FMP- What we're doing

• I've been talking out my arse this entire time and no one stopped me
• Museums, felt like this is what I needed to do because this seemed like something I should do rather than what I wanted to do
• Keep it simple what is the goal
• New goal is to create book cover and inserts for dante's inferno with some character boards and proposal for maybe comic?

Clear goals allows for the expression and mass productiopn of work with a puropse which means it is more likely to be developed and presented better. 

Dante's Divine Comedy Illustrated Seymour Chwast

• Its Innovative but a bit all over the place
• I'm Inspired by this graphic novel t to do something more than just a cover. Maybe the proposal for a comic??
• The use of symbolic characters such as Minos the snake that judges where in hell you go is a smart use of character symbolism and future call back for first time readers.
• While Chwast used a loosely based 20's theme I'd go for a more time accurate setting, due to style and personal creative license.
  

  

  
  

Museum -FMP

I'm going to  propose an exhibition using Dante as a gateway and his description of the 3 major sins. Represented by a lion, leopard and she wolf . The aim is to make three lino cut of these characters with the idea of having loads of artifact and antiques depicting the sinna around it. 

She wolf was the sins of icontenance sins (lust-greed)

Lione Beastial Violence

Leopred Treatrus sins

Character-Abandoing

So In reflection of the time I have available and the way I see this project going I have decided to abandon it. Professionally I feel like I dont have the time or focus right now for it. However I will be coming back to it after this module as more refinement of my character and background design should help me develop a better chance of being chosen within Anthology briefs. 

However the concept of character design and boards is going to be taken forward within my FMP in some way. 

CMV-Final + Show

I'm really pleased with the final image. Even Though no one bought one at CMV i'm not deterred in the slightest. as I now know that my work Isn't suited for the CMV audience. It situates itself in a darker narrative section of the art work. And That's fine with me. I'll be selling these images on my website at some point, along side other prints of mine. I may look making a comic out of these characters. Who knows. 

Vampire post

A big focus of this piece was detail. I decided I was going to cut every single hair on this monster after designing the final product. 

What makes it different from a lot of my other posts is that this Illustration was made through  multiple sketches and developments focused around the key characteristics of the creature I found from my research. 

• Hairy
• Long legs
• backwards feet
• Large Eyes
• Iron Teeth

In this case the large amount of character concepting and composition sketching was booth a blessing and a hinderance. At one point I got too lost in it. But taking a step from previous briefs where it got too much. I left it for about half a day and came back to my sketches. Looked over them critically and curated things in both the character designs and compositions that worked. Which is how I was able to get the idea finalised.

The way I put this all together was a using digital collage as a cleanup (slight enhancement tool). Realising that for me digital is the final 10% of a process. Which if done well takes my images to a whole new level. The importance of using digital sparingly is crucial for my practice, keeping my work to it's highest standard. 

Editorial-Feedback

So I sent my Historical editorials off to suzanne , the art director of the BBC history magazine. She was impressed by my work. However said they already have a select number of illustrators they like to use constantly.

I'm not deterred however. In a few months I may send her so revamped or new pieces. And I have been sending my work out to other history magazines. 

Editorial-Rest of them

With the time limit I'd Given myself I wanted to stick to a simple colour scheme that could be repeated throughout the other four illustrations. I chose simple black and white but with a spot colour of gold. Allowing for the sense of olden time luxury and the metallic highlight both stood out and blended in with the illustration. 

Pros:

• Created at least 3 well crafted and illustrated editorial pieces
• Using spot colour allows for a good sense of dramatism 
• The technique really suited he tudor pieces.
• There are some that have a strong sense of competition
• I can create editorial work with a fast turn around time. 

Cons:

• Some images (opera) where too convoluted 
• sometimes less is more
• Using a spot colour consistently would have helped some of the pieces in creating a focus for it. Not just in it's composition. 
• Sometimes just taking a step back and looking at the work you're doing + getting another person's feedback can be vital to the direction of a piece.

Editorial Pt 1

So I decided to jump back on the horse and set myself the challenge of doing 5 historical editorial illustrations within a week using lino as my main tool.

I had the following restrictions: 

• I didnt get to choose the articles

• I had to work to an A5 Lino space in a Portrait format

With the first one On the war on Ireland I decided that A personification of the countries and Irelands resistance would work best to depict this complex scenario. A lot of complex information is best illustrated using either personifications of issues or simple symbolism as you want to create a piece of editorial illustration that goes along well with the article.

I wanted to be very careful with my colours here. I knew that even in black and white the british flag was easy to distinguish however the Irish one is more complex as the colours and order of them distinguish it away from other european countries. So i did research which colour codes the flag contained.

Trying to stick to a simple colour scheme based around the irish flag I was able to use the black and white element a highlight for the hero (ireland) and the villain (England). The composition of the piece pushed across the idea of a domineering antagonist and a weaker but determined protagonist.

All in all I think that this piece came out exceptionally well and has reignited my confidence in editorial work.  

Chatacetr design -Tradishional

On the more Traditional side I Found some issues in the drawing of the characters. I hadn't set myself clear goals which meant most of the work I produced was very lackluster. Similarly I found when colouring and inking most I had a issue with using the wrong lining tool or colouring equipments. I feel like I hadn't just left them raw the images would have come out cleaner. 

Next time I would use the more traditional means again but with a clearer Idea of what i'm doing in mind. As I seem to work better with restrictions. However I would definitely use digital to clean up and refine my illustrations to a portfolio worth standard.