2D || The Final Four

The artist who inspires me the most in this project is Jessica Walsh. I particularly love how bold her style can be. And how different elements and style can speak something when they are put together!

jw
Source: Behance

Composition #1

“You deserve someone who loves you with every single beat of his heart.”– Love Rosie, 2014   

Draft.

2d2-3

The focus in this quote is “every single beat of his heart”. I played with the shapes of the heart and varied its color to represent the “beating” motion. Skeletal hands are used to symbolize eternity and infinity love. Since the heart is the main subject here, I emphasized it by using a different style of image – engraving.  Flowers are added to symbolize life.

Joyce, who was with us during our Photoshop tutorial commented that the composition looked rather stable with everything arranged symmetrically. Yep, it does. It’s just heart and more hearts, which lack of interactions. She suggested that I should play with shape distortion or change the position of the hearts.

Final composition.2d2-rosie-xhalftone-final

I reevaluated my previous design and added in a few other elements to make the whole composition more alive. Furthermore, I played with some of the transforming effects for the hearts. The figure-ground relationship is used such that if the white heart is removed, all there is left is a solid black heart, which in turn becomes a single, dominant element. Even though this composition does not have the symmetrical effect in the first draft, the focal point is still pretty obvious. Therefore, the final result appears more energetic than before.


Composition #2

“Everything’s uglier up close.” 

– Paper Towns, 2015

2d2-close-xhalftone-final

“Uglier up close” is my focus on here. Again, I used a different style of image – engraving, to direct the viewers’ eyes to my main subject – eye, because opposing elements create a focal point of interest. The eye is placed in a seeming magnifying glass or peephole viewer. As if someone is trying to look a little closer, but the closer you look, the uglier things are.

Lines are repeated to create rhythm; an illusion of movement so as to form the wavy hair. The law of proximity is applied by placing the lines closer to one another, so that viewers could perceive it as a whole, instead of a mere background pattern. Since “ugliness” is a huge aspect here, I wanted to portray a character who is trying to cover her face with hair. Besides, the thickness of the line is varied to create a three dimensional effect. The Eye of Horus is used because it matches the wavy lines that I’m going for. Also, is it just me or does she has this cool, distant vibe? I love how it is so flexible that I could duplicate it as its mouth as well as the handle of the “magnifying glass”.

I chose this as my tote bag print because of its simplicity, minimalism style. I particularly love how quirky it looks compared to the rest, which are squarish and seem confined in a box.

P.S secretly hopes that I could print this on a lot of stuffs but oh well the size..


Composition #3

“The music is all around us, all you have to do is listen.” 

– August Rush, 2007

background-copy

Since music is the focus in this composition, musical instruments are largely used. The wave-like piano keys intersect with the volutes, forming an unbreakable bond to symbolize “all around us”. All the volutes are curved inwards, which creates a type of rhythm, allowing the viewers to see it as a revolving item. The key message of placing buildings at the bottom is to show that everyone shall take note of their surroundings, where music can be found. Gestalt theory on the figure-ground relationship is used in the harp/head profile illusion. Depends on viewers’ interests, the image fluctuates between the two possibilities. This is also related to the stored information in viewers’ brain, which contains information about the harp and profile of head.

A sense of unity is achieved in the composition such that all the elements are linked to one another. The composition is seen as harmonious which every part complements each other, thus holding everything tightly.

Personally, I like this design the most. I did contemplate if I should use it as my tote bag print. Although it looks interesting as a whole with a bunch of elements in it, I doubt a tote bag print like this will catch my attention right from the start.


 Composition #4

“Maybe all the strings inside him broke.” 

– Paper Towns, 2015

This might just be the toughest composition I have ever worked on among all four. Ironically, I was pretty excited to work on it at the start of the project because I thought it was easy to portray.

Just broken strings right? Yeah.

SO WRONG. 

I took it very literally and there you go, my first draft.2d2-1

Cringing so hard just by looking at it right now. Well, there is always a first time for everything.

I tried again, obviously.2d2-1i

Boring. The design appears plain, which the viewers aren’t going to look at it for long.

More experimenting and here comes the third draft.2d2-strings-i

This time, I figured that I could portray hallucinations; “broken strings = losing control of oneself. It is scary, just like a horror film. I thought maybe adding in more black might turn out better since black is my everything?? However, the whole composition looks cluttered, not much breathing space, unsettling.

Oh well. I’m just gonna keep trying until something “clicks”! Also, I started to question my choice of movie quote that I went back to some of my backups.

IS MY QUOTE TOO SHORT?!

But no, I’m not going to give up on this.2d2-strings

This was also the part where I started thinking out of the box. Instead of “strings”, “broken”, why can’t I relate it to something else? I thought of broken cassette tapes and just broken machines in general because humans are made up of different parts too. Aaaaand that’s how the gears formed the background.

However, the whole composition looked rather messy still and the cassette tapes are not obvious enough for the viewers. So I scraped the idea.

Final composition.2d2-strings-xhalftone-final

After so many trials and errors, I finally settled on this piece. I feel that it has a certain depth and it relates to the quote in an abstract way.

Thread spools are used to represent “strings”. When things are broken, you tend to fix it and that’s how the wrench comes into the picture. I combined the man’s body with a bunch of gears to show that humans work like machines and it can be broken too. Clock symbolizes death (this is taken directly from the movie itself – Margo found a dead body under a tree, she figured that maybe all the strings inside the man broke and that’s why he committed suicide).

The man is being emphasized by placing it slightly off-center. Apart from that, the repetition of the elements improves visual interest. Value contrast controls the visibility of an element which helps viewers to distinguish between background and foreground. For example, higher value (lighter color) shows that the element is more distant while lower value (darker color) makes the element stands out from the rest.

And yeahhh, finally!

Author: Rochele Lim

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