Thursday, January 28, 2010

I think I can, I think I can...

Hi everybody! Well, this quarter is stuffed full of art, to say the least. It's going to be tough, but I can't wait to look back on it, knowing I devoted everything I had and did the best I could! Plus, hopefully, I'll have some killer portfolio pieces. A quick update on all my projects and such:

Starting February 12th, I will have my piece "Cat" in SCAD's Poetter Hall for the Society of Illustrator's Humane Society Benefit show. It's for sale, and the proceeds go the Humane Society. If you are in Savannah, you should check it out!

"Cat" 2009, Watercolor and Ink

My first relief print is finished! The composition was originally a tight square around the rabbit, but my professor and I decided it would pop much more on a solid black, and larger background. I used chine-colle to glue the cut-out rabbits onto 30 inch by 44 inch pieces of black western paper. It was a massive undertaking, but paid off quite nicely-- one of the three prints is now hanging in Alexander Hall, and another was held by my professor for the printmaking department.

"Bunny 2/3" 2010, Relief Print with Chine Colle

My pirate piece is complete, as well. I attempted to create an off-register look with gouache paint, and added detail with ink. The colors and symmetry are based off of illustrator great Maxfield Parrish's work. Here's a sample:

©Maxfield Parrish, 1908 "Lantern Bearers"
Here's my final piece:

"Captain Rory" 2010, Gouache and Ink

No finished pieces yet for Children's Book. We have spent the last four weeks on story-writing, spread-planning, composition-making, character-sketching, and layout-roughing. Here are some scans of my character development. This character is Francis, the girl who lives in a city apartment with her mother, and enjoys reading and writing. Her pet is a fish.

Francis as a concept during page layout. The sketches below were added later in an attempt to recreate the original pose.

First pencil sketch of Francis. Very stiff!

More pencil sketches, with newer pen ones next to them, attempting to be looser.

Redo of the layouts- Francis takes more shape, now that I've done a few character design sketches.


Sketching Francis acting as though she would in the book.

Working out the interaction between Francis and her fish.

Finally some color studies (after re-drawing all the roughs large-scale to be traced for the final artwork)! Her jacket will be collage, and the rest qouache paint.

I decided to do the outlines in a color relative to what it would be surrounding. The colors here aren't exactly right since I wasn't using a very good scanner, but you get the idea. My, how she's grown! And to think I haven't even begun (and have five other kids! Eesh!)
So much for this being quick. Oh well. Time for bed!
adios
caitlin

2 comments:

Daniel Woodling said...

Woah, that pirate drawing is intense! I love the simplified textures and the off register color.

Caitlin said...

Thanks! The off-register look is something new I'm playing with. And textures and patterns are my favourite.