Clockwork City

Clockwork City

Analog

Research and Sketches

Peer Critique Questions

1) Do either the setting or the character stand out more than the other or do they blend well together?

2) Is the character noticeable or do they get lost in the setting?

3) Would a different time of day or weather conditions of the setting have been better?

Reflection

The goal of this illustration was to create and design a character and illustrate them in a setting or world that fit their design and also told a story as well. In one of my previous classes, I did a final project where I illustrated ten girls and they all had different themes of wings. One of them had a steampunk theme and that one was my favorite and it made me interested in building a world around her and imagining what her world would actually look like. Steampunk themes and aesthetics were also something that interested me which is what also made me go with this type of setting. The setting is a steampunk city, a city with high buildings, pipes, gears, blimps, and other steampunk related technology. I wanted to make sure the character and the environment both blended well together and not have one or the other stand out too much. The perspective of the drawing was from up high looking down low at the city while having the character standing on top of a building more in the foreground. This way the aspect and features of the city could stand out but the character would also be in view immediately blending both character and world together in the image. The time chosen for the setting was night with the city lights glowing a bright yellow. Having it be night while also having strong light sources gives a lot of opportunity for high contrast and experimenting with strong lighting and shadows. Parts of the image, mainly the lower ends of the buildings, were also given a slight blur to not only help with the perspective, but give more depth in contrast with the character. Simple building silhouettes were also added to the further background to give the sense of a bigger and much busier city.

What's Natural Can Feel Impossible

Philosopher: Plato (appearance vs reality)

Claim: What feels natural for others, can feel impossible for someone else.

 Analog

Digital

Research

Newspaper styles in the 1800s and how they were oriented. Choosing similar style of fonts to use for headlines and body texts.

Reflection

The goal of this project was to create an illustration and then design it as a newspaper cover. The philosopher and concept that was chosen for this design was Plato and appearance vs reality. The claim that was made was one related to social anxiety which is a very personal topic for myself and I know is something that has become rather common in today’s society. It is a mental and personal struggle that can sometimes be hard for others who don’t struggle to understand. The main illustration was kept in a very simple and graphic style. It portrays the silhouettes of people talking with clean speech bubbles. Then there is one silhouette in the middle which is much smaller and looks as if they are hiding or trying not to draw attention to themselves. When they speak, their speech bubble is not clean and is instead a bunch of scribbled and messy lines. This is meant to symbolize how something that comes so easily for others like talking, can instead come out as a struggle or mess for others. Personally, as someone who has struggled with social anxiety, this was a very personal topic and subject I wanted to portray. Although I am contempt and comfortable with being quiet, talking is such a common and, in a lot of cases, a necessary form of communication. It is frustrating to see something so common come so naturally to others, while for some unknown reason, talking causes an anxious and stressful feeling for myself. A lot of people wish they did not struggle with this or at least knew the reason for these feelings happening in the first place. I think this illustration is clear and straightforward. The text boxes around it were written in a way to relate to the message. Overall the image was very simple and the text and message is simple yet straightforward.