Vian Wrya | Sheridan College | Bachelor of Illustration
YEAR 2
Looking back on my second academic year at Sheridan College, it's definitely had it's ups and downs. Moving from the foundational first year to the more demanding second year brought its fair share of challenges. Balancing heightened expectations, increased workloads, and tighter deadlines definitely required a few months of adapting. Still, even in the chaos of second year, there's a sense of growth and accomplishment.
This year, we delved deep into an array of traditional and digital media, from Blender and After Effects to honing our skills in Watercolor and Linocut.
I'm pleasantly surprised with the growth I've made in my representation of depth, conceptual brainstorming, understanding of different Adobe software, and ability to analyze the faults in my own work. This marks the halfway point in my program. I'm eager to see the difference in my finished quality from this year to end of next.
NOTE: This is in not a full representation of the work done in my second year. This is just a culmination of my favourite work throughout.
LIFE PAINTING: Some pieces are done in watercolour and others done with acrylic paint. All subjects are live in-studio models. The time each of these pieces took range from 3h to 9h- depending on what the focus was for that module.
ILLUSTRATIVE DISCIPLINES 1: These are two digital illustrations for "A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall" by Bob Dylan, 1963. The task was to choose a song and illustrate two metaphor solutions to the meaning of the song. I studied the political landscape of the time the song was released and annotated his lyrics to get a better understanding, then chose to take on two political themes embedded in the song. The first illustration tackles the attack that the Civil Rights Movement was under, and the second tackles the (at the time) ongoing Cuban Missile Crisis.
MEDIA STRATEGIES: An illustrative linocut project done for "The Fable of Fox and Heron" by Aesop.
MEDIA STRATEGIES: A series of still life watercolour studies. Using watercolour resist (or masking fluid), different ways to apply the paint, and finishing up with microns.
MEDIA STRATEGIES: This is the course that really pushes delving into different media. The first image is illustrative collage work done for Rapunzel by the Brothers Grimm, and the second image is a mixed media work done with watercolour and pencil crayon. The second image was one of my favourite assignments in this course. The task was to pick from a pile of old highschool graduation photos and re-imagine the person a few decades into the future. I re-imagined my person to be a glamorous drag queen in their 30s.
ILLUSTRATIVE DISCIPLINES 1: An information illustration project where we were tasked with picking a disorganized area of our rooms, annotate the items, categorizing them, and redesigning the storage space to accommodate the categories.
ILLUSTRATIVE DISCIPLINES 1: A few drawings from a larger project done for the short story "The Monkey's Paw" by W.W. Jacobs, 1902. First image depicts an angle of the inside of their bedroom, second image is the living room, and third is an illustration for the scene in the story when Ms. White opens the door and realizes her son isn't there.
ILLUSTRATIVE DRAWING (DIGITAL): A life drawing piece and an environment study.
MEDIA PRINCIPLES: A series of three illustrations of the same bug done with black India ink. First two done with calligraphy pen, final done with variety of household items (tissue paper, screws, straws, fabric). Each illustration is mean to become more abstract, starting with realism. Subject was drawn from life (taxidermy).
