SWOT/PEST workshop

Following on from the PPP session last week about SWOT, yesterday we did a SWOT analysis on McDonalds:

 

It was useful to practice this exercise on a company as an outside perspective, rather than an analysis on myself where I tend to be quite harsh on myself and not recognise my own strengths. While a SWOT analysis should be harsh in order to identify your weaknesses and where you can improve, it's also important to identify your strengths and what makes you or your business unique!

After the SWOT analysis, we learned about the PEST analysis (Political, Economic, Social and Technological) or PESTLE (add Legal and Environmental). I hadn't actually considered the wider context of a business and how factors such as law changes and trade regulations etc. could affect it. It was useful to do a practice analysis and consider all the ways in which these factors could affect how a business operates, including perhaps my own practice later in life.

Personal work/projects

When I spoke to Ben last week about worrying about 504, one of the things that came up was how I sometimes focus on or prioritise my own personal work.

I have a lot of ideas for graphic novels or longer comics, and I have multiple Word documents with notes, ideas, timelines and character lists etc., that I occasionally add to whenever I get a new brainwave. Something John said in one of the PPP lectures was that great ideas take a long time to form, and that's basically what's been happening with all my ideas for stories. They all stem from one idea, be it something someone said to me, a snippet from a blog post on Tumblr, or just something I overheard on a bus, but they all started as small ideas (lots of them from years ago), that have gradually picked up speed (some more than others) and become larger and more well-formed as the months and years go by.

I can go weeks without thinking about the story but then I'll get a new idea and it'll be added as a new story or a snippet of an existing story idea I have to form a larger story.

What got me thinking about this was when I said to Ben that in my sketchbook I write a lot of lists and diagrams - my sketchbook is a lot more wordy than some people's, but that's just how I work! That's how I tend to think through ideas - through writing and lists and mind maps.

Anyway, over summer, for our summer brief (draw every day), I decided to focus on one of my story ideas and work on character development for characters I'd already pictured in my head.

This particular story (I don't want to actually reveal it lest someone somewhere see it on my blog and create it before I ever get round to it) has been changed and moulded over time, particularly in terms of the love story angle - as I've grown up and become more aware of issues in cinema and other forms of narrative, my tastes have changed and my view of what I think my target audience (primarily inspired by what I myself would want to read) would want to read has changed as I've had new experiences.

But, moving on, here are some of the drawings I did over summer:

I wrote a blog post on my Studio Practice blog in July about struggling with my own visual signature (link here), which you can probably see in the drawings here, but this is the kind of personal work I'm doing at the moment, and the kind of work I want to be doing now and in the future. Obviously there's still room for improvement and a long way to go before the character development stage is complete, but just a snapshot into what I'm doing outside of uni!

S.W.O.T (Study Task 3)

Strengths

• Character
• Narrative
• Humour!
• Using Copic (and similar) pens (I didn't think I was that good but I've been told by quite a few people now that I am a Copic wizard (okay maybe they didn't say wizard))

Weaknesses

• Time management
• Motivation
• Drawing landscapes
• Digital skills

Opportunities

• Comic/zine fairs and conventions - I could make work (or use existing work) to sell (or at least showcase) and get my work out there!
• Responsive briefs and competitions! The work I do for the Responsive module could get me recognised and present new opportunities for work.
• Sites/apps like Tumblr and instagram - start a webcomic or daily/weekly comic strip/life observations on instagram

Threats

• People who draw better than me
• People who have more motivation than me
• My own motivation/time management
• People who have a more consistent style than me?

Who is my target market?

• People like me!
• Young adults (ages about 16-26), students
• People who like a laugh (and sometimes quite dark/niche humour)
• People who like stories!

Unique Selling Point:

There may be people who draw better than me, there may be people who draw the same things as me, but no-one has my exact sense of humour, ability to/way of telling stories or IDEAS! I have lots of ideas and I'm sure no-one has thought of ALL of them (maybe some of them). No-one sees things in quite the same way as me and I will always give a unique spin on an idea or image.

Observational Drawing

One of my friends recently reminded me of something I've done in the past - observational drawing! I know it sounds obvious and I should already be doing it, but it's slipped my mind recently. 

For projects in the past I've carried sketchbooks around with me and drawn people on trains, in coffee shops etc., just to get better at drawing people (my subject matter of choice) and to draw every day, which I should be doing, as an illustrator.

I'm going to buy a few small sketchbooks, A5 and A6, and try to remember to carry one around with me at all times.

The Creative Industries & me - Study Task 2

I think the areas of the creative industries where my work fits the most is Character & Narrative and Publishing & Book Design.

In my work, I primarily focus on character, narrative and humour, and putting that into physical comics! However, my work could potentially (and has in the past) expand into Editorial & Reportage, as there is opportunity for studying people/characters, or making comics as editorial pieces.

