WESLEY HARROP - COLLIDE SUBMISSION
BRIEF “Consider, explore and mash-up the three themes; Happiness/ the Internet/ Your Future Self” Tasked to follow three individual themes that would come together to create one final piece, Happiness, the inernet and your future self. we would then go on to respond effectively through research and development which would be documented through our own personal blogs and final presentations. Starting by refining each theme in things such as brainstorming and mind mapping possible outcomes and ideas, these were simple ideas done on pen and paper which would become the basis of my final idea. “create both physical and digital outcomes in response to the three themes explored.” Our final designs would compromise of two seperate outcomes, the first being a physical piece which can be interpretated in many different ways the examples being posters, advertisements and marketing strategies. The second outcome would consist of a digital approach, similar to the first outcome it will be interpreted in a way that was unique to the individual.
IDEA GENERATION Starting to visualise ideas at the begining of the brainstorming process was something that I struggled with at first, I began by writing down ideas and anything that sprung to mind on paper, overall the process was just a mismatch of scribbles and notes that would then go on to be scrutinized by myself when looking into the pro’s and con’s of each idea. These ideas were first narrowed into the three you see to the right, they were chosen mainly for the clarity within the ideas and whether or not they would work. The images to the right show a few of the details into what was written down when brainstorming, in terms of core meaning and motives. The two which stood out the most being Where’s Wesley and The Design Your Life process. The latter not being picked for reasons concerining similarity with other already produced pieces. It was basically a carbon copy of other ideas purely becaue I was so stuck in terms of where the work would be heading.
Make Mum Proud: Book with sections on what I will want my current and future self to Achieve. Similar style to the book 'Becoming a Dad'. All end outcomes will make mum proud. Illustrated/Handmade Possible use of paper cutouts to create stop motion to tell a continuous story. Achievements Graduating Becoming Parent Moving Out Getting Married Becoming Successful Design Your Life: Vince Frosts - Presidents Lecture “Life is most important design project” Initial inspiration came from the video referenced above, I found it while trawling through recent works on D&AD’s Website, he elaborates on how many designers and everyday people have not had a life that has been structured. They never got the perfect job or found themselves in the ideal situation. Continuous Drawing that defines the life you want to live, it uses a continuous line or way of showing continuous effect. The Designer essentially designs more. Allow people to continue illustration or begin there
Wheres Wally style/ Wheres wesley: Wheres wally style image Unsure of the direction being taken in life, needing to be found underlying meaning. Either one large image or multiple images combined. Happiness is end outcome. Running for Crayons. Future self/ Find Myself
RESEARCH Running For Crayons Stemming from the idea generation stage of my work I began by looking into illustrators and artists that would help me visualise my idea. Using the Wheres Wally theme as a core reference I came across the illustrations of ‘Running For Crayons’, an illustrator from Brighton who uses sketches of individuals to bring life into collages. It was the ideal reference point to refer back to when creating characters, I found that with many of the scenes you would find yourself stopping and looking closely at each individual that had been illustrated, which linked well with the theme of self-discovery and enlightenment.
Wheres Wally I linked the works of Wheres Wally with my idea because it shows the ideal outcome of my final design, the only differece being the motive behind each work. The message being portrayed is still similar, “in recognition of the worlds diversity� is a way of having a deeper meanin behind something as simple as a interactive book.
Self Discovery Using Self-Discovery as the focal point, I used quotes as references to define the basis of my ideas. It was a way of finding the core to what my final design would end up representing. Each quote would help me add more of a solid argument as to why and how my final design represented the three collide themes.
INITIAL IDEAS Brainstorming Once the ideas I would be looking into was chosen I began by writing down snippets of what I would want my work to encapsulate within the final design. My initial ideas stemmed from the black and white reference image that consisted of characters heads. The chosen name which I decided to stick with throughout was ‘Wheres Wesley’ and the overall idea behind what I was creating was about self discovery.
Character Testing After this I started to do a trial run to see whether the designs I would create would work well when edited within photoshop. This would allow me to see how things such as timescale and resources would have positive or negative effects. The designs were drawn by hand as always then illustrated within Adobe Illustustrator so that I could get a reference on how long it would take and whether it would be refineable. These were then transfered over to photoshop where I decided to colour them using Textures and standard colour. The end product worked extremely well but I struggled with timescale on how long they would take to make. This was then confirmed when I had multiple characters sketched out and attempted to illustrate then colour each one individually.
