Research into Banksy to further my designs.

Though I can't afford spray paint for this design I still want to pursue the graffiti style and I am taking some inspiration from Banksy. He tends to use a two layer stencil style, with one layer being white and the top layer being black for all the details. The other colour that seems to appear quite prominently in his works is red, which I think I will have another go at using in a way that invokes an even more emotional impact. I am leaning towards the direction of using Pastiche on the former graffiti statue piece. 

Working on the statue graffiti

Posters for the interim

Here are the posters I submitted for the week 5 interim

This piece really plays off my original ideas of putting graffiti on a statue. I illustrated the statue that stands at Anzac Cove, and then drew over it to simulate spray paint, using colours that are commonly associated with tags and vandalism. The off white background mean I could play with black and white type to emphasize certain words that I felt needed to have a stronger presence on the page.   

This piece is an evolution from the last canvas graffiti idea (green one) I took more sepia tones and colours that invoked a sense of age and history and fused them with modern striking colours that made the piece pop more. I illustrated the soldier with markers and pencil this time to give it an ever more authentic look. The idea behind the red strike over his face is the loss of identity, and it ties in with the "NO" nicely.

The critique I received from the interim was incredibly helpful. Firstly the general consensus was that the first poster was the strongest and that I should pursue it further, but on the same wavelength the second was far too similar and used the same ideas too much. 

In the first, it was slightly too wordy and the subtext was too large. Also the image didn't take enough precedence over the type like I intended. The choice of background colour (and even having one at all) was also questioned. It was suggested that I do some version of the image in a spray paint stencil style. I have some ideas regarding Banksy's work on that front so I will look into it.

The second apparently invoked the feeling of a soldier facing the firing squad, his hands behind his back and his eyes covered by what was perceived as a blindfold, alongside the blue splatters which was seen as a confusing recolour of blood, invoked feelings that I never wanted to portray in the first place. I feel as though I am going to scrap the idea in favour of something new and riskier. 

A new way to approach graffiti

I was incredibly focused on the idea of graffiti being on a wall, so I tried to move away from that taking inspiration from various canvas graffiti and comic artists to come up with this illustration.

The colours and imagery are striking and bold, but they don't really portray the message I want. Also I could not for the life of me figure out how to incorporate typography into this. It just did not work.

This is quite frankly the best result of incorporating some type into the image and it really doesn't look great. Back to the drawing board again.

Working with typography

I used one of my early Anzac concepts in an exercise with type, seeing how different fonts, sizes, words and layouts could work on the page.
I know that type is my weak point and I think this exploration page has been helpful and will serve me well in this assignment and the future.

I have experimented with all kinds on this page in terms of size, colour, boldness, lower and upper case, as well as the words themselves and their placement on the page. Playing with the balance between image and type has been a good experience.

Going ham on the graffiti concept

I fleshed out a bunch of different ways I could graffiti over the Anzac soldier's face.

In the end I was aware that the solider photo could only be a placeholder for so long, so I illustrated the soldier using the original image as reference. However I soon discovered that this didn't have the same emotional impact as the photo, so it was back to the drawing board.

A quick idea

I wanted to parody a scene from Batman comics where the Joker stands ominously over Robin after having beaten him with a crowbar.
In a twisted way I was drawing parallels between this idea and the idea of John beating the crap out of a soldier for the sake of a new flag.
I quickly saw however that this idea could be misconstrued, as well as the reference being too obscure for those who don't read comics.
I'm scrapping this idea but it was good to explore how far I could swing this.