My work could also expand into Retail & Merchandise, as in the future I do hope to expand my practice into saleable products, such as mugs and T-shirts for example. In Responsive, I'm doing the UK Greetings brief, which involves producing not only greetings cards but also accompanying wrapping paper and a gift bag, so I'll need to consider how my work will work in those formats. This also comes under Product & Packaging.

I could also envision my work in the Advertising & Promotion category, perhaps in the form of gig posters or other event advertising, as that is something I'm personally interested in.

The only area of the creative industries I'm not sure my work fits in is Object & Environment. I'm not quite sure what this category actually entails (I don't like to draw either of these things really), but I guess perhaps how my illustration would fit in an environment such as a shop window, or on a large-scale mural? A lot of these industries seem to overlap!

I guess my work could fit in that industry, but I think comic strips (and graphic novels) work better on paper/the web, rather than blown up to a larger scale, but I could see a character-based piece at a bigger size in the environment.

Rob Hodgson Big Heads (and other ramblings)

Honestly the only thing I really took note of from Rob Hodgson's Big Heads talk was right at the end when he said no-one really cares in the industry if you went to university or not, or what grade you got.

Sounds like I'm being cynical, but I have thought about this quite a bit before. Creative subjects like Illustration, Graphic Design, Animation etc., can't really be graded or quantified. Creativity and talent is so subjective. In some respects, Maths and Physics are a lot easier than doing a creative subject (or at least that's what I shout at my brother every time he tells me I'm not doing a real subject) because there ARE right answers. You can look up the answer and it's easy to quantify. In the creative industries you can't really be right or wrong! Some people will like your work, some won't. If they don't, it doesn't mean it's bad work.

But back to Rob; if you don't succeed at university in a creative subject, it's not necessarily representative of you talent and passion. There are so many boxes to tick and hoops to jump through in order to try and make sure everyone is graded fairly, but in the end, once you get a job or go freelance, all consumers (and bosses) care about is the end product. They don't necessarily care how you got there and how many hours it took you, just that they get a pretty picture out of it.

Again, not being cynical!

However, university does obviously have a point. I've already learned so much only being here a year and a half, things I wouldn't and couldn't have learned on my own, but sometimes I do find it stressful constantly ticking boxes and jumping through hoop after hoop. Sometimes it takes the fun out of drawing.

I do think I've picked the right course for me though. I do love it, even though it kills me sometimes, but if things are worth having, they shouldn't come easy. I hate to be cheesy and add a quote, but, 

"If your dreams don't scare you, they're not big enough." - Ellen Johnson Sirleaf


(and I'm scared every day!)

Thought Bubble!

OUIL502 Study Task 1

5...

...things I've learned on this programme so far:

☼ ROUGHS
☼ To take more risks in my work
☼ Less is more (sometimes) - e.g. reductive image
☼ To draw things over and over
☼ It's okay to make mistakes

...skills I think are my strengths:

☼ Comics
☼ Humour
☼ Character
☼ Narrative
☼ Academic writing

...things I want to improve:

☼ Digital skills
☼ My self-confidence
☼ TIME-MANAGEMENT
☼ My 'visual signature'
☼ Blogging

...things I want to know more about:

☼ Animation
☼ Comics industry
☼ How practitioners stay motivated/avoid procrastination
☼ How to network
☼ Digital drawing

...practitioners that demonstrate my interest in illustration:

☼ Bryan Lee O'Malley
☼ Kate Beaton
☼ Rubyetc
☼ Ellen Forney
☼ Luke Pearson

...websites/online resources that demonstrate my areas of interest within the creative industries:

☼ juxtapoz.com
☼ imagecomics.com
☼ nobrow.net
☼ vice.com
☼ drawnandquarterly.com

Banana Magnet

Today's collaboration mini-brief was... interesting!

Mine and Bronte's idea of an app called Hangry Hi-5 was selected. The concept was an app where you could order food and also meet new people to eat it with, like a combination of Just Eat and Tinder.


The day started off well, with lots of ideas and brainstorming, especially once we teamed up with a few other pairs to become a team of about 10 people.

However, once the whole room of about 40 students got involved, things started getting a bit more stressful! 

I really enjoyed working collaboratively, not just in a pair, but in a small team too. It's useful to get different perspectives on your ideas that lead to other, better ideas that you wouldn't have come up with alone. However, I think with a larger team of about 40, ideas start to get lost in translation.

Perhaps this was due to the fact that neither Bronte or I felt particularly comfortable being leaders! Thankfully we had Josh from Graphic Design acting as a spokesperson who conferred with each smaller team of students working on each aspect of the app (marketing, branding, the advert, the pitch and the presentation).

