Learning Plan

In terms of what I hope to achieve this year, I think the main one is to continue being experimental and not limiting myself to one specialism. I've decided I want to do the Children's Book Illustration MA at Anglia Ruskin University as it will bring so many opportunities and push me out of my comfort zone to live in a new city. Both personally and professionally it will help me meet like-minded people with similar goals so I'm working towards producing a portfolio of work with lots of observational drawings. This is something I started over the summer and can add to this year. I want to be continually thinking about the narrative element in my illustrations and how characters interact in a scene, this will increase my confidence in storytelling. In the last few years, I've realised how much of a role experimentation plays in my work; it's usually where the best ideas are formed and I end up enjoying what I'm creating more so my goal for this year is to push myself to try new processes. Luckily, I'm pretty good with time management and manage to dedicate weeks to playing with materials and processes like Riso and printmaking. 

Monoprint I worked on over the summer

Skills, Knowledge, Experience Acquisition and Application

Last year, the projects were very mixed, from editorial to character design and commercial illustration. I'm glad this course is so varied and allows us to develop skills both traditionally and digitally. This has helped me become better at using Illustrator and InDesign but I want to utilise this year with the freedom to plan my own projects based on processes I love and the type of work I want to be producing in the future. The main one is printmaking. I love exploring traditional printing processes like etching and monoprint so all of my projects have elements of print involved. From years of experience printing, I already have a good understanding of many processes but I want to get more comfortable with riso, taking the time to understand layering colours- not that riso ever behaves how you think it's going to! Many of my projects focus on refining traditional skills but I also want to get better at digital painting in Photoshop. This could include watching tutorials on Skillshare or finding books that will help me understand the process better.

Izzy Burton, digital paintings, 2021

Izzy Burton is an director at Netflix and artist I follow on Instagram who recently release a Domestika course ("Cinematic Digital Illustration with Photoshop" - Illustration online course by Izzy Burton | Domestika, 2021) that I'd love to do. It focuses on creating cinematic scenes inspired by your surroundings, looking at how light sources and perspective can bring a composition to life. This would be a great way for me to get better at digital painting in Photoshop. 

I also found lots of courses on Skillshare that I'd like to do like this one on creating simple character animations (Character Animation Basics: Create a Dance Loop with After Effects and Photoshop, 2021). I've never tried animation so it would be fun to try and animate some of my characters. 

My tutor mentioned a screenprinting workshop at some point through semester 1 so I'm looking forward to that as it's a process I'd love to learn more about and utilise in my work. I've found that most of my inspiration comes from travel and exploring nature as I love to document trips by taking photos to refer to. Whether it's colour schemes, lighting, composition, or atmosphere, I like taking inspiration from real life into my work as it then has a deeper meaning and narrative conveyed to the audience. This is something I've learnt over my degree; helping me figure out how I want to progress as an illustrator. I've chosen to use one of my personal projects to focus on observational drawing, similar to the work I was doing over the summer (see previous 'Summer Reflections' post). Taking this into consideration, it'll be good for me to take trips to different places this year to collect primary imagery and inspiration for my projects. I think it's important to have a solid foundation before starting a project, taking the time to figure out the theme and how to approach it in a way that will benefit my practice.

Processes and Methods

Although my degree has been somewhat altered by the pandemic, especially last year with limited access to the studio and more online teaching, I feel I've utilises the time well. In a way, I think having my own space and working from home gave me more time to produce both personal and project work going out and doing more observational drawings and playing around with different printmaking processes on my small printing press at home. This allowed me to explore more ideas and processes outside of project work. I want to continue to make more time for this as it will help me develop and become more confident in generating ideas. This year I look forward to taking more inspiration from trips and real life into my illustrations, giving them more personality which will reflect on the audience. Especially with future book projects, I plan to go to Iceland soon for my birthday so it would be great to use my experience as research for a children's book.

In terms of workflow for this year, I plan to overlap personal and commercial projects in both semesters to generate new ideas and have multiple focuses, while working on this blog and uploading my progression weekly. I found with some projects that the research takes up a large portion of a 6-week project so I've made them longer as there's always room to develop a project further at the end. This way, it will take the pressure of shorter timeframes and allow me to work on multiple projects, streamlining ideas and inspiration into each of them.

I also want to get better at full illustrations, combining traditional textures in Photoshop to create scenes. Jon Klassen is an illustrator I love who uses this process, creating depth and texture in a simple environment. These are scenes from one of his newest books, 'The Rock From The Sky' (Klassen, 2021).

Observational sketchbook spread, 2021

'The Rock from the Sky', Jon Klassen, 2021

Possible Collaborators

This year I've chosen to work on the AOI World Illustration Awards and Macmillan Prize for Illustration competitions. I worked with the Macmillan brief for my final project last year but only had a few weeks to enter and produce the artwork, therefore I'd love to utilise the longer time frame and explore alternative story concepts and production methods. I've chosen the AOI competition as it's one I haven't previously worked on and has always been one I've wanted to take part in. It's a highly renowned competition in the creative industry, popular among students and young people as it's good for networking and building upon your portfolio. The competition is judged by industry professionals, so it is a great opportunity to get your work seen with a chance of it being chosen among the 500 projects longlisted each year. 

I'm aiming to work on a personal and live brief simultaneously to give myself more time for each project and bounce ideas between the two. My tutor is keen to put on two exhibitions throughout the year so I'd love to be involved in these as it will help me boost my confidence in talking about my work and networking with possible clients. I've never collaborated with other artists so this could be interesting to look at; possibly joining with someone on the Photography or Fine Art degree. I have a friend at Northumbria University doing Interior Architecture so I could work with her to design a print collection.

