Comic Opportunity

DC are putting together a comic artist workshop. Those who can take part must seen a cover letter, a series of images as part of its selection criteria, a letter of recommendation and a CV. The applications are open at the beginning of April.

Batman:The New 52 Analysis

In the first volume where Batman encounters the Court of Owls, there is a technique which I noticed while reading. There is a series of pages where the panels are altered 90 degrees per page until they return to their original state. I found this to be quite effective as Fey (2012) says that this was the author and writer's way to illustrate Batman's sense of disorientation as well as reflect his distorted mind as he travels through their lair.
I would like to apply this at an important scene in the story where the protagonist encounters Father Dagon and it's monolith. My idea is to begin with the scene were the protagonist encounters the monolith which will be orientated in the correct position at 0 degrees.The next page will be at a landscape orientation at 90 degrees. The page with the appearance of Father Dagon will be positioned upside down at 180 degrees and then the next page after that,will be another landscape picture, This time it will be at 270 degrees.
Finally the scene where the monster spots the hero and as he runs away, the orientation will come full circle as a way to reflect the hero's disorientated mind and to further enhance the line for the story;

"I think I went mad then." (Lovecraft,1919, pp.23-29)

Here is a test of what to expect.

First Page

Second Page

Third Page

Fourth Page

References
Fey, E. 2012. Batman: Court of Owls (New 52) Volume 1 (2/2). [Blog] Era Fey Gossips. Available at: http://erafeygossips.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/batman-court-of-owls-new-52-volume-1-22.html [Accessed 27 Jan. 2016].

Lovecraft, H.P. 1919. Dagon. The Vagrant. (11): pp.23–29.

Visual Style Development:Framestore

I have considered some ideas for how the visuals could be portrayed in my comic.Since the story is told through an account by the narrator. What we could do is use the idea of how this story is being told by lettering on paper. I could make it look like it was one a story.

The tale of the Three Brothers

In Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 (2010), there is a scene where the Deathly Hallows are explained in the form of a fairy tale, The tale of the Three Brothers. The animated sequence is very stylized and reminiscence of a dark fable and shadow puppetry. I remembered watching this scene in a supermarket but unfortunately I could not hear the audio. Instead, I had to rely on the visuals and I under stood what was going on. what i also like is how the sequence has an overlay of a parchment texture to help enhance the idea that it was from a written story. There is colour but there are strong silhouette and lighting contrasts.The use of body language helped give me an idea of some of the charters's personality.

This link lead to the Framestore website where they discuss details about the animated sequence.
http://www.framestore.com/work/harry-potter-and-deathly-hallows-p1-tale-three-brothers

I could do this through applying existing parchment textures available online from this website.
http://www.ucreative.com/resources/40-plus-various-high-quality-free-paper-patterns-and-textures/

However I would prefer to see what I can create myself.

Here was a inked picture I made at Ryan's Inktober Event on the 27th of October.

I also included crunched up paper and some cloud effects through Photoshop to add some dampness  to the texture.

Scrunched up paper texture

Here are my attempts to adapt the Framestore style that they used during the animated sequence.

Frame Store Visual Style Test

Visual Style Tests

As you can see from the test, The silhouettes are not as effective as depicted in the animation. Therefore I will consider another approach to represent the characters. However I do admire the paper texture that is applied.

Short Comic Idea

I did have an idea for a short animation for my Advanced Animation Module. However in the end, I decided to scrap the idea and focus on a games related project.

Story

The initial idea for the story was a young fawn that is nothing but a dark silhouette. He is lonely and wants some company. He hears a sound like a flute mimicking a cuckoo bird. He follows the sounds making the same notes as a form of communication. However when he arrives after this journey he finds out that it was just a bird. He leaves and returners to his home disappointed. He remains there sad and depressed until he sees that the bird followed him. The bird cries out and other animals emerge. The bird begins to sing and the faun starts to play joyfully on his flute. What I had in mind was the idea of sketchy visual style. The idea was to keep this about 3 pages at least.

Here is a link to my Rough Animatic.

I was thinking about using this as a starting point. However I went and did some development work for how the character would look.

I looked at various ways the character could appear. The original design was for the character to be a black silhouette. The reason for this was to allow the figure to be drawn more efficiently.However I did not continue with this development.

Stain Glass Windows Visual Research

Stain glass windows consist of multi coloured forms of glass fused together with lead to create illustrative works that tell a story. At first the early forms of stain glass had little colours but colours were added through the use of chemicals and dyes. As different forms of stain glass were discovered more colours were available to be added to these stain glass pieces. Yellow stain glass was used to high certain elements of an illustration such as a halo or crown.

