drawing The Art of Dying | the Gojira project

color proofs

The biggest challenges with the Gojira project have been technical issues, mainly dealing with scanning and printing the illustrations. I am planning to have 10 copies of the project printed and bound, as limited-edition artist books. The books are approx 90mm X 140mm, and contain 31 pages in an accordion-fold.

After quite a bit of searching, I was able to find a printer willing to take on this project, Les Arts Graphiques here in Nice. Megapom', a local photoengraver, will be scanning and treating the drawings. And finally, a local artist has agreed to hand-bind the books once they are printed and assembled. 

We did 6 tests, in quadrichromie and in bichromie. The best process appears to be quadrichromie with a layer of Pantone process black. This makes the outlines denser. Using quadri (instead of bichromie) also helps bring out the depth of the illustrations, by capturing the fine naunces of grey in the coloring.

What makes this project complicated is that the accordion-fold is very long (about 2.7 m). The accordion-fold will have to be printed out in 4 separate pieces, which I will then fold and assemble together. So we will really have to make sure the printing is even, and that there are no strong color variations between the different segments. 

The scanning process will take place in 2 steps: first, we'll scan the outlines, and then, after shading and texturing those outlines, I will have the full illustrations scanned a second time.

Then the 2 scans will be superimposed in Photoshop, which will help make the outlines very dense.

So I have quite a bit of work set out for me! I aim to have completed the outlines by the beginning of August, and begin working on the colors later during that month. Sometimes I wonder how many sets of copic liners and Tria markers I will need to finish this all!  

Huun-Huur-Tu - Mongolian throat singing

I recently came across an excellent recording of Mongolian throat singing by the ensemble Huun-Huur-Tu. You can hear bits of mongolian throat singing in Gojira's The Art of Dying, especially in the introductory sequences. I found it extremely interesting to watch such high-quality performance - the sounds Huun-Huur-Tu create are incredible, absolutely mesmerizing.

side project : drawing Excision & Datsik's Deviance

Surprise! I decided to draw a dubstep track! hehe. 

I responded to a media request from the UK Synesthesia Association, for a student who is putting together an ipad app about synesthetic experiences with electronic music. She sent me a number of very interesting tracks, and I chose to illustrate my synesthetic experience with Excision & Datsik's Deviance.

 

My illustration corresponds approximately to 0:26 - 0:50. 

I found those heavy sounds very thick and interesting. They resonate right at the back of my jaw, at the spot where my wisdom teeth once were. I get a similar reaction from the frequencies in songs like Megadeth's Holy Wars, Down's Bury me in Smoke, Pantera's Cowboys from Hell.

On first listens, these sounds almost looked like gruyère cheese - very dense and full of air bubbles. Then I listened more closely, and could see how the sound was actually very "hairy" and layered, nuanced. The rhythmns make it very flashy and cut-apart - kind of like watching a badly animated clip.

The sound is very blue / grey (I've actually found that much electronic music has a similar color palette for me, interestingly).

So I took textured paper, layered on color pencils, scratched away the color with an opened-up paperclip, layered on color again. Then I cut the paper into strips, rubbed the edges with sandpaper and glued them onto a piece of heavy paperboard, and sandpapered everything some more.

I really enjoyed this challenge, because I don't usually listen to music like this. All I can say is, it's all about the sound!

 

The art of dying > i won't bring no...

Over the past few weeks, I've drawing the first chorus sequence in the Art of Dying. This is one of the central sequence within the song, it's quite heavily textured and absolutely mind-blowing.

 

Here's my original outline of the sequence:

 

The next step was filling in the forground and background, giving texture to the outline.

 

And then I began shading, using Tria markers in 12 shades of gray, to bring out the depth. 

I realized that the lettering has to been done separately and then added in with Photoshop, because the letters are quite fine and really interfer with drawing the hairline textures in the loops - the letters make it difficult to draw the textures in one continuous movement.

You can hear this sequence - which I've labelled sequence #7 - from 4:16 - 4:45 in the video below. 

Mechanical heartbeat

The Gojira project is moving right along - I feel like the past few weeks have been a bit more productive! In any case, it sure is difficult to balance a huge personal project like this one with my full-time day job doing graphic design.

I've been working a lot lately on the 1st verse of The Art of Dying. I've been refering to this section as "sequence 4," which you can hear from 2:17 in the video at the end of this post.

It's been a challenge, especially developing the background loops.

For this sequence, I wanted the foreground loops to be a little less present, and make the background loops a more important part of the composition - reflecting the balance between vocals and accompaniment.

The condensed, sans serif is to emphasize the linearity of the vocals, not to directly spell out the vocal line. I used some overlapping in the composition along with some extended ascenders and descenders to suggest the vocal texture and rhythmn.

the Gojira project > the process

Process has been an extremely important part of executing the Gojira / Art of Dying project. Since the project is so huge, I've tried to be a methodological as possible - asking myself, what is the best way to get the right type of results.

After working out the general structure and contour for the entire piece, I worked on finding the best techniques and materials to render the texture. This involved testing dozens of different pens, pencils, inks, markers and paper. 

These trial-and-error sessions helped me determine the right materials: tria markers in 12 shades of gray, and Copic multiliner pens in about 10 different thicknesses, on Inuit Ultra paper in blanc glacier.

I initially began the project by simply drawing in the Moleskine japanese-fold album. But this ended up being a problem: the tria markers and copic liners bleed through, making it impossible to work directly on both sides of the pages.

I then began working on separate sheets, which will be scanned and printed out in the same format as the japanese fold album. 

