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Memphis Girl / As Above So Below  -  2019

Roz Kazaz on Instagram 

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Program Summary

Mastery: Personal Development and Leadership: This course was a great introductory course to get me in the groove of things. This course allowed me to set my own personal goals and professional goals that I wanted to achieve in each course. During this course, it provided techniques on personal motivation that would help me get to the end of this program.

Defining Client Needs: Never having had a true client relationship this course allowed me really research how to interact with clients in a professional setting. Three different cities were presented to me and it was up to me to research each location and mind map what I felt was important. After doing my research and choosing my city it was time to sketch and refine my logo ideas for the city of Kyoto. This would be the first step in creating the brand identity for Kyoto. Form this course I found that the use of mind mapping helped gather ideas. The use of mind maps not only help with the design process but they can help with normal things in someone’s personal life when need be.

Brand Development: For me, this course was when I became more comfortable with the Media Design program because the project was something I was familiar with. This course showed me how to conduct my own research and turn my finding into unique original designs. This course showed that changes are made daily in order to produce the best possible option that the client needs. Brand development allowed me to really sit and sketch multiple ideas which were something that I did not really use to. Techniques gained from this course was the sketches and refinement process. During my undergrad years, this was not something I used to but this course allowed me to gain a new skill that has been very useful.

Effective Copywriting: Knowing the difference between copywriting and copyright was important in this course. In my research, I found that many people would often confuse the two if asked if they knew how to do copywriting. This course gave me another new skill to add to my resume. It was always easy for me to make flyers and posters but to add to this the ability to be a copywriter. This course allowed me to research my chosen non-profit and creating persuasive campaign ads that would not only speak for the non-profit but would speak to the intended target audience. During the course, I was able to gather information and turn that into taglines, different copies, and narratives that all align with the non-profit. This course showed me the importance of finding your audience and advertising to them so that they can feel comfortable and safe. Since this course involved writing it did help me improve on some of the common mistakes I always make.

Design Research: Going back to the work done in the Brand development course it was time to build on my design and tell the story. Already Knowing who the client is which was the city of Kyoto, Japan and already having an idea of what is important for the client it was time to build. For this course, it was more focused on humanizing the brand giving this city and voice and tone through the use of a narrative. This course would be a struggling which leads me to do serval different designs over the weeks. Design research taught me the importance of creating voice and tone and how to go about doing so. Also, a new technique that I gained was wireframing and creating infographics.

Organizational Structures: The use of motion was new and interesting this course allowed me to take that still vision broad from the previous course and create a dynamic vision board that incorporates motion. During my research, I found that there are so many different forms of motions that can be done in the media design industry. This was my first time dealing with the motion of any kind and I found that using storyboards and planning out motion would be really effective in the making of motion. This helped me personally conduct research in order to produce my best work but this also allowed for me to add to my portfolio as an artist which shows that I have the ability to learn fast and I am open to learning anything.

Design Strategies and Motivation: Taking what was learned in the previous courses it was time to put those skills to use and rebrand my own local community. The goal was to find smaller communities that are overlooked and often misjudged. This course allowed me to really look at different communities and find the beauty in places that I often visit. Professionally I was able to further my ability to rationalize my work and found the balance between my own thoughts and information to back up my claims.

Design Integration: Building on to the research and having chosen my community it was time to further my research by doing a SWOT analysis, brand voice charts, empathy maps, and target audiences. With that completed then it was time to create a mission statement and taglines that helps communicate the brands' voice and tone as well as help shape the brand identity. At the end of the course, I took a look at different media assets that I would want to use in the future for branding the community more. I have a high interest in branding and this is one of the reasons why I decided to attend Full Sail. Doing a creative brief with all the information from the first three weeks allowed to also work on my writing because the brief involved a lot of explaining.

Multi-Platform Delivery: The final process of rebranding the community was to create the media assets that showcased the community in a positive way. This course helped me better communicate my research and ideas through the use of these media assets. This course really focused on communication giving this brand a voice that makes it recognizable to everyone while staying true to the brands' identity. Personally, this course helped me find my limits knowing how far I can go with a design that is effective. Professionally the course showed me how to communicate ideas with designs that show research has been done in some form.

Measuring Design Effectiveness: A design can be good in anyone’s eyes but if you are working with clients you need to know if the design is going in the right direction. This course allowed me to write my own questions that I felt would give me the best information. I created a survey and collected results based on the effectiveness of my media assets. After the closing of my survey, I was able to review my results and provide written expiation about the effectiveness of my designs and synthesize my finding. From this course, I found that it is no need to be hard on yourself. Professionally this course proves that I have the ability to follow the design process fully to find the best solution for my clients.

Thesis: Presentation of Design Solution: Taking a look at all the work that was done during a ten-month process it was time to prove my mastery with the use of the four DLOs Connecting/Synthesizing/Transforming, Problem Solving, Innovative Thinking, and Acquiring Competences. The purpose was to clearly state and show what project best aligned with one of the four. Once finding the projects a website was created in order to showcase them. This course helped me with my writing which I still struggling but by paying close attention and focus I am able to recognize mistakes. This also shows that I have mastered my program and have put in the work to become a master.

Professional Practice

Above is an experience map that gives insight on what I have been thinking, feeling, and doing for the last twelve months of my journey at Full Sail.

