Due to the recent completion of my 7th project
studying my level 4 Animation & Illustration foundation degree I shall be
completing a self-assessed analysis to determine my current skill set regarding
this project and how I want to move forward in development. The way in
which I shall be analysing my work is using a structure called 'SWOT'
Analysis. 'SWOT' is an acronym for the questions:
- Strengths - What are the strengths of my unit, research, Pre-production, time scaling & final result.
- Weaknesses - What are the weaknesses of the afore mentioned.
- Opportunity's - What are the opportunity's that I have come across during this unit, did I take full advantage of them and what opportunities am I looking for moving forward
- Targets - What are my targets to consistently improve my creative works and skill set. The aim of these targets is to set the goals to becoming more industry standard.
SWOT Analysis – Contextual Studies 1
Strengths
The aim of my contextual studies project was to prompt
the exploration of current and historical techniques, theory’s, and processes around
the creative subjects of Animation, Illustration, and character design. The
action plan that I was set to secure the acquisition of these experiences is to
script an analysis of a minimum of 5-character designs, 3 Illustrators, and 3
animations. I believe that I was successful in this research-based project due
to the strengths I have demonstrated within my written responses to such artists.
The first strength that I believe has assisted me in getting the most out of this project is the level of depth that I attempted to go into when approaching my research, for example rather than just stating what I viewed about a creative work with each of the defined topics I tried to compare, deconstruct, and explain why each aspect of the discussed point was the way it was, why its impact works that way, and how and why I would be interested in incorporating such processes into my own creative works. This strength in depth has enabled a greater transfer in knowledge from the creations I invested my time into exploring enabling increased personal artistic growth.
Another aspect of my contextual research file that I believe is one of my works strong points is the range in which I made my explorations present in. What I mean by this is that when exploring illustrators, I made sure to investigate artists that use much different techniques, materials, processes, and styles. I made the decision to do this to broaden the scope of knowledge gain so that I can achieve a larger amount of experience received though this project alone. This is because instead of analysing similar works I can consider a range of approaches when moving forward in the industry due to the foundation of ideas and insights I have gained from a range of topics I managed to explore due to this contextual research. Therefore, I am confident that this projects strength has left a lasting impact on my creative mental and physical skillset due to the decision to do this.
Been able to create accurate and impactful art requires a technical skillset and practice daily, but it Is not the sole factor required to create impactful artwork. A successful piece of art also requires a good eye for what approach I require to take based of appropriate concise knowledge by the content creator. During this project I made considerable effort in making comparisons, explanations, and justifications for my opinion during each analytical discussion resulting in an improvement in my ‘eye for art’ or intuition involving artwork. This intuition is an integral tool for an animator with goals of creating their own short in the future such as myself. I believe that another strength that this project holds is the resulting refinement in my intuition due to the time I spent exploring, discussing, and immersing myself in art I deem to be of impactful, immersive, and engaging when writing the research file during this project.
Weaknesses
As strong as a result I may feel my project has, there is always room for improvement when striving to be successful in industry today. The first area I wish to discuss which I feel I still could use some improvement in is my time management, but not the way I have stated previously on this blog. Previously on this blog I have discussed that project deadlines can become an issue regarding quality due to time scaling because I allow earlier tasks in production to get backlogged giving me less time for later processes. This is not what I mean in this situation. The time scaling issue I am referring to is the amount of time I loose exploring through artists before I find one that I resonate with enough to analyse their work. The amount of time during my research project that I spent writing is a lot less than it should be due to this time sink. In future productions I believe I can improve this by becoming more organised with my topics of interesting streamlining the research process.
Another area of my contextual research which I believe is weaker than the rest of my project result is how I will take the information I have outlined and apply it to a concise plan of action to develop experience and experimentation in the application of identified techniques and processes. What I mean by this is that at the end of each researched section I express my desire to experiment technique x for purposes y and z, but I don’t plan a specific concept in which I could action plan the physical experience of apply outlined theory’s and processes. This is not a flaw but is something that can greatly improve my artistic growth if I took the time to follow through with it in my writing and post contextual research experiments.
