Artist research Karin Soderquist

Karin Sodderquist is an Illustrator from Stockholm that creates images digitally. I looked at her work because her images look like they are composed of cut out paper shapes. some of her images are 3D and are made out of wooden sets, this links directly to my project as that is what i am going to do within my illustrations. Her images are different to what i want to create in my work but it still fits in with the simplistic style that i want to create. I have looked at her work and especially focussing on background and scenery because they create a 3D feel. Here are a few of my images that i looked at for inspiration.

Artist research Gail Armstrong

Whilst doing some research i came across the artist Gail Armstrong, she is an illustrator that specialises in paper sculpture and she creates illustrations made from different shapes cut out and stuck down to compose the image. Her work is really vibrant and happy looking. Her images are amazing and finished to such a high standard that they almost look like they are created digitally. she creates images focussing on lots of different subjects but they always have the same happy bright style to them. Her work evokes the same feeling that id like to achieve within my own work.

Artist research: Rob Ryan

I decided to look at Rob Ryan's work as he uses paper cuts to create images. I thought his work linked to mine because he created 3D images using paper in different layers. Although his work is very different to mine it is really inspiring and incredible to look at. The amount of detail and intricacy within his images is unbelievable.  He creates very complex images that he cuts out of pieces of card. i looked at his work to get inspiration for the backgrounds although i decided to not do anything as complex as his work as i don't have much practice with cutting things out with scalpels, in the future i think i might explore this style more to see how it works within my illustrations. 
Here are a few pieces of his that i really like.   

Colin West Final image

I am doing the poem a king and a cat for my colin west piece. i had already drawn the male character but hadn't drawn the cat yet so i did that yesterday then composed the image on photoshop. for the cat i used pencil, coloured pencil, white crayon, water colour and fine liner. I decided to do the cat ginger as i thought it would stand out and make the image look fun. I really like how the cat turned out i think it conveys a fat lazy cat quite well. I also really like how the media that i used to create the image works. I think i have found what i like to use most and in the future will be working more in this style and using the same things to create my illustrations.

Here is the final image i am really pleased with it although i think it lacks a background. I left it out because in the original illustration there was no background and i thought it worked well. Also backgrounds have never really been my strong point so over the summer i am planning on improving this as it is important to making images feel complete. I think when my illustration is paired with the text of the poem it will look a lot less barren on the background.

Module 2 Evaluation

During this module i have learnt a lot about my own process in creating narrative illustration. I have found that with time management it is better to spread out the work load rather than doing a lot of work in a short amount of time. From this i have learned that i would benefit from making a proper work plan and setting myself smaller personal deadlines to make sure i keep up with the workload. I think that i managed my time to a reasonable standard, however following a proper time plan would have allowed me to have finish well ahead of the deadline, allowing more time to reflect on my work. I would have also had more time to annotate and research in more detail as my written work possibly suffered. 

With regards to character development i feel as though i could have done a lot more although i didn't have many characters within my story. Another thing that contributed to the lack of development was the simplicity of the illustrations. I wanted my illustrations to be simple as i feel that if i over complicated them it wouldn't work as well for the photographic technique i was using. I feel as though i did all of the development that was necessary for me to complete the project but it was not done to the extent that it probably could have been. 

Overall i was pleased with the final images and the final outcome of the book. I was happy because i was working in a way that was completely different to anything i had done before. and the whole process ran smoothly which is quite unusual for me as i usually have a few mishaps along the way.  

If i was to re do this module there are a few things that i would do differently such as:

•  More character development.
• Improve the layouts of my pages as some of the image became slightly stretched and distorted.
• I would maybe include more text as i only included a small amount of narrative and it could possibly be quite hard to follow if you don't know the storyline.   

Research Ladybird books

Over the easter holidays i went to south shields (i think thats where it was,) and i found a great little book shop. Most of the books in it were second hand but it also sticked lots of illustrated special edition books, it was great! They had a big vintage ladybird book section so i had a really good rummage around to find some really nice vintage illustrated books. I picked up some interesting and unique ones that i liked. I thought i would write about them a bit on here.
Lady bird books is a publishers that publish exclusively for children. They have a large range of books ranging from factual to fiction. They started making little children's books covering all topics and stories in the 1940's. These packetise books were a huge hit and modern versions are still made now. I like the vintage books a lot more than the glossy new ones. I picked up three books, here is a bit about my two favourites.  

Talk about animals:
I decided to get the book talk about animals because all of the different styles of illustration throughout the book and i really like animals. It was Illustrated by Harry Winfield and has a real fun vintage feel about it. I really like the diversity of images throughout the book, i don't think iv'e ever seen a book with such a wide range of styles through it. I also love the colour palettes of some pages as they are so unique and bright, for example some pages have sickly pink backgrounds and bright yellow in the illustrations. It is so different but so representative of the time it was published (around the 1940's.) Here are a few of my favourite images from the book.

Hannibal runs away:
What first attracted me to this book is the strange title, what makes it more funny is that hannibal is a hamster. I picked it up and the front is cute as it is a realistic illustration of a hamster. Im usually not to keen on realistic drawings for children's books as i feel they aren't as visually exiting, but the end pages sold it to me as they are a really nice style pretty similar to the style of books that no brow make now. They have simplistic drawings of hamsters using a limited colour palette. I love the way that these pages look and think they are done in a very timeless style as a lot of illustrations now have a similar style. Here is an image of the end pages.