Polly Becker

I love the way she assembles found objects to make interesting illustrations. Definitely makes me want to do more 3D work!

Stamps

We had a low-fi printing workshop with Geoff where we made stamps from erasers in order to make a small book for our society which we could reproduce quickly and easily. It was really fun and extremely useful, I don't think I have quite got the skill of carving away at the eraser, but hopefully I will with practice! I experimented with a bit of colour but I didn't have a coloured ink pad so used bottled inks and getting the right amount of moisture on the stamp was really hard, therefore I prefer the black and white images.

I am really pleased with the book we produced for our society, the sparse style we have adopted in this small document should hopefully continue in our manifesto.

Zines

I bought three zines in 'Printed Matter'. 

The Edge and Sigmund Freud by Alfred Planco.

Question Marks by Kaori Mitsushima.

New York, New York

Had an amazing week in New York. Here are a few of the highlights.

Times Square

From the Empire State Building

Grand Central Station Ceiling

American Museum of Natural History

American Museum of Natural History

Klimt, MOMA

Kandinsky, MOMA

Monet, MOMA

Seurat, MOMA

Model

When thinking about the size of my being I thought it would be really small, however this didn't really come across in the costume as I could not change my size through the costume. Therefore I made a smaller model/toy which is nearer the size of the being I imagined. I much prefer my design on this scale.

Playing with animation

We considered having an opening to our animation and I was quite keen to have a go at more stop-frame as my confidence had grown over the week. In the end we did not use it but I really enjoyed playing around with the technique, although I'm not completely happy with the outcome. All of the different ideas combined is too long, longer than the final animation! It is just an experiment in something I had not done independently before.

Play

We had a week workshop with Joseph Mann, which was my first time working with animation. This is our society's animation showing how we 'play'.  We played on the fact that a couple of our characters like to hide, so we have a game of hide and seek as the main narrative. The animation is not perfect and the main feedback we got was that it was too shaky at the beginning. I completely agree and we should have considered this when we put the tripod on a hill!

Costume

This is my costume designed to represent my creature. I want to be camouflaged in a forest so chose to disguise myself as a pine cone! I have used some of the defensive signs I have researched: Bright markings on the front and large eyes on the back to scare predators. I think the costume fulfils the needs I decided to focus on but perhaps it is a bit dull, I wish I had been a bit more extravagant and experimental!

Emma Denby

http://emmadenby.com/

I loved Emma Denby's quilts!!

Ritta Ikonen

http://riittaikonen.com/

I enjoyed the workshops with Ritta Ikonen and I loved her work on Norwegian folklore. I think it has definitely made me think again how broad Illustration can be and has certainly shown me that I should not be confined to 2D work and experiment with 3D!

Pine Cones

In order to camouflage my being I decided to make it look like a pine cone, I decided to capture this through using scales and drew a pine cone to learn more about the arrangement of the scales. However I also wanted more than one protection system and looked at how small creatures defend themselves. I have been particularly drawn to warning colours and fake eyes on animals to make them look much larger and dangerous than they actually are.

Designs

These are a couple of my designs for my being. These were developed into my final design.

Eyes and Ears

I love the eyes and ears on Elizabeth I's dress in this portrait, attributed to Isaac Oliver c.1603. Although used in this image as symbolism, it is an idea I would like to incorporate into my design.

http://www.phantasmaphile.com/2011/03/elizabeth-i-the-rainbow-portrait.html

Camouflage

My creature will be camouflaged in its environment as this relates to my need to hide. I think the way that patterns on animals can emulate with such accuracy the patterns and textures of their environment is amazing. I particularly love this owl!

http://500px.com/photo/129326

Andy Goldsworthy

I really want my costume to be related to nature and I love how Andy Goldsworthy takes his materials from nature and then creates his sculpture perhaps in the material's original setting. I want to look at camouflage and I think that his sculptures fit naturally and effortlessly into their environment.

http://artandcosmos.wordpress.com/category/sculpture-3d/

Tim Walker

As this project is involved with costume design I thought it was a good opportunity to look at more of Tim Walker's photographs! I think the costumes and sets are beautifully designed.

http://www.michaelhoppengallery.com/artist,show,3,135,241,1174,0,0,0,0,michael_hoppen_gallery.html

http://www.mymodernmet.com/profiles/blogs/tim-walkers-wonderland-12-pics

Things I wish I had.....

Collection of Me

In order to illustrate my world I mainly focused on the objects which have a special meaning to me, mainly because they remind me of my family. Click on the Russian Doll!