According to BBC.co.uk church floor plan interactive game (2014), they were in demand for clients, because people believed that they helped provide a sure entry into heaven when they died. Stain glass windows continued to be used and produced but it was until the church reformed in the 1500s when they decided that stain glass was no longer an effective form of sacred art. The art of stain glass making fell into obscurity until the 1850s when the lost art was rediscovered. The stain glass mainly consists of glass shards merged together with lead and are painted over on coloured stain glass. It doesn't have to be a collection of glass pieces together. Sometimes a single glass panel is enough to tell a story. The Archangel Michael Vanquishing the Devil, is a good example of this. What helps emphasis their appearance is that light can pass through them like a normal glass window. In this case, it helps illuminate the painting and give it more effectiveness in this story. In the 1400s, glass windows became common place and affordable by most people. It was long before that that the stain glass windows were used in churches. There was a time when stain glass was used at a smaller scale for houses and families. Some would be used for a family portrait. It was in the sixth century that the head of the catholic church, Pope Gregory requested that artists tell the story the stories of the bible as a way to educate people as it allowed those who could not read books to be able to understand the ideas and stories of the bible's teachings through visual representation. Gies, Joseph and Frances discuss how stainless illustrations allow "illiterate people to learn what books cannot teach them. (Cathedral, Forge and Waterwheel: Technology and Invention in the Middle Ages, page 130.) as quoted in https://www.awesomestories.com/asset/view/STORIES-in-GLASS-Stained-Glass-Windows

Stain Glass is still used to these days but the style of it has been used in different ways. In a few examples, this artist has used the style of stain glass to reinterpret the stories depicted in the World of Warcraft MMORPG series. Each of the panels represents the expansion of Warcraft. In the below image, it is a stain glass style mural which tells the story of Garrosh the warlord of the horde and how he ended up in the past. The expansion is about Garrosh travelling to Draenor before the first RTS game in the nineties. The top section of the shows us the warlords of Draenor and the dark portal. the arch of the portal helps act as a frame for a focal point. Garrosh is showing his back while stretching out to grab frames to suggest that he is trying to bend the timelines. The presence of gears and clogs helps indicates the them of time and the concept of time. Underneath Garrosh is an illustration of Garrosh's trial and how he was judged by the four spirits of Draenor. the overlay of warm colours connects with the primary colour them for the expansion.The Black Prince and the bronze dragon aspect is present on the mural

Vision of Time (Guo 2015)

Fall of Arthas (Guo 2011)

Hour of Twilight (Guo 2011)

Another example of this style being used in a different media is in the game legend of Zelda Windwaker.

Legend of Zelda Stain Glass (Nintendo 2002)

Book References
AwesomeStories.com, 2008. Stories in Glass. [online] Available at: https://www.awesomestories.com/asset/view/STORIES-in-GLASS-Stained-Glass-Windows [Accessed 25 Jan. 2016].

Bbc.co.uk, 2014. BBC - History - British History in depth: Church Interiors Challenge. [online] Available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/interactive/games/church_floorplan/index_embed.shtml [Accessed 25 Jan. 2016].

Gies, F. and Gies, J. 1994. Cathedral, forge, and waterwheel. New York: HarperCollins Publishers.

Guo, J. 2011. Fall of Arthas. [image] Available at: http://breathing2004.deviantart.com/art/fall-of-Arthas-213820425 [Accessed 27 Oct. 2015].

Guo, J. 2015. Vision of Time. [image] Available at: http://breathing2004.deviantart.com/art/Vision-of-Time-545394498 [Accessed 27 Oct. 2015].

Guo, J. 2011. Hour of Twilight. [image] Available at: http://breathing2004.deviantart.com/art/hour-of-twilight-252584914 [Accessed 27 Oct. 2015].

Khan Academy, n.d. Khan Academy. [online] Available at: https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/medieval-world/latin-western-europe/gothic1/a/stained-glass-history-and-technique [Accessed 25 Jan. 2016].

Nintendo, 2002. Legend of Zelda Stain Glass. [image] Available at: https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/eb/6d/69/eb6d6903d545a0c9efd0ccc3de12bd2a.jpg [Accessed 27 Oct. 2015].

Stainedglassmuseum.com, 2015. A Brief History of Stained Glass. [online] Available at: http://stainedglassmuseum.com/briefhistory.html [Accessed 25 Jan. 2016].

The Archangel Michael Vanquishing the Devil. 1530. [Colourless glass , oxide paint and silver strain] Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum.

Radio Drama Interpretation and Film Comparison

One form of media test I attempted was to take a scene from Star Wars and illustrate how it was portrayed win  the film but also in a radio drama format. Although both mediums told teh same story ,the radio drama had a more in depth description of the story and the characters.

 The segment I would like to reinterpret into a visual format is from 2:13:24 to 2:16:40

[UPDATED] This video is no longer available.

