Project - Finals

I was so relieved to finish my finals as I  wasn't totally prepared for how much work this stuff takes. I thoroughly enjoy the project even though it was challenging, but I felt it has helped me become a more well-rounded artist. Although I want to focus on 3D for future, going back to the fundamentals never hurts and this project made me push myself to think further about a lot of aspects of my art, such as form and perspective, which I had unknowingly been neglecting for a long time.

Here are a few pages from my final art book - I included my synopsis so the concept annotations make more sense!

Project - Creature Design

I had the most fun when creating the creature for my project, but I also found it the most challenging part. I knew from my theme and world that I would be designing a large insect, but I wasn't sure at first which route to go. I started by gathering references, taking note of particular shapes and ideas that I liked the look of.

I started by thumb nailing lots of different silhouettes, then I took the ones that stood out to me the most and filled in a design. At this stage, whilst drawing and looking at reference, I decided I liked the rounder, softer look I seen in a lot of cartoon insects and decided it would be a good fit for my world. I was also thinking more of how to make this design a character, and not just the standard pollinating insects in the world. I wanted it to be something that would be able to have some kind of relationship with others. This is why I decided  going forward that my design would be for a 'character pet'. 

I then chose the designs I liked best and made more iterations of them. At this stage I was still looking for a rounded design, but one that was interesting enough to stand out and be easily readable.

I then refined some of these iterations further. I was finding this stage difficult because of the amount of similar sketches I had been doing, most not even reaching the stages shown here. I was finding it hard to take a step back and look at them critically, so I decided to convert them back to silhouettes.

I again chose the silhouettes I felt worked best and asked others around me which ones they found easiest to read and most recognizable.

I ended up with two silhouettes that were very similar, and combining them together to use both of their strengths. I also experimented with some of the smaller details, mainly looking to personify the design at this point to make it seem more appealing and 'human'.

After my iterations I polished the design until I had something I was happy with. I chose to have long fur around the neck that looks like a scarf to make it seem more pet-like and domestic. I kept the wings small in comparison to the body to show it's small and cuter size. I made the 'bottom' large in contrast to the body as I found it made the silhouette more visually interesting.

I then looked back at my earlier references to work on the colour of the design. I wanted the colours to look warm, appealing, fun and communicate visually what the creature was. I chose a few of my favorites to compare below. I like the yellow and black, as they are associated with bees which are a well known pollinator, and works really well with the bee-like design of the creature. I also like the grey and white design, but I worried it was too colorless.

I tried out some colored eyes with the grey design, but I ultimately went with the black and yellow because I felt it communicated what the creature was more effectively than the others.

I then drew the creature from the side, front and back. This was so if it was theoretically given to a modeler they would be able to model from the character sheet. This was the last step before my final concept sheet which I will be posting soon.  

I had so much fun with this creature and I really pushed myself out of my comfort zone. I am not used to the world of concept design so it was hard to keep exploring new ideas and move past my initial concepts. This project has also highlighted to me a lot of the areas I need to work on, while also helping me improve in them. I want to learn a lot more about shape, colour and communicating visually. 

Project - Vehicle Design

Another part of my project I've been working on is a vehicle design. I started working on this part after working on my environment for a while, as I found it better to think about the vehicles purpose and function if I had a world to place it in. This led me to the decision to design a people-powered vehicle, as it was set in an eco-city and it wouldn't use any fuel. It would be use for transporting small amounts of cargo around the bio-domes that I would be designing in my environment. I wanted something that looked like it could be put together by hand, and that communicated its function through the design.

I began my research by looking at some bikes, focusing on finding interesting shapes and unconventional designs.

I then started scribbling some thumbnails, some of which are below. I quickly noticed that these all seemed rigid and alike. I think because I was telling myself, "draw a bike", I was struggling to break free from the idea I already had of a bike in my head.

Although I did like some of the ideas I decided to take a new approach. I started experimenting in an application called Alchemy, recommended by one of my tutors. Alchemy allowed me to scribble and sketch without worrying about what the bike should look like.

