2D Project 3 EGO

Initial ideas:

Ideas/ sketches of final layout:

 

Initial ide
1:
Me: Rugby ball because i play rugby.
Setting: My parent’s arms whenever I go back home.
Me + Setting: My parents are so protective of me so much so that they pad me everywhere to prevent injuries.
2:
Me: As you know, I have an alter Ego called Bernard. I envision him as an Old man with retro looking specs
Setting: Christmas, The Lord Jesus’ Birthday!
Me + Setting: I become the ultimate child when it comes to Christmas. I envision Bernard having the time of his life too, sipping hot chocolate with gingerbread snaps.
3:
Me: My Resting Bit*h Face is my signature look, no one can take it away. Not even I can change it.
Setting: A ROMAN BATH HOUSE that I dream that I would go to one day.
Me + Setting: I am so at peace so much so that my RBF melts off
4:
Me: I am as much of a boy as I am a girl. I am using my tomboy aspect.
Setting: A boy’s night out with beer etc.
Me + Setting: I think I can fit in as well as the other boys, I sip my water as if I am in one of maozedong’s propaganda posters.

From the Bottom up, below is the mood board that I created whilst finalising my final piece.


The following is my mood board that i made throughout my whole progress till the final stages:

colour-scheme-2d-3jpgREFLECTION TIMEZZZ:

What are the difficulties and take away from this project?

Difficulties: I had difficulties moving on from traditional media even though I had the choice to. I had problems getting out of my comfort zone as I did not have a general theme colour or subject matter for my series. I really wanted to use Photoshop to my advantage this time, therefore I experimented the different brush strokes and layers.

Take away: Colours are subjective as there can only be so many colours for every emotion. Therefore, for this project I found myself associating colours with my experience. Which would be what I would think of when making designs in the future as I would think about what would people associate with my designs. eg. I would not put a puke green colour on my design if I want to attract an audience.

Thanks Shirley for the great times. TO MORE GREAAT TIMES THAT AWAIT. G8 FORLYFE.

2d 2nd project FORREST GUMP

Quote no.1: There was no use in trying to emancipate a wife who had not the dimmest notion that she was not free – Age of Innocence, 1993

Keywords/key phrases for this quote: Emancipate, Wife, dimmest, not free.

This quote was taken from the Age of Innocence (1993) which talks mostly about how Old New York was superficial and caged in their pride and tradition.

To me, I likened not being free to being caged up. I tried to use a bird cage but it was too literal. I thought how I could have this visual with some human aspect to the visual and I came up with using a ribcage.

What I derived first from the word ‘dimmest’ from the quote was the idea of light. To push the idea further, I thought of a flame instead of a lightbulb as fire has more humanistic qualities as compared to electric light. I can relate this flame to the passion that the ‘wife’ in the quote does not have. Therefore, I edited components that relate to a flame.

I added dripping wax which I placed on the rib cage as well as a hand holding a cigarette stub. At first, I wanted them to be accompanied by flames of a candle and the smoke of the cigarette. However, the quote did say the wife had the ‘dimmest’ notion that she was free. Therefore, I chose not to put those components in. This is so as to emphasize that she can never go beyond her cage (aka ribcage).

Application of design principles:

At first, I placed the ribcage in the middle as a sole object. However, it seemed rather plain and I had nowhere to place the hand with the cigarette. So, I blew up the image of the ribcage and skewed it to the side and placed the hand with the cigarette directed towards it. Through this i hope i created some unity and rhythm that flows through the implied running lines from the fingers to the ribs.

The ribcage was initially an engraving it had more values as compared to the hand. I tried to take this as an advantage therefore i created a threshold layer for the hand and created a greater contrast between the hand and ribs.

At first, I wanted to have flames as the background. As i have said before, I did not add in flames to further emphasise on how hopeless it is to ’emancipate a wife’. Instead I found a print of reflections on water where the contrast of the light and darks were very apparent therefore I put it as the background to unify the two subject matters.

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Quote no.2: ‘I’m in a glass case of emotion’ – Anchorman, 2004

This quote was supposed to be a very comical yet emotional quote.

