Abstraction 

At the beginning of the project, we created thumbnail sketches that included two different elements of design in a grid pattern. We went around and the other students in my class picked which ones they thought were my best. "Emphasis and Color" and "Abstraction and Color" were both very popular with my class and also my two personal favorites. This is why I was guided by a focus on the elements of design color, abstraction, and emphasis. I also decided that I wanted to draw a loose combination of my two original thumbnail sketches. I combined a variety of shapes and colors from abstraction with eyes. Eyes are something that I actually draw a lot, mostly in my sketchbook and the margins of lined paper during math class, but I never really focused on them digitally. In the end, I think I figured out how to combine and emphasize the different elements of design into one piece well.  

I used the digital program Procreate on an iPad with an apple stylist to create this piece. I decided to use a digital medium for this project because one of the main elements of design I was focusing on was color. By using a digital program I had access to every color imaginable and was also able to change around colors as much as I liked to get a combination I really liked for each eye. Another advantage of using a digital medium is as always layers. Each eye and background section is on a different layer meaning I could move, transform, and change each one individually. I talk a lot about the advantages of digital art but one feature I don't like is that digital art doesn't have the hand-drawn charm that traditional art does. Expeshaly when I draw eyes I don't erase my initial sketch if I even do one, the end result has a lot of detail because it has a lot of semi-random lines. To mix this with the perfect lines that digital art provides I used the sketch brush in Procreate for the line art, this adds just a bit more detail through texture and line weight.  

The prep I did for this piece was the element of design grid activity. After that, I had to figure out how to use the elements I choose to use. I used a variety of colors in this piece, but kept a uniform color pallet in each section. I did this for emphasis  on color because each eye goes with and stands out on its background color. To put a ephasis on abstraction I changed certain aspects of each of the eyes to be unrealistic in shape or form. For some, I changed the eyelashes, size, eye shape, pupil, and/or iris. I also made the blocks of color in the background go with the eyes they were with, but together the shapes seem random witch furthers the idea of abstraction. Overall I think I implemented my chosen elements of the design well.