Here are the final pieces side by side ...
I added in those last few suggestions from my tutorials such as the shadows to finish them. Overall I am really happy with them and how they turned out.
Tutorials
I went to see both Georgina and Dolores with my art.
I went to Georgina first, who suggested I add shadows to my work to make the figures look more grounded. Something I did, as I had intended to do it as shadows were present in my roughs but I had missed them in my finals.
Dolores also liked the outcome but suggested a few tweaks here and there. She liked the boy in green, but felt I ought to darken some of the line art around his skin as when printed I might lose some of the detail as the colours were too similar. I have altered the line colour to make it a little darker in my final pieces.
Other than those few tweaks, the final pieces were approved. I also decided not to try and complete the second fairy idea for the deadline. I felt with the time I had left I wouldn't get it to the same standard as the completed Much Ado idea so in the end there really wouldn't be much of a decision as to which was better. I will however continue with the idea in my own time as I think it would be worth drawing out for a promotional piece or portfolio work.
Finals - Process
Here are the basic steps I went through to create the final piece. I decided to do them as two separate images and place them together at a later stage to make it easier
I started with the girls.
I started with the girls.
1 - I started with the lineart. I traced over the original image, correcting the mistakes in the new lineart. You can see I altered the stance slightly of the second character.
2 - Next I did the block colours. I stuck with my original basic colour scheme of pinks/lilacs and greens. The pink and green work as opposites but I kept them in the same tome so they still worked well together. The second character's colour palette is more similar to the background so you can still definitely see and notice her but not as much as the girl in green, obviously making her the central character.
3 - Next I added the background from the original rough sketch. I really liked the effect and didn't see the need to recreate it when that was exactly what I wanted anyway. I also shaded the image using the selection tool and gradient tool. That was a new way of shading for me, I usually paint in block shadows, but I feel this method worked a lot better.
4 - I coloured the lineart. The black looked good but was slightly too harsh and flattening. By colouring the image,I feel it brings it more off the page.
Next, the boys, following the same process as the girls mostly
1 - I altered the sketch slightly by redrawing the legs.
2 - Block colours. I was using the same colour scheme of green and purple/pink, going more purple with this character. I used slightly different versions of green and purple so they weren't identical to the girls, I felt that wouldn't have looked great. However by using slightly different colours, its easy to see they match the girls, who the couples are and the images work as a set and clearly look like they match.
3 - Shading. Again, I used the gradient tool.
4 - The line art was coloured
Finals - the sketches
Rather than sketch digitally, I sketched the figures for the final piece on paper with pencil. I tend to draw better traditionally but ink and colour better digitally. I made a few proportion mistakes whilst sketching, but I liked the overall expressions and figures too much to do them again when I can draw the figure correctly in photoshop with a tablet.
Here the legs on the guys are slightly out
The second character here is slightly out of proportion from where I've changed my mind on where to put her halfway through sketching
The Pitch
For the Pitch, I took in my two preferred ideas, the fairies and Much Ado and received feedback towards both.
The general feedback was positive towards both ideas. Both of them are extremely different what with one being about the simple characters and the other the entire scene.
It was decided that this piece was a lot better with the addition of the two new characters, it gave it more depth in terms of its narrative.
With the fairies, the feedback I received was that I need to be careful of colours for when it comes to printing, as making the background too dark would mean I would lose detail and I needed to be aware of that.
Both would be suitable for Olio. My general work leans more towards the much ado inspired idea so that might be the better one to focus on, but with the fairy work being slightly different and a bit of a change that would also work well for me to show in Olio. Whilst working on both ideas I couldn't pick which one would be better for Olio and personally liked both, though the much ado idea meant slightly more to me personally than the other. But on a professional level there wasn't one idea that was better than the other. It was decided that it would be my choice, I could do them both and see which came out better
I decided to start working on the Much Ado Inspired piece and see how I felt once that was completed.
Tutorial
Today I had a tutorial with Georgina, just to show my rough ideas before the pitch the next week. She liked both ideas but she had suggested improvements for both.
Much Ado
Georgina suggested that only having the two characters was a little simple. I could perhaps add an outline or shadow of two more characters, one with each of the originals, to add another layer of interest and narrative to the piece. Instead, I decided to fully add in he second characters rather than just hint at them. This filled the page more whilst still keeping it simple and made the previous version look too simple to be of any interest anymore. It did also add more narrative as it made it look more like the two characters were being pushed together by the meddling second pair.
Fairies
For the fairies, Georgina liked the idea of the character sat to the side writing about them but to make her seem more like she was bringing this world to life through her writing, Georgina suggested I put a gradiant over the image so it went from black and white to full colour. I did this with the rough sketch and it definitely worked to add that bit of narrative, to make it seem like the world was coming to life the further through the image you went.
Much Ado
Georgina suggested that only having the two characters was a little simple. I could perhaps add an outline or shadow of two more characters, one with each of the originals, to add another layer of interest and narrative to the piece. Instead, I decided to fully add in he second characters rather than just hint at them. This filled the page more whilst still keeping it simple and made the previous version look too simple to be of any interest anymore. It did also add more narrative as it made it look more like the two characters were being pushed together by the meddling second pair.
