Graphic Design: Drawing II

METAMORPHOSIS

Task 1 - Visual Research & Studies

A biological process by which an animal physically develops after birth or hatching, involving a conspicuous and relatively abrupt change in the animal's body structure through cell growth and differentiation. Some insects, amphibians, molluscs, crustaceans, cnidarians, echinoderms and tunicates undergo metamorphosis, which is usually accompanied by a change of habitat or behavior.

Subject matter :

Background Studies

Queen (chess)

The queen (♕,♛) is the most powerful piece in the game of chess, able to move any number of squares vertically, horizontally, or diagonally. Each player starts the game with one queen, placed in the middle of the first rank next to the king. Because of the value of a queen, it is sometimes used as bait to lure an opponent into a trap by a queen sacrifice, as in a Fool's mate. Another tactic is to use the queen to threaten the opponent's queen, to either retreat or make a "queen trade" (losing both of them) to reduce the game to less-powerful pieces. The queen is often used in conjunction with another piece, such as teamed with a bishop or rook, where the pieces could guard each other while threatening the opponent pieces.

With the chessboard oriented correctly, the white queen starts on a white square and the black queen on a black square. (Thus the mnemonics "queen gets her color", or "queen on [her] [own] color", or "the dress [queen piece] matches the shoes [square]", Latin "servat regina colorem".) In algebraic notation, the white queen starts on d1 and the black queen starts on d8. Because the queen is the most powerful piece, when a pawn is promoted, it is almost always promoted to a queen.

In the game shatranj, an ancestor of chess, the queen was a fairly weak piece called a fers or vizier, only able to move or capture one step diagonally. The modern queen's move arose in 15th-century Europe.

The piece is archaically known as the minister. In Polish it is known as the Hetman – the name of a major historical military-political office. In Russian it is known as "ferz'" (ферзь). The Arabic name of the piece is Wazïr, the same as inshatranj.

Movement

The queen can be moved any number of unoccupied squares in a straight line vertically, horizontally, or diagonally, thus combining the moves of the rook and bishop. The queen captures by occupying the square on which an enemy piece sits.

Although both players start with one queen each, a player can promote a pawn to any of several types of pieces, including a queen, when the pawn is moved to the player's furthest rank (the opponent's first rank). Such a queen created by promotion can be an additional queen, or if the player's queen has been captured, a replacement queen. Pawn promotion to a queen is colloquially called queening, which is by far the most common type of piece a pawn is promoted to because of the relative power of a queen.