If you've been reading my art blog for a while, you're probably familiar with my comic series, Green Corner. Zalanda is the primary antagonist of the series and the older sister of Aena, the protagonist. You can read Zalanda's character bio on the Green Corner site.

There are certain subtleties to the character relationships in Green Corner. Of course, I want the characters to have depth and be interesting, but I also want them to seem like they could be real people aside from the fantastic setting. I draw some inspiration from my own experiences for that kind of natural feeling, but none of the characters are really modeled after anyone I know. Aspects of their personalities may be similar to people I know, and some of the things they say may be quoted from life; but that's as far as it goes.

Zalanda is a character that I find a lot of people are drawn to at first. I think my character design for her is very successful in this regard. She's beautiful and curvaceous; she's got the kind of look that other girls and women are envious of (even if they won't openly admit it).

One of the things that bothered me growing up was the image of the female ideal that girls are exposed to. Zalanda is very much a commentary on how that type of image can be hurtful to the self-esteem of other girls. Girls are incessantly told and shown that the ideal woman is thin, with a small waist and large breasts. No matter how much you may try to tune it out, when an often impossible to achieve image is out there that much, it only encourages a division and sometimes an elitist attitude from people who feel that they are more important because of their physical appearance alone.

There's nothing wrong with taking pride in your appearance, of course. But there is a difference between caring about how you look and being elitist about your looks.

For Green Corner, I made a point of making Zalanda the gorgeous older sister with an abrasive personality. She has a sharp tongue and never hesitates to speak her mind. She can seem rather cruel and dismissive. That's an intentional commentary on how a supposed ideal of female beauty says nothing about a person's worth or personality. External beauty is only physical.

It may seem strange for me to say this, since I'm a visual artist and a graphic designer; but I don't think that physical beauty adds a great deal more value to anyone. I don't think that a physically beautiful person deserves more good fortune than a person with average looks.

Like Zalanda, a woman can look beautiful on the outside but also be a sour, selfish, petty person. Zalanda knows when she's being hurtful, but she doesn't care about the feelings of others for the most part. She is the type of person who craves attention and will bully others in an attempt to gain power over them and distract from her own flaws.

She is very much a combination of female bullies I've met in my life. She spreads lies, shuns people she dislikes, and leads the crowd for no apparent reason. She is superficially popular. Others may envy that for a time, until they come to the realization that she's not the type of person you want to emulate in terms of actions and/or personality. Rather, she's the type of mean girl that other girls are glad to see fall flat on her face in a sort of karmic retribution.

Self-worth is an objective thing, a personal thing. Improving your appearance for yourself is great, but doing so for attention from others could indicate you need to look more closely at your self-esteem. In Pathfinders, a friend of mine was once asked by one of our Leaders why she was wearing makeup at camp, as there were no boys around. My friend smartly retorted that she was wearing makeup for herself, not for boys. Experiences like that that really made Guiding memorable for me, and encouraged me to feel better about myself. WAGGGS is a great thing for girls and women to become involved in.

Green Corner is very much a series about teen girls, for teen girls. I have specifically developed characters such as Zalanda to encourage teen girls to think more about what it means to be physically attractive, and if it needs to mean much for them. But I also want girls reading the series to take comfort in characters like Aena who are openly frustrated and envious of the supposedly ideal body image. Aena sometimes finds it annoying to be dismissed as "cute" in comparison to her voluptuous sister. Like a lot of girls, she worries and feels insecure about herself at times; despite being genuinely well-liked by many people, skilled, and charming.


It's a normal thing, but it can feel very isolating when you're a teenager. We need more positive influences for girls and women. We should be giving more encouragement to appreciate our own achievements and assets. Being a teen is hard, you will probably struggle and stumble many times. But don't forget that you are worth something, regardless of the nonsense written in magazines. If you really think about it, you already know how amazing you are.

Other things to check out on the topic of self-esteem and the feminine "ideal:"

• Dove's campaign for real beauty – a refreshing campaign that encourages girls and women to recognize that beauty comes in many shapes and sizes. I love that this campaign is honest about Dove products too and doesn't make exaggerated claims about moisturizer making you look youthful. A moisturizer promotes healthy skin, nothing more.
• Girl Guides of Canada is a wonderful organization for girls as young as five through to adulthood that promotes knowledge and self-esteem. Outside of Canada, check out the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts (go to the "Our World" section to find the member organization in your country).
• Sex, Lies, and Photoshop a commentary video from the New York Times about the extent of Photoshop retouching in magazines and whether it should be disclosed.
• David Airey is a professional graphic designer and discussed Sex, Lies, and Photoshop on his blog previously. I'm glad to see that both genders are concerned about the topic of retouching and how it encourages negative self-esteem.
• The Photoshop Effect blog post by Sarah of Diet.com is a companion to the video of her experience on a professional photo shoot and having her image retouched. There's also a second video where Sarah and experts further discuss retouching.
  

