Graphic Narrative Evaluation

Use this template to help you evaluate your project.

You should give specific details about your work.

You should provide both written and visual examples to explain your project.

You should find areas to praise in your work. Be specific about why you think they are good or why you are proud of them.

You should also find areas that could be improved. Look for areas that you could make better if you went back to them. Be specific about what you would improve.

Add additional slides as you need to. Don’t be restricted by what is here.

Any blank slides should be deleted before submission.

Does your final product reflect your original intentions?

COMPARISONS TO MIND MAP & MOODBOARDIn my mind map, I discussed and gave examples of the different components of my story and how it would appear to the reader. One thing that I keep consistent was the colours I used in my pages. I wanted to use sunset, purple and green based colours which relate to the African culture/style. Here are the colours I suggested I wanted to use in my book and beside are some examples where I used those colours in the book.

In my mind map, I gave examples of text styles I wanted to use and the layout of the book. The layout I wanted was to have the text on one page and then on the corresponding page, the right page, I would have the image. I did achieve this in my book and I added a boarder too for effect. This is an improvement on my original intentions.

For text I wanted to use fonts that was very rustic and African style, that almost looks carved. I didn’t quite use this text style because it made more sense to use a more simplistic text to make the book easier to read. However, for the front cover I did use a carved, rustic text which looks like stone but at the same time it looks somewhat regal to represent the royal figure in the story.COMPARING DIGITAL FLAT PLANSPage one in both my digital flat plans feature the lion in his castle with the drum glowing in front of him. In the drawn, first version of my flat plans the lion also has a scythe/staff. On page one in my actual book there is the lion, the glowing drum and he is in the castle. This is an example of how my final product represents my original intentions well. In fact the image I used in my flat plans, is the same image I used to source my final product. However, page one in my final product does not feature a scythe/staff so you could argue that it doesn’t entirely match the flat plan.

A page that didn’t match my drawn flat plans was page 4. In initially aimed to make a page which was split in two and it would have the tortoise with food on one side and the angry animals on the other. Whereas, I actually ended up making an image of a feast on a table. The flat plan did contain food so I didn’t completely move away from my initial idea, but I still didn’t follow the flat plan as closely as some of my other pages.

How well have you constructed your images?My initial style was inspired by an artist called Will Terry. Through research I found that I really loved his style so I aimed to replicate it in my book. The rounded style and the vibrant, vivid colours is what I really wanted to imitate in my book.

TEXTURE – I often used textures or patterns in my images to liven them up and make them look less flat or bland. I would use a clipping mask over an existing object or I would use ‘threshold’ to make the pattern black and remove any unwanted areas. I really like the effect using textures gave and I feel like that was something really good about my images. As you can see, the tree I used on page 6 and 8 has a pattern on the trunk. This really finishes off the image and without it the image would not look as good.COLOUR – The colour scheme for my book was heavily based onAfrican culture and the overall appearance of Africa, but withemphasised colours. I used yellow based greens to create the grassto represent the lush savannah in Africa. In pages 1, 2 and 6 I used a sunset colour palette to create the sky. To make the sky look more realistic I used a gradient so it was not just one colour and make a more realistic sunset. In page 8, I used a radial gradient to make the sun look more realistic. I made the colour in the centre yellow and the outer colour blue and changed the angle and scale a little bit to create the sun. I really liked the effect this technique gave.

Here is a scene from his book “Skeleton For Dinner”. As you can see Terry has used textures and vibrant blues; none of the colours are muted or pastel. Also the characters are very rounded with no jaggered edges.

This is page 8 from my book, and as you can see the style is

similar in some respects. Everything is smoothed off and I have used textures just like in

Will Terry’s art. Also I have used lively, bright colours, which

again is like Terry’s style.

Page 2 was my test page where I experimented with different techniques, colours, placements and textures. The whole premise of my book was to create it using shapes and source images (especially for the characters), however I did use some rotoscoping for some areas. One thing that I’m not 100% happy with if how the tortoise turned out using just shapes. I would’ve liked it if the head was a different shape to what it turned out to be and I would’ve liked the hands and feet to look a bit different. One possible way I could improve this is by using various source images rather than just one and try using different techniques. Below shows the development of Page 2 and a talk through of techniques used.

This I my source image for page 2, as you can see the tree in the image is very similar to the tree in the actual page. This is because I used shapes and rotoscoping over the image to create the actual tree.

Here is the first draft of page 2, it’s very basic and simplistic with no real gradients or texture; it’s very bland. The sky gradient is not as smooth as I would’ve liked.

