Divergent Review

Divergent

Divergent. Lets just say that I've been to see this film twice in the cinemas... I want to go again! And I really really need to read the books too!!

Divergent is based around the story of Tris (Shailene Woodley) and Four (Theo James), Tris has her test and finds out that she is 'divergent' and does not comply to only one faction meaning she does not fit into their society.

When Tris joins the Dauntless faction, she meets Four who is to be the new recruits mentor and guide them through their training. Tris is one of the weakest and she has to work her way up the ranks to keep in dauntless otherwise she will be made 'factionless'.

You find out that Four is also 'Divergent' when he trains Tris on how to pass the mental test. You find out that Four has four fears, hence his name, and he shows Tris how a dauntless' mind would conform to their fears.

Tris and Four also have to find out what Erudite is upto within Dauntless before people are harmed and in serious danger.
They have to help stop a massacre of innocent Abnegation people and help stop Dauntless from becoming murderers.

A MUST WATCH!

XO

Throne of Glass - Review

On Friday, I decided that I was in need of a new fun and exciting book to read. I think I was in Waterstones for about an hour before I decided to buy Throne of Glass.

The book cover to me looked really fun and exciting and it sort of reminded me of the Black Magician Trilogy which I loved and read all three books in about 2 months!!

What I love so much about this book is the female character. Sarah Maas has created a strong confident heroine. And I must say I do love a strong female lead.

Soooooo..... About the book hey?!

What I noticed when I was deciding on which book to buy was that Throne of Glass has a really strong opening that is intriguing and makes you want to know more!

"After a year of slavery in the Salt Mines of Endovier, Celaena Sardothien was accustomed to being escorted everywhere in shackles and at sword-point."

I don't know about you, but I know that when I read this sentence along with about another 5 books, this is the one that had the most dramatic impact with questions about who is this character? why is she a slave? how dangerous is she?

All of this is answered within the next 2 chapters and it keeps developing throughout the book.

Calaena Sardothien is portrayed to be a beautiful but deadly girl and only 18 years old. All she wants is freedom and the only way she can get that is if she agrees to the deal the Crown Prince of Ardarlan has stuck with her, to become his champion and serve as the King's Champion and do everything he wants done for four years. 

Freedom or Slavery.

Win or Lose.

Kill or be Killed.

Seems simple right?

Well no not really as she also starts developing feelings for both the Crown Prince of Ardarlan and the Captain of the Guard, which is very much a dangerous game for everyone involved. She befriends the Princess of Eyllwe who is not all she seems and is also hiding some truths from Celaena. Then theres Elena, who comes as guidance and help for Celeana but also with missions... oh and theres a catch. Elena died over a thousand years ago.

Waittttt..... I almost forgot... 

There is also an evil lurking around and someone is attacking ONLY the other contenders. Will Celaena be next?

This book is thrilling, gripping and enticing.

If you want to read something interesting with a bit of adventure and danger behind it then I advise that you go and buy this book like NOW!!!

And like it says in the book..

"Nothing is a coincidence. Everything has a purpose."

So if you have just read this, then it means that you have read it for a reason.

That reason is so that you can read this thrilling adventure too.

Enjoy!

xo

The Elite - Kiera Cass

So as a 'Get Well Soon' present, my mummy got me The Elite to read while I was bed bound and as I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE this novel i have somehow managed to read it in two days because I am so so greedy! But it is amazing and boy will you NOT be disappointed in any way shape or form!

This book starts with a BANG on the first sentence never mind the first chapter!

"The Angeles air was quiet and for a while I lay still, listening to the sound of Maxon's breathing."

I mean Hello book two or what!!! I knew it was going to be good by the first chapter. Actually forget that! I knew it was going to be Awesome when I finished the first book and I have been DYING to grab hold of this beauty!!

This time round, I feel as though Kiera Cass has really got the reader involved by the way she has told this story. I mean I am a very visual person as it is due to the whole arts that I am into and I can picture things really easily but I must admit that I let my mind wander and I make my make believe world so extravagant but hey we don't want to know that we need to know about this book!

I think have way through this book where Marlee and her lover get punished I was so emotional, I felt sick due to what I was picturing, it was so vivid and I was so upset due to the emotions that America had that I was swelling up and then a Chapter later I really really really wanted to just punch Celeste in the face! Which thankfully Miss Cass made America do.... Violence is not the way but.... Celeste needed to be put in her place and a good slap was necessary!!  