What do you think about the topic of the feminine "ideal?" Any more articles or videos you'd recommend? yecrqwzm7f

Labels: art, green corner, theory, writing

Speaking as someone who's studied typography, there are truths to both sides of this argument. I'm going to get a bit technical here, feel free to ask about any terms that seem confusing.

Black text on a light background is common in print because it is high contrast and very legible, but also because it's more cost-effective to print. Printing light text reversed out of dark ink is a little more involved and may involve trapping to ensure that fine lines aren't obscured by ink spreading through the substrate.

This is more of a problem with a lower-quality or toothy substrate. Newsprint, for instance, generally requires a low line screen value because ink spreads very easily. This also makes trapping a little more tricky. A coated paper (or even a calendared paper) found in art books and the like will require a higher line screen value, and trapping is easier.

When I say line screen, I'm referring to the halftone line screens used in most professional quality presses. It's similar to the process used by inkjet printers. Resolution (measured in Dots Per Inch for print) is closely related to line screen, being 1.5 to 2 times the line screen value. For newsprint, 150 dpi is usually crisp; for art books and more high resolution printing, 300 dpi is a common value.

Screen resolution is measured in Pixels Per Inch, which is similar to DPI. 72 ppi used to be a very common screen resolution. Nowadays, users often have larger screens capable of higher resolutions. This is something that web designers need to remember when setting type size on the web. Setting type in pixels is unreliable as the physical measurement changes based on resolution. But that's a topic for another post.

For the typography enthusiasts, there are 72 postcript points per inch when measuring type for print. That doesn't mean that type is printed at 72 dpi. Type is usually treated as vector shapes (which are considered resolution independent, so they will print at the highest possible resolution based on the print settings). Again, that's not really something I want to discuss in-depth for this post.

Back to the topic at hand: if we're really going to get specific, the issue is actually about high contrast for readability. For something like a projected presentation, white text on black is actually far more readable and less straining to read, regardless of the audience. In a dark room, it's easy to focus on bright letters but straining to focus on dark letters surrounded by a bright background.

Looking at a computer screen though, it boils down to things like age, visual acuity, and personal preference. It's also a mistake to treat print and on-screen media as overly similar. There are many errors that people make when they try to transition from one to the other. Certain things work in print that don't work on screen and vice versa.

There is high contrast between the primary type and the background on my art blog. But it is not black text on a white background (at least not when you visit the site, I can't control the display in feed aggregators). I chose a dark type on a light background combination as I want to appeal to as wide an audience as possible.

However, if I were designing a site that primarily targeted teenagers, light type on a dark background could work just fine. Teenagers online are more accustomed to looking at light text on a dark background.

There also needs to be some consideration given to serif versus sans-serif typefaces as well as the weight of a typeface. A very fine weight sans-serif can be hard to read in body copy when the text is lighter than the background. On screen this can cause some readability issues if the type is too thin or too small. In print, the type would need to be trapped more carefully so that letterforms aren't obscured, meaning that there are more possible problems with this combination in print.

Many studies will tell you that a sans-serif typeface is more readable on screen, and a serif typeface is more readable in print; but that's a bit subjective. There are certainly ways to use both on screen and in print effectively.

I have a program on my computer for checking contrast for colour-blind visitors called Sim Daltonism. I use it sometimes on my sites and sites I design for clients to ensure that there is distinguishable contrast for all text. It's a simple program, but it makes it easy to double-check contrast.

I hope you found this post interesting. Feel free to comment with any of your thoughts on the subject of contrast for readability.

Labels: theory, tips, typography

Every graphic designer and, arguably, every visual artist should know how to use the principles of design to their advantage. I've seen mistakes before in the list of principles as presented by others, and I wanted to provide an accurate list here for reference.

I've listed the principles of design below as I learned them when studying graphic design in college. The information is based on my college notes and includes some direct quotes, but is largely presented in my own words. Unfortunately, I'm not sure of the exact source of some of the information, but I'll list recommended books from the course outlines in another post for those who may be interested.

Balance

• Used to portray stability or instability.
• Categories: symmetry, asymmetry, asymmetrical symmetry, and radial.
• Symmetry tends to create stillness and results in a more static, controlled composition. Asymmetry can give a sense of unrestrained energy.
• Asymmetry can feel balanced by giving the same weight to different areas without being symmetrical. Differing weights in asymmetry can create tension and/or emphasis.
  

