Crit Presentation

Vlad Yankov - Invisible Cities Final

Final Outcomes, Invisible Cities

And here are my final paintings, starting with exterior establishing shot:

Exterior low angle shot:

And an interior shot:

For some very strange reason, the coulours are much more different on every other monitor I look at them, when I painted them they were saturated. Need to double check why this happens.

CD Cover

Decided to go with some old colour comps for Octavia, wanted to honour my old, discarded ideas. :)

New Influence Maps for Octavia

After a lot of research, the exterior influence map:

And interior one:

Source Material Research

Vlad Yankov Source Material Research

Octavia thumbnail

Just a quick composition, based on my research in my sketchbook.

Octavia thumbnail

Visualising the city in perspective, not a lot of details I'm afraid. The city looks really murky I need to draw the attention of the viewer on it, but without the level of detail it really doesn't work at the moment. Feedback on the overall composition anyone?

Interiors research for Octavia

I had a chance last week to look around Rochester and do some sketching and take some photos. These thumbnails are inspired by that trip. I also had an interesting idea about the religion of the citizens of Octavia. They worship the two mountains from which the city is suspended, represented by the female sculpture on the left (thumbnail 1 ) and the male one to the right.

Here are some photos taken from the Rochester Cathedral:

And some urban sketching of the buildings around the University and Rochester Cathedral on the Outside:

Octavia research on how to design a city

Did some more research, I am happy with the overall shape of the city, it also looks a bit like a spider, which was purely accidental :)

windmills design research

Well windmills aren't very exciting, and the sketches are generic, but an idea did spark at the end and my whole city design is based on it, so I'm happy :)

Octavia overall design

Bit stylised but wanted it to be quick.
The reason behind this design is the height of the city. The shape collects the winds and directs them in the middle where the futuristic looking "windmill" transforms them into electricity.
Another perk for this shape is collecting rain water and the condensation of the trees, again gathered in the middle and filtered before send through the pipes.
My problem at the moment are the houses? Any suggestions?

New Octavia thumbnails

Based on my research I published yesterday, I did some thumbnails. I think they make much more sense than my previous ones.
1. Is a overview of Octavia with the buildings and houses.
2. Is a close up on the roof top water gathering trees.
3. A close-up on the "community building" and its entrance.
4. Is a more stylised version of the city.
Feedback is more than welcome :)

Octavia research

After watching the incredibly inspirational 2001: space odyssey today and reading an interesting article about concept design, i think i finally understood what Phil means when he said I need to design a city, not build it (finally, an epiphany)!
I looked into some key points and am including the scan from my neat moleskine:

Water for the city is gathered by rooftop "parks" with plastic bags around the tree branches. The water towers are collecting it and also filter it in a very basic way - rocks, sand and layers of charcoal. Also there are drains around the rooftop for rain water, again filtered in the same way.

Energy/Electricity - i thought of two ways an isolated city like Octavia can gather energy - capturing lightnings, implying the city is very technically developed, or wind energy. Second option seemed more plausible as i don't see the city as very futuristic and "techy". 

Transportation - cable cars, simple as that. Public transport is electricity based while individuals have manual cable systems of transportation and lifts to move around the city.

Religion? - i think it is more to do with the spiritual side of the citizens. Since they are high up in the air, between two mountains i can imagine they are quite spiritual. Air as the symbol of intelligence, the people of Octavia have a different understanding of " up and down" (a long and humble curtsey to 2001 space odyssey). They can use lifts to move up and down around the city, they spend a lot of their time hanging in mid air and height is something usual for them. 

Houses - hanging tents of course, citizens are growing ivy from their houses that stop them from moving in the wind.

Also I recalled two artists i heard about a few years ago - Dan Havel and Dean Ruck who created a "black hole" house which inspired me for the design for the temple in Octavia. Also there are houses built into the mountains surrounding the city, connected with it by ropes and ladders.

Overall design - the city resembles a scaffolding and the crossed levels and ropes hanging from it vaguely resemble a spider web.

First thumbnail of this new city design is at the bottom of the attached page.

I will do some digital drawings tomorrow, feedback will be welcome.

Octavia thumbnail

Just a quick one, the colours just refused to work so I turned them down almost completely.

Brush texture and invisible cities

Since I got a good response for my life drawing sketch from Phil (Hi Phil :) )

I wanted to incorporate it with my project. So after a quick chat with Jordan today, I made the drawing into a brush for photoshop.

I love the texture it creates, at first glance it looks like a really good start for rocky surfaces and possibly with some additional editing, clouds/steam. I did a quick concept thumb for Octavia using only my mouse (what a rebel!), so ALL feedback is welcome.

Colour comps - invisible cities

Some more Octavia inspired thumbnails, nothing to do with the design of the city really, but more to do with the colour and lighting.

First life drawing class

I enjoyed it a lot. The installation was quite intimidating (thanks for that Phil) but it was still great fun

After the initial "warming up" we turned to negative space drawing which was way more enjoyable than the first session.

I was focusing on the overall shape of the structure and added the negative space inbetween. The last part was even more fun.

I used a red pen, which isn't very visible on the photo) a graphite pencil, a rubber and a white oil pencil.

Colour comps - Invisible Cities

I sketched a lot yesterday and finally decided to add some colour in the new thumbnails. Feedback will be much appreciated. :)

Online Greenlight Review - project 01 Invisble Cities

https://www.scribd.com/doc/242062636/Project-01-Invisible-Cities

More thumbnails

A few more thumbnails from my sketchbook and digitally created. I picked some of them as my finalised thumbnails, although they do not cover the three concept painting view points.