The student created a children's book as a graphic narrative project. They used shaping tools to construct background images and rotoscoping to create characters. They included different colors, fonts, and effects to convey meaning. Bright colors were used in the beginning to match the happy emotions, and darker tones were used at night to match somber emotions. Character designs and locations were chosen deliberately to symbolize aspects like the old man's age through his baldness and hunched posture. Though the characters differ in attributes like wealth, both have positive traits. The student provided this self-evaluation to analyze strengths and areas for improvement in their project.

1. Graphic Narrative
Evaluation

2. Use this template to help you evaluate your project.
You should give specific details about your work.
You should provide both written and visual examples to explain your project.
You should find areas to praise in your work. Be specific about why you think they are
good or why you are proud of them.
You should also find areas that could be improved. Look for areas that you could make
better if you went back to them. Be specific about what you would improve.
Add additional slides as you need to. Don’t be restricted by what is here.
Any blank slides should be deleted before submission.

3. Does your final product reflect your
original intentions?
• Compare your planning/digital flat plans/
storyboards to your final product
• My planning document and digital flat plans reflect my final product in some
aspects more than others, the digital flat plans are quite similar to my final book as
the characters and pages are similar to how I wanted them to, as well as the
arrangement of the pages to make all fit and look good, some of the digital flat
plan is different to the final product as it has a bit of a different style and shape
compared to the final product.
The script has been kept the same as it is in the final planning document script,
although there has been minor changing to the wording and structure of some of
the sentences, as well as changing were some of the text goes within the pages of
the children's book to make more space for images, but its still very similar to the
final script.

4. How well have you constructed your
images?
• How well have you constructed your images? You could talk
about the overall visual appearance and well as the use of
texture and colour.
• The images I have created for the children’s book, I think are quite well
constructed as they show and visualise what I wanted show on the page
and I feel like I have achieved that. The art style I used was shaping as it
helped to get a basic shape and then warp it to the shape and design I
wanted to achieve and make it look good, using the warp tool to construct
the images gave the people some sort of human quality to the faces of the
character. The images in the book have a similar tone all the way through
as its not too dark until the end as it supposed to be night time but is still
in a light tone to the images.

5. How well have you used text to anchor
your images
• You should talk about the combination of words, images and text.
• The text varies with its place in each of the pages as it could be at the top,
bottom or middle. The text has been placed in different places to fill in
some space within the pages of the children's book. The text also its in
with the pages by colour as if the page is light then the text is darker to
make it stand out from the rest of the page and vice versa.

6. Is your product suitable for your
audience?
• Reference your proposal
• Give an audience profile and describe suitability in reference to content
• The audience I described in the proposal, was to aim the book at children aged 3-5 years old I
have tried to keep the story close to this age range and not make it too over the top that
would put older children off from reading the book. I think the book will also appeal to both
genders as there only two characters in the book and they are both of each gender, they are
both suitable for the book as they don’t look offensive and both have their attributes like the
woman is smarter then the man but he is richer then her so they are both equal in their own
ways. The book should appeal to people from all class’s as there is one rich person in the
book and one poorer person, so it could appeal to both class’s without offending anyone. I
think the book should appeal to the secondary audience, which is the parents of the children
as it doesn't’t have anything offensive within the children's book that would stop them
buying it or reading it their children. The book also appeals to anyone who can speak the
English language as its written in only English even if the words don’t make complete sense
to the readers.

7. What do you like/dislike about the
techniques you have used?
• Reference specific tools you used with images
• The techniques I have used when creating the children’s book I used the
shaping tools to create the background as it meant I could warp the shape to
how I wanted it to look what I liked about using the shape tool is the fact I
could control what I was creating and I could warp the shape to how I wanted
them to look, the basic shapes I used was squares and circles this meant I
could easily warp these shapes to look like a completely different object and
shape it/distort it to make it look slightly different. I also used rotascoping to
create the characters as I thought it would be better to make them look a little
realistic but also used shapes to add onto the characters dynamics and makes
them both look a little more interesting to look at, the thing I liked about
rotascoping was I could work over something similar to what I wanted to
create but it could also mean it would end up looking different from wanted it
to look like but it meant the characters had more of a human element to
them. It was better to use the warp and shape tool as it meant I had more
chance to create something new with the shapes instead of coping or working
over someonelses work.

