Examiner Note:

For the module OUIL504 Illustration 1 - Process and Production

Please see labels

• OUIL504 Illustration 1
• OUIL504 Studio Brief 1
• OUIL504 Studio Brief 2
• OUIL504 Studio Brief 3

OUIL504: Evaluation

I chose A Midsummer Night’s Dream because I love the magical atmosphere in it, I thought that this allowed for a lot of creative freedom within my prints and my animated stings. I also thought the themes of opposites, contrasts and symmetry would work really well in my lino prints, especially as I decided to create them in a renaissance surface pattern style. I have learnt many new skills and developed existing skills throughout this brief. The workload has been overwhelming at times but I think I have consistently been improving my time management and organisational skills in order to hit deadlines with a standard of work I am proud of even though it may not be perfect.

My sketchbooks were incredibly useful in this project and I loved creating them. It enforced my focus on the beautiful details and intricacies which were elements I was looking for in my author research as I knew I needed to find a play that meant I could capitalise on these aspects. I think the atmosphere and themes of A Midsummer Night's Dream appealed to me because of my love of drawing human interaction and emotions. Shakespeare's renaissance era meant a whole new focus on the human condition.  

Lino printing was something I really enjoyed in this project. I love the tactile element when cutting out and mark-making into the lino itself. I also loved the experimental side of the printing process, particularly combining chosen colours with density and opacity of ink. Deciding to create 6 prints instead of 10 meant that I was able to put a lot of care and effort in to designing and creating my lino prints. I also found it a lot easier on my final lino cuts than my practice ones as I invested in a better quality lino and bought my own tools which meant it was easier to cut into and gave me time over Christmas to use my own tools to get to grips with the cutting and mark making process.

I found it really easy to get stuck in to the research for this project as I love literature and I picked the playwright William Shakespeare. His plays capture my imagination completely and led me to stream line my project; to plays and then specifically to A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

A huge weakness in this project was being unable to produce the quantity of work I would have liked. This was because I found myself overwhelmed by the choice of the tangible and intangible in all four plays. I found it hard at first to translate visually; overloaded with the content within the plays, I found it difficult to get stuck in. However the exercises exploring these two elements really helped me to understand image making and put simply the process of capturing the atmosphere of a book or a play. I learnt how combining the tangible and intangible in a drawing can create more depth and meaning, also allowing you to communicate a complex meaning in a simple image. This was a point in the project where I began to understand how I could go about capturing the atmosphere of Shakespeare’s plays. However even after highlighting concurrent themes, symbols and motifs that were evidenced in all four plays I still felt overwhelmed but after discussing this issue with my tutor, I decided to focus purely on one of the plays; A Midsummer Night’s Dream. This immediately made me see the project a lot more clearly yet I was still stuck for how to translate all the genius of the play into 5-10 prints and 3-6 10second stings.

Learning and developing new skills such as those on After Effects and Dragonframe has really opened my eyes to how I can capitalise on my creative work. There are so many ways of creating animations and this brief gave us a great insight on the ways we can manipulate our own work with effects and programmes, saving us time or producing something we never thought possible; to a degree of professionalism. I am happy with my dedication and my illustrated frames for my animation. However I would have loved to have created them in a bolder media such as paint. I also would have thought about the title sequence more thoroughly in order to create one flowing and succinct animation. Next time I will definitely capitalise on programmes such as After Effects to use more collages and layers. I think the music I have chosen really helps to tie the animation together and convey the themes of the play/illustrations.

I made sure to try to attend all parts of this module as I found the peer group sessions, tutor one on ones and taught sessions, such as the tangible and intangible introduction session extremely beneficial to my project. They really helped me stay on track and narrow down the huge task of transforming Shakespeare’s work into 6 prints and 3 10 second stings. I think I contributed to the group well; most likely because I was incredibly interested in my peer’s projects and how we were all going about responding to the brief in such a diverse way. It was extremely useful to get their feedback as it was hard to see this project with fresh eyes after being submerged within it for so long.

