Assignment One - 03

Me, Myself and I - Phase Three (Final)

Prototypes/Final
I used Illustrator CS for both prototypes. I delineate my scanned roughs with the pen tool and progress from there. Working with vector graphics makes it very easy to scale my drawings and move them around to try different composition without the hassle of redrawing.

The Night
Initially, I exported the outlines (Fig. B) into Adobe Photoshop to fill in colors as planned. I did a sketchy texture for the background (Fig. A) but it wasn't visible on my test print! .. and I realised the original version (Fig. B) has a better impact! By using only black (on white) clearly signify darkness (the night). But the many white spaces was annoying so my brother suggested to alternate the colors. With black as my primary color now, it directly communicate my message. To put emphasis on my name, the transparency of the moon is reduced to 80.

(A) (B)

Critique: The general issue was the "I" and "G" were not prominent enough. The "I" ought to be separated from "Y" and the bird can be rounder. Personally, I prefer the "I" as it is because I dislike isolating every single alphabets - the composition feels too structured. But I guess that will be more art than design which I realised from examples in my tutorial that they are very different! Design prioritises clarity and bringing your message across, hence after couple hours of tweaking - here's the update:
The Cat
Despite completing my roughs, I didn't like the compositions much because the cat and fish bones are indirectly connected. I wanted the two elements to "interact" but due to time constrains, I proceeded with the prototype. And in Illustrator, I was able to scale and re-composite them and eventually settle upon this:

I've also removed the outline of the cat and went for a minimal approach. Warm colors are picked to simulate my fondness for cats. The "and i love cats!" is my attempt to use typography to create the illusion of the cat's tail (and even if unsuccessful, the curved text still conforms with other text).