Learning Outcomes for Visual Storytelling

1. Demonstrate a comprehensive and critical understanding of the techniques and methods relevant to visual storytelling in various contexts.

There are a number of ways to present a story visually: Key Moments, Storyboards, Colour Scripts, Teaser Ad campaigns and Posters. These are all excellent techniques to use when trying to sell your story idea or to present some of the methods as a way of "teasing" the audience to let them know what is coming. 

Depending on what genre your story is and what platform it will be presented on, for example games, animation, film etc. there will need to be a style for presenting your work that fits in well with the theme, genre and platform. 

An example of this is if you were to create an animation and needed storyboards, posters, colour scripts and key moments to present to a producer. All the artwork would need to look as if it was made for an animation. The style and colour of the drawings would need to demonstrate what kind of animation it would be. 

Consistency is important when it comes to any visual storytelling work that would be released to the public such as posters and teaser ads. They would need to have the same style and be recognisable as the same story. This is important so that people can recognise the story and anything that has been released previously to do with the story. 

Some elements of visual storytelling might have different quality of finishes depending on the intended audience. If the image is to be released to the public to promote the story, film or game, then a high finish is to be expected. However if the images purpose is to be presented to artists or producers within a studio then speed paints or artworks with a lesser quality of finish is fine.

2. Demonstrate a systematic and critical understanding of the breadth and depth of knowledge in a range of techniques and methods appropriate to the field of visual storytelling.

When it comes to displaying visual storytelling there are various techniques that can be used to communicate your idea. Below are some examples.

 Sketches set down visual ideas quickly and efficiently that can express and present your idea. Sketching down thumbnail drawings is a very important stage of any project, but a lot of time shouldn't be spent on this stage. It is important to sketch ideas quickly so that you can get as many ideas as possible to go on and develop them. Above are my sketches for my Teaser Ads and Key Moments.

Above are my Key Moments. As you can see they are of a much higher quality than the earlier sketches. These would be used to see: how the colour would be used, the style of the story, how the characters fit into their environment and to show a part of the story. These would be used for in-studio use to help everyone working on the story. They could be used to promote the story as well, but the poster and teaser ads would be better suited for this. 

This is the poster that I have created for this story. It is simple, yet intriguing. It shows light bursting out of the box which will make the audience wonder what exactly is in the box? A poster is a very large part of visual storytelling. It gives the audience the chance to see parts of the story or to tease them. Either way it pulls them in and can make them want more. A poster would have to be at the highest possible quality out of all other visual storytelling work.

3. Research and synthesise diverse visual materials to inform design solutions.

To make sure that I completed my work to my best ability, I had to do a lot of research before starting. 

For the teaser ads, I looked at a lot of examples from animation and film. I wanted to find what it was that made others successful and use them on my own work. 

They were all kept simple, with only a hint of the characters. They only showed parts of the characters that were recognisable or that showed an aspect of the story, for example the Madagascar characters peeking out from the water or Mike and Sulley from Monsters University lying on bunk beds. Everything shown on these teaser ads stick close to what will happen in their stories. 

4. Develop argued conclusions regarding industry and professional requirements.

When producing concept art professionally, there are a lot of factors that should be taken into consideration. 

We have been very fortunate to have had a number of people come in from industry that have talked about working professionally. One thing that every one of them told us was just how important it is to stick to the brief. It is no good changing the brief to fit your style or what you want to draw, they won't be happy and you might end up not getting paid as a result. They have asked for something that will fit with their brand or target group and as a concept artist it is our job to then complete the task they have asked for.

5. Plan and implement appropriate skills in the creation of visual work.

Below is the process of how I completed the Teaser Ad brief.

The brief stated that each teaser ad had to be half an A4 sheet so that it could be advertised in a magazine. I started off with my sketches. I looked closely at the research and used some of the layouts to influence my own ideas.  

 The last three images were developed from the sketches, however the feedback that I received suggested that I go back and do more sketches as none of these worked very well. 

I felt like I had developed the idea a bit further this time and was happier with my drawings.

I then chose the three that I thought worked best together and drew them out neater.

 Next I outlined them in Adobe Illustrator knowing that I was happy with their designs. 

The designs had been finalised and outlined, I then took them into Photoshop to colour them in. 

6. Systematically gather and evaluate information from a diverse range of sources relevant to visual storytelling.

It was very easy to find a wide range of sources that would help and influence my own visual storytelling work. 

Storyboards are completed in a wide variety of ways, and differ from studio to studio. They are made to help plan out camera angles, composition and to see how the film/animation will look when it's completed.

They can be drawn out very technically with lots of camera instructions and notes on, shown below. 


Some storyboards can also be drawn out very simply. They can just look like a sequence of images. Some studios prefer to do this and draw each frame out on bits of small card and then go on to pin these frames up on a board. I think this way of creating storyboards looks very attractive even though the frames don't have to be drawn out to a high standard.