I was extremely motivated to this project because I knew that if I let it slip at all I would be unable to finish the products to my expectations. My motivation was also speared on by my love of the literature that I was attempting to transform to print and animation. I really wanted to do it justice and although I am not sure this is possible, I know that I gave it 100% effort. My commitment to creating so many frames was purely in order for the animation to be as intricate and carefully crafted as the play itself. I wanted to ensure I kept a high level of imagery, motifs and symbols within my work as these are devices used powerfully and creatively by Shakespeare to convey meaning and messages within his own work. I also pushed myself to create a large quantity of high quality prints. I had to narrow down the amount I intended to create as I realised I could put more effort into creating dynamic work if I had a smaller amount to work on. I am really happy with the end result of my prints and I still think I managed a high level of quantity and quality with them. 

Moving Pictures: Project Proposal

Brief (what are you going to produce, how and for what reason)

• 3 stings - representing themes and characters from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream and a title sequence informing the audience of the play and author. I will try to incorporate the text into the illustrations. Either that, or add it digitally.
• To advertise the play/book.

Background/considerations (Tone of voice/mood, audience/context, form/format, colour, media etc)

• The mood will be magical, surreal, romantic and confusing in theme with the play.
• Audience - Shakespeare fans, students studying Shakespeare, anyone interested in the 'human condition' or literature!
• I will be using rich colours like red, gold, silver, green (to highlight the themes of lust/love/passion, magic/surreal, and the power of nature). I will also be using metallic inks to add a magical feel to the prints. I may add more details once the prints have dried with metallic pens or paints. 
• The paper/background will be white for a clean cut look. (or perhaps a sky with stars)

Deliverables- what exactly do you intend to submit? (Quantity, format, scale etc.)

• 3 10 second stings.

Interim Deadlines

• Thumbnail ASAP - experiment with layout and composition.
• Think about how to incorporate the imagery and motifs into the animation sequence
• Draw frames
• Think about how the text will be presented
• Experiment with colours and media.

OUIL504 ILLUSTRATION 1 PROCESS AND PRODUCTION

STUDIO BRIEF 3 PROJECT PROPOSAL: MOVING PICTURES

·         I intend to produce…

3 10 second stings corresponding to the 9 scenes in Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. There are 5 acts. I want to focus on symbolism and imagery; particularly transforming different elements into other motifs. I really want to use metallic inks – gold and silvers; to encourage the theme of magic; juxtaposing these with a darker rich colour like reds and greens. I will experiment with different ink combinations in my sketch book and then also experiment with tools and programs such as dragon frame and after effects to edit and compile my animation. I will try to create some test animations before my final ones.  

·         The content will focus on 3 specific themes/texts/concepts…
The texts I will focus on will be from A Midsummer Night’s Dream by Shakespeare. The themes from this play that I will be focussing on throughout my prints will be in simple terms love, confusion and magic; Loves Difficulty/Love out of Balance, Magic/fairies/love potion/supernatural power of love/surreal world, Dreams/events occurring without explanation/fantastical experience. Motif: Contrasts; groups of opposites and doubles (lino print should help with this motif as there will be a clear contrast between the cut out parts and the inked parts), and juxtaposition of extraordinary differences. Symbols: the love potion – symbol of the unreasoning, fickle, erratic power of love, Theseus and Hippolyta- represent order and stability and rationality, The Craftsmen’s Play – symbol for a Midsummer Night’s Dream itself – story involving powerful emotions that is made hilarious by its comical presentation.

·         I will be aiming to communicate 3 specific messages/moods/ideas which will be closely linked with the above themes. The mood will be magical/fantastical/supernatural, to do this I will really have to push myself to create scenes that are either unrealistically beautiful, e.g. flowers and fairies etc, powerful and strong imagery, or light and dark (things slightly hidden in the dark). Also love, lust and its irrationality and indecisiveness will also be focused on. I will be looking at communicating love and marriage, order and disorder/appearance and reality, using motifs such as nature, the moon, sleep and dreams, eyes, plays, rehearsals, roles/parts and magic.

·         To an audience of viewers that may either be Shakespeare fans, may think that Shakespeare is irrelevant (hopefully my work will help to show it for its timeless themes) and so open them up to him or even just being aware of his work, teenagers/adults; the themes are complex and about love and lust, not for children. I want to produce some unique prints that provide emotion and a sense of a dream like quality.  