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Month 11: Presentation of Design Solution

A little different than the past course this course was about presentation not speaking physical but still presenting work in a professional manner. Reflecting on this course I want to speak on three takeaways and the importance

Takeaway 1:

Thesis presentation or any presentation is meant to Persuade the audience on the topic. In order to persuade them included the research and the facts as well as the design process and design solutions. Presentations are not meant for you to just talk about the work once it is done but instead the presentation should go over why and how steps were taken that lead to that final piece of work. Wanting to focus on branding knowing how to present a brand in Totality is something that has to be done even if it is only presenting it to a small business owner they have to know how and why things were chosen and why it is best for the brand's identity in the long run.

Takeaway 2:

With any presentation get to the argument don’t waste time explaining certain information unless someone asks a question about that specific thing. Assume that the audience already had the understanding of why it was important because more than likely the audience already has the jest of the topic you are going to be talking about. Often times you find yourself including useless information in order to take up time but that doesn’t make the presentation useless all the time. Using methods like CAST (content, audience, Story, and tell) will help bring a presentation together by using important information. This is something that can be used in the future because I am someone that is not always comfortable with doing presentation especially when I have to speak I often want to include useless information that everyone already knows just to take up space and time but understanding that getting to the argument is best and having the content to back up the argument is better and can make you master presenter. This will be useful because apart of working with brands is to present so if I am able to get the important information out there that supports the argument then this could Potentially get money for the brand or partnership for the brand whatever they are looking for.

Takeaway 3:

The portfolio speaks for you when you are not there. If people are looking at your portfolio and it is missing information, the work has errors, or anything that should not be there is there than you might not get a call back so it is important that you not only create a professional cohesive portfolio but include descriptions about the project and include captions for each image so that no matter who is viewing the portfolio that has no reason to question what was done and why. Never having done a professional portfolio before until recently I am one of those people that throw the best pieces of work together online and call it a portfolio but in reality it’s just a group of work thrown together that only shows I am able to do certain things but it doesn’t show that I have the ability to take direction or rationalize my work. Once graduating I want to really actively start looking for jobs in the media design field and apart of even getting an interview, they have to see a portfolio. The portfolio will be a good opportunity to show a few different skills I have like writing in a professional manner about the work done and also being able to produce a variety of work that shows different styles that I can do.

The course overall helped me understand how to do a presentation for different work that highlighted specific concepts. Also, the course helped with my writing I have always said that I am not the best writer I often get lost and have a lot of grammatical and syntax errors so whenever I get the chance to write as much as I might dislike it I am always ready to take on the challenge in order to better myself.

Reference:

Sykes, M., Malik, N., & West, M. D. (2012). Stories that Move Mountains: Storytelling and Visual Design for Persuasive. Retrieved from https://ce.safaribooksonline.com/book/communications/presentations/9781118423998

Before making my thesis presentation site wire firms were made to explore different layouts that best achieve balance and cohesiveness between the writing and the images. 

Solving Problem page from thesis presentation site. This page is about how the research was conduct to find the problem in the chosen community and how was the problem solved.

The Acquiring Competencies page that talks about a new skill and program that I have learned during the journey of getting my MFA.

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Month 10: Measuring Design Effectiveness

During this month course, I learned about the importance of testing any design created to see if it speaks to the target audience. Since three months was spent on rebranding my local community I thought it would be great to test the media asset created. Haven’t done this before it was an interesting process to create questions for the questionnaire and see how the audience would respond to the questions based on the four media asset presented with the questionnaire. For me, the overall course was very useful because I often design based on personal feelings with no real guidelines so if I thought the design was up to par then that was the design that I would go with. This course shows that not all the designs that you do as an artist are not for personal use but are meant to align with different brands, beliefs, and view. 

Moving forward into the media design world this is something that I will be using to test the designs. Since I am an artist that is sometimes unsure if my work reflects the process of the project but with the tips for this months reading from Jennifer Visocky O’Grady & Ken O’Grady and Kathryn Best I understand how and why testing the design effectiveness is important. Now knowing that surveys and questionnaires can be used to reach the intended audience and professional peers I plan to use this for different stages if the design when it is something that has guidelines for the design.

Adobe Behance portfolio currently has 3 previous projects.

A look at a few questions asked during this month survey which was used to write this months paper about design effectiveness.

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Month 9: Multi-Platform Delivery

This month course went by really fast as I get closer to the end of the program I find that the information learned opens my eyes to what I want to do after this. Feeling comfortable with the logo concepts and the brand guide I thought this is easier for me than some of the other assignments. I feel that because the courses are short that sometimes all the work gets mushed together and often time don’t have the time to really reflect on what has been done and what has to be improved based on the amount of work and the turnaround time. This course still had me focusing on how to communicate the brands' voice and tone the best way possible. With this course, I think that I was able to really understand how to communicate the voice and tone that effectively helps the overall message of the brand.

After having been in this course I plan to use this idea to help design become more effective when working with other brands and people. Since I really do want to brand in the future this course was very useful for me because I really had to look at my research and understand the information in order to create something that helped the brand. Something else I picked up from this and plan to use is that if the design can be pushed keep pushing it until the best possible design has presented itself. Often time the first design is good but has the potential to be better as long as you explore the option. Now that I have done the brand guide I see that I still need more practice with my turnaround time especially with something like a brand guide.

Above are the 4 Media Assets I decided to focus on to be apart of the St. Charles community

The first image is the current logo for the community that not only has the honeycomb shape but includes a house shape. The second image is the first rendering of the logo

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Month 9: Process and Reflection

Connecting/Synthesizing/Transforming 

During this month’s course, a lot of research went into the logo concepts that I would go on to explore. The community that I currently live in is near St. Charles so I am very familiar with the area. Along with my knowledge, I also used my research to come up with the concepts. Sustainability is something that the community focuses on so from my research I really looked closely at different elements that not only relate to the community but also to the idea of sustainability. Coming up with the concepts I wanted to show that I used the research found on sustainability and made it into a unique design that could fit the community. Once I came up with the overall idea that I wanted to use the design would change as I got deeper into what my brand really wanted to showcase. From the idea of sustainability to researching the meaning and different design concepts helped me come to the current design that I have today.

Problem Solving

One of the problems that I was trying to solve this month is how do I communicate what is important to the overall brand into one logo design. Knowing that my community heavily focused on being sustainable I knew that the design had to relate back to this no matter what. Along with this, I wanted the design to have something that was recognizable throughout each step of the project and that was the idea of the honeycomb. The shape is interesting and easy to remember but it also showed that I did my research because bees play a role in being sustainable and they play a role in the St. Charles community. Once I had the idea I had to figure out how to communicate the brands' voice and tone I knew that by having the three shapes work together to focus on the idea of collaboration and togetherness that the brand focuses on as a part of being sustainable. Having the idea of being sustainable and collaboration was simple but the communicate charm and impact would prove to be difficult. In order to communicate those two, I decided that the overall design would help bring this together. The design shows its charm with the way the elements come together in an appropriate way that is not suggestive. Lastly, because the font has an impact on it using all uppercase and having the font front and center helps with the overall idea of being impactful.

Innovative Thinking

Many brands use the same media assets but it is about how you use them that sets you apart from others in the industry. My work compares to others because I use very common media assets like a bus stop sign and pole banners but it is the design that is placed on them that makes it different. For me, the focus of sustainability was really important so instead of sawing eat, play, shop like many brands do I wanted to really show the idea of being sustainable. Living in a more urban area I really wanted to use the environment a big part of being sustainable is the environment you live in. For my community, this works because it gets the residents attention but it also gets the visitors attention because spaces that were once not used now have a full display that many are not use too. 

Acquiring Competencies

This month for me was a refresher not only because this has been a similar process over the past very months but also because I have done the brand guide a few years ago. The one this that was truly new for me was the process for the media assets. In the past I have done this but not like these months. The media assets done this month was meant to focus on the community and not a specific event. This month I had to think more about the design and what would be best to convey the message unlike the first time I did this.

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Month 8: Design Integration

Month 8: Design Integration This month I felt more comfortable with what I was doing because most of the work was a repeat of what I have already done but just about a community I personally know. Since I want to do branding in the future I think that what I have done this month is very useful simply because I had to focus on the brands' voice and tone. With this course, I found a better way to find the voice and tone based on research. I am not saying that research hasn’t been done before but with the use of the brand voice chart, it was easier to find the brands voice and tone that best fits the brand and is unique to the brand. The first time around doing some of the same assignments was hard for me but I noticed this time around I was comfortable. At this last week i noticed that it is harder for me to do the design brief because I almost want to do a style guide and really design the whole thing from font to basic. With this course, I notice that if it is something that is important to me and something I really like then I produce work that I am truly proud about. My overall experience in this course went better than I expected. For me, I am hard on myself but this course allowed me to get out of my own head and really enjoy the process of developing my community identity.

Each course gives me something valuable that I can use in my future career. After this course, I plan to use the brand voice chart to help my personal brand once I am out of the program. Something that I have noticed that I like is coming up with the dynamic vision board and using after effects. The process of making those videos takes hours but its not hours where you hate it. Those hours I take I get lost in the creative process. For me, I plan to continue making these videos to became I diverse artist. Another thing I have noticed is that I am great at pointing Characteristics out that are important to and for the brand. This is something that can be very helpful when working with other brands I can find the right characteristics that the brand may be looking over certain things that the brand has already held.

The beginning steps of my brand voice chart that states the most important characteristics for the community.

Static Vision Board for the St. Charles community in Maryland that focuses on sustainability.

Dynamic Vision Board based on the research done and the static vision board from this month.

Media matrix chart to understand the pros and cons of using the four categories to promote.

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Month 8: Process and Reflection

Connecting/Synthesizing/Transforming: A great example of me conducting research and using that to design was finding the voice and tone. In order to establish my chosen community of St. Charles, Maryland I had to first start off by doing the brand voice chart. To begin this process of feeling out this chart I went back to the research I did in the last month but I also researched further into my community by looking into the people in the community and also looking deeper into the community website to see how they talk about the community. After doing this and gather the information I felt that was truly important to my community I started to look at a list of adjectives that describes brands ( also known as characteristics) and their meanings. Once I got my list down to four adjectives for my brand voice chart I started to really connect, synthesize and transform in order to come up with my tagline. The words I chose that connected to my brand were sustainable, charming, collaborative, and impactful. To better understand how the chosen words worked with my brand  I took those meanings and begin to synthesize the simple meaning of those words to come up with the descriptions as they relate to the word and the brand, as well as, what the brand voice should be like and what it should not be like. Take this information that I put together on the brand voice chart I had to transform this to come up with a tagline that was unique but also fits the brand. In order to come up with my tagline, I started to just describe the brand using my characteristics and narrowed that down into what I felt was important to the brand while still showcasing the voice of the brand.

Problem Solving: The design problem I was solving mostly this month is finding the right voice and tone for the community that could properly be shown throughout the entire brand. By making the dynamic vision board you are able to hear and see the voice and tone. By incorporating music to the brand vision board, you are able to connect the words, clips, and images used together instead of wonder how those items connect together. Since many of the target audience may see and hear about this community I think that it is important to have some sort of video, sound or person is memorable along with the best design so if one is seen without the other your audience still has the community on there mind. To solve this problem, I felt that it was important to find a sound related to the overall characteristics of sustainable, charming, collaborative, and impactful that could always be used. By making my dynamic vision board it was a great way for me to not only get practice but it also a great way for me to really find a way to connect what I have done so far in this course and the last course to show that I have really grasped the research I’ve done and used it to elevate the brand. Giving the community the proper voice and tone that is not only memorable with the audience but helps the overall brand is important to get more residents in the community. 

Innovative Thinking: In some shape or form branding a community you are going to run into some similarities as other brands and community but it up to you to set yourself apart. To brand a community you must understand the community and what is important to them. Some of the traits that are important to a community are collaboration, safety, and enjoyment. While I might have not used the words safety and enjoyment those are things that my community will promote simply because you want your residents to know they are in a safe place and they can enjoy themselves in their community. One thing I did use was collaboration because this is something that is important to the community because St. Charles has a community garden and farmers market. While the traits, characteristics might be the same as a designer it is up to you to make them unique to the brand, in this case, the community. A lot of communities are not talking about becoming sustainable this is the first step in setting my community apart. For my community brand to be innovative and set its self apart I focused on being sustainable. If you look at what has been done so far it all goes back to that main idea of being sustainable. The colors, the images on the static vision board, the clips in the dynamic vision board and even the characteristics they all can relate back to being a sustainable community. I am setting this community apart because I constantly am going back to the most important value to St. Charles which is sustainability.

Acquiring Competencies: While a lot of the things where stuff that I have already done at least once two things that were brand new to me was the making of the solution statement and making the brand Voice chart. The previous month we came up with problem statements that clearly a problem that needs to be fixed. For this course, we had to come up with a solution that clearly states how you intend to fix the problem. Doing this was tricky but out of the three I created I knew that the last statement would probably be the best for me to use and stick with. Doing the brand voice chart was completely new but I see this being something that I would use in the future because the whole process helped determine the characteristics that actually helps the brands voice and tone. In the past, this was done so to come up with the brands' voice and tone It was more about researching tone words and finding the best words that apply to the brand. The same goes for voices as well researching different types of voices like strong or timid could be the voice but this way allows for you to really define the voice and tone by clearly stating what the voices do and does not do. Another thing I was glad to come back to was the dynamic vision board and the after effects program. The first time around I had no real clue of what I was doing and how to use the program but this time around I was comfortable with what I was doing and able to create a dynamic vision board that shows improvement in my skills.

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Month 7: Process and Reflection

Connecting/Synthesizing/Transforming: During this month’s course, a lot of research was done to determine the final community that needed the most help. Once choosing the final community of St. Charles, Maryland it was important to research at the demographics of the community, what the community currently offers and the history but also physically look at the community and photograph the community. The main source of the research material came from the official website to see how the community portrays itself currently. Of course, the website will only showcase the good so it was very important to combine the research with the interviews and what I saw. A great example of how I utilized my research is the SWOT analysis found below. Looking at the positives things that the official site had to say about the community helped determine the true strengths and opportunities that the community has and is able to constantly provide. To find the weaknesses and threats of the community it helped to connect the information from the website and the interviews. With both those things in mind, I looked at what can be looked at as a weakness or threat based on the residents in the community. The research that was done and the SWOT analysis helped shape the final problem statement that the community face as.

SWOT analysis shows the Interal and external factors that makes the community a succes and what needs to be fixed.

Problem Solving:

This was the course where I actually got a good understanding of what a design problem really is and not confusing it with a technical problem that I faced. The process of making problem statements is a great explanation for finding and solving a design problem. Finding and fixing the unknown desires in the community was very important to come up with the problem statement that would be addressed as a part of this branding project. The first step was interviewing residents of the community and getting their inputs and thoughts on the community and what they want. From the interview and the research conducted it was time to do a SWOT analysis and find the good and bad based on what I already had. Along with this, there was an empathy map based on the two personas from the interview. With all the information and research that was done, I had to find the underlining issues that the community faced but didn’t want to speak on as deeply. To come up with my statements I really examined all the information I had and started to write down the things I noticed with my own eyes and pieced together what the problems really were. Doing the research and looking into the community to help me solve the problem of finding the unknown that many people went around.

3 problem statements that were made after all the research was done that give insight on what the major issues the community faces

Innovative Thinking: 

For anyone that deals with branding they often follow the same steps. The idea of branding and rebranding require the same steps so when it comes to the industry the work only compares when it is time to begin the process of branding, using the creative brief, mood boards, and style guides but it is up to the designer to set themselves apart from other designers. Staying true to myself I felt that I should go with the community I live in. I feel that a lot of times designers will go with what they are unfamiliar with but this was the perfect chance for me as an artist to really connect with the community that I live in. This is innovative because this is the community a face that they can relate to and find in the community. Many designers are only there to do a job but don’t actually want to get to know the residents instead they want to just do the job. This goes back to the fact that when something is meaningful to you take more pride in what it is and how you do. Since I live in the community and this is something I want to do I feel that I really went deeper into the community and my peers learned from the information I presented. Next month I want to really go deeper and show that this is something i am serious about doing.

