pattern

I enjoyed making the fruit repeat pattern, so I made another one out of imagery from CoP. I don't know the use of it yet but I liked how it turned out:

I think it would look good for notebooks, or again tea towels as it depicts houses which makes it quite home related. 

I'm not sure about these colours - the white on colour is interesting but I think it will need more work, all these don't fit very comfortably. 

repeat pattern

The illustrations I've been making for the various projects would look good made into a repeated pattern, so I tried making one. I watched a couple of tutorials but they were a bit confusing as what I was doing wasn't turning out the same:

They made a pattern but were leaving gaps around it and not going fully to the sides, I wanted it to be a seamless pattern. So I used a technique I tried last year:

make a diamond within a square and fill with the imagery 

take each section and move to the opposite corner

a white diamond space will be left within the square

fill in the rest of the white space

delete the background colour, go to edit - define pattern

 name the pattern, then on a bigger document go to fill - pattern

I like how this pattern has turned out, it is quite busy but very energetic and colourful - I can imagine it working for kitchen ware - like fruit bowls or tea towels. I like the idea of focusing the patterns in one area - like kitchen based, which works well as I am making food illustration at the moment. 

development

In my crit for extended practice I got some advice for my war horse work to make sure the illustrations had more depth. With my cut outs, they tend to very flat once the sections are stuck down, which works well for some images, but with war horse it might be more effective if I incorporated layers. One way to do this could be a diorama; I wasn't too cure about it at first but after a bit of research I've grown to the idea, some images I found:
https://www.pinterest.com/astridweguelin/war-horse/

An examples that really stood out to me was Hari and Deepti's creations

They are so atmospheric with a really strong sense of narrative. The limited colours puts more attention on the skill of the cut outs and the story thats happening. The way it has been lit is so important for the sense of depth and dream-like atmosphere. 

Obviously these are incredibly detailed and skilful, I don't think my paper cut skills would turn out anything like this but its a good example to aspire to. So I will look into thinking up some compositions. A good point was made that for the folio society, they will be looking for something very well crafted and unique - so not just doing a standard illustration might make me stand a better chance. 

new brief - patterns

I have been wanting to learn how to make a repeat pattern as I feel a lot of my cut out work would translate well as patterns. So I am making a new, small brief where I can use imagery from work I have already done and try make some repeat patterns out of them which I can then apply to relevant products. 

food editorial

Grub Kitchen: welcome to Britain's first insect restaurant (the Independent)

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-drink/news/grub-kitchen-welcome-to-britains-first-insect-restaurant-a6706891.html

I had a lot of fun making this piece, I got a bit carried away making all the bugs, some of which I didn't even use, but its good to have for future uses I guess. I wanted to make it look quite fun but also appetising as its meant to be promoting this bug restaurant which a lot of people wouldn't consider tasty. So I made the bugs colourful and look like they could be some kind of exotic food. I think the colour palette works really well with the textures, it has quite a rustic feel to it while also looking quite contemporary. 

food editorial

Mediterranean Diet: the secret to a long life… drink a shot of olive oil a day

(the Independent)

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-drink/news/mediterranean-diet-the-secret-to-a-long-life-drink-a-shot-of-olive-oil-every-day-a6689596.html

I'm pleased with this outcome, I think the simple outline of the bottle and silhouettes of olives and branches is effective in depicting olive oil while also implying the mediterranean atmosphere. The clean shapes and limited colour palette give a natural and healthy sense to it which links in with they health benefits of the oil in the article. 

I had initially done some sketches for olive oil in my sketchbook before I kew about this article, which is where I got the inspiration for the colour palette.