[ INTRODUCTION ]

I was a little worried going into this project, if I were to be perfectly honest. I never really thought of myself as a particularly interesting person so when I heard the topic was going to be on ego, or what makes me me, I drew up blank.

So I brainstormed about what makes me me. Nothing really particularly stood out. That was until my mom called to check in on me, as she does once in a while since I live in hall. I was hit with a bout of homesickness when I realised I haven’t actually seen my family and had a proper meal with them in nearly 2 weeks. Either I’m busy in school or my family has their own responsibilities to settle.

It made me realise how big a part my family had to play in who I am as a person and my own “ego”.

So I decided to dedicate each equation row to one of my family members, a situation I have experienced with them and how they changed me as a person. As I have a mom, a dad and a sister, I decided the leave the last one for myself.

[BRAINSTORMING]

Next problem came with deciding how I wanted to design my three rows. The OCD part of me wanted to make them all in the same style so that they looked more like a whole art piece together. I realised everyone in class seemed to be doing either vector drawing or traditional watercolour. I couldn’t watercolour to save my life and my pen tool skills are kind of…slow. So I decided I wanted to do something I have been gaining interest in after Project 2: Forrest Gump.

 

SUrReaLISm

 

I’m sorry. I meant Surrealism. But yes, I enjoyed photoshopping images together back in Project 2 as the compositions didn’t have to make sense but could still be understood because of imagination. I felt that it was a good medium to express what I was feeling considering how my emotions within each equation weren’t very extreme and mostly a combination of feelings.

[REFERENCES]

Eugenia Loli

My work is mostly inspired by Eugenia Loli’s collages, which I found online while scrolling Pinterest. I enjoyed how she combined images from  vintage advertisements and pieced them together to form a new image. She plays around a lot of motifs and object symbolism to bring across her message. Common motifs are things such as planets, flowers, nature landscapes, food and animals.

Here are some of her works:

 

[ LET THE FUN BEGIN ]

1.

STRESSED ME + LATE NIGHTS STUDYING WITH MY SISTER = FUN

STRESSED ME 

This was the first design that I presented to Joy one week after getting the brief. I wanted to expressed the stress I felt trying to accomplish my assignment at once.

To show that, I had hands reaching for paper planes (symbolic of assignments) stretching in different directions. To emphasise their effect on me, I had the hands to attached to me by red string connected to hooks embedded in the girl’s body.

The girl is representative of me, floating in a tumultuous sea of stress in a coffee cup full of bad feelings represented by the black sludge on the rim. To show how my focus is very dispersed I covered the girl’s eyes with static.

Joy enjoyed this design and liked how it incorporated the surrealism from project two. She also liked how the emphasis on the main subject was very clear by using the complementary colours with orange as the colours of the main subject.  She suggested I incorporate a subtle element to hint at what work the girl is doing to give it context.

I added a paintbrush into the girl’s hair to hint at the artsy work that I am working on. I also added a canvas texture to the image so that the photoshopped elements within it will have a more cohesive look and look like one painting.

LATE NIGHTS STUDYING WITH MY SISTER 

This was one of the rare designs that I didn’t have to update much. In terms of symbolism, this one is chock full. As you may notice, the running motif of paper aeroplanes representing assignments is still present. My sister and I, represented by the two girls are in a sea of assignments, We are clinging onto our ideas (symbolised by the light bulbs) for dear life. To represent the “working through the night” aspect, I replaced the bulb of the light bulb with moons.

I also wanted to express the feeling of lethargy that we felt while doing our work through the night; the feeling of our eyes closing. To represent that, I replaced the eyes of the girls with stitches.

Additionally, as a link between the first and second image, I made the girl representing me have pink hair again. I made the brown haired girl bigger for two reasons. Firstly because she represents my older sister, who is older than me, secondly she is the subject of my second image. However, I still placed certain aspects to draw the viewer’s eye back to me, the main subject overall in the equation.

This can be seen by the use of pink hair and the redder moon as well as the spiralled clock leading the viewer’s eye to my head. Thus drawing the viewer’s eye from my sister then to me.

Originally I thought this would count as a complementary colour scheme as orange and blue are still the prevalent colours throughout the composition. However, during the presentation, joy pointed out that this composition due to its wider range of colours could be counted under using the quadratic colour theory. This however still works as two of the colours are more dominant throughout and the remaining are used for highlighting and emphasising, creating a more dynamic and vibrant image.

