1.Demonstrate a comprehensive and critical understanding of the techniques and methods relevant to visual storytelling in various contexts.
The use of a piece of Concept art in order to generate ideas
for a game is without doubt one of the most important tools available to a concept
artist, however there are a number of techniques that have been used in
this module that really help to get the story across to the viewer. As a storyboard
artist for example you have to have a basic knowledge of cinematography, and
this can be a very different skill to basic composition found in painting, Drawing
etc. One area that interested me and had a profound effect on my teaser adds
,was the Bayeux tapestry the idea that an animated sequence is laid out in
front of you in one complete roll is intriguing. David Hockney also looked a lot at this through the work he did into Chinese
scrolls, so for me the idea that you could have a number of single images that
told a story individually but then could link up to tell a bigger story is
really interesting. As seen in the images below they work well individually,
but then make a lot more complex story when you bring them together.
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| Sequential image |
1 2.Demonstrate a systematic and critical
understanding of the breadth and depth of knowledge in a range of techniques
and methods appropriate to the field of visual storytelling.
There are a number of different techniques applicable to the
work of a concept artist involved in the field of visually storytelling, for
example it makes no sense producing highly photorealistic panels for a
storyboard, and the time involved in doing this would outweigh the images usefulness
to a director or indeed camera operator, similarly the quality of the artwork for
printed material needs to of a relatively high standard, after all it is
representing the game, or film so needs to really sell the idea you are going for.
A good example of this is the poster design, it needed to be current and
striking, but also hint at what might happen in the story. Developing content
for games also relies on Colour and lighting to guide the player through his game world,
darkness and the colour red for example give feeling of threat, whereas a
sunlit vista with blue soft shadows can put the viewer at ease. Again Hockney give
this as a reason he left Yorkshire to go to LA, because of the lighting he had seen
in the Laurel and Hardy movies, the hard shadows and the bleached out pavement
suggested where it had been filmed was a lot sunnier, so it’s easy to see how
you can use lighting and colour to help to visually tell a story.
3. Research and synthesise diverse visual
materials to inform design solutions.
From a research point of view, one of the key things I chose
to implement was to use proper dimensions for my poster, I chose to use British
double crown for my actual artwork and that is half of what a quad sheet is,.
By doing this instantly I felt I was producing something that was going to be
fit for purpose. For me I also spent a lot of time trying to find A4 adverts in
order to set up my teaser ads, these were a lot more difficult to come by, The
only ads I could find at half a4 were adds in motorcycle magazines and other hygiene
products, I think this needs to be thought about as the restrictions of the
size really did have an effect on the composition of the individual pieces.
4 . Develop argued
conclusions regarding industry and professional requirements.
For me there is always a battle between industry and professional
requirements, as artists we are passionate and focused on creation of your own artwork;
however in the professional world it is a different set of stresses that are
place upon you. This has been mimicked well in this project in particular. The biggest
difference however is that fact that you are producing work that would normally
be produced for a client, but you are getting no real client feedback, this
makes completing the tasks slightly different to a live brief, so the project planning
and the submission really does come down to the individual artist and not the
client.
5.
Plan and implement appropriate skills in
the creation of visual work.
The planning and implementation has been really tough because
of this being a part time module for me, I have had a full teaching load and
have also just finished all the marking for the undergraduate degree. So time
has been really pushed to the extreme of my day, I have found myself getting up
early in the morning rather than waiting till an evening to complete the work, this is perhaps
one of the reasons I didn’t complete all of the task requitered for the ICA.
6. Systematically gather and evaluate information from a diverse range
of sources relevant to visual storytelling.
In order to place my artwork in context I looked back at the
genre, and looked at key visual images that have aahd a massive impact on my
project. For me the key images are the 196 poster from the great escape, for me
this really defines the action movie genre. One area I feel I would have liked to
look at is the visual language of the teaser adds, and I would have really
liked to have scaled the work back and looked at more graphic ways producing
the teaser adds. For me another artist that had an effect on the Final poster
was Robert Crumb, I looked at a large amount of his work for this project, he
had an interesting style, highly detailed and structurally complete, it is easy
to see how his work has affected my final piece.
8 Reflect on practice and identify strengths
and weaknesses in own work.
.I think looking back at the promo
work done on Driver it meant the whole creation of a look and a feel for the
game was relatively easy, however especially with some of the delvarvbels for
the ICA, I found myself being very conscious that I was producing very much
marketing materials, so the level of finish had to be constant, for me this
was a little disappointing, I would have
preferred to paint my poster like a John Cocteau poster seen at the National
film museum in Paris, however this would have been a nightmare to photograph or
scan as the University is really starting to move away from the more
traditional form. My main weakness has been the lack of a real work ethic when
it came to completing my work, being employed full time and going through a
massive amount of marking has meant it has been difficult for me to identify
art work time without it being very late at night, this has limited the amount
of experimentation and creativity on the project.