This has required a lot of tracing, and I had to adapt my working surfaces accordingly. I first was working on an Ikea table with a small lightboard... and the project quickly outgrew the table. I recently got a new table with a full glass top - which has become a huge lightboard, basically. It's a lot less cramped and I can get much smoother curves.

I'm wondering how many meters long the project will end up being... and sometimes I wonder what I've got myself into! :)

back home again!

I just got back after a nice little vacation in the US and the How Design conference in Chicago. It was a great experience, and I really enjoyed the sessions with Armin Vit, Cami Travis-Groves and Jessica Hische. And I especially appreciated talking with Cami at the portfolio review, her comments were really encouraging and motivating. Thanks a ton, Cami!

I'll be off gallivanting Italy for a couple days (the Big four in Milan -- Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer & Anthrax, yay!) and then it's back to work next week! 

Gojira - The Art of Dying project: how a loop takes shape

When I'm drawing the different sequences in the the Gojira / The Art of Dying project, I use a lot of loops. I see the sound construction of the song as very circular.

During the drawing process, these loops go through many steps. The loop I've drawn here is a very small fill from the last sequence of the Art of Dying (minute 6:05).

Step 1: a basic, short-hand version of the loop.

Step 2: fleshing out the basic shapes of the loop and the thick thin contrast.  

Step 3: correcting the loop dynamics for rhythmn and movement.

 

And here is the finished loop-shape placed within the composition. 

Once I've finished drawing all the loops, I'll begin the coloring process. The entire composition will be against a black background, and the loops filled in with textured linework in blacks and greys, as in this example: 

 

Gojira - The Art of Dying project: how the paper sculpture works

Yesterday I posted several photos of the protoype paper sculpture structure for the Gojira-Art of Dying project. I put together this video to better explain how the paper sculpture works. It's a bit long (because the song is so long!). As the song plays, each corresponding loop of the paper sculpture is highlighted.

Gojira - The Art of Dying, paper sculpture from RPB on Vimeo.

First of all, I divided the song up into sequences according to how I visualize it. Each of these sequences works like a loop that circles around and around on itself, until you move onto the next loop. 

Now these sequences don't necessarily correspond to a proper musicological analysis of the song or even to the sections indicated in the sheet music. But that wasn't my intention either: I wanted to break the song down into the different sequences that I see synesthetically. 

One of the difficulties was working within the constraint of the 50-page moleskine format. This meant dividing up the sequences in a way that made sense, and also that worked out mathematically. 

The other constraint was developing a looping structure that functioned and that respected the layout of the different sequences. 

One of the really important points for me was to give enough importance to the chorus. These sequences are so powerful, and are really the central pivot within the song. 

I also decided to fill the entire reverse side of the japanese-fold album with one short sequence (sequence 11) that repeats itself over and over, in order to really emphasize the hypnotic quality of this passage. 

So once you've gone all the way to the end of the 50-page accordion fold, turned it over and came all the way back, you end up back at the beginning again. The entire project consists of loops, from its initial form, to the breakdown in sequences, to the drawing of each sequence - in which the sound itself is in loops... it all breaks down to the cycle of life and death. 

Meeting Gojira

Gojira is touring this summer and I thought it would be the perfect time to try to meet them. I’ve been working on the Art of Dying project for over a year now, and I really wanted to try to show them my work – even though it’s not finished yet - and see what they thought.

So last Friday morning (July 16), I got on the 6:30 AM train from Nice, and traveled 9 hours to Blois, a small town about 2 hours from Paris. The show was scheduled in a small club, the Chato’do. 

I was a bit nervous. I talked to the girl running the merch stand, to see if possibly there was some way of meeting them. I wasn’t too sure if anything would happen – especially since I knocked a full cup of water all over the merch table! But she texted me later on, told me to come back and wait after the show.

Gojira à Blois, Flying Whales 

I had a great time at the show. They played well, and the ambiance was really great. It was a full house, with kids crowdsurfing and stagediving all over the place. There were feet in the air everywhere, it was a bit funny even.

Gojira à Blois, fin de concert

After the show, I waited around for about 2 hours, talking to a couple of really wasted and aboslutely hilarious guys. 

Around 1:30 AM, most of the club had cleared out, and the guys from the band came out. 

I was able to meet the Mario Duplantier (drums) first. I started talking about the project and pulled out the little moleskine notebook I’ve been working in. I think at first he didn’t expect much of anything other than random fan art. 

And then I unfolded the whole moleskine notebook (the accordion is several feet long!) and talked about the idea behind it… and he said, oh we’ve got to get Joe over here to see this. Joe Duplantier is his brother and the singer/guitar player. From what I understand, they do the primary song-writing in the band.

The whole experience was quite surreal. They were very friendly and seemed very genuine, and it was quite different from meeting an American group: it didn’t seem as superficial, and was much less intimidating because of that.

 

It seemed like they were taken aback by the complexity and depth of the work – and mentioned several times that it was the first time anyone had shown them anything like that.

One of the things Joe said was that the project captured the basis of their creative thought-process – strings of sequences looping around each other. Mario talked about about how their songs are percussion-based, because the guitar, bass and voice also function as essentially percussive elements.

We talked a little about visualizing music, and Joe mentioned how they often talk together about the color of their songs and that they coordinate the lighting with those colors! And of course I was spacey and forgot to ask what their colors for the songs were. I regret not asking what color the “Art of Dying” is for them.

I would have loved to be able to talk with them more about their creative process and the way that they see things, composition-wise and creatively. 

But just meeting and talking with the Duplantier brothers and showing them my artwork was an experience I'll never forget.

 

With Joe Duplantier: