My work

I started off my project by first of all doing some observational drawings, at this point in time i didn't know what the theme that I was going to base my work on so just took some objects and started drawing. I decided to do a series of drawings of some plastic army figurines, just trying to find a route to go down.

I completed 6 different drawings using different materials, trying to explore with line and form to create simple expressive drawings. This particular page wasn't a very significant one in my book.

The next page after this was much more significant in directing me towards the theme i am now studying. This page was just another experimental page and I took an interesting old bike chain and create some experiments to represent the bike chain.

After i had completed this page I still did not know what route i was heading. I took some time to choose my current theme 'buildings with letters'
and decided to come back and make these pages more relevant to my theme.

I used my initiative and started to move the chain in different ways and I started to see different shapes appear, which looked similar to letters I then decided to create a word out of the chain 'mog' this is also personal to me as it is my nickname i took the chain and created this then decided to create a quick study. I took the chain and created a few more words.

skateboard page

Over these two pages I experimented with varied materials to represent the writing on an old skateboard that I picked out, as I found it interesting and exciting.The writing is faded away diminished through the layers of colour to its original surface underneath. All these marks left behind create a basis to experiment different way of representing the skateboards lettering. I chose the skateboard for its distinct writing and this links closely to my theme as I am looking mainly at the text on the skateboard.

I started off my experiments by exploring with making a black background with some charcoal, smudging and scratching to create a similar looking surface to the skateboard. I then took some white chalk and drew the writing over the top, I smudged in the black and white together to create a grey tone and added more white around the edge just like the lettering on the skateboard. I then took an orange/pink chalk and created fast, ridged lines over the top of the first two layers  to create the scratch marks seen on the skateboard.

The second experiment I done, this was more expressive and I just tried to be creative and create the form and line of the writing. I used the charcoal form the black background before on the first experiment and rubbed my fingers into it, i then used the charcoal on my fingers to smudge the charcoal on the paper. I smudged on hard to make a simple structure of the letters  'evo' this particular experiment didn't work very well as the charcoal did not display very well on the page when smudged with my fingers although it brought out divergent marks.

The third experiment was quick and simple using graphite in a 'gorilla' like grip to produce bold dark lines in the shape of the writing. This experiment was just experimenting further on ways to create the lettering with an array of materials, the lines formed were thick and in your face and worked very well.

The last experiment i did looking at the skateboard I tried to emphasise on detail more and look at develop some of the marks shown. This time I used paint as my media so I could get the correct colours into place and look at creating a more detailed analysis, although I did not create lettering with solid structure or form i feel that this particular experiment was successful when using correct colours and creating expressive marks matching those shown on the skateboard.

Ben Eine introduction page

This page is done to introduce Ben Eine into my book and show some of his work and the style in which he works. At first this page was dull and boring and it was simply just some images, which I added to a simple white background of layered white emulsion which gave the page some texture. I wanted to make the page more interesting and tie it all together so I simply added the name of the artist in red ink and then painted a large red 'r' in the middle of the page overlapping the images currently in place to bring all the images together and make the page more powerful. One thing that was interesting about the red paint was the images underneath were showing through, it creates another distribution to the page.

The page wasn't still complete so I thought of a way of taking it a step further and making it explosive. I added black around the edge of the writing at first to make the letter really stand out and bring life to the page. I then still felt it needed more and something to make the entire page stand out so I simply took the black and filled in the white spaces around the images. This made the page complete. The 'r' is also an experiment on Bens work and I tried to experiment with the use of colour and tried to interpret the way he creates his letters.

The first layer of white emulsion I had put on when I first done the page has created rough texture. The paint and ink over the top of this first layer has created an unusual surface, the texture would be much like some that Eine would work on himself as all of his work are completed on all types of surfaces and canvases. All of his work is done on different materials, this defines some of the rough canvases he could work on and shows the way that the lettering stands out further.

Ben Eine experimental pages 

across this double page spread i decided to make some expressive experiments on the work of Ben eine, using an array of materials. the main aim for this page was to experiment with the shape and form of the letters and some of the materials that work well.

i started off my experiments by using black acrylic to create some letter shapes in a similar style to Eine's work. i figured that the acrylic was thick and hard to control, when i painted a line the paint spread out and didn't create a clean straight line. with this in mind i added some water to the acrylic and decided to create some additional letters below i felt that the paintbrush flowed a lot more smoothly and created a much smoother, cleaner line which was easy to control and create the form of the letters.

i then moved on to create another experiment with the letters 'nd' this time i decided to wet the page in a certain space and applied the paint directly on top. this experiment i found that when trying to create the lines there was more flow in movement but and the shape was easier to determine but the end product wasnt the best. the writing blurry at points and also the lines werent as crisp they were slightly out of place.

the next experiment i used colour, i decided to use paint again and used acrylic. i chose the colours blue and yellow as theyre bright and ben uses bright in your face colour in some way to complete his work. i decided to free handly paint the letters again and tried to use the paint brush in more of a continuous movement to create the letters. i also added a little water as i found from my previous experiment that that worked better. this experiment was good but the shape of the letters arent of fine detail or proportion so the letters lack quality.

the last experiment on the right hand side i decided to take a different material this time, i chose to use charcoal to create a black and white drawing of the letters 'c' and 'a'.this time i decided to create the letters in a 3-D outcome as Eine tends to use black and white shades to create 3-D letters so they stand out and contrast against the bright colours he uses...