I chose the scene where Luke heads home to find the place burnt and his family killed. In the radio drama, this scene is reinterpreted from Obiwan's perspective. Luke heads off home while Obi-wan tells C3P0 to bury the Jawas. Luke returns emotionally scarred and he tells Obi-wan about what he saw so that we, the audience can understand what he saw. In this version, Mark Hamill delivers the lines in a more convincing performance. However it is cut short when he changes his decision quickly and decides to join Obi-wan on his quest. In my opinion, I think it would have been more effective if Obi-wan gave Luke some time to recover from his ordeal and to be by himself.

Here is my sketch of the scene based of the film's visual iteration.

Sketch

Line art

Here is how I visually perceived the scene as it was interpreted through the radio drama.

Sketch

Combination Attempt

Here is an attempt I made to combine the two together so that we cut back and forth to Luke when he's telling Kenobi about what happened. While I made this interpretation of the scene. I showed this to a friend and when we discussed the inconsistent and spontaneous change for Luke to instantly changing his mind and joining Obi-wan on his quest. It felt very rushed. He suggested that he may have been thinking about this while driving back. I had a thought of recreating that scene with Luke thinking about the homestead while driving he gets more upset thinking about it and almost hits a rock when he takes his eyes off the road. He parks alongside a canyon edge and a rest his head on the steeling mechanism. I feel this approach might be  effective as it can be told without the character saying a word.

Reference

Daley, B. 1981. Star Wars: The Original Radio Drama. [Radio] Prince Frederick: HighBridge_Audio. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bEPba_tdFbk [Accessed 1 Oct. 2015].

Star Wars Screenplay to Comic Page Process

Here is my current progress on my comic page interpretation of a screenplay extract. What I did here was read the screen play extract and wrote down the scene I wanted to visualise. I started with a few rough idea of how the comic page could be laid out. I intended to include the main story beats of this particular scene.

Page 1 Process

Initial Sketch

Base colouring of comic characters

Base colouring of Background

Character Shading

Page 2 Process

Initial Roughs

Line Art

Base Colouring

Shading Applied

Lighting Adjustments

Final Page

Final Page 1

Final page 2

Evaluation

I feel that I have achieved a visual approach to converting a screenplay extract into a visual comic page. I feel that I managed to get the characters translated okay in a style and captured the main key traits of their appearance.
An appropriate balance of traditional and digital techniques such as sketches and a graphics tablet was used to produce digital drawings. The characters were translated through a reasonable visual style, capturing the key traits of their appearance and provide a form of exaggeration to allow their facial expressions to be read clearly. The literature source of the screenplay helped provide an insight into how the comic could be visualised. The chosen art style was problematic while implementing the character’s proportions. The continuity of certain objects laid out in the scene varied from panel to panel especially for the background.The line work was thin and rough but it could be improved by thickening the lines and adding weight to them to help provide a more solid drawing.
The backgrounds were the weakest area because they were drawn last. This was overcome by digitally painting over the final comic image as a means of working efficiently without escalating the complication of the layers.
In hindsight, a quick floor plan in the form of a small drawing would have been beneficial. In response to this experiment, the production of the comic pages and the chosen visual style for the project artefact were changed. The inclusion of additional panels would have benefited the narrative.
The media tests were a technical experimentation of production values, including the application of current understanding of comic conventions and how they can be used to visually translate a scene from a screenplay.

In short, this was a test to demonstrate where I was with my skills in illustration.

Reference

Vaz, M., Lucas, G. and Hales, J. 2002. The art of Star wars, episode II, attack of the clones. New York: Ballantine Pub. Group, pp.200, 2004.

Notes from Ryan Locke Meeting

I had a meeting with Ryan  to consult him about my current progress on my honours project as well as to ask myself what I was wanting to achieve this year.
The main thing I wanted to get across was that I wanted to use minimum dialogue as a means to allow the visuals to tell the story. I showed a lack of clarity when I was speaking to Ryan and he helped me gin an additional understanding of my goals. I have an interest in adaptation'. interpretation of literacy medium into print media. He suggested that I carry out an analysis of artists by selecting a few examples of comic pages from different artists and  describe what they have done and talk about their art style, their similarities and differences and provide my own opinion on their work.
Thomas Cole's  series of paintings, Course of Empire was an area I wanted to look into because I saw that series of paintings as a strong example of telling a story visually with the use of words imprinted on the medium. Ryan told me that members of the church during the Middle Ages were the only people who could read. Therefore I will look at how stain glass windows and why they were used.

What I can do also is explain how these sculptures were made and how the stories were told visually through mediums. Overall, he was pleased with my progress and suggested that I continue exploring the ways of visually conveying a story, and to justify my choices every step of the way.

Lynn Parker Meeting

I had a meeting with Lynn Parker at 3.30 on the 7th of October 2015.

Before my meeting with Lynn to discuss my honours project, Deborah who worked on the Storybook Meh that was recently published in Edinburgh came to visit the university and I was given the opportunity to show my portfolio to her. He liked a few examples of my work. He suggested that I placed some of my previous works into a separate folder and allow my best current work to be the first images that employers would see. I showed Lynn my work. I told her of Inktober. She liked the idea that I was doing this exercise during October. I showed her my works, mood boards, thumbnails including some examples of Inktober. I feel like my talk with her was more of a report rather than a feedback session which I was expecting. I feel that it ended up unintentionally caused confusion with where I was going with the project. She agreed that I should work on one interpretation project for honours.

