The Discussion Forums

1) 'Digital vs Print'

 Nathaniel and I presented our chosen discussion forum to the rest of the students. We talked about the negative effect digital media is having on print sales and how this will effect us as illustrators in a faster-progressing world.

 I believe the reason to why digital media is causing this is because of people's lack of motivation. The internet has proven to be a quicker way to gain information than to visit a library and read a book. People nowadays take the quickest route to all sources.

 We went on to discuss the advantage digital media has over hand-rendered work when it comes to moving an image. A way in which illustrators can embark on traditionalist methods in moving an image is through, for example, pop-up books. This is a limited field of course, but it requires no digital involvement and can obtain a far more charming interaction with the reader, as opposed to a .gif on a computer screen.

 Digital has the upper-hand naturally with the use of digital recording equipment. The traditionalist way to make something move on screen would obviously have to be the medium of film. Digital media has caused these methods to be almost non-existent on the current market.

 We do indeed live in a digital world but maybe it isn't such a difficult thing to incorporate the two together to gain more variety.


2) 'Where is the content? Where is the comment?'

 The students who presented this discussion had read an article by Lawrence Zeegen who criticized the state of illustration today for excelling in aesthetics, but lacking in meaning.

 He backs up this argument with David Shrigley's 'Fight the Nothingness' poster that was hung up outside Hayward Gallery in London. It is a protest by Shrigley to influence other illustrators to apply meaning in their work rather than put all the time and effort into just the draughtsmanship.

 Zeegan claims that illustration has lost its way from discussing social topics into just becoming just a vacuous streamline. I agree with what the article is stating. Indeed this is happening, especially in the digital purist realm of illustration, and the market for 'pretty pictures' so to speak is becoming a hazard to what people perceive as 'good' art and 'bad' art.

 In the eyes of a conventionalist, the works of Shrigley would be automatically considered 'bad' art (if there is such a thing) and only 'good' art would come from the likes of fine artists due to they're aesthetic taste.


3) 'Taste'

 The students leading this discussion forum had answered the questions provided relating to a quote from a blog named 'Key Ideas' by Daryl Clifton. It discusses the role of taste and how it alters our lives.

 It raises the question that as students learning about the art industry, are we working to how we want to work or are we just making other people happy? My answer to that would be that I take a little bit from column A and a little bit from column B. An example of the way I like to work would have been in The Big Sleep project with the sketchbook development I conjured. Column B applies because I felt my final outcome was trying to be stylized somewhat in order to be successful in the competition.

 The likes of other people judging for themselves what is tasteful and what isn't is all a trend. It happens in fashion all the time. Last week it was 90's grunge, now this week it's 80's disco. Nobody truly has authority over that decision.

 In the case of fashion, taste is hard to come by, especially if you're some way influenced by what is considered tasteful. Taste derives from within and I feel that some people are too afraid to express their true taste due to trends and such. If your work suddenly appears original and it is published, your work will no doubt become unoriginal in a week's time.

Creative Review

1) Paper Tigers, Peter Lyle

 After making a presentation based around this Varoom article for context early this 2nd year, I feel it made an impression on my work. Lyle discusses how Le Gun (an underground illustration zine) is rebelling against the commercial influence in illustrative production. They also state that digital mediums should only be used as a tool because it is currently replacing our natural art heritage of hand-rendered work.

 This theme has come up a few times during the course of the year: within context, the discussion forums and the advice people have given me about my working methods. I feel that illustration and art aren't what they once were, such as the great movements of the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. That period in time posed as modernism, and I believe that what this article is proposing is that we are living in a post-modern world where commercialism has devoured everything that was once underground and has simply plastered it all onto t-shirts. The article has made me more cynical I think, but it's at least raised my awareness.

2) Ways of Seeing, John Berger

 I read this book to gain knowledge on how to better my critical writing skills. As well as that, it opened my eyes a lot more than they once were. Each of the essays within it increased my perception of things around me, such as: how we view art and where we view it (it's location being in various contexts). The essay that caught my attention most of all was the role that women play in society.

 Berger discusses that women are the surveyed gender in society and that they are not only surveyed by men, but by themselves. I studied English Literature and History at A Level and both subjects included and delved into this social factor. Men have objectified women for centuries! The way I read it from those two subjects and from Berger's discussion, is that women are almost sometimes considered to be a sub-gender (even in today's world, both in Western and Eastern culture). Being a man, I perceive women just as equally as I do other men. It saddens me to think this has been happening for so long and it still continues today as though it's a social norm.

 The reason why Berger exclaims that women survey themselves just as much as men do onto them, is because of the pressure placed upon them by the long-reigning patriarchal society. It also makes me wonder as to why women must suffer monthly periods and child birth too.

3) Manic (film)

 I watched this film recently with my girlfriend and I really enjoyed it. It's about a teenager named Lyle (played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt) who gets admitted to a juvenile psychiatric ward because he beats someone up with a baseball bat. He has anger issues relating to his abusive relationship with his father.

