Zine play – 03 – final / my inner demons

My inner demons.

For my zine, I decided to revisit 3 compositions I did for my final project last semester. The 3 compositions focused on 3 different japanese demons.  And through my zine I chose to further elaborate on these demons and how they relate to me.

Each spread of my zine corresponds to a specific demon and also a title of a japanese folklore about that demon.

1
On the front cover, my Japanese and Chinese name overlay in front of me,showcasing both my Chinese heritage and also my preference for Japanese art.
2
                            天狗 - TENGU

                  天狗の隠れみの Tengu no Kakuremino 
                        
                       "Tengu's Magic Cloak"

A boy in a village was warned by his mother not to trick a Tengu, as Tengu's love to play tricks on humans but do not like having tricks played on them. The boy went against his Mum's wishes and tricked a Tengu into giving him it's magic cloak. After realizing that it had been tricked, furious, the Tengu gathered other Tengu to exact revenge on the boy to get the cloak back. 

Me: As a trickster and prankster, there are instances where I get carried away and dislike it when others do the same thing to me. There are times where i will be bitter and though i would not think of revenge like a Tengu, it is still something about myself i want to change.
3
                             おに - ONI

                 うじ‐の‐はしひめ Uji no Hashihime

                        "Woman at Uji bridge"

A woman scorned by her husband was so hell bent on revenge that she asked the gods to turn her into an Oni. Under the god's instructions, she went into the river in Uji and bathed for 21 days and separated her hair into 5 horns, turning herself into an Oni. After which, she exacted revenge on not only her husband but the husbands family. and anyone that crossed the bridge over the river where she turned into an Oni.

Me: This is the art of myself i would like to cut out. ideally i want to take out the bitter feeling of revenge.
4
                         キツネ - KITSUNE

                  いえにきつね U Chi ni Kitsune

                       "Fox in the house."

An old man moved into an old house, and realizes the house is overrun by foxes. He leaves them be and they slowly get more and more mischievous as the days go by. Till one day he cant take it no more and decides to kill them all the next day. That very night, an old fox visits him in his dreams, explaining that his family has lived there for many generations, and asks for his forgiveness.The old man agrees to spare their lives. the foxes being grateful, would in turn help the old man. And whenever something good were to happen, it would be forewarned by a sharp bark of a fox.

Me; this is what i am trying to ideally work towards. Whereby i am still mischievous and playful, but when im told my limit, i not only know how to stop, but also be devoid of revenge and do good when it is due.

zine poster 3 
                 内側の悪魔  Uchigawa no akuma

                          Inner Demons

Zine play – 02 – The Long Process.

Process.

With the examples I found from my research, I started to think which project or projects I would like to focus on. And initially decided to focus on three projects. The EGO project from semester 1
along with the typographic portrait and the Point of view project from semester 2.  All of which were heavily influenced by Japanese art.

I decided right off the bat that I did not want to just plonk the soft copy art work into indesign and play around with compositions solely on the computer. So I chose to bring the physical art work to take a photo of it to use for my zine. Much like an installation or exhibition.

I actually had to make three separate visits to the venue to take photos. Cause each time the sun would get moody and hide behind clouds, leaving me with horrible lighting. Resulting in the revisiting of the venue and a whole lot of time spent.

Photos.

This were the photos I took on my first visit:

pangolinhandoninamepov

After reviewing the photos, I felt that I didn’t quite like how the typo and pov project looked with the background of the venue. I however liked how the circle compositions gel quite well with the background, and hence I decided to go back to take photos for a second time, this time focusing only on the circles:

kitsune oni tengu

On the second visit, I was more focused and looking for areas with good lighting and composition. But my untrained eye wasn’t fast enough and the sun set before I could get all the shots I needed. Proving the need for a third visit on another day.

The third and final day:
poster 1 poster 2 poster 3 poster 4

On the third day I managed to get most of the shots I needed and it was on to editing the images. Adjusting the lighting, saturation, and overlaying the text to work with the environment.

Spreads.

Initially, I had the idea of breaking the page in the middle with the artwork in the centre of the spread.
zine spread 1.5

But that proved to be a problem as putting the art work in the centre meant that the fold would cut through the middle of the art work. Hence I decided to push the artwork more to the side.

zine spread 1.56

After consulting with Shirley, she suggested to bleed the background more to the right, following the ¾ rule. And additionally, she taught me how horizontal and vertical forces work to make the composition more interesting. I worked with those ideas and started form my 3 spreads.

wip

The hardest part about the spreads by far was getting all 3 spreads to look the same. in terms of the saturation and colour. It was something that i didn’t expect but it took me a large amount of time. I had to constantly zoom out and see if they look good as a whole zine.

 

Cover page.

For the cover page, i had alot of initial ideas. such as:

I wanted to portray both my Chinese name and Japanese name together in the cover page. I played around with the opacity to overlay the 2 texts on top of each other.

But after having a look at my spread, I realised this minimalistic cover page wouldn’t fit very as a whole.

hence I chose a similar back ground and overlayed the text over.  which i felt worked better as a cover page.

zine cover page small

Poster.

Lastly, I chose to work on an A2 size poster to put at the back of my zine to bring it together as a whole.  I searched for demons in traditional japanese art and juxtaposed it with a photo of me.  To portray a sense that i am battling my inner demons.

zine poster smallzine poster small1 zine poster small2 zine poster small3

 

Still currently in the midst of editing the final outcome. minor tweaks here and there to bring it all together.

Zine play – 01 – Inspiration/Research.

Inspirations/Research

 

For this semester, my first two 2D projects have all been heavily influenced by Japanese art. And through those first two projects I explored and immersed myself in Japanese art and graphic design and fell in love with it even more.

So for this final project, I wanted to continue with the momentum and explore more Japanese art, in particular Japanese graphic design. And hopefully slowly develop a distinctive style that I can bring with me after my foundation year into and my specialization.

One thing that I picked out from researching from my previous 2 projects, was that the Japanese use their text and typography in very interesting ways. In terms of overlaps, overlays and their use of colors.

In Japanese graphic design, text and typography aren’t just there to tell you something, it is not just a tittle or a body paragraph. The text is there as part of the composition. To bring the composition further like a strong supporting actor supports a main actor in a film.

With this knowledge, I researched more Japanese magazines that have clever usage of typography. And I found these examples :

tumblr_kyxdcr4LiQ1qaz1ado1_500 tumblr_mjfm190nfu1rwdpako1_1280 tumblr_nqgdcf0xiX1qaz1ado1_500 tumblr_kxqe7arPod1qaz1ado1_500 tumblr_nin47t9CQe1qaz1ado1_500

With these examples in hand, I proceeded to continue to explore how i could use typography in a similar way for my zine.