She suggested that I should:

• reflect my media tests.
• provide some feedback.
• develop my skills in visual language and communication.
• analyse and learn but base my next activity on what I have learned or what I find difficult.
• Take a step back
• Provide as many visual cues as I can, metaphors/symbols/icons
• Put together some visual style mood boards

I spoke to Lynn about Plants vs Zombies artist Rich Werner and described his silent comic he made I addressed the text was in the panels and not in dialogue. I showed similar parallels with animation and comics as they share similarities. Thomas Coles's sequential paintings to stain glass. She asked me how important are interpretations to me? I replied that it was an opportunity for an artist to express themselves when giving the opportunity to express their vision of a story.  I ended up contradicting myself but I justified that it was a rational thought but can still serve as a test.
 Lynn suggested that I should talk about how visual logic is used to enhance communication in the narrative of a a comic form.

http://www.design.iastate.edu/NAB/about/thinkingskills/visuallogic/visuallogic.html

She told me that I should refer to the term of minimal or non verbal instead of minimalist as it was referring to an art movement.  I read a section of Scott McCloud's novel , Understanding Comics: An Invisible Art and He address how line work can suggest mood and in turn,  style can reflect the mood and atmosphere for a comic's story. However she was pleased with my progress and content. 

Further Definition Ideas

Over the weekend, I took some time to think about my research question and I believed that the main focus should be on what contributes visual language and how it is used during the process between translating a literacy source into a visual sequential art form. I still show interest in designing characters, props, environments. This time allowed me to reiterate on my Research question.

• What are the contributing factors to visual language during the translation pipeline of literacy media into a sequential art visual media?

While I wanted to see about the narrative being in a minimal approach. I feel that the visual language is an important approach.  However I still feel that the minimal approach is something to consider as each story doe not need to be a complex narrative but can be an entertainment spectacle which presents a simple but effective story. When Lynn told me this last week, I found it quite difficult from to express myself. To be honest, I am still passionate about creating a comic for my honours project. I would like to base my project on a short story I've read because I could try and I show my interpretation of how I would picture the story. Since I saw some other interpretations of the same story, these will help inspire me to develop he work into a different direction. As long as I do not alter the story to a certain degree such as having an unnecessary sub plot, I should be okay. The main thing I would like the project to be is to act as a portfolio piece to showcase my skills of character design, colour theory, visual storytelling, comic production and the ability to adapt an existing work.

There are also a range of questions I have set which I would like the artifact to help me answer.

• What are the contributing factors to visual language during the translation pipeline of literacy media into a sequential art visual media while remaining faithful to the source material?
• Should the project be faithful to the story?
• How can I establish the setting through visual clues, to show time and passing of time?

Character's Importance in comics

I am still looking for ideas for a project which I can base my research question on. During third year, I enjoyed designing characters in Ryan's Computer Art Practice class. I have considered the idea of looking into how characters can benefit from non-verbal narratives in sequential comics. The reason I want to work on a comic related project, is because comics can be an opportunity for me to showcase my strengths. I also wanted to produce a comic where the story was conveyed through visual means. I believe that it is important that a story can be presented in a visual format without having to rely on reading words off a page.

Case Study: Dagon Illustrated by Alice Duke and R,J. Ivankovic

Comic Adaptations of H.P Lovecraft's Dagon

For this study, I have chosen to pick a short story that has been adapted in to a comic book. Based on some examples I have chosen, I will look at the differences between them and how they relate to the original story. The reason I am wanting to look into this is because I have gotten quite interested in H.P. Lovecraft's work and I always wanted to retell the story in my own style. The following images are an adaption of Dagon, illustrated by Alice Duke.

Figure 1. Page 1 and 2

Figure 2. Page 3

Figure 3. Page 4

Figure 4. Page 5

Images of The Dagon Story from the Lovecraft Anthology comic (2011)

Moments

This version of the story is done in only a few pages but it does highlight the key events. The first page consists of one panel of him writing about his tale, the next one shows him escaping the occupied ship The following panel shows him in the boat on the ocean and then the last panel shows him waking up on the desolate plane. This does summaries it quite briefly and the visuals do help show a flow of what is happening. 

Frames

The gutter in this story more shows us moving form one scene to another. when the man comes across the monolith there is a transition of aspect to aspect showing us the details on the monolith then the ideas relating to the fact that is might have been worshipped by a tribe. There is a sense of consistency in this page. The panel featuring the monolith helps act as a focal point due to the glowing effect as it was described in the book.  With protagonist running back to the boat, the panels at that point in the story are border less and give us a clear suggestion that theses feeling there are the moods the protagonist is experiencing one in his head. It also suggests how fragmented his memories only, capable of capturing key elements such as the creatures face and hand.