Printed Pictures: Project Proposal

Original Brief

1. Make 12 lino prints at square format to show each act and scene of A Midsummer Night's Dream.
2. A magical, surreal, romantic and confusing mood. To show each act of A Midsummer Night's Dream.
3. 12 Lino prints at square format showing the acts of A Midsummer Night's Dream with rich colours.
4. Shakespeare/theatre fans.
   Anyone that likes the mood of magical, surreal, romantic and confusing in a piece of art. 
5. 'Exhibition, a book' all very different from each other... will it work on all?

TO DO

- Look at front and back and write specific brief. 

The only thing I will change about my previous brief is to specify use for a book. This means I will have to consider what binding and cover (hard or soft). 

Revised Brief 1    

• 12 prints - representing each act/scene from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream and a title so that I can bind the prints together to create a book if I have time after printing them all out. I will incorporate the text into the illustrations.
• Using lino printing. 
• I will create them on to a square shape about the height of A4 which will allow them to be used as separate prints and also to be bound as a book.
• Prints for a book illustration. I will create a bound collection of the illustrations. 

Background/considerations (Tone of voice/mood, audience/context, form/format, colour, media etc)

• The mood will be magical, surreal, romantic and confusing in theme with the play.
• Audience - Shakespeare fans, students studying Shakespeare, children -picture book.
• I will be using rich colours like red, purple, royal blue, black. I will also be using metallic inks to add a magical feel to the prints. I may add more details once the prints have dried with metallic pens or paints. 
• The paper will be white.
• I want good quality paper and a nice sturdy cover for my book. I will use a black or dark purple cover with gold writing if any. 

Deliverables- what exactly do you intend to submit? (Quantity, format, scale etc.)

• Square A4 - 12 prints.
• Bound book.

Interim Deadlines

• Thumbnail ASAP - experiment with layout and composition.
• Think about how to incorporate the selected quotes into the illustrations. 
• Have them all drawn out onto lino before Christmas.
• Cut out designs onto lino over Christmas.
• Experiment with colour inks and prints with metallic pen and paints on top.
• Print after Christmas - get paper or prepare paper over Christmas. 
• Bind book once prints are done.

STUDIO BRIEF 3 PROJECT PROPOSAL: PRINTED PICTURES

·         I intend to produce…

9 prints corresponding to the 9 scenes in Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. There are 5 acts. They will be a set sequence of prints based on either a summary of each scene or an important moment from each one. I will plan out the scenes and then decide on scale however seeing as I have decided to use the process of etching I should be able to get a lot of detail in which means I can create smaller images if I want to than if I used a process such as lino. In the occasion that I do create smaller prints such as A5 then I will make a publication (a small book) out of them however my main focus is making good quality prints so I may just create larger and more complex separate prints. I will be using lino print as I really like this effect and I think etching will produce a more sketchy outcome which is not the look I am going for in this project. I want to focus on symbolism and mark making more than sketching a perfectly accurate representation- As I am making up the scenes from my imagination this should work more effectively. I really want to use metallic inks – gold and silvers; to encourage the theme of magic; juxtaposing these with a darker rich colour like blue, purple, red or black. I will experiment with different ink combinations in the print room once I have created my lino cuts and I have also got some examples from some practice lino cuts I made last week in which I used purple and gold which I thought worked effectively in portraying my image. 

·         The content will focus on 3 specific themes/texts/concepts…
The texts I will focus on will be from A Midsummer Night’s Dream by Shakespeare. The themes from this play that I will be focussing on throughout my prints will be in simple terms love, confusion and magic; Loves Difficulty/Love out of Balance, Magic/fairies/love potion/supernatural power of love/surreal world, Dreams/events occurring without explanation/fantastical experience. Motif: Contrasts; groups of opposites and doubles (lino print should help with this motif as there will be a clear contrast between the cut out parts and the inked parts), and juxtaposition of extraordinary differences. Symbols: the love potion – symbol of the unreasoning, fickle, erratic power of love, Theseus and Hippolyta- represent order and stability and rationality, The Craftsmen’s Play – symbol for a Midsummer Night’s Dream itself – story involving powerful emotions that is made hilarious by its comical presentation.

·         I will be aiming to communicate 3 specific messages/moods/ideas which will be closely linked with the above themes. The mood will be magical/fantastical/supernatural, to do this I will really have to push myself to create scenes that are either unrealistically beautiful, e.g. flowers and fairies etc, powerful and strong imagery, or light and dark (things slightly hidden in the dark). Also love, lust and its irrationality and indecisiveness will also be focused on. I will be looking at communicating love and marriage, order and disorder/appearance and reality, using motifs such as nature, the moon, sleep and dreams, eyes, plays, rehearsals, roles/parts and magic.

·         To an audience of viewers that may either be Shakespeare fans, may think that Shakespeare is irrelevant (hopefully my work will help to show it for its timeless themes) and so open them up to him or even just being aware of his work, teenagers/adults; the themes are complex and about love and lust, not for children. I want to produce some unique prints that provide emotion and a sense of a dream like quality.

Printed Pictures: Final Prints

These are my final outcomes for my Printed Pictures brief. I want to put them together within a book alongside the quotes from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, the inspiration behind the imagery. 

After printing in gold and purple, a colour scheme that I have tried and tested and really liked, I noticed that there was also a silver ink in the print room which I had been unable to find before. I decided that silver would convey my themes of mystery and magic and the moon motif a lot more effectively. I decided to pair the silver with a dark blue/turquoise/teal which I think allowed the lino cuttings to stand out more as there was more contrast between the light and the dark. I wanted high contrast to fit with my themes of contrasts and opposites which run throughout the play. 

For these prints I used my carefully selected quotes, with key motifs and themes in their content, to inspire the images within them. I wanted a few different motifs and symbols to be included so that they could juxtapose and interact together to create an atmosphere reflecting the play and the chosen quotes.

I also used a theme of renaissance design to reflect the design of Shakespeare's time.

'Me thinks I see these things with parted eye, When everything seems double.'- Act 4 Scene 1
'The poets eye, in a fine frenzy rolling, Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven.' -Act 5 Scene 1
'Therefore the moon, the governess of floods, pale in her anger, washes all the air…' - Act 2 Scene 2
'It seems to me/ that yet we sleep, we dream.' - Act 4 Scene 1

For this print I used imagery such as; the moon, the eye, the magical realm between heaven and earth, tears and the night, to reflect the chosen quotes. 

'I will shake thee from me like a serpent.' - Lysander to Hermia.
'And through this distemperature we see the seasons alter…' - Act 2 Scene 1
'You spotted snakes with double tongue' -Act 2 Scene 2
'Four happy days bring in another moon.'

Here I used imagery such as; the moon, snakes, two-tongues, seasons, and night time to reflect the chosen quotes. 

'Sent with broom before to sweep the dust behind the door.'
'Think but this, and all is mended: that you have but slumbered here, while these visions did appear. And this weak and idle theme, No more yielding but a dream, Gentles, do not reprehend. If you pardon, we will mend.' - Puck
'Now until the break of day through this house each fairy stray. To be best bride-bed will we, which by us shall blessed be.'

For the above print I used imagery such as doors, a broom, fairies, the moon/sun, the night and day, to visualise the chosen quotes. 

'Reason becomes the marshall to my will/And leads me to your eyes, where I o'er look. Love stories written in loves richest book.' - Act 2 Scene 2.
'Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, and therefore is winged cupid painted blind.'

For this print I have used imagery such as eyes, an open book, the heart, angels/cupids, to reflect the chosen quotes. 

Quotes '''

For the above print I have used imagery such as flowers, night time, the moon, four people, pairs/couples, opposites and symmetry, eyes and sleep to reflect the chosen quotes.         

'The juice of it on sleeping eye lids laid/Will make or man or woman madly dote/upon the next live creature that sees!' -Act 2 Scene 1
'Churl, upon thy eyes I throw/ All the power this charm doth owe.' - Puck on a boy.
'A bank where the wild thyme blows, where oxlips and the nodding violet grows, Quite overcanopied with luscious woodbine, with sweet musk-roses, and with eglantine. There seeps Titania sometime of the night, lulled in these flowers with dances and delight.'

For this last print I used imagery such as flowers, night time, fairies, sleep, eyes, contrasts, grace/elegance, to convey the chosen quotes visually.

Lino printing was something I really enjoyed in this project. I love the tactile element when cutting out and mark-making into the lino itself. I also loved the experimental side of the printing process, particularly combining chosen colours with density and opacity of ink. I really like the fact that every print is unique and impossible to plan out exactly. I think this creates something special in each print and it gave me a chance to experiment with creating many different variations of the same lino print to see which captured the intended atmosphere and why. I found that I preferred the darker prints as they provided more impact as a final outcome due to a higher contrast and juxtaposition between the blank white paper and the ink. It made the pieces look more clean cut but also darker; more mysterious; fitting in with my chosen themes from A Midsummer Night’s Dream. After experimenting with colours I also discovered that silver and a dark turquoise worked best to translate the atmosphere of the play. I think this was due to the cooler tones compared to the purple and gold. The latter colours hinted at a richer more royal tone which I did want to establish in my pieces as hierarchy is a big element in the play.

I think I made a good decision picking 6 prints to do instead of 10. It meant I was able to put a lot of care and effort in to designing and creating my lino prints. I also found it a lot easier on my final lino cuts than my practice ones as I invested in a better quality lino and bought my own tools which meant it was easier to cut into and gave me time over Christmas to use my own tools to get to grips with the cutting and mark making process. 

Moving Pictures: Final Animations

Below are the links to my final animations; my three stings advertising William Shakespeare's play; A Midsummer Night's Dream.



X2 from Alice Dear on Vimeo.


X3 from Alice Dear on Vimeo.


X4 1 from Alice Dear on Vimeo.

If I were to create my animation again, I would make sure that I kept the title frames and the rest of the animation succinct in media as this led there to be some inconsistency within the stings; stopping it from flowing so easily. This happened because I ran into time limits when colouring in my frames for my animation after I had already collaged the six frames I was using for the background to my title text. I could also have overcome this problem of inconsistency by putting the collaged backgrounds faintly throughout the rest of my animation sequence. However because I decided to use pencil for the rest of my animation due to time restraints, my work wasn’t as bold and clear cut as I wanted it to be. I thought it was important to use colour in these pieces to capture the passion in the plays between the characters and their constantly changing emotions. Using black and white however may have been the better option as this would have made my work a lot quicker and easier whilst still looking clean cut and would have perhaps fitted together more professionally.

Overall creating these animations really gave me a huge insight into the work that goes into creating stop frame animation, yet it also opened my eyes to the effects and tools you can use to save time and to create a more professional finished product. In future I will be able to think about these elements while I am planning my project so I can incorporate digital with hand drawn in a much more effective way.

After Effects

I found learning how to use After Effects really useful for this project and for future animated projects as the tools this program has available can save you a lot of time and help to create a much more professional final animation. I think being able to add music using this program really helped to bring some more energy and life into my stings. It also added to the atmosphere of the work especially as the chosen music’s lyrics and instrumentals corresponded to the themes within the play itself.

Dragon Frame

Dragon frame was a great tool to use to achieve high resolution, ordered images for my animation. Learning how to use it was easy as once it was set up and the settings for the resolution etc. were sorted, actually taking the photographs of the image sequence was really simple.  I really wish that I had attempted to do a continual drawing using this software as I think this may have worked better as a faster way of creating the images I made. I also think this would have been a more effective way of creating the title sequence and would have probably fitted in a lot better with the rest of the sequence this way. I don’t think the way I have used digital text and drawn animation works very well so in future projects the process and production of all parts will need to be considered very carefully.

I am really happy that I managed to fulfill the brief and complete the 3 animated stings. It was extremely time consuming and it was quite hard to stay focused as I was doing frame after frame with only slight differences between them. However I absolutely love how you can create metamorphosis in your illustrations with animation. I loved creating patterns that turned into clasped hands, which then opened and turned back into patterns; creating moons that turned into a drop of colour, faces that were created from a line and then bought to life and blink. It was so fun to see the final result even if it was not exactly how I wanted it media wise! Animation is something I will continue to keep in mind and I think I can overcome some of the obstacles I found in this project by making less parts move at once or by using dragon frame to take stop frames whilst actually drawing the animation instead of lots of separate sheets of paper.

I wish that the metallic media I used had reflected the light in a slightly different way so that it produced a dark tinted silver/gold. This definitely has to do with lighting so in future this will be an aspect I will have at the front of my mind when setting up Dragonframe to capture my frames in the correct form. This would have made my animations a lot clearer, particularly in the fairy animation. I would also have liked to have created the animations in paint; however I am unsure how long this would have actually taken! This project has been a massive eye opener on how long a 12 frame per second stop frame animation can actually take to produce! Perhaps if I had used the intended media straight away when drawing it using the light box I may have been able to finish it in a clearer media. I instead used pencil to first draw the frames... however I then ran out of time to colour in the frames fully.

