Skill Set Challenge

"Learn from the flowers, every day is a new opportunity to experience, to grow toward the light." - Unknown

Our lecturer set us a skill set challenge in which we were asked to create a 20 x 40m garden, with a 2m hedge and twelve trees in a grid of six at each end of the garden. We were asked to create the garden in SketchUp, create three different perspectives, and then bring it into Photoshop to render it within 2 hours. 

I started the task in SketchUp, creating the garden to the dimensions we had been given, and choosing which trees I would use within the space, I went for pear and yew trees. 

The garden took me about 40 minutes to create within SketchUp, this included time where I had to google things and watch tutorials. I do feel that this task helped with my SketchUp skills, and made me stick to a certain timeframe, making sure I didn't spend too much time on certain aspects.

I wanted to use this task to play around with my visualisation style, I normally opt for a realistic adaptation of my space when I'm using Photoshop. However, I wanted to use this time to explore other styles, creating the garden with the use of sketchy digital lines and muted colours. 

At this point, the challenge had already taken me an hour and a half, I used Adobe Illustrator to draw in figures, and create a more textured garden. 

The image above is the task after 2 hours, this was the mark to stop and evaluate what I had managed to create within the time frame. I normally create my visualisations within Photoshop but choose simple viewpoints in which the perspective is straight forward. This task made use of the different camera viewpoints within SketchUp, which I think was useful as it ensured the perspective was correct. I think when creating visualisations again, although it took some time, it is worth it to create different viewpoints quickly. 

I enjoyed using a different style that had been inspired by a section for the Chaumont Garden Design, and think I would use the design again. I did take the time to finish the visualisation, which is shown below. This took about 2 and a half hours. I used colours with different opacities to create texture within elements such as the hedge and trunks of the trees. 

Overall, I enjoyed creating this visualisation and being able to explore SketchUp again. I feel as though we haven't been encouraged to use the programme within our assignments, and doing this task has made me feel more confident with it.