Task 15 Visual Composition

Im quite pleased to be doing this task as Its something I've spent a lot of time looking into of recent and Ive found some nice trickery and wizardry on the subject.
Composition is a amazing concept, its the method of how we see things, by cropping them and the arangment of the objects we see, so create something.
Composition can change your picture into anything you want, simply chaning the camera angle can change the whole feel of the image
Lets just delve deep into some different methods of showing an image, and how they effect they way we read it, or can read it. This is best portraid with the same image, from different angles.

Lets have a look at these speedy thumbs, thumbs being the best way to figure out what composition works best for what you are wanting to portray.
What does this image say? They say, two people, in an arena, one is attacking the other and the other is defenseless. What can we do with this visualy?
Birds eye: The birds eye view sort of shows quite a tense moment, the viewer is too far away to rach in and stop the attack, we can use this view, so get an almost a god view. This view also takes detail away from the characters, focusing on the shapes instead of details, the event is the most important thing to be see. In this particular scene, the birds eye view can make you feel nutural towards the scene, like youre floating careless, or youre in thr croud completely exiled from the action.
Worms eye: The worms eye view in comparison, rams the action right up into your face and forces you to see it. You can see this attacker is lundging in, the victim is defencless, dropping their weapon. This view is great for showing dominating power, the attacker is in complete controle, its all about the attacker, and his power. A worms eye is very good for displaying the " looking down ones nose at you " effect. Want your viewer to think your character is higher in the social lader than you? Worms eye is the way to do it.
Being the attacker For a different feel, we can set the camera behind the attacker. What does this do? This lets us be right up behind the atacker, looking right over his sholder. Its close, we can see the action, the motion, whats going to happen and enough detail to make us understand, whos doign what to who with what and how. This could also make us feel that we are a partner of the attacker, or we're just about to reach in and stop the action before this final strike.
Behind the victim This is quite a flip of what I just said, its like we are with the victim, we can see whats happening, whats coming, this sort of battle scene.

Fibonaci Spiral When I was working on my bradgate final, Chris mention a "fibonacci spiral ", this is a cool little trick which can make the viewers eye move towards an area you want, for example, a snail shell, your eye will move towards the point. This works with paintings aswell, you can easily combine multipul objects, to force the viewer to follow particular lines. For the image above, I wanted the viewer to have both the feeling of the calm landscape, to slowly pass over onto the action of this dragon fight, paying attention to the bite of the dragon than the soldier riding them in the center of this show.
Rule of thirds: The rule of thirds is almost a golden rule in photography, and can be used to give you controle over your imagery. It splits the image into a 3x3 grid, it alows you to position areas of rest and intrest in your image. Rest is a very important for the eye, if you have alot of noise, you wont notice any of the noise and youll make visual chaos, good balence will help you to create an image which is easy on the eye. Something that will let one look at your image for longer, without draining them. Simply by cropping the image, so the areas of intrest are in areas where the sections cross, you can make nice areas of rest and intrest. Sticking an image dead center, you will not be able to pay much attention to the whole image, as the main intrest, is dead center, sitting there dull and boring. The goal of this method is to get the viewer to look all over your image, so you get more time from them.

Moving objects need space to move into!
Lets have a look at a picture of a tortois toy I drew. Its a toy, but it could be real enough, like its on sand not paper lets say.

Looking at this, clearly I hadnt thought of rule of thirds. Other than that, it looks very cramped, that tortoise is looks like it wants to go over to the right, but it has no where to do, the picture feels uncomfortable. What does this picture show? That this creature wants to stand there? It ruins the picture. Too much of one subject and no space to rest the eye.

Well doesnt that feel better? That little section of uncropped gives you alot more to look at, gives you space to breath no? A place for the tortoise to move into, it no longer feels cramped. It looks like the thing could move into the space, quite hapily. Space is important, good use of space is key.


