Back again babey, hope you guys have been doing well!
Third post, woot. Currently, my progress on my pieces has been pretty steady! I've mapped out all compositions, shading, and colors for all 8 of my pieces, so that's awesome! There were a few pieces where I was unsure of what animals to pick to represent each family structure, but I've sorted that all out. The animals I decided on in the end were:
-Homosexual Relationships - Does (wlw) and Lions (mlm)
-Families who Adopt - Foxes and a Bear Cub
-Polyamorous Relations- Hyenas
-"Found Family", or a family comprised of friends - River Animals
-Families with a Large Amount of People/Children - Snakes
-Single Parent Families - Elephants
-Nuclear Families - Penguins
And here's a visual :D
*note: the letters on top of the elephant piece represents a color alteration I'm making to balance the colors among all of the pieces out
For each image, I've created a system for how I colored it. Each image is comprised of only primary colors. Each piece has a primary color for the animal, a secondary animal color, and a background color. Then, the pattern in the background is the same as the secondary animal color. I did this in order to create cohesion among the 8 pieces, as well as create a balance of color within each piece.
At this point, I need to go back over what I have and refine each piece. Currently, I'm tossing around several aesthetics I would like to utilize; the main issue I'm having is deciding between having hard, defined line work or not. Maybe I could even just leave a bold outline. Whatever I choose, I would like to retain that concept of it all looking childlike. I also have to recolor those elephants haha.
During the 1/3rd progress check, some feedback that I got that I will consider are changes in the background patterns to make them more cohesive, figure out which elements of my piece I want to be stylized vs realistic, and figure out how I want to position them to be shown in a gallery.
When it comes to the patterns in the background, making all of them uniform in a grid style would probably be the best approach to bring them all together.
What do you guys think? Should I leave the line work in the pieces, or would it look better lineless? Also, what pattern do you think would be a good replacement for the foxes, as they currently don't have a pattern in a grid fashion, so I want to change it to such without repeating shapes.
! Artist Highlight !
KianaMai - Kiana Khansmith
A 21 year old Japanese/Jamaican storyboard artists at Disney TVA. Her style consists of colorful, bright, and energetic works that I've been a fan of ever since she was 16 years old!
I've been consistently inspired by her art and her journey thus far.
In her portfolio she also has a comic called Puppitty that expresses the experience of being biracial. It's among one of my favorite works of hers, and being biracial myself and relating to many of the cultural and social experiences laid out in it.
If you're interested in a body of cute and expressive work, then her stuff is definitely worth checking out!