Process of Making Toast

This particular week, we learned the importance of processes and how listing out our problems step by step might help us to reveal unexpected truths. This method is known as system thinking and all we require are some post its and a pen/pencil.

Before starting the exercise, we first watched a video by Tom Wujec, in which it explained the steps to begin!

“Without writing down any words or explaining the steps, draw out how to make toast on a piece of paper” 

“Together in groups, separate the job or do it individually and piece them together, you’ll be surprised at the result” 

It was a really interesting exercise that is simple yet so helpful!

Week 3: Squiggly Birds

In-class activity: squiggly bird

Squiggly Bird exercise!!! Squiggle bird exercise basically helps warm up your hands and brain, plus helps stretch those muscles alittle before starting work proper. This exercise is so fun and easy to do because it only takes 5 minutes or less?

You start by drawing random squiggly lines. After that, you just need to insert the birds’ eyes and legs somewhere (anywhere really) and you get your own unique squiggle bird. We also characterised them in class. In a span of a few mins, we already came up with a variety of them. This exercise was indeed fun and relaxing 🙂

my little squiggly birdies! One of them is a gangster!

Week 2: Draw your friend

In-class activity: Draw your friend

Woohoo! This particular week of exercise was fun. We watched several videos of portrait drawing and how you didn’t have to be an artist to be able to draw one another. In fact many always say, “I can’t draw for nuts” but their drawing turns out to look great! Moral of story: Don’t be afraid to draw! It doesn’t have to be realistic, it could be a abstract or cartoon version on your friend.

To be honest, I was like oh no, I really am no good with human faces, and I don’t want to make my friend look ugly. Well, the result wasn’t that great anyway but it was fun observing Sabrina’s face and just laughing while we were drawing each other

Drawn by me. Model: Sabrina (sorry you are very pretty, this does not look like you)
The rest of the portraits done by my classmates

Week 1: Entopic Graphomania

In-class activity: entopic graphomania

For our first in-class exercise, we took some paper and drew dots on any ‘imperfections” there may be on the paper. This is a surrealist technique called Entopic Graphomania. After we drew the dots, we connected them in any possible and creative way. The outcome was interesting :)))))

After which, we took it a step further and added edits on each other’s work!

I think this helped us to just fun and create art in a different way that definitely does not limit our creativity!

I drew the curvy lines and a classmate added on the straight lines. It was a fun exercise 🙂

Applied Illustration – A Gooey Gooed Time (research and process)

For this final project, we were given the freedom to decide on any event we want and it can be as bizarre or as simple as possible, entirely up to us! The deliverables required are 5 items related to our event and at least one of them has to be 3D. 

ideation

Since there are endless of possibilities, I had a hard time narrowing it down to just one idea. However, after much consideration and feeling hungry while brainstorming, I decided to go with a product launch event for cookie fillings. 

WHAT ARE COOKIE FILLINGS? 

I’m sure once in your life you’ve had a gooey dessert, whether it’s a cookie or not, I really hope you have tried them because they are AMAZING (at least I think so) !!!! Recently, I chanced upon a local cookie shop called, “Nasty Cookie”.  Nasty cookie’s best selling point is basically they’re nasty gooey fillings in their fat cookies!

A little treat for your eyes

But the thing that intrigued me the most was how they inserted these gooey fillings. I always thought the bakers inserted a solidified chunk in the middle of the dough and then the chunk melts and becomes goo.

BUT actually! They insert the goo via a syringe and what makes it satisfying is it has a crispy ASMR of the cookie crack.

Inserting the goo
what if these bakers sold their fillings?

I decided to recreate a brand and have this brand market and sell their fillings. Thus, the event that I have decided on is  Gooeyooey’s first ever event and product launch that will also help people to destress by “stabbing” the cookie.

Thus the name of my event is, “A Gooey Gooed Time”

A GOOEY GOOED TIME

Initially, I named the event, Oh Gooedness! Here is my initial research and inspiration,

While thinking about my colour scheme, I thought that I wanted to do something more fun and not so related to typical dessert colours like brown.

My initial five items are:
  1. Poster
  2. Invitation
  3. Table placemat (later taken out as only 4 items are required)
  4. Packaging
  5. Syringe (for goo)
creative process

LOGO

Initially, I designed the logo to look more playful and fun. However, I did not want the entire event to look too childish as my intended target audience are working adults. Thus, I decided to go with this.

INVITATION

first draft

I was thinking of an odd shaped invitation at first. But later i realised it doesnt will make sense or look good, so I changed it to a more simple design. However, I received feedback that it looked to corporate and does not go with the other deliverables.

For the other 3 deliverables I adapted the same style throughout but do not have huge changes from edition to edition and so I will talk about them more in my next post.

Read more about my final deliverables here.

 

 

Applied Illustration – A Gooey Gooed Time (Final)

After many rounds of editions, I finally found the colour scheme that fit my theme and event.

Colour scheme

A mix of complementary colours and some brown to have some link to the cookie fillings.

confirmed deliverables
  1. Poster
  2. Invitation
  3. Syringe
  4. Cookie Packaging

POSTER

INVITATION

SYRINGE

PACKAGING

 

ALL DELIVERABLES

REFLECTIONS

Overall, this project was very fun to work on and although there were difficulties along the way. It was interesting applying an entire concept to different deliverables and finding different ways to fit them in and for different context as well. I learnt a lot through this project and if given more time, I would have been able to experiment with alot more and improve the illustrations. This idea is simple and does not involve complicated illustrations or fine details but it is something that I’ve always wanted to try (filling a whole poster with goo) and i’m glad I got to try that out!

