Week 10: Shovel, Sunglasses, and Flip Flops Variations

Craft: For the remainder of the semester, the focus is on designing a deck of cards, while adding a creative side to the design-making portion.  This week, we had to design 3 illustrations based off the theme of our cards and from there, have 3 variations of each illustration.  The variations included changing the color and stroke.  Since we have the option to trace a photograph, I decided to use photographs for each of my illustrations.  The illustration I will be talking about is the purple flip flops located on the right hand side of the screen.  I used a flip flop image off Google and placed the image into Adobe Illustrator after I saved the photo.  The pen tool was used when tracing the photograph.  The fill and stroke buttons were used when choosing what color I would like the flip flops to be.  Since I am doing an Uno deck, I decided to have the flip flops one main color, purple, and then a lighter shade of the color so that it's easier to distinguish the illustration as a pair of flip flops. The Brush library was used along with the Color Guide and Color section.  All those sections are found underneath the Windows button, located on top of the screen.
Composition: Since the flip flops fill up the entire page with a white background, the viewers can see the flip flops very clearly, and the background helps elicit the idea that the flip flops are the main focus.  There's nothing to distract the focus from the flip flops. The darker purple attracts viewers towards that color first, and the lighter shade follows that view.  The darker color is more prominent in terms of surface area so viewers are able to see that color first.  Since the lighter shade of purple is located in front of the dark purple, the viewers eyes directly go to the lighter shade.  The lighter shade is not overpowering the darker shade so viewers' are still able to see the darker shade first and then  the lighter shade.  The strokes outlined on the flip flops are what viewers see last since the strokes are very small compared to the purple colors. The simple combination of both color and the strokes help the viewers distinguish the illustration as flip flops and allows them to see a clearly recognize the illustration.
Concept: Even though the majority of the color is dark, the color displays the idea that flip flops can be any color, and that they don't necessarily have to be bright.  While light colors are usually associated with a beach theme, the flip flops show that any flip flops are okay to wear on the beach.   Also, the flip flops appear as if they were bought from a regular store since they don't look fancy and don't have any exquisite designs.  They appear as just normal flip flops and illustrate the idea that the beach is just a place to relax and is a laid back place. The flip flops also suggest that many people go to the beach since the flip flops aren't a specific brand or design.  Even though the brush stroke might be fancy, the main use of the strokes were to exaggerate the shape of the flip flops.  A simple design can elicit a whole new meaning towards an illustration.