New and Old technologies working together to make art

New and old Art

Last Friday, we tried something we've never done before on Cartoon & Comic Arts. That was introducing the students to a 3D programme called Mudbox by Autodesk. A vast amount of the students on the award have never used Photoshop let alone a 3d package. But undeterred by this we attempted to do it anyway. 

The aim is to get them to do something traditional and then incorporate new technologies to show them how it can help to improve their work.

Obviously some of them to to it like ducks to water - others it was a little harder. 

Portrait Drawing 

The other thing we did was to do portrait drawings, unfortunately I sprained my hand the other evening, which made the whole teaching task very hard. But I think I got the message over. 

More importantly, it was an opportunity for the students to do the Cartoon & Comic Arts Mantra - Draw....Draw.... Draw. 

The Idea is to get the students to build on their core skills that were developed in the first semester. Where we encouraged them to design characters then to build the models out of Plasticine.

From the images below you'll see that some of them aren't that bad an artist. 

This time we are going ask them to try and model their portraits using the 3d Software.

 

 

Now we quickly realised that between the drawing and the 3d modelling there is potentially a lot that can go wrong. But education at this level you don't always get the answer you expect. It is about taking the students out of their comfort zone and pushing them. So in the next few weeks it will be interesting to see what develops. 

 


It's already interesting to note that the students who haven't done any art foundation are the stubborn ones who wont push themselves. And see any 

 

 

 

Studio Redecoration

Studio Redecoration 

We thought it might be an idea to redecorate the studio space. With over 35 new students in September there was amply opportunity and labour to do the work. 

The 1st years were give the chance to do some research of comic characters from around the world. They picked one and painted it on the wall 

Sam (NOVA) Pye did...NOVA

Not sure what Charlie is doing here, but we caught her in the act 

This is the 3rd year area, where the geniuses of Rob Beiganski and Brad Sharples hang out 

The other corner is occupied by the Shy and retiring Nadia William, the not to shy Holly McCormack and Emily Moore 

2nd year area with Tony and Paul working on their project for sale at Londons MCM in MAY

Down the corridor towards my office.

Caught the labs Michael Leyland, Nial Conner and Rory Bond painting on the walls, or is it graffiti? 

1st Year Comic work

Halloween covers by First year students 

Above is the winner of the front cover of the Halloween comic by Danielle Bray. Some really nice work. It was chosen because of the sense of colour 

Special mention goes to Jamal who created the above comic strip 

Winner of Halloween comic 2 was Hayley Kershaw 

Ollie produced the above picture, I'm still thinking what punishment to give him 

Life Drawing with a difference

Ariel and Pole Society lend a hand 

The Cartoon & Comic Arts award was lucky to be able to have some assistance from the Staffordshire University Student Union Society The Ariel and Pole Society.

We organised a class where we aimed at getting the student to draw dynamic poses. As you can imagine it is quite hard to get people to hoover above the ground in a pose. That is until you use the help of the society and its members who use a pole for fitness. This killed two birds with one stone (so to speak) as it enabled the dedicated fitness enthusiasts an opportunity to practice their skills and at the same time enabled the comic artist a chance to quickly sketch the pose as they held it for as long as possible.

Doing this made it so the student didn't have time to over think the work, they had seconds to capture the body in the air. So you could sketch and pick at your work. You had to be strong and bold, and it forced the student to make a decision and put the mark down on the paper.

Overall we were very happy with the end results.    

Sculpture work by first year Comic Art students

Sculpture work 

Working with Becci Such the first years started to develop their character sheets with the idea that they were going then use these 2D images and make a plasticine character. So understanding how these 2D drawn images could be fleshed out and developed to create some impressive characters.

The idea is to open the cartoonist mind up to realise where this type of work can be used. So we all know that you go into forbidden Planet and there are an array of toys and figurine of our favourite characters for sale in the shop. 
It also provides the artist with a reference object to help them draw. So now they can draw their character from a range of different angles and positions.