Reflective Post 3

I don't really tend to do many editorial briefs and always feel like it's something I should be doing because it's probably the most consistent work one can get as an illustrator and they're also usually very quick turnarounds. I really wanted to put myself under some rigorous time constrictions for a change because I tend to procrastinate and get sick of briefs often because I've stretched them out too long and my brain has half moved into the next thing. Then it always ends up feeling like a chore finishing ideas off.
Gerry Brakus was supposedly coming to give advice/feedback on some responses to articles from 'The New Statesman" which she had sent over as examples for students in second year to work on so I thought I would try a couple of those.
The first article I illustrated was the most satisfying process from beginning to end. This was because the idea popped into my head really quickly and I was subsequently able to execute it quickly without losing momentum or getting bored. It only really took me a day in total. It was for the article "My Eleven Sleepless Nights" which concerned the author's experiences with insomnia.
I had had my bed frame replaced in my house recently and the people who came in and set it up left the instructions in my room, which I decided would be perfect to re appropriate somehow for the article. I thought the image of a deconstructed/incorrectly assembled bed would make a really strong visual metaphor for the content of the article. I actually ended up pushing this idea a little further in conjunction with a quote from the article referring to the bed as a "deconstructed wreck", and the final image was three beds, each a little more broken and "deconstructed looking".

   
The second article I tackled, "Blonde Ambition" caused me the most difficulty, and I ended up  dragging it out and getting sick of it, which is weird because it was really the most simple, all it needed was a portrait of Beck. I ended up with an image of him sat on a fourposter bed which is how the article described him during the interview. I was not particularly happy with this.

For the third article, "Count From The Splash", I took a very literal approach and just illustrated a scene from what was a kind of short story. I ended up procrastinating over this one a fair bit as well but I really liked what I ended up with, which came about through a happy accident on Photoshop where I was just playing around with level and colours sort of arbitrarily. This image did look the the least like my work but I was still really happy with it. 

I found it really satisfying to put the finished illustrations into context with the articles, it was a nice way of finishing them them off and was actually pretty helpful in determining their success.


The work I made for the MassArt collaboration was a really nice surprise, in that I actually didn't end up having to compromise as much as I thought I might for a collaborative effort. It was really nice working in a group which comprised of graphic designers and illustrators because it meant I didn't have to worry about any of the things which I don't like doing and was actually pretty free to just get on and crank out a load of images. The tone/theme of the project our group went for was fairly dark as well so it suited how I work a lot of the time. I ended up with quite a lot of drawings I really liked and just tinkered a bit with them in Photoshop to get them to sit a little better in the publication we ended up making. 

 

 

I also made some drawing on location at Leeds Library as part of this project which I haven't done for ages and really enjoyed. It really made me think it's something I should be doing a lot more of. Drawing on location can be much more applicable and useful to briefs than I previously thought.

Third 7x7