8. What do you like/dislike about how
your final product looks?
• The aspects I like about the way the final product looks is the characters, as I think
they look quite natural and a little human like with some of the quality's like the
facial features on the characters. I also like the differences in the backgrounds and
like the outside of the two houses as they are both completely different and help
to show the difference between the two characters. I also like the effect the dodge
tool created around the moon in the last few pages as it gave the impression of
the moon actually creating light through clouds and made the image seem a little
more brighter then it would of without the use of the tool. Another aspect I like
about the final product is the way the poorer looking house has been warped to
look like its falling down as well as some of the features on the house like the
windows look a little like its falling off the house.
• The aspects I dislike about the way the final products looks is the colour I used for
the poorer looking house as its brown but doesn’t look too much like its falling
down which was my original intention. Another aspect I don’t like too much about
the final product I created was the female characters facial expressions and body
language stayed the same throughout the first few pages of the final product

9. Why did you include the content you
used?
• Images, fonts, effects, colours
• The content I included into my final product was the font, which varied in size and
boldness as it depended on the space in the page of the book. The colours I mainly
used throughout the book was black and white on the characters as I wanted the
slave character to have ragged black clothes as it contrasted with the colour of
their skin. The other colours I used what brown and white to colour the houses as I
wanted one house to look poorer then the other character so I made one house
brown and warped it so it looked a little like it would fall down I also placed it on a
hillside as it makes it seem more like it would fall down compared to the rich
house which is bright white and I made it look like its standing tall on flat land as it
makes it look more stable then the poorer looking house to make it look more
stable I kept it quite square it also made it look a little more modern then the
falling down house. The effects I mainly used when creating the children’s book
was warping the different shapes to look like something completely different from
the original shape that it was

10. What signs, symbols or codes have
your used in your work?
• Choices of colour, style, locations, character design and tone all give additional meaning to
your work.
• The colours I used in the children’s book are mainly bright colours as I didn’t want to make
the children’s book seem depressing or too down for the children to read, the colours at the
start of the book are bright as I wanted to keep it happy to match the old man’s emotions at
the start of the story, the story then gets darker as its supposed to be night time in the story
and also helps match the female character’s emotions towards the end of the story. The
location of the story Is meant to be a small village somewere in Yorkshire, but the actual
name of the village Is unknown as it means the reader can use their imagination to connect
to the story or make it connect it to their own lives. The character design of the old man
within the story was to make him look old which is why I created him to look bald which
would imply that he is old, I also created him with a hunched-back and a walking stick, I made
this character like this as I wanted to make him seem very old and senile. The female
character I created, was desined to look a lot younger then the old man, by about thirty
years, i also created the character to look poorer then the man by giving her ragged looking
clothes as it sybolised some sort of poorness and contrast between the two character’s.
Although there are big differences between the two character’s they both have their
attributes as the old man is completely mental but he’s rich and the female character is poor
but seems to be a lot smarter then the male character.

11. Audience Responses
Cultural competence:
Media texts require us to have a certain level of cultural understanding to
be able to interpret them.
At a basic level, this could mean being able to read the language that a
magazine is written in.
At a deeper level, it means being able to interpret signs and symbols that
we use a visual shorthand to communicate ideas.
We recognise these signs in our own culture but find it harder to
understand when looking at others.
We create and attach meaning to signs and symbols in many different
forms.
11Creative Media Production 2012

12. Audience Responses
Cultural competence:
What is this?
This is a Norwegian Pine tree, covered in
snow and with a red ribbon on.
Our cultural understanding allows us to
interpret its meaning.
To us, in British society, it means
Christmas, presents and family.
This is because we share a cultural
knowledge.
12Creative Media Production 2012