I saved anything I made that had an interesting shape, then took any of the ones I thought could make a potential vehicle and drew on top of them.

 

I then combine the shapes I like into designs. At this stage I thought about how I could communicate the functions of the bike through it's design. I wanted a canopy, as it hinted at its use in several different 'climates', therefore in the world it would be used between bio-domes. I added a back trunk to show that it would be used for cargo. I used bent poles and chunky wheels that wouldn't normally be used for bikes to show that it may have been put together from materials left over from other vehicles. I went with the design below as I felt it covered those points, and I also felt it had a strong and easily recognizable silhouette.

I then done a quick 3D mock-up of the bike, mainly to help with my perspective when it came to my final drawing. I also wanted to check that the forms translated well to a 3D object. As someone who is new to the world of concept art I actually found this step really valuable.

I then traced the main forms to capture the proportion and perspective I wanted.

I then used this image to develop my final line work which would later be rendered for my final concept sheet. I aimed to keep it clean and simple, with small amounts of detail to hint at the surface texture. I chose a 3/4 perspective view of the front and back as these gave a good image of the vehicle. I also included a close-up of the back to show some of the forms that were missing from the other two perspectives. Overall I was satisfied with the design and felt like I got what I had aimed to achieve.

Project - Environmental Design

Throughout my weeks at university I have also been working on our end of semester project. So far I've been having a lot of fun with it, and now that I'm finished with classwork I'm going to share my progress here.This project has offered a lot of flexibility as we were able to come up with our own worlds to base our concepts in.

When world building I drew inspiration from various media around me when creating the idea. I love the aesthetic of futuristic eco cities and biospheres, but I wanted to combine them with a more dystopian feel. I was also reading the original Jurassic Park novel at the time, and I enjoyed the more scientific focus the book had compared to the movie - even if the 'science' was all just fiction and guesswork.


I decided to concept an eco city, based in the future after an economic and environmental collapse, where people rely on biospheres to live in and grow crops. Biospheres are utilized for crops, and there are also giant bio-engineered pollinators used for pollinating. This was the starting point for figuring out what three things I would be concepting. I like to use pinterest to keep track of ideas and inspiration, and below is the starting point for my environmental design

I then looked at smaller scale builds, especially interiors, to start thinking more about the functionality of the environment. I also came across some photos of mushrooms that inspired me. I liked the contrast of the organic growth around the geometric containers. I find looking at things like use and structure helps me when thinking about how the biospheres in the city may actually be used.




I began with some initial sketches below, taking the parts I liked most from my references and trying them out in certain ways. I played about with both exteriors and interiors, as at this stage I wasn't yet sure what was more useful to portray.

I tried out some quick environmental thumbnails, focusing on the outdoor environment. I then chose one of these to refine a little, to get a feel of where it was going. This is ultimately where I decided to instead go for concepting an indoor environment. I wanted to explore more the functionality of the environment and its place within the world, but this early development still helped me get the ideas needed for this down on paper (or screen!).

I wasn't too happy with my thumbnails, and decided to take a different approach to my environment. I thought an interior piece would be better for me, as I would be able to explore the functionality of the environment more. I started by listing and concepting lots of features that would make the environment unique, and detailed some of them which can be seen below. I liked the idea of a hospital/surgery/vet area for treating the pollinators.

Some ideas for 'insect pods', where some of the pollinators would rest when in the environment.

Some of the table ideas that I explored further. I liked the table around the tree as a centerpiece for the room, as I felt it could tie it all together, but I also like the more traditional 'surgery table'.

I quickly put down a lot of the things I would like included in the room above, and started mixing and matching them together below to get a feel for how I would like the room to be.

I then explored some of the key features of the room a but further, as I wanted them to look unique. I added honey to the pods to hint at their use and looked more at the shape design for the table.

I brought these together in my final line drawing, using an earlier thumbnail to help me with layout. This was the final design that I was least happy with, and looking back now there are a lot of areas I would changed. Although I still like the overall idea, the room looks to plain and polished for the what I was going for. I can see that I need a lot more things in there to hint at the story, concept and functions of the environment. This was the first concept piece I worked on, and I tried my best to correct this in my vehicle and character designs.

Weekly Task - 9

Continuing on from class, we had to design an interior environment that followed a brief we were given. It was to be an apartment set in the future, owned bv a busy worker who uses the apartment to recover from a busy life. The design had to make sure you could still 'feel' the city inside the apartment.

I used skills built up in the last few weeks whilst designing this. I do find some perspective drawing quick tricky, and I found myself going over some areas again and again. You can see that I 'borrowed' a photo of a boxing glove to help speed up my process. I used some references found on google when designing this, but I am aware it did end up looking a bit bare. Although it needs a good injection of personality, I liked the direction I was going with.

I chose a large window looking out onto the city to help bring the feel of the city in to the room. I [;aced furniture quite wide apart in unusual areas - for example, the coffee table far from the couch - to hint at the fact the apartment doesn't get much use. I left coffee mugs around the room to show she hasn't been keeping up on dishes, and included the punch bag and boxing gloves to show what some of her time in the apartment might be spent on doing. We were told she works as part of a detective unit and likes to keep healthy, and I thought boxing could be a good sport for doing so. I chose minimalist furniture as it is often associated with futuristic, sci-fi themes.

Week 9 - Interiors

This week we worked on creating some interior environment set ups. I particularly liked working in isometric, as it meant you can move things around and you never have to change perspective and scale.

In class we built up a simple isometric environment that could be used as a base of a design or drawing later on. We started with an isometric grid, and then used layer to sketch in, line and light up areas.

It is a fairly simple process, but I did find it is harder than I thought to get simple things looking good in isometric. A plus was not having to worry as much about perspective, and I thought it would be great for brainstorming quick design ideas that could be refined later on.

Week 6 - Thumbnailing

Thumbnailing is something I've never spent a lot of time doing so I found this week's class quite interesting. I usually do a few quick sketches based on an idea I had and use them when creating a final image. It wasn't much of  a process and I can see I wasn't particularly helping myself by sticking to it.

I had 20 minutes to create 20 different thumbnails. The idea behind these was that they were to be quick and messy in order to just generate a good number of ideas quickly on to the page. We were given a short brief to stick by when creating these, which was to illustrate an alien planet with an alien civilisation based on ancient Minoan culture. After spending a few minutes looking at some references I set a one minute timer and began to draw.

This was really challenging - I only managed to finish 17 thumbnails. Although we weren't to focus on setting up the scene and adding detail my natural instinct was to go back and add stuff on, and although I did stop myself from doing this I think it did waste time and disrupt the flow. I also found that after scribbling a few ideas down I was running out of ideas on what to do next. I found myself a few times staring at the blank box for a few seconds before making myself start drawing.

I have a few ideas for how to overcome the struggles with this task; looking at a broader range of references, training myself to start drawing without worrying about what ideas I have, stopping analysing what I draw instead of moving on. I feel like I was stuck on thinking of this as an idea-refinement process instead of an idea generating process. It is something I will have to train myself on breaking out of.

After this task I did have a go at beginning to refine a thumbnail idea. I used a different process for this one which I quite enjoyed. I started with a simple gradient, and began painting with a large block out brush on top. Using the lasso tool I began to pick out shapes that stuck out to me and add highlights and shadows to bring them out. A simple environment began to stick out to me. Again it may not be the best composed piece, but the process is all about idea generation so I'll need to get used to most of the ideas ending up in the bin!

Weekly Task 5

I had fun creating materials in class this week so I was pretty happy to continue on with that as a weekly task. We had to create two metal, two stone, two wood, one skin and one water material.The thing I liked about it is being able to focus solely on improving my texture painting skills without having to worry about doing a completely finished piece. I actually completely started over several of the spheres as after more practice I found it easier to notice where I had gone wrong and where I could fix it. Even now I can already see errors I have made, but it is all part of the learning process and I will try to improve upon them next time along.