There is more I could go onto, like piramid method, combining objects of different hights togehter.
But I want to do other things, like paint and finish a model.

Task 14

Planning And Conception

The beginning stages of a project, not just Game Design but film and other tasks, is one of the most important steps in creating a finalised product. Its hard not to want to jump to the final, as I know all too well in illustration, but its important that correct planning is done before hand, in order to achieve a successful product.

In drawing an illustration, such as has been taught to us by Chris, starts with a set of thumbnails, and than slowly develops into a more detailed image. But there is something before the thumbnails even begins which is the planning. We are set a dead line, much like one would have in any practice, this is what we call the Brief. This brief is basically the planning to our project, we are told, how many thumbnails are needed, how long we have on the project and what it is we are to be creating. This could than be developed into a routine, so if we are given a week to do a full image, we can break the week down into sections and spend 2/7 days on thumbnails and preparation with the remaining 5/7 on the finalised image, or 6 days on preparation and 1 on the final image.  That one segmented day could be broken down further into hours of the day, so planning can go quite indepth, and its very important it does, because its so easy to lose time. One of my greatest guilts is not getting out of bed untill 11am on a weekend, realising half the day has gone. When one realises they do not have enough time to do something, or time has disappeared it is down to poor planning on their part. Or in the case of waking up in the morning, thats more of a will power issue.
With a scheduled and good time management, one can assure that something can be created on time, if nothing goes wrong. Something will always go wrong, but without the schedule the amount of time wasted could double or even triple the length of the project. A efficient schedule wastes no time.
Going back to my metaphor about Visual Deisgn projects. Some students jump straight to the final image and than work backwards. It raises questions, why waste time if you already have the final image? What made them think the image they created was the best outcome they could have created? If they worked backwards and realised a better image from their thumbnails, they would have wasted all the time on a final, to make a better final.

When it comes to concepting, its pictured as a golden goblet, or a prise to the young aspiring artist, however conception is all about selling an idea. Its the packaging before the product is created. To get an idea across in a visuals is far more elaborate than in text. In a concept, you can show a person on any level ( investor, director, 3D modeller, audience, ext.) what you want and what you dont want your project to be. If you create an idea which is not liked, the image is far more editable than words, the image can be tightened and refined to strengthen the idea. How I see it, concept art is to turn a chaotic, nebula of an idea, into a a smaller area, to tighten the idea, so everyone understands it, setting limitations to what it should and should not be. If everyone can see these ideas, its easier to abide by them.


Or at least thats what I think, I dont know, Im a student.

Task 13 and Paranoia in Public

Now officially a Second year I can look upon my last year and say how good or bad it was. I think it was neither, some grey in-between, its either black or white and i was somewhere in the middle. I had a good start to last year.
Over the summer holidays my productivity rose to new hights and my quality of work in 3d and 2d came with it.

Although my work on these projects had to be cut short, I am still pleased with some of the progression made. My first high to low bake and my first 15k character.
The problems I will and already have began to face this year are responsibility and sacrifices that need to be taken into account. At the moment, I have not sacrificed anything in order to spend more time working, over the past year I have gained many friends which I once had not had and am grateful for. However this also cuts down on the time I can work, I would not like to cut the amount of time I spend with them out at all, so I will have to find other enjoyment to cull. This is primarily, reddit, drunkenness, maybe even documentaries. All things I do enjoy, but are not needed. I almost wish I could stow away and work with no other worldly distraction, but than my work would be dull and lifeless as the moons surface.

The start of my new year has not gotten off to a running start, as I was at fast pace during the summer, untill I had to move, upon which my speed as been reduced to a walk. I think I will continue to walk for the next day or so (A littlel earthly pleasure, before I change the definition of pleasure), than begin a race towards my goal.

I also feel Ive become some what more bitter of recent, this is probably due to a lack of interaction with others over the summer, takes a while for me to get back into the people mood.

