Waterstones Mural.

We have just completed the most exhausting week ever. We have produced a mural for Waterstones in Hereford, looking at it now, it is wonderful and we should be really proud - but this has been tough.

The project was started a while ago - Alan gave us the brief which was "apples and leaves". We visited Waterstones and asked John- the manager, to give us any more ideas. It was basically up to us as long as it was based on Hereford. We then had a group session, making mind maps and a big initial sketch. There was some great ideas.

We started a new big plan, combining our styles and thinking about the awkward stair/landing space we had to work with. Suzie, Steph, Adam and I went to speak to local printers to explore potential transfer/wallpaper methods, prices were around £30 for a 3ft by 5ft print. At this time we were unsure of Waterstones' budget - we later discovered it as a little as possible. At this time there were some serious group divides in the methods that we could use, there was wallpaper, poster, vinyl stickers, mdf and painting straight on the wall. For the next couple of weeks we made very little progress, due to attendance and this general umming and ahhing.

Eventually we began producing initial individual images that we could combine. We decided that using printouts and pasting our work together as well as working directly onto the surface would create a better image, that would work together. We made a long list, letting people cover areas that they were more comfortable with. We then visited Waterstones with some of our images, they were very laid back and were very pleased with our "grown up feel and toned down colour scheme" that we had selected.

We then finalised our plan - we decided that working on MDF and then attaching it to the wall would be best for everyone. We played with composition and decided to have two very large panels and several smaller ones. We could work on it at college, rather than on the awkward stairs. Getting the MDF was a struggle. Myself, Steph, Suzie, Cat and Rosanna all were vital to the operations as were two very lovely people of Hereford. The smaller MDF made it to our house, were Suzie and Steph primed it. The two large boards I primed at college.

It was at this point that the frustrations started. We spent about two weeks with it just being the three of us. We made the first marks, I tested different paper for printing, and pasting. I printed and stuck my buildings on before anyone from the group had even shown there faces. The mural was to be put up by Thursday at 7am. Tuesday morning we had a sparce set of boards and three very sleep deprived girls. We took boards home and finished them. By half 3 on Wednesday it did look amazing. Steph and Suze had gone to work - and i was close to having a mental breakdown. But Rob Gale kept me sane, and we got the mural to Waterstones where we left it over night.

Thursday morning Myself, Steph, Suzie, Rob and the college Caretakers arrived at Waterstones (it was still dark). After some very scary ladder situations, it was up. And it was awkward to look at first because I had been staring at it for 72 hours. A few days later, we went back and it is great. We did great. We always do. I can however honestly say that I will never try and do anything as a group with anyone but Steph and Suzie - we come as a three and that is all.

Cover

I made this cover up quite quickly, combining elements from some of the finished illustrations and some work that was not used. I quite like it, it hasn't got the correct dimensions yet, but i think it captures the dark, mysterious quality of the book.

Finals.

These are my finished three illustrations. I went back to some of my original drawings and reworked them both by hand and digitally. I printed them out, drew on top, rescanned and edited, then re printed, added more etc...... I am quite pleased with the results. They are simple, and there is a lot of negative space which i like. They are maybe not as dark as the stories are. But they have a mysterious sort of fun feel. And i like them.

Mural drawings.

I have been delegated to draw buildings for the mural in waterstones. They are wonky and i like them. They will be partially digitally coloured, printed out and then crayoned!

I am not a photographer.

I realised I should pursue the whole cut out standing up idea. And I love the look of making paper cut outs, and the way they stand. I am however not a photographer, I do not possess great skills in capturing their charm. And once they are photographs I am no longer excited any-more. I need to figure out how I really feel about this. For now I am going back to drawing.

Way tooo much.

I am having the exact opposite problem for the Bloody Chamber, I may have gone a bit doorframe crazy. I like the idea, and I like the shape created it just hurts eyes.

Something missing.

I put these images together a little bit in a rush. The image is nice. But it isn't fun, it isn't exciting. And i need to do something about it.

Matthew Richardson

Matthew Richardson - the winner of the last House of Illustration/Folio Society comp came to talk to us. His work is really interesting, and i especially liked his winning entry, the composition is so perfectly balanced with fine detail and empty space. He talked to me about my work and suggested more cutting out, perhaps using just white card rather than it coloured.

