Seeing things as they are and then replicating that in real life can be challenging. Each person perceives and understands objects and situations  differently, it 's a matter of perspective.

My goal in this project was to realistically replicate an everyday object using Adobe Illustrator. I spent quite a while picking the right watch, and decided I loved the simplicity and elegance of this black and gold Michael Kors watch. Throughout my project I tried to see each individual shape, gradient, shadow and highlight. This allowed my to create my project piece by piece, catching the little details.

I spent some time sketching different parts of watches with highlights and shadows. I wanted to grasp how I would show depth and perspective. This helped me consider lighting patterns and shadow intensities. This helped me remember to stay consistent with where my light source would be coming from and to keep my gradients and blending gradual and subtle.

This project taught me the importance of patience and pacing my work. I enjoyed working on this project and spent a few hours on my project each day. I showed my work to other designers and family and received great feedback that I then applied to my project. From my feedback I added blending and blurring to the the reflections on the face of my watch, I also added more depth on various parts of the face of my watch including the lettering and diamonds. I appreciate feedback from others, it gives me a valuable opportunity to see how someone else see my work and helps me fix small details I overlook.

I love how my final watch turned out. The watch on the left is my vector, the middle shows my outlines, and the right shows my reference image. I used many different shapes to grab the little details, like the dozens of shapes I added to each diamond to make it look like it is catching the light. I used many layers, gradients, and clipping masks to get my final image.

This project gave me a whole new perspective, I now see how light catches objects and follows a curve. I see what small shapes are combined to create a whole.This helps me reach my goal step by step until I've created something I can be proud of!