The Final Curtain

My Initial Proposal for the project was very open, I did this as I wanted to be able to narrow my direction through research and experimentation. Although this meant at times I became a bit lost and struggled with a clear vision of what I was doing I’m glad I chose to keep it open as it allowed me some freedom at the beginning of the project to discover a narrower path to take.

My research was a great starting point because watching films and reading books about the future helped me grasp others thoughts and inspired ideas of my own. It also led me into looking at Science Fiction artwork, like movie posters in books and on websites as well as comics such as “2000AD” and Johnny Ryan comics. Therefore my research helped me to start coming up with ideas for the final piece visually and conceptually.

My final piece was a low cost production as I just used black and white photocopies, black fine liner pens and my computer with programs I already had. I decided to use iMovie and Photoshop as these were programs that I was comfortable with and did what I needed, however in the future I’d like to try and use Flash, as I was unable to learn what I needed to in the time I left myself. All though I preferred Photoshop to taking stop frame photos, it was quite time consuming although had a professional finish at the end.

For looking at Film posters www.wrongsideoftheart.com had lots of weird B Movie posters, which I looked at a lot, specifically when thinking graphically about layout and colour schemes. I also moved from looking at people’s blogs on Blogspot to Flickr and looking at illustrators work on there and finding new illustrators that I liked through their favourites. It also allowed me to show my work and get feedback.

Another important way of getting feedback and generating ideas was by talking to talk to my peers and one to one tutorials because this helped me work out what I wanted to do with the project. Talking to my tutors was how I consolidated my initial ideas and research and decided to make it about the Gaia theory of how nature will defend itself in the future after the destruction of the Earth by humans.

I feel my time management was average as I stuck loosely to my time plan. However with the length of the project my enthusiasm and ability to generate ideas were not always constant meaning sometimes I would be able to create a lot more effective work then other times. Also with the amount of work and research I did, I didn’t leave myself enough time to learn Flash or to experiment with Screen Printing. Flash was less important as iMovie did everything I needed it to for the animation however if I’d done some screen printing it could of added depth to my drawings.

I have learnt that even when things seem to be quite difficult when generating ideas or consolidating them sometimes it works better just to do it anyway and try to ignore frustrations. This is something at times I could have done more and this would have improved my body of work for the final outcome. However I feel I have achieved my initial target to become more confident with my drawing with some successful experiments on a large as well as with colour. I also continued my joy of using photo montage and started to merge this with drawing even more in the project and taken it to a new media by using it in an animation. I will now look to continue these techniques experimenting further with them.

Animation

I've now got a 23 second animation using collage and photoshop with a stop frame technique. I haven't been blogging too much recently due to my new enthusiasm for Flickr, there's so much good stuff on there I keep spending ages flicking through peoples favourites that I like. Anyway back to the animation here's a few collages that I've made and I've either already used or am going to for it. suckkkkkkerrrrrrrrr.

My Mothers Crying Blood Dust Now

I've started using Flickr more, it definitely has a lot of plus's being able to favourite other peoples work you like as well as putting your own work up. The favouriting is quite handy as it acts as a collection of research material for my FMP. Anyway here's the link for mine http://www.flickr.com/photos/31113392@N07/ and a few cool things I found on there...

I've also started looking at experimental techniques to generate ideas for the outcomes of this project. I've begun using template shapes to draw characters on A1 sheets experimenting with different ideas and colours. I now need to start trying out different medias as all I have used is pen, pencil and photo montage.

After saying the song 3rd planet was related to my project I realised another song from the same Modest Mouse album, The Moon & The Antarctic, called "Wild Pack Of Family Dogs" sums up the new direction I have taken. In the song the Dad shoots one of the pack of dogs and their family dog ends up running away with the pack. The dogs then come back and as revenge they steal the dads daughter but her brother(the person who is telling this story in the song) accepts it as he see's the justice whilst his family are distraught.

anyway have a listen and ignore the idiots in the video.

The Universe Is Shaped Exactly Like The Earth When You Go Straight Along Enough You End Up Exactly Where You Were

After talking with my tutors today my vague ideas of what to do are slowly becoming more defined and focused I think. The whole idea I've come to is to do with humans destroying the Earth and nature and how in the future nature will fight back as the two become further and further apart and the only way nature can survive is by fighting back. This fits the broad Gaia concepts that living organisms on a planet will affect the nature of their environment in order to make the environment more suitable for life.

I've been listening to this song basically so much since starting this project. The lyrics and whole mood of the song link to what I'm doing I think in a way.

I'm going to start putting up more work hopefully, I just don't enjoy the whole scanning process.

THE STORY SO FAR...

Now Easter has definitely finished and college has started again I thought I should evaluate my progress in my research so far.

After choosing a monstrous subject: The Future to base my project on I was hoping through research I could narrow it down to a fine point and carry on with that direction. That has been a harder task than I thought but so far I feel I'm going somewhere with my research and ideas.