Colour

The art style looks like it was painted traditionally with water colours.  I like the idea of how it uses a traditional painted art style because when it comes to the flashbacks it feels distorted and even a small bit faded as it is being talk from the protagonist's memories. Cool colour palette works well with the night time setting and the mixture of green and purples gives us a dreamlike and mystical atmosphere. However there is a sense of fear and wonder of the unknown. It can also suggest of the creatures otherworldly origins too. At times it even feels a bit like the character is some dream state and it could even consider that it was a all a dream.

When the main character see the beast and runs back to his boat the sequence there feels blended together a series of aspect to aspect and subject to subject transitions as it begins to become jumbled up.I like this lack of uniformed panel layouts because it helps relate to H.P. Lovecraft's theme of madness that are usually refereed through his work. It also helps connect with the line "I think I went mad then." I also like the gradient effect used when the man wakes in hospital and the the framing becomes more organised again with the white gutter. the third last panel depicts the man's visions of a what will come and here it feels like a jumble of two images. One where that sea creature is eating man and other of two crawling out of a street  grabbing some poor souls.The two images feel like figments merged together to emphasis the consequence of what is to happen.while I admire its colourful traditional painted style I still found that particular style to be difficult to see clearly. The ending itself even is unclear with what happens we are not sure if it was him imagining these things or if the entire experience was real or not. Never the less this clarity may encourage further discussion of the story. When the man comes across the chasm, it is depicted like a wide canyon whereas I always depicted it like a narrow sea canyon.

Style of Narrative

The story is told through extracts from the original story summarising the points. I have noticed the adapter did not use all of the extract and has done this as a means to condense the story and highlight the key moments.The creature is depicted as a more humanised creature but shares a few traits of fish such as the eyes, the gills and the webbed hands and feel. However it keeps a intimidating appearance with having pupil-less eyes with blue liquid emitting from its tears and sharp teeth while drooling. The eyes are glowing to emphasis its inhuman appearance and personality. It's giant scale also emphasises it's appearance. These traits help convey its scariness. The monolith is show as a large cuboid with a pyramid top similar to monuments in our world such as the Washington monument and Political Martyrs' Monument. The obelisk is white with cool colour hue that helps emit a blue glow to its surroundings.

An artist called R.J. Ivankovic produced a series of illustrations based on H.P Lovecraft's work. His 

art style is inspired by Dr Seuess. These Lovecraft illustrations feature a narrative that is very similar to how Dr Seuss structured his picture books.

 HPL's Dagon (for beginning readers) - P20-21 (DrFaustusAU 2013)

The depiction of the monolith and its carvings are in sync with the simple line art work style for the story. Despite it being not as detailed as the previous style the artists went for, I still got an idea of what it was meant to be. The monument is round that fits with the child orientated art style. The character's white colour helps make him stand out in the pictures and contrasts with the unknown surreal environment. What I also like about this style is how child friendly it looks while being based of a short horror story. The use of curves, round and the the small head body ratio shapes helps emphasis its visual appeal to a young. The is not shading just base lighting however there is a a sense of gradient certain assets. the use of the soft line work helps emphases the stickiness of the environment around him.

HPL's Dagon (for beginning readers) - P08-09 (DrFaustusAU 2012)

In this depiction of Dagon, the gutters in these two pages helps give a sense of panning across the scene. The scene is not fully cluttered and you can see what is there. There is a sense of unknown as we are just as confused as the main character is. there is small evidence of where we could be.Not only does this establish the new environment but we get a sense of wanting to know what is going on. There are decaying fish, a rowing boat with cargo and we have the main character covered in muck and slime. We get the idea that this character is a sailor because of his cap and his anchor tattoo which is a visual cue associated with the navy. 
 Dr Seuss was a author who wrote children's books that use rhythm as a form of verbal narrative.This artists has developed a style that is very similar to Dr Seuss's visual style. Ivankovic's work such as the Call of Cthulhu looks more liker something that Dr Seuss could have written as it shares similar traits. However his stories have been given further updates versions. The two example are two example of him changing styles and even story layouts and moments. The first example looks like something out of a 1920s/1930s cartoon whereas the other has some traits similar to Dr Seuss unique art style such a the way the style of shading depicted in the picture. this is shown to help emphasis the sticky texture seen in the above image.

I really like how this is a innocent retelling of a horror story in the form of a famous children's author visual and literacy style.

References

DrFaustusAU, 2012. HPL's Dagon (for beginning readers) - P08-09. [image] Available at: http://drfaustusau.deviantart.com/art/HPL-s-Dagon-for-beginning-readers-P08-09-336348560 [Accessed 8 Oct. 2015].

