OUIL405: Final Book

Final Book

I followed a narrative that I personally found interesting and also pushed myself to research material I would normally ignore as non scientific and I related to many of the principles of having a spiritual connection to nature.

Photoshop

I've learnt a few more things on photoshop and using it more instinctively now and becoming generally more skilled at it. I definitely need to learn more about Indesign and need to use Illustrator for drawing digitally as my manual drawn figures pixelated horribly in photoshop and look a bit tacky.

Happy with the final outcome?

I'm not blown away by the final outcome. I really enjoyed testing and drawing for ideas but the effort I put in that doesn't shine through although my concepts of celebration and people connecting with nature does come through. The colours I've used work for the peaceful, tranquil tone but overall it hasn't reached the level I thought it would have.

I wanted my drawings to be a dominant aspect of the book but trying to refine them, drawn from reference somehow takes energy from them. My sketchbooks did need to be refined but I need to find a successful way of making the move from sketches to final drawings whilst retaining the energy.

It's a neat representation of my untold story with some charm and it's not too ambiguous. I prefer naturally to have white backgrounds for my illustrations but for a book this doesn't work and it looks a little bare. Maybe in the future it's important to explore patterns especially for the cover.

Make more mistakes

It's not a totally bad thing to be unhappy with the book. Physically making the book was another skill learned and meeting a deadline, organising the time is really useful experience. I shouldn't be at a stage of being satisfied with my outcomes yet and being honestly critical is the only way to improve.

The main thing I've learnt from making the book is that sketching and testing lots is important but I need to find a refined and definitive direction for an outcome sooner in the next project. I spent too long in my sketchbooks and perhaps left the final two weeks with too much refining to do which meant the book didn't match my expectations.   

I'm being very positive and will learn from the mistakes I've made for this brief which will be really useful long term. I also have a bigger appreciation for Japanese art and researching Japanese illustrators in the library was fascinating. I'm in love with some new illustrators now which I can steal some ideas from.