Design Development

Once I was pleased with the drawings I had produced I began to put the images into photoshop. I began by grouping certain designs together and then putting them into repeat.

Initial designs

The four images below are just a selection of my initial designs. Although I felt they worked reasonably well, it was suggested to me by my tutor that they were too ordered which I agreed with. Therefore I wished to push my self further and create something much more free flowing. I also wanted to create something with a more interesting back ground as opposed to simply having a one colour background. Overall a more complex design using the same colour scheme as I felt that the colour pallet was strong.

After this evaluation I began producing some interesting textures that I could use as backgrounds. I also looked into various designers work for inspiration.

                                                   

I feel the backgrounds I produced were very successful, when layered up behind my drawings they gave a greater sense of depth. They also made the designs look more complex which is what I was wanting to achieve. I feel that looking into the various designers work helped me greatly also. The designers I was most  inspired by are shown below.

Clarke and Clarke - Floribunda

I find this work very interesting as there are both complex and more simple designs in each collection, also the designs work really well together. There are designs for several interior spaces; wallpaper, cushion, curtains etc. Showing they can work well on several different surfaces. The style of the designs produced is very similar to the style of designs I wish to produce as I enjoy creating brightly coloured florals and feel it looks very effective.

Osborne and Little

I am inspired by Osborne and Little’s work for very similar reasons, they too use bright colours and florals and also create textiles for several different types of interiors. I took the inspiration from the two designers and used it in my own work, by creating more complex interesting designs.

Final Design Work

I am very pleased with how my designs have come out, I feel I have a nice balance of complex and more simple designs. I also feel that the designs are more free flowing and have less organised structure to them. And I feel they will translate well into interior. 

The visualisations above show the designs working in the interior space I had intended them for. The designs work well together in the room. They both suit the wall and I feel the scale is correct I also feel they suit the cushions I have put them on to. Overall I am very pleased with the outcome of my designs as I feel I pushed myself to create something different and more complicated than before. I feel it has payed off as the more complicated design are the best and are what make the collection exciting.

Development

Once I had decided that the colours from the African mood board were the best to work with, I looked into my colour pallet further. I wanted to find some images I could work from that had both the bright vibrant and the dull muted colours in it, so that I could see them working together. After looking through various books and journals I came up with the images below to work from.

Once I had established my colour scheme I wanted to find more information to draw from using China as my theme. During one of my tutorials I was told there were several Sotheby's catalogues on Chinese contemporary art. This was something I was very interested in therefore I researched the catalogues, the most inspiring pieces of work I found were the paintings of flowers. The textures and marks made are very interesting, it is a very effective way to draw natural objects as the tone and marks give the image a very unrefined feel. 

This effect is something I would like to achieve in my own work, so I began creating some drawings of flowers using various media and mark making techniques. The image below is a collection of the ones I liked best.

During this stage of the project we had the opportunity to have a one to one tutorial with a designer from the Diane Harrison studio. I found this very useful as it gave me an insight into what someone from the design world thought about my work. He advised me to take a little more time with my drawings and focus on one image for a longer period of time, so that I could ensure the dimensions etc were correct. He also advised that I look at some more artists drawings of flowers to give me a greater understanding of what works well. Below are images of the artists work I looked into.

Georgia O’Keeffe

I was inspired by Georgia O’Keeffe’s work as I feel the bold colours she uses have a similar effect to those I want achieve in my drawings. I also find the shapes of the flowers she draws interesting as they have a great feeling of depth and movement.  

Odillon Redon’s

It was more the positioning of the flowers in Odillon Redon’s that inspired me and it was suggested to me by my tutor that this could be something to consider once designing in photoshop. As I wanted to build up the interesting surface and detailed design that Odillon Redon had created in his paintings.

I came up with the drawings below after evaluating my previous ones and looking into the artists work. I feel that these work much better overall. 

On reflection I feel that the majority of my drawings worked fairly well, although I feel I lost a lot of the free unrefined marks (like those in the Chinese drawings) I had intended to achieve. My images are not as free flowing or as natural looking. However they are original and I feel the mark making techniques I used were effective they create a nice surface and interesting texture, which should translate well into photoshop. I also feel that evaluating the first group of images helped me greatly with creating the second as the second group are positioned better and look to be finished off to a higher standard.