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Throughout the whole of this A level Graphics course I feel that I have always enjoyed and loved experimenting with digital techniques and focusing on formal elements of design such as line, shape, colour, tone, form and texture. For my personal project I have chosen to look at digital website design and want to create artwork of my recording artists in the style of the most influential artists I have looked at throughout my As and A2. I have chosen to explore digital manipulation and talk about how different styles and techniques are used such as vector images, bitmap images, layering and photo manipulation etc. Throughout my As - A2 project I have been looking at artists to influence my packaging and looked at artist such as Miles Donavan and Steve Wilson. I want to focus on how digital manipulation and digital graphics has changed over time and how new designs are constantly unique in the way they use the formal elements. Also focusing on how quality of digital graphic design work has changed through use of vector image softwares compared to the still used bitmap pixel image software.
Throughout the whole of this A level Graphics course I feel that I have always enjoyed and loved experimenting with digital techniques and focusing on formal elements of design such as line, shape, colour, tone, form and texture. For my personal project I have chosen to look at digital website design and want to create artwork of my recording artists in the style of the most influential artists I have looked at throughout my As and A2. I have chosen to explore digital manipulation and talk about how different styles and techniques are used such as vector images, bitmap images, layering and photo manipulation etc. Throughout my As - A2 project I have been looking at artists to influence my packaging and looked at artist such as Miles Donavan and Steve Wilson. I want to focus on how digital manipulation and digital graphics has changed over time and how new designs are constantly unique in the way they use the formal elements. Also focusing on how quality of digital graphic design work has changed through use of vector image softwares compared to the still used bitmap pixel image software.
Miles Donovan is an illustrator and graphic designer who is a member of Peepshow collective. His work has been used internationally for editorial and advertising clients including The New York Times, Creative Review, Newsweek, The Guardian, The Telegraph, TIME, Wired and Qantas. You can find Donovan's illustrations in the books 'Illusive', 'The Fundamentals of Illustration', 'Pen and Mouse' and 'Illustration Play'. With Peepshow, Donovan also worked on art direction and animation projects for BBC, Nike, Channel Four, Philips, Toyota, Redbee Media, Diesel and The Victoria & Albert Museum.
I feel that Donovans portraits have been created in adobe illustrator as vector images so that the vibrant colours and smooth lines can be used to create different tones on the peoples faces. The use of vectors in illustrator creates these crisp lines and shapes which can then be filled in illustrator or effected in photoshop and/or other digital softwares. Most of these portraits in this portfolio are of celebrities such as Rihanna, Lethal Bizzle, Kate Middleton and others. Miles donavon focuses on colour tones on faces for different light effects to show emotion and action in his artwork. Donavon uses a small colour pallet including tones of blue, yellow, pink, red and green. I really like how Donavon gives a really free dynamic feel to his work by adding paint splats and spray paint affects behind his completed portraits. In this image below of Gallows and Lethal Bizzle I really love how Donavon had used two tones of blue throughout on the subjects (excluding background). I really like the way he has used patches of colour because of how the blues form the image and the whites are just negative space that is left to show bright areas where the light is shining on the subjects skin. Donavons work is very intriguing and eye catching because how he creates these style portraits by using very abstract colours, instead of using everyday colours such as skin colours. The abstract colours and effects behind the image add a lot of emotion and action to the artwork because of how in this image the paint splats really show freedom, fun, in your face, rebellious etc just like the thrasher music gallows create and the clubbing up beat music 'Lethal Bizzle' creates.
I feel that Donovans portraits have been created in adobe illustrator as vector images so that the vibrant colours and smooth lines can be used to create different tones on the peoples faces. The use of vectors in illustrator creates these crisp lines and shapes which can then be filled in illustrator or effected in photoshop and/or other digital softwares. Most of these portraits in this portfolio are of celebrities such as Rihanna, Lethal Bizzle, Kate Middleton and others. Miles donavon focuses on colour tones on faces for different light effects to show emotion and action in his artwork. Donavon uses a small colour pallet including tones of blue, yellow, pink, red and green. I really like how Donavon gives a really free dynamic feel to his work by adding paint splats and spray paint affects behind his completed portraits. In this image below of Gallows and Lethal Bizzle I really love how Donavon had used two tones of blue throughout on the subjects (excluding background). I really like the way he has used patches of colour because of how the blues form the image and the whites are just negative space that is left to show bright areas where the light is shining on the subjects skin. Donavons work is very intriguing and eye catching because how he creates these style portraits by using very abstract colours, instead of using everyday colours such as skin colours. The abstract colours and effects behind the image add a lot of emotion and action to the artwork because of how in this image the paint splats really show freedom, fun, in your face, rebellious etc just like the thrasher music gallows create and the clubbing up beat music 'Lethal Bizzle' creates.
Miles Donovan was an artist that I looked at during my AS - A2 project and vector imagery was a technique that I wanted to develop and use during the A2 Cd packaging project. During the Cd packaging project I created a vector image of an eye for my cd front cover but however feel that I really want to refine my skills of creating vector portraits similar to the one I created in the As to A2 project of two members from the band 'Modestep'.
