Month: October 2021

I began my character design process by researching other artists and media within my chosen theme – ‘Winter’. I wanted to look into different cultures that live in cold areas, such as the Inuit people, and how their environment affected their appearance. I found that often, they used animal skins to make tents and clothes. They crafted tools and weapons from the animals’ bones, antlers, horns and teeth. In summer, they travelled in boats covered with animal skin, called kayaks and in winter, on sleds pulled by dog teams, so their lives were very reliant on nature.

My first idea was based on a huntress who harnessed a wolf’s spirit in order to aid her. I wanted to combine some of the practicality of the Inuit with a more adventure/fantasy look, to add more interest to the design. I began by sketching out many ideas to experiment with different looks, trying out different silhouettes and shapes. I continued the use of furs and natural looking colours for most of this design process, but in the end decided to make use of blue colours to add contrast to the design, and make it match more with the winter/ice theme.

I finished my design process by asking for feedback on my artistic choices, in order to finalise some areas, and then drawing turnarounds of the character from the front and side.

Mary Taylor

I look down at the postcard on my doorstep. A woman’s vacant gaze stares back at me, her old fashioned black bonnet surrounding her face with shadow. Turning the card over, there is no note, only a signature: Mary Taylor

Through the glass pane of my window I see her on the street, consumed by a black shroud. She’s staring in now, directly at me. I turn and bolt my door, questioning ‘what could you want with me, Mary Taylor?’

I am on the bus. Through the window condensation I see a shadow, a white face standing out from the darkness. I stand from my seat but she is already gone, leaving the words on my lips: Mary Taylor

I hear a scraping outside my apartment door, like scissors on metal. The door clicks and creaks, and a tap, tap, tap, clicks along the hallway. She is here.

I wanted to use the image that I was basing my creative writing on, within the piece. I found an image of a Victorian woman, and based the character ‘Mary Taylor’ on her. The story itself is loosely based on the myth of Bloody Mary, which I wanted the audience to realise, hence naming the character Mary. The idea was that after seeing her three times (instead of saying her name) she would appear and kill you/the main character. I also chose the surname Taylor as I wanted her to have a seamstress theme. If I had had a higher word count I would’ve liked to explore the idea that she was a seamstress originally, possibly using sewing scissors to murder her victims. The word count did prove to be a challenge, as I could not offer much context, or description of the main character or the situation they were in, instead having to rely on more subtle descriptors. I also wanted the character of Mary to seem as if she didn’t really belong in the world, or was a supernatural character, so tried to show that she often blended in with the dark or could only be seen not in person (eg in on a postcard).

Beginning the week, we started by exploring different sounds in our surroundings, both inside and outside, and seeing how they could be translated into drawings. I explored showing individual sounds as well as soundscapes, through words and artistically. I also took recordings of a few sounds that I came across.

After beginning to work with sounds, we had to create three 10 second soundscapes, with accompanying imagery. The first, I wanted to create a theme of a supermarket, so I worked with different sound recordings of people chatting in a shop, a rhythmic scanner beep, and a metronome. Second, I made an outdoor scape of rain at a bus stop, using rain sounds, and the noise of a bus stopping. I also experimented with using whale noises and a previous recording of a siren, to bring a more musical quality. The accompanying animation was inspired by the sound itself, featuring a man who turns into a whale to board a mysterious portal-like bus. The third soundscape was of a cooking scene. I experimented with different sections of a long recording of myself cooking, including chopping, frying, and boiling sounds. Overall I think the second one was the most successful as I experimented with it the most, and spent the most time dedicated to the visual accompaniment. I would like to have had more time to work with the others.

Reflecting on my location drawing, I found it interesting to work with different perspectives and angles of the same area, both indoors and outdoors. After sketching outside and at the Tate with my class, I went to a café to try and focus more on people in my drawings. I was not used to including people/characters in my location sketches, so found giving them character quite challenging. I feel like I got better at this over time, though still have a tendency to draw the area around the character as the main focus. 

When drawing the ‘narrative story’ I wanted to use a very simple idea – a woman getting a text from a loved one. I knew I would find drawing the same character multiple times to be difficult, as it means maintaining the proportions and shapes of the character, so I chose to focus on the expressions and keeping continuity, rather than making the ‘plot’ too dramatic. I do think I managed to show clearly what is happening in the scene through expressions, though I would like to push them further at my next opportunity.