Assignment 1B
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
After the critique session for assignment 1A during the previous tutorial, two major areas of improvement to be made to my design were identified:
1) integrate the letters of my name more into the design instead of just using the cats' tails
2) create a sense of depth
According to this feedback, I decided to create one final sketch to refine my design before digitalising it:
The letters of my name are represented as follows:
Next, I scanned the sketch and opened it in Photoshop to use as reference while creating my final prototype.
Creating new transparent layers (separate layers for different body colours / body details / accessories and objects) over the scanned sketch, I traced and coloured the foreground objects (cats / ribbon / ball of wool). For this step, I primarily used the paintbrush tool, with some occasional help from the pen tool. The stripes along the ears and front leg of the brown cat are a slightly lighter colour than those on the other parts of its body, emphasising the letter 'y' represented by those body parts. The colour of the cats are also hints towards their personalities; for example, the playful, innocent cat is white while the bad-tempered cat is black. The results are as follows:
I then created another layer below the foreground objects. On this layer, I drew and coloured the facade of the castle. I chose a bright pink for the castle to create a happy mood, as the place depicted in the design is supposed to be a playroom for the cats to relax and enjoy themselves. Deviating a little from the original sketch, I used the pen tool to make the entrance arch into a heart shape to emphasise the concept that I love cats. I also added some decorative lines to the front castle wall in order to make the letter 'H' clearer:
After this, I created two more layers, both below the first castle layer. These are for the interior and the back part of the castle (the other two towers at the back). I gave the interior wall a warm but dim red colour to create a cosy feel. I also applied a gradient to the wooden floor inside the castle to create depth. After drawing the two towers at the back, I also blurred them to make them seem further away than the front towers, since principles of visual perception state that objects further in the background appear less clear than closer objects:
At this point, with all the main objects already drawn, I no longer needed the scan of the pencil sketch. Hiding the layer containing the sketch, I created another layer for the backdrop of the room underneath all the others. Using the paintbrush and holding the shift key to create straight lines, I drew the outline of the room. I then coloured the walls and floor, using gradients to create depth as well as to indicate the direction of light (from the direction of the viewer). Once again, the colours chosen are relatively bright to lighten the mood of the piece:
After this, I created another layer above the backdrop layer. This contains all the shadows that fall on the floor and walls of the room. The shadows of the cats are created by copying the shape of the original cat, distorting the image, applying a black / grey gradient and then positioning it accordingly. Other shadows are drawn in from scratch. I also created layers for shadows falling on the castle wall, the cats' bodies, the ribbon and the ball of wool. Each shadow layer is placed directly above the layer of the object the shadow falls on. The shadows are mostly drawn in black and dark grey, and the transparency of the shadow layers are set to about 30%:
I created one final layer on top of each layer of solid objects, and used the paintbrush tool in white to create some highlights to indicate the light falling on the objects. The light layers are also set to about 30% transparency. The main highlights I added are on the shoulders and leg of the brown stripey cat, the ribbon, and the roofs of the castle towers:
Finally, I trimmed the image to give it a more interesting shape, feathering the edge to give it a more dreamy look. The shape is that of an arch, giving an impression of peering through an archway into a room in my heart. The prototype that I presented in today's tutorial is thus:
Following today's tutorial, where I presented the above prototype, the following feedback was given:
1) the tone of the back wall is too bright; should darken it to make it recede more into the background
2) the yellow colour of the archway is too bright and calls too much emphasis to its shape, which suggests the letter 'm' and creates a conflicting signal with the 'H' the castle is supposed to represent; should change the colour to blend more with the rest of the castle
3) while the shadows on the black cat are visible on the computer screen, once printed the colour of the cat becomes a flat black; should lighten it some more so that the 3D shadows are visible in print
Guided by this critique, I further refined by final prototype. The new version, with the above improvements incorporated, is as follows:
posted at
14:56
The letters of my name are represented as follows:
