Observational drawings and photos (Animals at Pittville Park)

In order to practice drawing some animals from life, I went to Pittville Park. There are many different animals kept there which I drew from life. I also took some photos for any future drawings and/or mixed media work.

Pen and watercolour

This was a useful excersise. It was good to have to draw quickly from observation and focus on the main shapes and movements of the animals instead of the detail.

Style influence

Gemma Correll

Gemma Correll is a young illustrator whose work inspires me. She uses a limited number of colours and a simplistic style that works well and suits her aims. Her main objective is to entertain by using humor in her work.  A lot of her work is based around her pug - she creates many amusing illustrations about being a pug owner.  I discovered Gemma Corrells' work on Facebook and she has a professional looking website: http://www.gemmacorrell.com/

Her work and aims are similar to mine in terms of the eye catching cartoon style and quirkiness of her illustrations. Her objective is to humor her target audience and mine is to promote sources of help for mental health issues through quirky, eye catching and sometimes funny illustrations. My aim is to intrigue and capture the attention of my target audience.  I like her style and the way she draws animals. My initial idea for my final major project was to use a similar cartoon style to this. Although I want to go through a process of observational drawings and experiments, to work out what works best, before deciding on a specific style.

Below are some examples of Gemma Corrells' work that I found on her website or blog; 

I found this on Gemma Correls' blog. 

"The Scottish Angel

I like her minimal use of colour. Although I will have various colours in my final work. These quirky stand alone pieces are the kind of things I would like to achieve with my final characters. Using text and image to get my point across. The cartoon pugs above are drawn using simple lines and this is similar to the style I'd like my final characters to be in. I feel it is an appropriate style for badges, t-shirts and posters that are aimed at a younger target audience.

Something I found interesting and useful is that Gemma Correll makes 'daily diaries', in which she uses text and image.  This is good professional practice as it keeps her mind engaged in the creative process.  She can also use them as humorous stand alone pieces that her audience can relate to.

I like her style it is a good mix between quirky and traditional. It is still eye catching despite limitied colours.

Sketchbook work (practice drawing animals)

 

Here are some rough experiments I have done with a more detailed drawing style. As I plan to use animals in my final work I wanted to practise drawing them more realistically before maing them into cartoons.

Bear, pen - Sophie Bishop

Bear, pen and watercolour - Sophie Bishop

Chameleon. Pen and watercolour - Sophie Bishop

Budgie. Pen - Sophie Bishop

Dogs. Pen - Sophie Bishop

Giraffe. Pen and watercolour - Sophie Bishop

Owl. Pen and watercolour - Sophie Bishop

Sloth. Pen and wtercolour - Sophie Bishop

All of the above drawings are experiments I have done using images of animals online as a rough visual reference. I used pen and watercolour for these images and tried to mix detail with a slight cartoony style; (such as funny facial expressions and/or a quirky appeal). This is all practice drawing animals and experiments with style. I feel that my final characters will better suit my aims if they are more cartoony and use thicnker lines. This is because they need to be eye catching and appeal to ages 13-20. If my characters have a more cartoony style I have more freedom with bright colours, therefore making them more eye catching.

Mental health charities and organisations

I have browsed some websites for mental health charities and organisations to try and get some insight into how they work and how my illustration work could benefit them. There are various organisations and it is interesting to research the different approaches each organisation takes and the options that are out there.

The websites for some of the main ones I found are listed below:

www.mind.org.uk/

www.2gether.nhs.uk/

www.time-to-change.org.uk/

www.rethink.org/

 'Time to change' focus on campaigns and ways to tackle the stigma surrounding mental health and where to find help rather than offering help directly.  'Time to change' promote talking about mental health and even have 'cuppa and conversation tea bag' packs that you can order to help you arrange a conversation about mental health with people you know. This pack contains leaflets and badges with simple illustrations and these are the kinds of things I would like my work to be on.  Although I'd like my work to be used more generically for posters and badges, to capture the attention of young people who will then know where to find help or take part in events if they wish to.