Acquiring Competencies: During the course, I learned that researching your demographic/ target audience really helps understand the choices made in the future for the brand. Using things like SWOT and empathy mapping also helps determine what things need to be addressed in the future that could ruin the brand. With that utilizing the creative brief is something that I have never done. Wanting to focus on branding I think it is very important that I gather all the skills and necessary documents to really be considered as someone that is able to brand anything possible.

Empathy Map based on persona 2, Olivia. Shows what she does, feel, says, and hear on a normal day.

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Month 7: Design Strategies and Motivation Reflection

Since I would like to go into branding in the future this course was very helpful. While in undergrad I had a branding project but it was not as in depth as this course. Branding a company or a place you have to know about the company or place in order to help. Doing the demographic research, interviews, SWOT analysis, empathy map, and problem statement was something new for me but was very useful for me. This course allowed me to understand the beginning steps of branding and what has to be done and considered before the designer can even begin to really brand or rebrand anything. Since I am not a very good writer this course was very useful in helping me write better and on a more professional level. Another good thing about my experience in this course is that I was able to rationalize my work better because this is something that I am serious about and want to pursue in the future.

I feel that branding is a great way to get your name out there as an artist because if done correctly other brands and companies would want to utilize the skills you have. Moving forward the things I have done in this class will be very useful because I know have the tools to evaluate what really needs to be fixed if it is a rebranding and if working with a brand this allows for me as the designer to share my experience on what needs to be looked at and considered when trying to build their brand and find their audience and what works for the brand. As an artist, I love to have as much practice as possible and I believe that the assignments done in this course really helped me understanding branding more and makes me want to continue to explore branding. In the next courses to come, I think this month of research will allow me to produce a better branding project than when I first did the assignment. Another big thing for me is confidence with the video pitch I kind of stumbled over my word an what I practice. For me, this was good practice so I know what needs to be worked on in the future.

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Month 6: Process and Reflection

Connecting/Synthesizing/Transforming: During this course, a lot of research was done in order to help with the designing process. Since the class was based on motion an unfamiliar area for me each week research was conducted. Week one my introduction into motion and how to plan for motion. One piece of research that was very useful was Animated Storytelling: Simple Steps for Creating Animation and Motion Graphics by Liz Blazer. With the course, I must understand how to plan out motion and what steps should be taken to produce any motion piece. Having a story in mind is only the first part but getting to the motions evolves a few steps in between especially with this being a new skill for me. In my research thumbnailing and storyboarding was important to my process. To tell the story with motion a storyboard needed to be created and how to do so would be easy for the most part. In the second and third week, the same concept of storyboarding helped create a dynamic vision board. Taking the research from the first week in storyboarding and tutorials would be helpful. Using the concept of storyboarding allowed me to plan out my dynamic vision board motion video. Next, I would have to use tutorials to take my ideas from paper to graphics. This course allowed me to connect my research of storyboarding to what was produced. Understanding that a storyboard is an outline for your video with the use of thumbnails allowed me to connect those thoughts in my head to the brand of Kyoto and what would be best for the project. The goal for this month was to create a story that connects the audience and the brand together but still stays true to what Kyoto has to offer and the look and feel of the brand.

Problem Solving: With every project and assignment design problems always happen. Storytelling and storyboards were something that was hard to understand and produce. Sekinah Brodie wrote the article 10 Problems That Graphic Designers Solve (2018)  one of those things happen to be storytelling. “ A great logo and thoughtful design can tell the story about your business—about what you do or about your founding.” In the first week trying to tell a story about my brand with the use of motion was tricky. Being able to physically tell a story and write a story for the brand was easy but transforming into motion lost me in the beginning. What help was first learning from the mistakes from week one. Secondly, during the journaling, I was able to gather my ideas and storyboard them out to create the motion videos during the course. In order to solve the problem of storytelling when writing my journal or typing, I would find a piece of paper to draw the stories I wrote about. With this practice, I was able to move forward with motion and create a dynamic vision board.

Innovative Thinking: Being an artist of any kind, you often see the same style but it is important to set yourself apart. Some styles of transition are common but how they are used is important. The first draft of the motion video used fading in and out while the second used a sliding motion. With a lot of videos sliding between information is common. My video is no expectations but how I got to this is based on research an experiments. Thinking about how my vision board looks and the way elements are placed helped me create my second motion video. Using the theme as a guide helped with the transition. Secondly what helped was thinking about the identity of the brand are things spaced out or put together? Is this diagonal or vertical and horizontal? Asking myself questions helped determine what transition I would be using.

Acquiring Competencies: The overall process has been amazing. I have gained new skills, techniques, and knowledge of a new software. Firstly, journaling every day and reflecting at the end of the week was a great skill that I gained. Other time I have tried journaling my everyday thoughts and feeling but I would always fall off. This time around taking a different approach by looking at my surrounding was easier to write freely. Journaling is a part of storytelling and even though the stories could have more information to make them complete the stories are a great way of creating ideas for design work and storyboarding. The whole concept and working with motion was new to me and was a challenge. Motion is interesting and with so many different styles that all differ from each other, it was important to get an understanding of each style and what each style has to offer. Making motion and using Adobe After Effects was a major key for this class. The first few attempts were hard but once a clear understanding was made making the video got easier.