During the earlier stages of my contextual research in my character design section, I made sure to outline the influences that stimulate the character designs of those artists. Later, in my illustration and animation sections I briefly mention or left out such influences within my scripted analysis. I believe by excluding such information from my research analysis that I may have hindered my work from achieving a higher grade than I had already demonstrated as well as potentially missing out on understanding in more depth the driving points of such artists when attempting to learn insight from their creations. I feel if I had included this within my scripted contextual research that I would have improved the perceived technical standard and subject.
Opportunity’s
The time I have spent exploring and responding to artists during this contextual research project has provided me with the opportunity to explore new sources of inspiration and visual stimulation from both contemporary artists and those popular in history over the subjects of animation, illustration, and character design. This has impacted my creative skill set by enabling me new techniques and insights that I can apply to improve the quality of my creative works when attempting to work in industry.
Specific artists that I have had the opportunity of learning more about are:
The first strength that I believe has assisted me in getting the most out of this project is the level of depth that I attempted to go into when approaching my research, for example rather than just stating what I viewed about a creative work with each of the defined topics I tried to compare, deconstruct, and explain why each aspect of the discussed point was the way it was, why its impact works that way, and how and why I would be interested in incorporating such processes into my own creative works. This strength in depth has enabled a greater transfer in knowledge from the creations I invested my time into exploring enabling increased personal artistic growth.
Another aspect of my contextual research file that I believe is one of my works strong points is the range in which I made my explorations present in. What I mean by this is that when exploring illustrators, I made sure to investigate artists that use much different techniques, materials, processes, and styles. I made the decision to do this to broaden the scope of knowledge gain so that I can achieve a larger amount of experience received though this project alone. This is because instead of analysing similar works I can consider a range of approaches when moving forward in the industry due to the foundation of ideas and insights I have gained from a range of topics I managed to explore due to this contextual research. Therefore, I am confident that this projects strength has left a lasting impact on my creative mental and physical skillset due to the decision to do this.
Been able to create accurate and impactful art requires a technical skillset and practice daily, but it Is not the sole factor required to create impactful artwork. A successful piece of art also requires a good eye for what approach I require to take based of appropriate concise knowledge by the content creator. During this project I made considerable effort in making comparisons, explanations, and justifications for my opinion during each analytical discussion resulting in an improvement in my ‘eye for art’ or intuition involving artwork. This intuition is an integral tool for an animator with goals of creating their own short in the future such as myself. I believe that another strength that this project holds is the resulting refinement in my intuition due to the time I spent exploring, discussing, and immersing myself in art I deem to be of impactful, immersive, and engaging when writing the research file during this project.
Weaknesses
As strong as a result I may feel my project has, there is always room for improvement when striving to be successful in industry today. The first area I wish to discuss which I feel I still could use some improvement in is my time management, but not the way I have stated previously on this blog. Previously on this blog I have discussed that project deadlines can become an issue regarding quality due to time scaling because I allow earlier tasks in production to get backlogged giving me less time for later processes. This is not what I mean in this situation. The time scaling issue I am referring to is the amount of time I loose exploring through artists before I find one that I resonate with enough to analyse their work. The amount of time during my research project that I spent writing is a lot less than it should be due to this time sink. In future productions I believe I can improve this by becoming more organised with my topics of interesting streamlining the research process.
Another area of my contextual research which I believe is weaker than the rest of my project result is how I will take the information I have outlined and apply it to a concise plan of action to develop experience and experimentation in the application of identified techniques and processes. What I mean by this is that at the end of each researched section I express my desire to experiment technique x for purposes y and z, but I don’t plan a specific concept in which I could action plan the physical experience of apply outlined theory’s and processes. This is not a flaw but is something that can greatly improve my artistic growth if I took the time to follow through with it in my writing and post contextual research experiments.
