Research Objects

Tyga - 420 x 297 mm

Paul Reilly is a contemporary illustrator who is renowned for his beautiful fashion illustrations which have an urban touch. Reilly has really influenced me; he is the key to success of how I examine my work in the materials I use. Before noticing Paul Reilly, I was really unsure of what my talent was. But one assignment was assigned and we had to be inspired by Reilly so I challenged myself to produce work similar to his. Inspired by Reilly’s work, I was intrigued by the way he produced his portrait illustrations, and inspired by the use of lines he used. Also he uses a technique of stimulating the brush to create an elegant glow to his work, which I did for my own piece. With his work he exaggerated the portraits with colour, which gave it a more bold effect. He also adds areas of colour to the face to get a surreal feel to them; in my own interpretation of his work, I did this affect but instead I added a slight glow around the image so it blends better to make the image appear more realistic.

Marcus - 420 x 297 mm

Max Gregor started out doing illustrations for the urban underground art and music scene. He is working towards a graphic realism, juxtaposed by texture influenced by graffiti lines and pattern. Gregors work really helped me capture detail in portraits.

The above image on the left is a piece of work Gregor did and on the right is a inspired piece I done, inspired by Gregor, I really want to capture tones to the face to make it 3D so it didn't look just like a flat image. Max Gregor helped inspire my work by the thickness of line that he used; around the face of my attempt of work there is a thick line. Using the use of colour Gregor did, I tried to keep the grey jacket a sort of bold colour, but around the image I tried to add shading which is also inspired by Gregor. 

 

LaiYin - 297 x 210 mm

Sean Kernick was born in Detroit 1977 and grew up in Philly. His style is a hybrid of heavy graffiti influences and traditional characters. Art and drawing were his main interests. Kernick inspired me to transform a person into a character which I attempted for myself. 

The above image on the left is one of kernicks pieces, and on the right is my interpretation of his work. The process began with a photograph of me in a similar positioning as Kernick's in regards to the medium shot of the body, as well as a section of the body part coming towards the camera. Influenced by his cartoon theme, i also converted my image into a cartoon using colour similar to his which are quite bold and bright and animated features. What really inspired me about Kernicks work is the immature look to the eyes that he features on his illustration. From a young age I enjoyed drawing my own characters which included eyes which were animated and exaggerated so discovering Kernick's similar trend excited and interested me to explore his work further.

Beautiful Insecurity - 297 x 210 mm

The above image is a 'Brand' design I produced recently on Adobe Photoshop which was a result of a project assigned to me in university. To enable me to produce this piece I was initially partnered with Yvonne. The project idea was to come up with a brand that sums up a person and their interests. The first stage included me sketching some ideas of designs, before making a final decision. Upon inspection, I discovered that Yvonne is a quiet and insecure individual. To reflect this, I used body language in the form of her hidden face and confined body pose to portray her insecurity. Also, I positioned the image into a box to illustrate her stuck situation in society because of her insecurity which restricts her. Furthermore, I added wings to represent her angelic nature, because she is a very quiet, yet polite and friendly character. Yvonne also loves art and her favourite colour is pink, so I added these themes into the wings. Overall, I am pleased with the final design I created. I was able to capture the majority of her interests whilst still keeping it simple which is a trend in brand designs. Also, I didn't include text because I wanted the image to be the main focal point. If it wasn't for meeting someone like Yvonne I personally wouldn't have understood what sort of person she was, until I actually spoke to her. She was my inspiration for this piece of work I design and created.

Here are 3 screen grabs of videos I took from YouTube; top left image is of the original video of the Cadbury advert which was released in 2009 to promote their dairy milk chocolate bar. top right is a parody of the original version which Lily Allen and Alan Carr produced as a remake of the Cadbury Eyebrows which was aired on the ' The Sunday Night Project' on channel 4. Lastly, the bottom screen shot is a remake of my own Cadbury advert, inspired by the original and parody version. It inspired me to also make a funny version of the advert but put a twist of adding an Asian feel to it at the end. I also was inspired by the way they switched around the roles as Alan as the girl and Lily as the guy. Overall this encouraged me to come out my comfort zone and I uploaded the video onto YouTube My intention was to use my creative and humorous characteristics to produce a video that I, as well as others may deem funny.

Overall, this was a success because the video received over 3,000 views, which helped encourage me to make more YouTube videos so that I could entertain people who liked to watch my remake of the Cadbury advert.

Here is a link to my version of the Cadbury advert: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1G1VOXDGS88

Artist Statement

As an inspirational artist, my journey has developed from a young age. Since the beginning, I was exposed to art as a compulsory course in secondary school. I soon discovered my instant interest in fine art and often practiced at home where I kept a sketch book with all my creative ideas. I would often draw objects that I would find around my house, or I would draw family and friend's portraits. Art has helped me discover shading for in depth detail, as well as practice with scale for accurate proportioning. The techniques I have developed from art have helped contribute to my graphics work with designing fonts; we need to get the thickness right, especially if you’re enlarging a scale onto bigger paper. Also, shading in graphics is vital to make an image more realistic and dimensional.

 My past experiences in education have allowed my creative interest to prosper and develop. The combination of courses I have experienced has enabled me to combine my skills in illustration, photography and use of Adobe Photoshop to produce art in all mediums of digital and fine art. When selecting what course I wanted to take at degree level, I knew I wanted to enrol in a course that combines all my interests. Graphics was an obvious choice for me.

 

Okiema 420 x 297 mm

I often researched artists in my own time and have discovered a lot of artists who I have distinct interests in such as Max Gregor and Paul Reilly. Paul Reilly is an artist who has helped me immensely with my Photoshop skills. For my first assignment in college I was directed to explore the work of Reilly and how he portrays his illustrations. Influenced by his work, I was inspired to define and produce curved lines using pen tool in adobe Photoshop. I also discovered his urban inspired themes throughout his work, so I directed my model in the above image to portray an inappropriate gesture related to urban trends in posing.

 

J-Horror Magazine - 420 x 297 mm

In college I produced a magazine front cover. This was awarded best magazine of the year. This award gave me the confidence to believe in myself, to believe that I was good at Designing.

Dove - 297 x 210 mm This typography piece is a collage of wording such as ‘love’ to form a figure of a dove. I used different sizes of typeface and produced a smaller typeface to form a line to give an outline of the doves head, and larger ones to form the wings.

 

Rainbow - 297 x 210 mm

This was my first ever piece where I combined tracing and Photoshop together. I traced an image of my friend and photocopied it, using the piece as a montage I started to create shapes and numbering around. I was inspired by Paul Reilly collages.

 

Rhianna - 420 x 297 mm

Here is an illustration I did of 'Rhianna'. I used Photoshop using the tool 'Pen tool' to define the shape of the face, to get the smooth lines I stimulated the brush to avoid bold lines. In the face I used thinner lines to get an elegant feel and I also used different tones of shades, and blended them to give a realistic look.