Fairies
For the fairies, Georgina liked the idea of the character sat to the side writing about them but to make her seem more like she was bringing this world to life through her writing, Georgina suggested I put a gradiant over the image so it went from black and white to full colour. I did this with the rough sketch and it definitely worked to add that bit of narrative, to make it seem like the world was coming to life the further through the image you went.
Research and Design
I researched general information about letters looking for more inspiration. I looked into some of the origins of letters, like the first stamp. The first stamp used in the British postage system was the penny black in 1840. The first postcard was also sent in 1840 with a penny black stamp.
The victorian era has always been of interest to me, particularly because it links in with another topic I've always been interested in, fairy mythology. Fairy mythology before the victorian era was incredibly dark and twisted but the victorians made light of fairies, turning them from something to be frightened of to the fairies we have today, like the flower fairies imagery.
I used that to inspire an idea for olio. In my sketch I drew a lighter fairy scene, with a girl not from fairy sat to the side, writing a postcard or a letter to someone else about everything in fairy.
I wanted to cram as much into the sketch as possible, the exact opposite to the much ado about nothing sketch. The characters are what is important, but I wanted it to be busy with lots of smaller details to only see if you really look at the picture. I also wanted to prove I could draw a scene rather than just basic characters.
I decided to take both the much ado about nothing piece and the fairy piece for my pitch.
Much Ado About Nothing
In honesty, I was struggling to settle on an idea for Olio that fitted the brief. However, when I was looking at back at research, particularly Romeo and Juliet, I remembered another Shakespeare play. My all time favourite Shakespeare is Much Ado About Nothing, and I remembered a small scene towards the end where Beatrice and Benedick have both written sonnets about the other but have kept them hidden. Hero and Claudio however find them and give them to the other. The small insight into what the other really feels contributes to the plays happy ending and with the little push from Claudio and Hero, the pair are finally together. Here is that particular scene, from the film version with Kenneth Branagh ...
From this, I drew up an Olio design based on this scene. I didn't directly use any of the actors here as reference but used my own characters for it.
From this, I drew up an Olio design based on this scene. I didn't directly use any of the actors here as reference but used my own characters for it.
This is the rough mock up for the much ado about nothing inspired idea. I didn't want to clutter the design with too much of a background, plus my speciality has always been to focus on the characters, so they were the ones I wanted to emphasise in this work. What started out as a rough colour backdrop turned out to look sort of like half of a heart, so I decided to mimic it behind the other character to try and make a subtle heart shape to link the two characters together as being partnering pieces of art work.
I really like this idea. It fits the brief, it's based on something that means a lot to me and it focuses on characters, the thing I feel I'm best at.
Designs
I started to digitally redraw the music idea, but halfway through decided, like with the neighbours idea, something about it wasn't sitting quite right with me. I felt I could come up with a more compelling idea so decided to set this aside for the time being.
I was much happier with this idea. I added in a rough colour palette as well to see what it would look like. With this particular idea, I was thinking of invitations being a form of letter, so here I went with invitations to balls. The colour palette would be the most important aspect of this idea, as I wanted it to be incredibly busy but also all of the attention to be on the main characters, particularly the woman. I wanted this to be the idea of a couple meeting at the ball and all his attention being on her when he first see's her in the dress. There would be people in the background but not fully coloured, like the tonal range project we had with georgina, these would only be in tones and shadows and not fully coloured.
With this one I had the idea to concentrate on personal letters, between family as an example. I was running with the theme of a picture is worth 1000 words, and a collection of photos from one womans life would represent that, the photos acting as a note to the next generation of what she was truly like. I left this still in its basic sketch form, as if I finished it I just wanted it to be in sepia tones of old photographs.
Designs
I moved on to doing my initial ideas digitally in the correct size ratio so it was easier to plan the ideas out. First off, I've redone the neighbours idea. I like it, it's very basic but also quite fun, but something about it isn't sitting right with me.
InDesign
We had a session with Dolores in which she showed us how to use InDesign. Below are my brief notes from the session ...
InDesign
File - new - document [not book]
Add no. of pages, a multiple of 4 for print/ publishing
bleed - how far to edge of page
slug - area outside the bleed
Pages palette
zoom shortcut - alt makes it zoom out
file - place - picture is loaded onto mouse
click and drag to size image, let it go places
draw a frame with no image in it, file - place - open
image goes into empty frame. elliptical tool works too
blue box for resizing goes around frame
select the image
object - fill frame proportionately
pressing w previews the file
fit frame to content - if the frame is a circle it expands to fill as much as possible
use tools that say proportionately
A master in pages palette default
masters act like templates - whatever you put on it goes on everything
You can put page numbers on master pages
shift command as you click something copies it
put A's in each corner then current page, number - command shift - object - arrange - bring to front, number goes over everything else
Place - can be used on text document
insert image into text - place image on new page
window - text wrap
wrap type - detect edges
file - packages
everything gets saved together in folder
InDesign
File - new - document [not book]
Add no. of pages, a multiple of 4 for print/ publishing
bleed - how far to edge of page
slug - area outside the bleed
Pages palette
zoom shortcut - alt makes it zoom out
file - place - picture is loaded onto mouse
click and drag to size image, let it go places
draw a frame with no image in it, file - place - open
image goes into empty frame. elliptical tool works too
blue box for resizing goes around frame
select the image
object - fill frame proportionately
pressing w previews the file
fit frame to content - if the frame is a circle it expands to fill as much as possible
use tools that say proportionately
A master in pages palette default
masters act like templates - whatever you put on it goes on everything
You can put page numbers on master pages
shift command as you click something copies it
put A's in each corner then current page, number - command shift - object - arrange - bring to front, number goes over everything else
Place - can be used on text document
insert image into text - place image on new page
window - text wrap
wrap type - detect edges
file - packages
everything gets saved together in folder
Colour Work and Idea Development
I had a sudden new idea for Olio, most probably coming from the research of the more romance based novels and films as well as Paperman. I had the idea of two people living next to one another, with the man who has decided to try to get the girls attention so sends her a note via paper airplane.