7. Demonstrate independent learning and continued personal development.

Throughout this year at university, especially in this last term I feel that I have improved the quality of my artwork. I have collected a lot of art of books, looked a lot more at references on the internet and in books, and watched tutorials on Youtube. 

Below is an example of some of my work from the beginning of the year.

As you can see the line work is varied in size in inconsistent way. Everything about this piece of artwork is inconsistent and looks too simple. The environment doesn't look realistic at all, even for a cartoon. 

Above is a piece that I have worked on this term for Visual Storytelling. My line work has improved massively by getting advice and help from my lecturer, but also from looking at books and comics that have a cartoony style that uses varied line sizes. I have started using Adobe Illustrator to do my linework and have spent a lot of time practicing and exploring the program to improve my artwork. 

8. Reflect on practice and identify strengths and weaknesses in own work.

Shown below are some examples of my work that demonstrate strengths and weaknesses in my own work.

I am happy with this piece of work, however I know that there are sections that could do with some improvement. The expressions of the characters and the slight stretch of the hair are good and work well. The bodies have definitely improved compared to how I used to draw them and the "S" curves are plain to see and make the flow of the characters much more attractive. The background doesn't distract from the foreground too much and puts a sense of environment into the artwork. 

This poster isn't great, I looked at a lot of references and didn't seem to be able to use the information I gathered to influence my own work. The table that the box is sitting on looks out of place with the rest of the piece. I did struggle with this piece and it shows.

I believe this piece is one of my best for this visual storytelling module. The linework is strong in the character of the monk and the expression is strong and believable. The faces work well in the gang members, however the bodies let the piece down. 

Learning Outcomes for Concept Art Practice

1.  Demonstrate a critical understanding of business aspects of working as a concept artist including copyright issues pricing, and the rights of an artist.

When working as a concept artist, there are ethical and professional rules to abide by. It is important to sign a contract when undertaking any kind of work, whether it be freelance work or working for a studio as an employee. This way there will be a mutual understanding between both parties and details of pricing, the amount of work to be completed etc. will be declared and understood before any work is started. 

There are some guidelines that can be followed when it comes to pricing. For concept artists working on freelance projects they can be paid per hour or per piece of artwork. The client might decide which and include it in the contract or ask the artist for advice on which they would prefer. It is best to charge a lower rate when first starting out as a freelance concept artist. It is very competitive and charging a lower rate might help you locate more work. When pricing your work you should take into account the time spent and resources used. A usual working day is around 8 hours and to start out a price of £100-£200 would be a fair price to charge. 

As a concept artist you have to be very careful when it comes to copyright issues. Artists can be asked to sign a non-disclosure agreement to protect the idea or work of the client. Sometimes clients will allow you to use work you have completed for them for your own portfolio, but it is very important to ask permission before doing so. 

2.  Demonstrate a comprehensive knowledge and understanding of concepts, information and techniques at the forefront of Concept Art.  


Shown below is the process of creating concepts.

Mood boards to help find inspiration for my own idea.

Sketches to jot down ideas of body shapes and how the characters work together. 

Development and ideas of costumes and personalities of the characters.

Development of the individual characters; of body shapes and general look of the character.

That all lead to the finished piece.

3.  Review and critically appraise the complex concepts and professional practices which underpin the production of original imagery.

Below is some work that I have completed after putting together a moodboard of work to inspire my own ideas. 

Beauty and the Beast- I looked at animals, other versions of the story and rap artists for my moodboards. I felt that these were the most important aspects that I could use to inspire my own work. I think that these moodboards came in very useful and that you can see where I gathered my inspiration from and how it influenced my own work. 

Roman Brief- For the Roman brief I looked at a lot of different aspects of Roman history for my research. I gathered up a lot of images of different objects so that I could get an overall view of what made ancient Rome identifiable. I think you can definitely see where I was influenced and see how it effected my finished work. 

Neo Racer- I researched a lot into cartoon style cars from popular tv programs and films. I knew from the beginning that this was the look I wanted my finished piece to have. When viewing the mood board and the finished work together, I think it is clear to see how my research effected my finished artwork. 

4.  Critically reflect on the challenging and novel visual solutions to a brief.

One brief that I found particularly hard was the Roman brief. I have not had much experience of drawing historically correct artifacts or environments so knew that I would have to do a lot of research before starting. I also knew that the added electricity aspect would make it more challenging. 

After creating a mood board I felt more prepared to start sketching my ideas. I started with lots of sketches of chariots. I knew that I wanted to design a chariot that would charge electricity as it moved, so sketched ideas of shapes and parts of the chariot. Shown below is a page filled with all my starting ideas.

I had decided how I wanted the electricity to be generated, and in the bottom left hand side jotted down some sketches explaining it. I knew that I would be able to show it better in my final drawing, but knew I would have to do some more development before getting to that point. Below are some development drawings of the chariot.

