Sunday, February 27, 2011

man on a mountain


i made this this week (click it to see it a little bigger) - perhaps a product of a milieu of existential angst that came about as a result of the christchurch earthquake, a murder 5 minutes from our house, and some on-going spiritual wrestling. but it is also, of course, just a picture of a cartoon character standing in snow!

i don't want to flood a perfectly nice little picture with over-discussion, but i'm probably going to anyway. look away now.

the thing i like about the process for the creation of this picture, is that it took ages to come together, and then came together very quickly. the elements for the picture have been sitting around for years (literally) waiting to be used for something...

the photograph was taken on slide film at the top of fox glacier over five years ago. in the time between having the slide developed and scanning it into the computer it grew mould on it. this is very bad from a preservation perspective, and i always intended to clean it off the scan with photoshop. in this composition it looks best left there.

the little man came about after i read a book on graffiti street logos a few years ago. i decided i needed one for myself - even though i don't think i'll use it unauthorised on any walls. i loved the aesthetic, and designed this guy. he looks a bit glum.

i collect pictograms (wingdings / icons / picture fonts) and had always been fascinated by a set i had of cellphone related symbols. i thought the half-charge icon would be perfect for this guy. (his battery is half full or half empty depending on your perspective [cliché acknowledged].)

the last step was to paint him up with a rough sort of white paint look. put a little shadow at his feet too, but you can't probably notice that - just cements him on the landscape a bit better.