Coursework

I have always had a sweet tooth. When I was young, I ate my sweets and desserts out of normal bowls, and have always wished that these bowls were cuter and more appealing. Thus, for my coursework, I have created 3 different containers specially designed for storing desserts. They are animals transformed into containers, which I hope children will receive well.

First up, I had to use aluminium foil to get the structure of my animals. The aluminium foil is compacted and crushed together.

Process of making the octopus

Experimenting with pens to see if the legs are sturdy enough to hold the chocolate sticks

Next, I had to wrap and plaster paper clay all over the containers. It was tough as when the paper clay dried, cracks appeared, and I had to smooth them over with paper clay slip.

Lastly, I spray painted the animals. The octopus is done with different shades of white, yellow, orange and red, giving a blended effect of a yellow-orange octopus. The whale is done with blue, and dark blue for receded areas. White and silver spray paint is drizzled over the whole whale to give a polka-dot effect. The turtle’s body is done in a marble effect, with excess light green, green and dark green paint sprayed together. The paint mixes and gives a natural marble effect. The shell is done in similar way to the octopus, and the polka-dots are done in the same way as the whale.

Prep board attached to give a summary of the final work in different positions

Close up of turtle and octopus

The octopus stores chocolate sticks

The turtle stores jelly

Close up of whale

The whale stores a slice of cake or one whole muffin

I have only worked with clay in curriculum time, which means that I have only done 2 clay works before. My first clay work was very basic, it was done when I was 13. It was a dog, and consisted of a pinch pot for the body, another smaller pinch pot for the head, and 4 rectangular blocks for the legs. That was my first real experience with clay. My next clay work was a little more complicated. I did it when I was 15. It was a cat with its body serving as a bowl. The theme was containers. My work consisted of half a pinch pot for the body as a bowl, a pinch pot for the head, and four smaller rectangular blocks for the legs. I also included a carved out pumpkin with clay as an accessory. It was a pinch pot, but I cut off a little of the top to make it empty. Then I carved out the eyes and mouth of the pumpkin.

I have always been intrigued by clay, thus I decided to work on clay for my coursework. I liked the container idea we explored last year, so I decided to build on it this year. My cat was not good, as the container (its body) was very ordinary and boring. I wracked my brains for more creative ideas for my coursework, and I think I have succeeded in this aspect. I also wanted more vibrant and creative colours, instead of the usual block painting I did for both my previous clay works. I think I have also succeeded in this aspect, by experimenting with spray paints, different styles of spraying, and many different colours in each clay piece. All in all, I feel that this coursework has wrapped up my journey with clay in AEP nicely.

Scrapbooking

I started scrapbooking after I saw beautiful scrapbooking supplies at a store called Made with Love at Plaza Singapura, and I got very inspired to create my own scrapbooks. These scrapbooks are done in my own free time. I made scrapbooks (in reality, its one piece of paper, not a whole book) for my friends on their birthdays, and also for the animes which I enjoyed watching a lot. It is very relaxing and enjoyable to plan the design and layout of the materials, before sticking them on. The materials include stickers, buttons, ribbons, photographs, printed papers, etc. Everything is designed by myself, nothing was bought pre-made.

Here is a scrapbook I did for my friend last year in June. Its her birthday card. Size is the the square of an A3 drawing block.

Here is a scrapbook I did for one of my favourite animes. This was done last year in December. Size is the square of an A3 drawing block. I like to document my favourite animes in scrapbook format, as I think it gives the anime a fun twist. The designs and stickers I use are determined by the feelings I get from the anime.

Close up of blue and purple gems. I had to design them and paste them in this order myself, as they came in rows.

Close up of the space dedicated to Takuto, a character in the anime.

Close up of the space dedicated to Mitsuki, a character in the anime.

Close up of right corner. The peach coloured balls are crushed paper resembling flowers (effect can be seen from far)

In the past, I never bothered much with design and arrangement. After I started scrapbooking, I realised how important layout, planning and design is. I learnt some skills from scrapbooking that I applied to AEP. For example, I plan out my paintings now, and make sure that it is balanced. In the past, I never bothered about being balanced. Thus I feel that picking up this hobby has helped me in this area.

Upside down Cat

I did this drawing when I was 13. This was an assignment in class time. My AEP teacher flashed a cat head on the visualiser (or maybe its called a projector) upside down, and we were supposed to draw it with chalk in half an hour. It was quite hard to look at the cat as a whole, since it was upside down and gave me a headache. Thus, I focused on the part which I was drawing at one time, and the cat became much easier to draw.

Upside down cat. Supposed to be looked at this way.

Right way up. I'm relieved it looks like a cat both upside down and the right way up.

Close up of upside down cat's face

From this upside-down drawing experience, I learnt that instead of looking a art as a whole, I can also break up the work into a few pieces and look at each in detail. This was a very important lesson to me, and it was one of my firsts in AEP. This skill has helped me to analyse paintings in block tests.

Painted Hummingbird

I painted this hummingbird because it reminded me of someone. I was 14 when I painted this, and this was done in my own spare time. I have a book on animal photography, so I copied the hummingbird from the book onto a piece of normal drawing block with a 2B pencil. Next, I filled it in with acrylic paints. I am quite bad at using acrylic painting, so another reason why I painted this hummingbird was to practice my acrylic painting skills. I am quite pleased with the result.

Sorry for the bad quality, this photo was stored in my old phone, and it does not have a cable to connect to the computer, so I had to use my current phone to take the photos off the screen of my old phone.