 I was still focusing a lot on the shape of the chariot as I felt this was important. I also added the horse into the drawings to show how the electricity generated by the chariot could affect the overall improvement of the horse and chariot. Since these were still rough drawings, I knew that I needed to explore the idea better in colour and finished line drawings to get my idea across clearer. 

The image above is my finished artwork. After doing research into roman culture, sketching down ideas and developing them; while constantly checking them against my mood boards and other research to make sure they are feasible and believable, I maintained the electricity element and my own ideas. 

5.  Act autonomously in planning and implementing a Pitch Presentation’ at a professional level.

Shelley Page from Dreamworks set us a brief to redesign one character from a list of iconic characters. She returned after a period of time so that we could all present our finished work to her. As in industry, we had to pitch a presentation with the intention of selling her our ideas. Below is the pitch that I put together and presented to Shelley. 

Shelley loved my idea and thought it was very original and awarded me second place out of all the pitches in the class. I was also given some advice to develop the idea further and create more of a story to my idea as she thought it was good enough to be pitched to producers if there was more work to show my ideas. 

6.  Analyse and interpret challenging client briefs and produce relevant and original work in response.

Shown below is the work that I created for the Assassin's Creed brief that was set by Jack Couvela from Reflections, Ubisoft. 

I found this brief hard and very challenging because Jack wanted us to preserve the Assassin's Creed brand, come up with something original and also for our new idea to be historically accurate. As my style is cartoony I knew that I would struggle to preserve the brand in the way that Jack expected. After doing a lot of research I found that the white cape was very recognisable as part of the Assassin's Creed brand and that this should be something I should include in my own designs. 

One of the things Jack wanted us to produce was a model sheet of our character. It had to be drawn in the typical "T" pose or a 3/4 T pose, so that we could view what it would look like from the back, side and front for it to be passed onto modellers. 

This is my character sheet showing my designed character in a action pose that she could be shown in in the game, and also to show the colours of my final design. 

One of the deliverables was to create one mechanical asset. This could either be a vehicle, a weapon or another interesting prop. If it was a weapon, it had to be suitable for hand to hand combat or a limited projectile weapon. I designed an axe that I felt fitted the brief.

We also had to produce one typical building with hand holds for climbing as that is a major part of the Assassin's Creed games. I produced a whole village that fit in with the date and location that I chose for my idea. This shows how a character could climb, jump and navigate swiftly between buildings. 

7.  Explore and evaluate a range of visual responses to a brief.

Below are some pieces of work that I believe demonstrate the best visual responses to a brief. 

Assassin's Creed- This environment piece shows some detail, yet because of the cartoony style can also bend perspective and be rather vague with some of the other details. The colours also suggest a nighttime environment with cool colours to suggest a slightly darker mood to the piece. This piece also enabled me to practice using a limited colour palette.  

Neo Racer- This track design has a sense of depth to it to show how crazy, and wacky this racetrack could be. I needed to show some more of the track in background to demonstrate a bit more of the structure of the track, so being able to show distance in this piece was important. 




8.  Reflect on practice and recognise and critically appraise strengths and weaknesses.

Every piece of work that I have completed throughout this module has its own strengths and weaknesses. Having given careful consideration to all the feedback I have received on my work, I have applied this where appropriate to improve my work. Below are some examples of work that display strengths and weaknesses within my work.

This piece of work was completed for the Assassin's Creed brief. I was trying to make the character look like she was crouched on top of a rooftop and was supporting herself with her axe wedged into the roof. Feedback that I received for this work pointed out that the right arm is holding onto the axe doesn't work. The angle of the arm should be getting further away, yet it looks too close to the viewer. The way in which she is holding the axe also doesn't look realistic. Another weakness of this piece is the environment. I tried to make it look like it was silhouetted so that we could just focus on the character, however it doesn't match the character. If she had been coloured in very flat colours and looked more 2D then perhaps it would have fitted together and looked like a completed piece of work. 

I received very positive feedback for this piece of artwork. The characters are well designed and look attractive and entertaining. The line work could be stronger in some areas to demonstrate areas of shade and highlights. The size of the canvas could have been extended slightly so that I could have used that space to give a better sense of the environment that they are in. But overall this is one of my more successful pieces. Throughout the process of making this piece I have had a lot of feedback and that has been very helpful in guiding me to make improvements. 

This is one my less successful pieces of work. I tried to make a cartoon style car, but also tried to make it look realistic. I should have made it more stylised and over exaggerated the cartoonish style. One comment that was made about this car was that I should have stuck to the straight edge of the front screen as in my original sketch. If I had done that then it might have looked slightly more believable. When I did my research for this brief; I looked at very cartoony cars from Wacky Races. I think I should have used those kind of cars more for reference and used them to influence a wacky style in my own car. I think it would have been more successful if I had done that.