I have come to really enjoy this module. It has been such a long developmental period, that I really think I have on the whole benefitted from.
Although this module has been split into three main briefs, I have found that my progress and development has been down to an intertwined learning experience and journey of all them all combined. For example some of my early character development in my visual journal, helped to inform my initial etching designs, and also the way I went about conveying my characters in my animations - but then as I went on to progress with these briefs, I found that the work and imagery I had been creating for that was then coming back and informing my visual journal.
Overall I am a bit disappointed with the quantity and quality of work produced for my visual journal however, my drawing has really evolved over this module, I have begun to develop a confident way of representing and drawing characters, that are becoming more and more expressive and communicative as drawings. I hope that the evidence of this can be seen in my final outcomes for my animations. Finding the right drawing too and paying closer attention to contextual research has helped this certainly. Quentin Blake is perhaps the best example of how a drawing doesn't have to be incredibly detailed or accurate to convey across a wonderful sense of expression charm and character. Tool wise, getting and playing with a brush pen has helped to make my drawings, and especially characters even more carefree and expressive, and I believe now that I could really be on to something with a dip nib and ink - this allows me wonderful delicate lines and necessary refinement. Combined with my developed use of, particularly ink based, textures - that afford me lots of lovely expression. I still have such a long way to go with this - more and more drawing is needed to get even more expression that communicates across these characters and drawings. It is something that I hope will continue to evolve and refine itself for as long as I draw, but this module has definitely provided such a good focus and catalyst for its development.
Moving images has been something completely new to me, animation requires such a different level of thought and consideration. You have some much more scope to communicate, but then the challenge comes with choosing how to go about carefully making the most of this and creating something that is actually effective whilst balancing these with your actual ability to make these pictures move, and what is feasible and possible in the time available. Animation is very time consuming and not easy, somethings - especially for me at my early and incompetent stage - are just more possible than others.
I have really found that this has helped me to think about how I can get so much more out of just a still drawing. Especially under dragon frame, when I was drawing straight under camera, I really came to appreciate the value of a line when just a few simple brushstrokes can seem to change the entire look of your drawing. I felt that my practices at animating Death especially taught me this - by the end I felt like I could make his whole facial expression change just by adding a little bit of texture and some more lines.
Overall I think that I have managed to have some successes with animation, such as initially one of the first animations that I made with cut out collage had some lovely textures that do convey across quite well when put into motion. That was only on a very basic level though, it was a struggle to create refined or quality images this way. Animation has been quite an addictive thing, I wanted to just keep trying to improve them and edit them more and more on after effects, but there comes a point where you have to accept that there is a deadline and many other things to be negotiated first.
Successes I have had in animation have been with my sense of playfulness and character, and with regards to my finals although technically there are so many errors in them, and my use of aftereffects is quite shoddy and painstaking, I am happy with the sense of character and playfulness that they convey, I think that I did just about manage to answer what I set out to do - which was convey they wonderful, humorous, magical and strange aspects to Terry Pratchett's fantasy and hopefully spark some intrigue with my animation stings, their short nature doesn't should hopefully leave viewers curious as to why for example they librarian is very much an orangutang, or what Death is doing with a stick of party food.
There are far too many mistakes and the look of them isn't that good - my technical skills as an animator need a lot more honing! (not to mention my storyboarding abilities) But I am still happy with the overall effect, and especially how much the music gives them a humours and playful feel. These animations are very me, which perhaps isn't a good thing but then again I suppose Illustrators all have practices that are very personal to them, it's best to stick to who you are and what you love and just improve that instead of trying to invent something different.
So perhaps I have learnt that there is more to animation and indeed printing than just having perfect visuals for the final outcomes, as these are such hugely process driven practices. You can still have a satisfying end result that does answer what you set out to do without them being perfect, because the overall effect that they have is accountable to so many more things than just a perfect drawings or a super polished animation.
Printed pictures - successes: I have really enjoyed getting to experiment and learn about so many print process. Especially the more handcrafted ones, such as lino and etching, I have enjoyed and connected with. I have fallen a little bit in love with etching, it is a process that suits me and my practice well. I gained an understanding of it through much hands on practice, and through contextual research especially has helped me to see what etching is capable of and where I might take it, alongside interesting techniques - such as etching the lines over different time periods, so that some lines can be made to be bolder than others. It it is something that I believe I could continue to further develop and actually have a chance at getting good at (in the future, these prints and this module has just been the start - I believe I could with time get much much better at it).
Things to improve on, as always are my compositional skills. I have really tried to tackle this with the printed pictures brief, and I have come away with a small degree of success, but in general they are still not that good at all, they're very basic and could be pushed.
The neatness of my prints is not so good either, some of them are a bit squint, with the stray finger print. This really bothers me as I would love to achieve perfection from this process that I have come to enjoy so much, but the thing with etching is that it is a long process with many different components to it which all influence the look of the final print. It is not just a case of having a beautiful line drawn image - the texture of the inks, the colour blends, the history of the copper plate, how long you put it in the acid for, even how long you soak your paper for all play their parts in defining the image. So although I do wish that my final prints were better, both compositionally and with regards to the colours and the printing of the line work, I think that I can get away with some of these, as the overall effect, look and feel of the etchings is enough to just about make them successful. I should not be disappointed with them.
Things I will do differently for next time, firstly I have found that with my compositional development, I can't improve them just by re-sketching again and again, the only way I can really improve them is to actually have a go at printing them, or making my final, then after that I could see the successes and weaknesses and evolve from there.
An important lesson learnt has been to keep things simple! every time I would get very stuck or confused with this module it was generally because I was trying to attempt something very big and a bit mad. It's very natural for me to want to whizz off on a tangent, but in this module I referred back to the brief and tried to refresh what it was that I should be aiming to achieve and apply it to where my work it at. Rereading and evaluating my progress against the original brief is such a valuable thing to do and is something that I need to always do in the future. Sometimes aiming to answer something as simply as possible has provided me with the scope to create my optimum outcomes.
My attendance has been decent, and my work ethic certainly towards the end of this module has been stronger I would say than previous modules, which I think has really benefitted my final outcomes. I almost never produce final outcomes that are of a respectable finished quality or that I feel stand up to the likes of my peers, this time however I think I have had the time to develop and evolve my outcomes that little bit further and that one step further that has made all of the difference to the overall quality. They are a long way from perfect here, but considering that these are two process that have been completely new to me at the start of this, I am happy and maybe even the tiniest bit proud to hold my head up and put my name to them. I hope that in the future I can continue to find the time to further develop my final concepts just those few times more, it makes the difference between just passing the module and actually heading towards answering the briefs.
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