Illustration & Visual Narrative / Task 1

September 27, 2023

Illustration & Visual Narrative / Task 1

27.9.2023 - 31.10.2023 / Week 1 - Week 5

Bong Sue Zhiun / 0366866

Illustration & Visual Narrative / Bachelor of Design (Hons) in Creative Media

Task 1: Vormator Challenge

1. Lectures

2. Instructions

3. Tutorial

4. Practical

5. Task 1:Exercises

LECTURE

Week 2 : Character Design Basics

Week 3 : Chiaroscuro

Week 4 : Composition theory 1 / Visual Types and Shots

INSTRUCTIONS

TUTORIAL

Week 1

1. Introduction to the module for letting us to know what we need to do.

2. Create our e-portfolio.

3. Mr Hafiz introduces the Bézier game ( https://bezier.method.ac/ ) to us .This game helps us to learn and familiar with the pen tool.

This is my result of the car in the Bézier game:

Fig. 3.1.1 The Bezier Game , Week 1, 27.9.2023

Week 2 : Vormator Shapes

1. Mr Hafiz introduced our first task ( Vormator Challenge ).We need to use the eight vormator shapes to create our own character.

There are some rules when creating our artwork:

We are allowed to rotate, flip and duplicate the elements.
We have to use all the elements scaling that is allowed, but proportionally, so skewing or free transform.
We can add, subtract, intersect and group elements as we see fit.
The use of colour is unrestricted; we create our own colour schemes (e.g. use Adobe Colour).
We are allowed to use gradients and the elements may be filled, the use of strokes is allowed.
We are allowed to use filters or effects (e.g. drop shadows).

These are the eight vormator shapes :

Fig.3.2.1 Vormator Shape , Week 2, 4.10.2023

Example for the Vormator Challenge:

Fig.3.2.2 & 3 Example of Vormator Challenge , Week 2, 4.10.2023

2. Mr Hafiz taught us to trace the shapes using Adobe illustrator.

Way to place an image in the artboard:

Fig.3.2.5 Way to place image , Week 2, 4.10.2023

Tracing the shapes using pen tool.

Fig.3.2.6 Tracing the shape , Week 2, 4.10.2023

Use the Direct selection tool ( drag the red button ) to make the shape smoother.

Fig.3.2.7 Direction selection tool, Week 2, 4.10.2023

Fig.3.2.8 Smoother the shape , Week 2, 4.10.2023

Week 3 : Light & Shadows

After the tutorial session, I noted down all the things that I think is important as I'm new to Illustrator.

1. Pencil tool is located inside the Shaper Tool. Pencil tool is used for drawing free path lines just as if you are using an actual pencil to draw on the paper.

Fig.3.3.1 Pencil tool , Week 3, 11.10.2023

2. Pathfinder : press Windows and you will find it.

The Divide option creates a new shape for each shape section. It creates separate shapes for both overlapping and non-overlapping areas.

Fig.3.3.2 Where to find the pathfinder , Week 3, 11.10.2023

Fig.3.3.3 Divide is the first one under the Pathfinders , Week 3, 11.10.2023

3. Shortcut key ( SHIFT X ) : If an object is selected it will swop the stroke and fill colours.

4. Knife tool is located inside the eraser tool. Knife tool lets you cut shapes into multiple shapes with closed path.

Fig.3.3.4 Knife tool, Week 3, 11.10.2023

Week 4 : Colours & Blending mode

1. In Illustrator, there are six blending modes: Normal, Darken, Lighten, Contrast, Inversion, and Component. Each of these modes works a little differently, so it's important to know which one to use for which effect. You can find them in the “Appearance” section under the “Properties” tab on the right menu.

Tutorial of using blending mode : https://www.educba.com/blending-modes-in-illustrator/

2. Shape Builder is usually used to combine multiple overlapping shape. Besides, we can also merge, erase, and subtract shapes. In the tutorial, Mr Hafiz use it to erase the unnecessary parts.

Fig.3.4.1 Shape Builder , Week 4, 18.10.2023

Fig.3.4.2 Use Shape Builder to erase , Week 4, 18.10.2023

3. Compound path : Object > Compound path > Make.

It merges two or more shapes into a single path.

