Evaluation Task 3

Image Construction
I think the overall look of my product has worked really
well and keeps a consistent theme throughout. In my
production, I took some of the images myself and used
some of the images off the Internet to construct my
images. I think the colour scheme fits in well and I havent
used bright colours in my product to keep it quite dark and
mysterious to fit in with the storyline and create a
different tone to the fairytale. I also used the same effect
on the backgrounds in the panels to make them consistent
throughout. I put the characters on separately to the
background so I wanted the characters to look as if they
were there and didnt have that stuck on effect so I used
the Comic Book Effect but in some parts I used the Cut
Our Effect on the characters so it would work well together
and I think it does work. Some of
the
colours in Red Riding Hood dont
work
right and the Cut Out Effect being
put on
her has made the red colour from
her cape
blend in with the basket which
merges
the colours and doesnt work
right. I
had to use 2 different images of the wolf, some were taken
by me but then I had to get an image off the Internet
which means that the wolf was 2 different colours and it
doesnt work well at all so I should of stook to one image
of a wolf but the images I took didnt work well as I
thought they were going to so it was a last minute
decision. Some of the detail at the end fades away with
the Comic
Book effect I used and because I used
quite a
bold Threshold it makes the black
overpower the colour and blocks the details. I rotoscoped
the characters in the book which worked out really well
compared to what I thought it would look like because it
reduced the look of them being stuck on. I also had to
clone some parts of my images, I took an image off the
internet which had a man in the background and so I
placed an image over the top of a wolf as its a wolf I
needed there not a man. But the mans axe was in the way
and it didnt need to be there so I cloned that out by using
the Clone Stamp tool. The images below show the result of

using the clone tool. There are some mistakes as it started

to mirror a little and left some of the marks from the
Threshold image before so I should of waited till after I
cloned the image to then start putting the Comic Book
Effect over the top. With some of the panels, it was really
hard to put some of the images in them to make it fit. For
example, on the panel where the wolf is knocking on the
door, the image of the house wouldnt fit with it being a
landscape panel. This lost a huge amount in the detail as
it had to be cropped which only fit the top half of the door
and this was quite disappointing.

Anchorage
I think the text overall in the product looks and is
presented clear and simple to read. I found it really hard
on some of the panels as I had quite a few speechbubbles
which had to fit on a really small panel. This meant I had
to make the font size really small and this makes the text
harder to read because its so small to fit in the
speechbubbles. Some of the speechbubbles I had to flip
upside down to fit on a panel because there was not

much room and that was my biggest issue in production. I

also had to warp them to show which character was
speaking which made the speechbubbles out of proportion
to others and this didnt make a consistent size
throughout. The description box worked out well and the
colour made the text stand out and had a different colour
to the speechbubbles which made them clear which one
was which. The text in the description box fitted well and
didnt overlap to the border and
sitted well and clear in the boxes.
The first text I used in both the
speechbubbles and the description
box were both the same and it
didnt really have a comic book
effect to it. So then I decided to do
a selection of testers with different
fonts on a test page. This gave me
a clear understanding of what
fonts would work well in
comparison to other fonts. I
settled on the font
Suplexmentary Comic for my
speechbubbles as it has clear lines
which makes it easier to read
when its so small too and its quite bold which makes it
stand out on the page. It also looks a lot more comicy for
speech and fits in really well. For the description boxes, I
used the font Bang Whack Pow because of how clear it
looked on the page and how simple it is for description.
But thinking back I should of used a bolder font to make it
stand out more than the text as in some comic books they
do this. I think it might have worked better if both the
fonts were swapped around so the bolder font was used
for the description to make it stand out on the yellow
background, then the lighter font used in the
speechbubbles so its not too heavy. I think the text I used
in the novel links with the images and fits really well
together and doesnt not link with the images so it makes
them relevent. I think I should of added some more
description within the story to support the images more.
For example when the grandma is in the wardrobe, its just
the picture but the gran hasnt been introduced in the

story so it should be highlighted that its her in the

wardrobe and what happened.
Signification
I used a black bold border around my images and used a
dark theme throughout my story as it represents darkness
and mystry and with the black border it narrows it in and
keeps the focus on the darkness in the panels. Red Riding
Hood wears a red cloak and this means danger as she is
the main focus on being killed and it could also mean
blood as she is killed and this is important because the
colour strongly symbolises what happens later on in the
story. Also on page one, she stands out from the nature
and green colours in the
background which shows she
isnt in her natural and
comfortable environment and
how vunrable she is in this
new environment for her. For
my backgrounds I chose
quite hidden and deserted
looking backgrounds. For
exampe the house in the
woods is quite run down and
in a dark area as there are a lot of shadows along the wall
which shows the dark and scary side which lies behind the
shadows. The woodchopper is wearing grey which
symbolises moral ambiguity so we dont know at the start
if he is good or bad so this could lead to wonder and
mystery, wanting to know if he is or not. The wolf on page
4 has tones of black and a dark grey which symbolises evil
and the dark side but on page one he has the light greys
and hints of blue within his fur which contrasts with the
red on Red Riding Hood. When Red Riding Hood is in the
room with the wolf, both the eyes contast really well as
Red Riding Hood has blue eyes which symbolises
vunrability compared to the yellow, hungry eyes of the
wolf and these reflect welll against the pure black
background which heightens the danger which is being
shown through the wolfs eyes.
Representation

In my story, I have expressed the vulnerability of Red

Riding Hood as she is a young girl who is more exposed to
danger and this puts a negitive effect on women and
children as also the gran and the mother are exposed
more to danger too as the gran has been kidnapped and
the mum is close to being killed, it shows the weakness in
women and the vulnerability between them all. Then the
heroic and the strongness is brought out in the
woodchopper when he kills the wolf to protect the mum so
it shows the protection provided from the men and their
role. It shows the men are also there just to save the
women as he doesnt have much of a character but then
comes along and kills the wolf and thats his input in the
story and is now the leader of the book and heroic for all
women.

