Presentation 3.0

As always, I struggle to get started with projects so I began with taking baby steps, and just started doing some practice paintings to start producing some work. The style I work in is quite loose and rough which I tried to emulate in these but struggled with sometimes as the page size was only A3. I wanted to practice making flesh tones, so I tried doing some portraits and close ups of faces. To get me going I also did some rough sketches, to get a feel for face shapes and different angles. These tests aren't linked to fairytales, they're just a way to develop my skills and I used my friends and random photos to practice drawing/painting from.

I began using very rough paint strokes and messy colour mixing, and tried not to think about what I was painting as I have found when I think too much about things I focus on one part of the painting too much. I do think I should have spent a bit more time on this one.

This painting I spent a lot more time on, and blended the paint a bit more. I did, however end up focusing too much on certain aspects and rather than using loose free movements I ended up getting a bit particular. I liked working on the collarbones and the shadows and highlights on the neck, and struggled more with the face, as I have always had a tough time with side profiles.

I then tried out a few close ups of features I struggle with normally such as lips and eyes.

I then started planning my photoshoot, as I knew that I was going to need reference photos to paint from. I wanted to incorporate props into the paintings to add layers of symbolism, so that people could infer from that what the paintings were about, and find these meanings from within the piece. I referred back to Paula Rego to draw from, and also looked at some Renaissance art to take inspiration from the use of symbolism in the work. I looked through some images taken in various studio lighting so that me and Billie could talk about the kind of lighting used, and the sort of thing I wanted in my reference images.
I also went to an exhibition up in London to look at the work of artist Rose Wylie. Her work is very different to mine in some ways, but the freedom and playfulness in which she creates her work I really admired, and that rough, free quality is something I want to combine in my own work.

Props - For the shoot I spent a lot of time planning out various ideas for props I could use. As each painting is going to be based on Alice in Wonderland, Red Riding Hood and The Little Mermaid, I wanted to do three themed segments of the photoshoot. For the Alice segment of the shoot I brought in a lot of blue tops, a pocket watch, small potion bottles, an alice-band and playing cards. These were all things I strongly associated with Alice, and wanted to play around with. For Red Riding Hood, I bought in deep red and forest green jumpers that I used, and managed to find an old fur collar thing in a charity shop that I used as wolves skin. The Little Mermaid I struggled with, I had a load of small shells that I used, and wore a turquoise top and had damp hair but I wished there were more props to play around with and I struggled a bit with that.

I spend a lot of time thinking about who to get as a model for the shoot, and after speaking with Kathleen about why it is I have such an interest in fairytales, and not knowing the answer I thought it might be interesting (though also very out of my comfort zone) to use myself as the model, and try to explore these characters I am creating.

I spoke to Billie about taking the photographs as I know she has photography experience and we work together well. She has a lot of photography knowledge which is fortunate for me because I have practically none, and she was able to help guide me through what I would need for the shoot and how to get everything set up.

As there were many things I was unhappy with in the first shoot, I decided to do a reshoot of the images. I quite liked how the first Red Riding Hood photos came out, I think the colours and richness of the images, and lighting Billie set up worked really well but unfortunately we forgot to shoot in raw for those ones, so I'm going to replicate some of those hopefully. I don't think the shirt I'm wearing for Alice works as well as I thought it did, so I've got some other outfit choices in mind for the next shoot - booked for later this week - and the same for The Little Mermaid. I really felt the mermaid ones didn't work very well and I want to use some more props, larger shells and stuff.

I am also planning on maybe getting some video footage to play around with later on when I'm creating my projections.

I ordered a huge canvas that I was planning on using for testers/painting, and really like the idea of painting on unstretched canvas, as to me, it feels very tactile and free to work with. However due to the size of the canvas I am not sure it will be practical as when transporting the painting it will need to be folded or rolled which will result in the paint cracking, so I am going to either have to go back to my original idea of using MDF or instead just used stretched canvas. I really need to start painting but I have a little time, as I still need my reference photos.

I will then need to start playing around with projection ideas which are all still a bit loose, and need to settle on many details regarding installation... my installing ideas have not progressed very far yet, I think I will need to see the finished paintings (which I'm aiming to finish before the end of March) to fully realise how they will be best presented. I am also planning on taking out a projector to do some tests with once the paintings are finished.

I have also been working on TJ's project by illustrating his storybook for the film. TJ sent me a list of the writing that will be on each page, and a rough idea of what he wanted and allowed me to have creative freedom over the drawings themselves. The story focuses on a boy living in a house in the forest and wanting to go up to the stars all his life. With each drawing I have left room for the writing underneath, as the pages are going to be joined together to look like the boy and his mother have made the book together.

