PROJECT 1 - SELF-PORTRAIT

28 September 2022 -  12 October 2022/ Week 5 - Week 7
Sim Jia Min 0349784
Design Principles / Bachelor of Design (Hons) in Creative Media / Taylor's University
Project 1: Self-portrait

---

INSTRUCTIONS (MIB)

---

PROJECT 1:
BRIEF DESCRIPTION
Create a self-portrait based on life experiences, interests, culture, family, friends or any other things that are relevant to yourself. Observe and study the visuals surrounding, select the visuals that can represent you and make them into a self-expression portrait. No limitation on materials, use the one that can best express the idea, and of course, it is compulsory to apply design principles in the work. The timeframe is 3 weeks, deadline is 14/10/22 at 23:59.

VISUAL REFERENCES

Figure 1.1: The creator of the design is unknown. But the inspiration of this design is based on Pink Floyd's album 'The Dark Side of the Moon'. https://www.pinterest.com/pin/189080884346301090/

I like how this image can have different interpretations based on how we understand the meaning behind it based on the single white line and rainbow. My interpretation is, the white line on the left indicates receiving information, and the rainbow that comes out from the right ear indicates imagination, it is like a person being imaginative about the information they had received. 

Figure 1.2: Art by Veronica Cay https://veronicacay.com/

You can clearly see that the person in the portrait is going through some depressing emotion by the well-drawn of facial expression, especially the messy lines on the right indicate the struggle of the person dealing with their negative feelings. It presents a strong contrast between the colour painting and the messy lines.

IDEA EXPLORATION & DESCRIPTION

Figure 2.1: Mind map about myself

It is essential to know how I see myself as an individual since self-expression is a significant part of self-portrait, so we are required to make a mind map about ourselves before developing the sketches.

I decided to choose anxious (weaknesses) and listening to music (interest) as visual elements for the self-portrait because I usually listen to music to calm myself whenever I feel anxious or have other negative emotions, so I want to visualize that in my self-portrait. 

Figure 2.2: Some rough idea sketches

Figure 2.3: Idea sketch by using colour pencils

My idea is to make a portrait that has a contrast between my calm side and anxious side to well-indicate how music comforts me and makes my anxiety thoughts go away. 

Figure 2.4: WIP of final self-portrait

Figure 2.5: Close-up details

For colour choices, I used a soft blue tone to represent my calm side because it has a comforting and calm visual effect. For the anxious side, I drew it with some black colour messy lines to indicate the chaos of anxiety & messy thoughts. 

The musical notes flowing out from the headphone and going into the heart is to indicate how music really comforts me from anxiety by calming my heart.

Figure 2.6: Final self-portrait

I complete the shading and make some refinements based on the feedback given. 

Figure 2.7: Change the position of messy lines in Photoshop

Repositioning the messy lines near the head makes a better indication of the anxious thoughts in my mind.

Figure 2.8: Materials for self-portrait drawing 

I found that there are some art materials in my room, such as colour pencils, micro pigment ink pen, and papers that I bought a while ago, it will be a waste if I don't frequently use them, so I decided to use them on the self-portrait. As figure 2.8 shows, I used several colour pencils to draw my calm side, and the micro pigment ink pen (0.35mm) to draw the messy lines that represent my anxious side.

FINAL SELF-PORTRAIT

Figure 3: Final self-portrait A4 size

This is a self-portrait that represents listening to music is my coping mechanism for dealing with anxiety, and gives me great peace of mind.

Design principles applied
- Contrast: Difference of medium used, colour pencil drawing & ink pen drawing, which present different textures in drawing.
- Movement: The flowing musical notes that go into the red heart
- Emphasis: The red heart, it becomes the highlight point between the blue tone & messy lines
- Harmony: The colours of blue and purple on the calm side are cohesive

FEEDBACK

Week 5: From all of the information in the mind map, pick one or few of them as the main visual elements in the self portrait, and make a sketch for it by next week's class.

Week 6: Can adjust the rainbow's movement into a wavy line, or change the rainbow into something else such as musical notes, and make the movement go to heart (for a better expression that music calms anxiety). Developed another sketch for composition, the sketches for now lack of composition, can use rule of third/golden ratio method for composition. Need to choose the quality of paper wisely if drawing the final self-portrait manually. 

Week 7: The heart can make it bigger a bit, to have a better indication of music calming anxiety. The messy lines on the right can reposition near the head to indicate the negative thoughts from brain. Or can draw a few messy lines directly in the background. The darker part of shading can use darker colour pencils such as darker purple/green, to create more contrast and keep the undertone blue, because the blue part right now is lacking solidity compared with the messy lines.

REFLECTION
I have learned that it is important to have a certain meaning and message behind the self-portrait because it is not only about the drawing skills, but also for viewers to have sympathy towards the art and feel the art, or else it will be a boring self-portrait that has no emotions and no stories. Therefore, applying design principles to the works is necessary because applying principles can give the work meaning and let the message can be clear to transmit to viewers. I don't normally draw myself, I am more familiar with drawing some portraits with random faces that pop up in my mind, or just simply following my hand movements without thinking of faces, so drawing this self-portrait is quite awkward for me since it is a very new experience. But I am also glad to pick up manual drawing again because I have been using digital software for a while, doing manual drawing on paper is quite enjoyable.