I love the way that Kiera Cass has written her novels, they are so beautifully put together and the description in each sentence, the whole wording in this novel is magnificent and if you want a brilliant read then you need to get these books! I can not even put to words how gripping and exciting this book is! 

The adventure really has continued and their is romance, betrayal, trust issues and a complicated yet unknown love triangle going on so if you have nothing to do and you want to go and exercises your imagination get to your nearest book store or go on amazon! 

You will not regret it and that is a promise!!

If you have not read Keira Cass' previous book and you want to know how the series began go to this link here on my blog!!

Also if you are interested at all, visit Miss Cass' website! CLICK NOW!

Oh and please tell me what you are thinking on the novel of this book and tell me if you love it as much as me and what your favorite part is!!

Oh and like I said last time!! I CAN NOT WAIT FOR THE NEXT BOOK!!!!

Happy Reading!

Loads of Love

Melanie Katelin 

xoxo

Dark Skies

On Tuesday I went to the Cinemas with my friend who is back home from Uni and we went to watch Dark Skies 

Now when you watch the trailer it looks so good and interesting and like it is going to be a really good film. DO NO BE FOOLED!! 

The trailer basically shows you the best parts of the film! This film literally gets interesting in the last 45mins of the film which is not exactly what you want in a film really. I like to watch films that are punchy and exciting all the way though it.

If you want to watch this film I would personally say to wait until it comes out on DVD and watch it then. 

How ever if your as lucky as me and my friend were to have a group of 15-16 year old boys next to you who think that they are Big, Brave Boys then seriously go just so you can watch how scared they get all the way through!! Soooooo funny, it literally made the film so so so much better!!!

So this is what I think about this film.

Bloglovin' Review

So the other day I posted about how I was signing up to Bloglovin, just to see what it is and how it works and I absolutely LOVE it! So here's my little review.....

So this is what bloglovin' looks like before you sign in, if you just want to have a quick look, you can have a look at the top posts and see whether this is a site you would like to join.

Bloglovin'

  

So once you have logged in, you can see that you have your following posts that you have not seen right at your fingertips which is truly brilliant, especially if you’re busy and out and about it is a blessing in disguise! They are ALL at your fingertips and you can find new fun and interesting blogs!

Bloglovin'

 So these are the options that bloglovin' gives you. If you’re completely new to blogging, or just want to know some really cool blogs then this is the place to be!

You can like posts that you want to keep to refer to which I have done and I love this fact, you can see the MOST popular posts that other users have liked and then the most interesting one is Top Blogs which allows to see the best bloggers and I love it! It's the whole of the blogosphere in one place...

It's a fun place to go and network and just to find some amazing post and interesting things!!

Go Go Go Go Go Go Goooo!! 

www.bloglovin.com

Sketchbook Review

I have been talking about doing a sketchbook review for a while so here it is!!

I have scanned a few pages in from my sketchbook and I will explain what I have done on the page what I think has worked, what I like and dislike and how I could have improved!

I started my FMP on Tuesday 12th March as the day before I was so ill and did not feel well so I just rested for the day. On the Tuesday I was still not 100% therefore I decided that I would do some secondary research and watch Elizabeth: The Golden Age and draw from the film.

This is the first page in my sketchbook. I have created a fabric swatch drawing of the detail that was in the dress that I had drawn as I did not want to ruin a lovely continuous line drawing. I will admit it and say now that I DID pause the film so that I could see what it was and what angle I wanted to draw from. I have also along the bottom which you can not clearly see quoted part of the film from this scene that I found interesting/important and wanted to make a note of. The colour on this page has been created simply by using watercolours.

This again is a continuous line drawing from the film. I have mainly concentrated on the colour blue as it was a main feature in that scene. I feel as though there might be something missing from this page and unfortunately it is not the whole of the double spread as it would not fit on my scanner so I am sorry about that! I think I should have possibly added some form of text or a background or something else as it feels as though she is floating on the page and to me it feels slightly boring. 

