Illustration 1 Portfolio

Illustrations by Kenna Baker

Sketchbook

We sketched various new images for maga-zine ads in our sketchbooks and then photo-copied them back into the original ad.

This is an origami flower in the same position with six light sources. It is important to observe the differences created by new light sources.

Process

Thumbnails for: A Walk through the Forest. Keeping a loose hand, open mind, and playing with composition elements are all key at this step.

Thumbnails for: Avatar, exploring the term “sketchbusters” both loosely and literally.

Avatar Process

After completing thumbnails, choose the top three and make larger sketches to assess the correct composition.

Then work out the lighting: where are the shadows? Where are the highlights?

Avatar Process Avatar Final

In the final com-position, I combined the mediums of pen and compressed carbon pen-cil to create a coherent composition. I also used three styles: stippling, crosshatching, line, and grayscale to show the diversity yet coherence of the four. I used stip-pling in the face because of the variety of shadows and wrinkles. Line varia-tion in the throat because it follows the contour of the neck and cre-ates a rich black for the shadow. This technique was also used for the ink because it simulated the inky black color and crisp shiny highlights created in the light. I used gray scale in the background and hair to create a soft look. And lastly, used crosshatch-ing in the glove, wrist, hair and bottle because of the cross contour/or-ganic shadows it creates. All together this illustra-tion defines the phrase “sketchbusters” and works as a self portrait.

Product Illustration Process

Product illustration needs to showcase the object. During roughs, I worked on figuring out a flattering angle.

In the composition phase, I decided that a fron-tal light would show the texture of the snail the best and allow for readability when converted to stippling.

Using a .25 rapidograph pen on top of light pencil lines, I stippled a wooden snail and feathered bird. A photograph was used to help capture the nuances of light on the detailed woodcarving. The light source was held close to the right hand side, level to the face. The light glinted off of it because it had a lacquer on top, so some sections were made to fade into the background, as if the light was reflecting brightly into the viewers’ eyes. The straw bedding was twisted tangled and broken. In order to keep the hierarchy, it was left organic so that it wouldn’t compete with the details and lines of the wood carving. The use of precise dots works to show-case the quality and beauty of this sculpture.

Product Illustration Final

Ultimate Bedtime Story Process

The open mouth of an animal began to formu-late in this sketch, but it was missing the bal-ance and ferocity that it needed.

The girl is holding a lantern to set the story and give an interesting light source. In this compo-sition I explored the different textures the light would make.

Ultimate Bedtime Story Final

In the final I wanted to capture the feeling of the moment. The text used was “she always wondered where they’d gone” and the idea I wanted to focus on was a girl looking for her lost teddy bears, but unbeknownst to her, she is climbing into a bad situation. With washes of watercolor and tex-ture added with carbon pencil, I illuminated the teeth and kept the teddy bears rugged, ripped, and losing their stuff-ing across the tongue. Shadows across the lips showed the light within shining softly between the teeth. The girl shows no signs of fear that the audience would expect from the menac-ing teeth and overall dark demeanor of the Il-lustration. Together the technique and lighting combine to create an illustration full of depth and interest that will keep parents wanting to read stories to their children.

After listen-ing to parts of a story, images began to build in my head, the most visu-ally appeal-ing image was about a key. This rough begins to explore the angle and composi-tion of this key along with my hands.

Then I worked on the light-ing and the idea of light refraction when you stare at an object with the sun directly behind and peeking above it.

A Walk Through The Forest Process

A Walk Through The Forest Final

The final was rendered with watercolor, pen and ink, carbon pen-cil, and white chalk. The key was made shiny with crisp white and black pen; while the tree was given a rougher look, with carbon pencil. It was wrapped in vines and hard to see in my vision .The overlay of white chalk shows the blinding light I saw when looking at the object with the sun behind it. Though it is visually complex and layered, the text that is required with the illustra-tion works to enhance the experience I felt, and re-iterates the light over the key for the viewer’s un-derstanding. This illustra-tion works to describe my inner visions, prompted by words, describes my inner feelings, and brings them to the viewer’s eyes.

Matte Painting Process Matte Painting Final

In the rough I worked on the angle of the building, and placement of the two tentacles, to best balance them visu-ally and bring in the viewer.

Using marker I defined a light source bursting between the split in the building, shining on the windows and glinting off of the metal tentacles.

Matte Painting Final

The final work consisted of watercolor, pen and ink, carbon pencil, and white acrylic paint. Together, they created a light filled building with shiny windows and metallic arms. It took a while to decide on the place-ment of the reflections due to the curvature of the building and viewing angle. Then, I took a picture of a Spiderman figurine at an angle, photoshopped the background, pulled color from the matte painting image, and warped him to fit the view. He is small because he is pulling himself upward by his webbing and away from the hole at the bottom. His size also reiterates his predicament: the impending and inevitable end that should take down the superhero, but amazingly doesn’t. The matte painting and photo work together to create a coherent illustration full of movement and shining texture.

Looking through previous sketchbook exercises, I decided on my favorite one. This exercise was to replace the illustration of an ad with a new illustration.

First I refined my idea for the final project and decided where I wanted to place the tentacles.Then I decided which utensils the octopus should hold and from where the light source would come.

The final rendering uti-lized watercolor, pen and ink, carbon pencil, white acrylic paint, and digital overlay. The light source and churning of the water adds mood and makes the movie feel as if it would be intense and inter-esting to watch. The previous image was simple, the new one adds a sense of wonder and pulls in the viewer. With the detail, texture, and inter-esting situation of the image, the movie poster successfully promotes the fresh Indy short film about the seafood indus-try coming fresh to your plate.