Charlie Blaker
Visual Art and Design Portfolio
Title: Paper bag still life (from observation)
Date: Fall 2019
Medium: Charcoal
Dimensions: 12.5 x 19 inches
Description: Almost any subject matter has a ton of depth to it and allows a fair amount of artistic license in terms of the sharpness and boldness of the highlights as well as the range of values you chose to represent. I wanted to emphasize the sharp, thin highlights as well as the contrast between the curved, soft lines and straight, hard lines. I also included a large range of values directly complementing and contrasting each other.
Title: High Contrast Steam Train
Date: Spring 2022
Medium: Pen and Ink
Dimensions: 18.5 x 14 inches
Description: I’ve always been interested in the mechanical complexity of old machines like steam trains. I love how the light reflects off of their various pipes, tubes, and pistons. I thought a machine like this, with all the aesthetically pleasing highlights, would be a good fit for this high-contrast black and white style. I used this reflectivity on the bottom to differentiate the various mechanical parts while also keeping them consistent with each other.
Title: Oil Pastel Still Life (from observation)
Date: Fall 2022
Medium: Oil Pastel
Dimensions: 9 x 12 inches
Description: For this Oil Pastel drawing, I chose to include a salt lamp near the center of the composition as a dynamic source of warm light that interacts with the rest of a piece in a more active way than a light simply coming from the side. I chose two metal cups because I wanted to emphasize their reflectivity and practice these complex reflections from memory. I chose an Onion, skull and Two glossy wooden candle sticks to emphasize reflectivity but in a different more solid way. I wanted to include lots of diverse values and color into this piece as well, one of the reasons the cloth is navy blue.
Title: Ava Diamonds Commercial
Date: Spring 2022
Medium: Digital - Blender + Adobe Premiere
Dimensions: 1920 x 1080 mp4
Music: “Georgia On My Mind” by the Oscar Peterson Trio
Description: This is a Hypothetical Commercial I made for a fictional Diamond Company. I wanted to make it feel as classy and elegant as possible, hence the smooth Jazz piano music and slow panning / close-up shots of the various pieces of Jewelry potentially sold by AVA Diamonds. Lighting was incredibly important for this piece. It’s crucial to express and evoke specific feelings of intrigue and fascination in the viewer. I feel that the Subtle but consistent highlights on the metal as well as the detailed glimmer and highlights on the diamond perfectly evoke these feelings.
Title: Ava Diamonds Company Logo Sheet
Date: Spring 2022
Medium: Digital
Dimensions: 1280 x 960 jpeg
Description: AVA Diamonds is a completely made-up Jewelry company I came up with to practice my branding and create this logo design for. I started out by establishing a brand identity for AVA Diamonds; Elite, Luxurious and Elegant, prioritizing quality over quantity. The intricate design of the diamond in the middle, with more detail in contrast to the rest of the logo expresses the precision and care this company would put into its Diamonds and Jewelry. The “V” holding the center diamond in the middle and the circle below it accomplishes multiple things, creating a clever diamond ring within the logo while also drawing your eye downwards and back up again to keep the composition of the logo whole.
Title: Self Portrait
Date: Spring 2022
Medium: Adobe Illustrator
Dimensions: 1280 x 989 jpeg
Description: I made this Self Portrait digitally in Adobe Illustrator. Using very bright and bold Yellows and Reds, I wanted this piece to resemble that of old constructivist propaganda posters; Hence the sharp lines and shapes in the background expanding outwards. Trying to accurately cell-shade the hair using this style in Adobe Illustrator was a big challenge in this piece, but I think I managed to make it work with those long strips of solid color and very subtle highlights near the top of my head.
Title: Night Alley
Date: Fall 2021
Medium: Blender
Dimensions: 1280 x 1224 jpeg
Description: This piece was my first real render in 3D. While it is a little rough around the edges regarding the textures and sharp corners, I feel that the atmosphere and lighting are both spot on with this piece. The warm yellow light spilling out of the alleyway and from the windows, the cool blue-ish light at the end of the street, the highlighted windows you can see lit up from a distance; All of this contributes a lot to the atmosphere.
Title: Semi Annual orchestra Concert Poster
Date: Fall 2021
Medium: Adobe Illustrator
Dimensions: 676 x 1280 jpeg
Description: Pictured here is a poster I submitted for my school’s Winter Semi-Annual Senior Orchestra Concert. The three instruments are a Bass, Violin, and Viola all at different perspectives to appear the same size on the page. I decided on a regal, elegant feel, with deep reds and whites, and a simple black background to almost emulate the feeling of watching a dark, dramatically lit stage.