With Georgina, I took the rough sketch and looked at tonal values and how they affect an image. With the neighbours sketch I painted with watercolours the tonal values, splitting it into 3 shades as best I could. It was really useful as tone isn't something I usually think about in its most basic form. Its also good to consider what with creating an image intended for print - if there isn't that much of a tonal range the image may lose details when printed I hadn't thought about previously.
We then used a limited colour palette and coloured the image according to the tonal values we'd already laid out. I was struggling to use watercolour so swapped to use pencils.
Whilst looking at tone, this was also my way of experimenting with watercolours and pencils as perhaps a possibility of working with them for Olio. I never usually use them, mostly because I'm not particularly keen on watercolour. That hasn't changed as I found using them for tones extremely difficult. Pencil I feel would also not be a good idea. I'm better with them than watercolour, but with having to scan and reprint the image I felt there was a greater chance of losing detail and the image not looking its best. Therefore I decided to stick with my tried and tested method of colouring my work digitally.
Ideas Development
For my initial two ideas I expanded on them and drew them in proportion to the sizes of the Olio.
For the mermaid, I had to turn her on her side. I couldn't think of an image to lay alongside it, I felt this particular idea was better being solitary. However, I think this particular idea may now need to be put to one side as I feel it loses something being turned horizontally. Also with the gutter you would lose part of the mermaids tail and the image wouldn't flow as well. I think I will revisit the idea for personal work but for Olio I wouldn't be happy to compromise what I think would be a better layout to make it fit this page size.
Working with the Letters to Juliet, I decided to make two separate images. I liked the period idea, of drawing the young girl next to the wall, as if she were actually Juliet. In this sketch I've toyed with the idea of contrasting the old image with a modern setting, a modern home with a girl in modern clothes writing a letter to Juliet. I feel that would show the whole idea of letters to Juliet well. It's a nice idea but personally doesn't feel right to me.
Developing Ideas
I drew a second version of the letters to Juliet idea, adding a little more detail with putting the letters into the wall.
After a session with Georgina where we discussed ideas, I was given an idea by a friend when we were discussing the suggestions laid out in our initial brief. I took the idea of a message in a bottle and wanted to play with it. What if it wasn't someone putting the message in a bottle I could draw but someone taking it out? I decided on a mermaid who likes to collect bottles, but can't understand the paper bits inside so just pulls them out and discards them.
Both would need a second image accompanying them or turning to cover the double spread by themselves.
Initial Ideas
I started to sketch out some very rough initial ideas but only in single panels to start with.
Left - I had the idea of someone receiving a letter from a credit card company, so the main character would be sat on the floor of her room surrounded by piles of clothes, accessories etc. Very much inspired by Confessions of a Shopaholic.
Right - an initial sketch with Letters to Juliet in mind, a young girl in period dress sat with the wall from the film behind her.
I also had an idea based around the music I looked at earlier. One panel, a boy trying to write/ compose, in the next a girl sat listening to the radio, as if she were listening to his song he wrote for her - a message just for her.
Beatrix Potter
Whilst doing research, I looked briefly at Beatrix Potter. She is perhaps one of the most relevant artists to relate to Olio because before she even began her books, she was writing stories about Peter rabbit in letters to the son of a former governess which she also illustrated for him. He had been ill and she sought to entertain him with her stories. The letters are what ultimately turned into the books we all know and love today.
Whilst the illustrations in the letters aren't the full colour versions, they are like the small sketches that can be seen throughout her works between the full page colour illustrations.
Whilst the illustrations in the letters aren't the full colour versions, they are like the small sketches that can be seen throughout her works between the full page colour illustrations.
Reference
Ideas and Research
A few ideas I had for Olio ...
- Letters to Santa
- Letter in a bottle
As well as normal letters, I found a few examples of other kinds of messages from one person to another. I looked at Paperman, the short film by Disney ...
Research - Songs
I also looked at songs and song lyrics for initial inspiration. Below are some examples of what I found ...
This song is more about leaving a voicemail message than a letter but it's still a message
This song is more about leaving a voicemail message than a letter but it's still a message
Here is the link for my Pinterest board dedicated to Olio - there are both videos and images related to research influences, ideas and possible drawing references for later in the project ...
