developing portrait ideas

this was the stage i was at with my practical development when we had a group tutorial on Tuesday,
i was at a creative block, though drawing 3-5 portraits seems straight forward, trying to communicate my experience of meeting with each elderly person and tell their life story in a  creative and new way was really hard!
as i have done documentary/ reportage illustrations communicating peoples stories in previous projects such as COP 3 - illustrating an organ recipients life, i was proving difficult to try and come up with a new way to visually tell a story, though i really liked the way i did it on previous projects, i didn't want to copy it as it wouldn't show any development.

   

developing on croped versions of portrait. - doesnt work showing ful face as much as sections of the face!

i like the layout of this piece and i could see it fitting as a poster piece.
however, their is something that is missing, the combination of the detailed portrait and detailed objects just isn't working how i could want and and i just cant put my figure on why!.

experimenting with adding watercolour to pencil drawings
i like the way this has turned out, not sure how it will look when combined with pencil portrait.

dont know weather it looks to contrasting? distracting attention from the face.
the digital colour added to the cows definitley doesn't work!

from discussions with Fred, he said that my stronger work lately has been when i have added colour/ not had a lot of white space around my illustrations. however, as i want this project to be communicate a subtle, and natural feel which doesn't reply to much on digital manipulation to maintain a original and authentic quality, i have played around with adding a light colour.
i really like this colour, i think its more soothing on the eyes then a bright white. i also like that it adds a vintage feel to the portrait- adding to the concept of time/elderly/history. 

thinking about whats to communicate life stories:

i really really really like finding drawings like this on pinterest, i think its very expressive and authentic- which is really weird because i cant personally work in a sketchbook but this is the type of work that really exsites me when its done right. i always worry that i will waste my time in a sketch book if it doesn't go right.

i want to experiment with making more expressive work, i think it will be an idea way to show emotion and my experience of meeting the elderly people inside their detailed portrait. 

i really like the idea of incorporating text as a illustration like the first reference image about. 

a quick sketch to get an idea! 

the added background colour withe the coloured plan works a lot better as the background makes reduces the contrast.
i played around with a more sketchier, reportage style of illustrating my experience of speaking to john instead of drawing from reference which i think is the problem with the previous illustrations i added to the portrait (above) which come across quite flat and unexpressive.
i think the added colour brings the portrait more alive and adds personality to john.

my main worry and problem to overcome with this project was giving it a direct purpose. though i new it was to give elderly people a personality, Patrick suggested i apply it to a existing charity campaign. 

 i have decided my main priority with these pieces is to is to visually document my experience meeting each elderly person. communicating what they have told me about their lives, and the emotion and atmosphere that i felt when hearing their stories and getting to know them. 

By drawing things to summarise a particular part of the persons life (eg a rugby ball to show johns love he had for playing and now watching the game) this will resinate with people who are also fan with rugby, forming a common group and conversation starter that someone could have with a elderly person - helping to tackle looniness and isolation within the elderly generation as my piece will hopefully urge a person to start a conversation or visit a elderly person, remembering that they have had interesting lives and hobbies and are not all the same. 

As i want my work to bring awareness to elderly people and the issue of isolation, i propose to apply my illustrations to a campaign for a charity. 

at the moment Age uk have a project/campaign to 'combat loneliness' which i colour apply my illustrations to campaign awareness materials such as post cards, posters.

http://www.ageuk.org.uk/no-one/we-combat-loneliness/

however my main aim and drive for this project is for them to exist to sit in a exhibition. 

so saying this i could apply the illustrations to flyers and promotional materials for it.