Design Principles / Project 3: Visual Analysis

11/02/2021 - 11/23/2021 (Week 7 - Week 8)

Seojeong Kim / 0350085

Design Principles

Bachelor of Design (Hons) in Creative Media / Taylor’s University

Project 3

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Lectures

Visual Analysis: 

- Literacy and Visual communication skills is to analyze a visual art work of some kind. A visual analysis requires to think about what the art work is, what its role in society is, and the impact is has had or probably will have on viewers. 

Observation:

- Identify the visual elements of my chosen design, and describe it in my own words. You should describe what comes to mind when you see this design.

Analysis:

- Have to observe this design and express my thoughts on what I observe. Observe what kind of thoughts and influences these visual elements have on the spectators. And what is the reason?

Interpretation:

- Select the designer's work in which observations, explanations, and analysis are marked for the work. And when I'm done with my observations, I have to explain the meaning of the design and the purpose it was made for.

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Instructions

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Final Project

- For the final project, we will have to write a 500 word visual analysis of the chosen design work. Visual analysis should follow the three steps discussed in the lecture. After that, we have to work on our own designs to be inspired or influenced by the work we have observed, or our own way of expressing it.

Notes: 

- Select a design of my choice (poster, billboard, collage, illustration..).

- Create a visual analysis of your design in approximately 500 words or less.

- Finally, write a 150-200 word rationale for your design.

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Process And Research

- As I was thinking about which works to choose for my final project, I thought of my favorite works. At first, I couldn't come up with an idea as to which one I would like to choose: a work by a famous artist or a work by an unknown artist. Along the way, I thought of a collage poster, and at first I thought about designing a magazine cover. But soon after, I changed my mind, and the works I had always wanted to try came to mind.

- I looked up four poster and magazine designers. Each designer had their own charms. So I was very worried about which one to choose. However, I soon wanted to complete a collage using photos, and I struggled a lot between 'Yaroslav Lakovlev' and 'Eungenia Loli'. Then I saw Eungenia Loli's 'Kundalini' on the big screen, and this work was a great inspiration to me. Representing a collage poster with a simple but detailed description exploded in my head. So I ended up choosing Eungenia Loli.

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Visual Analysis

Observation

- The overall mood is a very happy looking couple. Women and men are having a happy time on the floor that you might think of as the sand on the beach or the bottom of a planet we can't go to. Using the dizzying universe as the basic base to create the colors and settings. Basically, a red color is used in this design, and the main designs, women and men, are placed in the center. College is a technique of mixing and pasting various things, so many viewers say that it feels dizzy. However, there is an expression that seems to have some meaning here. That is, women only see the overall silhouette. She is dressed, but her overall body silhouette, and facial expressions are unknown. In contrast, the male expressed a happy face expression and the overall silhouette of the body.

Analysis

- The composition of this design is slightly tilted to the left. There is an expansive background behind them, and the two humans are slightly skewed to the left. Nevertheless, the woman whose silhouette is not visible is perched in the middle, and her man, who is looking at her, sits to her left, but his face is towards her. The floor below is a bright and monotonous color, and the sky background above it is a red color similar to her silhouette. This allows to express the woman even more accurately and intensely in where she sits. Look closely at this design, you can see that the woman's head and the sky background are slightly connected. This is an expression that makes it feel like the vast sky is in her head.

Interpretations

- A collage is a visual representation. Assembly of various forms, materials and sauces, creating new. Use newspaper clippings, ribbons, colored or hand-made paper, parts of other works of art, photoshopped adhesives, etc. This work is a collage made in Photoshop. 

Basically, this work is an expression of 'Love'. It's important to make time for ourselves, but there are many reasons why it's also worth living with someone we love. However, real awakening only happens, says the late renowned ‘psychologist John Welwood’, in the charnel ground where we acknowledge and work with our wounds, fears, and illusions. When people fall in love, of course, there are benefits, but there are also negatives. Living with the love of your life might not then be as smooth-sailing as you might have expected. 

This work seems to express doubt. The person I love the most, but when I feel suspicious of her and don't know what she's thinking, people usually think only in their head and don't express it out loud. As if to explain this, his expression, mental state, and his appearance were all clearly visible, but the woman he loved was not expressed. This probably reflects the state of mind in his head. Or it could be that the woman is expressing her thoughts. She has so many thoughts in her head, and so many emotions that she can't control, which explains why her head and the sky are connected.

Reference Link

Visual analysis in the PDF file below:

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Design Process

- I would like to make my work with a theme similar to Eugenia Loli collage. I decided to create a work with a description method similar to her collage technique on the subject of 'doubt in love' about this. The reason I chose and analyzed her work is that I am very interested in her collage art work, and I wanted to imitate her unique atmosphere. To do that, I had to find a lot of sources and take my own photos.

Photographs:

- I wanted to take a picture of two people together. I tried to take a picture trying out different compositions. So, at first, I wanted to take a picture of one person and use Photoshop to make them look like two people, but it seemed a bit strange to express 'love'. So I asked two of my parents to be my models. Their names called 'Mico' and 'Jay'. I am very grateful to them for being a model for my final project.

Photographs PDF file:

- My photographs collections that I took, I thought a lot about which one to choose among these many good photos. Because I didn't like all the compositions! I thought this was pretty cool when I took the picture, but when I got home and looked at the picture again to start working on it, I didn't like it. 