Varoom Illustration: Process & Final

Continuing from previous post, here is the process towards 
my final layout.
PROCESS OF ILLUSTRATION
DRAFT

FINAL

Final Varoom Illustration Magazine cover

The lack of self-empathy and the inability to stay away from caring for others – represented through a bathroom scene where the water expands to a ocean scene. The human is submerged in the water, her hair entangled with the anchor which represents the heart and in this context empathy. The ocean represents the scary world and how being stuck in the empathy trap can be dangerous. This is represented through the angular fish, using its light to make the empathy alluring and attractive. The girl reaches her hand out to a lifebuoy which signifies the help he needs.

Varoom Illustration – Research & Process

empathy

Amongst the 2 other themes, Style and Obsession, I decided to choose Empathy as I thought the illustrations I could come up with might be more personal and relatable. I also wanted to push myself to explore this theme beyond its usual connotations. Thus, my choice of theme is, emapthy.

Research

I started my research by just listing out several things that first come to mind when I thought of the word empathy.

Words: Love, others, understanding, care, sensitivity, 
relationships, friendships, emotions, pain, suffering, 
priorities, damage, media, human.

From there I picked out those words that spoke to me more.

human, priorities, others, love, suffering

After which I realised that I thought there was a little problem with empathy at times. I feel that many people around me fail to put themselves first. They are always empathising with others, but they forget to empathise themselves. In other words they lack of self empathy.

inspiration

I did further research on articles and found a particular one titled, “How to Avoid the Empathy Trap”

This article spoke to me as I realised that this issue is indeed prevalent in society today. As such, I was excited to start sketching.

sketches (ideation)
USER PERSONA

I created a persona that my illustration will speak to and is meant for.

moodboard

Initial moodboard –

After which, I had to revise the colour scheme slightly to match certain objects in my illustration.

pencil sketches
Left: This illustration will address the issue of the lack of self-empathy and the idea of being stuck in it. In a bathroom setting, where people can spend “me time” on reflection, I placed upside down feet as if the person is drowning in the water. The water has bathbomb and pretty things that are actually harmful for humans. This conveys the idea of an empathy trap where people are so quick to put others before themselves. Middle: This illustration also address the lack of self-empathy. The scene is a cut open head. The head is where we think and make decisions, in this case, the head seems to not be functioning as usual as the hand sticking out conveys the need for help and it is also holding a flag to surrender. Right: This is something alittle different and not so much self-empathy but rather how empathy isn’t genuine anymore. It is now fake and people show it just to gain popularity or make friends. Thus portrayed in a form of an advertisement, “empathy for sale”

 

Revised and finalised sketch

This is a revised version of the first composition seen above. I revised it after gathering feedback from the class. Instead of a human leg sticking out, the human is now submerged in the bathtub. The water in the bathtub expands to a underwater ocean scene, with fishes, etc. The girl’s hair is weighed down or rather entangled with a anchor that represents empathy and the heart. Her hands reaching out to a lifebuoy as she needs help. There is also an angular fish which is dangerous and uses the alluring and trick method, as much as empathy is like. 

Read next post for process towards my final work.

Self-Portrait: Process & Final

I started this project by brainstorming various things that relate to me or how I feel at the current stage of my life. This the word list I created:

I decided to go through with the theme of reflections, as I feel that that best encapsulates myself and my current stage of life. Instead of taking the light-hearted path, I decided to do something more serious because just very frankly I could not think of anything fun and cute besides FOOD, FOOD and more FOOD!

Initial Idea

Here’s the very first sketch I did:

First Sketch

After consulting my classmates, I realised that my concept and idea behind this portrait is a little vague and all over the place. I, myself also felt a little lost in the direction as I just wanted to include so many things.

refining the concept

Taking the comments and feedback into consideration, I refined my concept. Instead of showing my made-up self in contrast to my natural (at home) self with the flowers in the background.

I decided to switch it up and include just one face of mine instead of two different faces and angles. This face will still sort of be split into half through the application of different colours. One side will now represent my trust in skincare products – it’s effect exaggerated through the use of flora and fauna. While the other side will show the downside of using too much of such products or “too little”. The negative side will instead have dead/dried flowers instead of blooming ones and my troubled skin further illustrated with redness and acne spots.

colours

In this illustration, I will be using warm – earth tone colours and it feels more grounded and “realistic” which goes hand in hand with my overall theme of reflections. Furthermore, it is currently my favourite colour palette.

earth tones
INSPIRATION
A huge part of my inspiration came from Manjit Thapp. I love her portraits – her composition, elements, and technique all falls together so nicely all the time.
PROGRESS

FINAL

This self-portrait reflects how I look at myself not just physically but also emotionally. Sometimes when I wake up in the morning and look at myself in the mirror, I just wish I didn’t see redness, marks or any acne on my face. When I proceed to wash my face, I wish somehow a miracle will happen when I open my eyes again and somehow the face wash and its “essence” would have worked its wonders on my skin.

Thus, I used flowers and leaves to represent this “essence” on one side while the other side has dead and dried flowers together with a “bad” face to show how nothing works or basically there’s two sides to me.

:))))))