Image result for im in a glass case of emotion

At first, I thought of gaining inspiration from the movie scene. Using the telephone booth, maybe filling it with things that denote emotion such as pillows etc.

However, I wanted to be more original so thought about another alternative: vending machines. When I searched for vending machines, I came across this retro print that was about buying careers. So, I thought why not make it sell emotions instead!

Choose a Career Vending Machine Comics Pop Art by Andrew Fairclough:

I proceeded to crop out the background and the people out of the vending machine.

For the emotions ‘available’ in the vending machine:

  1. Pillow – one can hug it for comfort or vent anger on it.
  2. Onion – when you cut into them, you tend to tear. You can use it as an excuse when you really cry.
  3. Sun – I associate the baby sun with comfort and Joy as they ‘remind me of a new day’.

Hot air balloon – a further intepretation of child’s normal helium balloon. I associated this with childish emotions.

For the background in the vending machine, I pixelated a picture of Blanket wrinkles and zoomed in on it. On the other hand, I used a rendering of water ripples as the background.

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Quote no.3: ‘What is an ocean but a multitude of drops’ – Cloud Atlas, 2012

Firstly, I woul like to highlight the greater meaning behind the quote.

“My life amounts to no more than one drop in a limitless ocean. Yet what is any ocean, but a multitude of drops?” ― David Mitchell, Cloud Atlas

To me, this made me feel that everything that you do in this life amounts to almost nothing in this world. Therefore, i wanted to create something that translated the sense of expectations and nothingness.

Since this quote is mostly centered on the idea of the Ocean, Water and life. I did not really want to mimick water droplets or waves. Instead i played around with the idea of ripples on water. One will take note of the ripples emerging from around the hand.

I also indirectly played around with typography as one can see from the concentric circles surrounding the hand. This was done to represent the letter ‘O’. However, to prevent an immediate relation to the quote i added in the slash to create some distraction and contrasting line with the direction of the hand. To hint the viewer more about the image’s relation to the quote, i brought forward the emerging portion of the hand above the background as well as the letter ‘O’.

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Quote no.4: ‘He’s too busy looking for your brain’ – A Walk to Remember, 2002

‘Well, if there is a higher power, why can’t he get you a new sweater?’ ‘He’s too busy looking for your brain.’

This quote was meant to be an act of sarcasm by the main character in the movie against the bullies in her school. However, since the movie was a rather romantically inclined, I took a romantic spin on this quote. For me, if someone was too busy looking for such an obvious thing such as your brain, he/she was probably looking in the wrong direction. Since Romance is driven by the heart, he was probably looking in your heart ‘for your brain instead’

I like this composition as it creates a sense of rhythm between the shredded layers of the heart and the contour lines of the eye rendering. At first, the eye drawing was in a triangle formation. Then i warped it to suit the contour of the heart.

There is also a variation of the densities of black and white in the composition between the rendering of the eye and heart.
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However, this composition was too minimal and not experimental enough. Therefore this is my play of the print with an addition of a posterized background.2d-quote-no2-draft1
2d-quote-no2-draft-2Above is the print that Ms Shirley did in 10 minutes? She experimented further with the contours of the background, playing more with the negative and positive spaces of the composition. She also skewed my composition more to the side, out of the frame so that there is more visual interest in the print.

Silk screen printing:

As for the more practical portion of this project, it was not as easy as I thought it would be!

During the initial exposing of my screen, it felt that even the smallest details mattered towards the making of the print. Later on in the process, I realized that practice makes perfect. Fortunately for me, I had a rather simple print to create therefore my lines and edges of the print were crisp.

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Link to Video: This is the video footage of me doing my final press!

https://www.dropbox.com/s/8onz6wni9zmquxa/IMG_5852.mp4?dl=0

2D MARK MAKING // project 1

Exploration:

Firstly, i made this by scraping paint (already on my palette knife) onto newsprint.
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Secondly, i used the ridged edge of my snack packet (pipagao) to scrape the paint (already on the packet) onto the newsprint.