 

This is one of my favourite pages that I have created! I have used this image in my CAD mood boards which I posted about, if you have not seen that post then <Click Here>. I think that the yellow is really bright and vibrant and I just really like the way that I have set everything out on this page and the pattern which is on the left of the page was an over head shot in the film that I really liked. This page really pops out and is very much a stand alone page. Although there is a lot of information on my page, I think that it is nicely set out my the use of the yellow shade. Queen Elizabeth is in painted in a brighter harsher yellow and the pattern is placed on a more washed out yellow. This is purely due to the fact that my paint brush was not large enough to fill the page the way that it should have and it leaves this nice wash out/ streaky background.

This page is also another image that I used for my CAD mood boards. I decided that this page was right for my 'Ice Royal' colour scheme spread as it is all blue and white with slight colour. I really like the way that the ink has run in this image and how the lines look soft but with shading.

*This technique is really simple but effective, to do this you will need an inky ball point pen, a paint brush and pot of water. Firstly draw you image like you would any other, using a wet paint brush with ONLY water (be generous) you paint along the lines. Quickly after doing this you get your pen and draw over the line below, the ink will then blend with the water but still show your line below. Repeat this until you are happy with the way it looks. I will also put up a demonstration tomorrow :)*

I really like the layering of this page. This page originally only had the smaller drawing on it, however I felt that there was something missing and later on in the film Queen Elizabeth was wearing another blue garment so i made it seem as though this was the main feature image and added more violet and blue into the water colouring.

On Wednesday 13th March I went to London with my friend which I have previously posted about, <Click here to go to that page> While I was there I took advantage of all the primary research that was around me. I loved that day although it was rather hectic and I had to take my medicine with me... BOOOOOO!

These pages are a lot quieter then the ones above from the film that I watched, however I have not used a lot of watercolour and I have concentrated on just line, tonal, dotty drawings. I tried to incorporate all the skills that we learnt in the first term of this course.

This is all that I am going to show for now as I do not want to bore you and I have missed a few pages out so I shall try and get that done for tomorrow.

So either Good Morning, Good Afternoon or like me Good Night 

Melanie Katelin

xo

CAD - Last Day - Outcomes

I have really enjoyed doing this course! If your at all interested in fashion, graphics or just like computers then it is something to look into. I have decided to do this course purely for the fashion side of things and to improve my portfolio, however, it just so happened to land perfectly with my FMP and now I have some professional looking designs to take back to college with me and I have the knowledge and skills to get by if I want to create any more styles or colour schemes. Actually pretty much anything!

My tutor for this course was Erica Godfrey and she has been such a wonderful tutor. She really knew what she was talking about and she made it so easy to understand what it was that you were about to go and do or what you should have done. Erica really showed me some cool tricks to do on Illustrator and Photoshop and I have had such a great time and she is so talented int what she does it's crazy! And if you click HERE you can go to her website!! OMG, OMG, OMG its so EXCITING!

This was created by Melanie Katelin, Please do not take credit for my work. Thank you

This is the first mood board that I created was for my colour scheme 'Revenge' which is Gold, Black and Red. I have scanned images in from my sketchbook and used them as you can see with the yellow illustrations that are slightly dimmed. These images do have effects on them which were created on Adobe Illustrator with Live Trace on CS6 and I used the 6 colour effect.

On this board I also have all my illustrations which clearly show the front and the back as well as the stitches and seam lines. I have put a brief description and I have created colour blocks which are shown along the bottom of the page.

I also did a Blue, Sliver and White board that goes with my colour scheme which is called 'Ice Royal'. I have tried to use a different lay out for this board to make it more interesting and to make it seem as though it is of a different design.

This was created by Melanie Katelin, Please do not take credit for my work. Thank you.

All that I have done with this board is change the layout completely. I have made half of the page an image and on the other half shown my ideas with a small description. Again with this mood board I have used my own illustration from my sketchbook which was simply scanned in and then I have edited my image on Adobe Illustrator and put my colour scheme circles along the edge of the page.

I think that both boards are slightly different in layout and style and I have worked with all my components that I had to work with. Please feel free to use my examples as inspiration or as a guide but do not claim this as your own as I have dedicated a lot of time to this project and to my CAD course. Also if you want more inspiration visit http://www.coroflot.com/people#keyword=fashion I found so may inspiring boards that have helped me create the two above which I am so proud of!

Let me know what you think and if you have made any boards please leave a link so I can see your amazing work :)

Melanie Katelin

xo

Boooo Hooooo!!