We had a bit of a dispute over the slogan - 'You might like me when I'm hangry' vs. 'Meet, greet, eat'. Bronte and I felt that the first one was better, as it captured both the hangry element of the app and the humour behind it, as well as relating it to the target audience of university students by referencing a well-known film. However, a lot of people chose the second option because it was shorter and snappier. But many people had trouble remembering which way round the words went anyway, and it felt like too serious a slogan for 'Hangry Hi-5'! But we took a democratic vote and the latter slogan won, but we were still going to use the first slogan as part of the voiceover in the animation.

Unfortunately the animation was lost because After Effects crashed, but we managed to salvage the basic points and still make a decent pitch.

Overall, I think today was an incredibly useful exercise in teamwork - listening to each other to get the job done! It was personally useful to me too, to build up my confidence a bit and to not take constructive criticism personally.

I do think we were the group that took this brief the most seriously!

LCA Illustration magazine?

Today in the studio, a few of us were talking about the possibility of an illustration magazine? Nest already exists at LCA but some of us feel that it's much more graphics/photography based, and we'd like something a bit different to showcase the talent of BA Illustration! And maybe perhaps branching out into disciplines like animation/fine art once we got a bit more experience with being editors.

The kind of thing I was thinking was like Nobrow magazine - where we set a theme (similar to Nest too), and get students from all levels of Illustration to submit things in relation to that theme.

I went to the Vernon Street library to have a look at their display of Nobrow books.

Or, on the other hand, maybe just showcase work that students have made in other briefs that they're proud of? Or both?

First day back! Summer projects!

Today, we looked at what everyone on all levels of Illustration had been drawing over summer, and identified a few of our favourite pages:

There were a few pages in this sketchbook that I loved, all with different approaches to image-making:

OUIL402 Personal and Professional Practice evaluation

Leeds College of Art BA (Hons) ILLUSTRATION	Level	04
OUIL402 Personal & Professional Practice 1	Credits	20
End of Module Self Evaluation

NAME	Molly Halson

1.  What learning have you inherited through this module and how has it impacted on your own understanding of professional practice? Consider yourself as a student at University as much as an illustrator
·         I've learnt a lot about different processes like digital and screen print and developed my own practice in how I make images, considering new approaches like shape and texture instead of sticking to black line. ·         I struggled with depression over part of the course, and that definitely affected my work, going from a first to a third over the first two marked modules. This has made me consider how to take care of myself and manage my time and motivation so that I can still complete my work and enjoy it! ·         I've learned that keeping visible visual aids of time-keeping like a wall calendar and post-it notes helps me to see what I need to do and when, instead of just a diary/notebook.
2. What approaches/types of research have you found most valuable over this module? Why did they have such an impact?
·         I've enjoyed keeping a Pinterest account and Instagram as well, learning what other artists are doing and being inspired by how they makes pictures. ·         I've been to a few exhibitions, like Jamie Hewlett and Comix Creatrix, which have shown me new approaches to making images, like drawing very big and how different comic artists work - that it's okay to cut and paste different sections of an image ready to scan instead of drawing it all on one sheet!
3. In what way has PPP informed the way your work in other modules and your illustration practice as a whole?
·         PPP has helped me question why I'm making images and why I make them the way I do. ·         I've started to think more about what process and visual signature is appropriate for each brief, especially informed by other artists' work that I see on Pinterest and Instagram, as well as presentations shown by tutors, and even my peers' work.
4. What weaknesses can you identify in your PPP submission and how will you address this in the future?
·         The screen-printed Illustrated Self poster isn't perfect - I struggled with using Adobe Illustrator for only the second time, so I was a bit rushed to the end, and my screen broke halfway through, the Friday before submission, so I had to persevere! The registration is slightly off and the colours aren't exactly right. I'd definitely allow myself more time next time, in case things go wrong! ·         I left a few of the study tasks until the end because they were at the height of my depression, so I should have done them earlier, but I think I have mostly kept up to speed with my blog. 5. What communities of practice and professional contexts do you intend to investigate further as you approach level 5? Why do they appeal to you?
·         I definitely want to continue going to exhibitions, and maybe go to more because they can be really interestn=ing to see what other artists are making and how and why they make pictures. ·         I'll continue to use Pinterest and Instagram among other media platforms to research not only finished work but the process of how artists' make their work - some artists I follow on Instagram upload process videos and sketchbook images which can be really useful. ·         I may start reading more art magazines like Juxtapoz for example, as these can show the behind the scenes parts of illustration.
6.How would you grade yourself on the following areas: (please indicate using an ‘x’)  5= excellent, 4 = very good, 3 = good, 2 = average, 1 = poor
	1	2	3	4	5
Attendance					x
Punctuality					x
Motivation			x
Commitment					x
Quantity of work produced					x
Quality of work produced				x
Contribution to the group				x
The evaluation of your work is an important part of the assessment criteria and represents a percentage of the overall grade. It is essential that you give yourself enough time to complete your written evaluation fully and with appropriate depth and level of self-reflection. If you have any questions relating to the self-evaluation process speak to a member of staff as soon as possible.

