Final Project (Fully Developed)

After about 2 weeks of drawing and tracing and organising, the final storyboard for the entire storybook is finally out. Text were added in and additional details such as trees and bushes were added as well. The design for the cover page, back page and even our “Do you know” pages and sticker page was finished as well.

Originally, we wanted to do perfect binding for our book but after finding out more information from the printing shops themselves, we found out that for a thin book of only abt 25 pages like ours, perfect binding may not turn out very nice. In the end, we settled on Goh Bros Enterprise in school to print our book and to use stapling to bind our book as well so it will be a soft cover book in the end.

Here’s the completed storyboard:

Final Project (Sketches)

For my final project, my group and I decided to do a storybook for 6 years old children.

The story revolves around a hippo called Tamus and this hippo tried to make friends with two groups of animals, the sheep and the rabbit, but was rejected by both because of his size. One of the sheep called Shebee chose to make friends with Tamus despite his outwards appearance and they becae close friends. One day, a wolf attacked Shebee while they were grazing on the grass plains. Just before the wolf could pounce on Shebee, Tamus jumped in and managed to save Shebee at the last minute.

We feel that society today places too much emphasis on outwards appearance and this is apparent even in children. So through the book, we hope to instil the value of not judging a book by its cover into young children.

Here’s the rough sketch for the storybook:

Sketch 1

Sketch 2

Assignment 5: Postcard – Colourful Asia

This assignment is really a headache because I really had no idea what to design for the postcard. In addition, there is the constraint of no ‘touristy’ designs like scenery and all.

Part of my brainstorming process is to look at what sets Asia apart from the rest of the world, be it food or culture, which are pretty common and would have been mostly done before. Then an idea struck me in the sense that most parts of Asia is very politically active and there have been political unrest and unstability for the most part of Asia’s history. This, I felt, was actually due to the people’s constant fight for democracy and true peace, something they truly wanted. I felt that this set us apart because this is still an ongoing process for Asia. Some may feel that this is a negative connotation and may not be that suitable for a postcard but I feel that what is admirable is their never-say-die attitude and how they are in a constant pursuit for happiness, something all of us are actually working hard for.

In my design, I portrayed this fighting spirit using a rioter/demonstrator in the forground with a headband that says “happiness” in Chinese to represent Asia, in addition to the Chinese pagoda silhouette in the background. The happiness, or peace in this case, is represented by the peace dove with the fig leaf. Here’s the colour scheme:

Postcard Colour Scheme

I personally found it hard to give a name to each individual postcard colour scheme because I felt that each had a common theme and that is why I categorized it in three main categories, mainly: Reminiscence, Chasing of Dreams, and Revolutionary.

Reminiscence serves to remind us of Asia’s history and how whatever we have today is because of our history.

Chasing of Dreams represents our ongoing, never-ceasing pursuit for happiness.

Revolutionary represents our daring attitude to revolutionize against things that oppresses us and our fighting spirit in our pursuit for happiness as well.

This design was eventually chosen for the final design:

Postcard

The red of the t-shirt as well as the Chinese pagoda silhouette was chosen to signify the passion and the ongoing conflicts while the blue background that the peace dove is based on is used to signify that the peace that the people wanted is still quite distant in the future.

Class Exercise 2

Class exercise 2 is quite easy: we have to use basic elements (dots, lines, shapes…) to create 2 abstract/semi-abstract images conveying the meaning of 2 words, which Pearlyn, my groupmate, and I have chosen to be Fear and Chaos.

Fear:

Fear

The different shades of grey actually represent a cave and the figure is standing outside to portray the feeling of fear in entering the cave.

Chaos:

Chaos

We used lines that are drawn in a haphazard manner and the duplicated it using different shades of black to give the idea of clutteredness and messiness to portray the feeling of chaos.

Assignment 4: Poster

This week’s assignment in to design a poster based on the theme: Save, Kill or Prevent. It is mainly targetted at the general audience and is to be placed on noticeboards on busy streets or at bus stops.

One of my main philosophies about life is that life is simply to large to be confined only to work and study. It should always be a balance of both work and play. This is the idea I try to bring across through my poster.

The main heading will be “Kill Boredom” and the poster is designed using elements of old school computer games in order to portray the feeling of reminiscence for childhood days where we were more carefree. Here are the two roughs:

Rough 1

Rough 2

The 2 roughs here show my main designs using elements from old school computer games, one being Mario Brothers and the other being Space Invaders. The Mario Brothers design was eventually chosen because Space Invaders is too common and the idea has been used before.

