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Matt’s Diary : Week 11 – Final Week

Apr 30 | by | Student Work Placements
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Wednesday

Today I drew MissKoogar in new positions some new hands positions pointing in various directions for use on the web site. I finished the final frame of the comic strip project on the Friday all I will have to do is assemble the frames together

Friday

Today I have finished the comic strip. It feels good to see all six frames together on the same page.  I utilized unusual shapes to form the borders to give the strip more momentum. The original square/ rectangular shape of the frames did not the fit I had to trim them down  and add a little more to the images here and there. Where the borders interfered with key objects I placed copies of these objects above the border.

This is my final blog post. Thanks to those  of  you who has been following!

Matt’s Diary : Week 10 – Final Frames

Apr 23 | by | Student Work Placements
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Wednesday

I  digitised frame A which displays Miss Koogar discussing proposal with a client. I tried to recycle as much as artwork as is possible without impairing the quality of the image. This adds to consistency and improves work-flow. Much of the recycled components have to been altered drastically but still save time in the long run.

The eyes, there so many layers within such a small space. They had to be redirected towards the clients. Adjusting  the eyes is really what took the most time in this frame. There is much more to do than just moving them from their original position. All of the opacity’s have to set to the correct levels and the scale and the shape have to be accounted for also.

Friday

I’ve been  making embellishments  to the existing frames and tweaking them here and there. Such as adding steam above a mug of tea, I put suggested text on the sheets of paper, I increased the weight of line on smaller objects. Some of the adjustments. I added another client who has been dark into frame A gave her/him a navy blue tone to distinguish the two clients.I changed the colour of the text in frame I from a navy blue to light blue to improve the overall uniformity  of the colour scheme.

I began digitsing frame F (the final frame of the comic strip), which shows Miss Koogar placing a package into an old fashioned postbox. I have been experimenting with different colours of the postbox as the traditional postbox red doesn’t existing within the Koogar palette. Currently it’s  set at medium purple and is looking good.

Matt’s Diary : Week 9 – Comic Strip Continued

Apr 16 | by | Student Work Placements
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Wednesday

I made some alterations “emailing the proposal” frame. I removed the toolbars, which allowed the viewer focus strictly on the email the window. In “the presentation” frame the line work is relatively simple so I was able to use the “stroke tool” in Photoshop. The stroke tool creates outlines around shapes, which really helps my work-flow as I do not have to spend large amounts of time manually selecting the areas to fill.

Friday

I continued working on the comic strip again today. I digitized the “client requirements” frame, which depicts Miss Koogar going over a checklist of a client’s website requirements.

I also updated some of the previous comic-strip frames, tweaking the images here and there. Limiting the colour scheme, giving the frames a more uniformed appearance. A lot of the frames still needed the tonal work and shadows adding. Once you add the shadow to an image it always gives it more life. The computer screen in the “emailing the proposal” frame was angled little to harshly so created a new image of the  computer screen at much more gentle angle.

I have used a number of different camera angles in the comic strip which are beginning to emerge. This variety makes the storyboard more visually interesting and helps to engage the viewer.

I’m really pleased with the way work is going right now, the Comic Stip project is coming along well!

Thanks for reading!

Matt’s Diary : Week 8 – Digital Comic Strip

Apr 9 | by | Student Work Placements
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Wednesday.

This week I have been continuing with the Koogar Comic Strip project. Today I drew four more frames in my  sketchpad  using pencils and  began creating a new digital version of comic strip frame C, which depicts Miss Koogar shaking hands with the client. One of these four frames conveyed the fulfilment of the  clients proposal requirements. Two  more of the frames  depicted  success stories from Koogar clients. The  last  was a newly improved version the email scene. the frame needed improving as it do not share the same standard of communication as previous frames have done. This had to be amended.

Friday

Today I continued working on frame C in Photoshop. To draw MissKoogar I first got an old jpeg image of  MissKoogar. I cut it up to fit the new pose and then in a new layer drew her new composition. I had to adjust the hands a little to give them some more definition, which I felt  the image was lacking. I managed to complete this frame in digital form.

I started working on frame I in Photoshop  today, which shows MissKoogar sending an email to a client. A large portion of this was just creating graphics on the computer screen. I had to amplify the scale the graphics to emphasize the most relevant features.  Such as the email addressed to a “new_client@googlemail.com” and the email title “website proposal”. I added large flying envelope icon which with the word “sending” beneath it. These images and words synonyms with the concept of email.  All contributing towards the communication value of the frame.

Matt’s Diary : Week 7 – The Comic Strip

Apr 2 | by | Student Work Placements
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Wednesday

Today I was pleased  to complete the last stages of the images were Miss Koogar is modelling the new company t-shirt. I added a few extra folds into the t-shirt to express the heavy fabric in the images. The dark tones were added to the t-shirts, which gave Miss Koogar her full figure back and emphasized the direction that the body faces in each pose. After that, I made the final adjustments to Koogar; firming up the line and checked her top to tail for any flaws and inconsistencies.

I used the remainder of the day to begin working on the new comic strip project. I gathered a large amount of refernce material for the new project and drafted out a few ideas on paper.

Thursday

Today I continued working on the comic strip project, doing it the old-fashioned way with a pad and pencil. I drew a collection of frames for comic strip that depicted scenes involving the interactions between Koogar and their clients. I styled this initial group of frames to be nondescript and minimal for functional purposes. The images in the comic strip strictly  focus on the actions and gestures made by the characters, hence the minimal detailing. As the Koogar comic strip project progresses more groups frames will be produced which may be significantly more detailed.