13. Audience Responses
Cultural competence:
There are many other signs and symbols
that we attach meaning to.
A leather jacket can imply rebellion.
A sports car can imply wealth and power.
A cross can represent religion.
13Creative Media Production 2012

14. Audience Responses
Cultural competence:
Visual representations of everyday objects are often the same the world
over. A car appears as a car, no matter what country it appears in.
What that car means however, can be very different depending on your
cultural background.
14Creative Media Production 2012

15. What representations can be found in
your work?
• How are men, women or children shown in your work? Does your work feature different
ages, races, social groups or religions? Does a lack of any variety of character types create its
own representation?
• There are both male and female characters within the children’s book and there are different
representations of each type of character in the book, all of which are not too offensive to
people. The male character is represented to be a wealthy man in the book but not very
bright, whereas the female character seems to be the smarter person but is poor. There is an
age gap between the characters as I have made the female character a lot younger then the
male character which also adds onto the fact the male character is richer then the female
character. There is a lack of a representation of black people within the book as I thought it
might be offensive to have a black person be shown as a slave as they might take it the wrong
way, it was the same when creating the male character as I made him a bit mental I didn’t
want to offend anybody. I didn’t include any refferences to any religions as i had no need to
include any of the religions in my book or was influenced by any sort of religion.

16. What style have you employed in your
products?
• Discuss influences/ existing products
• What visual style does your work have and why did you choose it?
• The visual styles that influenced my work was a few different styles, realistic styles
in illustrated books as it would give that characters I created a more human like
quality to them and would also maybe make them seem a little more real to the
reader of the book. Another style that influenced the work I created was the
scruffy art style that is quite common in some children’s books as it meant that I
could make it less realistic in the background and the setting I wanted to look
completely over the top and not realistic which is why the houses and buildings
are all a little miss shaped.

17. What were the strengths and weaknesses
of the pre-production and planning
• How did the planning and research help
• How well did you manage your time
• Reference specific examples
• The planning helped the production of the book as it gave me understanding as of to
what I needed to do to create a good book, the initial ideas part of the idea generation
gave me the idea for the story as it helped me to research the different story's. The
mind maps and mood boards helped as it gave me the chance to come up with themes
that could fit into the story or would work well with it. The mood board helped to get
an idea of the art style and the style of the characters I could use, it also gave me the
ideas of how my book would look. The test pages would be a weakness of my planning
as I don’t think turned out the way I hoped the way I was hoping they would, as the
plan was to create test I could use for the actual book which could have saved some
time on the production to work on other pieces of production. The draft and final script
were both strengths as they gave me the idea of what I would include on each page of
the book and also helped me to decide what the layout might look like on each page of
the book. The digital flat plans were a strength to the production as it gave me an idea
to what I would include in the final pages and also a rough idea to were the text will go
in the pages.

18. Historical and cultural context
• How does your work compare to what has come before? What other
similar products have existed in the past? What current products exist?
• The final product probably isn’t as good compared to products that have come before it, but
is still quite good in my opinion. The book I created has a sort of scruffy art style to it, many
other products from the past have a similar style like books ‘I want a friend’ by Tony Ross, but
the characters still have that human quality to them which is similar to the Tony Ross books.
• Similar books to mine that exist are the books that are written by Tony Ross as I have already
explained the art style is quite similar between the two styles it also similar to the author
Michael Rosen as some of his books have similar layout to the book I have created as he used
spaces in the pages to fill up the empty part of the book.
• Current products that exist and are similar to books like the gruffalo as that uses the space
e.g. the empty path to add the text to the image instead of using a second page, it also looks
good on the page and saves space. Another book its similar to currently is ‘were the wild
things are as it has a similar art style even though the children’s book I have produced is in
colour and the professional book is in black and white.

19. Peer Feedback
• Summarise peer feedback and discuss
– Responses you agree with
– Responses you disagree with