Due to these time restraints I decided to just use a few key colours throughout my animations. I think these worked okay but I am not happy with this aspect of my final resolutions. I think I really pushed myself to ensure all frames were coloured though so I am proud of my dedication and commitment to this even if it did not turn out as I had intended!

If I were to do another animation, (which I definitely will once I have recovered from drawing that many frames!) I will consider After Effects as a much bigger part. After speaking to my tutor Eleanor I realised how time saving this program could be, particularly on bringing layers together and just using 6 or so frames for a consistent moving background. Unfortunately I had already created the majority of my frames by this point however I did keep this in mind when creating my moving sky background to my text which consisted of only 6 frames and I think worked really effectively as a simple back drop.

Final Crit & Presentation - Peer Review and Check List

My feedback from my peers about my work for this module:

Studio Brief 2 and 3: Comment on the appropriateness of the response to the proposal provided.

Content and Communication
You've gone through with what you have proposed - in the time available (Printed Pictures)
I can't find a proposal for Moving Pictures (this was due to wrong labeling which I have now corrected!)

Visual Quality 
Both briefs have been consistent with each other and work well together.
The prints are well connected to the texts.

Comment on the overall quantity and quality of work presented.

Quantity
You have clearly spent a lot of time on this, throughout there is a high level of development appropriate to your author.

Quality
Your prints are so detailed, and animations are consistent. The colours work really well.

Comment on the organisation and consistency of the development of work in response to the briefs presented (Studio Practice Blog).

Organisation
Labels are all there and you seem to have documented the key moments. Put the images of your prints in a post - he wants to see them on there. (My prints were linked on to a post however I have now embedded it instead to make it clearer and easier to access.)

Consistency
High level of research and development of images.

Comment on the level of reflection and self evaluation documented throughout the module. 

Studio Brief 2
Planning of animation is effective. 

Studio Brief 3 
High level of reflection throughout.

Comment on the summary evaluation of the work presented. Does it appropriately reflect the work that you have reviewed?

Make sure what you are saying is important, and not just there to fill the gaps. Overall it seems good - a range of positives and negatives discussed. (I need to cut down the words in my evaluation so in doing so this will hopefully eradicate the unimportant information which may be 'filling the gaps'.)


OUIL504 Module Submission- Check List

Have responses to all three briefs been clearly presented for the final crit? Do you understand what the work is about and trying to communicate? (including who/what the author and text is?
During crit work on table evidences all briefs; Blog however is lacking. 

Is all work for the module clearly accessible on the Studio Practice blog? (Correctly labeled, images/movies viewable, organised clearly)
Try embedding ISSUU slideshows as opposed to just posting links to them (I have done this with a lot of my images now.)

Does the choice and selection of work and submission format appropriately represent the work produced in response to the module?
That's all sound.  

Are there any issues that you have identified with the work ahead of submission? 
Just get blog up to date. I am sure you already know all the things I have wrote down. 


Comments from peers on physical work (sketchbooks/prints/animation)

• Well presented body of work.
• Beautiful patterns and use of colour in sketchbook.
• Printed pictures are beautifully presented!
• I love your Studio Brief 1.
• Sketchbook
• What beautiful intricacy and time put into your moving pictures. Looks like so much effort. Can't get over how beautiful everything is. 
• Good sense of continuity in prints and moving pictures.
• Amazing work produced and so much of it.
• Everything is so pretty just lovely. Well done to you. 
• You have some ridiculously insane visual development here- well done.
• Beautiful sketchbooks.
• Insane and lovely sketchbooks.
• Highly informed prints... Vast amount of varied development. 

Visual Journal

I absolutely love painting and I decided to experiment with it in my sketchbook, particularly due to the fact that after speaking with my tutor we decided that using a media like this for my animation may give it a more expressive tone of voice. I really enjoyed creating this work and I really wanted to create my animation in this media! However unfortunately due to time restraints this was not possible... it is something I would love to have a go at in a future project though!