In this next draft I had added African patterns to the path, sun and tree. I changed the perspective of the path pattern to make it look like it was getting smaller. However I was still not happy with the grass and sky. I also added the tortoise and leaves.

After I had finished all the other pages I went back to Page 2 to try and improve it with the knowledge I had gained. I had learnt from page 8 that I could use a radial gradient to create a more realistic sun and sky. So I did this using orange and yellow to make a sunset. I added in some silhouettes in red on the horizon because I knew this was a nice effect to the image after creating page 6 and 8. Another thing that I added a gradient to was the grass, this was to make it look rounded and like it was going back into the distance. Finally I changed the pattern of the path and changed the perspective.

OVERALL APPEARANCEGenerally speaking I am very pleased with how my pages turned out using the techniques I listed, and I think they are well constructed. I especially like how I constructed Page 8. I wanted to add some animals to the watering hole but I didn’t want to overwhelm the image, so I just made them silhouettes instead. Because they were at a watering hole, I needed to add a reflection in the water. I did this by by distorting the silhouette using ‘ripple’ and then adding a gaussian blur. Finally I changed the opacity so it didn’t just look like I’d layered it over the water. However there are a few areas I don’t think are as well constructed as they could be, for example the drum and lions body/robe. I would like to eradicate the black line around the image because nothing else in the book has this black line, so it looks a bit out of place. I would possibly like to try adding a body to lion so it looks a little more realistic under the robe.

How well have you used text to anchor your images

IMAGERY/INCONOGRAPHY Anchorage is demonstrated well in my work through use of colour, facial expression and generally just linking the text to the image by illustrating certain words. In page 8 I have placed a broken love heart above the tortoises head, also I have added tears. It is said that the tortoise “with a broken heart” speaks to his family These two aspects represent how sad the tortoise is and how text is used to anchor it to the image.

FACIAL EXPRESSIONSAnother image where I have involved emotions and where text is used to link to the image is on page 7 when the father is “explaining to their children the rules of the fruit tree” and how it’s important to follow them. To represent this I made the tortoises face have a stern look by making the eyes smaller and flattening out the mouth. Also I had a finger pointing towards his son and a thought bubble above his head. However the text isn’t used as well as it could have been to anchor to my images. In the image it looks like the young tortoise is being told off, however in the text it says he is just having something explained to him. I could improve this by changing the words (possibly to lectured) or changing the facial expression.TIME AND SCENEOn page 3 I created a scene which was set in a clearing in the forest. To demonstrate this I created a lush, green tree with the palm nuts the tortoise was collecting. I used text to anchor the image by saying that the tortoise was collecting palm nuts, and I also said in the text that the King’s wife and his daughter came to “a clearing”. These two quotes link to the images well and I have successfully represented the words. I could improve by possibly adding more trees and long grass. Also in the text I mentioned how “One evening” the tortoise was walking through the woods. I illustrated this by creating a scene with an orange sky and silhouettes to implicate that the sun was setting.

PROPSThe final image that I will be discussing is page 4. On page 4 I have created a feast with fine cuisine, drinks and a large cake in the middle. It looks quite grand and there’s a lot of food. Text is used very well on page 4 to anchor to my images, it says how when the tortoise would beat the drum and “a feast appeared”. Feast implies that there is a lot of food that is of a high standard, so here the text links really well to the image.

EXISTING PRODUCT Here is a book by Julia Donaldson called Spinderella. On this page there is an illustration of children in a dining hall at school and they’re eating their dinner. You can see on their plates that there is food which looks like peas, potatoes and fish fingers. The text in this book is used very well to link anchor the image. The sentence begins by saying that the children of “Scuttleton Primary School were eating their dinner”. This links to the image because it is evident that the children are sat in a school cafeteria. Also the ending of the sentence says that they were eating “fish fingers, potatoes and peas” for their dinner. Again, this links to the illustration because the children are eating these three things in the picture. In comparison to my book, I think they are very similar in the way they use text to anchor to the image. For example in my book, on page 6 I said that the tortoises were collecting food for dinner from a “fruit tree” and in the image there is a basket of fruit. In this book, the text says what the children are eating for their dinner and what they’re eating is in the image.

CONCLUSIONTo conclude, I think that I have successfully used text to anchor my images. This is because I have illustrated the scene and then the text has explained what is going on in the image. For example in page 8, I said that the tortoises had to live under the magical tree forever. In the image there is the tortoise looking heartbroken beside the tree. However, I could improve how I’ve linked the text to the image on pages 1 and 3. This is because in the text I said how the lion was a King of all the land. But I haven’t given him a crown, so this kind of defeats the object of calling him a King because all Kings wear a crown. This could possibly confuse children because they will be using imagery to understand the characters. Although the King hasn’t got a crown, he is the only animal wearing a long robe which implies royalty to the reader.

