Illustration and Visual Narrative - Assignment 1: Editorial Illustration (Decisive Moment)

2023.10.30 - 2023.11.29 / Week 6 - Week 10

Teo Mei Hui / 0358315

Illustration and Visual Narrative / Bachelor of Design (Honors) in Creative Media / Taylor's University

Assignment 1: Editorial Illustration (Decisive Moment)

---

LECTURES

Week 6

Lecture 3: Composition Theory 1 / Visual Types and Shots

Basic Composition Visual Rules

Visual Narrative

• Visual in the scene in the scene complements the subject focus and reflect the narrative.

Visual Flow

• The scene has clear flow of visual that directs viewer's eyes.

Visual Balance

• The visuals in arrange to balance the composition in the scene.

Visual Hierarchy 

• The visuals are arrange in such ways that directs viewer's eyes to specific details first.

Different Type of Shots

• Establishing
• Bird's eye view
• Frame within frame
• Medium 
• Close-up
• Worm's eye view

Week 7

Lecture 4: Composition Theory 2 / Perspective

Construct Perspectives

One-point Perspective

• The most simple method of producing three-dimensional images.
• Objects drawn emerging from a single point on the horizon.

Two-point Perspective

• There are vanishing points on either side of the horizon, and the objects within the scene are drawn to both of these vanishing points.
• Helps to create greater sense of space by giving objects more sense of dimension and place.

Three-point Perspective

• Two vanishing points on either side of the horizon with the addition of another vanishing point high above or below the horizon.
• Most useful to achieve sense of drama and scale, and to fit more objects in one scene.

Isometric View

• For creating detailed concepts of individual buildings, it’s more beneficial to use a simple isometric view, since it allows you to clearly present three sides of your design without distorting perspective or obscuring details.

Lecture 5: Composition Theory 3 / Fore, Mid, & Background

Different types of planes

Foreground

• Object nearest to viewer.
• By using size differences and color contrast to highlight foreground as main focus.

Middle-ground

• Object in between foreground and background.
• By using size differences and light/shadow contrast to highlight the main focus.

Background

• Object furthest from viewer.
• By using shapes and light/shadow contrast to highlight the main focus.

Design Flow

• Good arrangement of visual focus.
• A design with good flow will lead the viewers’ eye throughout the layout.
• Our visual should be able to influence the way the viewer will digest our content.

The Soloist

Mr. Hafiz tasked us with watching this animation video so that we can have a better understanding on composition principles. While watching we can observe and identify how they utilized foreground, midground and background to give more depth to the animation and make it look lively. Below are some of my observations from the video.

Foreground

Figure 1.1 'The Soloists' 1:25

In this scene, the old lady and dog is shown to be at the very front. The contrasting size with the background makes it feel like they are nearer to us.

Middle-ground

Figure 1.2 'The Soloists' 00:29

Figure 1.3 'The Soloists' 1:48

The two scenes show the characters being in between objects, such as in between buildings, as well as in between objects and the wall. This type of arrangement is the most frequently seen one in the video.

Background

Figure 1.4 'The Soloists' 2:38

In this scene, the old lady is close to the wall. A little while after it will zoom out to reveal that this wall is the background, and the lady will then move to the fore/middle-ground.

Figure 1.5 'The Soloists' 5:36

In this scene the subject is in the background, but by highlighting the subject using lights and shadow as well as bright colors which gives contrast, we will focus on it.

---

INSTRUCTIONS

Editorial illustrations are produced for newspapers, magazines and websites to add a visual dimension to a piece of writing. This serves two main functions – it helps to grab the attention of the reader as they browse the publication, but can also help to add a new perspective to the article.

For this assignment, we must find a related article/story that discuss Urban Legends. The legends maybe local or international. The artstyle must be derived from Art Deco.

---

SUBMISSION

Urban Legend: OKIKU DOLL

First, I started researching on Japanese urban legends, because I'm more familiar with them. I came upon an article that discusses multiple well-known Japanese urban legends. After a bit of reading, I decided to do my editorial illustration on the urban legend: Okiku Doll, as the story was not too gory or creepy, and it seemed quite doable. 

Story

According to the story of Okiku, the doll was purchased by a seventeen-year-old boy named Eikichi Suzuki during a visit to Sapporo for a marine exhibition in 1918. The doll was a gift from his travels for his two-year-old sister named Okiku (in some versions of the story she’s called Kikuko). When she was initially purchased, the doll had a hair style called ‘okappa’ (similar to a bob cut), which is popular on Japanese dolls. Okiku loved her new doll and it served as the little girl’s companion until she died suddenly from a cold-like illness at the age of three. Devastated by their loss, Okiku’s family put her favourite doll on the household altar where they prayed in memory of Okiku. Before long, the family noticed that the hair on Okiku’s doll had begun to grow, as if the hair was on the head of a human. The family concluded that the restless spirit of Okiku, who died so young, was now inside her beloved doll. The doll remained with Okiku’s family until 1938 when they moved to Iwamizawa in Hokkaido and gave the doll to the Mennenji Temple where she remains enshrined to this day.  She is now referred to as Okiku after her former owner. Some believe the hair that continues to grow from her head is the hair of the child Okiku. Her hair is cut from time-to-time, apparently, it makes her happy.

