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1. Graphic Narrative
Evaluation

2. Does your final product reflect your
original intentions?
My original intentions were to create the ugly duckling story as it had always been written, but while doing
research I saw that there was so many copies of the book already and mine would just add to that list so I
decided to make it different and change the ending while keeping parts of the main story in there to make
sure I didn’t create a different story altogether. I think it was a good thing to do as I could create a story
that no one else had done but still keeping it the traditional fairy tale it originally was. By keeping the main
parts of the story the same as a traditional, already existing book I knew that people would enjoy because
I looked at customer reviews of other ugly duckling books and they were positive and many said that they
enjoy the story. After making the change to the story I had to then make additional changes throughout
production, this means that my final product would not have been exactly how I had planned it too but
the changes were not big enough for my flat plans and storyboard to not represent the work that I have
done. I think that it was a good idea to change the ending as it made it creative and exciting but I also
think that once I had planned out what I would do I should have kept it that way or thought about
changing the story during planning as it would have not created any problems for me. I also ran into
problems like pages would not match up so I had to change others or add/remove some which again
meant that it would be different to my original ideas. I kept the style of my book the same because I had
planned to make it have a cartoon look to it and after researching other styles I decided on a final style. I
also planned to make my illustrations using shape task because I found that it looked well and would
create the style I wanted best which is what I did in my final product. All the plans that I made for the
production side of my work I kept the same but I changed the story.

3. How well have you constructed your
images?
My images show a constant style throughout, I tried to go for a simple cartoon look with the images because
when I was doing research I found many pictures of cartoon animals that all had a specific style that I
wanted to use in my work. The style was very simplistic but it was still complex to do, I had to make sure
that the characters were all perfect with correct sizes and shapes. I tried to make the backgrounds in the
same style but have the detail that they needed. The textures that were in my work were created by
shapes I made these were things like the waves in the water and the grass, I created these with shapes
and I did not use any overlays for them. I didn’t use texture overlays because I wanted to create the book
with the style I saw from my research, it used plain colors and I decided to make the colors I used mostly
bright because also from research I found that all children’s books are brightly colored. I also did not any
other things that would create textures like shadows as I wanted to keep the images having a very simple
look, making them easy to see by not having too much on a page. I think that I constructed the images
well as I went by my planning when making them and using existing images and books for inspiration for
me to create them to a good standard. I think that I constructed my images well, they all follow the same
style and they are clear with nice colours that work well.

4. How well have you used text to anchor
your images
I made the text easy to read for children, by using a correct font, size and colour. I made the text a plain serif
font as this made the letters understandable which is important in children's books. I made them black as
my images were all made from bright colours and making it black would make it easy to read. I placed the
text in places that would make it easy to read, this was places where they was no images, this was either
the top or bottom of the page. I used images on the page and put the correct text that would show what
was happening. I made sure the words I used were not to complicated as it was made for children to read
and even if they get it read to them, they must be able to understand the story. I found a copy of the story
that had been made into a play, this gave me different characters and a narrator so when doing the story
boards and planning I could use the characters to decide on how to put them and I could use the narrators
lines for the text as it will match the images. It made it easier to put the images and text together than
using the original story as it would be too long. I then could then add parts to that story and remove any if
I didn’t need it, it also made it very easy to put in any characters or take any out. I think that because I
used that version of the story I managed to use the text well to anchor the images. I used a website that
has many different fonts on to decide which I should use in my work, I found a few that I thought would
look nice in my book but I then had to chose from those which would be easiest to read for a small child. I
found some fonts that would be to complicated to have in the book because they were very fancy and
would maybe be suitable for the front page but not the whole story. I found out that most books have a
serif font because the text is clearer but I found a children’s book that had a sans serif font and I liked the
look of it as it followed the style I wanted to go for in my book but in the end I decided on a serif font as it
was easier to understand.

