2 Weeks of Experimenting

Boom. I am back...again. Har har.

Enough of my nonsense!

1st-14th April 2014

 The previous two weeks has been pretty hectic. I think as the weeks have come, I have become crazier and crazier, probably due to the fact that there is no time left for this project (as I keep mentioning). This is how my last two weeks went...

What has been achieved?

• I have started experimenting with various materials to test things out, e.g mark making etc. Oh, and Photoshop too!
• I have started editing down my story, a whole chunk has been removed as I don't want my reader to get bored. 
• I have made about a million character sketches now because I can't quite seem to get my main character right. 
• I have started looking briefly at children's illustrators that will influence the visuals of my book. 
• I asked my 7 year old cousin about my project, observing her behaviour etc and from it I gained so many ideas.

Now for some pictures... (hurrah!)

Strengths

• I have produced a fairly significant amount of work so far, beginning to test out some ideas.
• I have let my ideas grow, I developed them so that they have moved away from my first ideas. Thumbnails have been particularly helpful to visualise my ideas. 
• Everyday I am thinking about the project- I am always thinking about what I could do next in order to improve. 

Weaknesses

• My brain is still scattered- I still am in that position where I want to do everything at once.
• I am such a slow worker! I do know there isn't long left but I can't seem to get into the pace of things. 
• I haven't done as much experimentation work as much as other people- I know it's bad to compare yourself to other people but I feel like I haven't made anything 'creative' yet.

Improvements

• START EXPERIMENTING LIKE CRAZY! Just do different variations of medium based on one composition- photocopy an image and just paint or do whatever on top of it to save time having to draw it over and over again.
• Pick up the pace a little, or bigger in my case. I looked at the calendar to remind me of the time we have left for this project and I was completely shocked- I just needed a visual reminder and it worked- now I just feel like I want to do a ton of work. 
• Just relax a little bit- I know I should be stressed (because having a little can help) but just do deep breathing and pretend to be a wise old mantis.

I thought back to the time earlier on in the foundation course and I just thought I was so lazy back then. I pretty much spent most of my time worrying a lot and avoided my projects in general because I was scared of my own ideas. I felt like I haven't shown the best of my ability; I am trying to make up for my laziness earlier. I have definitely stepped up my game and I feel much more confident with my ideas, using the creative process. I figured that this is my one and only chance of challenging myself because it is the last project. Because of this I am having so much fun, even though it is hard work as well. 

Creating this children's book might seem impossible to do in just a couple of weeks but I do think that I can pull it off. I predict that the rest of this week and the next will become crazier. I better get going!

Later chums! Got a ton of work to do.