Resolving my final designs:
In the end I decided to take make work into photoshop and work digitally. This was in an attempt to resolve the issues of texture vs clarity of imagery that occurred within my media experiments. I therefore decided to work with out line and focus on shape on to which I could then use vector masks to add analogue textures such as charcoal, ink, pencil, paint etc. This was so as the add warmth and energy to my pieces as I feel quite often overly digitalised work can seem to sterile.
I also wanted to push my self out of my comfort zone by creating work without an outline given that, up until this point most my work has been driven my line. Furthermore I felt it would help me create a more naive feel to my images which would reflect the theme of unconditional, 'child like, love for nature. I wanted to further communicate these ideas of naivety and joy through the choice of soft pinks and blues as a basis for more colour palette.
Therefore I decided to look at practitioners who work digitally but have a hand made aesthetic. In particular I was interested at looking at those whose workers uses limited amounts of line work and instead focuses on shape.
I looked at the work of Jon Mcknaught at the recommendation of a tutor and realised I was actually familiar with his work as he had just been featured in Nobrow. What draws me to his work is the clarity achieved in delivering his message. This achieved primarily through a simplicity in his concepts which is then made the focal point of the image through the use of composition.
Evaluation:
As usual, within hours of completing my final images, I had a complete falling out with my final images. This was based on several aesthetic and compositional issues which I felt harmed the conceptually value of the images by detracting from the message being communicated. This was further confirmed my both peer and student feed back on the work.
These issues were as follows:
-Choice of colour. I tried to move away from using green to describe nature as I personally hate working with green palettes and I felt it was too obvious to work with given the theme of nature.
-Lack of clear natural textures, ie leaves, flowers, plants etc, within the figure of nature's hand. This when coupled with the use of pink made it unclear to the viewer that the hand was meant to be that of a living embodiment of nature.
-Further more within the image of nature being drowned out by modern technology this lack of texture and interest within the plant made it feel life less and depressing where as it was meant to show hope of nature prevailing.
-I also decided not to use texture masks on top of the images of computer so as to draw a distinction between technological and natural aspects of the images. However this only served to make the image flat/not engaging and work less successfully as a set with the other two. Had I instead chose to use analogue tv/electronic feedback/glitch textures on the screens of the computers it would have made the image both more engaging and allowed it to function better within the set.
-The use of composition within my final image massively detracted from the message at hand of nature being a 'true haven for our phyce'. This was because the shadow of the human figure was pushed to the bottom of the image. When combined with the fox motif it serves to draw your attention away from the shadow and instead focus on the fox. This use of motifs detracted from the meaning of my images by unintentionally re directing viewer focus was also present in the first image in the form of a bird's nest.
-Of all the points listed I feel this was the one that took away from my resolved images the most and therefore I need to consider more carefully composition and use of motifs in my next project. In particular I need to be aware of the dangers of over complicating/redesigning images in photoshop which ultimately detracts from he final image.
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