Outcomes! Editorial

Editorial outcome crit

Lots of good feedback from my final imagery, they all seem to have gone down well and clearly told the intended message. The only somewhat negative aspect that was raised a few times was that the landscape image wasn't as strong as the other images. I agree with this sentiment in terms of the quality of the image, especially compared to the work put in to the other images, but i feel that the image still has a clear theme, possibly the clearest of the three if a person doesn't have the context or knowledge of Animal farm. Something that most likely isn't helping the imagery though is that it primarily works with cartoon characters as I raised in the final evaluation.

Editorial final outcomes

Square

Portrait

Landscape

A few last touches

Portrait

Thanks to the crit i used the original drawing and just changed the figure.

My first issue was wether or not to have a gouache or digital flat backdrop. I felt the paint helped the image, I guess I preffered the hand made aesthetic for this. When showing this difference to others, there seemed to be an even split on what people preferred, which made using my own preference the more viable option. One thing that was mentioned when i displayed the image to others was that "you aren't planning on keeping Stalin like that are you?" In truth i was, but everybody present agreed that it needed some rendering.

So I did so and came to agree with the masses. The first image was created using cut out sections of scanned, pencilled in paper, but this looked digital and a bit naff, so I just re drew the form and rendered analogue, I like it and with that have the first outcome.

Portrait

So again because of the crit i un-inverted the torso faces and yes, its much better. With that I felt the background really didnt fit, although i dont think I ever did honestly. I decided I would try putting a gouache background to this and darkening the colour from the original red, but it just sat perfectly instantly, it just clicked and suddenly the image was a finished outcome!

Landscape

Not much to talk about with this one, I knew from the get go that all I would do is fill the pig and edit the line work to be white. I opted to again use the gouache for the fill to really cement the trio as a colletion.

Editorial crit 3

Another handy crit, this one really helped me to knuckle down on finalised elements, regarding colour use, which draught ideas I should follow, and in some cases, how i should go back to earlier drawings and use them for the final. The portrait was helpful because i was set on the idea of having the head of Stalin left unaltered, whereas the other heads on the garment would be inverted. The group decided that the heads should all be left unaltered as the faces were easier to read this way, but still looked as though they were a part of the form. Also for the box image, I wasn't certain on what draught of the head i should follow for the final image, but the group agreed that i should just use the drawing i created for the second set of roughs and change the wee nazi to a wee Stalin.

Final set of roughs

Portrait

Moving on from the second crit, I had a pretty certain idea on which images I would be working on from here on out, the only image I was somewhat conflicted on was the portrait. This was between the table of tea cups and the Stalin transforming images. Although the Stalin image would fit with the other ideas tonally and thematically. The tea idea did get a lot of love though, but as i previously mentioned, a conversation with Ben caused me to decide to stick to the Stalin images, and possibly save this for a later part of this unit.

With a clear direction, I jumped straight on to the portrait form, feeling that I had less of a clear path in my mind for this one, and wasn't quite confident that it would work. The setup was simple enough, scan my transforming pig drawings, add some darker shading and line work to make for clearer portraits. This left me a lot of time to mess with colours, levels, effects etc, but I still feel I am yet to come close to the right outcome. These images still feel rough and unprofessional if that makes sense. Hopefully something will pop up in a crit and help me with this issue. 

Landscape

So when I first created the Stalin riding a crushed horse image, I created it to fit the square frame. This means the image naturally looks quite squished when scaled to fit the frame.

With this I decided t5o make three variations, having a pig that utilises and fits the frame of the image far better, the main thing I wish to know about this image is wether or not the horse looks better flatter, or breaking through the floor. I didn't feel the need top mess with colour, I know this image will be quite simple with the use of colour and I know for certain I want my additional colour to be red.

Square

My final image, I'm really thrown on what angle and how much of the head I should show, the input from the crit will really determine how this image will look in its final stage.

Editorial crit 2

The stuff that seems to be favoured this time continues to be the animal farm based imagery and the Orwells' love of tea works. This is good as I personally also felt that these were the strongest, and am the most interested in furthering. The only issue with the Tea image being singled out is that I don't feel like it tonally matches the animal farm imagery if I were to have the three images featured in the same article.

Edit: I had a conversation with ben regarding the possible choices, and he felt it would be best to work with the animal farm imagery, noting that the images for the tea and homeless experiences would be beneficial to leave for the later stages in this unit.

Further roughs

Editorial small group crit

Very interesting to see the direction that others are starting their projects in, and great to gain some insight as to what ideas of mine interest others in this early stage. The images concerning Orwells love of tea seems to seem like a nice idea to others, something that they want to see more of. The animal farm ideas seem to be sparking an interest, and also the homeless experience related images, so i can surely see myself furthering and refining these ideas.

