I Wish it Would Rain (Project 1)

For this project we had to create an image using only the lyrics from a song by Gladys Knight and the Pips.  While listening to her music I heard alot about peace and love, but I also heard about heartbreak and sorrow.  I tried to reflect that in my thumbnail images in my sketchbook.

  I wasn't to familiar with her work until I heard "I Wish it Would Rain".  My father had sung a version of this song in a band he used to be in so I thought I'd pay tribute.  The sketch of the eye (above right) is what I decided to base my image off of.  I then sketched out another, simpler version on a larger sheet of paper and started plotting out where the different verses would go.  When trying to construct the base image of the eye I had to chose lines in the song that would be long enough to make up the lines of the eye that I needed. The rest of the lyrics that were left over (after the basic construction) were then used to create the eyelashes and eyebrows.

  I chose a couple of fonts.  Cooper Black for the bolder lines in the eye, and Handwriting Dakota for the eyelashes and eyebrow.  I constructed the parts of the eye separately on tracing paper and then taped them all down where they formed the rough image of the eye (seen above).  This was then placed in the xerox machine and copied, making it easier to see and ALOT less smudgy.
  I then covered the back of the Xerox copy with graphite, creating a "carbon copy" type paper... only with graphite.  This paper was then placed graphite down on the illustration board where it was taped down and traced again.  This made a ghost print of what I would be inking.  This ghost print was then traced yet again in ink.  In the picture below I am halfway through inking, to show the difference between the ghost copy and the ink. 

   When I was inking I traced all the cooper black writing first and then filled it in once all the other tracing was done.  For the crease above the eye and for the outline of the iris I used stippling instead of solid black because I didn't want it to compete with the outline of the eye and the eyebrow/eyelashes.  I'm pretty pleased with the final product.