This module went really well for a group project as we worked well
as a team and were able to discuss ideas without arguments. Normally I find it
difficult to work as part of our group because I am not a very confident person
but my group helped me work around my anxieties. Best of all we all managed to
help each other to complete our goals and more importantly reach the deadline
without fail.
There was a lot of
research involved in this module as you had to be well informed on the theme to
be able to write the articles. I enjoyed learning more about one of my
interests for my work as it caused me to learn some new skills which will be
useful in the future if I ever decide to make another newspaper like this. As
part of my work I was able to research an artist I admire (T-koni) and look in
more depth at their works while also using it to my advantage to further my
knowledge.
It was a
challenging thing to write two articles when I had never had the experience of
doing it in the past, but I now feel more confident in writing articles in the
future. I feel that the book 'How to write an article' really helped my group
to understand what you need in order to write a good article, in which you can
capture a readers attention. I also learned what you shouldn’t do in an
article and I hope that I have achieved this by using the advice in Chapter 5.
I have found that writing an article is extremely different to
drawing an illustration but I have also learnt they do have some similarities. The
ways in which they are different are that when writing an article the key
aspect is the background research, as without it, you wouldn’t have an article.
Whereas when creating an illustration it’s all about your own creative ideas
and you do not necessarily need to do any background research. One of the
similarities they do have is the fact you can choose any topic/theme and make
it into something that is your own.
Another thing I enjoyed about writing the article was that I got
to read lots of different versions of my tales ‘The fairy Horn’ and ‘Female
prisoner’ and it sparked curiosity in my mind to explore these tales in my own
time now that the project is completed. I am particularly interested in the
Female prisoner and what will now happen to Gloucester Prison. I found that Lyn
Cinderey was a very useful source and has an extensive knowledge of the
paranormal especially in the Gloucestershire area. I think that if I interviewed
her for the newspaper like I had planned to it would have been an interesting
contribution to the articles as she showed strong interest in the female prisoner
tale in numerous articles.
Out of my five illustrations for the newspaper, my favourite was
the blue fairy. I think that the drawing was simplistic but also captured the
delicate nature of a fairy so I believe that it was a successful illustration
which fitted well with my article.
Another favourite of mine was the pointing hand, I like the way
the pencil lines show through the markers as it creates a softer feel to it
rather than going around the image with a bold outline. My dragon painting was
more disappointing as I realized after painting it that I didn’t like it as
much as when it was a sketch, I feel as if it lost something. However, I did
think the textures the gouache created was effective and made a rough skin like
how you would imagine scales feel. I was extremely disappointed with the horn
that I illustrated as I felt it didn’t fit the colour palette as well as it
could have. In the future I would like to explore more with painting because I would
like to improve on my technique and skill. I find that I am more used to
digital painting rather than analogue. I would like to practise with the
programme InDesign as I did not get to use it as much as I would of liked to.
The aesthetic of the newspaper overall fit well together and contrasted
nicely with the darks and the lights in the palette. I think that the colours
we decided on were successful in the finished product as they worked well with
the illustrations we all produced. If we were to work together in the future I hope
that we would be more outgoing and produce higher quality illustrations that
show our skills and advantages in different materials.
I feel like we made a successful newspaper seeing as it was our
first attempt. It was very informative, captured the stories well and had
illustrations which were relevant to each individuals article.
