Illustration and Visual Narrative/ Task 2

on October 30, 2023

6/11/2023- 20/11/2023 (Week 07— Week 09)

Wang Yifan/ 0368363

COM 61304/ Illustration and Visual Narrative/ Bachelor of Design (Hons) in Creative Media / Taylor's University

Task 2/ Decisive Moment

Week07:

Assignment 1 Editorial Illustration (Decisive Moment)

LECTURES

Composition:

In week 7, Mr Hafiz introduced us to the compositional use of foreground, midground, and background.

Week 7 Lecture Slides

After learning about compositions, Mr Hafiz instructed us to watch an animation short film named "The Soloists" to study the design compositions in the overall video. We were given our own time to watch the film and take notes on the details of foreground, midground and background as well as identify the flow of the plot happening in the film.

My notes regarding the video :

Fig 1.2 Scene showing good usage of backgrounds , Week 7 (11/6/2023)

In this scene i noticed that there is a very clear contrast of the different backgrounds with the 3 sisters being in midground and the background shows very clear contrast. There is good application of shadows and contrast applied here too.

Fig 1.3 Scene showing good lighting and usage of backgrounds, Week 7

There is also the use of symmetrical composition in the scene near the end. The use of a spotlight pointing to the centre/ characters enhances the idea of symmetry as it leads the audience's eyes to the centre, balancing out the overall background.

In the scene above, I noticed that they used lightings to bring the main focus of the viewers to the center and they also arranged the backgrounds very well too, ensuring a smooth design flow from scene to scene as well.

Applying textures and noise to designs :

Mr Hafiz taught us how to give more texture and gradients to our works by using the distort function in adobe illustrator and applied grain texture. We were also briefed on how to use gradients in our work to give it more depth. A short exercise was done which is to apply texture and gradient to one of the characters Mr Hafiz gave us, below is my take on the exercise.

Fig 1.5 Texture design exercise , Week 7 (11/7/2023)

Week 7 Lecture Slides :

Week 8 : Recess Week

Week 09: Limited Animation

In week 09, Mr. Hafiz introduced us to limited animation. He also suggested watching a video about the principles of animation that make the animation more interesting.

Week 9 Lecture Slides :

INSTRUCTIONS

Project 2 : Decisive Moment Poster & Animation

-Part 1 : Mood board & Research

-Part 2 : Sketching of frames

-Part 3 - Digitalizing Poster

Feedback

Reflection

Task 2—That (Decisive) Moment (20%)

Story Research & Rationale

Brief: Editorial illustration is typically a type of work has a deep history in political satire, especially though extends beyond the world of politics. Every day, newspapers and magazines print illustrations alongside their articles to illuminate some element of the concepts for the reader. For this assignment, you will be assigned a story and break it apart into its narrative structure. You will choose one of the turning points in the narrative and illustrate that “Decisive Moment”

Editorial illustrations are produced for newspapers, magazines, and websites to add a visual dimension to an article. This serves two main functions -it helps to capture the attention of readers as they scan the publication, but it also helps to add a new perspective to the article. For this assignment, Mr. Hafiz Zamri had to find an article/story about urban legends. These legends may be local or international. The art style must come from art Deco.

Introduction：

Urban legend/urban rumor (folklore, story or legend)

1. Animal related 2. Car related 3. Accidents 4. Sex and scandal 5. Crime related 6. Business and profession 7. Government behavior

9. Horror and thrillers 10. Academy related 11. Virtual worlds 12. Paranormal activity

I. Urban legends intersect with urban fantasy

Incorporating traditional fantasy story elements (eg. Vampires, orcs, elves, and artifacts) into an urban setting has nothing to do with an original quest
It's written by a fixed author, completely fictional.However, urban legends are narrated by "the personal experience of the speaker's friends," so you need to distinguish between true and false.

Ⅱ.Urban legend and superficial fantasy intersect, but are not identical

In ancient, backward villages or ancient cities,Urban legends occurred in the modern era after the rapid development of industrialization and urbanization, and were influenced by modernization.

Ⅲ.

Urban legend ≠ fairy tale
Urban legend ≠ rumor

This week, we were introduced to a new assignment in which we had to illustrate a particular turning point in our chosen urban legend. Mr Hafiz also added that we were only allowed to use the art deco style for this illustration.

The urban legend I have chosen is a folk story from China. This story is very popular in Chinese folk, and it is one of the stories that adults will tell children. I think the Little Jungle Girl is a legend and not a true story.

The plot is as follows:

Since I was a child, my mother told me not to go to the back mountain at night, because there were man-eating monsters that ate children's hearts, but I didn't believe it. Gradually, I grew up, so I went to that mysterious area!

In that woods, I still haven't come out of the psychological shadow since that incident.

My hometown is Dayangshu Village, which is a good place with beautiful mountains and rivers. I don't know when it started, and many strangers came to the village one after another. When my mother saw those strangers, she unconsciously hugged me tightly. At first, I didn't know what those people did. Later, my mother told me that those people were beasts. They were all traffickers, and there were several people in our village who specialized in giving birth to children.

Our village is very strange. They are all boys, basically none.

Girls, even if there were, they would sell them to traffickers, so I asked my mother what was going on with curiosity. My mother told me that the girl was caught and eaten by the monsters in the back mountains and woods. At that time, she was young and easy to deceive, so I believed it. We boys went to take a bath in the stream in the back mountain. I have long forgotten my mother's advice. After all, the cold river is a big temptation for us, as if you were dying of thirst. Suddenly someone told you that there is a bottle of ice water in front of you. I don't think anyone will refuse.

So we secretly went to the back mountain.

After a while, we came to the stream and looked at the clear stream. We cheered and couldn't wait to take off our clothes and plunged into it. However, just as we were getting dressed and preparing to leave, suddenly I heard a sound, so I stopped and took my companion's arm and said, "Did you hear anything?"

They turned their ears and listened carefully for a while, and then looked around doubtfully, because they also heard the strange sound, so we followed the sound slowly to the mountain. Strangely, the sound seems to be magical, taking us into the woods involuntarily, and the more we go inside, the clearer the sound will be. Wow, wow, wow" At this time, we have a father's problem, and the original disease is the baby's crying. When we woke up a little, we were surprised to find that we didn't know when we came to a short mound. There were a lot of those mounds, a little like a cemetery, but not like that, because those piles were much smaller than the ones we saw.

Just when we were scared to death, suddenly,

A big cry attracted our attention. We suddenly turned around and found a baby sitting on the mound. The baby was full of blood, and Dongshi turned his body into pieces. After a while, his whole body was quite a pile of bones. They are all covered with mud, and some have become white.

Bones, some are full of maggots, and some seem to have been eaten by wild dogs, and their bodies are full of blood. Watching them slowly climb up to me, I screamed and closed my eyes. It's better not to look at them. I don't know what they are, but I'm sure they are not human. When we were about to be scared to death by these babies, suddenly, one of the oldest of us shouted, "I heard that the boy urinates to ward off evil spirits. We must have met a ghost tonight. Let's pee quickly!"

At that time, we were not in the mood to think about whether this method was feasible.

It's not workable. There is at least one way that doesn't come out, so we take off our pants and pee without saying a word.

Sure enough, after we urinated, those terrible ghost babies in Zhou.

They all disappeared. When we saw it missing, we quickly picked up our trousers and ran down the mountain. Anyway, we didn't know how to get home in the end.