Title: Cell-Ship
Date: Spring 2022
Medium: Blender
Dimensions: 1280 x 720 jpeg
Description: Inspired by sci-fi cartoons and animations such as Cowboy Bebop and Futurama, I wanted to design a unique sci-fi ship of my own, but I wanted it to be different. I decided to cell-shade it to both demonstrate my technical ability regarding complex shaders and to focus more on the general design and composition of the piece. This also allowed me to experiment with a different, less resource intensive rendering engine.
Title: Forest Cabin
Date: Fall 2021
Medium: Blender
Dimensions: 597 x 408 jpeg
Description: This piece of a forest cabin in 3D I made to emphasize Lighting and difference in value as well as contrast; I wanted to emphasize the dark shadows of the trees, roof, and in-between the logs in contrast to the light wood and tiled roof. Another aspect of this composition and value diversity I tried to focus on was how dark the values in leaves and bark in the trees were, and how this dark tone is broken up by bits of sunlight shining through the leaves and the big area of clear sky directly above the house to separate the composition.
Description: This piece of a forest cabin in 3D I made to emphasize Lighting and difference in value as well as contrast; I wanted to emphasize the dark shadows of the trees, roof, and in-between the logs in contrast to the light wood and tiled roof. Another aspect of this composition and value diversity I tried to focus on was how dark the values in leaves and bark in the trees were, and how this dark tone is broken up by bits of sunlight shining through the leaves and the big area of clear sky directly above the house to separate the composition.
Title: High Contrast Self Portrait
Date: Fall 2021
Medium: Pen and Ink
Dimensions: 11 x 14 inches
Description: Experimenting with this Black and White High Contrast style again, I made a self portrait with more abstract geometric shapes in the background. Consistency with Shading is vital for this style; You have to be confident and bold, not hesitant to block in big chunks of pure black
Title: Cliffs of Moher
Date: Spring 2018
Medium: Watercolor
Dimensions: 12 x 8.5 inches
Description: For this piece, experimenting more with watercolor, I found the textures of both the ocean and cliff contrasting but very intriguing. Something unexpected that came out of this piece as a result of the observation was the value difference in the water and it’s brightness in comparison to the edge of the cliff. One of the main reasons I initially chose the Cliffs of Moher was because of the simple yet incredibly interesting composition of the structure.
Title: Two Cats (from photograph)
Date: Spring 2020
Medium: Paper collage
Dimensions: 6 x 6 inches
Description: I wanted to work on my ability to create simple yet interesting compositions with this collage. It’s of my two cats, Frazzle and Daffodil, sitting together. While it’s not the most technically impressive piece, I feel that design choices like the placement of the white of their paws, the pink triangles making up their noses and ears, and the orange stripes on Frazzle’s tail make this composition stand out in a different way.
Title: Self portrait from above
Date: Fall 2022
Medium: Pen and ink
Dimensions: 9 x 12 inches
Description: I wanted to do a self-portrait from aninteresting perspective with this piece. Ifocused a lot on the harsh difference invalues between the hair and skin as well astrying to fit in details such as the refractionof the glasses and wrinkles in the clothes.I chose a mix of a harsher, more darksharpie to block in darker blacks combinedwith a lighter, thinner pen to do subtleshading with cross-hatching on the skin fora smoother, more subtle look and a mix ofboth to illustrate hair texture effectively.
Title: Portrait
Date: Fall 2022
Medium: conté crayon and charcoal (directobservation)
Dimensions: 9 x 11 inches
Description: I tried to go for a more rough, seamlesslook with conté crayon and charcoal ongray paper for this portrait of my dad. I feelthis medium allowed me to express threeseparate textures well, the texture of theskin and nose, the texture of the hair andbeard, and the texture of the shirt andjacket. Using sharper lines and highlights tohighlight individual strands of hair. As with all of my pieces, differences in anda wide range of value were of high priority.One of the challenges I faced was creatinga smooth transition in the skin while alsomaintaining the sharper highlights present,and making these two aspects mix. I feelthat I managed to achieve this fairly well.
Title: Orbital Satellite (video)
Size: 1920 x 1080
Medium: Digital (Blender and AdobePremiere)
Description: I made this animation of anOrbital Satellite blowing up a building onthe ground in Blender and Adobe Premieret o illustrate my compositional abilities and camera work/lighting. With various shotslike close-ups and panning shots of various actions happening in the scene, I feel this animation effectively tells a story in a clearway. Audio was also very important for this animation. The deep, distant sound effects combined with ambiant noises illustratet he magnitude of the explosion and satellite and further enhance the story. The difference in volume and contrast between the silence of space and the surface also helps to immerse the viewer.