The Initial 60

Professional editorial analysis

John Holcroft

I start things off with an image that instantly strikes me as an editorial image, shape based imagery that has a very clear message, simple and effective. I feel that this work concerns the objectification of women. The image plays with the phrase looked at her/him/me like a piece of meat, showing a person as a literal chunk of meat, and keeping the idea that this is supposed to be a person with the inclusion of underwear. The pose of the figure also helps to communicate the idea, as though it was a model posing for a photo shoot. I feel this work is a great bit of communication, but something that I wont really try to replicate stylistically, seen as Im not the biggest fan of shape based imagery. I will try to create imagery that communicates easily though.

Vincent Mahe

A shape driven image like the previous, but taken way further, there is a lot of detail to this image, a very interesting work that retains simple conveyance. I know that this work was created to commemorate the 40th anniversary of an airports opening (The Charles de Gaulle airport to be specific). This is shown with the setting having aeroplanes surrounding the focal building. The focal building is shaped like a cake with a slice taken from it, and cake candles atop in the shape of 40, clearly indicating a birthday of sorts and the age. I really appreciate how the illustrator has managed to have such a clear message in such a detailed image. The colour scheme is also quite nice, all the tones pop and leave the image with somewhat of a happy aura. This goes to show you can really work on an image but the message doesn't have to be muddied by the extra elements.

Isabelle Arsenault

I thought I'd add an additional work to show that editorial doesn't necessarily need to be shape driven or created with illustrator. This image happens to be made my a mixed media Illustrator, clearly painted, but still utilises simple motifs to clearly convey the message of the text. I feel this image concerns abortion, cleverly using the setting of wine spilt on a nice dress, the figure is attempting to wipe away the fetus shaped stain. She is possibly trying to say that the baby was a silly mistake, much like spilling a drink. Very powerful image that took me aback upon first viewing, this is a tonally dark image and possibly closer to the style of imagery i plan to create for my outcome.

Metaphor workshops

Working with metaphors is something I believe i have unknowingly worked with in the past, but have never paid much attention to. This is something that Im really glad has been raised as working with, these ideals have a lot of potential for strong imagery and come in handy for all facets of illustration. We started with two over encompassing themes, love and then hate, and afterward were given two lists of words. With this i had to combine a word from each list and combine it with another from the other list, this resulting combination was then to be illustrated. Thanks to this task I feel i absolutely need more practice and research in to the use of metaphors.

Zine crit and final thoughts

Lots of really nice feedback, the class seems to have appreciated my idea and execution. The only complaint I received was for the use of type on the cover which totally makes sense to me. I hadn't really put a great deal of thought in to the cover text as I pretty much quickly created it and instantly jumped in to the content. Its something that is kind of annoying me in hindsight, considering I had more than enough time to work on the text to write something neater. Lesson learnt, take the time to refine your work, don't let any detail slip.

So considering the short time span for the brief and ignoring the text, Im more than happy with my result, If I were to work on it again, I may try a black and white cartoon aesthetic, or i could go one step further in the future and actually animate the scene.

A day in the life of orwell

Zine digital process

So creation of the zine took three simple steps:

First the stage

Then the props

And finally the cast

It really was as easy as that, the only real difference from the concept to this stage was hitlers expression when being punched, I had a shot at presenting him with a deadpan reaction to being punched, and I found it funnier, so there we have it.

About the author study task 1

Kicking off the year, the class was tasked to create a 12 paged zine, A5 in scale, with work that acts as a visual response to my author, instantly my mind was abuzz with ideas, but one stood out to me:

A day in the life of Orwell feat Hitler

This one would somehow follow orwell through a day, drinking lots of tea, smoking, writing and somehow culminating in a fist fight with Hitler. The idea for this one spins from a combination of two of Orwell's essays. First an essay on Mein Kampf, written before the war, with Orwell pretty much warning that this Hitler fella isn't to be trusted. The second one being an essay on how to make the perfect cup of tea, which was written when he was frustrated at the lacklustre tea when he was based in india.

The idea appeals to me because it is going to be some goofy fun to work with. To start with i needed a recognisable cartoon version of orwell, simple to fit the goofy tone, and possibly old timey/ dated to symbolise events of the past, I'm thinking along the lines of Max Fleischer cartoon work.

http://www.fleischerstudios.com/uploads/1/7/4/1/17419695/6567245_orig.jpeg?209

And just that I created. Due to the tight schedule I wasn't comfortable putting time in to experimenting with little changes in character design and just settled on my first design. Silly really, I finished the project early and definitely had time to work further on the ideas. The face of hitler I did feel the need to experiment with, finding that his likeness was lost in his stage of being punched. When planning the page thumbnails, another time saving means popped up, but this time Im quite proud of this one, I had realised that if I created a medium shot of orwell behind a desk, i could primarily use objects on the table to tell the story. This meant that if I was to make the final images digitally, i would only need to draw each element once and move them around, and only really need to draw different expressions for orwell.