Commercial Context related to your progression into industry

While children's book illustration is my main specialism, I want to explore more traditional printmaking methods and work towards bridging the two to help define my style. I'm excited to start this year and plan out my personal and commercial projects towards creating my portfolio book and final exhibition at the end of the year. As mentioned earlier I'm considering progressing onto a Masters in Children's Book Illustration (Children's Book Illustration MA degree course - MA - ARU, 2021) so I'm busy deciding whether that's the right step and making a portfolio in the process as the interview and portfolio reviews could start as early as January next year. It would be a big step for me to move to Cambridge but I think it would be an amazing opportunity to meet different people and make connections that will benefit my future career. Observational drawing is a huge portion of what they want in a portfolio, taking inspiration from the world around you, so I'll be working towards getting a portfolio prepared whether I decide to go or take a different route. I follow a lot of artists who are current or past students on the course so in a way already feel like it on it! 

Illustration work from Frances Ives, currently on the 'Children's Book Illustration' course

Possible sources of research

List of resources to use throughout the year:

• Pictoplasma Online Conference 2021 (Berlin | Pictoplasma Conference 2021, 2021)
• Little White Lies magazine editions, Edition 71 in particular (Little White Lies, 2017)
• Character Design Quarterly (Character Design Quarterly, 2021)
• Domestika and Skillshare courses on Illustration and Animation
• Inktober 2021
• Seven Stories
• Yorkshire Sculpture Park
• Gallery visits and artist research, possibly The National Gallery, taking influence from different movements like impressionism

I'm also going to London in November for my birthday and planning to go to The National Gallery (The National Gallery, London, 2021). I've never been so am excited to see some different artwork- especially Monet if I get to see any of his paintings there. Closer to home, I've recently visited The Old School Gallery in Alnmouth to see the Sue Asbury exhibition (Sue Asbury, 2021) which was an amazing exhibition showcasing local talent. Asbury has the ability to capture such beautiful compositions with distinct ways to add light and depth. I also got the submissions email there as I'd love to make some prints to sell there.

The Old School Gallery, Alnmouth. A gallery with similar printwork to what I'm producing, a great place to look at for after graduation to be more involved with and possibly sell some prints.

Anticipated Problems or Needs/Access to Resources

I'm constantly pushing myself to learn more as there are so many things I want to try, such as pottery, screen-print, large-scale painting while testing new materials and working on university projects, I know this is the time to experiment and figure out what I enjoy doing. Something I want to utilise this year is the risoprinter, figuring out new colour schemes and learning more about the process. Riso is growing in popularity and a great way to reproduce commercial prints so it will be good working towards my final exhibition where I could look at selling prints or making riso-printed postcards. While being experimental is a good trait to have, it can sometimes be overwhelming as I feel guilty when I'm not creating. I need to learn the importance of taking time out to reset and stop thinking about future goals over where I am now. Overall, I'm looking forward to starting this year and getting back into using the riso printer and having more communication in studio.

Bibliography

Domestika. 2021. "Cinematic Digital Illustration with Photoshop" - Illustration online course by Izzy Burton | Domestika. [online] Available at: <https://www.domestika.org/en/courses/2699-cinematic-digital-illustration-with-photoshop> [Accessed 2 October 2021].

Skillshare. 2021. Character Animation Basics: Create a Dance Loop with After Effects and Photoshop. [online] Available at: <https://www.skillshare.com/classes/Character-Animation-Basics-Create-a-Dance-Loop-with-After-Effects-and-Photoshop/1590736356?via=homepage> [Accessed 2 October 2021].

Domestika. 2021. Domestika. [online] Available at: <https://www.domestika.org/en> [Accessed 2 October 2021].

Skillshare.com. 2021. [online] Available at: <https://www.skillshare.com/?via=header> [Accessed 2 October 2021].

Aru.ac.uk. 2021. Children's Book Illustration MA degree course - MA - ARU. [online] Available at: <https://aru.ac.uk/study/postgraduate/childrens-book-illustration> [Accessed 5 October 2021]. 

Art of the Picture Book. 2021. ROCK FROM SKY — Art of the Picture Book. [online] Available at: <https://www.artofthepicturebook.com/rock-from-sky> [Accessed 3 October 2021].

Klassen, J., 2021. The Rock From The Sky.Aru.ac.uk. 2021. Children's Book Illustration MA degree course - MA - ARU. [online] Available at: <https://aru.ac.uk/study/postgraduate/childrens-book-illustration#applynow_panel> [Accessed 3 October 2021].

Instagram.com. 2021. Frances Ives. [online] Available at: <https://www.instagram.com/francesives/?hl=en> [Accessed 3 October 2021].

Pictoplasma Conference. 2021. Berlin | Pictoplasma Conference 2021. [online] Available at: <https://conference.pictoplasma.com/> [Accessed 3 October 2021].

3dtotal shop. 2021. Character Design Quarterly Backissues. [online] Available at: <https://store.3dtotal.com/collections/character-design-quarterly-backissues> [Accessed 3 October 2021].

Nationalgallery.org.uk. 2021. The National Gallery, London. [online] Available at: <https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/?gclid=CjwKCAjwqeWKBhBFEiwABo_XBpZ0p2x716-kd9S43JSo-95XNSAQYtLySsG9zJSu73xvF6GnHhiqcBoClBUQAvD_BwE> [Accessed 3 October 2021].

The Old School Gallery | Alnmouth. 2021. Sue Asbury. [online] Available at: <https://theoldschoolgallery.co.uk/sue-asbury/> [Accessed 3 October 2021].