Contrast

• Can be used to create emphasis or a sense of similarity.
• Often used in conjunction with other principles.
• Contrast can be between: shape/form, volume, size, value/colour, position, or direction of items.
  

Emphasis

• Used to focus the attention of the viewer and add interest.
  
• Unity must be carefully considered. A composition which is not cohesive feels uncomfortable to the viewer.
  

Positive/Negative

• The interplay of positive space (the figure/image/component) and negative space (white space/ground/picture plane).
• Balancing positive and negative space is more comfortable for the viewer. It allows for focus on important positive space while giving the viewer some visual rest.
  
• Excessive positive space prevents the viewer from focusing and important elements can be overlooked. Excessive negative space can result in a product which appears unfinished or unusually plain.
  

Repetition

• Encompasses rhythm and patterns.
• Can be used to create unity (e.g. a predictable pattern), a dynamic effect (e.g. a swirling vortex), or even emphasis (e.g. an anomaly within a pattern).

Movement/Direction

• Used to portray liveliness, stillness, time, change, or motion.
  
• "Tension plus direction equals motion."
  
• Diagonals tend to create visual movement, as they encourage eye movement in a particular direction.
• Comics, or sequential art, are a classic example of art used to portray the passing of time. The layout of sequential art also encourages a particular reading pattern or eye movement from the viewer/reader.
  

Gestalt/Unity

• Grids create a sense of unity and structure. Mathematical sequences can be used to create grids, including the golden mean and the Fibonacci series.
  
• Grouping creates a sense of unity and harmony. The relationship of groups can create a sense of closure, which is more comfortable for the viewer. Grouping can also be used to create implied shapes.
• Gestalt theory:
  
  1. "The parts of an image can be considered as distinct components."
  2. "The whole of the image is different from and greater than the sum of its parts."
     

Labels: design, recommendations, theory

If you've followed my comic series, Green Corner, for a while; you've probably noticed that I tend to make adjustments from the pencil stage to the final digital image. In the earlier pages, I often corrected proportions as well as relative sizes of characters and objects.

Now, I make far less adjustments of that kind and find it easier to double-check things while hand-rendering. I check proportions a few times while I draw by hand, to minimize the need for digital corrections.

I know how to draw in perspective, and what looks correct. But I sometimes have a little trouble with things like the sales desk in the bookshop. In my head, I know the size that I want for the desk, but I'm not actually using reference.

Professionally, I use more reference to ensure correctness; but Green Corner is a personal project (and a learning project) that I have the option of editing at my discretion. For the most part, I don't use reference for Green Corner. The problem with this is that it can be difficult to translate what I see in my head to what I draw on a page; which I think happens to a lot of artists.

I was recently working on page twenty of Green Corner; one of the more complex and detailed pages.

I wanted both Zalanda and Alshina to be mostly visible in the first panel, but I placed them a little too close to each other and made them a little too large in my pencil to allow the desk to fit naturally between them. Initially, I wasn't sure about including the desk, but I added it and other scenic elements to the page for interest. I adjusted the desk as well as the size of the characters in that panel for the digital version.

The desk is seen at various angles and in relation to various characters many times in the first twenty pages of Green Corner. I often find myself adjusting the perspective of the desk, to ensure that it's correctly rendered when it appears. If the angle appears too steep, it can make an entire page look awkward.

I prefer to digitally render the more geometric scenic elements in Green Corner, regardless of whether or not I sketch them out by hand. I can fix things when I re-work pages digitally, but when making detailed pencils, I want to limit later adjustments.

I think part of the problem I have with rendering things like the desk in pencil is that I'm used to drawing at a single size. When I draw characters of different heights, I often reduce a sketch with a photocopy and re-draw to fix relative size. This allows me to maintain detail and consistency at smaller sizes. I may re-draw characters multiple times, but I don't do the same with scenic elements.

When creating digital pages, I find it very useful to layer items and selectively hide objects if I need to work on something unobstructed. It's more involved to edit things in pencil. I find it awkward to check perspective of the desk by hand because it's usually obstructed.

I don't think I will continue making completed, hand-assembled pencils for Green Corner. I think it would be better to draw items separately by hand and then adjust and assemble in Photoshop as necessary. I would still have a hand-rendered foundation, but there would be less re-drawing. I think this would work better for the way that I tend to complete the pages, as I often draw portions not visible within the confines of a page to ensure things are rendered correctly.

I don't think I'll ever stop drawing things by hand, but I like to streamline my process when possible. Illustrating a comic series is a tricky thing, but it has taught me a lot so far and always encourages me to grow as an illustrator.

Labels: comics, green corner, illustration, theory, traditional media