I emailed all of the above charities and organisations explaining a bit about my work and asking for any advice and information regarding the work they do and how they go about promoting themselves. So far the communications manager from 2gether nhs has responded and seems interested in my project. She suggested me coming in for a meeting to discuss ideas so hopefully I will be able to do that soon. A copy of the email is below:

Hello,

I am an illustration student in my final year at university. I am starting up a project which aims to tackle the stigma surrounding mental health and am interested in getting involved with mental health charities, events and organisations.

The main aim of my project is to help young people who may be suffering with mental health issues to find help.

I aim to achieve this by creating fun, illustrated characters that each appropriately express different symptoms of different mental health issues in a way that is eye catching and effective. These characters are quirky, fun and colourful and will be made into posters, badges, stickers and printed onto t-shirts. I hope for this to be a way to ‘get the word out there’.

I’d like for my work to be linked to a mental health organisation, so that the people who see my work will know where they can go for information and help.

I’m aware that there are a lot of young people who might not know where to turn, feel alone and don’t know how to deal with their emotions. This is why I want to create characters that appeal to young people and reach out to them in order to point them in the right direction. At the very least, I'd like my illustrations to openly highlight the fact that no one experiencing issues with mental health is alone.

I'm hoping for any advice regarding how mental health organisations go about advertising and reaching out to those affected by mental health issues.

Any general advice about working for one of these organisations and what’s involved would also be greatly appreciated.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Yours sincerely,

Sophie Bishop

 

From: Sophie Bishop [mailto:slbecreative@live.co.uk]

Sent: 12 January 2014 17:59

To: 2Gether Comms

Subject: Illustration work

 

 

 

Hi Sophie,

Thank you for your email. We would be interested in finding out a bit more about you and your work as we are always looking for ideas for reaching out to different groups, in a bid to explain more about mental illness and promote sources of advice and support.

We are currently particularly keen on mounting a campaign for young people, which would seem like a great use of your skills and would tie in with your suggested way of working.

Are you able to tell us which university you are studying at? If you are local to us, perhaps you would be able to come in and have a brief meeting to chat through ideas?

Kind regards

Kate

Kate Nelmes

Communications Manager

2gether NHS Foundation Trust

 

Proposal

     My aim is to tackle the stigma surrounding mental health. I aim to do this through quirky characters and illustrations. My target audience is 13 - 20 year olds. I hope for my work to reach out to young people who may be suffering with some form of mental illness and may not know where to turn. My quirky characters and illustrations will confront mental health issues and be a link to where sufferers can find help. My work will be designed for badges, posters, t - shirts and short comic strips. I feel these are the best outcomes for my work. It suits my aims of raising awareness and reaching out to people so they know where to look for help.  The style I am working in is a loose cartoon style. I hope for this to allow for my work to be eye catching and sometimes humorous without evoking too much emotion. This is because I don’t want to evoke empathy. Instead, I want my work to be an eye catching and quirky bridge between mental health sufferers and the help that is out there. I plan for my work to stare mental health in the face and express that no one should feel ashamed or alone. Some of my work is going to contain tips and information. My work will boldly tackle the stigma surrounding mental health and hopefully make young people more aware that mental health issues are common. I feel that it’s important to make young people aware of the changes they can make in their lifestyle that will help support good mental health. My ultimate goal is for my work to end up being used by mental health charities and organisations, in schools and/or colleges as posters, badges and to illustrate information leaflets.

Work process (Time plan)

Every two weeks (timescale will vary) I will create four tasks that correspond to the list below depending on what stage I’m at. This will happen from January until May and then I will be finalising my work and printing the final images. I will then plan out another time plan according to where I’m at in May.

1. Relevant observational drawings

2. Research mental health information (charities, organisations, tips, causes, treatments, common mental illnesses that effect young people etc)

3. Character design and mini comic strip planning

4. Research a relevant artist/techniques for posters/badges how to make your work stand out/styles AND/OR processes/how to print t-shirts etc


With this project I aim to:

1. Tackle the stigma surrounding mental health by creating quirky, fictional characters that represent various mental health issues. In doing so I also hope to; help sufferers not feel alone, promote positive thinking and inform sufferers of hints and tips to good mental health.

2. Reach out to young people who may not know what options there are in terms of discussing and learning about mental health. I'd like to do this via posters, badges and leaflets. I'd like to team up with a mental health charity or organisation and for my work to promote the help they can offer.