Matt’s Diary : Week 6 – New Pose, new clothes

Mar 26 | by | Student Work Placements
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Wednesday

I  finished off putting the tonal work and shading on the “45 degree pose” of MissKoogar as well as:

  • improved the line
  • added some more folds in the trousers
  • drew new image of a new head using the to fit the angle of her body and recycled all the effects and fill layers to adapt them to the to new composition.

Friday

I drew a Koogar in a new pose facing away format the camera. The new image shows her wearing a casual black t-shirt instend of the white shirt she has previously been seen in. The new pose was also created to display a design on the reverse of the MissKoogar t-shirts. Its been modified using some of the older images of MissKoogar, changing her shirt for the and adding the new black MissKoogar t-shirt in its place.

Matt’s Diary : Week 5 – New Pose

Mar 19 | by | Student Work Placements
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Wednesday

I created the Koogar twitter bird and gave it a round, bulbous form with a large head to make it look cute. I completed the image to the bird today, the Miss Koogar images took a lot longer to design, produce and render, so I was pleased to have this done. I worked a quite a lot on colour matching especially on the various layers I had imported from previous images, finding equivalent tones which gel together.

It was decided that Koogar’s eyes needed to change from green to blue I colour matched the eye layers and adjust the Hue/Saturation levels accordingly. Blue eyes are better suited to the Koogar brand. Amanda thought the blue eyes were  looking a little too much of a dark shade so I softened the colours and the contrast to make the eyes appear brighter.

Friday

I created another image of Koogar  in a new pose this week. She is standing at a forty-five degree angle and pointing to her right. She still needs the dark tones and shading added but the image is coming along nicely. I have taken a couple of parts from previous images of Koogar which are different sizes, so this new image needed to have a lot of thew pieces resized. The image will prove useful when the Miss Koogar character is acting as a guide on the web site, directing viewers where to go and what to do.

Thanks for reading, Matt.

Matt’s Diary : Day 9 – MissKoogar is now finished!

Mar 13 | by | Student Work Placements
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Today I made some alterations to Koogar’s new clothes, making them a little baggier here and there and added in little more detail.

The cats now have a shadows!  To stick the shadows onto Koogar images I outlined the figures with the selection tool and filled the area with a medium grey. I grabbed hold of the layer with the transform tool and slanted the shadow area to the left, then reduced it’s height. It now looks like Koogar’s shadow is on the floor  where  it should be and not standing behind her like ghoul.

After the images were both were finished and complete I added a 9pt stroke around the outer line of each figure. I copied all of visible layers, rasterized and flattened them into one, so I could add one continuous line around them as a unified composition.

The Koogar twitter bird has begun to take shape on computer now has wings, a body, a tail and a Koogar style head. The Koogar twitter bird is cross between a cougar-cat (Koogar) and a blue bird (which is the Twitter logo). I it’s looking quite cute so far and I hope Amanda and Andy will like it too!

Matt’s Diary : Day 8 – Adidas trainers and baggy trousers

Mar 11 | by | Student Work Placements
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Today I was giving Koogar a change of clothes. Koogar is dressed in smart/casual attire but we needed her to be leaning a little closer to casual and also looking more like Amanda. We gave Koogar a classic pair of mock Adidas trainers and replaced her formal slacks with some casual baggy trousers.

To help Koogar change her clothes, I simply drew her trainers on top of where the feet used to be. To make her new trousers I selected portions of her trouser layers and made them wider using the scale tool and then tapered them in to give them a little more shape. I created a new layer and added all of those new folds and creases in her clothing. Having all of this on a separate layer allows you to adjust the bagginess of the trousers easily.

Matt’s Diary : Day 7 – New Map!

Mar 6 | by | Student Work Placements
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After writing up the day’s task list I went on to work on the map. The first thing I did on the map was changing the current colour scheme using a revised palette, which better suited the Koogar identity.

I marked out a pathway for which a walk from when arriving at Lime Street Station. To make the pathway I copied and pasted the section of the streets where you would walk when going from Lime Street to Koogar into a new layer. I then rounded off the outside corners of the pathway. After the route was the desired shape I then used the magic wand tool to select the contents of the layer. I contracted the selection and then inverted the selection and deleted the outer contents of the layer. This narrowed the strip of the pathway, which now appears to run through the streets and not on top of them.

Now the pathway layer was no longer simply highlighting an area of the map, it now implied a route of which to take.

This route was originally marked out in white I tried various other colours but no other tone shared the same synergy as the white so I returned to the original colour. The white contrasts nicely yet works in harmony the other features of the map and does not glare out from the image.

I drew in a few well-known landmarks, which are in close proximity to the Koogar office such as Lime Street Station and Saint George’s Hall. I did this by outlining simplified shapes of the structures, in-keeping with the style of the map.

I created a glass orb effect using the elliptical selection tool and gradients with various opacities. This makes map more attractive to look at and gives it a better chance catching a clients attention when viewing the Koogar website.

Today, I also made some subtle changes to one of the images of Koogar. Koogar is supposed to bare a close resemblance to Amanda. Amanda has a suit jacket with grey trim around the lapel and pockets and so we thought Koogar should have this on her jacket also. I added this to image on a new layer. In this image Koogar is sitting at an angle and because this you cannot see the left pocket upon her jacket. In order to keep the image looking consistent and symmetrical I added in the top half of the pocket exposing the grey trim.

I am pleased that I managed to get the map finished today. I like the way it looks and I hope Amanda and Andy do too.

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