PROJECT REPORT Astrid Weguelin
OUIL505 - APPLIED ILLUSTRATION
I chose to take on the ‘publishing and book design’ category because I am interested in illustrating books and working from texts as well as the actual design of books, but I feel the project also dips into ‘character and narrative’. For my project I chose to create a front cover, inside illustrations and promotional items for the book ‘Lord of the Flies’. I decided on this book because it is one of my favourites which isn’t commonly illustrated, it also has really descriptive quotes surrounding the setting and strong themes throughout, which I was mainly interested in.
I enjoyed working in the visual journal, it allowed me to really experiment with different processes, and it was used throughout the project and is strongly linked to my final illustrations. I began by exploring shapes and textures related to nature, I was influenced a lot by Matisse’s cut outs, I love the boldness and appreciation of shape and colour within his compositions. The continuous shape making allowed me to create a large database of shapes and textures, which I can use again and again. This process of working is quite different to how I usually work, it is very stripped back – similar to the stencil work I did for OUIL504, where I would depict things in their simplest form. I like working in this simple way as I feel the images I am creating have a certain rawness to them, which hasn’t been overworked and it is all handmade which I love the aesthetic of.
I found that I kept getting too into just making shapes, that I would forget the main part of the module – how the illustration is applied to contexts. I wanted the book cover and illustrations to be the main product, as I wanted to spend a lot of time crafting them; I could then apply the designs onto further products. The context, which this book was to exist, is an illustrated edition for its 60th anniversary, the book would come with bookmarks, a fold out map of the island and an illustrated carrier bag. I would then also have to think about promotional posters in shop windows etc. I found that once I started applying the work into context it all started coming together as a proper project, everything was in the same format and looked professional.
I had a lot of problems getting my process right for the inside illustrations and it affected the rest of the project because I felt I couldn’t design any of the other products until I had the aesthetic right for the main illustrations. I found that my initial plan of cutting out shapes and arranging into compositions on Photoshop just wasn’t working, each time I tried something different it came out looking too convoluted or flat. I then decided to do it all by hand, it was still too busy. I didn’t realise until quite late that inner book illustrations are usually in grey-scale, so I had to take that into account as well, and all the illustrations I had done so far became confusing when turned to monochrome as the bits that would usually stand out in colour were lost in black and white. It wasn’t until I had a tutorial and was advised to strip the illustrations right back and go back to playing around with shapes, that I found my process.
Photoshop - hand drawn/Photoshop - hand drawn - hand drawn/Photoshop - all too busy, flat or with no line of sight
I also stopped trying to keep exactly to the quotes I had been working to, I felt it had been limiting the experimentation, I wanted the illustrations to go back to that raw state where I hadn’t forced any sort of composition. I cut out lots of bits and played around with layouts and most of the compositions I chose happened by accident. I feel my process started and ended in a similar place while having a bit of experimentation in the middle with Photoshop, I enjoyed this hands-on process a lot more, and it came much more naturally to me.
I feel like one of my strengths throughout this project has been my experimentation with materials. I spent a lot of time making different textures which then lead to a lot of problem solving as I was having to try and make the same scene on Photoshop, hand drawn and digital and then just hand made, it was quite a frustrating experience but rewarding once I was happy with what I made. I feel like I used the visual journal well, it wasn’t just a sketchbook for the beginning of the project; it was a tool, which very much influenced the direction of my final products.
textures
I feel like my sense of narrative within the illustrations was also strong; they had a slightly sinister tone of voice, which relates well to the book, also their cave-man style aesthetic is very relevant to the ‘decline in civilisation’ theme within the book. I felt my compositions worked pretty well, that is usually a weak point within my work but I feel I created images with interesting lines of sight that lead the eye around the page.
I think my weaknesses surrounded ‘applied’ element; I think I spent too long on the illustrations for the book that the other products such as the bookmarks (picture) and promo posters suffered slightly as not much thought was put into their compositions. I also didn't do enough to promote the 60th anniversary, I would have made stickers for the book but I didn't have time, at the moment it is just the posters which say it is the anniversary, there isn't much other evidence.
I feel my map ended up being a bit too convoluted as the figures and main places aren’t that clear, that is the problem with doing everything by hand as it took so long to make that once I realised it was too busy I couldn’t take any of it out (picture). I also didn’t manage to achieve as much as I initially wanted, my products decreased quite a bit from the original 9 inner illustrations and 4 bookmarks. If I had worked out my process sooner I would have been able to do more inner illustrations, as the actual images were relatively simple, so that is a bit frustrating, I didn’t expect the main struggle throughout the project to be actually deciding on an aesthetic.
I am pleased I made the last minute decision to make the slip-case box; it was quite messy and didn't come out perfectly lined up when I stuck the front cover on, but it gave me a sense of what it would look like if it was a real book cover - I feel it finished the project off well
My favourite part of the final products was making the book cover and inner illustrations; I definitely want to do similar projects in future modules. I also feel this module has made me more certain on a particular process, I loved the cutting and sticking element of working, it allowed me to be a lot looser and playful with my image making, it is a lot more time consuming but I found myself much more comfortable with it as compositions came much easier to me, as well as finding it more rewarding that making the whole thing digitally.