Saturday, March 12, 2011

IF-Stir + Japan Earthquake


(27 April 2011 update above: Honestly I really shouldn't have published the illustration as it is below. It wasnt ready. Regardless I have reworked it with the warp tool function, revisited the value structure, and utilizing my new super brush of doom in photoshop repainted it! hope you enjoy the difference. I know I DO! I know its not much of a complete change..for example...Maybe over the summer I will get around to adding color back in. IN the meanwhile...off to go work on final deadlines.)




Among my greatest surprises this week was the Earthquake and Tsunami that hit Japan. In the the picture I wanted to address the fact that no matter who you are, where you are, and what you are doing, you are not immune to the natural way of life: fear, danger, injury and even death.

It seems that we as a people like to forget that we are only part of a page which is being turned by time in the book called reality. We imagine to ourselves that we are part of a grand plot staring ourselves...and we become so self absorbed in what we are doing, and what we want to do, that we forget to remember that life is short and precious.

Events like this make me wonder what MY tragedy would be if a natural disaster hit nearby. Immediately my mind lists off my wife, son, parents, bothers, sisters, relatives, friends, my cat...etc. But during good times I am surprised at how easily this list is contradicted by the normal flow of life, which is filled with innumerable directions and distractions. Always remember WHAT MATTERS MOST!



Anyway....
Here is what I learned/explored with this picture:
Recently I came across a great blog entry from Freelance Illusrator Greg Newbold discussing the uses of value and color and it set my mind thinking...

I've heard of such concepts before, but end up usually stumbling across the finish line ignorantly because I was focused on having a good range of darks and lights which emphasis the focal point(s) of the picture.

...well this time I went at it from a value-relationship point first. The first picture you see below is my initial impression of what I wanted to accomplish. The 2nd one is what it ended up being (my final picture turned greyscale).


So ultimately I created a picture that not only LOOKS good with color, but also with only greyscale values. I accomplished the picture by setting the value with a greyscale layer, and then utilizing the selection tool, colorize, and colorbalance, I ultimately kept the same tonal values while making it color(though to further emphasize the woman as the main point I changed the umbrella to be lighter than the hair, and ultimately anchored the picture by making the table about the same as the hair.)