I worked on Billies shoot as a runner, which was a great experience and helped out anyway I could. I was mostly clappering and keeping the time and doing any stuff she needed at the time.

Presentation 2.0

Haven't got loads to show physically since the last presentation, I've mostly been working on my production pack and stuff.

So I've also been carrying on doing storyboards, I've been in contact with TJ and using a shared google document to get the shot list and show the rest of the group any progression with storyboarding.
TJ and I met up to discuss the shot list and go over exactly what he wanted each shot to look like.

I did a rough draft first, and even after I'd finished drawing I ended up redrawing some that I was not happy with. I added some very rough camera directions and compiled the images onto one file so they were more easily viewed.
This is only the first half of the shot list and I will soon be completing it.

For my own project, I'm still doing my three paintings, of three fairytale characters; Alice in Wonderland, Red Riding Hood and The Little Mermaid. I chose these stories because I feel they have complex characters in the middle of stories with a lot of psychological interpretations which I thought would make it much more interesting to paint them.

I began looking at illustrations I found online and by looking at them purely as colour blocks I started to think about what colour palettes I wanted to use for my paintings.

I started right off with Alice in Wonderland which was possibly not the best idea as I hadn't really made a colour palette before and there are so many different colours in Alice in Wonderland it was a bit overwhelming at first.
I knew for Alice I wanted a bright colour palette, something to stimulate the eyes of the viewer as Alice in Wonderland is such a visual story, so I chose the most prominent colours I could find in the drawings and used them as part of my colour palette.

For Red Riding Hood I wanted a slightly more muted colour palette. The tones in this story are very different to Alice in Wonderland; there are a lot of earthy greens and browns, and the greys of the wolf and shadows. The colour red is also very important to the tale, and will be key to the painting.

Something else I enjoy about this colour palette is that of course the story is quite dark, so I wanted to emulate that in the colours I chose to put in my palette. So the usual greens and browns you would have in the forest I made sure were really dark and rich in tone.

My colour palette for The Little Mermaid was similar to Red Riding Hood in that the colours really worked together. The deep blues, purples and greens of the ocean were very satisfying to put side by side and the fiery red of her hair, which is something I am taking from the Disney adaptation, stands out nicely against the other blue tones. The tone of the original story – like most old fairytales – is quite brutal at times, with the little mermaid losing her tongue to the sea witch and every time she takes a step on land she experiences excruciating pain. With this in mind the main colour palette for the piece is quite sorrowful, with a lot of blues and dark. The mermaid herself is a bright spark amidst the darkness around her.

I've put together some diagrams on how I think the paintings could be displayed in the installation piece, as I am still considering different options and what I end up choosing will be based on the space I am allocated to display my work.

Each painting is going to be A0 in size, with dimensions of 841x1189mm and will be spaced out with a gap of 200mm between them. 

The first idea is to have a projector opposite my paintings, projecting shadows and creating the illusion of movement onto the work. I am considering whether or not I want the space to be dark or not, and it could be beneficial either way.

Of course if the environment is darker, the projection will stand out a lot more and be easier for people to see. On the other hand if I place the paintings in a lighter environment people will be able to see what they are more easily, but the projection will be less evident

However I have been thinking that even in the daylight you are not unable to see projection, it’s just fainter. On that note, I have been thinking it could actually be quite effective to have fainter projection over the top of the painting as it would be a much subtler effect of motion.

My other plan was to project something onto the floor of the location, and have it link to a fairytale environment and hopefully be a bit more immersive for the viewer.

By this I mean to maybe have either like a body of water or a forest environment projected onto the area so that the audience feel as if they are in a fairytale environment themselves.

A third idea could be to have one painting on three walls of a room, with three projectors in the middle each pointing towards a wall. They would project a vision of an environment that is associated with each painting such as an underwater scene for The Little Mermaid or a dark forest for Red Riding Hood.

Sound

For my sound design I am planning on have either one piece to play aloud for all three paintings, or three individual sound pieces that will be played through headphones for each piece. If I do one soundscape it will be linked enough to the paintings so that there are homages to all three of the stories but not so much as is overwhelming.

If I do three, they will be individualised to each painting and the story it is based on. I have been listening to lots of various soundscapes I can find online and also using my knowledge of film soundscapes to think about what I know has been used for magical fantasy scenes in the past.

The links for these are in my production pack.

Budget 

Schedule