SKETCH
I was inspired by the character Kaonashi (faceless man) in Hayao Miyazaki‘s movie Spirited Away. I would call my monster the Soul Collector. He is a “Transboudarist”, which means that he can cross over the boundary between the human and the ghost world. His job is basically to collect souls from others in order to make himself bigger and powerful. The SouL Collector would come to the people who have strong desires in their hearts and use his treasure to swap their souls. Usually people can’t deny his treasure and will eventually lose themselves in the exchange.
BRAINSTORMING
Text in the sketch (just ideas):
- Kaonashi’s face
- The story behind Kaonashi: He always uses gold to lure people. If someone accepts the gold, Kaonashi will be able to have the access to swallow this peoson’s soul in order to make himself bigger.
- Bubbles: Every bubble that overflows from his body represents a human’s soul (or a different source of power).
- Feather on the hat: It is a collector of the souls and also locator that can search for the humans who have strong desires in their hearts.
- Chains: It can lock the souls so they can’t escape.
- Coat: It is a huge coat to cover his body inside, and his body is all black which is composed by magic, souls, wishes, and teasures (all kinds of things).
- Four feet: In original story, two characters hide under the coat and try to go over the bridge. But in my sketch, I just want to use some weird elements that related to human.
PROCESS
1. Crow-Like Truncheon: Crow represents a curse
2. Feather: A locator
3. Mysterious Bag
4. A Lucky Charm with a Bell
5. A Huge Hat
6. Bubbles of Wishes&Souls
7. Iron Chains to Lock the Souls
8. A Huge Overcoat to Cover Up the Whole Body
9. Kaonashi’s face
10. The Bag Tied on the Truncheon with a Lucky Charm Hanging at the end
PROJECT
My final piece is a drawing, and I recorded the steps when I was coloring it. I used the watercolors. As I mentioned previously, my monster is a “Transboundarist”. I gave it a background that’s divided up into two colors like he’s walking across the boundary between the two worlds.
Final Piece
REFLECTION
Through the communication with my group members, we think that a terror monster does not necessarily need to look like a horrible and ferocious creature, which most people think it should be. Other than that, the nature of terror of a monster can be seen in many other ways.
I’ve borrowed the ideas from the movie I watched before and put a lot of my imaginations into it. I think my monster is a Japanese style monster. He’s meant to be a terror monster, which he is, through his powerful magic. But on the other hand, he looks creepy and cute at the same time. I chose to use gray to make the tone darker, and the clothings and accessories I drew, in my opinion, are closely related to Japanese old time traditions.
I found the most difficult part is the coloring. I had been struggling in between the color pencils and the watercolors. I finally chose the watercolors, but I didn’t handle it well. Since I put on the colors it was hard to make a change afterwards. It was also hard to mix the colors together by water because it dried up really quick. After I finished the monster part, I realized I had to draw a background too. It was harder to draw the background after I already colored the main part, because I had to pay close attention to not blend the colors of the background into the parts I already finish coloring. Also I had been struggling with which colors to use, so that’s why I had 4 photos in my final piece, because I frequently put on the new colors.
After all, I really think it is a thought provoking project. Through this project, I’ve learned how to use my imagination more effectively to create something completely new.
