With a Flourish, Part 3

See, I said I'd keep going.

This is a continuation of my discussion/explanation of the why and how behind my design at this blog. (Part 2 is here, Part 1 here).

Today's discussion? Vectors.

Most images you see around the internet (if not all) are what's called bitmap images. These images are composed of, essentially, a map of colored dots, or pixels, that all form the image. The way that bitmap images are composed means that when you enlarge them, all you're doing is enlarging the pixels, so the result you get is a blocky, or 'pixelated' image. Vector images are different. Instead of creating a line by putting one pixel after the other, after the other, vector images create a line by using math, an equation, which tells the program that this line should be so wide, should start and stop with this length/proportion and should be this color. Because of this, you can endlessly enlarge vector images because the equation stays the same, you're just proportionally increasing the numbers in the equation. Okay, so thats how I understand it to work, anyway, but I haven't had math in years, so I'm a bit mathematically challenged at this point.

Anyway, the point being that vector images can be much sharper at every size than bitmapped images because it's relying on math instead of a colored sequence of pixels.

Because of this quality, I wanted to create the swooshes and swirls for the background design as vector images, both so I wouldn't have to worry about the rough edges from my pen marks, and I could make sure it was much more even. I wanted my circles to actually be circles, instead of my shaky hand's approximation of circles. It also allowed me to have consistent line widths where I wanted it - and over all, just have much more control over the forms.

Unless people are curious, I won't go into the intricacies of how exactly I created the image via vectors. Lets just say I made use of lots of circles and ovals as guidlines for myself.


The headline was also vectored - but for that, I wanted to incorporate Art Nouveau typography (which was very flowing and hand done. Made to fit the specific area) But I also wanted to tie the background into the header to make them relate to each other - but I didn't want it to just be text stuck inside a border.

I tried several sketches before coming up with one I could work with.


I started off with only partial borders, encorporating the same kind of swooshes and spirals in the background, but they weren't quite working for me. So I tried again.


I found this one to be more in the direction I was looking for, so I decided to run with it. I had to change the dimensions from my sketch in order for it to be the right size for the header, and some other changes and additions were made during the vectoring - but that tends to happen anyway.

Here's the final header:

Studies

Just a couple more sketches and studies from the Twelve Dancing Princesses project. This time using marker to help with making the sketches more readable.

With a Flourish, Part 2

In my last post I mentioned the work that went into the graphics of my design here, at Laura's blog. I also mentioned that I'd go into a bit more depth about it.

This may become a few part series.


I started out doing a good amount of research, looking at different styles within Art Nouveau. For each one I found that I liked and though might work, I sketched it down in my sketchbook, both to keep it in my mind, and so I've have everything in one place when I needed references. This way, I could also have all the different styles all there to look at so that I could mix and mesh the different things. The sketches with stars and arrows pointing at them are the styles I thought would work best. I wanted something more flowery, flowy, and less geometric.

Once I had these images in my head, I mulled them over, turned them around, mixed and matched them in my mind. And sketched. A lot. On whatever was available when the idea or urge came to mind.

Like my arm, for example.

Soon, though, I was working on finalizing a design I liked. I started here.

I wasn't quite satisfied with this, it seemed a bit too much, too involved. So I tried again.

This one felt much better, the trapped flower worked well, but it didn't quite have the feel I was going for. I thought maybe something between this and the first one.

My third attempt was better, but it just didn't flow nearly as well as the first two.


This was my last try and the final inked design. This is the one I ended up vectorizing. It had some of the more flowery aspects of the first design, while also being a bit more open and simple like the second, but still flowed well, which fixed the problem of the third.

Next up: Vectoring! And possibly the header.

Past Due

Remember that children's book illustration for The Giving Tree? Well, I've been saying for a while that I was going to show the character design sketches for that. Now that I've finally dug that sketchbook out of the box it was in (I'm one and a half boxes away from being completely unpacked!) I can share!


So here we have the typical character turn around on the top of the page (And on a few of them, you can see the base shapes and forms I used to make the character), but what made this one interesting is having to design him at different ages. The age difference is so vast, that I was worried about not being able to recognize the character as the same -- So, to prevent this, I made an effort to keep some of his features similar. For example, his head-shape doesn't change through the years, and though his nose gets somewhat bigger, it stays the same basic shape. I also kept his eyes the same.

Oh! And for those wondering, I have found a job! I'll be working at my campus bookstore - yay minimum wage?

Process Contiued

Two posts in three days? Unheard of!

Anyway! Today was a beautiful day of 8 inches of snow and no class, so you all get another post.

So! The second step! Inking the bottle. This is fundamentally different from the watch because it relies much more on the form of the bottle and on the lighting than on specific things on the bottle itself. Inking the glass bottle is something that's a little bit more fluid and allows for more flexibility because other that the outline, it's all up to me to decide how my bottle is going to look as a (fake) 3D object.

The first image is the base outline that I did prior to taking photos. You can see my pencil sketch underneath the ink where I'm giving myself an idea of where I want to draw my lines to define the form. The sketch is rather loose.

In the second image I've followed my sketch and placed outlines in the basic spots to show the thickness of the glass, as well as the base of the bottle.

The third image you can see where I've added lines to form the top of the bottle, to show it stepping up to the neck. I've also thicked the outlines to show which side of the bottle is in shadow as well as to give more dimension to the glass. Having lines all one thickness on an image makes for a very boring image.

In the fourth image I've thickened a few lines a bit more to show form, but I've also added some hatching to indicate form and shadows.

The last image is the finished product, everything hatched, shaded, and inked.

Process

That ink project from my last post is still continuing, and I think I'll keep posting as it goes along. I'm actually having a lot of fun with this project, I've a newfound love for ink and watercolor. Except my ink isn't waterproof, sadly. But that's workable.

I also, for some random reason, decided to take pictures while I was working on one of the drawings. So these pictures to the left are an example of how I ink. The preliminary pencil sketches are already laid down, and I've already got certain things outlined at the beginning, so the inking process I'm showing you is for the clock face and the inside of the glass bottle.

The first image shows the drawing with most things outlined, as well as my tools: a plasic film canister for water (these things come in awfully handy for so many things because they're airtight. I use them for paint storage, water, safety pin storage, and all kinds of things. Save 'em if you got 'em), a bottle Pelikan black ink, a scrap of fabric I use to wipe my pen nib on to dry it after cleaning it, and my trusty pen (The nib is a Hunt Globe bowl pointed nib, or so it says). The second image is a close up of the face of the pocket watch. I already have the main parts outlined, so what's left is the detail.

In the third image I've started inking the details. First I went in and inked the arrows which point to the hours/numerals. This way, even if I get off my pencil sketch, I still have a point of reference. You can also see how I go about inking, first outlining, and then filling in.

The 4th image is mainly just progress, but also shows that I turn my paper while I ink, keeping my hand out of the wet ink as well as allowing me to drag the pen properly to get different thicknesses of line.

The 5th image is just more progress, getting further along and finishing up the numerals.

The 6th and last image for today is the final pocket watch. I've finished the numerals, put in the tic-marks for the minutes, and added shadows along the edges of the watch to show the dimesions of it. Another way I did that, was to thicken the lines, you can see this along the bottom of the watch, where the base is thicker to mimic the shadow you'd see at the bottom of an object.

Next post: inking the bottle and the final product.