My portfolio project explores the broad theme of ‘Death.’ Within this theme I have chosen to focus on the portrayal of death, in particular the Mexican culture surrounding death. To do this I have been looking into all the various stages and celebrations to get a grasp of the different views and attitudes towards death. Pairing my research and artist together I was able to create a strong project on this theme. Speaking of artists, I have been influenced by three artists; Amandeep Singh (Inkquisitive), Carli Ihde, Russ Murphy (Ruff Mercy).

  

1 ) Inkquisitive - an ink artist from London.  

Inkquisitive has inspired my project in the way that he critically crafts his pieces, especially the political pieces he makes regarding social injustice. Furthermore, I like how he brings his unique style, background, and beliefs within all his pieces. From him I plan to implement the continuity and develop my own style to bring throughout my project using meaningful imagery and subliminal messages. You can see this through the repeated use of specific icons and concepts. Also, the use of coloured backgrounds to add more life to a plan white background 

 

2 ) Carli Ihde - a digital and tattoo artist from Wisconsin. 

Carli Ihde has inspired my project with her unique rotoscope style. She makes animations and images using her style of outlining the subject frame by frame and either completing it in black and white, or creating stills on cardboard accompanied by artificial light to give false depth. From her I plan to use her style of rotoscope in my digital work and apply it to more than just faces. You can see from how I developed from a still image to animation and increasing the complexity with each development while I maintain the level of detail and fluidity of the rotoscope. 

 

3 ) Ruff Mercy, an animation director from Bristol. 

Ruff Mercy has inspired me with his bespoke animation skills. Especially his work in ‘The nightmare on wax’ and music video ‘Skengman.’ His use of lines in a multitude of ways inspires me to recreate and produce my own animation complimented by these captivating visual effects. You can see this by the way I develop my own effects and transitions inspired by his work. 

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To further my project, I took pictures and videos of people, mainly portraits to recreate all the angles to allow a smooth animation. To exaggerate this, I also painted models faces to see how shapes and lines vary on a face from a variety of angles. This benefited my work massively as it allowed for a realistic, true animation. 

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My development work will all be digital, in the sense together all three will show the three points in which I plan to include on my final piece. My main goal in the developments it to be confident on mixing the artist together and creating my own style.

 

In Development 1, I created a portrait image in the style of rotoscope without the animation. This was of a person decorated in the Mexican attire for the day of the dead. This included a suit, top hat and make up. From this I learnt how to decorate the face in the traditional Mexican way. To improve I knew I had to add more and mix my artists better than a faded flag in the background.

 

So, in development 2 I stepped it up by creating my first animated portrait rotoscope, a simple head movement to start with. With this piece I once again included the day of the dead makeup however changed the background to a more colourful one, I created using watercolours. Furthermore, I incorporated Ruff Mercy and added some simple text and lines to make the work more interesting and fill empty space. To improve from this, I would have reevaluated the background as it was far from Inkquisitve’s work and had more meaningful lines.

 

This brings me onto development 3. I highlighted my competency in rotoscoping in my biggest animation, in size and length. This time landscape to include two models. One being the returning model from the past developments and the other being death itself. The piece shows the narrative of the man greeting death with a handshake only to then become the day of the dead man - inspired by the 'The Life Of Death' video on my Inspiration page. My goal was to show how the acceptance and cherishing of death is a key concept in Mexican culture and I feel that my final piece does so accurately. Moving to technical aspects of the piece I learnt from my previous developments and included a new, digitally created background which is alike the ones made by Inkquisitve. Again, I followed in steps of Carli Ihde to create a 60 frame rotoscope and boosted it further with my own style of Ruff Mercy effects, however mixing some with the meaningfulness like Inkquisitve. All three artists combined to create a piece that not only is visually pleasing and captivating yet conveys my research and project fluently and precisely. 

 

In my Final piece I wanted to show transitions and new ways to use the Ruff Mercy style lines. I created another portrait rotoscope of my model, this time including more of the body and hand gestures. I made it so the lines would morph over the model and leave behind the day of the dead make up in a clean transition. Furthermore, I added multiple lines at the same time each doing different things, some outlining the model and some creating shapes. I experimented with how to add the animated Inkquisitve/Ruff Mercy background, and I was pleased with the transitions and the demonstration of my skills in rotoscoping.