First thing I think the quote 'Every saint has a past and every sinner has a future' by Wilde is a quote that summarises where I sort of knew I wanted to go with my work with the whole idea of the world getting worse, humans ruining it and themselves (because no one wants to draw happy people.) This is a quote I feel I can work with even if I don't directly relate to it and has led to me to start thinking about the enviroment and how we're destroying it but also the recent economy crises and how we're even managing to destroy this made-up, all powerful, fictitious thing called the economy. Not only are we destroying it but we're letting it destroy us.

This whole idea of me thinking about the economy and the environment was in progress when I managed to end up on a book review about the baby boomers and how they've ruined our futures. Not only are we going to have to pay ridiculous taxes for their pensions but also have been the wealthiest generation. Money aside they've also probably been one of the most influential generations on the downfall of the environment and increase of pollution, leaving us with this poisonous toxic society that we live in. So although this doesn't strictly fit into Wilde's quote in a weird way it sort of does proving the point that modern society is full of pollution and stress leading to sin.

Along with the ideas above I've been thinking about the rapid increase in population and how there's only so many houses you can make with a functional world still existing. This is something which like the baby boomers is relevant to my life now as it will be in the future with England being the most densely populated country in Europe (possibly the world?) Anyway this thought process made me think J.G. Ballads book High Rise could be an interesting read as it is about a society of people in a tower block who have everyone and everything they need(according to them) surrounding them so they eventually spend all their time inside this human built world in the sky and it all goes horribly wrong(I think I haven't actually read all of it yet).

After Geoff's presentation in college I have also begun to revaluate how I do my research; instead of just looking at directly related research I've started to broaden it by looking at different things that could influence my drawings and colour schemes I like. I have also started to put together an A1 sheet of landscape influences, with photocopies, illustrations and making collages from landscape images. I'm going to do this for my character design for the people in the future and also the machines and technology so I have a few A1 pages of research that I can easily reffer to when drawing my initial ideas and final projects.

After this week I'm going to start slowing down my research by spending next week experimenting and figuring out a concrete final idea with plans and sketches of alternate ways I can make it so in two-two and a half weeks I should be able to just get on with my final piece.

GORE AND NAZI PORN POSTERS

I found this website called www.thewrongsideofart.com which seems to have every weird amazing film poster ever made. All the genres from aliens to nazixploitation to sex education films. I don't know why blockbusters these days fail to have posters that don't seem like they've had the same fancy photoshop template as every other film. Surely if they can make such amazing posters for some b movie that never really made any money let alone be remembered, they can't for any of the new ones. These posters just seem to tell you so much about the film which I think these days they don't.

First of all I started looking at the Naziploitation one's, naturally. Nazi art and the whole design of their campaigns has always been admirable and probably quite groundbreaking even if some wouldn't want to admit it. But one way of making something better is by adding seductive women. i like the way the first two of these try to stick to the original look of nazi posters making it almost subtle that they're not propaganda from the 1930's, which you later realise by the nudity and cleavages. This sort of poster art and the layouts are something I want to explore for my final major project as the layout is very important and something I fail at, at times.

I then moved onto looking at the more obvious gore and Sci-fi posters which never fail to amaze me. As much as I'd like to say I will do some illustrations like these it would be kidding myself but in any case they're nice to look at as inspiration seeings as my drawings will be of the future so Sci-fi art and illustration is something I feel will be important in my research.

RICHARD CHASEMORE

I bumped into the illustration of Richard Chasemore by accident online but after having a look at his work I love how technical it is and the way he draws machines. He does the drawings for Dorling Kindersly books as well as Star Wars. I'd like to be able to produce such detail in my work, I'm going to start studying images to enhance my drawing as this is something I have not done enough this year so better late than never.

HIGH RISE

I've started reading this book 'High Rise' by J.G. Ballard. It's an interesting read (so far) and the concepts of a microcosm society in the future as everyone living in this high rise block of apartments are surrounded by all that they need they become more and more reclusive. I was thinking about how in the far future with the population growing at an alarming rate building will have to start going up in the sky or underground/underwater to accommodate all the people. I was thinking this could play a key role in my large scale A1 drawings as an arrangement or background.

SKETCHBOOK

I started looking at my dads 2000AD 1984 annual and got inspired to do some drawings using line and some bold colour in the first. No doubt the character is influenced by Judge Dred but hey, I AM THE LAW.

HOW TO SAVE THE COUNTRY BY ACCEPTING YOUR PARENTS HAVE FUCKED YOU OVER

Just saw this article on a vice blog about a book coming out by Neil Boorman called It's All Their Fault: A Manifesto. As you can probably tell by now it's about how the older generations have fucked over our future with student debts and every baby being born with 22,000 debt effectively. Basically the book puts forward some interesting predictions as well as hard facts about the future for the up and coming generations.

These sort of facts are something I can start moulding my project around looking at possible outcomes in the future, with all the old pensioners living the life whilst everybody else lives in a crippled world full of debt which would inevitably lead to a broken society and a world of ruin.