- Since I'm going to make a square piece, I decided to find a composition that fits that square well.

- The photos above were the last three positions I picked. Since I will be working on this using Photoshop tools to only show humans, the position was very important.

- I looked at the various positions and compared them, and I compared all the photos using the tool to see if they fit the square. After slowly comparing and observing these, I thought the first photo would fit the composition of my work. Thus I finally chose a picture!

Digital Design:

- I find it very exciting to do digital design, because creating something out of nothing is a very enjoyable and inspiring task. So I will probably be able to run this project happily.

- For the first time, I erased the background using the pen tool once in my photo position. This is a very time-consuming task, but it can complete more sophisticated and detailed work.

- Then, I searched and found various space photos, and transformed the photos I cut with the Pen tool into space photos. This was also a time-consuming task, but I was very satisfied after it was completed. 

- And I edited the space photos with saturation, brightness, contrast, etc., and overlaid various old textures to give an old photo feel.

- Soon after, I merged all the human layers I worked on, and now I added shadows and brightness to make it look a little more realistic. After that, it turned out to be a very realistic photo. 

-At first, I tried to choose the one I liked more out of the two works, but I just finished both works and decided to implement two final projects.

- Next, I went on a search again to create a background. In order to best fit my work and express her technique, I cut the background of the elements I found, and again using the pen tool to make a PNG file, and tried various positions to find the layout that best suits me.

- After all the background was done, I started editing again to give it a retro feel, overlaying textures, and using channels and paths to give it an old-fashioned look. The background that came out was this male version of the blue series and the female version of the red series.

Background PDF files:

Male Version:

Female Version:

- After all the edits, I merged the background layout and the human layout. I laid out the humans in the middle position that suits them best, and resized them again.

Final Digital Design:

Female Version:

Male Version:

- Final digital design titled "Repeat Signs Love". Time: Over 20 hours, completed in 1 week. Completed with Adobe Photoshop.

Visual Analysis

Title: Repeat Signs Love

First of all, the title of this work is 'Repeat Signs Love'. What is the connection between the vast universe and humans? For people from afar, love for each other is deeply rooted in their hearts. They always give and receive love, pour it out, or take it one-sidedly. 

'Love' is the most difficult word to express. Obviously there are many healthy relationships, but there are also many unhealthy relationships in love. In my work, I express these unhealthy relationships. That's doubt. They scold their loved ones, suspect them, become angry, and tighten their hearts. 

When two people fall in love, in general, people don't know what the other person is thinking. Because they are all different. The way we think, the way we have lived, the way we live in the future are all different. That's why people have no choice but to be suspicious. This is normal.

In this work, they express their world. In a normal photograph, everyone's silhouettes are visible, but when I made this work, I covered a single person with the entire universe, making the human figure invisible. 

From the woman's point of view, the man is invisible. That means she's suspicious of him. She loves him, but gradually he becomes invisible. Like someone who doesn't know him. Since this doubt is endless, it reaches her background. It's like your daily life is ruined. From a man's point of view, this tells the same story. 

Her other daily routines are always the same. Just like the positions of the planets in the background. But when she meets him, everything is the same, but her heart and mind keep changing. 

With all of that involved, she will no longer love him. There is no end to these doubts, and the only thing without end in all this world is the universe. That's why I found the connection between these two, and completed the work like this.

Visual analysis in the PDF file below:

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Final Outcome

Male Version:

Female Version:

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Feedback

Week 12: 

- At first I didn't know what to choose and what to use. But after listening closely to what Mr. Charles was explaining in class, he said that this could be everything, I just choose the artist I want and explain it. So I wanted to make a collage piece, so when I asked him if I could use photos, he said yes of course.

Week 13:

- I took my own photos, and I tried various digitization based on my sketches by analyzing and selecting the composition. It was definitely difficult to compose the camera, and I had to try different angles.

Week 14: 

- He saw my final work and said it was very interesting. Its expression is similar but different backgrounds are very eye-catching, and the different colors in each piece make it very special. He said that my work fits the description very well, and that there is nothing to fix on the last piece. That was the perfect last week's feedback!

Reflection

Experience:

- I have had a very confusing and arduous time during this project as to what to choose, analyze, and where to get inspiration from. Once again I realized that coming up with an idea is a very difficult task. But then, as I browsed through various posters, magazines, and collage art, I discovered that the world is full of ideas and imaginations. And through this project, I learned to observe the work, and realized that it is not only necessary for me to be inspired, but also very important to observe when I create my work. Observing the work in detail, understanding it, and explaining it seems to be one step closer as a designer.

Observation: 

- I've come to understand from this project that, why has all the artists writing different descriptions under their work. While there are parts that I can understand without reading the description of the work, I know that there are parts that I can understand more by reading what is being explained about the work. Through this project, I learned how to create my own artwork and perform visual analysis on it, and found that it was an essential element to create a work. 

Findings: 

- Through this project, I have come to realize once again that I definitely love to create art using photos and Photoshop. These works are very suitable for expressing my art world, and I learned more about collage. And through this project, I learned how artists can communicate with people and show their work. It is very important for designers to describe their own work, and it is like adding life to the work.