Fig.3.4.3 Compound Path , Week 4, 18.10.2023

4. Clipping mask : Object > Clipping Mask > Make.

It is an object whose shape masks other artwork so that only areas that lie within the shape are visible, in effect, clipping the artwork to the shape of the mask.

Fig.3.4.4 Clipping mask , Week 4, 18.10.2023

Fig.3.4.5 After applied clipping mask , Week 4, 18.10.2023

PRACTICAL

Week 2 : Vormator Shape

I trace the eight shapes given using pen tool in Adobe Illustrator.

Fig.4.1.1 Shape Tracing , Week 2, 4.10.2023

After that, I create two characters for my Vormator Challenge.

Fig.4.1.2 Vormator Challenge #1 , Week 2, 4.10.2023

Fig.4.1.3 Vormator Challenge #2 , Week 2, 4.10.2023

Week 3 : Light & Shadow

We are learning about the technique of chiaroscuro ( light-dark ). In this exercise, we have to draw out the pear using the image provided below and apply shadow on it.

Fig.4.2.1 Image of pear , Week 3 , 11.10.2023

Mr Hafiz taught us to use knife tool to cut the pear into pieces. We also learned that we can recolour our artwork without manually changing on the artwork. We just need to go Edit > Edit colours > Recolour Artwork. There will be some sample prompts that we can try on it.

Below is my outcomes of cut pear & recoloured pear.

Fig.4.2.2 my outcomes , Week 3 , 11.10.2023

Therefore, Mr Hafiz gave us a homework which is applied the same thing that I learned in the previous exercise but only change the shadow to the image of a skull.

Fig.4.2.3 Skull , Week 3 , 11.10.2023

This is my outcome:

Fig.4.2.4 Pear with a skull's shadow , Week 3 , 11.10.2023

Week 4 : Colours & Blending mode

Chiaroscuro exercise 2

This time, we are going to use the image provided below and apply the concept of chiaroscuro into it.

Fig.4.3.1 Image of man , Week 4 , 18.10.2023

Outcome:

Fig.4.3.2 Outcome , Week 4 , 18.10.2023

After that , Mr Hafiz taught us to apply texture to our previous outcome. He recommended us to find the texture on freepik ( https://www.freepik.com/ ). I applied to my artwork using two different textures .

Fig.4.3.3 Texture #1 , Week 4 , 18.10.2023

#1

Fig.4.3.4 Outcome of texture #1 applied , Week 4 , 18.10.2023

Fig.4.3.5 Texture #2 , Week 4 , 18.10.2023

#2

Fig.4.3.6 Outcome of texture #2 applied , Week 4 , 18.10.2023

TASK

Milestone 1 Exercise : Vormator Character Design

I choose the nine tail fox as my vormator character for this task.

Fig.5.1.1 My Vormator Character , Week 2 , 4.10.2023

After the exercise of applying shadows to the pear, I apply the shadow to my Vormator character.

Fig.5.1.2 My Vormator Character with shadow , Week 3 , 11.10.2023

I choose a texture from freepik and apply the texture to the tails' shadow part. To suit with the texture, I also change the colour palette of the nine tail fox.

Fig.5.1.3 Texture , Week 4 , 18.10.2023

Fig.5.1.4 Apply texture to tails' shadow , Week 4 , 18.10.2023

After that, I find that the texture in the tails' shadow is not so obvious, so I apply the texture to the whole tails. For the tails' shadow part, I maintain an opacity of 100% while changing the opacity to 80% for the tails.

Fig.5.1.5 Apply texture to whole tails , Week 4 , 18.10.2023

As adjusting the opacity will affect the appearance with the background later on, I use photoshop to adjust the brightness and contrast for the texture. The darker one is used for the shadow part.

Fig.5.1.6 Adjust the brightness and contrast on Photoshop , Week 5 , 25.10.2023

Fig.5.1.7 & 8 (Left) Before adjusting, (Right) After adjusting , Week 5 , 25.10.2023

I reapply the clipping mask on my character.

Fig.5.1.9 Result after reapplying clipping mask , Week 5 , 25.10.2023

Using the pen tool to draw the background for my character. The background is based on my guesses about the location of the nine-tailed fox and my opinion that it is a nocturnal animal. I therefore draw a forest as my background and a moon to indicate that it was nighttime.