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Thirdly, I then tried putting the paint onto the paper directly first. After that, i scraped a clean palette knife along the paper.
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In another paint exploration, i tried overlaying paint and doing the kindergarten style of folding over half a page to reveal a symmetrical pattern.

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what was the result? overall it was kind of boring because the inks did not mishmash as much as i had hoped for them to. However, when you look at it closely (as shown as the image below) : the white paint merged very nicely into the blank ink. Displaying IMG_5375.JPG

I tried another version of this in a composition with more black ink and it resulted in something very grey toned.
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I pleated a piece of paper at 0.5cm intervals, sandwiched them into a tight bunch then dipped them ever so slightly in paint and stamped them onto another sheet of newsprint.

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BUBBLE EXPLORATION:

I started this firstly with mixing some soap solution and chinese ink into a container and blowing air into the solution using a straw. when the bubbles were overflowing the container, i just lay the piece of paper over the container. TADA!

The results are shown in the top half of the picture below. The ink was too diluted and offered no contrast. Therefore i tried using Block printing ink in the solution instead and it is shown in the second piece of paper!
IMG_5105This is the result of the second attempt, using block printing ink mixed into the solution. This captured the bubbles much better. It even captured the movement of the ink on each bubble.
Displaying IMG_5106.JPGLesson learnt: do not mix the solution manually (meaning mixing the solution vigorously) as it creates many small bubbles that would not pop on the surface of the paper. It would distort the image instead.


As my second attempt, i dipped the straw into the solution and blew the bubbles directly onto the newsprint.

This direct application allowed the contours of the individual bubbles to appear more and it even captured the specks of ink as the bubble burst.

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As i was intrigued by the splatter stains, i took the straw and dipped it in the ink solution once again. However, this time i blew it forcefully near the paper to create this strong splatter of ink!Displaying IMG_5367.JPG


BRUSH EXPLORATION:

I explored different brush strokes. Firstly, by placing the brush horizontally and secondly, perpendicularly. As shown by the following two photographs.
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In the end, i tried the dry brush technique using chinese ink and created the following. i found myself holding the brush more horizontally.Displaying IMG_5370.JPG

In comparison, i tried a less vigorous version of the top painting. I used a fairly wet brush (dipped in chinese ink) and swept the tip of the brush ever so slightly onto the newsprint.

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I then tried creating a pattern onto a toned background. I started by drawing mismatched strokes into ambiguous shapes that melded around each other.

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i changed the pattern slightly by making it contain thinner lines and have more interesting shapes (more pointy and rounded etc.)Displaying IMG_5365.JPG

LINO CUT EXPLORATION:

This was my first lino cut where i started making a pattern using repetitive egg-shaped cuts.
Displaying IMG_5124.JPGI found the pattern very interesting so i did one in a more slender form where it ended up looking like a school of fish. Then i added more small cuts to one portion of the print and it started to look like a school of fish under other fishes. It gave it an illusion of space.

Displaying IMG_5123.JPGFor the last cut, i made long straight cuts, then i created more fluid looking shapes by turning the cuts ever so slightly with more space between them.

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Smoke printing exploration:

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MATCHING UP EMOTIONS WITH MY PATTERNS:

A. ANGER:

1. Annoyance: whipping hair/ dry brush

How did i do it: i created this print by dragging a dry brush in loopy patterns.

I relate this pattern to Annoyance as it is almost as if this is the trail left behind by my hair as i would shake my head and flip my hair whenever i am annoyed.

2. Slow burn: one line of paint w splotches

How did i do it: This is from the pleated paper print, where i pleated newsprint then dipped it into block print ink. I only took one line from the actual print and enlarged it.

This illustrates slow burn well as it gradually fades along the horizontal line.

3. Exasperation: Direct bubbbles

How did i do it: I made a bubble solution with black paint, dipped a straw in the solution and blew bubbles vertically onto the paper.

This print captured not only what the bubbles once were, but it also captured the act of them bursting. With specs of paint distributed throughout the print and also contrasting ink splotches, this creates a emotion likened to a type of explosion which i relate to exasperation – the desperation to burst/open up.

B. LOVE: 

4. Enchantment:

How did i do it: I created this print by drawing lines in different directions bound by invisible boundaries.