Steve Wilson is also an artist which I have previously looked at and who particularly inspired my use of illustrator and photoshop to digitally manipulate the LV brand logo to create it in the style of Steve Wilson's 'Stussy' logo design. I focused on using similar bright colours like Wilson using greens, reds, blues and pinks. I really love Wilson's typography work because of how he uses a unique paint dripping glossy effect throughout his work. When I was creating my 'Lv' logo design I used adobe photoshop (bitmap software) and even though it was a quick experiment you can clearly see the difference in the quality when looking in detail of my piece compared to Wilson's. Steve Wilson is an illustrator from Brighton who focuses a lot on creating work such as type, posters, portraits and album covers in the similar style of Miles Donovan. Wilson has worked for many clients such as Nike, Stussy, Virgin, Adidas, BBC and many more. I really love Wilson's type and portrait work because of his unique style of using bright abstract colours and curved expressive lines and shapes. Straight away you can tell that Steve Wilson uses vector software such as adobe illustrator to create these pieces of artwork because of how you see crisp colour and sharp clear quality lines and shapes throughout. I really love how Wilson uses abstract colours just like Miles Donavon and still makes the image stand out by using darker and lighter colours to show shadow, mid tones and highlights throughout his artwork. The image on the right is a portrait that Wilson created of an English musician part of the band 'Rolling Stones', named Keith Richards. I feel that Wilson has used these strong contrasting colours of red, black and tones of grey because of how the well known famous Rolling Stones logo is a bright red illustration of lips and a tongue sticking out.
Digital manipulation has evolved over the years and really improved the detail and quality of outcomes. Vectors in graphics is the use of geometrical primitives such as points, lines, curves and shapes. Adobe Illustrator is a software that uses vector other than photoshop which uses bitmap using pixels to form lines, shapes and curves etc. Vectors are used for logo design etc to create an image which can be resized without affecting/ downscaling the quality. In the graphic design industry there are always exciting, new and unique graphic designers that use digital software to manipulate a photo, image or text. Photo manipulation artists such as Ewa Mos and Markus Muller are examples of this.
Ewa Mos is a illustrator, graphic design and photographer from copenhagen and has created many different funky and unique photo manipulation pieces of art work for clients such as: Adidas, design wars, fused magazine, don't panic and many more. When looking through Ewa Mos's website I was really quite amazed by how funky and unique her pieces of work are because of how she creates simple high quality digital illustrations. Even though some of these illustrations are simple, the use of vector software has really made these illustrations stand out because the high quality lines and colour along with the high quality photograph. I found this piece above really cool and creative because of how Mos has really made her model make a facial pose so that Mos could fully incorporate the illustration into the photograph. I really like how Mos has create her illustrative squid character follow the lines of the models face and also even look like it is going through the models nose and out the eye. I feel that the more the illustration merges with the photo the less flat and plain the piece of artwork looks. Lighting is also a factor that Mos has taken in to hand because she has use toning and shadow throughout the illustration and create the light and shadows look similar to the ones on the models face. The use of toning has also really made the illustration look much more 3d and less flat on the photo.
Markus Muller is a digital artist and illustrator from Germany who digital manipulates photographs on illustrator by adding, subtracting and continuing photographs. This portrait above is from a project called worming portraits where Muller used illustrator and photoshop to be able to digital manipulate the photograph by using layers, tone, colour and shape to be able to make the skin of the model look like it is breaking away and forming into leaves and flower patterns. I really love how Muller has used layers and shadows to make the face stand out from the page looking like layers of the models skin are being formed by these leaves or the skin is breaking away to form leaves and other shapes. Other than Donovan's or Wilson's work, Muller has used colour in a different way. Colour has been used to add a splash and define layers throughout the models skin colour. The use of vector software has also helped with the smooth lines and contrasting the crisp colours against the black background.
In conclusion, I have researched and analysed chosen artist to look at the different artist that have inspired me most and what techniques they have used to create high quality digital manipulated portraits/ typography. I have found that the use of vectors in graphic design has changed the way illustrators create artwork. Many illustrators use vector softwares nowadays because you can get crisp high detailed imagery and illustrate onto photographs. Looking at artist such as Miles Donovan and Steve Wilson, I have found and analysed the way they use formal elements in their work, colour, tone and shape is a big part of their work because of how they form their portraits with patches of different colours and rely on the colours they pick to show tone on areas of the subject. Digital manipulation in my opinion is quite abstract and unique in the way artist now use formal elements in an abstract way, E.g Miles Donovan and Steve Wilson are similar in the way they use a variety of abstract colours and shapes throughout their work and Ewa Mos and Markus Muller add and/or subtract parts of a photo by using shape and tone to make there manipulation and illustrations look as realistic as possible. Steve Wilson is an artist that uses a variety of bright colours and choses colours depending on the emotion or links to the subject he wants to show, E.g. The Keith Richards portrait is mainly created with red to link with the rolling stones logo. When creating my artwork for my website design I feel I will go with the style of Miles Donovans work by using free dynamic lines, shapes, paint effects etc behind my vector portraits so that it will give the dynamic freedom feel just like Modesteps music because of how its different, fun, loud etc.
Bibliography:
Miles Donovan's Portfolio and Facts: www.milesdonovan.co.uk/
Steve Wilsons Portfolio and Facts: www.stevenwilsonstudio.com/work
Ewa Mos Portfolio and Facts: http://www.ewamos.com/
Markus Muller Portfolio and Facts: http://www.behance.net/mueller-photodesign
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