Wednesday, 11 February 2015

Where am I now? What have I learnt?

This session focused on our progress so far in the course and where we feel we are at in our journeys as illustrators.

Making a series of lists on how we have developed:

Personal Development

  • Learnt to live by myself and be completely independent
  • Prioritising on a more serious level
  • Living off a really tight budget
  • Perspective on the value of money has further increased
  • Soap, sponges and toilet roll don't magically appear! 
  • Adapted to living with four other people my age
  • Managing long distance relationships
  • Self-discipline when tackling four modules at once
  • The importance of blogging near enough everything
  • Realising that everything is so expensive!
Professional Practice- What have I learnt?
  • Learnt more about the creative industry, how it can be based upon trends and popularity and how this fluctuates individuals demand and workload
  • No matter what, people out there (most of the time the minority-hopefully) will dislike your work in some way
  • How the world around us revolves and relates to illustration
  • This industry is very self-driven, the pros and cons of being self-employed
  • Keep a sketchbook and draw regularly. Drawing is like a sport, keep it up or you'll become bad at it
  • It is important to experiment as a first year and not constrict yourself to a style just yet
Working in groups, devising lists of different skills in categories:

Personal Management Skills:
  • Find value in free time
  • Not to waste time, plan thoroughly
  • Use pinterest!
  • Don't be afraid to step outside your comfort zone
  • Look after your health
  • Eat well and try and find time to exercise
  • Spend money wisely
  • Learning how to accept your own limitations, capabilities and strengths
Practical Skills:
  • Learning digital methods
  • Roughs and Scamps
  • Variety of media
  • Going to BigHeads sessions creates goals and aspirations
  • Experimenting with different media in sketchbooks
  • Exhaustive research is good
  • Professionalism
Study Skills:
  • Daily 'to-do lists' or goals
  • Mental notes
  • Where to find illustration specifically
  • Talking to people
  • Blogging and reflection of progress
  • Reading/watching documentaries
  • Use the library!
  • To be inspired, what inspires me and what I need to be aware of in terms of being inspired
  • Be critical of other peoples work and form opinions
  • Analyse everything from a creative perspective
Other Skills:
  • Looking at the world visually
  • Human contact is good, but being alone is good too
  • How to cook
  • How to balance social life/uni life
  • Freezing bread makes it last longer
Refreshing our minds on types, purposes and contexts of illustration:

Type:(what)
  • Graphic novel
  • Zine
  • Advertising
  • Children's books
  • Roughs/scamps
  • Instruction manuals 
  • Editorial
  • Print
Context:(where)
  • Album covers
  • Billboards
  • Children's books
  • Newspapers
  • Manuals
  • Magazines
  • Books
  • Zines
  • Clothes
  • Posters
  • Adverts
  • Exhibitions
Purpose:(do)
  • To inform
  • Persuade
  • Communicate message
  • Humour/entertain
  • Advertise
  • Propaganda
  • Understand

Task: Create a visual representation summarising where you're at currently within terms of this module.

Planning- categorising different things I have learnt so far, and actions that have followed/are following.



Thinking about relating the aesthetic to a map of Leeds, however I thought that this may be more difficult to follow.




INSPIRATION: Searching 'Maps', 'Mind Maps' into Pinterest:







I thought that the idea of a tube map was clever, and easy to read; it also related to the analogy of 'boarding the illustration train' and embarking on a creative journey.

Some further developments- shapes and colour co-ordination.





The final idea



I mapped out a chronological journey of my time and development on the course so far, and linked the different elements together appropriately. Each colour represents a different 'line' which can be decoded on the map making the message clearer to the viewer.

The final map







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