5. Is your product suitable for your
audience?
I think that my product is suitable for my audience because I have made sure that the images were simple and
easy for someone to recognise what they are, I also made the text relevant to what was on the page in
case the images are not understandable. I made sure that the text was suitable by concentrating on the
size, text and colour and using already existing books for ideas. The story has an overall meaning to it
which is to treat people fairly even if they are different which is something people should be taught but it
does not have any other meanings or hidden messages because I think that young children would not
understand or recognise them. I had to make sure that I made everything clear and simple, with small
amounts of detail because when doing my research I found that the other books were like this, they had
lots of colour and little detail so that is how planned my book to be. I did not use the original story in
planning as my original script because it is very long and I didn’t want to re-writing it all so I found a
version that had been made into a play, this was useful because I could use the narrators lines for the main
story and the characters lines in speech bubbles on the pages. It was also a play made for young children
so it had easy to read words and it made it perfect for me to use in my book. Overall I think that my book is
suitable for the chosen audience because I researched well what I should use and made sure I used the
right things.

6. What do you like/dislike about the
techniques you have used?
I like the way that I created the images for my book. After practicing all the techniques that I could have used in
production, (photography, rotoscoping, illustration and shape task) I decided that I liked the way that using
shape task looked. I used shape task to then create the images by placing the shape over the top of the
image and using the warp tool to then shape it into a shape similar to the image for a base then I would
sue the tools to create the shape I wanted. I am glad that I picked shape task because I think my final
product looks good with it. I did find it hard to make the backgrounds with shape task and it was also hard
to do small detail with but I think that it would give me the best final product out of the methods. I could
change a shape if I needed to and it would because of the method I was using. I also could layer things to
create a better look but this meant that I had lots of layers and it was hard to change something as I didn’t
know which layer it was, to overcome this I renamed the layers. I could also merge the layers into one if
they were the same colour but if I did this I could not then un-merge them after that meaning if I needed
to change anything later on when I couldn’t undo, I would have to re-do all those parts. I liked that I made
all the characters first then did the backgrounds then put them together afterwards, this was helpful
because I knew what I had done and what I needed to do and it was easy to keep organised. My characters
did not need their facial expressions to change throughout the book so I didn’t need to worry about
making different copies of a character with a different look. This made it easier to keep organised and I
also would find it hard to make my characters show different emotions because they are animals so
instead of using the images to show the characters emotions I put it in the story.

7. What do you like/dislike about how
your final product looks?
There was lots of space on the page that didn’t have anything on it so I could have made the page size smaller,
made the text larger or I could have split the text up so it was spread out. My images turned out really
neat and the colours of them worked well. Because of the style that I used the book has a nice simplistic
look to it and it doesn’t have too much detail that would make the pages look full or crowded even if I did
make the pages smaller. I think that I could have added more detail in to the story and I could have added
more pages, although this may have taken too much time. I like that all the pages followed the same style
and none of them looked different and the characters followed that style too. I like the colours I used
because they were bright and looked good with it being a children’s book. I chose a serif font because I
thought it would be easier to read but I wanted to use a sans serif font as it looked better and I think that I
should have gone for that font as it would have improved the look of the pages. I also like that I used the
shape task for my production method because I think that it would give me the best outcome. I like the
style that I created by using it, I think that it is similar to the rest but has its own look to it.

8. Why did you include the content you
used?
I used the content I did because I had to make the book for a child, I had to make sure that all the text and
images were right for a children’s book. I researched many already existing children’s books to see what
they were like, this gave me an idea of what to do in my book; I got ideas for the images, font, text and
styles for my final product, I did this because these books were popular which means people like these
aspects of them making mine fit in with them. When looking for a copy of the story I found a copy that
was written for children doing a play because the original was very long and detailed but I wanted mine to
be short and simple. I included the content that I used because it was all from ideas from research on
popular children's books, using popular work for ideas is better because it gives you an idea on what
people like and what parents want their children to see. I had to make sure that it was all suitable for a
young child and didn’t include anything complicated and hard for a young child to understand.

9. What signs, symbols or codes have
your used in your work?
I did not use anything in the story to create any extra meanings because the book is for young children and I do
not think that they would understand them. I kept the story simple and made sure this way it would be
easy to read and follow. Although I have not used anything like colours or animals to create another
meaning, there is a moral behind the story. I think that having a moral in children’s books is good because
its better to teach them when they are young. The story shows the animals disliking another because it is
different and I think that shows the children that it is wrong to judge people based on their looks. I have
not used colours to show anything like emotions in my book because in my research I found out that
children's books are all brightly coloured. Using signs, symbols and codes in children’s books is not
common, they usually follow a simple storyline and have no different meanings for things.

