Photoshop Class: Unit 2 Week 2

Continuing with the piece I started the week before... This week I started to think about colour and find a style to make it look like it is underwater. I was really unsure how to go about this but by looking at other artists work and talking to Photoshop Phil narrowed it down to colours used. Looking through the images that i had collected I wanted to choose an image whith a good colour range that i could use in my own work. The image I felt was the strongest and agreed by Phil was the image I found on DeviantArt titled the Forgotten Atlantis. On the image below i mapped out in the previous week (after neating up the layered edge and choosing a strong contrast range between the layers) I began to apply the coulour range using the adjustment tools.

Adding perspective lines helped me to see how the perspective can work withing my drawing.

I decided to move the layers over revealing more of the background for more light to flood in from above and include the underwater mountain the city of Atlantis is built on... In the background I want glimpses of the city because I originally wanted this image to depict the explorers climb to Atlantis through the coral... In the text it describes them being lead by a red glowing light... in the later stages of this piece I will put a slight red glow in various areas of the piece red is a complimentary colour to blue so it should contrast nicely and break up the large areas of blue/green. 

The Forgotten Atlantis

Also this week I decided to begin making a coral brush i cam stamp onto my coral.

Fan Coral

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)

A vision born in the era of German expressionism with high-contrast lighting, distorted sets and hidden symbolism that makes you question your own perception of sanity. 
  

“This is a genuinely creepy film which delves deep into the mysteries of the abnormal mind...an uncomfortable journey to say the least. Everyone is suspect and, in the end, we must ask ourselves: "who is really the mad one here?"

The imagery in ‘The Cabinet of Caligari’ has very bizarre qualities that give the film its creepy gothic horror quirks. The story unfolds in the streets and houses of a town called Holstenwall, where the walls of the streets are set at irregular angels that remind me of the look of a Crooked Cottage that you would find at a fun fair. The angels obscuring the view act as a constant reminder to the audience that something is not right in this world before them. There is significance of this in Francis telling the story to us discovering that he is mentally insane because the madness of the scenery as a hidden clue to the climatic twist in the story.

The strange psychedelic markings cultured on the walls of the scenery also contribute to the presence of madness but at times it becomes a bit too overpowering and distracting.  In all I feel the scenery is summed up by the words of critic Scott Achlin “...through modern eyes it looks awkward, clunky, and often needlessly confusing.”

Scenery isn’t the only confusing mystery to this film, the complex storyline is hard to follow especially if you’re not used to watching black and white silent film and comes as a bit of a culture shock. You have to watch carefully at the minute details of the characters actions that unravel the twist in the plot where you have to piece together the plot together scene by scene. Unlike in most modern films the plot is almost dummy proof and easy to follow in full dialogue and visual technology.  Also in all films music plays a key part in the story progression, by setting atmosphere and building suspense however it was hard to make order of the music to what was happening on screen. The overall mood of the music sounded wonderfully dramatic and powerful however the music became more dramatised, at what felt like, inappropriate times which became confusing when something did happen.

“By the end of Caligari, it's obvious that emerging ideas in psychology and psychoanalysis had a heavy influence on the plot, and Wiene never explains what "really" happened.”

Another trait of German expressionism is the development and focus of building the characters and The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari has some wonderfully strange iconic figures. Most of this is done through the dramatised look of the people like the tall thin figure of Ceasar with haunting dark eyes, the mad scientist look of Dr. Caligari with his mad hair and oversized glasses.   

Links:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0010323/

http://www.1000misspenthours.com/reviews/reviewsa-d/cabinetofdrcaligari.htm

Thumbnail Rough Sketches

Life Drawing Week 7

This week in life drawing we had total freedom to how we approached our drawings. For all of my drawings I decided to do a straight forward observational drawings with a couple of thumbnails. In all I felt like I couldn't focus in this weeks class and it effected my drawings. I know i have done better in previous classes so i felt a little bit dispointed.  

Photoshop Class: Unit 2 Week 1

I started by looking at more images of coral for sources of inspiration for the landscape and i found an image where there was a strong source of light flooding in from the background crating an outline of a shape of the coral picking up glimmers of details in the foreground. The image below wasn't the image i found for my inspiration however it is very similar.

Using the ideas of shapes i began to build up an image of a coral in layers knocking back the tone to crate a sense of depth as the coral fades into a light . Moving the shapes around i began to work a composition that i felt i could work with later, the basic structure to build my coral on to.



Final Thumbnail of the Lesson 



Creating a Coral Reef

After reading through the extracts I wanted to recreate the coral landscape the explorers walk through on there expeditions to the bottom of the ocean. I thought it would be interesting to look at coral because of the wide range of colours and textures i could be able to recreate in photoshop. My last final piece was successful because of the texture i created using the different types of brushes it would good to carry this into my future images.

Different types of Coral

Textured surfaces...

To get the textured surfaces i can create my own brushes in photoshop so i have my own set of brushes to use across all 3 of my paintings.

Bright Pink Coral

Fan Coral

I particularly liked this image because the way the coral branches out in this image almost looks like lightening fading into the darkness. By picking out different colours in the coral and making areas stand out i can draw attention to specific areas withing the drawing. 

Fox Coral

Light Ripples

@Tutor Phil

Hey, I know there isnt much happening on my blog atm thats because iv been quite ill over the past week, meaning iv fallen behind a little bit with the work load. I have done initial thumbnails and research drawings but just need to scan it on the computer and post them asap!!