Presentation

Illustrated Self done!

I FINALLY finished my posters!

I had multiple problems during this brief:

• The graphics tablet I borrowed from uni wasn't calibrated to my laptop (spent multiple hours attempting to delete my Wacom Bamboo driver so the Intuos driver would work, and eventually had to manually scour for and delete ALL Wacom files after multiple restarts to no success)
• I'm not great at using Adobe Illustrator (I've only ever used it once for the Vector brief), so particularly in the print out positives and digital files you can see that things don't line up properly where I've not used the pen tool etc etc (I just need more practice)
• I missed my print slot by about 10 hours because I didn't anticipate how long it would take me to draw to whole poster! I had to print at Vernon street where they (thankfully) don't need you to book a slot.
• The font I picked which I thought was standard (I've downloaded A LOT of fonts and can't remember which ones are standard or not) was not, so when I opened the Illustrator file at uni ready to print, the font had changed and I had to spend a while adjusting it which meant that the registration for the pink and yellow screen positives changed a bit because I was a bit lazy/rushing to be able to print in time and changed them individually on the different files for each screen (turns out I was right to adjust it because I was in the print room until closing on both Thursday and Friday and finished in the nick of time!)
• THE SCREEN SPLIT! DISASTER! Thankfully, I had already printed all the yellow, but it split just after I'd done the registration for the pink on kodatrace and was flooding the screen for the first print. So all of the pink is slightly off registration, despite re-doing the kodatrace, as the screen didn't stay tight even after taping it back together.
• The colours didn't come out as I anticipated. The parts that I hoped would be darker where the pink and yellow overlapped were not clear. I tried to amend this by adding white to the pink, but didn't realise the white is even more opaque!
• I didn't manage my time that well - I only started planning the final design on the Tuesday before the deadline because of CoP hand in, and then the sunny weekend, so didn't start final drawing until Wednesday night, which meant I was rushed, especially considering my inexperience with Illustrator, the graphics tablet calibration, and that it was the first time I'd ever screen printed properly on my own (so I'd never washed or coated a screen, which took time to learn)

This is what I hoped it would look like:

(Despite the off-registration text)

Things I've learned:

• I need to practice using Illustrator and Photoshop more, and graphics tablets!
• Next time I screen print I know not to have the design so close to the edge of the screen, as the pressure of the squeegee can split it!
• White screen print ink makes things lighter, not more transparent!
• I CAN do things! I've been scared to try screen-printing outside of briefs where we've had to (even though I really wanted to) because I'm quite shy and nervy to ask for help, but once I get going it's fine!

What I'll do differently next time:

• Plan ahead!
• Start earlier!
• Place my design(s) on a bigger screen (or two screens) with more space around the edges

Despite multiple things going wrong and being fairly ambitious for the project, I think it did still turn out fairly well! It's a perfect illustration for my first year of uni - not only the drawn content, but also the evidence of the process: that I want to get better at using digital software, I want to screen print more and sometimes I make mistakes and take risks that don't work out! But that shouldn't stop me from trying!

Poster progress

I shouldn't have used Illustrator! Whyyyyyyy

It's haaaaaaard. I'm not used to using it. I've only used it once. I figured it would give me cleaner lines by using vectors, compared to Photoshop on a graphics tablet where my hand shakes. I know there are ways to clean up lines on Adobe programs but I don't know what they are and don't have TIME!!! My print slot is 4PM Thursday - gotta finish!!!

I also don't really like the line quality in Illustrator. it's too uniform and I realised that I prefer having different weights of line that look hand drawn - like a brush changes weights as you move it across the paper. Should have drawn it in Photoshop or even just by hand! The problem I foresaw drawing it by hand though is that I can't change it if it goes wrong like I can using digital - I'd have had to do a lot more planning and roughing on A2 sheets I think to get it right, and I didn't see myself having time. But who am I kidding, may not even finish it on Illustrator!!

It took my a fucking age to calibrate the graphics tablet to my laptop - multiple reboots and deleting Wacom files and re-installing. I'm so TIRED.

Poster's coming along okay, hopefully I'll finish before 4.

I'm not sure what colours to go for. I'm using two, and hoping they'll cross over to make a third darker colour. I thought I'd use pink and yellow like so:

(Ben Rider)

These colours are pretty happy, and I want the image to be fairly playful despite some of the self-deprecating jokes in the picture. These colours would symbolise my growth and fairly happy condition at the moment, having enjoyed and grown during first year!

However, I then started thinking purple and green:

(Maya Hayuk)

These colours work so well together (and would make a great dark colour for the linework) and I love lilac and mint green as colours. But they're both cool colours and I think that would make the image too sad?