I associate this pattern with being in a forest. Almost like being in a fairytale, the lines look like the trees in the forest. But the implied shapes of the pattern make it as interesting as the feeling of being enchanted.

5. Worship: embroidery

How did i do it: I did Embroidery on paper where the threads are all directed towards the center.

This allowed me to illustrate the beams of light descending down from the heavens and the halo of Angels. This creates a sense of space and the threads have a certain tension aspect to them which could be likened to the divine power bringing you to a greater place.

6. Crush: lino print

How i did it: I made the print first by making a lino cut then i scanned the print to enlarge it.

The gradual change from wavy lines to straight lines illustrates the feelings you get when you have a crush. When you first have a crush, you feel funny and all over the place! Then slowly you realise that therefore it gets straightened out.

C. JOY:

7. Amusement:

How did i do it: I covered paper with a layer of white gel crayon, went over it with squiggles of black crayon and went over it again with the white crayon.

The texture of the crayons are quickly associated with our childhood where we would just make random squiggles on paper thinking that they are the best artwork ever.

8. Ecstasy: bubble cluster

How did i do it: I took the print of the Bubble cluster (please refer to top to see how i did the print) then i scanned the image and enlarged it to draw attention to the details of the print.

This print contains the visual of bubbles which annotates pure joy. However, even in the print the movement of the bubble solution on the bubbles were captured. This movement looked very trippy and drug like, therefore i associate it with ecstasy.

9. Satisfaction: one line one breath

How did i do it: I repeatedly drew lines horizontally and varied the spaces in between the lines ever so slightly.

This creates a very calm drawing that looks like waves

D. FEAR:

10. Anxiety: circular squirtles

How did i do it: I scanned the original print (done by blowing ink through a straw), duplicated the image, played around with the transparency of the print and finally changed the angles of the duplicates.

This allowed me to create a print which has 2 planes of motion, one in the direction of the sprayed paint and the circular direction of the layered prints. This creates a dizzy print which i associate with anxiety. Through personal experience, having anxiety gets me really dizzy and my brain and body moves in different directions.

11. Doubt:

How did i do it: I scanned the image of the Lino cut print of the school of fish.

This print has a variation of density of similar shapes and that creates an illusion of space in the 2d print alone. The most likely association with this print is a school of fish, and the emotion of doubt is shown through how i can get out and be by myself but i doubt myself and continue being in a group.

12. Revulsion: pipagao packet

How did i do it: I created this print by scraping an end of a snack packet as it is loaded with ink.

This created a gradually patchy outcome which relates to revulsion as it can be likened to regurgitation.

E. SADNESS:

13. Cheerlessness:

How did i do it: I took a whole strip of watercolour paper and soaked it in plain water for a minute. Then I took a brush dipped in Chinese ink and dragged it across the top of the paper. I dipped the brush into plain water again and dragged it along the bottom of the paper.

This created a very gradual diffusing of the ink throughout the paper. This allowed me to create a texture that was rather dreadful the more i look at it.

14. Grieving:

How did i do it: palette knife painting. I dotted the paper with varying blobs of Ink, then went in with a clean palette knife and scraped past the blobs to create this pulling motion.

This allowed me to create a sense of longing much like one experienced when one is grieving.

15. Heartbreak:

How did i do it: symmetrical paint. I spread a base of white paint first then added some small spots of black paint on only half the strip of paper. I then folded the paper in half into itself. After the paint has smoothened out, I slowly pulled the ends of the paper to extend the paper and reveal the goodness inside.

This created a very wispy interaction between the paints, this is like what i feel under heartbreak. The feeling of not being able to fully let go, the wispy intertwining of the two bodies still lingering.

F. SURPRISE:

16. Adruptness:

How did i do it: I dragged a charcoal block across the strip again and again. I liked the texture already however, there seemed to be a rhythm in the strip itself. Therefore i naturally had to draw on the strip so hard so that it ripped :’) AND that was a blessing in disguise as i was able to achieve adruptness through that.

17: Revelation: pleated prints

18: Unforeseen: smoke screen.

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