Is your product suitable for your audience?

AUDIENCE PROFILEFor my children's book there are two target audiences I am trying to create a book for, the children and the parent/s. Through production I have not changed my target audience and it still remains the same as what I proposed at the beginning. In my proposal I said how I will be creating a book for 3-7 year olds and this has remained the same due to the style I used.

TARGET AUDIENCE ONEAGE – 3-7 because I am using a very simplistic style with big, vibrant pictures. Also the vocabulary is not very complex and is fairly easy to understand.GENDER – In my proposal I have said I didn’t aim to target one gender, however after production I think my book is targeted slightly more towards boys that girls due to some of the dark settings.CHARACTERISTICS – My target audience will typically, as stated in my proposal, enjoy lively, adventurous stories with bright pictures and a strong narrative. The bright images are more visually attractive to the younger audience.

TARGET AUDIENCE TWOAGE – 25-40 because I am targeting the parents of the

children. These are usually the ages at which people have children or are raising a 3-7 year old.

GENDER – I think my book does not have a target gender for the parents because either parent can read

the story regardless of their gender.APPEAL – My story is an engaging and attractive story to

parents. The story is not complex and safe for children to read, this will really appeal to parents.

When researching the demographic for some children's books, generally women of the age of 25-39 came up.

This supports my target age group however it does not support my target gender. They appeared to be

interested in “Early Childhood Education”.

CONTROVERSIAL CONTENTSeen as my target audience is young children I had to ensure that my book contained no offensive, or inappropriate content for that age group. My book is very suitable for my audience because it has no content which could be deemed inappropriate. As I stated in my proposal and the beginning of my book, my story is set in Africa. A common controversial theme which could be linked to my book is racial stereotyping and racism. In my book I included African culture, like JuJu and Egbo men, but nothing that is racist or incorrect, my characters are all animals which have no stereotypes linked to them besides what is common throughout African folk tales; the tortoise being the bad guy.

VISUAL CONTENTAll of my images are suitable for my audience due to the lively yet simplistic illustrations and they are fitted to the context. There is no gore, blood or violence shown or described in my book which will make the book appeal more to the parents. The only part which could be deemed remotely violent is the part where the Egbo men are said to start beating the tortoise. However this is not shown in the corresponding illustration which is why I don’t think it’s harmful to children at all.

TEXT BASED CONTEXTA part which plays heavily in the selling point of the book is the interesting, exciting narrative which is portrayed through the text itself. Because of how young my target audience is, I had to ensure that the text is suitable and easy for them to understand. This is why my vocabulary is often simple and not confusing for them. The 5-7 year olds could possibly even use the book to learn how to read better and improve their skills.

What do you like/dislike about the techniques you have used?

USING SHAPESADVANTAGESTo create most of my book I found a source image and I would recreate parts of that image using shapes. Once I had chosen the right shape to begin creating the image, I would lower the opacity and then use the warp tool to manipulate it into the desired shape. Overall I think this technique worked really effectively and it allowed me a lot more freedom and creativity when making the backgrounds. It worked exceptionally well when creating the lion, although I had difficulty at first after some trial and error I managed to create a lion which I’m really happy with. One advantage to this technique is that you can create really clean cut, rounded and bright images. There’s no jaggered edges and you can create some quite interesting and different characters. For example to create the lions mane, I just overlapped different sizes of the same shape and in different colours which gave a nice cartoon yet sophisticated resultDISADVANTAGESEven though there are many advantages to this method, there are some disadvantages which may have affected the quality of my work. Using this technique is very time consuming and can become very tedious after awhile. This meant at some points I was rushed for time and I possibly didn’t get as high quality work as I could have. For example in page 5 and 3, I would’ve like some more time to improve the drum because using this technique made it difficult to create a drum that didn’t look out of place. Also another downside to this technique that I dislike is the amount of plain space that is sometimes created with this technique. Because I am using single colours with a possibly gradient, the image can sometimes look a bit flat if one shape is used to cover a large area of the image. For example in page 4 the grass looks a bit odd and flat because it’s a large area which is one single colour. To improve this I may try adding some more hills and objects to the background.

