reflection

[vrgatoreflection]

08/03

Today was the new semester’s first project launch. Ever since our first class with Lauren, I was already very excited about the Illustration pathway - since it is the reason I chose to study at EBAC in the first place. The warmup exercises are often easy for me because I usually draw very quickly, but I wasn’t exactly happy with the results. Lauren read quotes about drawing being about hierarchy and what you choose to represent, and I felt I had chosen the wrong things, or rather the wrong way to do so. But that’s upon second glance because when I first drew them, I was satisfied. Maybe that came from comparing my results with that of others, which can be useful, but this time it only made me feel incompetent. The positive side of that feeling of incompetence was that it motivated me to complete all nine daily drawings for this project. Illustration projects such as these make me want to prove myself and be a better artist, and though it can be stressful, I like feeling challenged sometimes.     I decided to start by working with my most familiar materials and techniques, such as watercolors and stylized manga, to get in the flow more easily. It worked well in the sense that throughout the day, I challenged myself more with each drawing. I even made a spontaneous collage, which is unusual for me. And as I completed these tasks, I became more inspired and was proud of all of my results, even the weakest ones.

[vrgatoreflection]

SECOND SEMESTER

[vrgatoreflection]

04/01/2021

This Christmas recess wasn’t as productive as I would have liked, but I’m still proud of what I’ve done so far. I always knew that during the holidays I wasn’t going to be able to do much since there’s family and parties, and they mostly happen out of town where there isn’t a lot of internet connection.

But my only outcome left to complete was the Observe sketchbook, and during my time on the countryside I saw some really beautiful things I don’t usually do when I’m home. It was a very good time for me to draw in peace and see a lot of different shapes and colours than the ones in the city.

Once I returned home, I focused on the rest of the project processes I still wasn’t done with, mainly research. I made a huge mistake by leaving a significant part of my research for the last minute. Not only it was very stressful to have to complete it in a shorter amount of time, but it also prevented me from using a lot of valuable information while working on my outcomes before. I really regret this decision and for next semester I seriously have to come up with better time management skills that fit the BA format.

[vrgatoreflection]

18/12

Things didn’t go out as I intended at the beginning of the week. As I had mentioned, there was a lot in my plate. My plan was to ignore my personal life issues until I delivered everything today, but things just don’t work out that way a lot of the time. My anxiety got completely out of hand as the week went by, and by Thursday (yesterday) I wasn’t being able to do anything without having a meltdown. I spent the day at the print shop and could only get a few drawings done; Marcelo only showed up after lunch so I had to print digitally the posters for Research Frameworks I was planning on screen-printing, and after this I just spiralled down until I just went home since I couldn’t get a single thing done. In the same day I was supposed to finish off all research I still had to do, but instead I ended my relationship of four years.

So, on Friday, I didn’t have everything ready. I was very sad about this, because I was looking forward to delivering everything before Christmas, also because I’m going on a trip on January 11th. But I was able to talk to Jaygo and he told me I can deliver on January 8th, before going away. I didn’t want it to turn out like this but Ill make the most of it.

[vrgatoreflection]

13/12

So, five days until my hand-in date. And here I am, still alive somehow.

This last week was very intense, and it started with some very intense planning but a not so-enthusiastic following of such plan. But I think that’s due to the fact that, although I had planned to finish both Hollywood Bling and Observe this week, the first took way more time than I ever expected.

Since I first started this rotoscope I had put a lot of pressure on myself to make the best work I possibly could, since it’s something that does correlate a lot with the things I like to do and I’m good at. I wasn’t happy with anything I did or thought about, and I know now what was primarily lacking, which is research. Getting the hang of this project structure had a huge impact on my process which prioritize research before actually starting on the actual outcome. There were some references that were really helpful for this animation, but if I had done more careful research first, I might have been able to complete it way faster and probably have an even better result. But through changing my mind million times I inevitably ended up with something I liked. That was scheduled to happen on Wednesday, however, and I only finished on Friday.