Final design:

Final Design

Assignment 3: U C what I C (Revised)

Some minor changes were made to the photo story, mainly to add in a photo of us for the second frame to make more aesthetically pleasing. In addition, I also added two red circles around the reservist dates to further place emphasis on them. Here’s the completed version:

Photo Story

Assignment 3: U C what I C

This week’s assignment is to tell a story using only 8 photos and we are to capture these photos on our own. I was getting a headache on what story to tell for this assignment when an interesting incident happened to me. I recently received a SMS notification for my NS reservist and went to check the dates online. The duration is from 15th June to 19th June and my girlfriend was like complaining because 17th is our ten month anniversary together. lol.

And so, I thought this would be a nice story to tell using photos since it even included a twist as well. Of course there’s some slight modification. Haha. Here’s the rough draft for my frames:

And here are the frames:

Frame 1

Frame 2

Frame 3

Frame 4

Frame 5

Frame 6

Frame 7

Frame 8

Feedback:

The overall flow of the story was ok, with 2 minor problems. First problem is my second frame, which many find to be not aesthetically pleasing enough and that more can be done to make it look better. Second problem is my seventh frame, where my reservist dates may be easily missed. One suggestion was to make it clearer by probably bolding it or putting a circle around it.

Alright, I will upload the new pictures after I’m done enhancing them. Haha.

Assignment 2: Pictogram (Revised)

Basically I need to redo the entire degree of abstraction and my pictogram because of the fact that ATM is simply too common and the words “ATM” has already removed the need for any pictogram at all. Therefore, I had to go through another process of thinking to come up with a new idea for this assignment.

As some of you might know, I’m in a CCA in NUS called CAC Voices, and basically what we do is we sing and perform on stage, with either minus 1 tracks or with a live band. Every Friday, the CAC clubroom at YIH will be used by our band for their jamming sessions and this is the same for the other subclubs under CAC such as the Guitar Club as well, except that they will be using the room on other days. What this means is that there is usually some loud music going on at YIH and this is how the idea struck me.

My new pictogram is more of an informal, funny way to “warn” people that they will be experience some loud music when they pass by the clubroom. It will be placed outside the clubroom or even along the corridor. I used a picture of an electric guitarist because usually an electric guitarist’s solo is the loudest and most anticipated in a gig and so will be able to portray the “loud music” sufficiently. Here’s the degree of abstraction:

Degree of Abstraction 2

And finally, the developed pictogram:

Pictogram

Assignment 2: Pictogram

This week’s assignment is on pictogram and degree of abstraction. A pictogram is an image created by people for the purpose of quick and clear communication without language or words, in order to draw attention to something. For this week, we are to think of a pictogram which we want to place anywhere in NUS and we are to use the process of abstraction to aid us in doing this. Basically, we’ll find a photo or two, do 5 different degrees of abstraction, and choose one to develop into our pictogram.

So, one thing I realized in NUS is that the locations of ATMs aren’t that obvious and anyone who is in NUS for the first time will have difficulty locating them. Thus I decided to use ATM as my theme and to work out a degree of abstraction on them. Here’s the design:

Degree of Abstraction

And here’s the pictogram:

Pictogram Prototype

Feedback:

Well, ATM seems a bad choice because it is very common and the thing is, with the words “ATM” written in my pictogram, there really isn’t a need for any pictogram at all. To sum it up: Redo! -.- Arghhhh. Sianz.

Assignment 1b: Me, Myself and I (Revised CG Prototype)

After gathering feedback from the class, I’ve decided to change my CG prototype design and use my singing/performing name design instead. Here’s the two roughs:

Name Design Rough 1

Name Design Rough 2

From previous feedback, there is the issue of my guitarist not being obvious enough as the letter “K”, and also the note not being obvious enough as the letter “O”. Therefore, as seen from rough no. 2, the guitar was tilted highe to make it look more obvious as the letter “K”, and the note was replaced with a bass drum so that it is very obvious now that the letter is an “O”. In addition, there were some comments that the letter “N” made up of musical notes in rough no. 1 does not seem like a “N” because of the wire that is supposedly behind it. Thus the positioning of the both “N” were swopped in rough no. 2.

Rough no. 2 was eventually picked to be further developed into the CG prototype and what results is this:

Name Design Final CG Prototype

Additional details such as the stage and the lights were added to further portray the idea of  performing on a stage. Grey was eventually chosen as the background colour to distinguish it from the wire, musical note, and the amplifier.