DrFaustusAU, 2013. HPL's Dagon (for beginning readers) - P20-21. [image] Available at: http://drfaustusau.deviantart.com/art/HPL-s-Dagon-for-beginning-readers-P20-21-353467254 [Accessed 8 Oct. 2015].

Lovecraft, H., Lockwood, D., Edginton, I., Davis, R., Hine, D., Moore, L., Reppion, J., D'Israeli., Oakley, S., Culbard, I., Stafford, M., Gallagher, L., Hartman, D. and Duke, A. 2011. The Lovecraft anthology. London: SelfMadeHero.

Lockwood, D. ed., 2011. The Lovecraft Anthology. 1st ed. London: SelfMadeHero.

Seemster 1 Task: HP Lovecraft Plan

I have decided that I will  tell the Story of "Dagon" (1917) by H.P. Lovecraft, through the same codes and convention demonstrated in Rich Werner's comic. According to Rich Werner's website it does not have a name but it is part of a series of short comics called Monsterpedia 2014.
The question I want to answer is can I tell a story without using dialogue or captions that expresses how a character feels? Another challenge will be to establish the setting. i.e. Arkham, 1917 or Pacific Ocean, 1914. I could use visual cues to indicate this such as a newspaper a flag from that time period or a letter. Costumes could help as well. H.P. Lovecraft's works can be heavy in text. However I can try and look for methods to get across that form of storytelling though visuals.
This artist produced a comic called "The Quest" where he used text but in a pictorial style.

http://www.richwerner.com/?p=1163

H.P. Lovecraft Comic Adaptation Initial Idea

During my time at second year, I've been listening to audio book adaptations of H.P. Lovecraft's short stories. The reason I listened to these was because I enjoyed listening to audio which  allowed me to concentrate on my practical work. I have read many comic variations of H.P. Lovecraft's work and each iteration has shown great examples of creativity. I worked on a H.P. Lovecraft inspired project for Spatial Constructs module where I took a scene from a novel and made it into a level.
I decided to pick the Black Mire environment that the protagonist finds himself in. However I was thinking about revisiting this world again and adapt it to a comic format. Although I was quite happy with the way I designed Father Dagon, I wanted to redesign the creature.
I would like to see if I can retell the story of Dagon without using any dialogue. During the next few weeks , I'll try to develop a rough idea of how the story could be told in a visual format.

What is the comic's goal?

To tell the story of Dagon is in a visually enhanced comic format where captions or written text is not the main focus.

What is it's target audience?

It's target audience will be those enjoy reading comic adaptions of existing novels and those who enjoy reading comics.

How long with the comic be?

Long enough for me to tell the key components of the story.

Brian Meeting Week 4 Part 2

I had a class, in the morning where we discussed what our vision statement is. We learned that the vision statement and the research question are basically the same thing but the minor difference is that one is a question and the other is a statement. I spoke to some of my colleagues and provided reasonable feedback and even suggestions. I addressed that my idea has some problems and the non verbal approach may not be the most beneficial. However I addressed to them the idea of taking a non visual medium and interpreting it into a visual medium that can be accessible.

Here is the feedback from the group:

• Don't go back, go forward.
• What makes existing comics work?
• Look at a comic called Hard Boiled.
• Minimalist dialogue look.
• Go forward to new ideas.
• new format like a wall mural or series of paintings.
• Continue doing media test, ideas and questions will arise.
• I need to decide which is more important the adaptation of the concept story. I could do the someone but make the edges fuzzy and encourage lack of clarity and leave it up to reader interpretation.
• They liked the idea of converting a non visual source screenplay into a visual medium.

Brian's Meeting 

The next day, I met Brain at 2.00 to continue our discussion from yesterday. I spoke to him about using the term "interpretation" and addressed my interest in science fiction. I mentioned to him that I like the idea of mashing up certain genres together to generate new concepts. Many artists have already demonstrated this concept before. Here are few examples by Garth Cameron Graham who made some illustration mashedup of fairy tales but with other genres:

• http://fav.me/d2pf89y
• http://garthft.deviantart.com/art/Cryonic-Beauty-264574750
• http://fav.me/d4v75qy

I admitted that there was some restrictions with my idea of interpretation and I told him that I will continue with my media tests and practices. I justified why I think characters are important and why they should be prioritized over world building. I explained that films like Stars Wars focused on characters first before developing the worlds. I was worried if the idea I chose to do was already being used by another student. Brian reassured me that every project will not be the same. This time I felt more satisfied with his feedback and I had a understanding of what to do.

Reference

Graham, G. 2010. Steam Beast. [image] Available at: http://garthft.deviantart.com/art/Steambeast-163633318 [Accessed 1 Oct. 2015].

Graham, G. 2012. Wonderland Wars. [image] Available at: http://garthft.deviantart.com/art/Wonderland-Wars-294266842 [Accessed 1 Oct. 2015].

