Colour Development - Collide

Showing how I initially intended the colour palette to work within my ‘Wheres Wesley’ design. I began by not following a guidline and colouring in a random manner, this was initally because of the reference from town centres and cities and how Individuals are unique, they look and feel different and should have individual colours. The colours ranged from different shades of Orange to purple in order to show individuality. The use of of skin tones became unique in order to follow these steps which upon starting was extremely easy to follow.

When the image was viewed as a whole I felt like the use of colour wasnt something that worked extremely well, it became confusing and wasnt very pleasing on the eye. I went on to research and take reference from the designs of ‘Wheres Wally’ and ‘Running for Crayons’, each of the designs for these two collage designers combined two aspects. They duplicated the single characters, recoloured then reorganised them and also used a single colour palette of around 5-10 shades, skin tones included.

Here you can see where I have update the palette of colours to follow some form of guidelines, this is something I should have followed from the beginning but only came to mind when the image began to grow. Also when I viewed the Andy Baker parklike animation and seen the use of only around 5-6 colours used to great effect.

Character Development - Collide

The characters designed were all hand drawn from either the use of real individuals or done solely off unique interpretation.They are each initially drawn with pencil then traced over with a black fineliner, I decided against adding to many intricate details because it ended up being difficult when editing and adding colour.

Each character would take on a different pose by facing different directions and being shaped in different ways. As I continued to create more designs I became quite limited with ideas on how to make individuals look and feel, this is when I resorted to duplication within my final design.

Below is a selection of the illustrations I created out of around 40-50 individuals characters.

Curriculum Vitae

Martha Rosler - The Bowery in Two Inadequate Descriptive Systems

Martha Rosler is an American artist who originates and lives in Brooklyn, she is an artist that works with video, photography, text, installation and performance. Her work focuses on exploring public issues that occur within every day life.

The bowery in two inadequate descriptive systems 1974-1975 is Rosler’s work created in New York, She went on to win one of the major prizes within Art and Design. She has often employed photographic conventions; Rosler uses a combination of images and texts to respond to earlier documentary photographs of vagrants and alcoholics, doing this through descriptive photography she explains within a short segment how the masses of people who follow up on the work that has been done are often attempting to show a society’s lowlifes.

She explains how she begins to represent the homeless and the mindless victim which is the individual, the basis behind the idea is that she will photograph the area In which they live and integrate and allow the viewer to envisage who lives there and the surroundings they are in. Rosler allows the viewer to think for themselves without objectifying the people that would initially be within the image. Rosler uses juxtaposition to convey an all to in-humane state. She combines these photographs with typewritten words associated with drunkenness. She arranges the works components in a grid style, applied so that she can disrupt the traditional idea being that a work of art, simple has to be a thing of beauty implying that there is more within the depth of an image or piece of art. it opens up to how the work can be seen from a different perspective.

It is a great way to understand how when creating a piece of work the underlying thoughts and opinions on it are so important and that feedback and criticism can and should always be taken positively.

Character Creation - Collide

Following on from my previous post where I explained how I found inspiration from the artist ‘Sloppy pencil’. I decided to show the images that were initially tested but didn’t make the cut within the final design.

These were the images I began to illustrate after drawing freehand with pencil and fine liner, then through the use of Illustrator and Photoshop I began to add colour, textures and the black outline, which would allow the image to stand out. Each image was slightly time consuming considering the breakdown of processes and the use of 2 different software’s, they would then finally be merged onto one overall image and placed in a way so that the image worked harmoniously, This was only the finals steps taken after drawing the image up manually.

To conclude the reasons behind why this style wasn’t chosen is because of the extensive time it would have taken o create the say 30-40 separate drawings that were undertaken when within the design process. To highlight the use of colour and textures was something I intended to put in but when merged with other drawings the vibrancy began to fade because of how intricate and complex the piece began to look.

Character Creation - Sloppy Pencil

An Animator and Illustrator under the name of 'Sloppy Pencil' creates amusing satirical characters for the nickelodeon show ‘Pig Goat Banana Cricket’. Referencing his work to be used as inspiration for the work I did on my Collide. Attempting to recreate the techniques used in order to add some substance into the images.

His images are usually very surreal in a way where poses are exaggerated and limbs and body shapes moulded in a way that isn't seen as being normal. The use of colour is something he attempts to resemble reality but to contrast exaggerates in a way to help make the character stand out and example is the use of orange within the image below 'Donald Trump'.

Initially the characters I began creating were rather dull and boring they added no life to the image by being rather static. I began by delving into ways to make the individuals I added have more life and movement, similar to the designs done by sloppy pencil himself they were created through pencil drawings and then digitally overlayed using illustrator. In doing so came with some pro’s and cons, the positives being that the quality of image and clarity was something that could be justified as excellent. Combining this with creating multiple characters was something that went against me so I changed the way in which they would be added to my final piece by scanning them through as a fine liner image and colouring manually through photoshop.  

Statistics Infographic - After Effects

INFOGRAPHIC (Converted) from Wesley Harrop on Vimeo.

After watching a short tutorial on how to create infographics I ended with an extremely simple version on how to create a moving Pie chart. The only problem I encountered was adding to the moving text a Java script code which would have allowed me to make the text move accordingly with the circle. I like the way in which this would be useful but currently within any of my projects it hasn't been an effect i have needed many of the work I create isn't animated so i feel adobe after effects I wasted on me.