Research - Films and Books
When looking at Olio, a lot of my ideas have initially come from books and films I have read and seen.
In a sense, I feel books themselves count under the category of letters - they are a message from one person to another through written words which often affect the readers just as much as personal letters.
Below are a couple of examples of romance books, films and plays I looked at that contain letters ...
Me Before You - Jojo Moyes
The letter in this book is written from one friend to another and doesn't appear until the very end, but the use of it is incredibly poignant. It's highly emotional and thought provoking, the point of the whole book. The emotion is again the whole point of the written letter.
P.S I Love you (2007)
based on the book, by Cecelia Ahern
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In a sense, I feel books themselves count under the category of letters - they are a message from one person to another through written words which often affect the readers just as much as personal letters.
Below are a couple of examples of romance books, films and plays I looked at that contain letters ...
Me Before You - Jojo Moyes
The letter in this book is written from one friend to another and doesn't appear until the very end, but the use of it is incredibly poignant. It's highly emotional and thought provoking, the point of the whole book. The emotion is again the whole point of the written letter.
P.S I Love you (2007)
based on the book, by Cecelia Ahern
The whole plot for this story revolves around letters. It's highly emotional, like with Me Before You, and the theme's revolving around the letters are romantic and about letting go.
Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare
Romeo and Juliet has been retold several times in all sorts of film adaptations revolving around the original play. In the story, letters that are meant to be passed on to Romeo to explain the plan to fake Juliet's death never reach their destination and as such result in the plays tragic ending.
Pride and Prejudice (2005)
based on the book by Jane Austen
Pride and Prejudice (2005) is one of my favourite films, which also contains letters. Darcy leaves Elizabeth a letter when they fall out and he wants to explain to her his reasoning for his actions. The letter leaves more of an impression on her than his spoken words probably would have.
Our Girl (BBC TV Series, 2014)
This drama from the BBC focused in an army medic, Molly, away in Afghanistan. Whilst it touched briefly on letters home in the programme, the writers of the show wrote fictional letters between the main characters and relatives back home that were posted on the facebook page for the show as promotion.
Research - Letters to Juliet
One of the first main ideas I had for Olio was to base it around the film, Letters to Juliet (2010).
The main idea of the film revolves around Juliets balcony in Verona where women who visit leave letters addressed to Juliet between the stones, asking for advice. In the film there is a committee of women who take these letters and write back to the women as Juliet.
In reality, women from all over the world write letters addressed to Juliet and send them to Verona. Opposite the balcony is an office home to 'Juliet's secretaries' who all respond to these letters they receive. They are called 'Club di Giulietta' or 'Juliet's Club', and were set up in the late 80's.
The whole idea is highly romantic. All of the secretaries are volunteers, none are paid to write back to the thousands of letters they receive. I like the romantic notion, and according to the daily mail interview I found (link below) the notion of writing letters addressed to Juliet is what the secretaries themselves love because of how personal and romantic it makes it. Letters just say so much more than emails, especially when the subject is such a personal one.
The main idea of the film revolves around Juliets balcony in Verona where women who visit leave letters addressed to Juliet between the stones, asking for advice. In the film there is a committee of women who take these letters and write back to the women as Juliet.
In reality, women from all over the world write letters addressed to Juliet and send them to Verona. Opposite the balcony is an office home to 'Juliet's secretaries' who all respond to these letters they receive. They are called 'Club di Giulietta' or 'Juliet's Club', and were set up in the late 80's.
The whole idea is highly romantic. All of the secretaries are volunteers, none are paid to write back to the thousands of letters they receive. I like the romantic notion, and according to the daily mail interview I found (link below) the notion of writing letters addressed to Juliet is what the secretaries themselves love because of how personal and romantic it makes it. Letters just say so much more than emails, especially when the subject is such a personal one.
Ideas
In a session with Georgina, we split into small groups and put together a collection of words and topics we thought could relate to the initial theme of letters.
We also each wrote our own definition of what we considered a letter to be.
Letter - a message from one person to another, given when the sender cannot be there to say it for themselves
We also each wrote our own definition of what we considered a letter to be.
Letter - a message from one person to another, given when the sender cannot be there to say it for themselves
First Olio Session
25/9/14 Session
Brief: The Letter
'To produce a 2 page spread or 2 single images of narrative imagery using the theme of a letter written to from someone to someone else.'
Crit/ Rough deadline - 6th Nov
Final Deadline - 10th Dec
For the rough deadline we will present 2 ideas, roughly drawn but clear intentions, which the 'client' will choose from.
In the session, we looked at ideas around the letters theme in groups.
My initial thoughts/ ideas for the brief ...
Brief: The Letter
'To produce a 2 page spread or 2 single images of narrative imagery using the theme of a letter written to from someone to someone else.'
Crit/ Rough deadline - 6th Nov
Final Deadline - 10th Dec
For the rough deadline we will present 2 ideas, roughly drawn but clear intentions, which the 'client' will choose from.
In the session, we looked at ideas around the letters theme in groups.
My initial thoughts/ ideas for the brief ...
- Letters to Juliet - both the film and the real thing.