 

FUN

For the final image of this equation, I placed both my sister and I in a sea of flowers. The two of us are blowing bubbles but I have replaced the bubbles with paper planes to show how assignments have instead become something fun when we do it together. Additionally, as you may have noticed, the two of us are children again to show how it’s become child’s play and also to emphasise the element of fun or childish delight and bonding.

In terms of design, after consulting joy, she felt that the flowers were a bit too striking and took away from the subjects that was the girls. So following the complementary colour theory,  I once again made the dominant colours of the image orange.

Additionally, this worked out better as a row since now all three images makes use of complementary colours and get progressively more orange, representing how everything gets warmer and happier.

2.

DEJECTED ME + HEART TO HEART TEAS WITH MOM = COMFORT

 

DEJECTED ME

This was the original design. I was trying to go or more analogous colours on the red orange end of the colour wheel. However, Joy commented that the main subjects of the image were kind of fading into the background. So I updated the design instead to use the complementary colour scheme of red and green to create a more dynamically coloured image.

The starker contrast between the colours also make it clear to the viewer what to focus on in the image. That is the cat and the umbrella.

In terms of design, I chose to use a cat trying to reach for an umbrella in stormy weather to represent me trying to reach my goals. To emphasise the grabbing motion, I replaced the cat’s paws with human hands.

The ladders are to represent how all the options around for me to reach my goal are too far out of my reach.

 

HEART TO HEART TEAS WITH MY MOM 

I had a bit of trouble thinking how to represent these tea breaks I have with my mother. I tried placing us in tea cups in fish bowls etc. Then I watched Beauty and the Beast with my sister over the weekend. Mrs Potts and Chip seemed like a mother and child relationship reminiscent to what I experienced as a kid with my mom. So I replaced this mother and child’s heads with a tea pot and a cup in varying shades of red. To represent the wealth of knowledge that my mom imparts to me over our tea talks, I used books that look like they are flying towards us about to land. To represent my own latent worries, I used crows (common sights in fields and sometimes bad omens) and replaced their heads with clocks to show how time felt like it was running out.

I also placed the pair under a mushroom shelter to represent a new hope as mushrooms are often representational of life that comes from death. So the new life or hope to my dead dreams.

In terms of colour theory, Joy felt the original image’s sky was a bit “undecided”. It was both green and blue at the same time. She suggested I pushed the colour a bit.

So instead I opened to make the sky blue so that it forms a triadic colour with the yellow and red. With red to emphasise the main subjects of the image.

Additionally I cropped the image a bit wider this time as I wanted the viewer to be observing the situation from a distance and thus making the talk seem more intimate.

I also placed the two kinds of birds (the books and the crows) in similar patterns on opposing ends to balance each one out and also to create leading lines to the pair in the middle.

 

COMFORT

With this design, I wanted to show how I have a new dream, represented by the floating balloon in the same position as the umbrella from the first image. I also wanted to show how the new hope from the second image have ground and bloomed larger than how far my dreams. The comfort comes in how I didn’t have to face chasing my dreams alone this time around and the options available to me are all hinged on my growing hope.

In terms colour theory, I chose a sub-complementary colour of blue and red. However, joy mentioned that the mushrooms were more a green brown than red. She suggested that I turn it more blue so that it will distract less within the image and the viewer will notice the woman and the child more.

This is the only row within the four that does not have a running motif across the three images. In this case it’s the mushroom. However, since I’m using mushrooms as a representation of hope, I wanted to show the lack of hope within the first image.

Additionally, I wanted me in the images to get progressively more human to show my growth as a person after the talks with my mom. Someone with more logical thinking and less based off instincts.

3.

BORED ME + KARAOKE CAR RIDES WITH MY DAD = FREEDOM

 

BORED ME

With this image, I wanted to show days I hid out in my room listening to my music and being antisocial instead. The girl is basically me withdrawing from life in my hermit crab shell. I used the headphones on my head, firstly as a shoutout to the music theme coming up in the next few images. But because headphones are a very individualised object. When used, only one person can use it at a time. The goldfish are to represent my thought process, or lack thereof. My thoughts in my own shell don’t last very long and go in circles.