CHARACTER CREATION Hand Drawn Characters 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.
Characters In total I created around 30 sets of drawings with each averaging around 2-3 charcaters per sheet. The characters would then be transfered over to photoshop when scanned or photographed, where they would be edited and coloured digitally.
Creating Me I went on to create the illustration that represented myself, this would be the main characater that individuals viewing would be attempting to find , this would then be coloured and placed in the collage to be found by the viewer. creating the character was rather simple I just used my face as reference from a picture of myself, then added clothing that would be easily recognisable and a different posture than the other characters. From here the aim was to colour and place the character so that it would blend in and be a struggle to notice. In doing so I would be creating something that interactive that would need to be found at the exhibition.
COLOUR PALETTE Use of Colour 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.
Change in Palette 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.
Updated colours I went on to follow guidelines by only using a set of five colours, to keep it simple I used primary and secondary colours and also added grey as the design started to become more intricate. I stuck to using block colours instead of tones and shades which I initially tested on my first attempt at the character colouration. The skin tones used ranged from light to dark so that there would be a variety. hair colours were also included but they were more sporadic and random.
Clothing
Skin-tones
TEXT When creating the text that would be used within the final piece initial steps began by selecting a font that would stand out but not over power the image it would be over. ‘Coolvetica’ is a royalty free text that was used in block capitals, there was a slight bit of retouching done within spacing of the letters within the header, also the height and width of the question mark. I started by using cinema 4d to create a header that would be prominent, initially a test to see if I could combine medias, being 2D and 3D.
The grey on white image was the initial design that I went ahead with and edited into the collide piece, I found it difficult to edit and make it feel as though it was part of the backdrop. I changed the Cinema 4D header so that the the background colour matched what was represented on the final design. When used as the header I decided to get a second and third opinion by asking a few individuals on whether the layout and colour would work. Majority of feedback ended with how the header didnt work by being 3 Dimensional because the image below was 2D. I then went on to edit the image within cinema 4D so that the background was the same colour as the photoshop document. Allowing me to edit the image easier. Although the edit was much cleaner the effect of a 3 dimensional text wasnt working as well as I first thought.
Final Text Unsure on whether to use the dimensional text i went on to finish my final design and would go back to creating the header. Sticking with the releant colours and typeface. I decided on using a 2 Dimensional typeface that i believe worked much better with the final design. The main reasons being they worked well as a flat image, as intended. The colours used were taken from the final design with the exception of the dark grey background which i placed in order to make the Coolvetica typface stand out. This was then placed accordingly over the final design with some adjustments on shadowing and bevel. The cons of where I placed the text is that it does view as a slight distraction in terms of placement.
FINAL DESIGN Physical Piece My final Design was a combination of the processes used through research and development, stemming from the original ideas that consisted of the ways in which i’am currently in a confused state of mind, my persona is trapped in a world where i am not sure how to move forward or step out from the crowd. The final design was a slow burning process that I changed numerous times, which you can see in previous pages. overall layout and colours were worked in a way that would help the image stand out when combined with others in the exhibition. . Each of the designs you see were hand drawn and then scanned and painted digitally through photoshop. Some ended up being duplicated and recoloured to save time when creating the collage. I initially began by using a palette of colours that didnt follow a guidline, this then changed because the image ended Within my project we were told toto combine the uses of our future slef happiness and technology, I feel I have interpreted these in my own way. Interpretting future self and happiness as a way of self discovery, when asked how i feel about my future self or where I see myself in ten years I was confused and couldnt give a direct answer. After researching ways in which this could be portryed I hit a standstill. I decided on attempting to illustrate the emotion around not knowing what or where I am going to be in my future life. Intended to be interactive whoever viewed the image would read a short section below explaining the idea and how they could help me to ‘Find Myself’, thus helping me achieve overall happiness. this would then be followed with a link to a twitter domain where I asked individuals to send in tips on how to become a better you.
DIGITAL Digital Piece As stated within my previous page I desrcribed how my final design was accompanied by a short paragrpah that explained how I wanted people to resond to my final design. This was also accompanied by a QR code which was created online that had a direct link to the twitter site I was going to be using. The aim was to grab peoples interests by making them think about how they could ‘become a better you’ . This was the main motive behind the self-discovery to show how as individuals we should want to stand out, but we dont always find it that easy.