A freckle past a hair

June 2, 2017

vector watch, final product, skeuomorphism, timepiece by Loren Yarrington

A freckle past a hair. Growing up, this smart aleck comment was often heard from my Dad in reply to a request for the time. Dad's are great for that sort of thing, aren't they?

This project was all about creating a photo realistic vector timepiece. Above is the finished product.

Wondering how I got there? I will explain.

Here's where things got sketchy:

wristwatch, parts of a watch, timepiece sketches by Loren Yarrington

I began by sketching the watch I was pretty sure I wanted to use as a photo reference. I figured this would help give me a good idea of what I was getting myself into as I took a closer look at it. I then sketched a few wristbands from other watches to be sure I was happy with my decision. I experimented with different clock hands and looked more closely at how they are made and held together. I tried some shading with some of my sketches in the hopes of training my brain to pay closer attention to light and shadows. Sketching a sideways view and parts of other watches were also helpful in helping me see how light interacts with different surfaces.

Time takes all shades and shapes

I first created a very rough draft of just the basic shapes using my photo reference.

Basic shapes of a watch, vector watch shapes, timepiece by Loren Yarrington

After that I began adding shadows behind the clock hands, adding gradients to the hour marks and trying to figure out how to make the wristband look more like leather.

hour marks, gradients, leather wristband, vector watch, watch, timepiece by Loren Yarrington

After some critique, I was able to modify my shapes and make them look more real. I was made aware that the sharp points I had on parts of the band and lugs were not pointy in real life. You can see in the photo reference that what I thought were points are actually rounded corners. Thank goodness for critiques because I had not noticed this previously. I have circled the points I speak of below in green.

drawover showing unecessary points, timepiece by Loren Yarrington

This next image shows some modification of shapes, shading and gradient work on the lugs, reworking of the clock hands, added threads on the outside edge of the clock face, and a leather texture I created for the wristband.

leather texture, lugs, gradients, shapes, modification, timepiece by Loren Yarrington

I knew the wristband still needed help. After several hours of work I was a lot happier with the look of it.

leather, texture, shadows, highlights, gaussian blur, blur, timepiece by Loren Yarrington

The Finishing Touch

I was still not entirely happy with the color of the leather. I fixed that and also added a few more shadows to the edge of the band where it bends around the pin. After further critique, I decided to redo the side knob completely and add a shadow to make it appear a bit behind the watch face and not in direct contact with the light source. I used some different ellipses and the Gaussian Blur effect (the Adobe Illustrator version) to add the different highlights and shadows on the outside edge as well as the inside of the watch face. I finally fixed the bottom left rivet that had been driving me bonkers too, that was a relief.

vector watch, final product, skeuomorphism, timepiece by Loren Yarrington

This project was super intimidating at the beginning but I did it and learned so much. I even enjoyed it!