However, I wasn’t very satisfied with the colour. I wanted something a bit more dynamic.

Now the colour of the girl’s dress, the shells and the fish seem more synonymous. I made use of complementary colours and the red blue-ish green colour scheme to make the image more dynamic.

 

KARAOKE CAR RIDES WITH MY DAD 

I tried to go for the same colour scheme with this design. I made the car out of different instruments. And I replaced the man’s head with a boombox to show how my dad is always singing and how he’s really LOUD.

The goldfishes are now flying upwards with the car to show a sense of flight and building exhilaration and also to show how my thoughts are taking an upward turn and have more direction.

Joy suggested I changed the colour of my dad’s shirt and the guitar on the car so that they would match more with the green sky to create a complementary colour scheme.

 

FREEDOM

With this image, I wanted to show how my dad was transporting me out of my room and my shell and to see a whole new world in music as a way of expressing my emotions. As can be seen from the fishes (my thoughts) escaping the gramophone like lyrics of a song.

My dad and I both each have a guitar at home and we sometimes play together. I figured it’s be cool to replace both our heads with them. And finally the shells in the bottom, show how I am leaving my shells behind and achieving Freedom through music thanks to my dad.

In terms of composition, I placed the shells and the fishes to balance each other out within the image. The image uses the sub complementary colour scheme.

4.

BUSY ME + FAR AWAY FROM HOME = HOMESICK

BUSY ME

This is busy me, represented by me rushing through life on the MRT, and how everything is a blur to me because it’s going by so fast, represented by the blur sotong I replaced the person’s head with. I also tried to show me  trying to avoid the stinging sensations of homesickness, representing the feeling with jellyfish.

I used triadic colours of pink blur and yellow. I also wanted to draw the viewer’s eyes to the MRT and the person on it. So I made the MRT a vibrant yellow and the person’s vest a bright blue.

I also made the jellyfish go the opposite direction as the MRT to contrast the direction of the MRT and also to give a sense that they are rushing by the train.

 

FAR AWAY FROM HOME 

I wanted to emphasise the distance I felt from my family living in Hall on Pulau NTU so I placed a tent on the moon far far away from the city below. I also kept the general skycap shrouded with the same jellyfish to show how homesickness is always hanging around. I used a similar colour scheme as before. However instead of blue, I used split complementary colours of green, pink and orange with orange as the emphasis, drawing the viewers to the subject of the image that is the tent.

HOMESICK

The final and most important image in the whole 4 rows, and the reason behind the direction of this whole collective piece. An image to show my homesickness. This is also probably the simplest piece.

I wanted a punch in of the previous image. A closer look at myself on that moon. The “floor” of the moon that I used in this image is actually another image that I stitched together with the galaxy background because I liked how the landscape seemed to have natural seats and tables for my character.

I added an astronaut sitting on the moon. And the astronaut’s helmet is reflecting the earth on it’s glass, showing the direction of the astronaut’s gaze, towards earth. The jellyfish in the background is to show how the feeling of homesickness is sometimes understated but it is always hiding out in the background.

I didn’t mean for it at first but this image of the astronaut I used is holding a gun in hand. Which gave the image a whole other meaning. While I am not lonely to the point of suicide, I think it is something that some people may feel or relate to so I left the it there, for a small amount of people to notice and maybe feel.

[ CONCLUSION ]

If you may notice, each row has a specific theme. Starting in the seas (actual sea, sea of clouds and sea of flowers), to the field to the skies and then then space. I chose space for the last row specifically to show the loneliness and silence that is very present in space.

University is truly the first time I have spent such extensive time away from my family. I think I’m quite happy to have been able to create something to represent aspects of my family that I miss and love and to a certain extent show them my appreciation of how much they have shaped me as a person.

In terms of the design and art direction, I’m quite happy with how the surrealism pieces turned out. While it was really hard finding images that pieced well together and the printing was hell.

I think this project was a good conclusion to whatever I have learnt in foundation 2D. For example, using patterns, shapes and lines to create emphasis or to lead audience eyes to piecing images together and using semiotics to create meaning from abstract images that I learnt in project two and design composition to balance an image and the negative space.

IM DONEEEE! 

Thank you for all your lessons Joy, I learnt a lot and I really enjoyed them. 🙂