Field Notes: Observations from my Backyard

This was an illustration project I made last year for a digital illustration class. I wanted to create a narrative using a collage-style notebook that told a spooky story about a teenager interested in biology.

Process

Content and Style

Before starting the project, I was interested in exploring the concept of speculative evolution. In examples of speculative illustrations, I found for visual reference, they took a lot of influence from technical scientific illustrations.

After doing this research, I decided on the general content and layout for the project. In general, each page would have a collection of “scientific” detailed pen drawings, simpler cartoon drawings, “painted” backgrounds, and sometimes other media taped into the notebook (i.e., a map or newspaper).

Research

As soon as I had the idea for the project, I started researching the ecosystem I wanted to set the narrative within. Since the illustrations are from the perspective of someone really interested in biology, this would determine the subject matter of most of the following pages.

I landed on using the sea lamprey as a “monster” for the story. Both because it goes through metamorphosis, which could create interesting and dramatic moments in the narrative, and because it’s invasive to the Great Lakes, where the story takes place.

Proof of Concept

Reproducing materials

Even though this project was limited to a digital medium, within the narrative, it was a physical journal. To get this effect, I experimented with traditional illustration a lot near the start of the process, both for visual reference and to get an idea for how each page could be constructed by the character.

Because the art was “in-character”, sometimes an illustration could be more or less rendered based on how much time and energy I’d expect the narrator to have.