My goal for this year, to gain an internship, to visit and draw at every coffee shop in Leicester, to push myself.

Paranoid in Public.

Over the years as I draw people out and bout, coffee shops, pubs and clubs. I have noticed a strange almost paranoid feeling from those I draw and at times, I almost feel as if I shouldn't watch others in public, or even see them as I am trying to do through drawing. The feeling from many can almost make the work of drawing seem almost voyeuristic, but not in the sexual sence, its as if these people are in a bubble, in the public world but in a thin bubble of which ones glance is intruding into their world.
Let me explain.
In order for me to draw people in life, as they are, I need to draw them as they live, not as they pose or want to be portrait, but how I see them at the moment. So I will draw publicly and attempt to capture their life through my eyes, which is difficult if they were just sitting still at the very least.
Others do not share this mind set. Its almost as if the public, should be as private as ones own home.

Lets use example.
A few years ago, I decide to draw a family (a mother, father, two daughters and a son). No harm there. I watch them from a distance not to disturb them. One of the daughters notice me watching them and begins to freak out.
Now a freak out is how I describe someone whos actions become extremely agitated, sharp head movements, worried facical expression, whispering, pointing and sudden abrupt leaving... Oh and this is a good one, communication to others at the table with phones. (Parinoid behaviour in my books.)
Suddenly the father decides to talk to me and see what Im doing, which is fine, this isnt about people seeing my work, so I will stop there.
What I am interested in is why that girl freaked out.

Recently, a flatmate told me that her sister had recently felt " creeped out " by a man drawing her in a coffee shop in London not 2 months ago. Interested I bothered her with more questions. It seemed like this man was just drawing. But to her sister, he was " Weird " "creepy ". So the freak out was over appearance and that such a person with such appearance was looking upon her. If the description of the male was " attractive ", "cute" it would be a much different story.
So. Is the the reason for the freak out. No. What runs through the mind of someone who is being watched? " Why is this person looking at me ", " What are they doing ", " What do they want ", " Who are they. " ext.
I question, "Why do they care?".

This person is in a public place, in a world over ran with people. These people spend time and effort, making themselves look presentable, to go out into the public world. Some women take hours to get ready to leave their private domain. Im assuming they get ready and leave so people will see them, among their daily tasks.
So theres a catch 22 or whatever its called. People want to be seen and noticed. But they dont want to be seen or noticed it would seem through the eyes of an artist. But what annoys me, is they spend this time, they want to be seen and noticed, but when someone watches them for more than just a passing glance, they freak out, or begin to question why someone else is looking upon another person. Do they think I should process every characteristic of that person in just a glance, they may be able to do that, but it takes me alot longer. I'd rather be able to see the seams of a persons boot or the earing a person is waring for longer than a millisecond. So my question is why wont people let some appreciate others for simply being alive, it seems alien to me.
In some places in england, if you look at a someone for longer than a glance, they consider it a threat, questioning ones reasons for simply noticing their assistance. Looking at someone for longer than a glance, some consider flirting, and either freak out or flirt.

Ive also recently figured out why people notice you at all. People need constant stimulation. If what they are stimulated by ( a conversation ) becomes uninteresting, they will begin to glance across the room, for other things to stimulate their minds. From watching others, Ive noticed the type of people who will enjoy their companionship so much they will not notice whats going on around them, and those who are pretending to care, but never stop looking for something more interesting than the person sitting next to them. And whats more interesting than someone you know nothing about, looking at you, with a book.
I could conclude it here, people freak out, because they are bored. Ive also noticed, those that get bored talking to others, often have repetitively boring appearances, the blad man with glasses and laptop, the female fasion students, the business students (theyre easy to point out).
Theres much more on this subject, I always muddle it around in my head, so its harder to get out in text.
Lets just say, how I see it is; If a person is in public, they shouldnt feel afraid to be seen. And hell, Ill probably pay more attention to that person more than anyone else in the room/street.