CDDA Module Evaluation

Concept art and art in general has never really been a strong point of mine and as such had never really been of particular interest to me either. Before the module i had a reasonable knowledge of photoshop in terms of its layout and the various tools, however, i had never previously used it for creating any artwork which was meant to look realistic, i.e. shading, materials, depth, shadows. I tried my best during the concept art section of the module and in the end actually managed to produce some pieces which i was reasonably happy with. Of my three final concepts, both the prop and the environment are the ones i am most pleased with. The overall design of the compass was good, it was both interesting being a both a sundial and a compass rather than just a compass, but still actually usable for exploring by not being overly ornate. The 360 views i made for the compass worked fairly well with the brass material looking pretty realistic. The perspective shot of the compass is perhaps the piece i am most proud of. For the environment i wanted to create a mysterious jungle temple. My very first thoughts when it came to thinking up the temple were to base it loosely of Incan structures with light coloured stone making brick walls as well as larger pillars. To give myself a good starting point for the beauty shot i made a very basic model in Maya which i was then able to draw over. The final environment beauty shot turned out fairly well, although during the presentation of my work various flaws were pointed out with it which would need to be rectified in order to make it look better. The creation of my character history allowed me to be quite specific in the kind of person i wanted him to be. I was pleased with the actual character i created as he seemed quite interesting, reasonably originally and yet at the same time his history made him very real. The artwork for the character was the part of the model which i struggled with most. Having never attempted anything like it before i found drawing, shading and generally making the character look real to be extremely difficult. Because of this i tried to keep the actual design basic, while still sticking with the general ideas behind the outfit of a jungle explorer. To be completely honest i'm not overly pleased with how the character beauty shot or 360 turned out. Despite my best efforts they were both still majorly lacking. I also struggled when it came to the facial expressions sheet, again having had no previous experience. Despite my original troubles with it, the final facial expression sheet was reasonably good although nowhere near a top piece of art. However, the facial expression sheet is still my most pleasing piece of character artwork.

The other part of the CDDA module was life drawing. Over the course of the module i have found the life drawing sessions to be incredibly helpful. They have given me a much clearer understanding of proportions, as well as perspective and even shading. I also feel i made great progress through the sessions, with my proportions in the sessions in the second half of the semester being vastly superior to those in the first few weeks. Life drawing has also given me more confidence when it comes to drawing human shapes, which allowed me to at least get the proportions of my character artwork fairly accurate which i feel was probably the best feature of them.

Overall, I have found the CDDA module very challenging. For me the life drawing sessions have been the most rewarding part of the module and the area in which i have most improved over the semester. I have mixed feelings about the concept art i produced, although i have now been given suggestions as to what i could do to improve it and hopefully i will be able to produce something better in the future.

Final Pieces

Here are my final pieces of concept art. I'll talk about them more in my project evaluation.

Prop 360

 Prop Beauty Shot

 Character Beauty Shot

 Character 360

 Environment

Chess Pieces

Better late than never, here are my simple designs for a few chess pieces.

The theme of my chess set is 18th century piracy, with pirates versus the British Army.
The rooks for each side are canons, which would have the ability to attack in straight lines in any direction from the square they're on.
The bishops are a Royal Grenadier and a pirate equivalent, both with the ability to throw bombs which would do damage in a certain square radius.
The pawns are basic British linesmen and pirate peasants, which would operate roughly the same as pawns in a regular chess game.

Expression Notes

 Here are my notes and sketches about different facial expressions.

Life Drawing

 This was the first life drawing session in which we had a female model. It was an extremely interesting session, trying to learn and get used to drawing the proportions of any entirely different body shape.

The first three images are quick 10 minute sketches. The proportions in the first two aren't great, with certain areas of the body not quite looking right. To try and get a better idea of the proportions i did the next two quick sketches using the basic joint and limb structure lines. These two sketches have somewhat better proportions, although still not as accurate as the proportions of my sketched of the male model.

These two sketches both took around 40 minutes. I am extremely pleased with how they turned out with the image on the left being one of the best i've managed to produce throughout the life drawing sessions. The proportions on the left image are pretty much perfect which i am massively pleased with. The proportions of the sketch on the right are mostly correct, with only the left leg looking slightly inaccurate. I also feel that i using the colour and shading to good image on both images.

Character History

Here is the character history I created.

Jameson Irving Hughes

Born in  Surrey, England in 1947.

Father, Wallis Hughes. Biologist, historian and explorer

Mother, Sue Hughes. Retired author

Raised in a well off family with an older brother and younger sister. Raised in a fairly strict environment. Rebellious in his youth, sent to boarding school. Studied biology at Oxford University, dropped out in the second year.

Lead a playboy lifestyle after leaving uni. Left home at 20, finally fed up with his strict home life. Disowned by his father who refused to speak to him after this point.Occasionally got in touch with his mother.

In 1972  his father died. Despite choosing not to attend his funeral, his father’s passing had a major effect on causing him to become much reclusive while increasing his drinking. A year later his mother died. At this point he realised that he needed to change the way he lived. He returned to his childhood home which was now vacant and decided to follow after his father.

His life is now dedicated to continuing the research and exploration started by his father in the hope of finally getting his family name the recognition it deserves. Along with this, he has taken a great interest in invention. Although he is yet to design his breakthrough invention, he is still capable of adapting and improve various items to better suit his needs.

Lives in a large house in a small village.Most of the rooms in the house haven’t been entered in years, with dust sheeting covering all of the furniture and all paintings and other decorations removed from the walls. Only the section of house containing his father’s lab and office are ever used, with the house itself remaining unoccupied for months at a time.

Highly charismatic, well read and very well spoken.Quick thinking, able to talk his way out of difficult situations.Slowly becoming more positive and sociable as more time passes from his parents deaths.Strong sense of justice and honour which has gotten into trouble previously and is likely to do so again.

Average to slightly thin body

Thin face, defined cheek bones, slightly wide chin, wavy blond hair, nearly shoulder length

Even More Life Drawing

 The first three images here are all quick 10 minute sketches, two standing up and one sat down. The first stood up sketch has pretty accurate proportions, however the balance of the model in my sketch is slightly off. The second stood up sketch is again well proportion although in the this one the balance of the figure within the sketch is much more stable. The sat down includes the use of basic lines and circles to show wear the spines, the limbs and the joints are before fleshing the structure out. The sat down image is has good proportions all though I personally don't see the use of the stick outline before. Rather than doing that, I find it easier to simply sketch a basic outline on it own, judging the various different proportions as I go.

The final two sketches both had around 40 minutes spent on them. Overall I am pleased with how they both turned out. The use of colour within both images really helps to show the shaded areas as well as adding extra definition to certain parts of the body. Also the proportions of both figures are just about spot on. The only issue i did encounter was with the sat down sketch. Originally, i had drawn the top half of the body slightly off balance which made it look slightly wrong. To attempt to fix this i moved the positioning of the left arm (the new position shown by the blue outlines) and this seemed to work.