_ The City of Octavia: An Art Of BY MANISHA DUSILAThe Briefing “An artistis not paid for his labour but for Ais vision” — James Macneill Whislter. Presented to us is a joba job to invision the journey of a concept artist, To create a city described only with words ~ taking these words and making something ineredible. Beginning with research, influence maps, thumbnail drawings (small sketches to show a general idea and composition of a scene/ drawing), pre- production, digitally painting toa fully rendered, beautiful piece of digital art, The final product for our “client” includes: -Exterior Establishing Shot ~Exterior Low Angle Shot Interior Establishing Shot Follow me on this journey and see through my eyes.Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities Calvino is the author of “Invisible Cities” (released in 1972)- passages of text where provided that described a very differnt city on each page. ‘The descriptions ranged from extravagent, bustling cities, to cities high above the clouds; isolated, underground, destroyed and luxurious. Each city had a theme~a female name, For example: Anastasia, Armilla, Baucis, Thekla, Octavia, so on and so forth. It was also revealed that in a way, Calvino was describing different aspects of Venice Chosen City: “OCTAVIA” After reading and creating thumbnail drawings exploring all of Calvino’s cities, I came to decide that the city of Octavia would be my choice. A city high up above the clouds , described as the “spider-web city’- hung between two large mountains, it consists of chains and catwalks; the “net” supports the the houses are made like sacks, you cannot see anything below except the clouds glide past, Everything, instead of rising up is hung below: rope ladders, hammocks, skins of water, gas jets.” Iam intrigued by this city and was excited to create ideas ~ | felt a pull to do this city.The Description “If you choose to believe me, good. Now I will tell how Octavia, the spider-web city, is made. There is a precipice between two steep mountains: the city is over the void, bound between the two crests with ropes and chains and catwalks. You walk on the little wooden ties, careful not to set your foot in the open spaces, or you cling to the hempen strands. Below there is nothing for hundreds and hundreds of feet: a few clouds glide past; farther down you can glimpse the chasm’s bed. ‘This is the foundation of the city; a net which serves as passage and as support. All the rest, instead of rising up, is hung below: rope ladders, hammocks, houses made like sacks, clothes hangers, terraces like gondolas, skins of water, gas jets, spits, baskets on strings, dumb-waiters, showers, trapezes and rings for childrens’s games, cable cars, chandeliers, pots with trailing plants. Suspended over the abyss, the life of Octavia’s inhabitants is less uncertain that in other cities. They know that the net will last only so long.”INFLUENCE MAP INFLUENCE MAP, down and drawing, there is a need to create an influence map to hel ‘ion and an idea of colour schemes. Here are two of the initiOctavia: Initial Digital Thumbnails With Calvino’s description of Octavia in mind, I set out to create some digital thumbnails. These were done on a digital painting programmed called Photoshop, and drawn with a graphics tablet — this connects to the computer and acts like virtual paper for the drawing program.Octavia thumbnails continued It’s very convenient to have different brush types in Photoshop — just as you would doing a traditional painting. You get different textures, weight, detail and sharpness. Numbers 61, 65, 58 and 63 show a rough exterior establishing shot — the general idea of the city as a bulk. The rest are street views.Structures Beginning to think about the buildings and structures that make up this city. From the get go, I wanted a unique, different style, not typical skyscrapers and streets in your average city. These structures are quite “out there” and I was also looking at aspects such as string art and macrame to fit with the web theme.Still exploring Octavia’s buildings - and trying to use a different technique rather than traditional drawing. I opened up Photoshop, grabbed the lasso tool and created shapes before finally filling them in with colour. ‘These are inspired by the previous page, plus some extra details and different forms.A ax Adding some monochrome (black and white) shading with a softer brush to Wie (UNS owe S give a metallic fill. At this stage, the weird and wacky curved and distorted buildings now rise up and a metallic / futuristic theme is born, which I liked very much.INSTEAD OF RISING eris wont HELOReturning to digital thumbnails and keeping the flow of creation going, Here we see different perspectives and other view ideas, such as the low angle (number 3 and 9 )and interior establishing shots (numbers 4 and 7)BY 2 Coming back to the exterior establishing shot, I re drew a thumbnail and began exploring the actual colour scheme for the city. I had some difficulty choosing colours that work well together, and I originally wanted this to be a dark themed and depressing cityHowever, that mentality changed. I went with a lighter coloured sky in the end, and one thing that helped me a lot when choosing colour schemes was actually colour picking from reference images, such as rust, The rust images had a range of colours that worked well together, such as blues, greens, ‘orange, yellow, purple, pale beiges and black. Number 3 is the one I went with,Further development for all three shots.Working back on the interior and looking at different views. This is the build up of more refined thumbnails painted initially in black and white.Adding colour using gradient maps and blending mode layers and choosing colours.Just as with the buildings, the interior was looking too sleek and perfect. So I made them tatty to stay with the theme of the entire city and make it look like it's actually from the same place. The grubby wall textures where made with a custom Photoshop brush.Fr NV baal ‘D) a wh Sr LSNow looking at the composition for the low angle shot. At first, I wanted to show both the top and bottom of the city.Step by step: Exterior Establishing Shot for OctaviaMh SS fl ey AY | at hee AAT ‘The next step was to lower the opacity (transparency) of the sketch layer, add a new layer on top and refine the sketch more.Now it’s just paint , paint, paint! Adding detail, light source, adjusting the brightness as well as the hue and saturation. This is the final painting for Octavia’s “Exterior Establishing Shot”Step by step: Interior Establishing Shot for Octavia “ Bh thce aN es lh ue : ir s Mi Ne 7, vei aa | \ Lanny : Ww \Beginning to add in black and white values...Change of Plan It's not too late to make changes! I realised that the previous interior didn't convey the culture or purpose of octavia, let alone the room. I used the same base, changed up the perspective and thought about created a holy/ worship / legacy room.AWB ey J | \ My ~~ I ws. Vf Ni WZ fi WI oA } e772 fae — , Sf Ko yN, WN —ke-\ L—= <= KX Lineart...Dy) la f * yy | / va Basic colour scheme...f) sit le)Add effects, use texture brushes...ne ) -, re ] Finished!Step by step: Exterior Low Angle Shot for Octavia / \ fp | LEM De NN AS REE IA TAA TR NN iCAY eae SST SH ~Lf SS eee a y” ES E>f