Sunday, 28 February 2010

WTF

Rant no. 247

contents:
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intro
main rant
cry
summary
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the shit
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I've re-written this intro about 4 times now, not knowing how to start it or word what I want to say..... but long story short, I dont feel like I am progressing/developing and I'm starting to feel like I'm being left behind and as if i'm just tech support for people who dont quite know how to use photoshop and illustrator...

This recent project has really gotten to me... I struggled for days trying to finalise my ideas and then to make them, but I spent more of my time worrying about how to make them, how to make them look and feel and in the end I fell back on my knowledge of photoshop and illustrator to create some shit looking, cheap and nasty, tacky illustrations... none of which I feel any attachment to, except for the sheer amount of time I wasted on them...

now, Im not just being over sensitive, nobody was malicious or overly criticising of my work, but as I sat through everyones presentation during our critique sessions... i saw how people have started to develop their own way of working, their own styles... they all came up with interesting and differing ideas and all produced some great looking stuff... but when thinking about my own, I cant see any change in my work. I havent developed a new way of working... or drawing... i just rely on what i already know and I think it showed this friday.

I have ideas of drawing and creating characters as well as producing clean and concise vector images as I love the visual effect of it, but when I get the chance to... i fail at it... I want to create work that is unique and something that I can really call my own, something fun and possibly humorous but I dont know why I'm doing this... I feel like i should be taking some risks and trying new things, screen printing was one of these things and I love it... but Im not utilising it as much as i could...

I have had many a conversation with friends, peers and staff/professionals about the whole "style" thing and I know that it will eventually develop but I think i'm understanding why no one true/real style of mine is showing through... because I can mimic almost any style I see or because I've often been asked to recreate/achieve a specific effect or style means I'm becoming a mac monkey... someone who has no creativity, just the technical skill...

This is all really depressing for me, purely because I want to be employable when I leave the course... but at the same time I dont know what I want to do when I'm finished... I enjoy working in many different areas and particularly I like working in a studio environment, where I can bounce ideas off of people and develop new ones... being part of an art collective seems more appealing to me along with a little bit of anonymity, where I can pursue my own ideas but also as I dont like having ALL the responsibility... I wouldnt want any pressure on my shoulders... call it fear/cowardice/lack of confidence but strangely the idea of me becoming an art director was suggested a while back... maybe this is because I do enjoy looking at others peoples work or because i can be quite diplomatic when it comes to giving criticism but I cant exactly walk into an art director position straight out of uni can i! :/

Anyway....

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this is the bag of shit I produced.... (the brief was to produce a cover and 2 spot illustrations for an article looking at social networking as well as its application to business and the economy)




the first feels unfinished because I cut a few corners in completing it and then the 2 other illustrations not only look crap but were executed in an equally shite way...
I think they look like a kids drawings, something i might have made years ago and would now look back on and cringe at.... but instead I have the cheek to call myself an illustrator..

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I was going to add a lot of my sketches to this post but I dont want it to be soo long that they are lost at the bottom of the page and never seen by anyone... (see next post)

2 comments:

  1. Shut the fuck up
    You have style, although I think your scared
    to show it,
    if this evokes a reponse:good it is needed.

    Stop comparing yourself and you will stop judging yourself.

    If you stop judging yourself, that's one less bar in the prison you've created for yourself.

    Then you can get on with being creative.

    Dont look at any Illustrators for a week or two, look at photography, films, read a fucking book and imagine the world and the characters.

    When I rant motherfucker, I motherfucking rant.

    On a side note, Im redoing my images because mine WERE SHIT & Im not happy with the slop I produced.
    They are not gonna get marked BUT I will be happy.

    ReplyDelete
  2. piss off, have a look at my recent post and you'll see what I mean about my work.. theres so many different ways that I can draw that I get lost in what to actually do... I cant decide... scared to show my style? if you can tell me which one that is then great...

    ive tried in these last couple of days to not look at any artistic reference and my girlfriend told me to take a break from it all too.. the problem is.. I usually draw in my spare time and so it feels like ive wasted time by not doing anything...

    ReplyDelete