 The reason I like this film is because of the confined relationships he is forced to create with people in the ward. He befriends two people, Kenny and Chad, who both have similar social problems, and has a sexual relationship with a girl named Tracy (played by Zooey Deschanel) who has reoccurring nightmares of herself being raped. His relationship with Chad turns out the strongest due to their similar interests in music and their desire to escape the place to go to Amsterdam.

 A connection and symbol within the film relating to the study of art is the scene where Sara and Chad are debating over what van Gogh's painting Wheat Field with Crows means. Sara says, "freedom" and Chad cynically responds that it is about, "depression and confinement because of the borders."

 The main reason I enjoyed this film is because it brings back a sense of nostalgia of the 1990's. This is evident in my work because I particularly loved American cartoons and the music from that era. There is a scene in the film that evokes a great sensation in me. It's the scene when Chad puts the song Headup by Deftones on the stereo and everyone starts moshing out together. The sense of community I feel whenever I'm in a full-on moshpit at a gig is one of the best feelings ever...

 Best scene ever.

'The birth of Radio' Animation

 I have finally finished the animation for the brief and have uploaded it onto YouTube. Here it is:

 There was a lot of editing to be made in After Effects which made me panic slightly due to the massive workload that also needed to be in. When I got to uni, I photographed each frame using a vertical stand for my camera so it would remain in the exact same spot as it took each picture. I then imported all the images into After Effects and began adjusting the time sequence so that each morphed image would run parallel with the sound of the broadcast. I made the reversals too by swapping round the frames in correspondence to the next subject being discussed by the broadcast. When I finished that, I moved onto adjusting the constant horizontal line. I realised it was too central within the frame and it was causing the tops of some of the images to be cut off. I went into the filter section and increased the contrast and levels which made the white background and black lines a flat colour. I then added another flat white background to fill in the entire space behind the frames. This allowed me to be able to drag the sequence down a third without there being a different shade above. I re-scanned some of the frames that had this problem and replaced the originals with them. Also what I could do is rub out some of the smudges that appear too often due to the background being a solid white colour. I could probably edit this tomorrow and render it again.

 I believe I have responded to the brief well with this piece. My reasoning for the constant line and the morphing forms was because it connoted with how radio signals are read. The flickering line almost represents both the speaker's voices as though they are speaking to the listener through radio communication. It also illustrates the historical information they speak of by morphing into what they are describing. Animation and sound together make very effective composition with one another. The two compliment one another through expressionism.

 I can't believe it's the end of 2nd year! I hope I do well in this project and the other two.

1, 2, 3 Best Pieces of Advice

1. "David Shrigley, Paul Davis and Bragg - soon started to establish a school of drawing chic that prized emotional honesty over visual spectacle and charm over draughtsmanship, and saw crossings-out and wayward grammar as more forgiveable than vacuous sterile polish." Peter Lyle

 This quote was taken from the Varoom article, Paper Tigers. This is not necessarily advice due to it being a quote, but rather more a source of influence. I feel that in my work that the more raw the image is, the better! Once I place an image into Photoshop to clean up, it loses its soul. The process of scanning something in and then, for example, adjusting it's contrast levels just seems to lose all respect for the hand-rendered stages. I feel that I don't want to work in Photoshop for this reason, but when a brief arises that requires some digital element, I feel that I HAVE to. This ruins the sense of enjoyment, and in turn, ruins the piece of work as I feel I am only working digitally for the needs of others.

2. "Concentrate on your drawing. Just keep playing." Ben Jones

 This is an actual piece of advice that I received in person from Ben Jones when we were discussing what to put into my portfolio. Those probably weren't his words, but he delivered the same advice. He said that my drawings are evidently the main driving force within my work and that I should keep it as raw as possible. This I respect highly considering he has worked and been successful in the professional industry. He advised drawing on various surfaces and textures too, which I will take into consideration because my work always seems to be against a standard white background. And he also criticised my Big Sleep book cover due to it being clean and not messy enough. This makes perfect sense because my lead-up to the final outcome consisted of my best work and it was all purely hand-rendered. Therefore I shall keep playing with imagery within my sketchbooks.

3. "I get a kick out of being an outsider constantly. It allows me to be creative." Bill Hicks

 Bill Hicks was a controversial comedian from America who performed stand-up during the 70's, 80's and early 90's. I had heard of him due to the legacy after his death, but only began watching him properly about two years ago. He satirised topics of society, politics, music and religion which is what I find humorous and can sometimes be evident in my work. This quote again isn't direct advice obviously, but it describes how I feel a lot. It may sound arrogant, but when I feel like I'm an 'outsider' I feel the need to rebel and this in turn makes my work a lot more creative and original. I think a shock factor is something I crave when I show people my work, which is what Bill Hicks always accomplished to his audiences.

 Here's one of my favourite videos of him doing stand-up. He talks about musicians who 'sell out' and don't sing 'from the heart'. This further encourages my work ethic of doing what I want to do, rather than what someone else may want.