- P.S I love you - the film/book
- War letters - Letters sent from and too the front
- Telegrams
- personal letters - letters I have been sent/ found from members of my family
- Unwanted letters - bills from credit card companies etc
- Letter in a bottle - as suggested in the brief, but I like the idea of playing with a pirate theme
Professional Practice
The Aims
For this module, we will focus on the professional work practice of an illustrator and will begin to prepare for self employment. We will be gaining insight into the field through work experience and lectures that will include what we will need to know as a freelance illustrator. These things will include web presence, how to sell your work through the use of portfolio, copyright etc to name just a few. This will benefit me as it will direct how I go about getting started as a potential freelance illustrator.
Sessions
CV Session
How to get the job you love.
Think about what your USP is. Never say Quite good/ I think etc.
As a illustration student I would most likely need both a creative CV and a skills CV - the skills CV having the simpler layout and used for jobs not based in a creative industry, for example if I was simply looking for part time work.
A skills CV needs;
- Paid Employment and Work Experience (including from when at school.
- References - available on request
- Education (starting with newest and going back to GCSE’S but can leave them off if necessary)
- Skills (a good word to repeat throughout)
- Hobbies and interests
- Personal contact details (photo and DOB not necessary)
- Personal Profile (3-4 sentences about myself to grab attention)
With a creative CV, add links for portfolio’s and relevant blogs. It’s a good idea to use an image that represents my work.
Always send a covering letter unless it says not too.
Always check for grammar mistakes.
We also looked at what kind of jobs we could go into with an Illustration degree. Obviously freelance illustration but there was also publishing, artist in residence, concept artist, art therapy, architectural illustrator, editorial illustrator, children's book illustrator, agencies etc. Freelance, children's book illustration and publishing all sounded interesting to me and things I would possibly want to look into in the future.
We also looked at what kind of jobs we could go into with an Illustration degree. Obviously freelance illustration but there was also publishing, artist in residence, concept artist, art therapy, architectural illustrator, editorial illustrator, children's book illustrator, agencies etc. Freelance, children's book illustration and publishing all sounded interesting to me and things I would possibly want to look into in the future.
Georgina Hounsome & Fumio Obata
Our lecturers, Fumio and Georgina spoke to us about their personal work and professional experiences within the illustration industry. Fumio talked us through how he constructs his work and also gave us a lot of advice in looking into contracts with things such as translation rights being a big thing to consider I otherwise wouldn’t have given much thought too. He talked us through his own experiences of publishing his books and how it can be a difficult process sometimes and takes a long time.
Self Promotion
He also told us about LinkedIn, the online version of a cv and he recommend us join it to start making connections through the various companies and groups that exist on the site.
Group Project
As a small group of 6, we were given the task of organising a hypothetical event with a £200 budget. Our group decided to organise an exhibition, with the theme of ‘being young’ as the idea behind it would be to display pieces of our own work in our first exhibition. We each took a part of the project to organise. Below are the lists we drew up for each category we assigned ourselves to organise.
Artists
Becky's area was artists. below is a breakdown of the presentation she made. Its consists of examples of artwork from everyone in our group as well as a selection of local and relevant artists to our event we could ask to be a part of our exhibition as we thought having work from more established artists featured alongside our own might draw more people in to the exhibition. There are also examples of pieces of work from other students on our course who we thought could also take part.
Location
Lucy M looked at location. She looked at a few different places before settling on the chapel at university. It would be a large space free for us to use that already had most of the facilities we would need.
Advertising
Liam looked at advertising. Among other things he looked into the cost of printing things such as posters and also the various ways of spreading the word through the use of social media. he looked into things like twitter and publishing the event onto facebook.
Georgia and I looked at organising the launch night. Bearing in the mind the theme of being young, we looked at the different decorations available to us for the launch night. We decided to go with more 90's decorations seen as we all shared that decade as our childhood, so we looked at balloons, banners etc and the price of them, as well as thinking of 90's background music for the night. we also looked up how much food and drink would cost and what we would need in total.
Anna and Lucy B looked into fundraising. Looking at what the rest of us had planned we would need to spend in each area they came up with a rough sum we would need to put on the event. next they looked at various ways to raise the money for the event.
Portfolio
We looked at what we should and shouldn’t put into a portfolio, such as not including development work. With a portfolio, you can make it specialist on one subject or put a more varied selection of pieces in, both of which have their pro’s and cons. If you put only one type of artwork in then you may be limiting yourself but showing that you are good at that area. Put in a variety and you may come across as not having any specialist area, but you are a more diverse artist. Tailoring a portfolio to fit who you are showing it to is a good idea, as well as limiting your images to around 10. Never put original artwork into a portfolio, that way it won’t get damaged through transport but who you are showing it to can see how your work comes across in a printed format, as they won’t be using original work if its intended to be mass produced. Keep the images in the same orientation within the portfolio so you don’t have to turn it around for every other image and consider the type of paper and paper quality you will be printing your portfolio onto. We looked at how to make a portfolio, from a standard idea of a portfolio to presenting it as a concertina book, an animation, a printed book or even a box set. The portfolio I made was with a french fold [can be found in the evidence folder]. In my first portfolio I included cartoons, realistic digital paintings and traditional realistic drawings; I chose to show my variety of work rather than focus on a singular style entirely, though i did include more cartoon style images than any other. As a second example I made a small version of a concertina portfolio. This one was more of a demo as it was a smaller size then I'd probably really want it. there also aren't as many images in this one, only 6. These 6 however are my favourite cartoon illustrations and the ones I am happiest with enough to show. With this portfolio i chose to focus on one single kind of illustration rather than showing the variety.