Reference: Blazer, L. (November 19, 2015). Animated Storytelling: Simple Steps for Creating Animation and Motion Graphics. Retrieved from https://ce.safaribooksonline.com/book/animation-and3d/9780134133812

Brodie, S. (2018, August 10). 10 Problems In Graphic Design Identified and SOLVED | Penji. Retrieved from https://penji.co/10-problems-graphic-designers-solve/

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Month 6:Organizational Structures Reflection

Halfway through the program, the course organizational structures have taught me a great deal about motion. What motion videos are, how to make motion video, and the different styles of motion. Every course I have some kind of struggle be it personal or in the course, it is always something. This course was different though I didn’t really struggle to understand motion. By doing my own research I was able to find a visual example that worked best for me and get a better understanding of what needed to be done. With the new programs and concept presented in this course helped me grow into more of the artist I want to be.

Knowing that with each course I was going to always gain new information I was excited to begin this course because the motion is new to me. My overall experiences in the course were great. I have gained new skills, techniques, and knowledge of software like After Effects. First, the requirement of having to journal every day and answer a few questions at the end of the week helped me to be creative with the Kyoto motion video and storytelling. During the first week of Journaling I was a little lost and unsure of what I was doing but with the feedback from Professor Baldowski, I knew that I was on the right track. Now, this is something I will continue to do. As an undergrad, I had the all the Adobe programs but only used one faithfully. I was excited to see that this course was going to have me to use something else other than illustrator. My initial experience with after effects was a challenge for me but with my own research I grasped the basic concepts and was able to create my own motion. Most of the time professors give you certain information to use and gather information from that plus do your own research but with this course having to do all the research on your own you can find something more interesting that is useful. For me, it is important that I do my own research and find information that I can connect to my own projects.

As an artist, I am always looking for skills to add to my resume. Motion is very popular and important to some brands. Not only wanting to build my own brand as not only a designer but an all-around artist that has the ability to do many forms of art. I also want to be able to work with different brands and produce motion videos that impact the brand. After this course, I will continue to practice the basics and continue to build my skills.

Week one planning for motion with the use of storyboards.

First draft of the dynamic vision board

The final draft of the dynamic vision board with transitional charges.

Using different motion style. Style of cinemagraph.

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Month 5  Journal Reflection

This month course was Design Research and provide to be a challenge but the experience was very insightful. Research is very important to the branding process and the design process overall. The course gets you to research almost everything and explain how it inspired the design. The research makes you have to think about what it is that you are designing and how to explain what is and back up the claim. Coming from an undergrad program where you didn’t have to research anything but instead going right into designing this class is very important for me. While I did struggling with some of the ideas and concepts the course is helpful for me and shapes my design process. Every assignment it is important to synthesize the information, solve the problem I have, use innovative thinking and acquire competencies. I want to give some examples of how I used those four things one certain assignment and how it helped me.

Synthesizing: During this month the assignments would prove to be a challenge but in the end, there are lessons that I have learned to help. One assignment that allowed me to strongly synthesize material was during week three. During this week the assignment was web development trends and finding the connection between Steve Krug and Amber Leigh Turner writing. This assignment was eye-opening because I had never seriously looked into web design so it was important for me to seriously research and understand what I was reading. After reading a chapter from Steve Krug’s book Don’t Make Me Think, Revisited: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability (2013) and reading the three trend articles from Amber Turner it was important to find a connection between the two to show that while trends change over the years the trends will always work with web usability. During my research, I started by reading Krug’s first chapter to see what his suggestion was for web usability and took away what I thought were major key points. After that, I looked into what Turner was talking about for the web design trends over the years and then I started to look back at Krug’s information and found. I decided to make the connection between Chapter one Don’t make me think! of Krug’s book states “ For instance, it means that as far as is humanly possible, when I look at a Web page it should be self-evident. Obvious. Self-explanatory.” (Krug, 2013)  and the statement Turner made “We struggle to figure out exactly the best way to showcase this important piece of content to make it usable no matter the screen it’s being viewed on.” (Turner, 2016). For me it was important to take the first usability feature Krug talks about and connect this to something that Turner speaks about. Synthesizing plays a big part in working with clients understanding the clients and making connections are very important. The course helped me understand how to synthesize and connect information because there is so much research that helps shape the design projects. Below is a profession example from turner and how I used the information to shape my own design.

Problem Solving: The hardest design problem I faced this month was doing the vision board. In the beginning, I thought for my brand of Kyoto would be romantic but it was hard to get the narrative and get the design together. What helped fixed the narrative problem was the assignment of week three dealing with theme, voice, and tone. On the other hand, the vision board still needs work but with continue, the vision board will get better. To solve the problem with the narrative I had to figure out what key attributes make a good city and what does Kyoto have to offer. The next thing for me was to talk aloud as if I was speaking to a friend and I’m telling them a story. Once I got the narrative down the rest fall into place it was easier to find a theme and find the voice and tone which started to help the design come together. The vision board design would prove a challenge when trying to write the narrative and come up with the look that also helped tell the narrative and give a feel of the overall brand that I am trying to sell. For me, the look of the vision board was never terrible but always need some work. The only way I could fix this is by constantly looking at other vision boards and style guides to help. Along with that I just had to sit and play around with the different elements and images until everything started to flow. The experience with the vision board is eye-opening because if you don’t know what you are selling it becomes hard to design for it. Along with that researching helps out a lot and with this class being a research course it opens your eyes to new information and things to consider when designing. Below is a vision board I first looked at and  a few different versions of my vision board during the course.

