CONTENTS

INTRO

WORKING PROCESS

INSPIRE

PROMOTION

THE OUTSIDE WORLD

There are many different aspects to my practice, from animation to comic art, but the majority of my work revolves around post-er making.Posters fascinate me and I find the idea of grabbing someone’s attention with a single image incredible. In my work I aim to inspire the same feelings I get when viewing the movie and band posters that I love.Finding visually interesting ele-ments of a story to illustrate in a single image is key to my most recent work illustrating classic and contemporary books.

This booklet provides an insight into my working process and also acts as a plan for my next steps after graduation.

INTRO

WORKING PROCESS

I can usually be found at my desk working to the background noise of my favourite monster movies.Much of my inpiration comes from the strange things not usually seen in day to day life, books and movies invloving monsters and horror fill my room and inform my work, neverfailing to spark my imagination. I find joy in creating images of creatures and scenes thatI think up inside my head. Drawing and creating from my imagination provides freedom to make something new and unseen, this isnt to say that im not in-fluenced by events everyday life, even strange things need a sense of reality to appear grounded and authentic.

As much as my artwork has changed throughout my years at university, drawing has always been the one contant in all of my projects. My work utilses a mixture of ink drawing and digital colouring, balancing my images with large areas of black and white before converting the image into a photoshop file for colouring. Using digital programs allows me to take my original work and apply it to a number of different things.

WORKING PROCESS

My working method is comprised of 4 key stages. the initial stage involves sketching out thumbnails, these quick drawings allow me to judge what elements to incorporate into a composition with relative ease and save a lot of time. Step 2 involves taking reference images and and drawing each element of the picture in full scale, these images tend to be on seperate peices of paper allowing me to keep track of my layers when scanning the image into photo-shop.After roughing out the image in pencil I use brush pens and markers to apply the ink and then scan the images. The computer al-lows me to control each individual drawing in the composition and arrange it in a num-ber of ways until I find the one that works best. At this stage I’m also able to make minor tweaks to the original images, resiz-ing areas and darkening the inks.By plac-ing rough colours underneath my ink layers I can quickly gauge what colours work in the image and what colours to keep away from.

The last stage in the process is setting up the layers ready forscreen printing. Each colour must kept on a seperate layer with the darkest layer at the top and the lightest at the bottom.

WORKING PROCESS

Experimentation is key to understanding your own work and throughout university I have tried learn as much as possible about art materials and creative programs .This has opened up a wide range of possible routes for my work to travel in.

Deciding to make the change to screen printing is one of the best decisions I have ever made with my work, however, deciding to change to it so late in my project was perhaps not the best decision.Printing feels like the next natural step to my work but I only wish that I had experimented with it more in my previous years at uni-versity. In the short time I’ve had using silkscreens I feel that I have learned a great deal, this much is evident when comparing the quality of my first prints to that of my latest ones.Working with screen printing has changed my working method greatly, making me add more consideration into the use limited col-ours and how to balance them correctly in an image.

Screen printing has allowed my work to mature, changing my digi-tal work into physical images.Reproducing my work via screenprint-ing gives it a much more genuine and tactile appearance adding greater value than standard inkjet prints. By choosing to print the images myself I have greater control of what colours im using and feel more of an attachment to my final pieces.

WORKING PROCESS

The beauty of screen printing is the uncertainty.You never know how a final image will look until you print the final layer. Setting up the screens can potentially be very stress-full as there is much that can go wrong, but the process of printing itself is such a reward-ing one that it is worth all of the effort.

INSPIRE

No artist can say that his work is truly original, everyone has been influenced in some way by the things they’ve seen and experi-enced. Researching others work is the catalyst to exploring your own practice The trick is to de-constuct these images to find out why you like them, this can apply to everything from composition to techique.The next few pages give an insight into my favourite art-ists with brief segments on what I have learned from their work and how theyve inspired me.

INSPIRATION

Movie posters are a dying art form, not as much importance is put into this form of advertising as there was in the past.There are still special companies whos focus is bringing the art back into movie poster, companies like MONDO commision illustrators to create limited edition art prints.Shown here are two illustrators whos work bridges the gap be-tween advertising and art.

Kevin Tong is by far one of my favourite illustrators.The quality of his posters inspire me so much that i recently purchased one of his prints to hang by my desk. His works range from official band gig posters to big budget film posters and his ability to recreate key scenes from movies withso much attention to detail and at-mosphere is staggering. The col-ours used in his prints are given great consideration as they must work perfectly when reproduced with silk screens. Viewing his post-ers reminds me of the importance of details when printing and in-spires me to pay closer attention when creating my initial images.

INSPIRATION

Ive only discovered Rich Kelly’s work very recently when I hap-pened across this amazing poster for ‘Beasts of the southern wild’.Kelly has an talent of filling a im-age with great detail and visual information whilst maintaining a rough visual style. In place of stark realism Kelly chooses to de-picts characters with exaggerat-ed features, making his work vis-ually unique and easy to spot out from other artists. The alternative look of Kelly’s work makes it a fresh sight in the world of movie posters.

INSPIRATION

Film plays a huge influence in my work. Whilst working at my desk I will almost always have my favourite films playing to inspire me. The works of David Fincher and Ridley Scott are a key inspiration to me, many of Scott’s films contain extraordinarily artistic shots and compositions that the director himself has put much thought into;even going as far as to storyboard his entire films himself. Both direc-tors skill at visual storytelling makes their work instantly recognisa-ble. Finchers knowledge of contrast and composition is apparent in every scene, with shots that could be seen as works of art themself.