Moving Pictures: Music Choice

Purity Ring - Push Pull

''You were young and you'd stare

With a reverence unimpaired

There was an echo far and faint

Beneath the air remained

You were young and you'd stare

Where my limbs hung far and fair

Make a ladder of what folds

And climb up in me

You push and you pull and you tell yourself no

It's like when you lie down, the veins grow in slow

You push and you pull

But you'd never know

I crept up in you and I

Wouldn't let go''

What themes/motifs/sybols/atmosphere do the lyrics in this song have in common with Shakespeare's play A Midsummer Night's Dream?

The lyrics in this song link to the text I chose to focus from A Midsummer Night’s Dream by Shakespeare. The themes- love, confusion and magic; Loves Difficulty/Love out of Balance, Magic/fairies/love potion/supernatural power of love/surreal world, Dreams/events occurring without explanation/fantastical experience. Motif: Contrasts; groups of opposites and doubles - the juxtaposition in this song - push pull completely embodies this! Symbols: the love potion – symbol of the unreasoning, fickle, erratic power of love, Theseus and Hippolyta- represent order and stability and rationality; all themes enforced throughout this song!

I wanted love, lust and its irrationality and indecisiveness will also be focused on in the music and I think with this song I managed that. The music and instrumental help to enforce these themes too with the precussion and effects itself sounding surreal and magical due to the high notes and metallic sounds. 

Moving Pictures: Experimenting with Dragon Frame and After Effects 2

Moving Pictures: Experimenting with Dragon Frame and After Effects 1

Moving Pictures: Media

Some lovely illustration by Violeta Lopiz. I really like the mark making and hand drawn elements in this piece. This is the type of effect I want to convey in my animation through hand drawing it and using specific colours. I think in an animation this would create some nice movement as well as each frame will be different. 

After experimenting in this illustration, which I then made into a short practice animation, I have decided that using metallic is a must for me within this project as I love the effect it has and how we as an audience react to it; it immediately enforces the themes of A Midsummer Nights Dream; magic, the surreal, and the beautiful/elegance of the fairies.

Moving Pictures: Animation Progress

Things to do: 

• Create a 6 frame background for the animation stings. This can be used as a background for the text which will need to last 3 seconds so will take 36 frames. 
• Finish drawing out all frames in pencil for the three stings. Ensuring you have about 75 frames. May photocopy some of the frames if I think the movement is going too fast- this will bring the number up from 60 to 75.
• Paint outlines onto the frames. Think colour scheme and how they will interact with the separate background. 

So far I have 60 frames each for two stings and so I must do 15 more each for these. I also have to create 75 frames for a third sting. I have based all of these on my designs for my Printed Picture prints as I really like these designs and they really take into account the symbols, motifs and themes of the play; A Midsummer Night's Dream. I will use animation to bring these designs alive.

Although the basic design will be similar this work will look totally different to my Printed Pictures work as I will be using paint as my media and I will also be adding sound and text. 

I plan to create a 6 frame animated sequence to work as a background… mainly symbolising a night sky but also keeping an abstract element. I need to think about whether to stick to just paint for this or to use mixed media such as photographic elements of a moon or woods/branches or flowers etc. This way I can have a backdrop of a sky of twinkling starts etc but nothing too distracting or over complicated. 

My 75 frames will be the foreground image - the main movement in the pieces. These will probably be mainly outlines in paint and the main element will be abstract colour. I have done quite a few test pieces  for colour palettes in my sketchbook so I will have to rely on this while I am painting over my pencil lines in order to convey the correct atmosphere and meaning within my work.  

The background will play on after the 75 frames while the text comes on to inform the viewer about Shakespeare's work. It will look effective if there is a slightly animated night sky within the letters and black space around - as if the letters are cut out… however I will have to experiment with this on After Effects before I can be sure that this will work and look effective. 

For now I will concentrate on creating the pencil frames and painting them in along with making the separate background. 