Graham, G. 2011. Cryonic Beauty. [image] Available at: http://garthft.deviantart.com/art/Cryonic-Beauty-264574750 [Accessed 1 Oct. 2015].

Project Idea: Comic about Local Legend

As I am planning to produce a canon of work, I wanted to produce a comic about a local legend told in Kirkcaldy. It was about a demon who lived in the ancient harbour of Kirkcaldy who was challenged by a wizard called Michael, to turn sand into rope. He failed and was banished underneath the sands of the harbour.  During the summer of 2014, I was thinking about developing an illustration depicting this tale. I started out with some sketches of how the demon could appear. I was hoping to keep the traditional demon traits but at the same time alter the appearance to make it stand out.

Early Sketches of the Demon from 2014

Rough Illustrations Composition Ideas From 2014

This story can be told through visual cues and symbols. This would enable me to visually tell the story without the need for dialogue or captions.

Fifecoastalpath.co.uk, 2015. Industrial | THE FIFE COASTAL PATH. [online] Available at: http://www.fifecoastalpath.co.uk/Industrial_1_18.html?name=royal_burgh_of_kirkcaldy&view=42 [Accessed 28 Sep. 2015].

Katlas, 2009. Kirkcaldy: a Hellmouth?. [Blog] Katlas Travel Blog. Available at: http://katlascreates.blogspot.co.uk/2009/01/kirkcaldy-hellmouth.html [Accessed 28 Sep. 2015].

Kirkcaldybook.com, 1999. The Kirkcaldy Book - KB Magazine Articles. [online] Available at: http://www.kirkcaldybook.com/modules/sections/index.php?op=viewarticle&artid=27 [Accessed 28 Sep. 2015].

Lynn Week 2 Feedback

Today, I presented to Lynn, my lecturer about what I have been working on. During the tutorial, we were instructed to create a mind map to write down questions we had for the honours project. Most of my questions were centered around character design, transmedia narrative and sequential art. From this, I discovered that I misunderstood the meaning of trans-media narrative. I assumed that adaptation was affiliated with the term "transmedia" as it can sometimes mean taking something from one media format. What I really want out of this honours project is to create a portfolio that displays my strengths and gives me the opportunity to improve my areas of weakness.

These are tasks I plan to do for next week is:

•  Learn more about sequential art, it's meaning and look at what areas it covers.
• Produce or plan a rough adaptation of a segment from a Star Wars screen play.
• Explore different artists and analyse their art style.

Lynn was quite happy with me going in the direction of adaptations because she even said that each adaption will be different and she mentioned Alice in Wonderland based on its diverse audience range. There have many different variations of the same story and yet there is still space for more creative opportunities.
Some of the questions Lynn suggested that I explore were ; 

• How can I adapt a novel into a comic book that can be verbal or non verbal?
• What is the creative process for a comic and see how it has changed?
• How can I take HP Lovecraft's detailed work and translate into a simplified visual medium?
• What is the interpretation / adaption process and what should I take into account?
• Also how can I make it appeal to a modern audience?

I also wondered how true should the adaption be, to the original source. The Lovecraft Anthology, Vol. 1 (2011)  is a series of stories written by HP Lovecraft reinterpreted into comics. They are not written but "adapted" by writers, along with artists who provide illustration and give their own illustrative twist on the Lovecraft stories while keeping true to the main plot of each story. I also like the concept of producing silent comics and I would like to see how close I can get to producing one. I asked Lynn if I could still include the research on character design as I still show great interest in this piece. I could include this in an adaption project as it does come into account of the adaptation development process. One suggestion Lynn made was to include it into my research question. Another idea she considered was "How does character design influence non verbal narrative in sequential art?"

References

Lovecraft, H., Lockwood, D., Edginton, I., Davis, R., Hine, D., Moore, L., Reppion, J., D'Israeli., Oakley, S., Culbard, I., Stafford, M., Gallagher, L., Hartman, D. and Duke, A. (2011). The Lovecraft anthology. London: SelfMadeHero.

Week 1 - Initial Ideas

Lynn Meeting: July

For my honours project, I had a few ideas to begin with. During the summer, I took the opportunity to speak to a couple of the fourth year lecturers such as Brian Robinson and Lynn Parker. At the time, I was gearing towards doing a project focused on character design because it was a field I enjoyed learning about in Creative Research last year. Lynn gave me me some sound advice, where she suggested that I aimed at at a project where I focus on a range of fields that could help benefit me when it comes to looking for work. While I am free to follow this character design only project, I do not believe that it would benefit me in regards to employment because I was wanting to leave my final year at university with the ability to find work in a field that I am very passionate about.
I plan to avoid the idea of a concept art project because I am well aware that it is a very popular job role that is difficult to get work in. I have considered looking at a 2D Artist role but I will need to look at what companies are looking for in terms of a 2D Artist.
During high school, I used to work on simple comics as a hobby, I took a break from this to investigate other areas such as character design and concept art. The main reason why I liked to read comics was that it was a format that helped visualize and present ideas in a way that can be communicated easily to the user. I picked up a few books from the library. I  was keen to look at a few art books from films such as Frozen to see what techniques were used for producing concept art.  I was quite keen on working on a project that is focused in visual communication and this would also be an opportunity for me to develop a unique art style.

