Illustration and Visual Narrative: Exercise 1 & 2 - Vormator Challenge

2.4.2021 - 30.4.2021 (Week 1 - Week 5)

Wendy Seto / 0348805

COM61304 Illustration and Visual Narrative / Bachelor of Design (Hons) in Creative Media / Taylor's University

Exercise 1 & 2: Vormator Challenge

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LECTURES

Week 1: During the first IVN class, we were given an introduction about the module. Ms. Anis also showed us a brief representation of what our future assignments will look like. The class was pretty fun and I really like the lecturer, she seems so nice and friendly!

Week 2: Today, we started to learn about the basics in character design. In the beginning of the class, Ms. Anis wanted us to upload a picture of our favourite existing character. I have many so it was hard for me to finally choose one, but then I go with Toad from the Mario Games. The reason why I chose Toad is because I always use him when playing any of the Mario Games since I was a kid, so I feel like I grew up with him. Ms. Anis showed me the shape breakdowns of this character, it was kinda mind blowing to me because I did not payed much attention to it previously. It is interesting to see that the shapes can actually create such characteristics and impressions in our mind.

fig 1.1 my favourite character! 9/4/21

In the practical session, we finally meet Mr. Kannan. He was not able to attend our first week of class so this is our first time being taught by him. He took us around Adobe Illustrator and introduced us to pretty much all the basic tools that we can use on our future exercises.

Week 3: In week 3, we learned about compositions and the positive and negative spaces in those compositions. I really like Ms. Anis's lecture slides, it is very fun to look at and I just like the whole concept, handwritten notes on a crumpled paper. I have never seen this kind of slides from a lecturer before, she definitely put a lot of effort into it!

Week 4: We learned about perspectives in todays class, it was a pretty heavy topic in my opinion but interesting at the same time. Ms. Anis showed us a video of a painting breakdown, it was really satisfying which made me want to watch more of those videos in my free time.

Week 5: A self-directed class! The lecturers gave us the class time to finish up with our exercise one and two.

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INSTRUCTIONS

module information booklet

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EXERCISES

Week 2: For exercise one, Ms. Anis wants us to create a character based on these limited shapes:

fig 2.1 the vormator shapes

And these are my character sketches:

fig 2.2 first sketches 9/4/21

The one in the bottom left reminds me of Dratini from Pokémon. Fun fact, when I told my 5 year old little sister that I have this one assignment that requires me to create a character like in the Pokémon she is so excited!

fig 2.3 Dratini from Pokémon

I did some more sketches on my phone afterwards because I do not like the scanned version of sketches that I do on physical paper.

fig 2.4 more sketches 9/4/21

I think I am going to go further with the teacup one but Ms. Anis said she likes the cactus. Actually, I have been thinking to choose one between these two as well. I drew the cactus one first, it kinda look like a crossover between Pokémon and Plants Vs Zombies. 

fig 2.5 cactus plant from PvZ and Diglett from Pokémon

The ice cream and teacup are inspired by characters from the Koisuru Purin! comic series. There is an original character for the ice cream one actually, so I am just trying to sketch it out with the vormator shapes, not planning to use it for my own. 

fig 2.6 Koisuru Purin! comic series

Week 3: In the middle of the class, Ms. Anis wanted us to create 5 different background compositions based on the knowledge we have learned today. However, I only got to do 3.

fig 2.7 my three background composition ideas 16/4/21

I think the first one is a fail because it is very unlikely to work out. The second one is a basic foreground - middle ground - background composition and the last one I am not really sure, maybe it can be considered as a foreground frame composition? 

Week 4: In week four we were taught about perspectives, so Ms. Anis wanted us to try creating perspectives into our week 4's compositions. I thought I have understand how does perspective work but turns out I did not. I showed my sketches to Ms. Anis and she said that they did not show perspectives at all, it could be because I am not sure where to place my character.

fig 2.8 my failed perspective attempts 23/4/21

Week 5: Everyone has probably finished their vormator challenge, but I am just getting started on digitalizing it. April has been a hectic month, I am still struggling on managing my time between work and school. Luckily, Ms. Anis extended the assignment deadline so I promise that I am not going to take the extra time given for granted! 

I started by rewatching all Mr. Kannan previous practical sessions because I know nothing about Adobe Illustrator. The fact that he literally introduced us to every single tool available is a life safer (but of course I did not manage to remember everything lol). 

I did the chiaroscuro exercise first to practice using the pen tool and then start digitalizing my vormator character. At this point, I have decided to design my character to belong to the tamagotchi family! Will not be a hundred percent look like the tamagotchi characters though but she will definitely fits the world they are living in.

fig 2.9 the tamagotchi characters

I created a shapes breakdown for my character to make sure I am following the rule of the vormator challenge.

fig 2.10 my character shapes breakdown 29/4/21

fig 2.11 digitalizing my character using pen tool 29/4/21

I started pretty late so I am continuing it in the next morning. For this exercise, I am still very clueless on colour theory and how to create my own palette on Illustrator so I am just going with the flow, mix and matching everything that I think looks nice. It took me a while to form the eyes as well because they sometimes do be looking weird.... 

fig 2.12 adding a face and filling in some colours and details 30/4/21

In fig 2.12, she really look like one of the tamagotchis! I love how it turns out and not gonna lie that I actually quite enjoy illustrating in Illustrator so far. It is not as complicated as I thought, but I could still change my mind if suddenly the software makes me cry in the next few hours.

I took a big decision here, with or without outlines..? It makes it "less" a tamagotchi character if I get rid of the outlines but it looks nice at the same time. 

fig 2.13 getting rid of the outlines and creating shadow effects 30/4/21

Moving on, lets start illustrating the background! I have decided to use my second composition I sketched in week 3. I spent most of my time illustrating the sink, using the picture on the right as a reference.

fig 2.14 start illustrating the background 1/5/21

fig 2.15 finished "pen tool-ing" all the elements in the background 1/5/21

fig 2.16 fixing the weird shaped faucet 2/5/21

fig 2.17 filling in colours 2/5/21

fig 2.18 adding more elements and details 2/5/21 

Here is my final background illustration. I removed the books from the picture because I think it is a bit irrelevant. However, I still think that the background is so empty although I worked so hard on it. I am pretty sure that the background took me longer than the character itself, well the sink took forever so it is making sense. 

fig 2.19 final background illustration 2/5/21

Onto the last part of the exercise, creating a game card composite of my character and background. I never knew that tamagotchi has their own game cards until today!? These are so cute omg I officially need them now.

fig 2.20 tamagotchi game cards

I am using it as a reference for the cloud shaped text box on my card design. Did not take much progression screenshots for this part because I am running out of time.

fig 2.21 card illustration progress 2/5/21

fig 2.22 final card template 2/5/21

And here is my final final result for the vormator challenge! I freaking LOVEEEE how it turned out. This is my first time creating an illustration on Adobe Illustrator and I am so proud of it. I have not received any feedback from my lecturer yet for my background and final game card illustrations because I just finished it an hour before the deadline. Thank you again Ms. Anis for extending the due date for this assignment, hopefully you will like my design as much as I do and please let me know if there is anything that I should improve on so I can provide better work in the future. 

fig 2.23 final vormator challenge 2/5/21

A little introduction about my character, she is known as Miss. Teacup or Chawan Chan in Japanese. She is made from porcelain so she is indeed very senstive and fragile that needs a lot of care and affection. Chawan has the ability to boil water up to 100 degrees and break or repair another porcelain objects.