I found the skin and the water materials particularly tricky, which surprised me as I thought because they were more organic looking that they would be more forgiving with shape and colour. This did highlight to me that an error I may be making is that I'm not studying these kind of materials enough when drawing, so my youtube history will soon be filling up with skin painting tutorials!

Break An Egg - Competition Entry

This week our tutor was running a little competition for a character design book, so I decided to enter. We were given a line drawing of a chicken to render, a chicken known as "Ser Clucksely Piffingstall".

I wanted to have some fun with this, so started looking at some colour schemes. I love colour, and I have some very messily organised folders on my phone of colour schemes that inspire me.

I had been playing a lot of Stardew valley this week and had loved this cut scene just for the colour, and had the screenshot saved on my pc because I knew I wanted to use it at some point. After messing about with a few ideas I decided to try using it for Ser Clucksely.

I was pretty happy with the finished image. I worked in layers, mainly using the soft and hard opacity brushes. I kept some of my rougher brush strokes in the final image as I think it adds to the hand painted look, and added a layer of noise on top. I did have a lot of fun with this and I definitely will be using these colours together in the future. There's just something I love about them together.

Week 5 - Materials

This week I had a go at rendering some textures in photoshop. I started with tree bark, using the above image as a reference. I started by shading in a sphere for a 3D effect by using masks and a soft brush, then again using masks along with some harder and more textures brushes to layer the detail on top. I used the colour picker tool to grab some of the values from the image before blending between them myself. I worked mostly from dark to light as I find this a more natural flow when rendering materials. I finished by cutting in the sides of the object to make it appear more 3D and communicate the feel of the material. I done this on a new layer so that I wasn't deleting any of the material I had already painted.

The next material I created a mossy brick material, this time using photobashing. I achieved this again by using masks - I rarely paint without them these days - and painting with a low opacity brush to make the textures blend together. I done this over a shaded sphere and added more shading on top to add to the 3D feel.

This was my first time photobashing and it turned out to be easier than I thought it would have. I can see its usefulness, particularly when creating intricate textures or when a speedier workflow is needed. Saying that, I think it is also useful to be able to break down, analyse and recreate hand painted textures yourself. I can see where both techniques have their usefulness and I am going to experiment more with them both in future.

Weekly Task 4

 This week we had been looking at shape and form, which led to us creating a shape language sheet using shapes derived from the following images.

When I first started the task I used a hard brush and focused on clean lines, but I quickly realised this was the wrong way to work as I was spending too much time refining the shapes instead of just being messy and getting ideas down on the page. I switched to a rougher, textured brush and just started sketching down quick ideas from shapes in the image. Accuracy wasn't my aim, I just wanted to get some silhouettes down to see if anything jumped out to me.

What I produced is far from a perfect sheet of amazing shapes, but there are a few ideas here that I think could be built upon. I like the transition from a hard, straight line into a rounded curve in 9, I think the contrast between a hard and soft shape can make things pop. I also liked the organic look of 4, both the solid shape and the negative space.

The next part of the task was to lightly shade in a sheet of shapes we had been given. At first when I began this task I approached it from the wrong way, trying to fit imagined shapes into the boundaries of the box. This felt counter-productive so instead I took a step back and decided to go with the first silhouette I could really see. Unsurprisingly it seems to have been inspired by the amount of animal photography I look at. This approach worked out better for me as I felt like I was working with the shapes rather than fighting against them.

Weekly Task 3

Continuing on from class earlier this week we continued learning how to make and utilize photoshop brushes. We were given ten different brushes to make, and two other brushes that were up to us to decide. 

Having specific brushes to design made me think not only about how to make them, but how I would be using them and how they should "feel", or rather look, on the screen. Were they fluid, rough, did they layer, fade, smudge, were they messy, were they accurate? Even if I don't use the brushes, I feel that thinking about this sort of thing makes me think more about how the digital brushes work on screen. I do sometimes miss the physical feel of messing around on paper when I do digital work and this task made me see that there doesn't have to be as big of a gap between the two.
My two extra brushes actually came from some failed experiments at creating some of the other brushes. I loved the 3D look of the snake brush, and I thought the spike brush would be good for rough foliage or fur.