Mind maps I made prior to the meeting

Idea One

I worked using 3D low poly models last year as a way to show people my skills in producing  3D assets. Between 2nd and 3rd year, my understanding of 3D  modelling  improved but it was in 3rd year where I learned more of the 3D pipeline using software such as Mudbox.  This was a more efficient way of applying textures onto a model instead of taking it into Photoshop. The original idea for my honours project was to revisit my final creative project where I produced a roster of characters that belonged to factions within a story context. I developed their personalities, suggested through the use of colour, shapes and posture. It was also an opportunity for me to explore the idea of contrasting personality traits. I considered  revisiting a few selected characters to develop them further and improve  their design because I knew that there were a few flaws.
I also did the Spatial Constructs module where I grew confident using UDK to produce a 3D environment and import 3D assets into a an iterative environment. With this, I was wanting to model the characters I designed in Creative Research, into static low poly models.  I would then place them in a museum environment and have the player move around the environment and interact with them. Another addition to this that I considered was a map in which the characters would inhabit and provide information of the world. However I do not know very much about coding and so I have decided that this may be too difficult for me to develop for my honours project. Nevertheless I believe it was something to consider. For my final year at university, I wanted to do something that I was very passionate about and something that includes character design.

Idea Two

The second idea was to create a series of sequential pieces used to explore to what extent the concept of comics can be used as a form of visual language and narrative. I started looking at storyboards and animatics. While I have some experience of animation I prefer the idea of expressing the sense of time through panels. However, I enjoyed learning some of the principles of animation because as an artist, some of the principles can apply in single framed illustrations. Some of the principles I considered that I could apply to illustrations were balance, staging, arcs, overlapping, secondary actions and solid drawing. This idea could also allow me to work on my weak areas in drawing such as facial expressions,environments,perspective drawings and posture. It could also allow me to try and experiment with different art styles.
Based on what I've discussed with my lecturers. I see my project heading towards exploring visual language through comics as it also covers the fields I feel passionate about.

The other initial idea I considered for honours was a trans media project where I would the characters I made for Creative Research and develop a comic, an animation animatic, and or light novel. However based on my lack of knowledge on Transmedia Narrative, I decided that this idea may not be suitable.

 Meeting with Supervisor : Week 1

Brian gave me some feedback on some ideas I was considering.

• Compare with other characters from different settings.
• A retelling of a historical event,
• A retelling of an existing pieces but done in a different format. I saw this more of a case study or from of practice.
• Visual Aesthetic or universal language.

He believes that I can cope with a project that has a big scope, a unique visual style and be able to carry out many drawings to experiment and develop an art style.

We reflected on the following:

•  graphic novel, what other frames can I find? 
• How they are laid out? 
• look at what already exists. For examples, primary children if I am going  to produce something for kids. 
• If there is a technical learning difficulty and how I can approach producing a book for that practical research learning theory and be aware of some of the choices I make. 
• If I am going to make a comic or story for kids who have difficulty reading then I would need to explore various forms of learning theory for that particular audience.
• I even considered with him what techniques I could use. 
• I suggested that I would try to use 3D objects as a way to produce a perspective environment. 
• Since in honours it was encouraged to try and cut corners. I think that this would work as a test. 
• He recommended that I look at Fleischer from the 40s. In addition, he told me about a student who worked on using gutters in comic to assist it's narrative.
• He suggested that I look at comic artists/authors  and ask myself why they were drawn in a certain style, how they tell their story, how they think of their story and how they got their inspiration, 
• What do they use as visual language and why they chose comics as a medium?

In connection to this, I am quite keen to produce a graphic novel that can fit within the scope of my honours project. I see that it could be an anthology of short stories that provides storytelling in different ways and or retelling of something that people are familiar with.

I do like the idea of interpretation using an existing story but by applying my visual style as a way to present it into a different format. One idea that came to mind was a H.P. Lovecraft short story called Pickman's Model (1926). He concluded by saying that I can explore the form of visual language through a canon of comics.

Here is a list of how I want to spend my days in fourth year.

• Draw, develop and understand the pipeline. 
•  Passion about creating story worlds. 
• Creating characters, 
• Producing sequential art
• Props. 
• Improving areas. 
• Improve colour theory.
• Improve my approaches to design. 
• World building
• Develop my visual voice and expression

I have also thought about some ideas about how I can do some form of practice. During my summer holidays, I made some art prints for upcoming conventions. The reason I was doing thiese was not only as a way to show people my work and build up my portfolio but to also understand the latest trends in entertainment. I found this to be a efficient way to keep my self up to date with current trends.