During the earlier stages of my contextual research in my character design section, I made sure to outline the influences that stimulate the character designs of those artists. Later, in my illustration and animation sections I briefly mention or left out such influences within my scripted analysis. I believe by excluding such information from my research analysis that I may have hindered my work from achieving a higher grade than I had already demonstrated as well as potentially missing out on understanding in more depth the driving points of such artists when attempting to learn insight from their creations. I feel if I had included this within my scripted contextual research that I would have improved the perceived technical standard and subject.
Opportunity’s
The time I have spent exploring and responding to artists during this contextual research project has provided me with the opportunity to explore new sources of inspiration and visual stimulation from both contemporary artists and those popular in history over the subjects of animation, illustration, and character design. This has impacted my creative skill set by enabling me new techniques and insights that I can apply to improve the quality of my creative works when attempting to work in industry.
Specific artists that I have had the opportunity of learning more about are:
- Greg Simkins
- Tomer Hanuka
- Hell'O Monsters
- Emmanual Ho
- TADO
- Neko Studios
- Nick Sheehy
- Motomichi Nakamura
- Grand Chamaco
- ‘Moon’
This project has also enabled me the opportunity to
discover and plan the experimentation of new techniques and processes in all
creative fields of which I indulge. To suggest a few new techniques, I have
learnt about due to this investigation are: Painting techniques with acrylics
and digitally, Drawing techniques with pencil and ink, and animation techniques
through digital vector approaches. This researched knowledge will guide me as I
strive towards new goals both personally and professionally.
Although a lot of the artists and artwork I have explored this project has been things of interest to me, this is the first time I have given myself the opportunity to deconstruct such creative works in an analytical format resulting in the knowledge acquisition. This allows me to enhance my artistic intuition regarding content creation improving the technical quality and pace of my own creative workflow when it comes to my professional works.
In the future when I begin to work full time in the industry it can often be hard to find the time to explore at this level of detail artists and artwork that I resonate with and find appealing. This project has presented me with a prompt to explore to a technical high standard artwork that I find interesting and learn from it setting the foundation for my future endeavours.
Targets
To consistently grow as an artist, it is imperative that I understand how I can improve to allow my skillset to naturally evolve in a productive direction. Reflecting upon my SWOT analysis and my project there are a few key areas which I would like to create an action plan for to balance out my skill set moving forward regarding this contextual project.
Target 1 – Develop a streamlined research process
Creating concise and effective research is imperative for the success of a creative production but creating quick but equally as effective research is the difference between complete and successful when engaging in industry.
As outlined in my weaknesses section of this blog post I feel that I sunk a lot of time into deciding which artists to pursue rather than been able to focus on the analysis of their work. This issue is detrimental the potential I could have if I was able to pursue the scripting of artists from the get-go. As a solution to this problem I deem it necessary to streamline this process by identifying, devising, and executing a technique that will speed up this process.
Potential solutions that I have considered for this issue is to write a list of artists I find appealing in advance ready for the next time I require an investigation prompt for my artistic growth. This could be done in situations where I would not be able to do other work such as on the bus in a limited situation. Another solution I have considered which could be a solution to this issue is to invest in art compendiums such as those created by ‘Pictoplasma’ and ‘Juxtapose’ which double up as a catalogue of quality artists when seeking quality in visual stimulation.
Discussing suggestions alone will not bring about successful change within my work, therefore as an action plan I have decided I will invest in buying art books such as those provided by the brands above as quick and easy location of inspiration and visual stimulation regarding popular and successful artists in industry. Whilst I have this as a core approach I will also write up a side list of artists which I can draw up whenever I need a boost in solutions for my contextual requirements. These answers put into action should improve the time scaling of my research process regarding the stated issues.
Target 2 – Plan and follow up on the application and practice of contextualised techniques
All talk and no game will never see me grow as an artist, If I am to achieve the goals I have set out to achieve as an animator then it is imperative that I plan and follow through with my experimentation in response to my research.
