HOW TO USE A LETRASET PROMARKER

As i mentioned in my final evaluation, I said I would want to find out more about Letraset Promarkers and as I went unto the internet this is what I found.

I found out how I could use the Promarkers:

An artist called Stephanie Wilkinson was asked for some advise and what she said is that to use those markers effectively, I should be able to choose a range of 8-10 markers from light to dark and also I should have a thick piece of paper I could use to test the colors on to see what the colors look like before actually using them , as it is safer to do so.

Another thing that she mentioned is that also, for the markers i would also need a bleed proof paper to use them on so that the colors wouldn't bleed through the paper. She also advised that i should go over the color twice to be able to make the color stand out and not make it see through and also said that I should experiment on overlaying the a color of the marker and see what it would look like.

One last thing that I would like to mention is that she advised also that overlaying the color on wet ink would give a much softer ink.

If I had researched this much earlier I would have been able to achieve a much better quality of my initial design and perhaps i could have even achieved a much better final fashion illustration.

Developing and Experimenting...

I wanted to test different ways I could have positioned and placed the twists if I was to start producing my final outcome. And these are the ideas I came up with. 

This one, I really liked because of the way I could transfer the idea from my sketchbook's first developed design into a neck/top piece. 

This one in particular was more than a Neck piece and it was actually inspired by one of the body adornment pictures I found on Pinterest (see below) 

What I took from this picture is the way the braids itself go around her neck and freely hang down from her neck. 

This one is very similar to the one at the top and I really like it because I like the way the braids crawl up the breast and create a shape. And really that's what real African braids do, when they are braided on someone's hair and the braids fall down on the chest they form a shape of their own freely.

DIGITAL OR HAND WORK?

     Since I decided to create an illustration for my final outcome, I have always asked myself if I wanted to do a digital one or one with pencil, and other materials, or with both.

Most of the illustrators that I researched like Megan Hess and Hayden Williams, only use physical materials to draw their work but sometimes they do use digital softwares for their work maybe to clean it up or to add an existing brand logo on for example, the Vogue Cover created by Hayden Williams that I reviewed, he must have used Photoshop/Illustrator for the "VOGUE BIT" because even when you look at the bit where he's put his signature you can see that he had to do something digital to make it legible but also professional and clean. 

What i like about drawing with pencil and other similar materials is the fact that I don't have to learn about how to not make it look flat because I have been drawing for years and do I have already been taught about shades and light and all that kind of stuff, ON THE OTHER HAND, when it comes to digital fashion illustrations I have to learn how to draw perfectly with the softwares and learn about vectors and all that kind of stuff. Don't get me wrong but, I just don't have enough time to learn about all those things so obviously the only option I have right now is to use pencils, watercolour and others to achieve other things then maybe I may use photoshop to clean up my work, only if it is necessary.

MOODBOARD

The reason why I decided to do a digital mood board is because it was faster to do and it would mean that I wouldn't have to print out big sized pictures and not worry about if the quality of them would have been good. This mood board is mainly for the dress that I was going to make so I may consider doing another digital mood board for my fashion illustration. 

WHAT I  USED...

For this mood board I used Adobe Photoshop CS6 to create it. The benefits of this software is that it allowed me to use different effects to be able to achieve this. I will be evaluating this software further in my final evaluation.

Hayden Williams

Hayden Williams is a social media famous fashion illustrator and designer. He uses pencils,markers, fine liners and brush pens as well for his illustrations. He likes to share his work mostly through Tumblr and I researched further to see if he uses any digital softwares to neat up his work but as one of his followers asked him he said "simply pencil.. I'm old skool" which is simply amazing.

This is one of my favourite piece of illustrations he's done so far. 

What I like about it? 

It looks so realistic but apart from that it is beautifully detailed. I like the way he has applied shadow and light into the skin tone to make it look so realistic. The whole illustration is very effective and with all due honesty there's nothing for me to criticise about. 

Perhaps I could take the idea of the Vogue bit at the top and make my illustration into a Vogue Magazine Cover like I mentioned in my proposal. 

This is another of his illustrations. The reason why I want to evaluate this one this one is mostly because the dress that I will be illustrating will be similar to this dress. 

What I like about this illustration is mostly the dress because there's A LOT of detail in this dress and I absolutely love that because that is what I exactly want to achieve in my final illustration. I like the way he has drawn the attention on the dress more than the model itself because really that's what he's trying to show that whoever he was illustrating, what they were wearing was on point. 

For this one, it is the same thing that applies for the previous one, so much detail in the dress that makes it look 3D and also realistic and effective, very nice.

Overall.. 

Hayden Williams is an amazing illustrator and one of the things that I've mostly learnt and will take from him is by drawing in pencil, fine liner and maybe brush pen and markers. One final thing that I've learnt from his illustrations is the fact that he does not do anything to the background, he leaves it blank; why? Because, in my own opinion the background isn't as important because what you're trying to illustrate should be the subject and the attention of the viewer and nothing more than that. 

Rihanna's Chinese Themed Met Gala Gown

This dress has become so much inspiration to me in fact , this is what inspired me to make a dress that draped at the back. I just simply liked the idea of it beautifully drape at the back of which makes the viewer gasp. In fact it reflected and emphasised the fact that something very simple can be recreated into a magnificent and elegant gown. So, I wanted to take this idea into braids because it would let people know that braids, African braids, can be beatiful and are beautiful even though they are simply braids. 

MACRAME

  

Basic Knots:

This one is called ''Square Knot'' as you can see in the picture, that is because the knots that you do form a square. I found it really easy to do, especially with rope as it makes it look effective and it is strong enough to not go wobbly at the sides.

This one is called '' Spiral Knot'' and the only difference to the square not is that you knot to only one of the thread so then the rope twists itself and becomes spiral which is why it is called spiral. 

One resource that I used to make this process easier and faster is Youtube.com. I watched a video of someone else doing it and so that made it easier for me to understand it much quicker. 

(Please see Bibliography for Youtube link.)

(See page 55 in Sketchbook for the ones that I did.)