Photos by Johnnie Dang

When choosing my source images I made sure to choose photos with nice highlights, shadows, and midtones as needed in order to place out the different shapes of my subjects. I personally didn't have any photos on me of plants, animals, or people with the required lighting for this project. However, I knew that my boyfriend does since he's into photography and so I decided to ask him if I could use his photos. The first subject being my boyfriend himself, I decided to choose this photo as there is a cohesive warm toned colour scheme throughout the photo with clear shadow and highlights. I also chose him since he is someone very important and dear in my life. Secondly, I've chosen a picture of his cat named Peanut. In this photo there is also very clear highlight and shadow on the cats face and highlighting his one eye. Peanut also has some stripes throughout his fur which can be interpreted into shapes. 

Tonal Map Johnnie & Peanut with Added Texture

At this point in time I had decided to choose using Peanut for my further manipulations and iterations as I had the task of making a scarf design in mind for the later future. I believed that I would be able to make a more universal design.

When choosing my photos to use for my clipping masks I decided to use photos of nature, fabrics/textiles with different textures or patterns, and a wallpaper with a geometric pattern. 

When actually creating my tonal mappings with my clipping masks I made sure to create some cool contrasts against the clipping mask photos and the solid colours that I had still kept in the design. Before starting the tonal clipping masks I decided to choose the two illustrations of Peanut I ended up liking the most. For my first Peanut design I decided to focus on using warm brown toned photos with different textures to reflect what would be his fur. Using the photos of textiles with a pattern, a carpet for some texture, and a tree stump I was able to replicate the colour tones I had in place before the clipping mask. The second design I've used my more geometric illustration. For this design I used most of the photos I've chosen, I believe that this design created an interesting visual as there are many textures, patterns, and objects throughout the iteration. My last iteration of Peanut I've focused on using the photos of nature and flora which I thought created something quite pretty and contrasted against the flat colours of browns and oranges while also creating a unified design.

Knowing that my scarf design cannot have a specific orientation I played around with how I could setup a base design. At this point I had decided that out of my illustrations I had done of Peanut, I liked the geometric one the most and continued my scarf design. For this iteration I chose to use the tonal mapping of Peanut with added texture as I believed it created a cooler effect that gives relation to the texture of fur. I basically laid out 4 cats going in a clockwise motion around the border of the 12" by 12" artboard in illustrator to start off.

For this second iteration, my orientation is again composed of 4 cats but this time with the cats facing each other, I had used the cat design with floral tonal mapping with clipping masks for this one as well. This created an interesting design and layout and clear shape and counterform in the negative space between the ears. However, I believe that the orientation isn't as strong as the first one in terms of not having a specific direction.

When creating my border I was inspired by traditional asian architecture such as ones used for temples or historic houses. Using simple lines with a 7 pt stroke I created the simple border design.

Temple in Malaysia photo by Afeeq Nadzrin on Unsplash

Chinese dragon emblem photo by Joshua Ang on Unsplash

Door archway photo by Eric Muhr on Unsplash

I then went on to experiment by making 3 scarf designs with these base layouts. When choosing my background I had used these interesting patterned graphic styles while also playing with colour, size and other shapes.

I then further manipulated the designs into more intricate scarf designs incorporating the optical illusions of the bezold effect and complimentary colour optical illusion. 

For my first design I had taken my original design from the 3 experimental iterations and saved it as a jpeg and then placed it into a new artboard where I constrained the size in order to shrink it a bit to fit the centre of the 12" by 12" artboard. I then made the background border colour a red orange while also adding the border design I had created in the corners of the composition with the four cats. I had then used the bezold effect within the border of the design by lining up 4 cats within the centre of each side of the square. The line of cats face up and down surrounding the the scarf.

For my second design I further manipulated and was inspired from the past two iterations I had done. I used the foliage graphic styles pattern in a fuchsia colour, then adding a green square in the centre with a red stroke to compliment the green colour. Within the green square is a composition of the 4 cats with the tonal clipping mask design, each being within either a teal or pink square, making a checkerboard looking design. I then added my border design within the green square with two lines in between to create a more continuous looking border.

I ended up liking the first scarf design as I thought the composition and elements are more interesting and still created a better design without a clear direction. And so, I went and added my logo which I created using the Lust Script font on adobe. I just used my initials "CL" for my logo. I used the letter "C" and flip mirrored it and then attached it to the back of the "L" as the curvature from the "C" fitted perfectly. As you can see the "C" and "L" turn into what looks like the letter "K" which is also symbolic as my nickname is Kat. I ended up making the logo a deep red for the final design, matching the border I had created.

Reflection: When creating my final design I was able to experiment and play around with many design principles and design tools in illustrator. Figuring out what the best design and layout was in order to incorporate all of my required design elements while also keeping a cohesive design. I would say that at first glance my design is quite busy, however the design elements come together to create something very interesting as it still has the right amount of plain space. The colours and pattern help draw your eye in towards the middle of the scarf design as the cool green colours pop out against the warm oranges and reds of the design. I also believe that my border design compliments the overall vibe and design of the scarf.