Corridors of doors.

Ten wolves:Twenty Wolves.

I've been drawing lots and lots of inky wolves. Developing from the line of the story i chose. I also then started to stand them up, in a similar way i did with the collections project. I think this has very exciting possibilities. I just have LOTS to cut out...

Boots and Eyes and Bums.

The Company of Wolves and Puss in Boots

I found these two stories much easier to get follow and explore. I like the idea of a vast amount of wolves for the Company of Wolves. And perhaps finding a less dark element to Puss in Boots as i found it the least dark story.

The Bloody Chamber

I have found this story really hard to read, yet it does have lots of visual potential.

I really like the above line, and the idea of a dark winding corridor.

Folio society.

The Folio Society, House of Illustration competition is our first project this year.

"We’re pleased to announce the launch of our second Book Illustration Competition with The Folio Society, to illustrate The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories by Angela Carter."

The stories are very dark, quite terrifying and a little bit odd. They should be fun to explore their visual possibilities.

Collections project.

We have just completed putting together a small show of our collections in Hereford. I've made a separate tumblr blog for this module. Take a look!

http://tiny-carcollection.tumblr.com/

Finished. Almost.

This are my final images for the ebook. I definitely did not have time to do the whole narrative and that makes me quite sad, and I'm defo going to finish it sometime anyway because I am really pleased and proud of these. I love the colours, and the way everything ties together. I feel the Mitten itself is still an issue that hasn't quite been solved. Along with the animals, who need some further development, through their movement and expression. I am however glad that I chose against putting them in the Ukrainian outfits, i feel it would have been a bit random now. Also I'm pleased with the way the hand stamped type works with everything. So yeah I'm just happy, I worked really hard on these and even though I didn't finish the whole thing, I'm still super proud of them.

Characters

As well as the giant in the story, there is of course a handful of animals and now a boy. Drawing a boy genuinely scares me, and after many many many attempts this little guy was created. I made him in parts and stuck him together on photoshop. I like that he is pretty unbalanced looking and that his arms are in a completely ridiculous position - much like some of the animals I have been creating. The scenes he was storyboarded for, would have had views of him front on, side on, and behind, and I think his simplicity would have helped make this work. I really want to do that page. I might do it RIGHT NOW.

The animals kinda developed from my obsession with repeatedly drawing bears in Christmas jumpers, these bears have been really simple, and either collaged or just simple line drawings. They needed to be more in this story I felt, but I had no idea how to create them, or what would work. I eventually went for some scratchy crayons, they need tweaking on photoshop, most of their arms are disappearing into nothingness. An idea from a crit was to take the idea of animals and clothes further and perhaps reflect some of the stories origin through the use of traditional Ukrainian folk clothing, I did a lot of research and found that the dresses and waistcoats worn were quite detailed, I gave it a go on a mouse, but I just couldn't get it to work.

Pick Me Up!

We went to the Pick Me Up show at Somerset House today and it was realllly cool. There were some just awesome things. We especially liked the area were all the collectives were hanging out and selling there work, it was like a dream.

Below is some work by Paul Blow, his work was some of my favourites in the show, I like everything about the piece below. I think it's his use of colour and composition, I especially like the yellow sky. He has done a lot of work for the Independent and the Guardian. And I just thought it was awesomes.

Also all of the things for sale smelt like the best kind of ink and paper combination ever.

Print workshop and rubber stamps.

We had a royal visit to college and got to spend the day in the print workshop. I really should visit the print workshop more often because I do always create useful things. We were experimenting with letterpress, and I focused on the animal names of the story as they are so inventive and a key part to the tale, I also like the idea of the text being part of the image, rather than just stuck on top in a boring font. I also think the language used in the story is key to its charm and it should be emphasised.

After the print workshop I decided to dig out a couple of rubber stamp alphabets I have and elaborate on the animal's names, I like that the different use of colour, positioning of the stamps in relation to each other can reflect the character. Like the mouse, is simple and dainty, where has Snout Rout Boar is boystrous and pretty dark.

I really hope to include these bits and pieces in my final images, letterpress or rubber stamp, or even hand drawn/painted. Maybe I should look at that next!