10. What representations can be found in
your work?
My book does not show any particular group of people being represented in any way. Gender is not really
mentioned in the story and where it is, it doesn’t become of importance. The point of the story is to show
how one set of people showing negativity towards another because of how he is, is bad. I think that this
represents how people can act towards one another in different groups such as gender, race and religion.
When researching children’s books I found that they would generally use stereotypes these could be for
gender for example. They will use a general picture of what most people think of when mentioning a
group of people. They do not do this in a negative way but just to make the children understand what
types of people there are.

11. What style have you employed in your
products?
I have used a simple style that uses lots of colour and little detail. I found this style when looking for character
inspiration, I came across some pictures of birds that used a style that I thought I could create with
Photoshop using shape task which was why it was my chosen production method. I used this idea to find
other characters that used a similar style and I managed to find an image for each character and other
things that I would need like the barn. I used my children’s book research to find out if the style I had
chosen was common in other books or not and I found that a lot of books use simple styles and plain
images with little detail so I decided it was a good style to choose. I found that a lot of old books had more
detailed images that were usually illustrations drawn by someone but I found very few recent ones like
that. I used bright colours as there is no small detail, this was common in other children’s books too
because children mainly look at the pictures more than the text so they have to be bright and appealing
for them. I also found a book during research that had very simple illustrations that had been done using
Photoshop, they were made up of few smaller shapes to create the main one, or even just one shape. Each
page had only a small amount of writing on and because my story is short I decided to use a similar layout
but I changed the font. I changed the font so my book looked different and it would be easier to read as
many books use a serif font but that book used a sans serif font.

12. What were the strengths and weaknesses
of the pre-production and planning
I used Photoshop to create my work and I used it well to create a good final product. I used the method that I
found looked the best as I wanted the final work to look good but that meant that it wouldn’t have been
the easiest one to do, it was quite a complicated method to use but I think that I managed to work it out
and create the book to the best quality I could. I think that I have been very creative throughout the
project because I made changes to a story so it wasn’t the same as another and I also used pre-existing
books to create a style for my own work. I changed the story during production and after planning so I had
to go back and redo my planning and change the pages I had made. My most creative aspect of the project
was coming up with a different ending to the story because I could change it in so many ways like changing
the animals to humans. I think that a weakness in my planning was trying to decide on which style and
font to use as there was so many different ones I liked and so many different ones that the other books
use, this was also good because I had a large range to choose from. I made a schedule so I knew what I
was doing well and made sure that I was organised. I was always in front of my schedule which meant that
I could get more of my book and checking done, this was a good thing because I knew that I would get it
finished but this did mean that I would have time at the end in which I had nothing to do after improving
and checking. If I was to do the project again I would take my time and make sure that I spend a lot more
time in production and going through things thoroughly to make sure everything is done properly.

13. Historical and cultural context
The story is originally an old traditional folk tale written in 1843 and it was published in a book of new fairy
tales in 1844. The copy that I had found was a modern take on the original, made into a play for young children.
This meant that the words were easier for children to understand and it was easy to follow. The story was
illustrated with hand drawn images which is common for books published that long ago. The writer stated that
it was not originally for children but more of an autobiography. Over time it has developed into books, films
and other types of media for children by many different people which is why there are so many different
versions of it. There is many new copies of the story with some having the same plot and some having a
different one. I found that a lot of the re-written ugly duckling books have changed what animal he is so I
thought that I should use that in my work because of it being so popular, another way of changing it that I
found to be popular was changing the ending, stories that change the ending usually keep it a happy ending
like most children’s books do. Comparing my version of the story to the original, mine is much shorter and it
has a lot less detail in it. The original has the ugly duckling visiting many places in which he is teased then he
leaves but I decided to shorten the story. I did this because I planned my book to be for young children
meaning it has to be easy to both understand and read, the original gives lots of description of each character
and it sets the scene in high detail, I did this in my images instead of in the story. Another difference is that I
use images created in Photoshop whereas the original images were hand illustrated which is more common in
old children’s books. I found that most children’s books that have been recently made are illustrated with
simple images, this can be ones that have been hand drawn but they’re mostly made in Photoshop.