Week 14 Sketch

I was sitting in my chair watching TV next to my lamp, when at the time I thought it was a wasp and it kept flying around the lamp over and over and OOOVVER again! So, that was the inspiration for the little bug flying around the lamp. As for the piece of paper and pencil, I don't know what's written on there, but it might have to do with how annoying that wasp was. ~_^

P.S. I later found out from my brother it was a parasitic wasp that doesn't hurt anyone. =P

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly (Book Covers Edition)

(http://www.skrishnasbooks.com/2009/03/hopeless-romantic-harriet-evans.html)

I found this book cover very appealing because not only does it pop out with the color choices, it shows "a hopeless romantic". With the girl going on top of the fountain, dancing around with an umbrella tops puts the icing on a cake to how it feels to be lucky in love and uses the pink to distinguish the umbrella and the author's name, which is very nice. Also, I love that the leaves on the trees are heart-shaped and shows a magical theme.


(http://jacketsandcovers.wordpress.com/2009/05/18/uglies/)

Actually, I had bought this book just because of the cover back when I was a sophomore in high school and absolutely loved the book. Though the title and author text are very simple, it doesn't need anymore than this because of the picture and how it brings an element of mystery. From how they had the person peeking out behind the bushes, having only half of the person showing, and the element of sadness that this brings made me go Wow!


(http://www.nevadaappellatelaw.com/articles/when-lawyers-write/)

Alright, so I feel in love with it's simple idea (especially the title). It takes the key points that you would look on a naked boy doll and "censors" it out with the title that is very clever. It also points out the "anatomy" of the boyfriend, including the next (a.k.a. "the hickey zone"). Using so little colors, simplicity, and the dots to distinguish the title and author makes for one great book cover that I'll remember.

(http://sfscope.com/2009/09/books-received-september-2009.html)

Oh my! Oh dear! This is the book cover that I will be redoing, but it seems to be very... corny. The text first seems to be going in completely different directions, uses a combination of many different fonts, styles, and actions to create a creepy effect. Secondly, the background is very distracting with it's different combination of pictures and colors. Lastly, though it's completely "awesome", I love how the bunny and the raccoon are so monstrous. It's completely bad, but so bad it's awesome.

Research For Project 4

The book that I’m going to be redoing is Zombie Raccoons and Killer Rabbits by Martin H. Greenberg and Kerrie Hughes. The book (of analogies) is basically fifteen short stories of animals that range from being happy to horrifying animals that you never want to meet in your lifetime. There wasn’t much more information to gather about the book since it was all about different animals and it’s not a very well-known book. The source about the book I got was from a guy’s picture of the back of the book (below).

(http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Zombie-Raccoons-&-Killer-Bunnies-Short-Stories-Pbk--NEW_W0QQitemZ370269229747QQcmdZViewItemQQimsxq20091022?IMSfp=TL091022119001r37421)

Kerrie Hughes is an author/editor that has written only with Martin H. Greenberg only with different analogies. Martin H. Greenberg taught at the University of Wisconsin in Political Science and wrote Political Science Fiction in 1974 for a teaching guide, and since has been writing science fiction anthologies with other authors, including Alexander Potter (Sirius: The Dog Star in 1994). He even edited The Future Adventures of the Joker in 1990. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_H._Greenberg)

When I was looking into the different science fiction and anthology book covers, mostly they have aliens, space ships, or anything that has to do with outer space on them. But, with anthologies it seems that there is no theme but to try and attract the user with it's interesting book cover to try and get them to buy the book. I took a few examples from one science fiction book and an anthology and science fiction anthology.



Sources (from left to right):

1. http://fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2007/04/fahrenheit-451-by-ray-bradbury.html
2. http://hwadarkwhispers.wordpress.com/2008/10/
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirius:_The_Dog_Star
   

Week 13 Sketch

With this sketch, I was eating donut holes this morning and always thought about those pictures that they drew with the big, scary fish eating the small, innocent fish. So of course I had to incorporate that into the donut holes! =]

Week 12 Sketch

I was sitting at Parkland and I noticed one of those big fountain drinks that you get at a gas station and just decided, "Why not?" And I drew this, adding the effect where if someone gets over the capacity of the cup, the drink decides to magically make a mess and spill all over the place and out of the straw. Have you ever had that happen to you? It sure has to me!