We also looked at how a standard interview works in relation to showing your portfolio; talk about your work, why you’ve approached that given company, your professional qualities and most importantly show that you care.
Pricing
We looked at how to price various pieces of work. Georgina talked us through various different illustration pieces and what you could be expected to charge for producing them according to the guides on the Association of Illustrators website.
When it comes to your work you often sell a licence for its particular use, rather than just selling the copyright. more than one licence may be needed e.g. a cover for a book would need a second license for a different country. Things to consider with a licence are its use, duration, area and exclusivity.
magazines and papers
-cover - £500-£1000
- inside illustrations - £150 - £450 depending on size
- full page inside illustrations - £450 - £800
book covers £400 - £1000, depending on how well they anticipate the book to sell.
hardcovers pay less
CD and records
similar to book covers
would need to have one licence for cover and another for merchandising
Educational books, low pay for lots of work
£300 - £500 for a double spread
Childrens picture books
You can be paid an advance of £3000 - £5000 but you don't earn royalties until the advance is met by sales. Advance is also paid in instalments so isn't always practical, it can take a long time for a book to get published and result in earning money from it; paid at contract being signed, delivery of artwork and publication.
Work out acceptable minimum rate for work.
Greetings cards - £150 - £250 per design. Bad pay.
Brochures
£400- £1200 cover
£250 - £1000 inside
Packaging
£250 (for small design, like an easter egg box) up to £1500
Advertising
Largest fees.
1/4 page black & white £600, full page £1000 - £2500
Re-use fee's
Discount of original price, usually around 50%
Rejection fee's
rough stage - paid 25%
artwork - 50%
rejection fee's are rare to have to deal with.
Cancellation fee's
25% paid even before completed roughs
33% at roughs
100% on delivery of full artwork
basically they pay for the percentage of the work you have done, though when it is 100% completed and there is a cancellation fee the client still retains the right to use the artwork at a later date.
When it comes to your work you often sell a licence for its particular use, rather than just selling the copyright. more than one licence may be needed e.g. a cover for a book would need a second license for a different country. Things to consider with a licence are its use, duration, area and exclusivity.
magazines and papers
-cover - £500-£1000
- inside illustrations - £150 - £450 depending on size
- full page inside illustrations - £450 - £800
book covers £400 - £1000, depending on how well they anticipate the book to sell.
hardcovers pay less
CD and records
similar to book covers
would need to have one licence for cover and another for merchandising
Educational books, low pay for lots of work
£300 - £500 for a double spread
Childrens picture books
You can be paid an advance of £3000 - £5000 but you don't earn royalties until the advance is met by sales. Advance is also paid in instalments so isn't always practical, it can take a long time for a book to get published and result in earning money from it; paid at contract being signed, delivery of artwork and publication.
Work out acceptable minimum rate for work.
Greetings cards - £150 - £250 per design. Bad pay.
Brochures
£400- £1200 cover
£250 - £1000 inside
Packaging
£250 (for small design, like an easter egg box) up to £1500
Advertising
Largest fees.
1/4 page black & white £600, full page £1000 - £2500
Re-use fee's
Discount of original price, usually around 50%
Rejection fee's
rough stage - paid 25%
artwork - 50%
rejection fee's are rare to have to deal with.
Cancellation fee's
25% paid even before completed roughs
33% at roughs
100% on delivery of full artwork
basically they pay for the percentage of the work you have done, though when it is 100% completed and there is a cancellation fee the client still retains the right to use the artwork at a later date.
Agents
Along with pricing, we discussed the pro's and cons of having an agent. On the plus side, they could help you find work as well as sort out pricing, contracts etc so if you aren't particularly savvy with those sorts of things you wouldn't have to worry about doing it. However, you would obviously have to pay an agency a fee, so it really depends on how comfortable you are with sorting fee's and contracts by yourself. If you aren't keen on sorting that it would probably be worthwhile getting an agent so its one less thing to worry about. Personally i think getting an agent is the better idea.
Research
As additional research, some friends and I attended a recording for BBC Radio 4 on the subject of how to construct a successful character. The pan
I used Pinterest to gather together idea’s and inspirations for creating professional promotional material
- The Association of Illustrators website
Contains all the relevant information for commissions.
- Sea Lemon on youtube
I found this really useful as there are a huge amount of videos to do with crafts relevant to my practice. The main relevance being the video used to help make our first portfolio’s.
This being the specific video we used in our session about creating a portfolio.
What do artists do all day - BBC 4 documentary - Jack Vettriano
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=902K9eWfNX0
What do artists do all day - BBC 4 documentary - Jack Vettriano
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=902K9eWfNX0
As research for my own work i looked at several online videos with Brian Kesinger. Kesinger is an american storyboard artist for Disney. He published a video showing the process behind a few of his art pieces which I found highly interesting and relevant to my own work.
