2D Design
Semester 1 Reflection
Some things that I have been most successful with this semester include complexity and detailedness as well as texture. For instance, as you progress through my portfolio, you can see how my pieces of artwork are gradually becoming more detailed in different ways. For example, my circle project resembles texture with the materials I used, consisting of oil pastels on watercolor rag paper. Another project of mine, the hand narrative, consists of texture since I used a high amount of detail on the flowers and hands. For the duck stamp, I think I was successful with my “sunset swim” art piece since it shows realisticness, is colorful, and has detailedness with the material gouache, a material I don’t use very often. I also drew the reflection of the duck pretty well, making it more realistic.
In another way, I think I got a better understanding of how to use the online app called Photoshop, where I learned how to use detail by matching colors together and adding them to the artwork. This app was also new to me, so it gave me a chance to try art online, rather than hand on hand. For example, both “Brothers,” and, “The Wind Beneath The Wing” projects were created online. Making these pieces of art, showed me how long art can take since Photoshop was very time-consuming, however, I was successful with them since they ended up looking pretty realistic and resembled some complexity.
Ending the semester off with the three sustained investigations was successful in a way as well. For instance, I got another chance to try new materials I had never used before, which consisted of glass, wood, and bark. I got the experience to fuse glass, color on wood, and paint on bark I found in the outdoors.
As I progressed through 2D design, I had a few struggles with time management. For instance, as I worked on Photoshop, I hadn’t realized the amount of time needed to complete a realistic-looking piece of art on the app. I think this is because once I learned what Photoshop was about, I hadn’t expected there to be so many colors to match the picture you’ve chosen. For instance, in my digital painting of “Brothers,” I had thought that one of the kid’s faces would only take a few colors to complete, but I then learned that skin consists of various colors and shades. I faced this challenge by matching every color in the picture and applying it to the piece of artwork.
Another struggle I faced was using paint and learning to add layers in order to get details. For instance, in my duck stamp as well as my third sustained investigation, I learned to paint the background first, let it dry, and then add more layers following the background.
One of my artistic goals moving forward includes getting more into painting, specifically in a more realistic way like landscapes. As I created my 3rd sustained investigation, I aimed to focus on different materials other than colored pencils. Although colored pencils are nice to use sometimes, I do want to test out other materials. By taking part in 2D design, I got a chance to try out a few different materials, which inspired me to use them more often in the future. For instance, another goal of mine is to experiment with oil pastels and or charcoal, and more paint. By using these new artistic techniques, I can widen my knowledge and skills in textures, designs, colors, and shading.