Little Treasures (Poster 3) - The Process #process #DES101
- Emma
- Apr 9, 2020
- 3 min read
For my posters so far, I was interpreting the poem to be very dark, so for my third poster I wanted to take a more literal approach and explore the happier themes of the poem. I feel the haiku’s literal meaning is searching for treasures at a beach, this was my theme for poster 3. I took inspiration from Studio Ghibli animation and Charlie and Lola illustrations. I really love the style of animation in Studio Ghibli films, I think the characters are cute and easy to watch. I love the ‘hand done’ style of Charlie and Lola illustrations.
I started by writing out story ideas. I knew I wanted it to be set at the beach with a child who goes missing. I first came up with complex stories where the child is intrigued by something and runs off, then it starts raining and the family freaks out. I quickly realised this was far too complex and simplified the idea and number of characters down. I am proud of myself for realising so early on that my idea wouldn’t work. I didn’t get attached to my first idea and simplified it down at least 3 times before coming to my final storyline. I think I have grown in my decisiveness as in the last two posters I got attached to the idea of composition of something and it took away valuable time.
The story follows a beginning (5 frames), middle (4 frames) and end (3 frames). I tried to design a narrative which only used the key moments, to show the essence. (Chastain, 2009) The story reads vertically down and follows a little girl who feels her sand castle is missing something so goes off in search for it. Her mother doesn’t realise until later and freaks out, I wanted to emphasise a feeling of loneliness here. She finds her daughter who’s collected a whole of sea shells or ‘treasures’ and they decorate the sandcastle. The essence of my narrative is about feeling. I want the viewer to experience a feeling(s) when they see it. Whether it be the feeling of loneliness seeing the mother feel lost without her daughter or delight at the sight of the little girl holding all her treasures.
I drew all the frames with no digital design which was challenging as I’m not the best drawer and I found it hard to narrow the narrative to 12 frames and figure out what was ‘redundant’ and predictable. (Fiske & Jenkins, 2010) I had to keep thinking about how someone who doesn’t know the plot would view it, what is important? And what would go over their head? I cut out frames the audience could predict, such as the mother following the footsteps, which could’ve been in frame 10, or the mother and daughter decorating the sandcastle, these can be interpreted through the frames that come afterwards. To help emphasise time passing I focused on the shadows in each frame, especially the direction and length of them to emphasise that time has passed and the child has been ‘missing’ for a long period of time.
I was decisive with this poster, letting go of ideas I knew wouldn’t work early on. I am proud of what I’ve created, especially as it is all hand drawn, I think I could improve on my drawing skills though, especially drawing limbs.
Reference List
Chastain, C. 2009. Boxes and Arrows. Experience Themes. Retrieved from
Fiske, J & Jenkins, H. (2010). Introduction to Communication Studies. Communication Theory, (p. 62).
Miyazaki, H. (Director). (1999). My Neighbour Totoro. Retrieved from
Miyazaki, H. (Director). (2004). Howl’s Moving Castle. Retrieved from
Child, L. (2000). Charlie and Lola. I Will Never Not Ever Eat A Tomato. Retrieved from
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