I also found a video of an interview with him conducted by DeviantArt, an art website used to share, sell and give feedback on artwork. Kesinger talks about the importance of being in a community for art to get feedback, something I consider to be a huge part of any illustrators professional practice.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPMfdhHCziM
Kesinger also goes briefly through his own practice of creating the images and touches briefly on being approached by a publisher with the idea of turning his characters sketches into a book. It's something to consider with my own practice as I work mostly with characters but haven't really thought about a way in which to present them in which to sell them. A book of character sketches and scenario's is something that really interests me as I take great inspiration from Kesingers work.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BNxbt4_tS0A&list=WL5qVMV9Zr5PoBlUa8dhf_Ug&index=83
Kesinger also goes briefly through his own practice of creating the images and touches briefly on being approached by a publisher with the idea of turning his characters sketches into a book. It's something to consider with my own practice as I work mostly with characters but haven't really thought about a way in which to present them in which to sell them. A book of character sketches and scenario's is something that really interests me as I take great inspiration from Kesingers work.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BNxbt4_tS0A&list=WL5qVMV9Zr5PoBlUa8dhf_Ug&index=83
When looking into blogs, I looked to other artists, most notably abigail Larson. her own website is on blogger, the same blogging platform I'm using for my own blog. I got more of an idea of how to lay things out and what to put into my blog from looking to hers for inspiration.
http://www.abigaillarson.com
http://www.abigaillarson.com
As additional research, some friends and I attended a recording for BBC Radio 4 on the subject of how to construct a successful character. The panel was made up of actors and authors discussing their favourite characters from their favourite radio shows/literature etc. I found it useful as in a lot of my artwork I create narrative and characters so the discussion was very insightful.
I also visited the London Book Fair in April with the university. Whilst there, we browsed the various stands and gathered business cards and contact information of various publishing houses for later reference.
Work Experience Report
For my work experience, I chose to break it down into 5 separate activities looking at 5 slightly different aspects of the illustration related field in the hopes of gaining more insight into wider topics surrounding illustration work.
For my first day of work experience, I volunteered to help at the Cheltenham Illustration Awards tent where all the artwork linked to the awards was being displayed. The work experience involved staying with the tent for the allotted amount of time and speaking to the general public as they came in to view the work. We answered any general questions they had about the awards and the artwork, as well as our own experiences and talking about our own work and link with the university. The day was very much like working in a standard art gallery. Personally, I found the day moved very slowly, although it was interesting to talk to everyone about the art and to hear the various opinions, as well as have the time to view the artwork for myself. The time of day I was allotted to help, there were very few people wandering around the festival so for the most part the tent was extremely quiet. I found the work too slow in pace and although gallery work would be a good job to link in well with illustration, it didn’t suite me.
For my second day of work experience, I visited Beehive Illustration. Beehive illustration is an illustration agency based in Cirencester and for that day it’s founder, Paul Beebee, allowed me to interview him about the business (a summary of which can be found in my evidence folder for the module).
I found the interview incredibly helpful. The whole team at Beehive were easy to talk too and happy to answer any of my questions about the business. They were also very down to earth, knowing that the business of illustration can be a difficult one, and very realistic in their advice. Having more of an insight into how the agency works has given me more confidence in going to agencies in the future - the insight into how they work takes away the mystery and has made me feel more at ease in approaching agencies in the first place.
Next, I chose to enter a drawing competition online called secret 7”. For the competition they give you a list of songs which you then have to design an LP cover for. The rules were that you couldn't include any text saying the name or artist for the song. A number of designs are chosen, printed and sold for charity, with the buyer not knowing what song it is they actually have, they only have the artwork to go on. I find the competition very useful as it helped in giving me more of an idea of working towards a short deadline; I found the competition very close to its closing date so had to work with the knowledge of those time restraints without sacrificing quality of work. By the very nature of the competition it also gave me a more realistic view of what would be expected in a professional sense as what I was drawing was restricted to what the competition rules demanded. Yes the whole idea was to give my own interpretation of the list of songs given so was not as restricted as it could have been, but none of these were personally to my taste. However, I did enjoy pushing myself to fulfil the brief on time and I often listen to music while working, so it wasn’t straying too far from my normal practice, but just enough to give me that bit more of an idea of taking it to a more professional level. I definitely learnt along the way to be mindful of the image quality when pushed for time. Looking back it was not my best work and I could easily point out parts of the image I would now wish to change.
The next part of my work experience was definitely the most helpful in terms of my own practice in a professional place. A friend got in contact with me asking for me to do a commission for him. He was planning on publishing a small ebook and asked for me to design the books front cover. As my first real commission, I jumped at the chance to work with him on the project. Although with this commission I knew I would be catering to what the client wanted within the image with very little freedom, I still enjoyed the process. I learnt how important it is to keep in contact and converse well with the client so both parties are understood in reference to the image. The client was clear to me in what he wanted and I was able to discuss this with him and develop a few ideas of fonts and compositions for the image. I learnt it was a good idea to do rough sketches to show the client first off, something with my personal work I very rarely do but was necessary here. There was no point in rushing into the full finished piece when that wasn’t what the client wanted. Changes were easy to make in these initial stages as I kept in touch with the client so he was informed at every stage.