Stated previously in my weakness, I outlined that although I had discussed in detail the inner workings of the artists creative works and expressed that I planned to apply my understanding and inspiration into experiments to learn about them in full that I did not pass comment on how I would action plan these to ensure that I do end up attempting these experiments. Therefore, to solve this identified problem I shall discuss and action plan here how I will apply these experiments in full moving forward.
In the following weeks on this blog I am keen to perform 3 experiments whilst posting about it online to receive feedback enabling me to continue growing as an artist. I will perform one experiment in response to my research on character design, one on illustration, and finally one animation experiment. This action plan is a practical approach to ensure that I get the absolute most out of the research I previously committed my time too.
Although a lot of the artists and artwork I have explored this project has been things of interest to me, this is the first time I have given myself the opportunity to deconstruct such creative works in an analytical format resulting in the knowledge acquisition. This allows me to enhance my artistic intuition regarding content creation improving the technical quality and pace of my own creative workflow when it comes to my professional works.
In the future when I begin to work full time in the industry it can often be hard to find the time to explore at this level of detail artists and artwork that I resonate with and find appealing. This project has presented me with a prompt to explore to a technical high standard artwork that I find interesting and learn from it setting the foundation for my future endeavours.
Targets
To consistently grow as an artist, it is imperative that I understand how I can improve to allow my skillset to naturally evolve in a productive direction. Reflecting upon my SWOT analysis and my project there are a few key areas which I would like to create an action plan for to balance out my skill set moving forward regarding this contextual project.
Target 1 – Develop a streamlined research process
Creating concise and effective research is imperative for the success of a creative production but creating quick but equally as effective research is the difference between complete and successful when engaging in industry.
As outlined in my weaknesses section of this blog post I feel that I sunk a lot of time into deciding which artists to pursue rather than been able to focus on the analysis of their work. This issue is detrimental the potential I could have if I was able to pursue the scripting of artists from the get-go. As a solution to this problem I deem it necessary to streamline this process by identifying, devising, and executing a technique that will speed up this process.
Potential solutions that I have considered for this issue is to write a list of artists I find appealing in advance ready for the next time I require an investigation prompt for my artistic growth. This could be done in situations where I would not be able to do other work such as on the bus in a limited situation. Another solution I have considered which could be a solution to this issue is to invest in art compendiums such as those created by ‘Pictoplasma’ and ‘Juxtapose’ which double up as a catalogue of quality artists when seeking quality in visual stimulation.
Discussing suggestions alone will not bring about successful change within my work, therefore as an action plan I have decided I will invest in buying art books such as those provided by the brands above as quick and easy location of inspiration and visual stimulation regarding popular and successful artists in industry. Whilst I have this as a core approach I will also write up a side list of artists which I can draw up whenever I need a boost in solutions for my contextual requirements. These answers put into action should improve the time scaling of my research process regarding the stated issues.
Target 2 – Plan and follow up on the application and practice of contextualised techniques
All talk and no game will never see me grow as an artist, If I am to achieve the goals I have set out to achieve as an animator then it is imperative that I plan and follow through with my experimentation in response to my research.
Stated previously in my weakness, I outlined that although I had discussed in detail the inner workings of the artists creative works and expressed that I planned to apply my understanding and inspiration into experiments to learn about them in full that I did not pass comment on how I would action plan these to ensure that I do end up attempting these experiments. Therefore, to solve this identified problem I shall discuss and action plan here how I will apply these experiments in full moving forward.
In the following weeks on this blog I am keen to perform 3 experiments whilst posting about it online to receive feedback enabling me to continue growing as an artist. I will perform one experiment in response to my research on character design, one on illustration, and finally one animation experiment. This action plan is a practical approach to ensure that I get the absolute most out of the research I previously committed my time too.
Having reviewed my ‘Contextual studies’ project and
applied my feedback into a clear action plan for me to work on, I am satisfied
that I have grown from my time analysing and reflecting on my scripted work and
the artworks of others in this unit. I hope that everyone reading this has
taken on board from my experiences and learnt a little something for
themselves. Thank you for reading, till next time.
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