Boo Hoo Hoo Hoo :'(

I am so upset right now, I have not had the chance to read any books (that are not factual or picture books) since the start of my FMP I have just been so busy! The worst thing is that I have the second book for beautiful creatures waiting for me upstairs in my book case but I haven't managed to find the time or brain space to start it! My aim for my one week of Easter break is to start and finish this book! I adored the first and I know I will the second its just needing the time!

I also have not even finished my 6 Gossip Girl box sets and I'm still stuck on Season 5 Disc 2 which means I am going NO WHERE! However, I have watched the whole of Season 1 of Game of Thrones which is absolutely fantastic and why have I only just started watching it?! Am I CRAZY?! So this Easter I am going to completely STUFF my face with chocolate in bed with a good book/TV show/laptop/ depressingly Sketchbook :'( But This is the MOST important part of my LIFE right now! with out these grades, I AM NOT GOING TO UNI!! SO I need to STOP with my moaning and pull my finger out and great the BEST collection that I could ever imagine!!

I will keep you updated on everything and hopefully there will be a review of a book on here soon!!!

Chatsworth House Trip

Ok this is real late! On Thursday 21st March, I travelled to Chatsworth House with my friend from college so that we could get some primary research for our FMP. Now I have been here before but I was a lot younger and I couldn't quite remember it. But WOW!! I think that this trip was the best that I have done!!

It took us 3-4 hours to get around the whole house as we took so long drawing and taking pictures and just simply looking around but I have NEVER seen so much gold on one building apart from Buckingham Palace but that is the Queen's home!!!

We went through the main entrance and into the hall with the staircase which was just breath taking!! I spent a good 40mins drawing just the golden stair case. The amount of detail on it and the carpet that leads up to another staircase is ridiculously beautiful! I loved it and the whole room was one big mural! and the celling! just WOW! Also just to add note my sketchbook page from this room was AMAZING, best one of the day and I will another day do a sketchbook review.

<<<  To the left is the detailing of the golden staircase, I loved the swirls on each motif that ran along the stairs. I think that when you see detailing up so close, pictures can not do it justice especially not with this house! If you look closely at my picture, you will be able to make out the leaves that are coming off of the swirls and you can not notice how thick it is! 

>>>  To the right their is an image of the whole of the staircase and you can almost see what I mean about the detailing of the carpet. It was so thick and the colours were so vivid. Also in this image you can see how much gold their really is!!

After this room, we entered the drawing room I believe which was covered entirely of gold! It was EVERYWHERE. It had two silk covered thrones, two marble tables, lots of paintings and a really cool door with a painting of a violin on a door which looked like another door and I am going to have to put a picture up otherwise I can not explain my self! 

In this picture unfortunately you can not see it quite as clearly and it certainly does not do that door/painting justice. I didn't even realise that it wasn't real it was so good! it does just look like there is a violin casually hanging there!

Also from this picture you can tell what I mean by it is a golden room! The whole room is like this, gold everywhere you look it is pretty incredible.

Adjacent to this room is the King's Quarters I believe it was called, and this room was so rice in red and gold and blue. I also found out some rather cool facts about this room which I shall tell you all about. In this room I mainly concentrated on looking at colour and pattern.

This picture is not to the best quality, but this is because the room was so dark as they were not allowed to have the curtains open as this room is so old and precious that the sun would damage everything inside.

*Cool Facts*

 - The Duke paid £100 for a china vase which would have been filled with tulips to to remove any bad odours. Also this was in the days when £1 was your annual wage!!

- The Duke was NOT allowed to stay in this room as he was not from a high enough class and only the King was allowed in this room.

- King Richard did NOT like this room and the second time he came to visit, he asked to be moved room.

- As the Duchess of Devonshire (I am unsure which one) was the lady in waiting for a Queen, when she died, she took the Queens dressing table with her.

We also saw one of the most iconic painting of Georgina the Duchess of Devonshire and may others, but I was mainly interested in Georgina as I watched The Duchess the other night and I loved it and then I had to Google her (good old Mr Google knowing EVERYTHING! What would my life be with out him?!) and I fell in love with the story and I have found out that their is a biography about her which I have to go and buy!!

....ANYWAYS.... Did you know, that this was only one of many homes for the 5th Duke and Duchess of Devonshire? Although I was told that they visited Chatsworth often. 

