One of my favourite classes I've taken thus far has to be the Digital Illustration class offered at WCSU. Taught by Vicki Vebell during the fall semesters, this class can be taken in place of regular, analogue illustration. Since I am concentrating on Graphic Design, my advisor and I felt that this class was more appropriate for what I'd be doing in the future. Vicki was truly a pleasure to work with and motivates her students to stretch their work into areas previously unknown to them. As of writing, she is currently trying to expand this programme into a two-parter, with Digital Illustration II to continue on the principles taught in the first part.
Throughout the class, three projects were assigned, all with varied themes. The first was an illustration to coincide with an article about water conservation. The article explained that the world's most abundant natural resource is used to make many consumer items. The surprise came when a table was displayed showing exactly how much water was used to make something so simple. For example, eight gallons of water are needed to produce just one apple. For this project, I've hand-drawn and scanned in a cartoon version of myself, eating an apple, while my stomach inflates after consuming all the water needed to make that apple. My character is set in what looks like an outdoor grocery store, with a giant food tree sprouting from the chequered floor.
The second project consisted of making a poster displaying the "Best of Connecticut." Mainly a photo collage of various places in the state I've photographed throughout the years, this project stretched the normality of a regular photo collage a bit using various filters and modes. Set driving down I-84 and entering the state in Danbury, one can see the classic New England landscape of Madison Beach to the top left and lower right corners, the quaint restaurants of Bethel on the top right, as well as the industrial feel of the factories of Shelton to the left and the outside of historic White Hall on the back of the lorry.
The third and final project consisted of designing an album cover for our favourite music artist. Set to the dimensions of a 5"x5" compact disc cover, I've designed a cover for a fictional Duran Duran Greatest Hits album, showcasing their hits of the original line-up from 1980-85. Suggesting to look like a page of a fan's scrap-book, this cover makes use of photographs of the band, shown to look like they were taken on a Polaroid 600 camera. The photographs are left floating however, as the shadows are the only indication that a Polaroid picture is there. 35mm negatives flow downward to suggest more pictures taken whilst at a concert perhaps. Various lyrics from songs are hand written in lip-stick, crayon, oil pastel and Sharpie marker and lie on top of and behind the photographs.