INSPIRATION

Alongside my love of film my other passion is comic books. Ive col-lected comics from a very early age and Im constantly looking for interesting and alterative new comics to add to my collection.The amount of effort that artists can go into to make every panel per-fect is incredible. While there are many comic artists whos work is generic and stale there are also many innovative artists whose work stands above the rest and make comics an art form to be taken more seriously. Among these artists is Greg Capullo. Capullo is a self taught artist whose worked with many of the big comic compa-nies, his eye for great compositions along with his draughtmanship and knowledge of anatomy and perspective make his work a very fresh sight in the world of comics. Every panel is perfectly arranged and proportioned giving them a realistic and cinematic quality. Through his twitter account he often accentuates the importance of working hard on a daily basis, working long hours almost everyday himself to meetthe comic deadlines.

PROMOTION

Without promoting yourself as an illustrator, getting work is an impossiblity. Even the best illus-trators work will go unnoticed if they do not promote themselves in the right way. I have made it an aim to use as many different platforms as possible to show my work and get as much expo-sure as possible. Sites like Twitter make it easier than ever to show your work to a wide audience that includes industry profession-als. As great as this is, using ad-ditional tools for promotion will always be a good thing.

Tumblr is a great way to show my working process and connect with other likeminded artists. The more realxed setting makes it easier to show more personality in my work, taking viewers through each im-age step by step. By looking at the working process of other artists on tumblr I feel a need to keep updated with their work and will regularly check their blogs for new images and characters. In turn I hope that by posting my progress viewers would be more inclined to keep updated with my blog.

The easiest and perhaps most important means of promotion is online promotion. The internet is accesible by almost anyone today which makes it the quickest way to get your images to reach a large audi-ence. As an illustrator trying to promote my work the internet there are many different sites that I can use that cater for different audi-ences, both professional and casual.

PROMOTION

My professional website shares the same visual theme as my other sites but with a less casual tone. This is the site that I prior-itize above the others and the one I always make sure to post links to. This site acts as a showcase for my most recent final pieces rather than sketchbook images and works in progress.

Tumblr is a great way to show my working process and connect with other likeminded artists. The more realxed setting makes it easier to show more personality in my work, taking viewers through each im-age step by step. By looking at the working process of other artists on tumblr I feel a need to keep updated with their work and will regularly check their blogs for new images and characters. In turn I hope that by posting my progress viewers would be more inclined to keep updated with my blog.

PROMOTION

My professional website shares the same visual theme as my other sites but with a less casual tone. This is the site that I prior-itize above the others and the one I always make sure to post links to. This site acts as a showcase for my most recent final pieces rather than sketchbook images and works in progress.

PROMOTION

Aswell as all of my online promotion I find it important to give phys-ical examples of my work to potential employers and other illus-trators. This is why I have decided to make a few small promotional pieces including bookmarks and business cards. Bookmarks were the obvious choice of format when deciding about how I was to promote my work seeing as my final major project is based illustrating popu-lar book covers.Both promotional materials will be included when sending art agen-cies physical samples of my work. I am hopeful that not only will the bookmarks be put to use, but they will also be memorable and serve as a reminder of my images.

PROMOTION

The idea behind my business cards was to show small snippets of my work, this was done in hope of interesting the viewer enough to seek out the full images themselves. I chose to keep the informative side simple and informative, only showing links to my various online sites alongside my name.

THE OUTSIDE WORLD

The years spent studying Illustra-tion at university have been the most fun and interesting years of my life, I’ve met great friends and made images that i am very proud of. While I will take away all of these fond memories I now have to focus on my next steps, and making movements to become a full time freelancer in the world of illustration. The next pages contain the areas that I have taken into considera-tion when planning my next year and how I plan to achieve these goals.

THE OUTSIDE WORLD

Along with a selection of friends on the course, we set up the ‘Explore’ exhibition at the SIX gallery in Boscombe. We had the gallery for a week, in which time each of us took turns in curating it. Explore was a great introduction to working in a gallery in terms of orginisation. It was also my first taste of an art themed event set up outside of uni-versity.Working as part of a team to set up and maintain the gallery has really helped me understand the working behind art events and management and will certainly help me in the future if I want to set up exhibitions for my own work.

THE OUTSIDE WORLD

The work submitted for the gallery had to be based on the theme ‘EXPLORE’ with each illustrator creating their own interpretation of the word. My work took inspiration from deep sea divers and the exploration the sea.

THE OUTSIDE WORLD

It was never my intention when I first started university but my years here have opened my eyes to the possibility of freelance illustration. Hearing lectures from visiting illustrators my opinion has changed and an area that I’ve never put much thought into is now the exact career I wish to pursue.The excitement of getting new comissions regularly with a quick turn around sounds like a great challenge that would constant-ly keep me on my toes and in turn progress my practice. Even without a freelance job I still intend to be creating and selling limited edition art prints on my website as a form of income.

THE OUTSIDE WORLD

After handing in my FMP my plan is to continue making screen prints in order to showcase in the end of year gallery at the Embassy Tea Rooms. For this I will be utilising the university print studio as much as I can whilst I still have access to the printing equipment.I’ll also be using the time space between now and the gallery opening to ensure that all of my work submitted will be the best quality that I can make it. During this time I will be sending emails and packages to art agencies in hope of getting my work noticed. Another long gestating project I’ve had is the creation of a comic book with a friend of mine. The script is still in its infancy but my plan is to start putting many hours into this as soon as possible when I move back to my home town. The writing duties will be shared between me and my friend, whilst the artwork will be left to me. Upon completing our comic the plan is to send it into Image comic publishers in hope of getting it published. Image comics is known for only publishing creator owned comics wich is why it was our first choice when thinking about the future.

LINKS

Website: www.aubri-illustration.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/aubriillustration

Twitter: @george_aubri

Tumblr: http://george-aubri.tumblr.com/

DO OR DO NOT,THERE IS NO TRY

-Yoda