That was also because, on Wednesday, I was animating but really hating everything that was coming out of that (due to what I previously said). So, I decided to take a break to do something else; and because I had a printing workshop with Danilo the next day, I figured I might as well get the projects I’m going to print all ready! And there was one thing missing in one of them: I was really dissatisfied with the cover for my Alternative Stories zine. The colours were all wrong, the silhouettes were way too simplistic, and I had luckily already found an image to use on my tracing for the new cover! Na amazing image that I thought really summed up the story without giving away any pieces of the narrative (like a good cover). So, I spent a few hours on it, and I was so proud of it when I finished. Although I did use time I had planned to use for my animation, I would have to work on that cover sometime, and the result got so good it evened things out.

I had also planned on working on the Observe sketchbook. I was so excited about this project at first but I really let it get past me, so now I have to make up for the lost time. I did do a few drawings – mostly portraits, which are the easiest for me – but there’s still a lot to do. These tasks are so inside of my comfort zone that I really took this project for granted, way too much. I will be struggling a bit everyday until the hand-in in order to complete it to the best of my ability.  

To top things off there was a lot of personal stuff going on this week. Major life changes, meltdowns and serious conversations, which began to pile up into stress, combined with school related stress, and the stress of work. Because aside from all the drama and all the school work, I also had to work on a freelancing gig and on some flash sheets for a flash tattoo day that happened on the 12th, in which I worked all day from 12 to 9pm. So, pretty rough stuff, but I’m still up, and I’m going to put everything I can into this week to wrap up the semester as best as I can.

[vrgatoreflection]

Data Space - 13/12 Update

This project gave me a similar reaction than Time Designed. The launch and the first workshop were very exciting. I didn’t get to bring a lot of stuff because I didn’t want to mess with my parents' belongings, so I only brought objects I could find around my own room. I was lucky that Lucas got to bring a lot of things and him and I were on the same group for the morning, and we decided to work with colour since all the objects there were very bright coloured, so the arrangements we made were very successful. It’s so fun to see so many different stuff colour coded and brought into the same category. I think that produces some very nice results. Recording and documenting the process was a little tricky, so there isn’t a lot of process footage but rather pictures of the outcomes.

It was nice seeing a project get the class together, even if the class consists of only 5 of us and Jaygo. It’s something I miss a lot and we got to experience a little with this workshop.

The actual confusing part of this project is, again, the expected outcome, which is a video. I’m not familiar at all with video, but even if I were, I think there are so many other interesting ways we could be able to explore the organizing of data in. But there wasn’t a lot I could do so I just attended the premiere lecture, which was a total disaster (for me). Software lectures are already a pain, but on zoom? I can barely focus on the class, let alone on the task at the same time, considering its Premiere which I have almost no experience with. So, it didn’t help me. At all.

Now, I have two ways I can go about this: I can either sit in front of Premiere for a few excruciating hours and figure something out (I should be able to do that), or I can find some other tool for editing video - something a little more intuitive, I hope. Unfortunately, if I follow the plan I set up for the next weeks, I will have time to tackle this project only in my last week, so maybe there won’t be much of a choice there.

[vrgatoreflection]

Time Designed - 10/12 Update

This was a very unusual project. By the time it started we had been given a week to catch up, and it had been all good and fun - I was in fact able to catch up quite a lot with the other pending projects - and now had another project to tackle. I got excited while watching the launch presentation because the concept seemed very interesting and I liked the references Jaygo showed us. I like seeing internet culture in the briefs because it’s something I feel close with.

But once I learned about I what we were actually supposed to do - the video with the letters - I suddenly wasn’t as interested anymore. That’s because the presentation had given me a lot of inspiration to create something out of my own interpretation of concept of Time Designed. I wanted to make a more personal outcome; it seems I’ve been lacking one of those throughout this semester and I miss having briefs with a little more room for interpretation.

But when it came the time to actually produce my outcomes, I conformed quickly. I really wanted to finish this project as soon as possible once I realised, I could finish it fast and not let it drag through another week or more. Although the software was very confusing, I found the whole premise easy enough to execute. I ended up choosing the letters H and O, because when I first thought of this combination, I thought it would be pretty hard to combine, but after seeing some examples I realised it was actually very interesting thinking about how such different letterforms could interact.

I looked into some fonts in which the letterforms would fit nicely into each other, and realised the san serif ones would probably work best. At first, I had thought about making something minimalistic, because that’s how I usually work with type, but considering the black background, I decided to slap into some colour to make the videos pop. I should have put more thought into the designs that I chose, because in the end they were very easy and quick to make, and although this isn’t necessarily bad, that’s never how I like to handle my assignments.