ROTOSCOPINGADVANTAGESTo create some parts of my image I used rotoscoping because it seemed the better technique to use for that specific area or it was too complicated to create with shapes. On page 2, 6 and 8 I used rotoscoping to create the tree, this was because without using it I wouldn’t have been able to get the effect I wanted, which was individual leaves, using shapes alone. As you can see all the different bushy parts of the tree are not smooth all the way around and have jaggered leaves around the edge, using shapes I would not have gotten this effect. So an advantage to using this effect is getting jaggered edges where needed and saving time by making it a lot easier and simpler.DISADVANTAGE On page 6 I initially wanted to create a tree from a source image using rotoscoping, however this proved difficult. For this particular tree, I wanted it to have smooth edges and using rotoscoping, it just was achievable. So even though in some instances it is great to use to get those sharp edges, it is not always appropriate and can prove difficult. After awhile of trying to make the technique work, I just decided to use the tree I had created in page 2 and change the textures and colours. This in fact worked really well. Also, another disadvantage is that if you’re not careful when using rotoscoping, you can end up recreating the source image and not adding your own style to it. This not good when creating a sourcebook and you could come into copyright issues.

Talk about individual techniques • Creating lighting• Silhouettes• Glow around drum• Perspective

What do you like/dislike about how your final product looks?

FONT – Throughout the book I keep the font and font size (21) consistent which I think is important. For the main body of text I used PT Serif. I really like this text because it has a sophisticated, ancient feel to the text. Also it looks like it could've been handwritten or carved into stone. However for the first letter of the paragraph I used a different font called Perpetua Tilting MT in size 33 because it added a bit of a twist to the text and gave a nice effect. This font is little more fairy tale style but it still worked well with the overall theme.CHARACTERS – I really love the lion characters in my final product, they are interpretations of African animals. I think they look contemporary and quirky; the sharp lines and bold colours match the African culture well. I especially love the lions mane and all it’s different colours because how well the technique I used, turned out. Whereas with the tortoise, I’m not so happy with how it turned out. I really like how the shell looks because, again, it has this rounded style to it. But I’m not very fond of the head and it’s shape, I think if I experimented I could make the head shape look a little better. TEXTURES – In some areas of my book I have used textures/patterns to add some interesting features and patterns to the images. I like the outcome of doing this because without them the illustrations looked quite bland and were lacking in some African style. When creating the chairs on page 4, I used a clipping mask to overlay a wood texture onto the chairs to add some realism and so they were not just plain brown. I used an African pattern on the tree trunk and branches on page 6 and 8. This created a really attractive effect and brought the page to life. However, if something that I dislike about the textures is on page 2 on the tree. I would prefer to have used a different texture because I find the current one to be a bit boring.

COLOURS – I used colours heavily in my book to bring it to life and to really portray the African theme. One thing I really about my use of colours if the silhouettes. I didn’t want to make any silhouettes black because I felt this was too harsh and stood out/looked odd compare to the rest of the colours used. So instead used a deep, orangey red because of how well it blends in with the sunset, which gave a really nice effect. I also used this technique when creating page 8. I thought putting animals with textures at the watering hole would be overwhelming, so instead I used the silhouette technique and it worked really well. LIGHTING – One thing that I think went exceptionally well throughout my book, was adding shadows and highlights to add depth the image. To do this I set the brush colour to black (unless adding sunlight) and changed the opacity to 13%, flow to 50% and hardness down to 0. Then I just painted the areas where a shadow was necessary, in doing so I added a lot of roundness and depth to my illustrations. When adding sunlight, I did the same thing just using orange and yellows instead. One good example of where I carried this technique out was in page 1 with the pillars. There is a window showing the deep orange sunset, I figured that orange light would be hitting the pillars, so I added an orange glow. I did the same with the mountains.

CONCLUSIONTo conclude, I mainly like most of the work I have created and I’m very happy with the outcome. I’m especially pleased with how pages 1, 6 and 8 turned out. I really like colours I used on these pages because I think they contrast well and portray the African style even further. On page one I really like how I used lighting to add some depth to the image and I like how I created the sky which you can see through the window. I also am pleased with how the tree on page 2, 6 and 8 turned out because the appearance of the tree looks magical and doesn’t look out of place with the contemporary style of the book. However my book could do with some improvements and is not to it’s highest standard; there are some areas that is dislike. Areas like the drum and the tortoise need improving in my opinion. I dislike the black line around the drum and I would like to try remaking it. Also as I mentioned before, I’m not happy with how the tortoises head, arms and legs look. I would like to try experimenting with different techniques and styles.

