Week 27 – *Come on and Slam and Welcome
to the Art JAAAM!?!?! Or (a chilling elegy)
Unrelated Space Jam Gif - I just really like Space Jam |
This week was filled with anime,
drawing and well more anime and drawing. Oh yeah I also went to an art Jam on Easter
Friday.
Taking a break from Game art I
think has resulted in me going back to 14 year old self of drawing anime and
manga in my room, however this time I've got a basic understanding of anatomy
perspective under my belt so it’s no way near as bad as my deviant art phase.
Anyway this leads me onto my next
point, after spending so long on the course studying about design and well
drawing manga characters this week, I started to get a real appreciation for
one of my favourite manga artists Akira Toriyama.
Yes before I start, of course I am
aware of how bad and almost incestrious manga can look and also aware of the
fact that there isn’t a UK manga market so becoming a manga artist is defiantly
a no go. However during the holidays I found myself just captivated at how Toriyama
approaches character design.
NOTE - THIS IS NOT TORIYAMA'S WORK - THIS IS MANGA AT ITS WORST |
One character of Toriyama’s design;
Frieza has always conveyed good character design in the sense of subverting
character conventions. The character within the lore of his text is supposed to
be the Grand Emperor of the Universe. A super powerful being who is supposed to
bring fear to all who see him. Yet the design of his first form is a small,
pink effeminate man.
This is Frieza By Toriyama |
Said design draws parallels to that
of a French aristocrat during the French revolution or even Napoleon himself.
Rather than showing power and evil in physical fitness this is represented via the
nature of his gesture which conveys arrogance and the feminine look which
conveys a sense of affluence and said intertextual reference to this aristocrat
trope.
French Aristocrat - looks similar right |
Napoleon |
I would like to end this mini rant
by also mentioning how Toriyama designs the evolved forms of Frieza by falling
within convention of making him physically bigger however then designing his
final form as the small effeminate man he started with thus subverting the idea
of making someone bigger to convey strength in character design and rather
using the look of confidence and arrogance in a character to depict power and
intimidation.
Frieza's final form to the left |
So yes of course I ended up drawing
Frieza during the week.
Moreover this week I got really
inspired by a video by Max Landis director of Chronicle. In the video he
discusses how Professional wrestling is more like a soap opera about wresting
rather than actual wrestling. Bring this back to Art related stuff this
inspired me to produce some character designs based on professional wrestling’s
over the top characters. I wish to work on this project in the future as a
little personal project.
One of the wrestlers I'm working on |
Studying shape's and also animal anatomy on the side |
Frieza really does inspire me in how I design villainous characters |
Finally on Friday I went to an art
Jam with some friends off the course. This session mainly consisted of
designing vehicles and creatures via a mashy monsters exercise we did. We got
the idea and name from an exercise we did on the first day of the course in
which we write random names of objects, manmade and natural on a piece of paper
and then we put it in a hat. We mix it up, pick two words and then design it. I
can’t remember for the life of me what I got and what I made. The results are
below. I think one of them is a Rabbit Mech and Butt Mech and a weird
octopus/dear like creature. It was pretty fun anyhow and it got me to use my
imagination in ways I don’t usually use it.
Other stuff I got up to over the holidays
...
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