Historical and Cultural Context

I had a look at a website which had the tradtional fairytale
that was witten by Charles Perrault which was published in
1697. I made sure I picked out the ideal parts of the story
and most important parts that needed to be put in to show
the main parts of the story and this was managed really
well, I think that I picked the right parts. Since this version
was written, there has been 28 adaptations of Red Riding
Hood and this includes films too that have been created .
Production Processes
The overall production of my graphic narrative has been
produced very well considering my shortage of time.
During my production, I lost my memory stick and
because I didnt back it up, I lost all the production I had
completed which was the backgrounds and the layouts of
the pages. So I had a week left to complete my production
as I wanted to finish it in time with the rest of the class. So
even though I had less time to complete it, the finished
product looks just as good as what the product would look
like if I had finished it without losing my memory stick, so
next time I should back up my work to make sure I have it
saved even if I lose my memory stick. I didnt look at my
schedule throughout the project as parts took longer to do

and some were quicker than I thought and in all honesty it

should have been stuck to but when I lost my memory
stick, I needed to come away from the schedule anyway
as I had to start again. But I am very happy that I finished
the product on time and then it was done and I am happy
with that. There are some areas of the product which I
wanted to change. For example, on the first page, Red
Riding Hood is looking straight on when speaking to the
wolf when the wolf is at hip level, so I should of taken the
image so she was looking down at the wolf to make it look
more effective and if they were actually speaking to each
other and give them eye contact. Also, I wanted to take
some images for the background but I knew this wouldnt
of worked as well when I was wanting to complete it in the
time set so I had to re-think and get the images off the
internet for the backgrounds but I think it would have been
more productive to use images I had taken for the
background to go with the pictures of the characters I had
taken. When I took the pictures of the characters, the
lighting in the room turned some of the pictures orange
and this came out in some of the images and this
disapointed me because it made the characters have
different tones. As you can see in the example image, the
mum is orange in one panel and then in the next panel
she is overexposed and so I should of used either natural
light instead of flash or tweeked it on Photoshop before
putting them on the final layout. I thought some areas of
my product really worked well and I do think the
characters were Rotoscoped well enough to look as if they
were took on that background setting and I am really
pleased with the last page because I put quite a few
images together, the blood was all different images of
blood, the characters, the wolfs head and the background
and this was quite a challanging page and overall it looks
great. I also think the cloning was a very creative part of
the project and the image works really well as well with
the wolf put on the top because the shadow from the man
who was originally on the image, looks like its the wolfs
shadow and works well together. I think on page two, the
image of the wolf walking away from Red Riding Hood
didnt work well at all and I should of got another image of
a wolf to make it look like he was walking away as I

warped the wolf image too much to try make it look

realistic and as if he was walking away. In my work I used
a range of tools in Photoshop, I used the Crop Tool, a range
of comic look effects, the Clone Stamp Tool, the Threshold
Adjustment, Rotoscoping (Magnetic and Polygonal). For my
borders I used the Stroke Tool on the images but
sometimes the images overlapped the border and this lost
the border. So I decided to use the Rectangle Tool to put
rectangles along where the border would be and this gave
an equal border
throughout the
book. I also made
sure the text box
borders were the
same thickness as
the borders around
the images to give an even look. So
using Photoshop, I used a range of
different skills that I have learned
throughout the book to make it as good
as I could get it.
I had looked at various examples
of layouts when I was doing my
research for my graphic novel.
This was so I could see what I
could do with my work and how I
could make it look really
professional and similar to ones
that are out now. From looking at existing products I feel
that mine in comparason has very similar features and
could work really well if it was published as I have kept
things the same as professional ones. Here is an example
from a graphic novel that I have chosen to look at. The
layout of the panels are very similar to some of my pages
and even though the border is quite thick around the edge
of the page, I kept the thickness of mine quite thick but I
think it works better how I did it. The thickness of the
border in the middle of the panels to separate them are
abiout the same thickness of how I did mine so this is a
similar feature between mine and the existing products. I
think in the existing product, the speech bubbles seem to

blend in better with the art and I think that it doesnt look
cramped and its easy to read the writing. I think even
though mine is easy to see and read and it fits on the
pages, sometimes they look slightly cramped and some
had to be overlaid over each other. This could be improved
by me making bigger panel boxes like this novel has done
and this will make it easier for me to spread it out without
it looking cramped. They left there dialogue boxes in white
whereas I changed mine to yellow but I think the yellow
stands out better and a lot of novel books have used
yellow for the dialogue boxes. The illustraition in the
example novel is very cartoon styled and also looks really
detailed and professional. I think mine works well but it
doesnt have that effect of it being like a cartoon and it
doesnt look as illustraited as the top one. This could be
something that I could have done, maybe drawn the
images to make it look more graphic and like a graphic
novel. The fonts are quite similar too in the example and
my version of a graphic novel. Its bold and stands out on
the page and is also easy to read. The colours and the
tones in the example image really flow well together and
work well and it doesnt look like a clash and contrast of
colours. With my images the red does tend to stand out
too much and come across really sharp compared to the
background images so I think there can be a clash of
colours and it doesnt flow as well but I do think that the
similar layout of both images show the comparason of the
example and my copy.