“Penile-Inversion Vulvoplasty: Labiaplasty” Surgical Illustration
For this series of surgical illustrations, I had the opportunity to observe both a transition-related vaginoplasty and vulvoplasty under Dr. Alexandra Millman at Women’s College Hospital in Toronto, ON.
Scroll down to see how this project progressed!
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Pen & Ink
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Prof. Michael Corrin (University of Toronto), Dr. Alexandra Millman (Women's College Hospital)
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Novice surgeons/surgical residents
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Coursework
OR Sketches:
Observing the surgery & live sketching.
I was invited to observe both a vaginoplasty and a vulvoplasty. In the OR, I sketched and took notes for the entirety of both surgeries. (~ 6 hours each!) These sketches are rough, and are meant to help document the procedure and guide future drafts.
Drafting:
Narrowing down the sequence & iterating with feedback.
Based on the OR sketches, notes, and other research, I was able to create thumbnails for each step of the procedure.
I consulted with my professor and my surgeon to narrow the scope of the procedure, and continued refining the accuracy and salience of each step.
Once my sketches and narrative were clear, I could move onto the rendering stage.
Rendering:
Preparing the sketches for inking.
A clean version of each step was created and scanned.
Then, the image was edited in Photoshop to only show the cyan color channel.
The cyan image was printed on inking paper, and inked with a flexible nib and India ink.
Once finished, the drawing was re-scanned and the cyan channel was digitally removed. Any additional digital retouching was done to remove unwanted artifacts.
Layout:
Composing the illustrations with text and graphic elements.