Summer doodles For mister orwell

George orwell

The complete novels of George Orwell

Starting the summer break, i picked up this handy collection, having had my eye on it for a while, the task gave me more than enough reason to grab it. As the name would suggest, it contains all of the Orwell novels, those being:

-Animal Farm
-Burmese days

-A Clergyman's Daughter
-Coming Up for Air
-Keep the Aspidistra Flying
-Nineteen Eighty-Four

Of this collection i have read both Animal farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four, and am currently working through burmese days.

Animal Farm

Of the two main Orwell titles (the other being Nineteen Eighty Four), i'm definitely a bigger fan of animal farm, its so damn good. Doesn't overstay its welcome in length, presents its point in a setting that a wide range of ages can get in to, an despite doing so, is still incredibly effective at conveying its cautionary message. The ending paragraph left me with such a sinking feeling. As i mentioned with my Kafka write up, I love good characterisation, and this story does so masterfully, using different animals as an analogy for the different classification of the socioeconomic status', whilst also in keeping with the traits of said animals.

Nineteen Eighty-Four

The second of the big hitters, i do really appreciate the book, but didn't quite grab me like Animal Farm. The story did tend to drag from time to time, but that was necessary exposition to build such a distinctive world, so I do understand. The real standout element of this book are the numerous aspects of the world that have come to be in reality, its eerie really, and worrying, but thats why we love Orwell, his ability to communicate and warn. One of my favourite lines from the book actually covers that, "How could you communicate with the future? It was of its nature impossible!" I was taken aback reading this line, for even though Orwell probably wrote the line in an immediate sense, this is exactly what he achieved with this story.

Diaries

This started with great promise, the days accounted by orwell, homeless on the streets of london. Informal and insightful to both the state of things at the time and the personality of orwell. There's a lot of gems within these stories, the characters he encountered and things he had to do to survive, they were really engaging entries. Sadly once the entries jump to a different time, he starts to write more formally, every entry matter of fact, abridged, i cant help but feel they become soulless. So i lost interest in this book pretty fast, and realised there was more material from his homeless days, 'Down and out in London and paris' so I've got that on the way and will do a write up once i finish that.

Franz Kafka

Metamorphosis and other short stories

So the unknown author, what did I think of Kafka, did he amount to the expectation others had built for him? Well, starting the book I was entirely confused, there where short stories that would last about two, three pages or so, that would set a scene and vaguely a single or select few characters, then they would end. Ive been told that Kafkas work is quite deep, and so i tried to find any deeper meaning or moral in the writings, but couldn't. I gave the stories the benefit of the doubt, they are earlier in the book so were probably Kafka flexing his new literary muscle from an early stage in his career. A section for fascinated fans of the Author who wish to see his progression/ growth, but not great for a newcomer to gain first impressions. After a few of these i decided it would be best to jump straight to the title story Metamorphosis.

Metamorphosis

Hmm, another poor first impression, a man wakes up (Gregor), finds he is now a bug and can only think of how inconvenient it is. The most important part of any story to myself is great characters, false people that you can understand why they make the decisions they make, act the way they do, interact with some one way, and others another. Now saying that, i don't bloody care who you are, you wake up as a bug, you freak the f**k out! Nobody would ever calmly consider how inconvenient that situation would be upon waking to it. This clearly rubbed me the wrong way. But i'm not going to just trash the story, it was quite entertaining and the other characters, such as Gregors family were great. As for the moral of the story, it was never going to live up to the praise from its legacy, and i didn't finish the story with a blown mind and different worldview. I feel that the story was Kafka communicating that its Shite being weird around normal people, or to put it properly a feeling of alienation from society, which is a great thing to use as your theme, but thanks to the characterisation of Gregor, i just couldn't fully get behind the story. Possibly i'm just too brutish and dull to comprehend the themes of the story, but i'm honestly not too hot on using Kafka as an author either. Ill give another one of his stories a shot and see how it goes.

(Update:) Ive read both In the penal colony and and a hunger artist since writing my original thoughts and comparatively enjoyed them far more than my previous reading. They have great characterisation and more compelling messages i personally found. I think i've began to grasp why he gains such acclaim.

Cormac McCarthy

No Country For Old Men

My first read, and boy what a cracker it was! I thoroughly enjoyed this book, its certainly butting heads with One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest for the position of my favourite book. That being said, i regret to say that those engrained images of the film are all that would appear for my mental imagery, every wonderful monologue from Sheriff Ed Tom Bell was said by Tommy Lee Jones, the cruel calculated acts of Chigurh were acted by Javier Bardem. A testament to how well the film brings the book to the big screen, but man does that not help me, thankfully the book was great enough to not be counted as wasted time, Im grateful that the project finally got me to read this book, as it has been sat on my bookshelf untouched for months. There is a lesson to be learnt from this experience, if I see a film release adapted from a book that i have yet to read, definitely clear the book first ( nervously checks the impending release of the girl on the train).

(Unnecessary note: Ive read and watched the girl on the train now, average book, film's not great..)