For my final day of work experience, I got in touch with one of my favourite current illustrators, Abigail Larson. Abigail Larson is an american freelance artist who kindly answered some of my questions by email (a summary of which can be found in my evidence folder). To me this brief interview meant a lot as she is at a stage where I would love my own professional practice to one day be. She was very kind and again, open and realistic with her answers which gave me a little more confidence in pushing myself with my own work. She is also a relatively new freelance illustrator so has very recently gone through the process of becoming a freelance and gaining a name for herself as an illustrator. Because of this I feel her experiences will be much more relevant to my view of a current freelance artist and my own practice than others may be.
Throughout all 5 days of work experience, I learnt a multitude of things in relation to the professional side of the illustration related industry. First off, there is no typical work experience when it comes to the field of illustration. In both the interviews, the subject of ‘there is no typical day’ came up. Every day is different, as is every branch of illustration I looked into as part of this module. Another point which came up across all areas is the idea to have good communication skills. Within the interviews, understanding clients and talking to the general public, the most important thing is communication; being unable to get across your point or idea results in confusion and not getting the right work that a client may want. Time management also came up as a big factor in my learning curve. Whilst speaking to Beehive Illustration, I learnt that they are always pushing their illustrators to meet their agreed deadlines for their clients. This is something I learnt first hand as being important when I entered the competition, pushing myself to the set deadline. The commission did not have a set deadline but the idea in my head was always to get the work done as quickly as possible for the clients book without rushing the artwork. Time management is something I can see me needing to work on but with this process I saw just how much it comes up as being an important factor in an illustrators professional practice. All of the things I learnt from work experience, I already knew I had to bare in mind for the future, but as I was yet to actually experience them first hand, they were abstract matters to me. Now though, I have much more of an idea of the field of work in general and how these matters are relevant to me and my own practice.
Promotion Work
Business Cards
Business cards are an important part of freelance work as its the one thing a potential client can take away with them. Below are a few examples of demo cards.
For my first example I used a piece of my work that I liked, focused in on the features and put it into a typical size of business card. I ended up putting a white gradient over the image otherwise whatever text I put over the top would be lost to the background. I chose to fade the white into the image to blend them and compliment the image. However, I still slightly lose the text which isn't what I want. With the second I put a more definitive line between the image and where the text would be. I experimented with using my own handwriting for the text which I like for my name, but perhaps isn't the best thing when it comes to the contact details as there is more room for incorrectly reading things such as the email address.
I played around with the typography, using a preset type but I felt that wasn't that creative.
So in the end i settled with a mix of handwriting and preset type.
i also decided that it might be a good idea to put something on the back of the business card, and the originals of both pieces I used for the demo cards were roughly the right dimensions for the card, so I decided to put the full piece on the back.
As the images fit into the right dimensions for business cards, I also though that they could be enlarged and printed as postcards etc for self promotion.
CV
For this module I have created both a skills CV and a creative CV (both of which can be found in my evidence folder). For my skills CV, I based it around what the careers team told us in our earlier session on CV's. For my creative CV however I looked a lot at examples I found on Pinterest for inspiration. I started by roughly drawing out some thumbnails for possible ideas and layouts.
CV
For this module I have created both a skills CV and a creative CV (both of which can be found in my evidence folder). For my skills CV, I based it around what the careers team told us in our earlier session on CV's. For my creative CV however I looked a lot at examples I found on Pinterest for inspiration. I started by roughly drawing out some thumbnails for possible ideas and layouts.
Next I did some rough sketches of characters. I drew my favourite human character, my favourite animal character and then a quick sketch of myself. I wasn't entirely happy with the sketch of myself so I proceeded to ink in the other 2 and scan and colour them.
I tried to incorporate both sketches into the CV design but it looked too cluttered, hence why only one character appears in the final version.
My Links
As a way of promoting my work, I created a a blog for my personal work and an account on deviantart. Whilst my blogger site is new, my deviantart account is something I've had for a while but I still use to post work.
http://amymusgrave.blogspot.co.uk
http://reeniesteam.deviantart.com
Bibliography
http://www.pinterest.com/amymusgrave93/uni-professional-practice/ Last accessed 2nd May 2014
http://www.theaoi.com Last accessed 2nd May 2014
https://www.youtube.com/user/SeaLemonDIY/videos Last accessed 2nd May 2014
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-r6c_trSxY Last accessed 2nd May 2014
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkSZ8CLUdTs Last accessed 2nd May 2014
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPMfdhHCziM Last accessed 2nd May 2014
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=902K9eWfNX0 Last accessed 5th May 2014
http://reeniesteam.deviantart.com Last accessed 5th May 2014
http://amymusgrave.blogspot.co.uk Last accessed 5th May 2014
http://www.abigaillarson.com Last accessed 5th May 2014
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=902K9eWfNX0 Last accessed 5th May 2014
http://reeniesteam.deviantart.com Last accessed 5th May 2014
http://amymusgrave.blogspot.co.uk Last accessed 5th May 2014
http://www.abigaillarson.com Last accessed 5th May 2014
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