ARTICLE

HOW TO KILL YOUR PARENTS

EVERY SAINT HAS A PAST AND EVERY SINNER HAS A FUTURE

As I begin to get more and more wrapped up by my final major project for college this blog will probably start to take one direction: The Future. This is what I've decided the theme's going to be and something that I've been researching throughout my Easter. I was looking at famous quotes about the vast subject and I ended up picking Oscar Wilde's "Every saint has a past and every sinner has a future". For me this quote is about the corruption and downfall of the world as the more we progress and go on the more we seem to fuck the world up and the more society and the connections between nature and humans seems to fall apart.

As a starting idea I would like to end up with some drawings and an animation which is short and a collage maybe with the quote being read out. I would like to go bigger with my drawings maybe some A1 sized drawings as this is something I often fail to do but I'll see what happens.

Recently I've been looking a lot at the work of Gary Panter as his vast influence on many of the illustrators I like is really strong. When I was on his website browsing I found the section of his work which is all light shows. I've been into light shows for a while without really knowing too much about them or making any myself. Panters use of line over a use of bold colours is something which translates well into illustration as well as lights and something I'll look at for my animation projection. I also like the more abstract ambient shapes that he uses which has a very Sci-fi feel and looks like some sort of projections of space.

GIFFFF

My friend Josh asked me to make something for his DJ myspace (www.myspace.com/spaceraideruk) so after getting carried away I decided to learn how to make a GIF and this was the obscene result.

Check out his latest mix too it's proper live.

01 SUPER KESTRAL LIVE MIX by Space Raider

'This One Goes Out To My 4X4 Ravers...'

Me and my friend Josh put this together the other day for a night he's putting on. I'm pretty sure 75% of people don't get it but I think it's pretty hilarious. Should be a live night, getting smashed and playing cheesy club bangers.

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=354138239685&ref=ts

Also my cousin showed me this video him and his band made for their christmas song, if you like Municipal Waste you'll love it. More wigs than a alopecia victim.

http://www.myspace.com/easyhips

College Work

Everything's pretty hectic right now, I'm still ill on and off and with 3 interviews and an assessment next week there's no sign of things slowing down. Anyway I thought I should post some work I've been doing recently which is mainly all related to my portfolio and getting everything polished. These two collage/drawings are from a zine I reworked which was all based around Odin losing his eye.

I also made the last edit of my 3D project which seemed to take way longer than it should of. Anyway I'm pretty happy with the final image. It's meant to be about pantheism and the idea that God surrounds us in nature which I learnt about studying the Romantic poets Coleridge and Wordsworth last year. I'm not religious but I quite liked the idea.

I've started doing some drawings that I'm liking the look of too, got a sort of mad line style to them but I'll post them up here tomorrow or something.

IIILLLL

Haven't posted in a week or so I don't think been hit with tonsillitis and laryngitis, as if one isn't bad enough. Pretty much contemplated suicide on Monday night think thats the worst I've ever felt and slept. I'm now super behind in my work which is horrible timing with the old portfolio.

Anyway one good thing about being ill is it got me back into watching films so I bought some DVD's with some birthday vouchers today so should have Michael Winner's Death Wish and Terry Gilliam's Brazil and Time Bandits. The last two I pretty much bought on a whim after getting too excited watching Gilliam's animations on youtube. I really want to do something similar myself. I also got a step closer to completing my A1 collage today which I'm pretty pleased with just needs some finishing touches.

Municipal Waste Is Gonna Fuck You Up!

I now wish I brought a body board to Scala even though they definitely would of taken it off me. It was a pretty amazing night though.

I Want Summer

Snow is boring. Cold is boring. Portfolios are boring.

I have to make four images to show how I would improve the world for my Leeds application. They don't ask for much, aye? But because I'm so cool and urban I think I'm going to do something with homeless people and abandon sites yeah 666 muthafucker.

COLOUR

I'm trying to fight my inability to use colour in my work, so I decided to get on photoshop and have a go with a drawing from the newspaper/zine thing I did. It's pretty sketchy up-close 'cause the paper was originally news print but it didn't turn out too bad in the end, in my opinion.

The Meths Men

Here's some of the collages from the zine I made in the first part of my foundation. I started of by looking at a text about lowlife meths drinkers and their underground community in the debris of post war Britain. I somehow managed to get to these collages by picking quotes that I felt represented these people and their lives.

Malice in Wonderland

My friend sent me this video before the new year, it's probably one of my favourite animations, with one grotesque image merging into another.

It looks like it influenced Chad Van Gaalen a lot in his video for Molten Light. The songs pretty dark seeing as the melody and songs so soft but it's about some bitch coming to haunt you and rip you to shreds. don't they all?

Invasion

I started this zine at college, it was meant to be a newspaper but I ended up drawing aliens attacking humans. Earth invaded is the story, I guess. I'm not sure if I'll turn it into a finished article yet but here's the drawings.

2010201020102010

New Year, New Blog, Third time lucky.