I end up browsing off topic because one pin leads to another interesting one. ?

It helped me identified the medium and feel I was going for as this round’s project allowed us to explore any medium we wanted to. Here comes the problem. Whenever there’s more freedom in a project given, there’s so many possibilities and there comes the headache of narrowing down the ideas. It’s hard but it eventually worked out. 🙂 Right off the bat, I had mediums in mind that I wanted to try out on the compositions.

Below are some I was intrigued by and those I already had in mind as mentioned.

EMBROIDERY/PATCHWORK

I love how embroidery is so versatile. It can even be done on plastic bags!!

Izziyana Suhaimi: http://www.izziyanasuhaimi.com/

An artist who does fashion illustrations with embroidered accents and accessories.

COLLAGE

Linking back to the Dadaism art movement, this medium was pretty relevant to the tactility I has in mind for the project as well. Here are some artist references I chanced upon while browsing through Pinterest.

More of her works: http://beciorpin.com/

CRAFTWORK

More of her works: http://anneten.nl/

TYPOGRAPHY (EXTRA)

Example

Another idea I had was to try using word typography and translate it into a literal image from the words. Example would be like the image above. Using the word Cat to form an image of an cat from it. I thought I could apply idea/technique this to this project to form each equation and composition which I thought could’ve been rather interesting.

So in this case, something that represents ME, e.g. A flower. So using the word flower form an image of a flower. But I figured that it’d take a super long time to get the image-typography thing going as it would’ve been a challenge visualising.

COLOUR THEORY RESEARCH & COLOUR INSPIRATIONS ?

For this project a huge component of it was for use to apply colour theories. So before starting on the compositions our homework was to research on what they were. This was a table that I found to be a really helpful summary of the various kinds of colour theories around.

Another interesting aspect of colours was that it could represent one’s emotions and feelings. It could also symbolise something. Some examples of emotions as seen below in the chart. I later on applied this to my compositions as well.

For colours, I really wanted to go for pastel hues or pop hues as they were colours that I recently took a liking to after follower a local embroidery artist and a local designer on Instagram. I particularly enjoy the range of colours they worked with and was inspired to take on a similar colour schemes for my compositions.

@teeteeheehee: https://www.instagram.com/teeteeheehee/

@ultraaviolets: https://www.instagram.com/ultraaviolets/

Besides the above inspirations, I got ideas from design seeds too. It’s this account on Pinterest that provides a wide range of ready mixed colour palettes. Based on these, I generated a colour scheme for each row of compositions using Adobe Kuler since we had to make apply colours in accordance to the colour harmonies we learnt and also taking in account my theme for each equation.

Bright Hues

Another artist that used vibrant colours in her works, Kate Shaw

More of her works: http://www.kateshaw.org/?doing_wp_cron=1478882812.2931230068206787109375

Pastel/Muted Hues

Eventually I think I was leaning more towards the pastel and muted range of colours as my eventual rows of compositions weren’t highly saturated and hard on the eyes. You can see the end-product in my final post so keep reading 🙂

Through all these research, I’ve decided to go with the basic idea of having every composition start off with a digital “base” first and I will treat the surface thereafter with a traditional medium since during consultation Joy mention that the composition shouldn’t be fully 3D, ideally it should still have some 2D flat elements to it.

Project 1: Picture Story – Curating Self

August 30, 2016 by Charlotte·0 Comments

TASK 1: ME

We were tasked to creatively introduce ourselves using 3 photographs and the concept behind these photos came quite naturally. I thought hmmm creative… why not incorporate something that I enjoy doing, handicraft to introduce myself?

For the first photo, I purposely hid something underneath a random mess of lace in which the item is later on revealed in the last image. With the soft and dainty feel of the lace and something hidden, I was trying to portray my introverted personality.

