Howdy y'all, how have you been? I've been busy with studying, 9 to 5 plus five hours of travelling daily, and I can tell you: that does not leave much time for other projects. However, as my mom had her birthday recently and today I was ill at home and couldn't focus on school stuff, I've been picking up making illustrations for postcards again.
The last card I've made was almost half a year ago, trying out polygons for the first time for a Christmas/holidays card we sent.
The card below is the birthday card from a couple of days ago, using polygons again which is a style I just love. I've been doing a tutorial on how to make polygon illustrations from 3D files with the software Blender, but I have yet to finish them so these are simply made in Inkscape (open source and free Illustrator-like software). The background was taken from a downloadable polygon backgrounds pack from Spoongraphics (who, by the way, has lots of awesome tutorials; if you're interested in graphic design I'd really recommend visiting his site).
Today I just didn't get anywhere with my school stuff and felt ill, so I chose to move that work to the weekend and instead try out a new graphical style: water colours.
Using tips from this and this tutorial, and the awesome watercolour textures from Carolina Garofani, I made two cards. The first one of a daisy, for a 'spring' kind of feeling since it's very sunny today, and the second one with a crown, continuing on a design I didn't finish last year.
It's King's day tomorrow in the Netherlands, the first one ever probably. Last year our queen abdicated and her son became king, the first one after over a century of queen regnants. Traditionally, the queen's birthday has been celebrated in a day of orange-coloured craziness, and this well-loved holiday is of course continuing with the king.
Keywords on this day: orange, more orange, crazy hats and outfits (orange, of course), free market, childrens' games, music stages everywhere, beer, party!
"Drawing skills", my coach in university once said, "are the most useful tools a designer could ever have". And he added that during his education, he would have drawing practise for at least one-and-a-half day per week, for several years.
Well, than it stands to reason that my drawing skills are not on par with those of traditionally educated designers. My education was more of the "define you own curriculum" kind and I've always considered function to be highly superior over form. Therefore, spending an eternity on practising how to make 'pretty' drawings was not very high on my list of priorities.
Until now.
It started when, after graduating, I started to use more sketches and doodles during brainstorms. After a while, I noticed that the ones with the better-looking sketches were far more pleasurable to go through again and again, and that browsing through those sketches would give me lots of enthusiasm and motivation to continue working on the concept.
Now, I highly prefer working on paper compared to making digital drawings (or worse: only descriptions with no pictures at all). Even though digital drawings or renderings can be much more precise and beautiful (and not to mention, there is an 'undo' function that paper sadly lacks), when it comes to brainstorming and concept development, drawing on a sheet of paper gives so much more freedom. On paper it is so much easier (at least for me) to put down your train of thoughts, ponder, compare, take it with you, make some minor adaptations etcetera.
There is just something about a drawing that cannot be captured in words. Even though words are often needed to emphasize or explain aspects of the design, a drawing communicates so more about the idea or concept. That is, as long as the drawing is accurate.
And there's the challenge: making drawings that are both accurate, aesthetically pleasing and not to mention drawn quickly. That calls for quite some skill... Maybe the extensive drawing practise was not such a bad idea after all!
During my "Sleek & Futuristic" challenge, originally meant to discover the form language of sleek/futuristic looking items, I rediscovered and tried out new drawing techniques. I learned a lot, although I cannot say I already have a good grasp on how to make something look futuristic or sleek, but my understanding definitely improved and that's what I was aiming for. The rest will come over time, I'm sure.
The first days, I was really lost on how to start, but after studying reference pictures it became easier. I used 3D software (1 and 4), pencil sketch on paper (2) and digital drawing software (3).
Two more 3D modeling software renderings (5 and 7), and pencil sketches (6 and 8).
After that, the challenge turned more into a drawing training assignment. I even started to use markers (day 10 to 14), which I hated during my education. And I liked it! I also discovered the awesome effect of drawing on colored pape, using a sharpie (Dutch: fineliner), grey markers and a white chalk pencil (day 10 and 11). Whoa!
As you can see, I still have a LOT to learn and train when it comes to perspective, shading or even just setting straight lines. That's fine. I'll just need to keep on practising and experimenting, and then maybe, maybe after a looong time, I'll even reach the level of a classically educated industrial designer!
For those of you who are interested in using markers for drawing, here is a nice tutorial on how to use them. The website idcreatures.com (I'm a fan) has many more of those, very convenient if you want to learn more about making product drawings.
My next challenge will be drawing people in interaction with objects - talk about challenges!
Still no dice on the product photos of batch no. 2 (I'm still utterly without inspiration), but my various 'challenges' are wielding some results. Disclaimer: with results, I mean actual results and not high-quality ones. No need to get your hopes up, it's all about learning here ;).
Challenge no. 1, '14 days 1 shape a day', is finished. It's been really good for my 3D modelling skills: when working on my product designs I usually don't feel like experimenting with the software, because things are progressing slow enough as it is. However, when just tinkering around for the challenge I can experiment to my heart's content, with improved skills as a result. The shapes that came out of this challenge are:
Not that bad, eh? I might actually use some of the shapes and techniques for future product or jewelry designs.
After this challenge I started a new one to learn creating designs with a sleek, futuristic look. '14 days 1 futuristic, sleek design a day'. I naturally lean more towards organic styles and have trouble making an item come across as sleek and high-tech. I'm trying to use several mediums for this: 3D modelling, but also sketching and marker drawings or even Photoshop and/or Illustrator (well, the free & open source alternatives GIMP and Inkscape for me).
It started out giving me quite a headache but after studying many reference pictures it's going better. But anyway, stepping out of my comfort zone is what these challenges are all about, so it is all good, I guess.
As you can see in the lower right picture, I managed to find the virtual 'camera' in the program back, with help from J. . Now I just have to learn how to make decent renderings...
Another challenge, photography with backgrounds & props, is still running. I find it rather difficult but it's a good exercise trying to come up with new props and compositions. The newest photographs:
I scrapped some pictures from a supermarket magazine with the theme 'la bella Italia' and taped them into my sketchbook. It is always nice to have some reference/inspiration pictures by hand. I love the colours of the pictures. Oh, and the pasta canister is a new purchase I came across and just hád to take home. I love canisters in various styles, they feel so homely ;). It is the perfect size and style for storing my embroidery materials, which until now were residing in a plastic zip bag.
These are the study sketches to understand how exactly 'futuristic' looks like. I find that studying those pictures by observing is one thing, but sketching them makes you understand the form language a lot better.
Well, that's it for now! In a few weeks, I'll have the bulk of my product design work for this year done, so I'll hopefully have a bit more time for creations in the kitchen and sewing field. Around that time I'll be busy with promoting and marketing so I will be needing the creative diversion...
