Individual creative evaluations
Some sections will be split between us.
Sam
Images
In some of my designs, specifically the pin-up girl posters and a few INK and PAINT club posters I used real life models that i found royalty free images for, when choosing the models i had to be careful they weren’t too provocative or revealing as those sorts of images would be found in different sorts of clubs…. Anyway still on the topic of my pin-up posters i believe them to be well made.
However I think I could have chosen some different filters to make them look more cartoon like or a least less realistic, because i wanted to create them with the illusion of being drawn, as most pin-up posters are drawn or painted a lot like Czarina’s watercolor piece. Another thing i could have done is choose different backgrounds to make the posters more varied because the cream coloured background started to get a bit repetitive.
Despite the pinups getting a bit stale they still serve their creative purpose, moving on we have my ink and paint posters which use Courtney’s Jessica Rabbit image, as it was a vector image it allowed me to edit it more easily than the stock model images. I Feel that I could have done more in the way of decorating the posters, but I have improved the methods in which I edit images and designs by experimenting with various tools but i still have to get the hang of using some of them, Another thing I did was adapt some early silhouette designs which i put onto the playing cards. Also I took an image from the film and made some patterns from it which i used in some designs, so it’s a good idea to use scenes from the film to help with design work.
I think next time I will try to experiment more with Photoshop as I feel more comfortable doing so, I would like to try using more of the tools. Along with the images I had to consider text, I feel I didn’t have enough text for it to have its own section so I thought id mention it, I mainly used gold or an alternation of purple and black.
Technique
The group came up with an idea to create three designs each and pick the best at the end. I found that this was a good opportunity to focus on our strengths of design. I was able to take the contextual approach on this project as the other members of my group were computer based. I created three designs through colouring pencil, chalk and watercolour. This was because I wanted to vary the styles and create distinctive styles. Chalk was a different method that I was not familiar with so I selected this particular media for practice. I was able to blend a mixture of colours to make it stand out. The overall design came out well, but it was messy and the image was not distinctive. I felt that I had less control over chalk but it was interesting to try something new.
With my second design I used colouring pencils which enabled me to experiment with tone and shading. This gave a realistic viewpoint to my work. At first I wanted to use charcoal but colour is an important factor in posters and cartoon, and the purpose for the product was to make it stand out. A problem that I came across was the text, as I felt that it would not stand out through pencil. To try to make the writing stand out I wrote the text with a marker. For future reference I will take more time to research calligraphy so I can create a professional looking typeface. I thought that the text did not look well detailed in contrast with the image. To prevent this problem for happening again I will scan the image into Photoshop and add text through there. Also, I will focus on maturing my calligraphy skills and have the right resources (etc pens).
The last design I thought that I would focus on the movie and create a piece dedicated to the iconic sex symbol Jessica Rabbit. I wanted to create an artwork through watercolour as this would show variety and distinction. I love working with watercolour so I thoroughly enjoyed creating the product and I could add my own style. I am happy with the overall product as I thought that it showed more confidence and capability. I posted my work on social media to see the public’s reaction.
I thought that working with chalk did not work as well as I wanted to. This is because I require more practice. The product looked untidy which I am not comfortable with. It was time-consuming trying to mend the problem. My strong point is working with watercolour and I could create a professional looking poster in a good amount of time. I initially wanted to scan my chalk design to Photoshop and add text and borders but the colours would leak on the scanner and the lines would not be as sharp. I wanted my other two posters to look like artworks as I wanted it to be a certain style. I felt that I should have researched more into advertising to come up with promotional posters.
For next time I would work with Illustrator and Photoshop so I could make my products look current. I will look at texts and borders so I could put my learnings into my work. To achieve this I will practice on the programs in my spare time. The Christmas season stopped me from doing this as I did not have much spare time. I am going to start looking into calligraphy so if I took the contextual approach I could hand draw styles to create stunning effects.
Research
The research conducted for this project was mixed between using the internet and watching the movie.
As a group of three we independently researched the characters from the movie, who framed Roger Rabbit! We looked at other movies of a similar form which was a mixture of live-action and cartoon.
For our final piece, we chose to create a small collection posters for the night/ gentlemen’s club that Jessica Rabbit performs in during the film.
For this we looked at the posters from the 1940s? the years that the movie was based in, giving us an idea of what they would have looked like. The posters mostly consisted of ladies posing, these were often used to convince men to join the military. appropriate as then this would help us create something that would convince men in those days to go and see the performance.
Other research consisted of looking at the different characters featured in the film, using a mixture of fan pages and official webpages for the film. We took the main characters Roger Rabbit, Jessica Rabbit, Eddie Valiant and Judge Doom to research, looking at their personality traits, characteristics and who they are. Images were used to get a better description of the characters.
Looking at this movie, it was a very popular movie, and has a huge fan base so most websites said the same things about each character, making the information found reliable as well as useful. The characters are well-remembered and easily recognised which makes it easy to spot mistakes anywhere. Using pages like fan pages that can be edited everyday is risky as they might not be entirely reliable so it is necessary to explore other searches to check on facts and cross-reference them with each other to ensure they are indeed correct. Additionally we could use the film as a reference to double-check the information scene by scene to make sure it is correct.
I feel like we could have looked at other examples of night clubs, other than the one in the film as this would have given us more options when designing items, it could also have given us more potential items to design or new patterns or colour combinations. But I suppose we wanted to be faithful to the original designs, I think i should have researched other nightclubs to gather more ideas about typical poster layouts that you would see in clubs, this would have helped when laying out my poster and I should have used Indesign make the layout but I deemed it unnecessary because the poster didnt consist of much.
Target Audience
I believe that our work is fit for the audience I identified in the audience analysis post I made sure my design work was kept well within a reasonable level of sexuality, there is just one problem with my pin-up poster sand that is that they might ne considered degrading to women or it might appear that i am objectifing women by showcasing them in such away.
I think our work definitely meets the brief we took a film’s script apart and found parts we could design objects for we chose those objects and made them, we have included plenty of research to help with our decisions as well, the language I used in particular is suggestive but it wont be viewed as over the top. As far as age is concerned i doubt most younger people would understand the suggestive nature of some of the designs.
Conclusion
I am quite pleased with this assignment, I feel the three of us worked well in a team, we assigned each other roles and we completed them within good time.
Next time i think i should have focused a little bit more on the research so i could get a better idea of what to design, i do consider this project an experiment in terms of design as it’s the first time ive tried using Photoshop, I will say that I like both Czarina and Courtney’s work they both have unique styles which contribute to the overall standard of our project, in particular I liked Czrina’s water-colour poster it gets me thinking that maybe I should try something different in future projects not exactly water-colour because im not that experienced with painting but maybe a combination of all four softwares ive used so far, Illustrator, Photoshop, Indesign and Aftereffects.
Also ever since my last FMP ive always wanted to do a cross stitch piece so hopefully I can do that maybe in the coming FMP. Anyway this project was extremely different to previous projects as we had to work in groups which I found quite enjoyable its good to split the work load so one person isn’t overloaded, the only difficulty is the initial assignment of the various roles as if it’s the first time your working with someone you have to establish what people’s strengths and weaknesses are but other than that it was good.
Over the course of this assignment i have learnt a little bit more about Photoshop, specifically the layer settings and how to use a mask to edit around photographs which i can use to get rid of specific areas of a photo for example a background, i have also learnt more about the selection of filter available and what some of them can do the perfect example of where ive displayed these skills would be the pin-up posters. Additionally Courtney has also developed her skills with both illustrator and photoshop which is evident in her work as well.
Time wise this project was pretty simple to manage however at times it was difficult to keep track of everyone’s task, it might have helped if we wrote them down and had a check list so we could tick them off so we would know they were done. Our work was quite different to everyone elses that’s not to say there’s wasnt any good because it was especially the effort Emma put into her mask, but i feel our work was unique as we chose a film that was made twenty-nine years ago where as most other chose films from the 2000s, the difference being that the props we see would be a bit dated such as old technology and the like. Also the time period the film was set in differed to other as far as I am aware so we would have seen outdated references or things that aren’t seen as commonly in modern films such as old technology, old movie studio tech, theatre cinemas even the cars would be different and the style of every designed item.
spottergraphics 