Why did you include the content you used?FONTS – For the main body of text I used the font PT serif and then for the first letter of each paragraph I used Perpetua Tilting. I used PT Serif and Perpetua Tilting because it seemed to correspond well with the images. Because the images are quite simplistic but detailed and bright, I wanted to use a simple font that wasn’t too loud. Also these fonts seemed to have an African, carved vibe about them which is appropriate for one of the main themes of the book.COLOURS – Colours were used heavily in my book for iconography. My main colour scheme for the book was green, purple, orange, yellow and red. Green was used to add a lively feel to the book, I made it a yellow based green to portray the lush grasslands of Africa. Purple was used for a magical effect because when it is a deep purple it implies mystery. I used it for the drums glow and it worked well to imply that there was an enchantment on the drum. The orange, yellows and reds are quite typical colours of Africa and seemed necessary to create a book based in Africa. EFFECTS – On certain pages I used different effects to improve the general appearance of everything. One example is using a gradient tool on the grass and sky to give the appearance of them getting further away, or to create a sunset. I used a radial gradient to make a convincing sun that didn’t look odd and out of place. On the grass I used a linear gradient to give the appearance of the grass getting further away and to create a horizon.TEXTURE - Africa is renowned for it’s vibrant culture and patterns, so it seemed essential to include some patterns in the book. The texture I used on the King and Queen’s robe were traditional African clothing patterns and add to the overall vibe of the book. I used them because a plain red robe didn’t look as good as a patterned one; it looked bland otherwise. A flat brown tree trunk looked quite boring and the image appeared quite flat, but adding the pattern brought the image back to life and improved it a lot.

What signs, symbols or codes have your used in your work?

• Choices of colour, style, locations, character design and tone all give additional meaning to your work.

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Audience ResponsesCultural competence:

Media texts require us to have a certain level of cultural understanding to be able to interpret them.

At a basic level, this could mean being able to read the language that a magazine is written in.

At a deeper level, it means being able to interpret signs and symbols that we use a visual shorthand to communicate ideas.

We recognise these signs in our own culture but find it harder to understand when looking at others.

We create and attach meaning to signs and symbols in many different forms.

Creative Media Production 2012

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Audience ResponsesCultural competence:

What is this?

This is a Norwegian Pine tree, covered in snow and with a red ribbon on.

Our cultural understanding allows us to interpret its meaning.

To us, in British society, it means Christmas, presents and family.

This is because we share a cultural knowledge.

Creative Media Production 2012

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Audience ResponsesCultural competence:

There are many other signs and symbols that we attach meaning to.

A leather jacket can imply rebellion.

A sports car can imply wealth and power.

A cross can represent religion.

Creative Media Production 2012

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Audience ResponsesCultural competence:

Visual representations of everyday objects are often the same the world over. A car appears as a car, no matter what country it appears in.

What that car means however, can be very different depending on your cultural background.

Creative Media Production 2012

What representations can be found in your work?

• How are men, women or children shown in your work? Does your work feature different ages, races, social groups or religions? Does a lack of any variety of character types create its own representation?

What style have you employed in your products?

• Discuss influences/ existing products• What visual style does your work have and

why did you choose it?

What style have you employed in your products?

CORINNA ICE is a freelance illustrator from China, she has been illustrating children’s books for 10 years. She is part of the inspiration for my work and I have employed some of her style in my product. I love the unique style to her work and how everything is rounded. I incorporated this style into my work by creating some fun, and quirky backgrounds which are smoothed round. Everything in her work seems to flow well and coincide with each other, this may be due to the contrasting colours or a well thought out image. Either way, I used a same approach with my colour scheme and I made sure they contrasted well. However, her work is very detailed and I would’ve liked to have included this into my product, but I didn’t have the time or photoshop skills to do so.

Here is a side by side comparison of my and he work. Although Corinna’s is a lot more detailed, the lighting and basic style remain the same. She uses bold colours and I did too in my work. I also incorporated, around the drum, glowing lights which relates to the pastel, faded glows and colours she uses in her work.

KATIE KIRK is an illustrator who runs her own design studio and illustrates children's books. Her work is very simplistic and uses bold, striking colours; she has a very contemporary, individual style. Incorporated her simple style into my work and I used the bold colours too, however my work does have a little more detail than hers.

What were the strengths and weaknesses of the pre-production and planning

• How did the planning and research help• How well did you manage your time• Reference specific examples

Historical and cultural context

• How does your work compare to what has come before? What other similar products have existed in the past? What current products exist?

Peer Feedback

• Summarise peer feedback and discuss– Responses you agree with– Responses you disagree with