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SELF-PORTRAIT
One of Ringling's courses, focused on artistic experimentation, required that students create a self-portrait and animate it. Abstraction was strongly encouraged, as opposed to simply creating a stylized representation of the artist's face
IDEATION
A page with most of the sketches of alternate versions of the Self-Portrait. The one that would eventually become the final version can be seen in the top left. Several of the other ideas that were proposed were watermelon themed, including an alligator made of melon pieces, a melon hatching like an egg, and a more literal portrait with the subject's head replaced with a melon. Also present is a design already in use in casual online spaces, also of course watermelon themed to match the rest of my unprofessional branding. Also note the sketch immediately to the right of the pufferfish, as this was the other idea in this batch that would be chosen to be rendered into a style frame.
STYLE FRAMES
A few ideas were selected from the previous round of ideation to be made into style frames, so others would have a better idea of the final aesthetic each approach would aim for.
As previously stated, watermelon is already the basis for the aesthetic of my personal accounts, so a watermelon themed idea was always going to push on to later rounds. I used the unique shape of melon leaves to represent my most standout feature, my hair. The face was designed to have a strange handsomeness to it, for no reason deeper than I thought it would be funny, and including my sense of humor in a piece meant to be representative of myself as a person seemed like a natural choice.
Hair is a massive part of the way I view myself and how others view me, so another choice for this project reduces me down to only that hair, with an impish grin and legs sticking out. This approach was meant to embody the wild energy that takes over when a project is just right, and enthusiasm and inspiration take over.
The final idea that moved forward to style frames was the pufferfish, but the design and environment were much more detailed in this stage. The choice to use a pufferfish (or more accurately, a porcupinefish, if one wants to be pedantic, which I often do) to represent myself came partially from my hair once again, and the way it fills out a space with its volume, and the way it made the silhouette of my head very round when I was younger and cut it shorter. In a similar vein, I can have a very large presence in a room, thanks to my years in theater molding me into someone loud and comfortable holding others' attention. I put the porcupinefish in a bowl to emphasize that idea, literalizing my capability to fill a space as the porcupinefish inflates, accidentally pushing everything else to the sides.
FINAL
Originally, this final version was meant to be a pencil pass before the environment, final lines, and colors were to be added, but upon review, it was agreed that this rougher, less polished version actually fit quite well, and so it was left alone. Given that the piece is meant to be representative of the person making it, the aesthetic does fit with my go-with-the-flow personality, and being in a rougher state does make the artist's hand more apparent, also fitting.
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