Concept Mood Board

Figure 2.1 Concept mood board

Sketches

Figure 2.2 Sketches

Figure 2.3 Sketches

After deciding on the urban legend, I started to look for inspirations and references online to get an idea for my work. I gathered the pictures and put them into a mood board, then I sketched out my ideas. In my opinion, the difficult part was trying to follow the art deco style.

Rationale

Turning points / climax: 

• Doll is possessed by little girl (owner)
• Hair of doll grows
• Hair of doll is cut regularly

After reading the story and identifying the turning points, I immediately had the idea of the doll having overgrown hair for my illustration, so that it can emphasize on the fact that it's a doll that has growing hair. Then having someone cut the doll's hair with scissors to further emphasize the fact. The doll would be placed in an altar, as according to the story, the real doll is being kept in a temple. My illustration only shows the inside of the altar, so that it can be kept minimalistic.

Illustration Process

1. I placed my sketch into Adobe Illustrator as a template, and began tracing it to build the basic shapes.

Figure 2.4 Illustration process 1 (basic shapes)

2. I refined the hair and hands as the first one was just not it. I also added the background and foreground.

Figure 2.5 Illustration process 2 (background and foreground)

3. Here I added some more elements as it felt too empty. I also adjusted the color to my liking.

Figure 2.6 Illustration process 3 (refining and additional elements)

4. Lastly, I started adding gradient and grain textures to my illustration. I tried to achieve art deco style but I admit it's lacking a bit.

Figure 2.7 Illustration process 4 (texture and gradient)

Final Editorial Illustration

Figure 2.8 Final editorial illustration jpeg

Animated GIF Process

The final part of the assignment was to add limited animation to the editorial illustration and turn it into an animated gif. The animation had to be minimal and within the scope. We were advised to animate secondary actions and not the main action.

1. I made 5 frames for the animation in Adobe Illustrator. The idea was to use the anticipation principle of animation since we were told not to use the main action. So I animated the action of opening the scissors wider before cutting it. There is slight animation in the reflection of the scissors as well. I also added the doll's eyes glancing over. Originally, I wanted to have the name plate be shining, but after animating it, I realized it was too distracting and would divert the viewer's attention from the scissors.

Figure 2.9 Animation process in Adobe Illustrator

2. Then, I imported the 5 frames into Adobe Photoshop. I duplicated the frames so that it would rewind and loop forever. A total of 16 frames set at 0.15 seconds were used.

Figure 2.10 Frames in Adobe Photoshop

Final Animated GIF

Figure 2.11 Final animated gif

---

PRACTICAL

Week 7: Transparency Gradient and Noise Exercise

In this exercise, we learn how to add texture to our illustration by adding gradient and using the grain effect. The gradient also helps to add shadow to the illustration. First, we practiced with basic shapes like circles and triangles.

Figure 3.1 Gradient and texture exercise on basic shapes

Then, we were tasked to add shadow and grain texture to a vector illustration of people. We had to add the gradient and texture part by part.

Figure 3.2 Gradient and texture exercise on vector

---

FEEDBACK

Week 9

Told Mr. Hafiz my idea/vision for the animated gif. He said he thinks it will work, as long as I limit the animation to something that will loop seamlessly.

Week 10

Showed Mr. Hafiz the final animated gif, he said it's ok and the artwork is good.

---

REFLECTIONS

Through this assignment, we had to do our research on urban legends and identify the turning point / decisive moment of our chosen story. It was interesting as i got to know more about various urban legends, but it was kind of a bad idea to do the researches at night. Furthermore, I also got introduced to the art deco illustration style through this assignment, it was one of the tricky parts of this assignment as it was a little difficult for me to achieve the style. One thing I realized is how researching on the subject, looking for inspirations and references, as well as creating mood boards is extremely beneficial for our design process. Besides that, I learned about how to create editorial illustrations and further enhanced my skill in using Adobe Illustrator. Moreover, I was able to learn more about composition and apply it in my work such as utilizing foreground, middle-ground and background. I also learned how to create an animated gif for editorial illustrations by using limited animation that are mainly focused on secondary action instead of main actions. Overall, it was a great learning experience and I'm happy with my final outcome, and will strive to do even better for my next task.