Innovative Thinking:

When doing a vision board there is many standard design choice that came into play for me. Typography was one of the major elements that I wanted to work with and not fail at. In the Principles of Beautiful Web Design by Jason Beaird and James George (2014) stated “Let’s face it: the core purpose of all web design is communication. Whether we’re talking about an online retail store, a web presence for a Fortune 500 company, or a profile for a social networking site, typography is a vital component of your message.”( Beaird & George, 2014) I felt that it was important for me to find a safe and readable font but not use a default font that comes with the programs. Since typography is an important way to communicate with the audience I did a lot of research into what fonts work for certain people. What slowed me down was trying to find what colors worked for the font and the brand as a whole. “Color is one of the most powerful of elements. It has tremendous expressive qualities. Understanding the uses of color is crucial to effective composition in design and the fine arts.”( Jirousek, n.d.). Color is very tricky if you use the wrong colors then the brand gets the wrong audience attention and once I changed my narrative the audience changed as well but I didn’t want to change the color. Originally I planned for the brand to be romantic so I used pinks and soft pastel colors but images different reflect the softness I wanted. My next step would be changing the colors to fit the images I thought helped sell and communicate the brand. It was a better reputation but it still was not all the way there yet. Once I changed the narrative it was important to change the images but I still didn’t change the logo color. It was pointed out that the logo colors give off a different meaning than what I was talking about so I went back to researching colors and looking at what colors dominate my vision board already and went with those instead. While I feel like the logo and colors together might not be as strong as they can be I do feel that I am going in the right direction. I am starting to understand how to get every element to come together. I understand how research plays a major part in the design process.

Acquiring Competencies: With each course, I learn something new that improves me as a designer. During this course, the concepts and/or techniques that helped me were first the concept of wireframing. Wanting to get into web designing I never really knew how to even go about this. It was very interesting to learn what wireframing was and how to go about doing this. Since I didn’t know anything about the concept I had to do a lot of research to understand what I was doing. This was an eye-opening assignment that I know will help me in the future to expand my own brand. second, the concept of web usability also applies to me wanting to get into web designing. Not only thinking about what I like in website usabilities like easy to find information and easy navigation. It is important to see what has been proven to work and see what changes and stays the same over the years. When making the wireframing I found it extremely important to consider and incorporate easy usability into my wireframe sketches. Wanting to choose something I have never done the concept for me is to understand what I am selling and how do I brand that. In the beginning, I thought I had the idea of what I was doing but that would prove me wrong. If every element does not add up it is hard to brand and sell anything. By finding the theme, voice and tone helped me tell a story that grabs the attention of my audience. By targeting my audience, they feel more comfortable and welcomed and want to use the brand more often. Knowing how to speak through the design is very important to selling an idea, concept, brand whatever it may be and I have learned how to go about doing so. The first image below is from a style guide that helped me with the narrative, Theme, Voice, and Tone for my vision board. Along with that are wireframing from me and an example i found to be very helpful.

Reference:

Beaird, J., & George, J. (2014). The Principles of Beautiful Web Design (3rd ed.). Retrieved August 29, 2018, from https://ce.safaribooksonline.com/book/web-design-and-development/9781457174353

Charlotte Jirousek, C. (n.d.). Art, Design, and Visual Thinking. Retrieved from http://char.txa.cornell.edu/language/element/form/form.htm

Krug, S. (December 24, 2013) Don’t Make Me Think, Revisited: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability, Third Edition. Publisher: New Riders. Retrieved from: https://ce.safaribooksonline.com/book/web-design-and-development/9780133597271

Turner, A. (2016) 10 Web design trends you can expect to see in 2016. Retrieved from: https://thenextweb.com/dd/2016/01/01/10-web-design-trends-can-expect-see-2016

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Project Reflection

First coming up with the headline I was trying to be very forward and honesty but I wasn’t thinking about who my audience was and what my nonprofit really was about. The beginning headlines were as if actually people were talking but that wasn’t working for this campaign. Using example like the No More Campaign should me that the headline cause is the same throughout the campaign and the taglines can change throughout the ad to connect to the audience. The new headline I would come up with was intended to make the consumer work in a way. Felton(2013) “ Don’t discuss the product; discuss what happens after the consumer uses it or what precedes or necessitate it.” (p. 209) Using the No More Campaign for inspiration and watching Ian Lurie videos helped the headline and copy come together. “Headlines should be driven by your copy, not the other way around” (Lurie, 2014). The gives more information on the headline and tagline but for me, I struggled to bring it all together. Trying to write a copy is a challenge because the structure would be off and not provide the right information. With the help of the writing checklist found on page 128 and knowing that the copy and headline should go together it made it slightly easier to revise my copy and headline for my revised comps.

Like I always say in undergrad I would often go tight into the design stages and do a complete design then make the changes if need be. “ Concepts need to deliver the client’s message and if you’re finding yourself struggling to get the viewer’s attention, at any cost, it’s probably worth developing different solutions.” (Smallish, 2013) In the beginning stages, it was hard for me to make the comps that showed the ideas and message come together. Before this class, I have no clue what a comp was and what was the purpose. The process for making the comps of my testimonial ads started off with sketching out the ideas. The ideas include the placement of people, objects, or whatever it may be. Once I did my sketches I picked the top three I felt comfortable with, that I thought could work with the message, and the three that I thought would visual deliver the message. My initial comps were hard for me to do when I was trying to turn the sketches into images. Next would be using the headlines, taglines, and the copy I thought up that would go with each ad. With my first attempts, I didn’t think about what Ian Lurie was saying when it came to writing copy. I thought I could come with something good and would all come together but that wasn’t the case. When I went back to revise my comps I paid attention to the feedback and I went back to the drawing board. The revised comps I took my time to find the right images that helped the nonprofits message. Next, I would write not different taglines that women can relate to but not give off the wrong impression which I felt was really important. After the taglines, I thought of a few headlines that can be used all the time. Next, I would tackle the copy I wanted the copy to relate to the tagline, so whatever that tagline was about the copy would be about that service offered within the nonprofit. Once I felt that all the writing was all cohesive then I moved on to the design aspect. Thinking about placements and colors that can help the ad connect to the target audience and also relate to the nonprofit. The second time around I felt more comfortable with the process, unlike the first time.