However, finishing this project quickly on the spot was a very smart move. Maybe the outcome isn’t as good as it could be, but spending less time on it allowed me to focus on other tasks that had just as much importance. Thinking of that, decided that if I get any spare time at all before the hand-in date, which is in 8 days, I will go back to take a closer look into this project.

[vrgatoreflection]

Luxury Goods Update - 04/12

This was a project that started off with the wrong foot, but in the end, it turned out even better than I could have ever expected. I think maybe it’s because it was a group project, and although I don’t usually have trouble working with other people (especially people I already know), I hate being dependent and having to rely on them in order to complete an assignment.

When the project launched, I formed a group with a very close friend and one other person I don’t know very well. My friend really likes the “kitsch” aesthetics, and so do I, so we went in that direction and collected a lot of cheap and tacky objects from the studio and from the grocery store. I wasn’t really sure what to bring, but it turned out we had just what we needed as we decided to mix these cheap objects and food with luxury brand boxes and bags, to create a kind of contrast.

I was happy with this idea, but as we were going to develop and photograph it on Thursday, my friend didn’t come to school, so I was left with less objects and another partner who wasn’t doing anything. I panicked, a lot, and even had a mild meltdown in the restroom. I felt I had no group and that I couldn’t do this project by myself. The pressure had built up and I needed help, so I called my friend Isa and we decided to continue the project together. But first, I had to calm down.

So, I went to Isa’s house and she helped me with the personal stuff that was also clouding my mind at the moment. Me and her decided to shift the focus of the project to a cult/altar aesthetic because it’s something that interests us both and thus, we had a lot to work from. I’m so grateful for her. The shoot was very fun and because we get along very well, we were able to discuss the ideas we already had in order to organize our set. We also took turns photographing and I think that allowed for a bigger variety of perspectives and thus, results.

Isa was the one to edit the photos for the final outcome. I don't have basically any experience with photo editing, so it was better to let her do it, since we wanted to finish this project soon instead of letting it drag through the next weeks. I will try to learn this skill eventually and use it in other projects though.

[vrgatoreflection]

Hollywood Bling Update - 03/12

I am very excited about this project since the day it started. I'm not onto the specifics of animation, the math and all the boring stuff, but 2D animation and cartoons were where my interest in art first started when I was, like, three. Also, I remember seeing the other years BA students working on their own rotoscope project, and looking at the final video they all made, and thinking "wow, BA is so cool". So, this is a project I’ve been looking forward to for a long time.

I read the brief and I was very excited and I remained excited during the launch day when we made the little group animation. Jaygo told me, upon seeing my storyboards, I had an animator mindset or something like that, and I was really flattered. My storyboard did look good, but I think it came from my interest and skills in illustration, really. I was happy with my results, but when it came to actually drawing on top of the video were using, I think it’s safe to say I panicked a little.

I felt the lyrics had little potential for illustration, as the song is more about abstract concepts, so I decided to do my own thing and draw the stuff that I like to draw. This is also because everyone in the class will have their share of video time, so I figured I have to make the most out of mine so it really looks like Me amidst everyone else's works. Thinking of that, it seemed pretty obvious what to start with; she had her finger pointing out, and to me, rotoscoping is the most effective when it explores the footage well. So, I had to draw my favourite thing flowing out of the girl's finger: little ghosts! Ghosts are a bit of a staple for me since I made my Foundation project about them.

So, since I was going to use my favourite themes, I had to come up with more stuff for the remaining frames after she took her finger down... But to be quite honest, it’s been a month and I still haven’t figured anything out. This is one of the projects I put the most pressure on myself about, since it’s so interesting and I know I can do something I really love. But now that the deadline is coming in two weeks, there’s really no time to waste. I will gather references and do my best with the time I’ve got.

[vrgatoreflection]

Type and Language Update - 03/12

I really love typography, but type projects usually take me a long time to complete. I keep procrastinating on them! And this time wasn’t very different.

But the workshops were really interesting. Coincidentally, this was the first project after the hybrid system started so I got to attend the launch day in person, and that made all the difference. Attending the collage workshop from home would be borderline impossible (at least for me), because I'd have lost all focus. I was happy with my results. I think I should have experimented more, gone a little crazier. Everyone, even tutors, tend to tell me to do so, because I tend to keep very neat, and that’s good in itself but it keeps me from expanding my work beyond it.

It became very clear during the week what we were supposed to do, regarding the three posters, and I really wasn’t confused or nervous about this assignment. It just felt a little... Not boring, but I wasn’t excited about it in the slightest. So, I let it slip through the weeks until I had an assessment conversation with Jaygo. We were going over all projects and this lone stood out as being the one I was most behind on. That made me very nervous and (finally) got me moving somewhere.

I chose the posters to grid in the most unimpressive way: I merely picked out the ones I liked the most. It turned out they were mostly very minimalistic, but what can I say? I actually like that kind of stuff, especially if I had to do an all-type poster based on them. I had a day where I organized all my little project books in which I made those grids, but then I neglected it for a few more weeks. I can’t tell for sure, but I think it’s because it’s a relatively ''easy'' project that I knew would take me little time to complete, so I kept pushing it further and further.

 Until last week when I finally was able to start my reflection and do some actual planning after two months of neglect due to stress. I decided I would make the most out of the four weeks I had left before the 18th of December hand-in, so this project was one of the things I decided to tackle first, since it would be quick to solve. And it really was! I just downloaded the pre-selected posters, the fonts, and got to work.

 I love working with minimalistic type, especially sans serif, because of my need for my work to feel neat and organized. And I think I managed to do just that: turn already minimalistic posters into the most minimal versions of themselves. But I also added a little twist to the ones that had circles as graphic elements; I wanted to make circles out of type, so I just watched a quick tutorial on YouTube and figured out a way, so then my posters are 100% black and white and type. I'm very happy about these results, and I will print them with Danilo soon.

[vrgatoreflection]

Alternative Stories Update - 03/12

Project 3 might have been my best one so far. Since first reading the brief I knew this was going to be a project I would be able to handle very well. I'm used to working with narratives and creating visual representations of them. During the last vacation period I experimented a lot with comics, and found my art style has a lot to do with this format. I also met a lot of amazing comic artists online, so this project was something I could dive right into with a lot of baggage.

I chose Snake rattles immediately because of the name, because I thought it sounded edgier than any of the other ones, but as it turns out I ended up really liking the narrative, and it was actually pretty easy for me to form an idea of how I wanted to represent it. I was lucky to be in a group with friends of mine because it always helps me to be able to discuss my ideas better. We gathered some very interesting images that would be my lasting references for my illustrations, adding a lot of emphasis on the environment and the characters. That was especially important to me because I had already decided not to use any words.

That decision was based on the story itself. It mentions the desert, the distance and the isolation which is the context one of the characters is inserted in. There was really no space for dialogue in a story that is all about different ways of communicating. So, I used the references we collected as a group to start building up that world, but then I realised I didn’t want to make something too obvious. I had been observing some artists on Instagram that I really admire, and realised a lot of them used tracing as a resource for effective storytelling.

Tracing can be a little controverse, I know, and I hesitated a lot in using it. But the narrative and the things I wanted to talk about... They just didn’t seem to fit with my usual style which usually tends to look more cartoonish. It's not that I wanted realism, but I wanted the subject to be more important than how it was portrayed, so tracing felt like the perfect way to achieve that. I would also be able to use the images I had already spent time collecting and that fit perfectly with how I wanted the backgrounds and characters to look.

But tracing can look a little boring if I would just trace a picture and leave it be. So, I decided to add some texture by making the backgrounds traditionally with oil pastels. I love oil pastels because of how pigmented they are and how well the colours blend into each other, which is pretty good considering I was using them to illustrate skyscapes. I was pretty happy with how well the digital tracing illustrations and the traditional backgrounds blended together to create the finished pages.

My only problems now, that the zine is pretty much ready, are the covers. I made the covers with basically the same principle of the other pages, but I didn’t want to give away any elements of the story so I kept only the most boring elements in contrast with a skyscape that turned out not very good (I don’t like the colours I chose for it). But I may have managed to find another interesting image I could maybe use for it instead of what I have now. I have to test it still, but I definitely won’t print it as it is now. I want to have this figured out up until next Wednesday since next Thursday I'm having a tutorial with Danilo in order to print it as best as I can, especially since colours are so important.

[vrgatoreflection]

Research Frameworks Update - 02/12

This was yet another project that had a pretty great start. At first, I wasn’t very enthusiastic about a research-based project because research is the less practical part of a project and that sometimes makes it less interesting. But I was happy with the way the project was conducted, starting from a quote. I chose the Kurt Cobain one (they laugh at me because I’m different I laugh because they’re all the same). It's very tacky, but it's something my younger self would probably relate to a lot, and I thought I could easily connect it to subcultures and music, since it’s from a grunge artist and that's a subject I'm really interested in.

 But my thought path changed fast. Fred suggested me to look at some avant-garde art and movements which challenged the concept of ''Art'' at their time, so I looked into a few I could think of. But then my brain took yet another direction. Because of Kurt Cobain, I remembered his wife, Courtney Love, who was a pioneer in the kinderwhore movement. I'm really attracted to the concept of kinderwhore and went to do some research on it. It consists on taking the most constraining parts of femininity and subverting them through fashion, and it translated a lot on music onto what became known as riot grrrl music, a derivative from punk rock. I love punk music, and have for a long time, so I took this opportunity to research a little more into riot grrrl, since women have always been so overlooked in the movement since its very roots.

 This led me to the concept as the female as the non-male, the second sex, the male as default. I have a lot of curiosity around this idea and I usually like observing how it manifests in society, so I investigated how it manifested in art. There are a lot of female artists talking about this, talking about being invisible, and I was delighted to see it since it’s probably my favourite feminist concept. Nonetheless, I decided to stick to riot grrrl and its derivatives; it’s not merely a music-based subculture, but an independent art based one as well.

 Seeing how I was supposed to create something out of this research, I thought initially about making a zine, since it’s a punk staple and its super easy and cheap to make. To be completely honest I haven’t completely discarded this idea yet, since it’s very relevant to the entire research, but I have already made a zine for project 3 and I wanted to explore something different as this project’s outcome. I talked to Jaygo a few weeks ago and started considering a collage that I would print in the print room with Marcelo. I’m thinking about taking a lot of staple riot grrrl imagery and text and combining them into a poster (or even a zine that turns into a poster) that I would proceed to glue around downtown.

 However, I haven’t been paying virtually no attention to this project as the next ones kept coming, so I haven’t experimented at all yet and that what I need now in order to make this decision. I intend to do this sometime soon.

[vrgatoreflection]

Observe Update -  25/11

Observe was initially a project I felt very comfortable with, since drawing is my main medium and the proposal to work with a lot of different materials was something I was already planning on doing to challenge myself. I started off really excited, and I felt like drawing everything in my sight, so I drew stuff from my room, stuff that wasn't even on the prompt list, but that just felt interesting to me, like the colourful tiles in my bathroom. I tried focusing in the prompt list a bit more, after, especially the ones that regarded buildings.

I'm a huge fan of cycling around my neighbourhood so some of the prompts reminded me instantly of some of the houses I see regularly, so I went off with my bike to draw them. I'm not as fond of the results because I like to put a little more care into my work, and drawing on the sidewalk in the sun isn't the most comfortable way to do so. But in retrospect I think it adds to prompt the experience, and I can always enhance them a little afterwards. That also depends on the material I choose to work with. There are some things I want to portray with more detail than others, so I must know which medium to choose.

I'd say drawing with regular graphite pencils or fine liners are the easiest for me, since I'm very used to both of them. My goal is to experiment as much as possible and for that I'd like to use paint and oil pastels which I don't use very often. This is especially true for portraits, because they also fall into my comfort zone and I wanted, as I said, to be able to take advantage of this project to be more experimental than I usually am. I'm very good at drawing and that sometimes isn't as good. There are formulas I have already mastered but that will keep me stuck in the same place if I just keep using them over and over.

But as the weeks went by and other projects came along, I have to admit I neglected Observe quite a bit. I guess, because it felt more comfortable to me, that I just took it for granted while trying to focus on other tasks that seemed more difficult. In the end, I know if I just dedicate a few hours to observing and drawing I can actually complete my sketchbook, stress-free. I just really need to plan and find the time in these next three weeks to do so.  