Week 11 Sketch

This was a sketch basically of being bored and how I felt while I was doing this sketch... really really tired. I felt if I got the point of view with just one of the eyes and how the eyebrow is lowered, I thought that I could convey that feeling without showing the whole head and make it come out better. Let me know what you think! =]

Research So Far...

I found many things when I was researching for my event, “Star Course Presents The Academy Is…” which is at Foellinger Auditorium on November 18, 2009 featuring the Secret Handshake. I am going to this event, but it was very interesting what I found out during my research. Their style of music is characterized as punk rock, pop, and even emo. When watching and listening to their music, they like to be youthful and talk about the "good ol' days" of high school in their songs. One of their songs proves this point is their song “Summer Hair = Forever Young”. In this song, he sings about being in love with this girl though she’s moving on with her life, while he still wants to be young. Look at part of the lyrics to song: “Stop making plans, start making sense/Don't you believe any word they said/Sparked up, sparked up like a book of matches/Falling through the night and rising from the ashes/I'll never let you go/Don't ever forget/Tell me you'll remember /Forever young”.

I also looked at some reviews from their new “album”, “Lost in Pacific Time: The AP – EP”, and their old album, “Fast Times at Barrington High”. Some of the reviews were good, and some were bad. One of the reviews for their album “Lost in Pacific Time: The AP – EP”, they said that they were still going at their youthful ways, though many of the bands that they toured with (such as Fall Out Boy), have moved on and moved on musically and on to other topics. A reviewer from review rinse repeat said that they sounded like a “high school themed dime-a-dozen pop route” (http://www.reviewrinserepeat.com/2009/10/24/the-academy-is-lost-in-pacific-time-ep-review/). But others, such as the reviewer from ign.com talked about how they brought an “upbeat and hopeful feel of their earlier work” and even said they could be put into a mixtape (http://music.ign.com/articles/901/901197p1.html). If you read the review from Rollingstone.com, I think this one sheds a pretty good light on the album: http://www.rollingstone.com/reviews/album/22214937/review/22664981/fast_times_at_barrington_high

Overall, I would say that after this research, their purpose is making music that is youthful and brings back old memories of high school. Definitely their target audience I believe would be high schoolers to some of the youth in college (16 – 24). But the older generation wouldn’t like it because of the sound and how they look (because some won’t exactly approve of a guy wearing a low v-neck shirt with a long haircut and tight pants). As for the posters, I looked at some of the posters from similar artists, and it seems they are all bright colored, have a random theme to their posters (some with deer or rainbows on them), but sometimes can be “rough around the edges”.

Good Posters

The reason why I chose this poster is because I love how it is simple for printing with only 3 pantones which is nice for printing. But it's not just about printing, I like how they create the idea of the boy in the picture mowing over the band name and, even at an angle, is readable and emphasizes the main message in the poster.

The reason why I liked this poster is because if a fan were to look at this poster, I believe that they would be understand it's message. The album itself is very eerie and very dark, especially with some of the issues that they bring up, which is conveyed by the picture. The person looks like they are screaming, with the words being typed in a sort of fine handwriting that looks like they're coming out of the mouth. Also, the colors and the blending of the colors brings this effect to life.



The reason why I find this poster very interesting is not only because of how simple it is or the two pantone used to print out the poster, but how they played with the name of the band. I like how they took a silhouette of a black cat and broke it apart, enlarging the black cat on the bottom and put the tail on the top (possibly making the cat's tail look very long). What makes it really cool is how the cat's eyes aren't part of the picture, which gives it a sort of creepy feeling. I also liked how they used a font that would normally be a part of any bar and gives it that "House of Blue's" or an old-style Chicago feeling.