I am pleased with the overall experience in the course. The course taught me something completely new. Before this, I had only heard of copyrighting and just assumed that this class was the same thing but it is a completely different spelling and meaning. The experiences with making testimonial ads I am grateful to have learned how to write a copy, how to find the brands voice and how to make advertisements flow together. In the upcoming months, I hope to be able to use my new copywriting skills and build my own brand and portfolio.

Reference:

Felton, G. (2013). Advertising: Concept and copy(3rd ed.). Retrieved from https://bookshelf.vitalsource.com/#/books/9780393733921

Lurie, I. (2014, May 30). Welcome. Retrieved from https://www.lynda.com/Business-Online-Marketing-tutorials/Welcome/149250/175041-4.html?autoplay=true

Smallish, C. (2013, August 16). Welcome. Retrieved from https://www.lynda.com/Design-Business-tutorials/Welcome/126121/145380-4.html

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3 Takeaways

-Design Rationales: Learning who to properly explain my work in the third person and being able to back up my claims and reasoning was hard but as time moved I was able to improve. Moving forward I have an understanding of how to talk about my work to anybody and sell what I believe in and talk about my process. Hopefully, by the end of the program, I can be able to remove the pronoun I from my vocabulary and explain what was done and why it was done.

-Creating Comps: I have never actually had to create a comp, while in undergrad I would often go right into the design stage and then work with the problems faced. Over the months I have slowly been able to get out of my ways but this month it was different having to sketch then pick the strongest three to start with helped me realized how to design effectively. The initial comps help me see what work and goes together visually so that I can make charges till I get the right design and layout that is effective. Moving forward using this process will help me came up with my design that are better than me just putting a complete design together as if it was the final design.

-Writing: Every month I want to improve on my writing with this month having a lot of design rationales helped me out. While I still have a way to go I notice that over the four weeks that is a change. In weeks one and two it was more of getting comfortable with writing and with weeks three and four I was able to notice a change in my writing and I feel more comfortable. In the courses to come, I intend to take the feedback given to me about my writing and use it and continue to improve to where I have no mistakes what so ever.  

The overall experience was good because grades and feedback came in a timely manner. I was not waiting till the end of the next week or till the end of the course to get grades and feedback for a professor. The course was eyeopening for me because I had never done anything like this nor did I know anything about copywriting before this course. Now I have a new skill I intend to use moving forward in my media design career.

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Revised Comps

While the 3 revised comps still need some work, it is a major improvement. Based on the feedback I would change my whole direction by using the No More campaign as inspiration. Going back to the drawing board I thought about what do women say when they are in a domestic violence situation I wanted that to be the tagline. So, with each advertisement, there would be different things that women can relate to. I would also make a head like that can be used for every ad like the No More Campaign. Each of those print ads has the headline “NO MORE” followed by different taglines. After getting the headline and multiple taglines together I moved on to images that show people similar to the target audience like women of different race, women with a child or children, and boys that are affected by domestic violence. In my feedback, it was pointed out to me that doing three women instead of the shoe may come off better so I went back to my sketches to see which one would fit with the three women. After choosing the images I would go on to improve the design the colors, fonts, and composition. At first, I thought that maybe doing purple for the advertisement would work because purple is the color for domestic violence but I felt that would be stereotypical. Instead, I went with the colors that the brands already use to make the advertisement and organization cohesive. After researching what gets women attention I have to find what worked together and how colors made fonts look and how it worked with the image This time around I felt that the solutions I currently have turned out amazing but with feedback and more work the advertisements will get better.

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Initial Comps

After doing my 6 sketches I ended up choosing the wrong person, the expert and not the person but something associated with the person. I felt the strongest about those ideas because I thought for Genesis the comps would show more insight about who they are. With this being a whole new thing for me I didn’t know how hard it would actually be to come up with the copy and finding the right composition and the right images to help sell Genesis. For the copy, I found that when I write what came to mind the copy wasn’t as effective but when I used some information directly from Genesis the copy came together better. The headlines were hard to write because I was trying to be put what men who abuse say, what women say and think, and what an expert would say. In Advertising Concept and Copy George Felton(2013) talks about “making the consumer do some of the work” (p. 209) I thought that that approach would work best by being straightforward the headline would make women want to live and the whole advertisement would make women feel safe. The idea wasn’t a complete fail but it needed to be tweaked and worked on. Next writing the copy would be a challenge for me I found it hard to grab the attention in the beginning. It was like I was missing the lead Felton talks about I would basically go right into the middle. I would provide information that would be great for the middle only. The close would be okay but it was more like an end and not a proper close (Felton, 2013, p. 128)

Reference:

Felton, G. (2013). Advertising: Concept and copy(3rd ed.). Retrieved from https://bookshelf.vitalsource.com/#/books/9780393733921