Foundation 2D – So, I’ve decided on my medium. I’ll be posting my artist & medium references here soon as well.

What are the things that are important to me?

I started out with that question – and amongst brainstorming and idle doodling, I found my answer.

I am passionate about children’s books, education, communication, engagement, life. 

Sometime during the rat race of life, the new environment, my commitments overwhelming me, I’ve lost sight of why I decided on doing art as my chosen profession… but one day I just sat down and told myself, this is enough; my grades can’t control me and I’m not my grades – then I put myself into my project.

I suppose this is also easier, in a sense, as the project brief is more free, and more focused on ourselves. There’s conscious thought being directed to my person, who I am and what I stand for. The freedom in medium is liberating as well.

My style will help me speak.

I’ve often been told that I draw like “disney” or “adventure time” – and far from offended, it’s flattering, because it’s a style I love and naturally tend towards. I love children’s books and hope to one day be an illustrator or an art teacher, and just because I’ve put my dreams of working for Disney/Dreamworks on hold doesn’t mean I’ve given up on them.

I believe that my style – the cheerful colours and character design style will be able to bring across the idea of childlikeness that I’ve mentioned in my previous post.

Areas that I feel like I need to grow

…In my technical skill with colours, definitely.

Presently, I’ve just relied on instinct and gut sense to colour, often relying on the natural colour of the paint (resulting in me painting directly from the tube/palette). I feel that in order to really push it and improve, it will be in my colours. I will speak more about colours in other posts, as I want to focus on the medium and message in this one.

What medium? 

I’ve eventually decided on – diorama.

Remember I said earlier, that engagement was an important quality to me? This is one of the reasons why I chose diorama. I want to be able to convey a stronger sense of depth and interactivity in my work, and I feel that to really bring that through, something 3-dimensional would be optimal.

Below is one of the mock-ups I did to test the effect.

The mockup was actually a call-back to one of my old works, a children’s book illustration that I worked on in junior college, called “Eden’s Adventure at the Forgotten Fort”. My partner and I are really proud of the book cover.

But looking at the draft & mockup I did, the nervous expression on mini-me’s face seem to mean something.

Perhaps, if anything, this composition would be the final panel of:
Me + New Environment = Lost (in the Woods)

I also chose this forest partly because of my love for hiking and the outdoors, as well as the idea of getting lost in the woods alone, which would really scare me. “I Shouldn’t Be Alive” had a really long-lasting impact in my life, watching it as a child with separation issues. Even as a young adult, I don’t recommend it, haha!

Were there any other options?

Initially, I had wanted to do 3D pop-up. I stumbled across the pop-up book section in the library and was totally enamoured by the idea of acquiring this set of paper engineering skills. However, I felt that it wasn’t as good a choice of medium as:

1) I spent some time researching about it and found it quite difficult to execute effectively – running on the time constraints that we have currently, it would definitely be difficult (though not impossible) for me to pull it off

2) However, in this work, a high degree of finish is going to be very important to me. I want it to be professional, deep and multi-faceted. I understand that this means careful hands and doing and re-doing works to make sure it looks perfect, but I’m willing – and dioramas would definitely me more manageable for me.

3) Furthermore, I wanted to spend more time on the message and ideas in the work. With dioramas, I will be playing with much more familiar ground — it would be simple, yet doable, and much more feasible.

Here are some of the mockups that I did. It took me quite long, longer than I would like it to have been.

note to self – insert images later, as I left the work in my locker

 

So, what’s the big idea?

Good, I thought you’d never ask! So, having come to the conclusion of a diorama, how would I like it to look, as a final? Below are some sketches I did in my sketchbook.

The diagrams are quite clear enough. I also included the reason why for my choice of material. I’m aware that I could have used other less stubborn materials – acrylic perhaps, art card, paper, cardboard.

However, I felt that it was important to use wood.

Why? 

I feel that wood gives off a sense of sturdiness and resilience, something that might even come across as homely – wood is a common material for furniture and children’s toys. Furthermore, it will contribute to the tactile quality that I intend for my work.

Any last words?

As I go along, I will probably be adding other things to the structure, so as to enhance the effect and carry my message across stronger. For example, I am thinking of incorporating lighting/lightbulbs/light boxes to brighten my work (for easier viewing). It might also be to set a mood/tone, for example, by having a more warm tone with an orange-yellow light or a more cool tone with a white-blue light.

Thank you for reading; the exploration continues, and I’m excited to continue working on the assignment.