Also which is pretty awesome is the fact that the current Duke and Duchess of Devonshire allow the public to look into their private quarter and into their rather impressive library which I would die to spend just a few hours in! The books are so old and I bet they have so may secrets would be quite fun to read even if I wouldn't be able to understand their English/writing! Also the Duke is often seen as he regularly holds meetings in his library and he sometimes goes for a casual chat with people.

Now this was probably my favourite room purely due to the bath in the room, I mean this is where the terms En-Suite began! 

I love how its casually chilling in the wardrobe! could you imagine,

"Darling I'm just jumping into our wardrobe, don't mind me, I'm feeling like a dip in our rather modern bath!"

hahahahahaha

I LOVE IT! haha plus all the trimmings on the door are of gold and their is a mirror chilling in and out of the doors so you can have a little peak at how clean you look, oooo Darling hehe

*FACT MOMENT*

Did you know that the reason the bath is put inside the wardrobe is due to the fact that they did not find it proper for their washing area to be on display. 

Oh what I would do to live in those eras for just a month, not being greedy although I would like to have experienced it as a Duchess or Queen.

So this is the fun adventures that I underwent in Chatsworth House.

Do go its amazing fun although I must admit it is much more fun with your friend and sketchbook because due to the fact that you have to analysis it sooooo much you end up making really random stories and imagining the people who once lived there. Well my friend and I did anyway hehe

And for the Grand Finale, Chatsworth House

P.S. HELLO PINK VASE!!!! This was probably the highlight of my trip as Pink is my favourite colour in the WHOLE WIDE WORLD and look and that vase! Beautiful, Stunning, Spectacular!!

Cinema :)

This weekend has been SO much FUN!!

I went to the cinema on Saturday to watch Wreck It Ralph with my mother and brother and I must admit that I loved it more than a 5 year old and I really really want to watch it again. This film has such a beautiful message behind it that tells you that you can only be the best version of yourself and that being you is perfectly fine no matter whether your the bad guy or not!

I think that this animation is fun, funny and fabulous! (what can I say I do love a little bit of alliteration! hehe)

I'd go for sure whether you have a brother or not and hey if your embarrassed to go by yourself borrow a little brother or sister for a few hours! They will love it, you will love it and the parents will love you!

I have also just arrived from the cinema after going to watch Oz the Great and Powerful, which was just fun all round although slightly sad at parts. The special effects on this film is ridiculously amazing, if their were plants made out of emeralds and rubies I would LOVE to say hi!! and I would love to rid in a big bubble, that would be pretty amazing!!

I found it quite sad the way that Theodora (Mila Kunis) became the green evil witch as she only wanted peace and for everyone in Oz to live in harmony, however her evil sister made the dark side of her stronger than the light and she eventually gave in, so sad!

And in the end Oz found his true calling and stopped being selfish and helped other people for once!

SUCH good films go and watch them, I loved them and maybe you will too

Hope you've had a good weekend too,
Love
Melanie xoxo

Beautiful Creatures

Beautiful Creatures - Review.

I wanted to wait before I wrote a post about the book as I wanted to watch the film too so that I could basically give my views on both of them as a whole and I'm so glad that I have.

The Book.

I was completely gripped with the book by the first 15 pages. This book took me 4 days to read and I went to see the film yesterday and on Waterstone's buy one get one half price, I brought the next two! hehe

The book is so much fun, I was there almost shouting to tell Ethan (male character) what to do! I just wanted it to work out! The end (which I will not tell, read it yourself!) was so sad that I think I may have shed a tear or two! 

The writers have really made this book so detailed and descriptive and plan beautiful, it is such a good read so if you’re bored or don't really have anything to do go read this book, you will not be disappointed and before you say I've seen the film, think again!

The Book

The Film.

Wow it was good, like real good! The only bad and annoying thing for me was mainly Ethan's accent, not what I had pictured when I was reading the book! 

The film was as good as the book and this is purely because I saw something different, admittedly I did compare it to the book and when the beginning was not the same as the book I was like NOOOOOOOOOOO!!! But the more it got into it, the more I realised that it was all slightly different, the ending ended in a WHOLE new way and the library was very different to how it was written. 

BUT... BUT...

It was still as good as the book due to the difference it had, it created a whole new way of seeing it, it did bring things to life that you hadn't thought of before, and it was still a sad ending!  

Watch it, it's not like any other supernatural film that I have seen and it is so good but if you watch the film you HAVE to read the book to!