Printed Pictures: Layout and Composition

So after having a long period of struggling with composition and layout, and attempting to tie this in with the theme of my project; I had a sudden realisation that it didn't have to be a realistic theme. Considering that I really wanted my pieces to hold an element of the mystical and magical in response to the themes in the play, it was perfect to create work that didn't necessarily make sense. The people didn't have to be standing; they could just be floating heads. The moon didn't have to be at the top of the image; it could be in the centre. Simultaneously I was also investigating art of Shakespeare's time:

He was working in the theatre at the height of the renaissance movement, something that is reflected in Shakespeare’s plays. The renaissance movement did not necessarily reject the idea of God, but rather questioned humankind’s relationship to God – an idea that caused an unprecedented upheaval in the accepted social hierarchy. In fact, Shakespeare himself may have been Catholic. This focus on humanity created a new-found freedom for artists, writers and philosophers to be inquisitive about the world around them. Shakespeare was born towards the end of the renaissance period and was one of the first to bring the renaissance’s core values to the theatre.

Shakespeare Embraced the Renaissance in the Following Ways:

• Shakespeare updated the simplistic, two-dimensional writing style of pre-renaissance drama. He focused on creating “human” characters with psychologically complexity. Hamlet is perhaps the most famous example of this.
• The upheaval in the accepted social hierarchy allowed Shakespeare to explore the humanity of every character regardless of their social position. Even monarchs are given human emotions and are capable of making mistakes.
• Shakespeare utilized his knowledge of Greek and Roman classics when writing his plays. Before the renaissance, these texts had been suppressed by the Catholic Church.

Art - Against a backdrop of political stability and growing prosperity, the development of new technologies–including the printing press, a new system of astronomy and the discovery and exploration of new continents–was accompanied by a flowering of philosophy, literature and especially art. The style of painting, sculpture and decorative arts identified with the Renaissance emerged in Italy in the late 14th century; it reached its zenith in the late 15th and early 16th centuries, in the work of Italian masters such as Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and Raphael. In addition to its expression of classical Greco-Roman traditions, Renaissance art sought to capture the experience of the individual and the beauty and mystery of the natural world.

I started to think about the printing process and how I could involve the themes from the play like opposites, symmetry and contrast in my prints. I decided to research into renaissance patterns. I really love detail and it appeared to be a key characteristic in the renaissance patterns that I found. My research looking at these renaissance surface patterns really inspired my layout and composition in my own prints. I now started planning out my prints in a grid format so that I could create symmetry and parallels in the pieces. I decided to include a border of swirly patterns inspired by these renaissance patterns which helped to tie in my prints as part of a set. 

Using the grids really helped me to get a sense of direction within my pieces and after I decided this was how I was going to work I quickly came up with some ideas based on the motifs and symbols in the quotes I had carefully selected. 

Knowing that I was overwhelmed by information from A Midsummer Night's Dream and all of the Acts I decided that I definitely must cut down the amount of text I was relying on to inspire the individual texts. 
I separated the quotes into specific themes and motifs from the play and then it was a lot easier to link some together and separate others. In the end I chosen about 3 quotes per each print that I thought had similar symbolism or atmosphere. These inspired my prints and really helped to give direction to my work. 
Below are some images from my sketchbook of my initial print designs: 

Progress Review - Eleanor

Issues discussed at the tutorial:

• See progress sheet for details
• Make animation simplification key focus
• Also organise blog and bring up to date. 

Tutor action:

• Identified gaps - submission
• Advice given

Student action: 

• Adress points as above

My own notes: 

• Write up alongside all pictures on blog.
• Explain thought processes and practical processes on blog.
• Create power points, PDF them and upload them to ISSU then link to blog post instead of having all the images on posts. 
• Create a 6 frame background for the animation stings. This can be used as a background for the text which will need to last 3 seconds so will take 36 frames. 
• Finish drawing out all frames in pencil for the three stings. Ensuring you have about 75 frames. May photocopy some of the frames if I think the movement is going too fast- this will bring the number up from 60 to 75.
• Paint outlines onto the frames. Think colour scheme and how they will interact with the separate background. 

Printed Pictures: Test Prints

After creating my final lino cuts I went into the print room knowing the colour combinations I would try out and use; metallic and a dark rich colour- most likely purple. I had previously experimented with lino prints and used metallic gold and dark purple which I really liked the outcome of, I thought these colours worked effectively to create the atmosphere of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. I quite wanted to try out silver however I was unable to find this ink in the print room so I used gold in my prints experimenting with where I rolled the ink and how this effected the meaning within the piece. For example when I placed gold where the wings would print this exaggerated the magical theme bringing alive the mystical concept of fairies. Yet I preferred it when I used the gold over the body of the fairy, this bringing alive and warming her face and the centre of the image; her heart.