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Kate Minogue

BA [Hons] Animation

Kate is a Wexford-based artist with a great interest in the visual development aspect of the animation pipeline. She an avid fan of suspense thrillers and ghost stories and has spent much of her final year at IADT developing visuals for film projects with horror themes. For her final project, she created a series of illustrations based on folk tales of the Banshee from her native County Wexford. This showcase reflects Kate's love of stories with mystical and macabre themes. She is excited to continue building on the artistic skillsets she acquired during her time at IADT and hopes to join the industry as a visual development artist post-graduation.

This is my first illustration of **The Banshee's Comb**. While stories of the comb from my county do not mention it having any particularly special qualities, I wanted to depict it as a beautiful magical object in my artwork for this project. I wanted the comb to be eye-catching as the focal point of my illustrations, an object that one would be enticed to pick up as my female main character is enticed to. As such I designed the comb to be a golden, sparkling object emitting a glowing light to emphasise its presence throughout my artwork.

This illustration depicts the moment in which my female main character first discovers **The Banshee's Comb**. I chose a low angle perspective for this image to both give the impression of the character looking down in awe at her discovery and to draw further attention to the comb as the focal point of the image.

In one particular tale of **The Banshee's Comb** from my area, a person who stole the comb seeks the help of a Priest to get rid of the vengeful spirit. This is my character design for said Priest that I made as part of my illustration depicting this element of the tale.

A further Character Design depicting my main character begging for the Priest's assistance.

This set of images shows the development process for the church background I made for my illustration of the moment in which my character seeks the help of the Priest. I intentionally kept the background simplistic and dark so as not to distract from the characters in the foreground whose interaction is the focal point of the piece.

According to local legend, when one steals The Banshee's comb she will follow that individual home and proceed to violently bang on their doors and windows until it is re.333333turned to her. This illustration is a graphical interpretation of this aspect of the story. I drew The Banshee in silhouette, framed by both a brightly coloured window frame and flying shards of glass to draw the viewer's attention to her imposing figure. My aim was to emphasise her formidable, threatening nature when she is in the act of demanding her comb.

The only safe way to return The Banshee's comb according to myth is to hand it to her on the end of an iron fire tongs. She is known to tear the limbs off of comb thieves and so this way one could protect themselves from her. This illustration depicts my main character in the act of returning The Banshee's comb with her fire tongs while the creature's arm looms out of the darkness to reach for it.

This set of images shows the development of my Banshee character design. There are conflicting accounts in my county's folklore as to what the Banshee supposedly looks like. The most common descriptions range from a dark featured, crow-like hag to an ethereal, long-haired woman. For my horror story interpretation of her I borrowed elements from each of these descriptions.

As mentioned, The Banshee often took her comb back from a thief with such aggression that she would tear the returner's hand or even their entire arm off of them along with the comb when she came for it. As an avid horror fan I was particularly interested in illustrating this aspect of the comb's lore. My artwork shows my main character's horrified reaction to losing her hand to The Banshee.

In Wexford folklore The Banshee is often said to be seen at night, wailing and combing her hair next to streams or on bridges. This illustration depicts such a scene with my Banshee Character sitting on a wooden jetty using the reflection of a stream as a mirror to comb her long hair.

The Banshee's Comb

This series of artwork is inspired by a bit of mythology from where I live in County Wexford, particularly as collected in "The Folklore of Wexford" by Michael Fortune. As children growing up, we were taught to be wary of any lost or discarded combs we happened to find outside as we were told that they belonged to the legendary Banshee spirit. According to our local folklore, if someone was foolish enough to take a comb found outdoors The Banshee would follow them home, where she would scream and bang at their doors, walls, and windows until the comb was returned to her. The only way you could safely return the comb to The Banshee was to hand it to her on the end of a pair of iron fire tongs, otherwise she would rip your arm off along with the comb when she took it back. The above illustrations are my interpretation of this tale as a horror/thriller in which a naïve girl accidentally invokes the wrath of the Banshee after stealing her comb.

Kate Minogue Suspense Thesis PDF PDF

"Shiver With Anticipation" A Study Of Suspense In The Horror Film Genre.

Suspense is the core driving force behind a cinematic narrative. Any film can introduce a character and give them a problem to solve but suspense is the key to creating the necessary tension that keeps the audience engaged and interested in finding out how that character’s problem will be resolved. While suspense is a greatly valued narrative tool utilised across multiple genres, there is arguably no other cinematic genre that relies on the use of suspense more than Horror. The ultimate goal of every horror filmmaker is to have their film elicit feelings of palpable fear and tension in their audience. However, the achievement of that powerful sense of fear and tension which they strive for is unquestionably tied to their ability to successfully generate suspense within the events of the film. Most filmmakers could reasonably come up with a suspenseful premise for a horror film. However, it is the execution of that premise through the careful crafting of Visuals and Sound that can make or break the experience of such a narrative for the viewer. My thesis investigates patterns of suspense building in classic and contemporary horror films with the aim of identifying particular methods by which it is most successfully achieved in such narratives.

Kate Minogue Suspense Thesis PDF PDF

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