The Graphics examination question entitled "Music To Live" was the entire focus of the project that is now coming to a conclusion.
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[Stick in the music to live question extract here]
[Stick in the music to live question extract here]
[Stick in the music to live question extract here]
[Stick in the music to live question extract here]
[Stick in the music to live question extract here]
[Stick in the music to live question extract here]
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I choose this question above the rest because I have always had a strong fascination about the way that music has such a strong part and effect in life, I find it both wonderful and intriguing, especially the way that it effects the mind of living things (and how many different things respond to the sound vibrations in different ways).
The way I went about answering this question was to methodically work out my interpretation of the phrase "Music to live" and how other music/graphic artists interpreted this.
My interpretation of the "Music To Live" question focused primarily on the themes of morality, spirituality. nature, life and circles & cycles.
The way that morality was interpreted was that it conjured the idea that music is something to live by, like the Ten Commandments of the Christian faith.
This brings me to my next point, spirituality is far more involved with this phrase that first meets the eye. The churches of many religions such as Christianity and Catholicism practice both hymns and prayers. This religious music is preformed for a number of reasons, but the one which relates to this question is that some religious people believe that the act of preforming music alleviates their soul (consciousness) and so they may carry on living.
This again links nicely back to the themes of morality, religious people living to music.
I tried to show my initial interpretation of this through a range of formats such as mind maps, detailed written concepts and mood boards focusing on album art which I felt had a connection to the way I interpreted "Music To Live."
Many religions such as Buddhism hold a strong belief in reconnecting with nature. Many Monks are known to attempt reaching this state which is known as "Enlightenment" through mantras, which can be preformed in solitude or in a group.
They attempt to lead more natural lives and one of the ways the attempt to connect to nature is by trying to harmonize with the sound of nature, the melody of the may birds to the symphony of the rushing rain.
The way this is all connected together though is the last three points; life, circles and cycles.
Life is a strong element exhibited in nature, spirituality and morality, it is the ultimate action. Without action there would be no life, without life there would be no music.
Circles & cycles are the bonds which tie together many of these themes. They are a part of our life as we wiz around the sun, they can be seen on graphs as time pass's by. they allow one event to move on to another.
The way I derived this from the phrase however is very simple, "To". This gave me the impression that music is "To" live, as though is it from one to the other, like an action and a movement, but as I view Music and Live as elements which reflect and rely on one another, I made the connection that they music loop back on one another.
From working out my interpretation of the question, I came to what I thought was the logical step, I wanted to make holographic album cover. This was based on the idea that I could show the "depth" of the music visually using the holographic medium. However after researching this particularly high priced medium and only receiving a luke warm response from my peers during my pitch, I decided to return my concept to the drawing board for refinement. Looking at what I had done so far I decided it was a bad idea to abandon it and start fresh, so I remolded the concept. I had a concept idea to focus on landscapes (as this was my initial template which helped my link to nature whilst producing my graphic art). I then thought that the landscapes would stand out more if I made them in the form of silhouettes.
When I presented this to my tutor, he was not impressed by the focus of the silhouetted landscape as he reminded my that I had a strong focus on silhouettes in my last project, he did however like the lightening effect which resembled bird like figures. The problem with the design was that I was not answering the question. I had not yet tackled the "Music To Live" element clearly enough, so I started to create something. I played around with a various assortment of layouts but eventually decided upon the numerically concept design of a modified "2" in the center of the "music To Live" logo with Music at the Top and Live at the bottom. I then applied rays coming out of either end, as though the music and live was coming out of the two. I tried to keep a nice clear monochrome pallet whilst designing this template.
Once this was done however I produced a range of color variations to pick the base color (which can be found on the insert of my final piece).
I then morphed the center two with the liquify effect and came out with what my Tutor thought resembled a "Phoenix". I did some research into this and it strongly relates to my project, the phoenix in mythology works on the idea that every five hundred years or so it dies and from the ashes of the dying creatures rises a new one. This is a clear cycle, which has manifested in the modified "2" which is the connection of music to live "To".
I have to admit that I was intrigued by the similarity of the way that Tenacious D had placed their newly release album Entitled Rise of the Fenix, which the phoenix in the center and the text and the top and bottom, very much like mine. The design is primarily red flames, which is very much how I designed my own logo (with red flames surrounding the Two shaped Phoenix).
http://rockitoutblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/music_tenacious_d_rize_of_fenix.jpg
After showing my tutor how it had progressed he appeared to like it more, however he again suggested that the lightening birds I had done resembled my last years project on the subject of "The birds" in which I made bird faces out of a coffee stain using the liquify effect in Photoshop. I then attempted to reform the birds into the shape of a bird, so as to include the whole body. My tutor agreed that this fitted better however it could have resembled the initial lightening birds mentioned earlier a little more.
After some reworking of the backdrops for the music to live logo during my development stage, I grouped all three separate artists onto one album. This went against my initial concept, however I felt it flowed more with my actual work as it symbolizes the three solo artists coming together to form one harmonious product.The way that I presented them was that I removed all of their color and put them on a high contrast filter to create a monochrome effect, which I felt blended the artists together whilst not distracting from the main point of interest which was the music to live logo which retained all of its color on purpose to draw the eye.
The back cover was a matter of zooming into the middle of the front cover (minus the logo) which I did because I felt you could not see this on the front so easily (partially as it is obscured by the logo). I liked this however I felt it could be improved and so I flipped the Mad Monty half around, which then formed what looked like wolves howling at a speaker shaped moon. This works with my interpretation of the question so I worked into it a bit to bring out what I saw.
Once I showed this to my tutor he liked it but suggested that I add a middle to my CD insert to give it a more full product feeling. I used the Hue board I had designed as I thought it was a nice piece of concept art. After having compiled all my work into my graphics project I reflected upon the experience and what I had produced with some of my friends on FaceBook. Here is what they had to say about the album I had produced:
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