[vrgatoreflection]

24/11

Today I finally managed to organize myself in the way I've been meaning to for almost a month now. The semester started off really confusing to me; I was beginning my bachelor's degree in a zoom class, and that was just no good. Returning to school, even a few days a week was really helpful in terms of motivation, but I must admit that social contact after 8 months of isolation was just as distracting as it was good for my mental health.

These two months that went by after class started were hazy and weird in a lot of ways. I was very confused as to how I should be organizing myself, because there were things I learned in Foundation that I just couldn't apply to this new project structure, such as the way I used to use my project book. It was very effective for week-based projects, but for ongoing ones it simply doesn’t work, because one project does not end before the next one starts.

I admit I delayed (a lot) actually reaching out for help. I do have a bit of a perfect student syndrome after getting two Distinctions, so I thought I could figure everything out on my own, regardless of how confused and lost I was really feeling. But in the end, I only performed well in my other courses because I was constantly asking for help and tips and whatnot, so I reached out to Roger from Academic Support. It felt weird talking to him because I wasn't exactly sure of what I was supposed to say other than '' I feel completely lost'', but he gave some nice insight about making little project books out of loose sheets and getting on with reflection.

That freaked me out completely because I was one month and a half into the course and had completely forgotten about reflection!! I hadn’t written a single word, and it's not that I didn't know I had to do it, the tutors just never mentioned anything about it so I kind of just allowed myself to neglect it for a long, long time. Even after realising this I'm only now, 20 days later, actually sitting down to write a decent entry that hopefully will accommodate everything I left unsaid for two months.

Even after my talk with Roger I still couldn't bring myself to get organized, because the haziness had transformed into anxiety, so much that in the last day of the Luxury Goods week I had a meltdown in the toilet in the middle of class. But I never did give up. I spent the whole week after that having only started organizing loose sheets to become my project books and doing a little planning, but I realise now I did my best, considering my mental health wasn't in its prime at the time.

My last resort after I had figured things out mentally was talking to someone I had a lot more intimacy than my new tutors or even Roger, Carlos. He had helped me a great deal in Foundation, especially in Part 3 when I had a big meltdown, so I reached out and we had a chat. To be honest, there wasn't much he could say that would come as a big revelation, because I had a very clear notion of just what I had to do, but he gave me great suggestions. I told him how great Foundation methods of research and reflection had worked for me, and he said I could still basically work as I was used to, just in different platforms other than padlet.

I was very aware of this already but hearing him saying it made me feel strangely reassured. I still wasn't calm and was very fixated in my anxiety, but it seemed now that I had known what to do all along (which is true, at least in part). So today I stayed home and took advantage of the one to one tutorials, meaning I had a lot more time than I usually do on Tuesdays or any other day. I had planned to attend a one to one with Jaygo about the software for this project (Time Design) because I had some trouble combining video and audio at the workshop yesterday, but my internet wasn't working so I focused on catching up.

It started off slow. I tried printing some posters from Type and Language to trace their grids but my printer was being stubborn so that delayed me until after lunch when it finally decided to print the sheets. I was procrastinating this grid exercise because I thought it would be a bore, but I actually really enjoyed analysing the posters and trying to think like the designer to kind of "discover “the grid within the poster. After that I felt compelled to continue.

I initially planned on doing some more practical work on the projects and leave research for later on once I had advanced more on the outcomes, but my iPad was charging so I ruled out projects 3 and 5. Projects 2, 4 and 7 I need to do in school. My laptop doesn't support the software, and I will also need the print studio. Projects 1 and 6 were the only ones I could technically work on today, but I was feeling more introspective so I just went for research instead.

I first organized all the references I had collected alone for each project and put them on Miro, and only then I organized all references from the briefs and selected the ones that would actually make it to a more thorough research. I do this by typing each artist into google and taking a look at their work. If I think it would be of relevance to my project (and the criteria changes for every one) for any reason, then I go into more depth. I am really proud of myself for tackling the tasks that felt most daunting: research and (especially) reflection. Once I was tired of research, I thought about calling it a day. But I was still in a workflow that was very difficult to get in and decided not to waste such potential, then I gathered all my courage and started writing this. I'm very proud of how everything turned out today.