Digital submission

I have created a gif for the digital submission part of this brief, the concept was to show that In ten years time my creativity will still be present, however like the wilting flowers shown, there will always be growth then the ideas that have been developing slowly fade. This reflects me, as I am forever changing my opinion during my design process, and no matter how nice something my look the organised mess can consume me as an individual. 

Development

Making origami flowers:

Want to create a gif for the digital submission to represent me in ten years. Still has a strong concept/direction however nothing is ever organised, however the unorganisation has a clear direction, ideas are constantly developing and growing. This suggests that we are unsure what is going on during our design process, when creating, however there is always a refined solution in the future. The flower represents the growth then deterioration of an idea. Then the process is repeated. 

Development

In order to start creating the screen print, we started creating some digital layers for our print, trying and testing several compositions and sizing.

Central design, symmetrical.

Adding some shapes dispersing from the centre, however we both decided that because the centre was very tight and intricate, the outer shapes need to be slightly more dishevelled, allowing us to create something that illustrated the concept (disarray yet with obvious direction.)

Changed the sizing of the silhouette so its slightly larger.

Final negatives

How the layered print will look, each of the separate layers will be a different colour. We will select three of the colours from our chosen colour palette. The decision for the specific colour palette reflect on us as individuals, they are the colours which we feel represents our mood effectively. A combination of darker hues, and pastels create a nice combination. 

Influences

When looking at alternative self portraits, I came across the designer Petra Peterffy. Her illustrative and digital practice began as collage design, and her inspiration comes from anything that crosses her path, her designs tell their own stories or depicts situations from alternative perspectives.

This image depicts the blurred boundary between sleep and wakefulness. This digital art piece I find to be intriguing, the soft floral combines with the prominent shapes creates a nice contrast. The transition from sleep to awake is clear, as it suggests that when in sleep, everything is a blur. 

This is one of my favourite pieces from the artist, as the distorted imagery emerging from the figures.

We looked at some interestic repeat patterns including geometric shapes, and linear designs. The soft pastel tones contrast agaisnt the harsh, angular shapes created by the linear structure.

The visual motifs of a geometric pattern are repeated to form the full design, but with our own print we want to create something that has direction and not just a repetitve design. Symmetrical and linear patterns could work nicely as a layered print, this will make the print slughtly difficult as each intricate layer would need to be lined up correctly, this is something we want to experiment with and see how intricate we can make each layer. 

Initial Ideas 

 The first layer displays an arrangement of geometric, angular shapes dispersing from the left hand side. The idea would be to duplicate this and flip it, creating a symmetrical linear design. The centre is more intricate, then the shapes expand towards the outside dishevelling and appearing less intricate. We would imagine this to be the base layer. The next layer (as shown on the tracing paper overlaying the first layer) would be some of the same shapes already creating, however instead of being a linear line, they would be block colour allowing the shape to print over the exisitng in a separate colour. The third layer shows a side profile silhouette (the important part) as this will show us, as a person. To keep the print consistent and with the concept still present, we want the silhouette to appear rather subtle, so its not just an obvious self portrait. 

Before we started creating the design for print we both decided on a colour palette that reflects us both. With the brief asling for an alternative self portrait of ourselves, the colour palette was informed by our own interests and personal choice of colours. These pastel hues would wokr well together as the shades compliment eachother, they would work together in any context. Knowing we are creating a layered print, we selected a few colours allowing us to have a wide  range to test on paper when it comes to producing the final print. 

Wetransfer: Collaborative Practice

The Brief

Deciding on our concept

When sitting down with katy to decide what we needed to do, we made a couple of mind maps to get each of our ideas out there. Fortunately, we both agreed on the same path to take with this brief, I wanted to create something slightly different to what I would usually create, allowing us to produce something that has more tactile qualities, which also explores different processes and medias. The brief requires us to celebrate who we will be in 10 years, and produce an alternative self portrait. With both mine and katys skills combined, I feel like we would be able to produce an interesting response. Me and katy collectively agreed that we want to focus on something that allows us to have exploration of different processes and materials, and something slightly more hands on, and illustrative. For katy, this comes naturally as she is on the printed textiles course, which I am excited about working with her for because she will be able to bring certain skills and techniques when working on the brief, which I don't usually get the opportunity to do. To try and tackle this, we sat down and spoke about who we are, what we like, and what we want to pursue; within the creative field. 

Initial ideas/notes:

layered prints, screen prints, drawings shapes

built up layers of drawings, with different opacities 

the concept needs to inform the illustration 

self promotion - use styles that suit us individually

manipulation of photos

layering up different processes/techniques

telling a story with a collection of images 

collection of all things relevant to me 

A lot of katys work includes bold, floral patterns suitable for print design of a large scale, we have similar interests in terms of designers and influence therefore I think katy is the perfect partner to work with. I want to combine her floral pattern work, and ability to work on a larger scale through the use of prints, drawings and digital manipulation with my ability  to add the graphic elements, resulting in creating a unique response. 

Concept: 'Organised mess'

The idea behind this was created by both katy and I, we considered that we both have the same work flow and same work ethic, therefore this brief was good to collaborate on as we both have the same visions of how we see ourselves in 10 years time. We considered obstacle and difficulties in life, but mainly focused on the way we work creatively. The self portrait needs to be influenced by our design process, as we still intend to be creatives in 10 years time, however in 10 years we will have more direction and stability. 

Katy and I both agreed that we wanted to experiment with different processes for this brief, such as screen printing. With the concept in mind, we felt that it would work well if we created a print that reflects the idea of constantly developing and adding to a process so a print built up of many layers could be something to try. We both sketched out some rough ideas. The print must include something that can represent me/katy as an individual, as it asks for a self portrait, however the idea to illustrate a detailed version of a self portrait did not appeal to either of us; we had both presented some research to eachother that included abstract, geometric designs and as this is something Katy doesnt really base her own practice on we thought it would be a good idea to explore this even further and allow Katy to create something that she wouldnt usually. 

The response will illustrate that there will always be constant development and growth of the creative ideas going on in our minds, and nothing is organised, however there is still a clear direction and focus of where we intend to potentially end up.