Comparison of hummingbird beside original photograph

Dot Painting with Pens

I did this dot painting when I was 13. This was done in my own spare time. The dots are not really done with paint though, they are done using coloured pens. Firstly, I drew a lion with some patterns on it. Next, I added some designs into the background to spice up the drawing, which can be seen at the four corners of the paper. Then I used the coloured pens to draw small dots throughout the whole piece of paper. It is a pity that I used a very similar colour to the lion’s outline and the background, since it makes the lion blend in. This is my first time doing a dot painting, and it was an interesting experience.

Close up of lion's head

Close up of lion's body

Close up of one of the sides of the background

This artwork really tested my patience, and I learnt that one has to be meticulous and careful in order to create a nice artwork. This lesson has helped me throughout my journey in AEP, as whenever I feel like giving up and rushing through a piece of work, I will be reminded of this lion, and I will calm myself down and work slowly and carefully.

Anime Drawings

I like anime very much, especially Pokemon, so I have been drawing a lot of anime and Pokemon in my spare time. All these are done in my own spare time.

These are 3 drawings from an anime titled Gakuen Alice. I drew them last year for my LA SIA project, which had anime as a theme. However, the drawings were not needed in the end. These were done at the beginning of last year, and this is one of my first attempts at drawing anime. The medium is one 2B pencil, and the characters are quite easy to draw. I did not touch up on the 2 girls, I only touched up by outlining and darkening certain areas for the 2 guys.

Gakuen Alice

This is a drawing of a musician from an anime titled La Corda D’Oro. This was done somewhere near the end of last year. The medium is one 2B pencil. From my previous experiences of drawing anime, I found out that I am not very good at drawing human faces. Since this was done purely out of interest , I left out the face of the character.

La Corda D'Oro

These are 2 drawings from an anime titled Pokemon. This was done very recently of about a month ago. The artworks that I do that are purely out of interest are always drawings with a pencil. However, I decided to add some colour to the Pokemon this time round, so I used my preferred coloured medium, watercolour. Here are the Pokemon with and without colour.

Pokemon

Drawing cartoons and anime may look easy, but it is not. I found out that proportion relevant to the cartoon is extremely important in cartoons, as if the proportion is off, no one will be able to recognise the cartoon you drew. On the other hand, nature is very flexible, so if the proportion is a little off for nature like animals, people and scenes, it is fine. Drawing anime and cartoon has sharpened my portion skills, and I am now able to draw something faster and more accurate, since I have understood proportion better.

Black and White vs Colour - Conte Crayon and Watercolour table and chairs

When I was in Secondary 2 (Augest - September 2011), my art teachers, Mr Robertson and Ms Yap, brought the class on an excursion to Chinatown. We were supposed to take photographs of buildings or man-made structures. I chose to take a photograph of a marble table and the chairs around it. It was in a cafe in one of the buildings of Chinatown.

After printing out our chosen photo, we then had to trace out our photograph on a A3 size paper using a lightbox. With reference to our printed photograph, we were supposed to duplicate it, but in blacks, whites and grays and with conte crayon (they were in small, rectangular blocks) as a medium.

I have never used conte crayons in my life before. They do not work like pencil or charcoal, though they are somewhat similar. The conte crayons have a texture between that of pencil and charcoal. They break when force is applied, so we had to be very careful no to apply too much force. The crayons were given to us in small rectangular blocks, which made controlling extremely difficult. In the end, I ended up buying a set of conte crayons in the form of pencils, so that I could get into the small corners.

Here is my completed conte crayon work

Close up of marble tables

Close up of some chairs

 The program flipped the photo upside down and I have no idea how to upright it. Close up of part of marble table with another chair.

Conte crayons in pencil form, which helped in the details

My photograph was one of a marble table, and since I took the photograph in the afternoon with the sun reflecting off the table top, there were marble reflections on the whole table top. It was so difficult to recreate these reflections. I tried my best to copy the reflections as accurately as possible. This was also my first time using watercolor paints. I kept making mistakes, so I layered the paints on top of each other.

Here is my completed watercolor work.

Close up of marble tables

Close up of chair

Close up of background tables and chairs

In both of these times, I had to use mediums that I have never used before, and they took a lot of getting used to. It was really difficult trying to find out tricks and tips on how to work best with these mediums, and I had to try by experimenting. I thought that I would do badly in these 2 assignments, since I was so new to everything. However, after all the hours of hard work, I learnt that one should never give up, and all the effort is worth it.

Drawing at the Supermarket

One of the June holiday assignments in 2011 was to take 10 photographs in a supermarket or wet market, with each photograph telling a story. After that, we were supposed to draw two of the photographs. Each drawing should be A3 in size. I picked two photographs the were slightly different to draw. The first photograph was of my brother holding a powder milk can. The second was of a baby in a pram. Since these were set in a supermarket, there were many bottles of sauces and powder milk cans in the background. My AEP teacher told me that I could just draw the rough shapes and leave the details of these background bottles or cans out.

My brother holding a milk powder can

Close up of the shirt

Close up of the hand and top part of milk can

Close up of the milk can

A baby in a pram

Close up of the baby

Close up of the pram. The photo was turned clockwise by the program and I have no idea how to upright it. >.<

I have been using pencils since young, but I have always used them to draw cartoons. I found the shading of my brother's checkered shit very difficult. I broke up the shirt into four portions. These portions follow the 4 main sectors the natural folds of the shirt created. I spent one day shading and drawing one portion, so each portion is better than the previous. The milk can was also very difficult to recreate. I spent one whole day on that too. The baby in the pram was fairly easy, and I finished it without much difficulty.

Overall, this assignment has helped me to improve my observational skills, and has sharpened my drawing skills.