Following which, the second photo is a direct representation of materials that I usually use with the intention wanting to try out flat lay and I took reference from and was inspired after looking at this website: https://www.enlightapp.com/blog/7-fantastic-tips-for-fabulous-flat-lay-photography/

And in the last photo it shows me working on a handicraft piece. I reveal myself with a literal representation of my name, the object that was hidden under the pile of lace in the first photo while not forgetting to express my introvertness still by doing a over the shoulder shot, hiding my face from the camera, shying away.

TASK 2: OBJECT AND REPRESENTATION OF SELF

This set of photos revolves around an object that is of significance to me and it would be this patchwork quilt that was handmade by my paternal grandmother who I never got to meet. She passed on the very same year I was born and the quilt was later passed to me from my parents when I was told The Story.

Through the images I wanted to show my feelings for the object (the quilt) and personally I feel that it is synonymous with the feeling of protection. One of the photos compositions being me hiding behind the quilt to portray my fear of thunder and lighting, how I would hide under it whenever it strikes especially since I sleep alone. While the other photo portrays my longingness, me missing my grandmother. I felt that it was a pity that I was not able to meet her.

Recalling the feedback from my peers during the critique session, what I could have done better for this set was by showing the stitches of the quilt rather than taking a full shot of the quilt for the first photo since I mentioned that the quilt was a symbol of love to me as every patch was painstakingly sewn together to form the quilt. I wanted to show the beauty of it.

TASK 3: MY WORLD

The final set of photos came about with the idea of wanting to give the audience a glimpse into my everyday life, a 360-view of the surroundings and sights around my HDB estate. Especially since I grew up in this HDB estate for 10 over years and I walk by these areas everyday as I go to and fro from school or when going out and these areas in particular are meaningful to me.

The first spot – The corridor I walk down everyday without fail. Something unique about my level’s corridor is that it’s the floor with the most number of potted plants. My neighbours, even my family included are avid “gardeners”. They would sometimes exchange their plant seedlings and all, it’s a really nice gesture.

The second spot – The open area at the lift lobby. As my block is structured in a way that the balcony of the apartments are facing each other, it creates a triangle open area whereby when the sunlight is able to enter and cast light on the walls of the block. I felt that it was a beautiful sight and wanted to capture it. It brought out the architectural beauty of the block.

The third spot – The HDB void deck. In this photo is one out of the three void deck cats that moved in several years ago and every day without fail, there will be this lady who comes by with her red trolley and cat food to feed these cats. The lady is captured in the background, off focus. So happen it was their feeding time that day as I was going around to get shots for the assignment. Caught the “The Golden Hour”! 🙂

The final spot – The Resident’s Corner which I would walk past everyday without fail on my way to the bus stop as I make my way to school in the morning/afternoon. Usually in the mornings, around 10am, there will always be this same group of aunties that gather here for their daily chit-chat session which I found really amusing. They are really friendly and would greet me every time I walk by.

I enjoyed photographing for this task the most as these are places around my HDB block that I walk by everyday but only got to realise the beauty of these spots when doing this particular task.

DOCUMENTATION AND LEARNING/TAKEAWAY POINTS

Photo Cr: Xuan Fei

Presentation layout for in-class critique session

Here’s the documentation of the photos displayed on the wall along the hallway during the critique session yesterday and to sum up the project, some takeaways.

Through feedback from by my peers and Lei, I think I could better improve on layout especially for Task 3 by having the open area photo placed at the top to balance out the colours of the other images as that particular photo was very jarring in a way that made it stood out from the rest. Suggestion given was that I could have made it the first photo of the series to create a smoother top-down viewing in terms of contrast.

Paying attention to tactility and that my photographs focused a lot on textures – This was something that I did not realise recurring across my photographs until Lei pointed it out to me, linking that it’s probably got to do with my love for handicraft. Guess the observer sees one the clearest haha…

All in all, I really loved how this assignment allowed us to get to know each other better through the photographs we took. There’s a story behind each and everyone’s photos and probably my biggest takeaway from this project would be how photographs are magical. They’re able to tell a story like they say, “A picture is worth a thousand words”.

Till today, I’m still amazed by the power of photography.