spowellarts102-05 - Tumblr blog

[spowellarts102-05]

For my final blog post, I am reflecting on this course. I learned a lot from this course through the Adobe Cloud platforms and through experience. I learned how to create and important tips and tricks on how to be a better artist. My favorite projects were the poster and logo projects because I thought they were fun and taught me the most skills. My least favorite project was the semantics project because although I learned vocabulary, I found it boring. I thought the time given for each project was appropriate and allowed for review and minor changes. The only thing I would switch about this course is to start the process book early so we can add to it as we finish a project. I think this would make the writing on each post easier (because it will be fresher in our heads) and make the final project seem less daunting.

[spowellarts102-05]

Over the past two weeks, we have finished Project 5 and started our final project. Project 5 was about learning syntax, which I mentioned in my previous post. Overall, I am very excited to move on to Project 6. We are creating a book of all of our work this semester, including photos and descriptions. I am very excited to design the cover and the layout, but I am nervous about how long it will take. Gathering all my pieces from this past semester has shown me how much I have grown in such a short period of time and makes me excited for my future. This week's reading started with Etsy. This is one of my favorite places to online shop because of the uniqueness of the products and because I love to support small businesses. Learning about the different kinds of designs that this brand uses was very useful, especially the software engineering section, because that is something I'm very unfamiliar with.

[spowellarts102-05]

These past two weeks, we finished project 4, which is our logo project. This project was entirely in Illustrator, and I learned a lot about little tools that help you create whatever you want.  The hardest part of this project for me was deciding on the color scheme for each logo.  I am very indecisive, and finding a color scheme that reflects the character but also fits the requirements was challenging.  I decided to do a monochromatic orange and red color scheme for Veruca to connect her and the golden egg, showing her as a rich, spoiled girl.  For Slugworth, I did a  split complement of red, yellow, green, and blue colors to bring a child-like feel to the logo.  Lastly, choosing a typeface was my favorite part of this project (besides creating it) because it allowed me to tie my logo with the character and their personality. We also started project 5, which is understanding semantics. In this project, I analyzed the semantics of four different water bottles. While this project was quick, I think it helped me learn vocabulary and how we look at designs. The “girls and games” section stood out from the readings for these past two weeks.  Not only am I a female who enjoys gaming, but I am learning how/why these stereotypes came to be and what designers are doing to fix them.

[spowellarts102-05]

These past weeks, we have finished our previous project and have started working on the logo project. Although we have just started, this is my favorite project because this is what I want to do for my career. I am excited because of the process and creativity a logo takes and combining that with my favorite childhood movie, Willy Wonka. I have finished my sketches and begun working on my Veruca Salt logo. Working in Illustrator has been pretty successful, and I am getting the hang of the tools. This week's part of the reading that stood out to me was the Ted Talk model. The tips and tricks for presenting your work are beneficial, and I can see myself using them in the art world and other aspects. The tip I found most helpful was "Have a snappy name for your project. Recount how you came up with it." I think this is beneficial because it is something I wouldn't have thought of myself. I never name my projects, and I think this is a fun way to introduce them.

[spowellarts102-05]

Over the past two weeks, we have been working on Project 3. This has been my favorite project so far because this is the first project where we have to start from scratch and create our own piece. I had difficulty making my refined sketches because I am not very good at drawing, but I used tracing paper for the first time, which turned out to be very beneficial. When working in Adobe Illustrator to create my pencil, I struggled with adding detail, which made it look more realistic, but still kept the simplicity I wanted. I am still playing around with the scratches and shading and, overall, figuring out all the little details in Illustrator, which could benefit me. The part of the reading this week that interested me was the interview between Justin and Jose, where they discussed their partnership and what they do to make it effective. I believe interviews give the best insight into what really happens in companies, and it is helpful to me to know what these professionals do to make them successful in their careers.

[spowellarts102-05]

These past two weeks, we worked on finishing up Project 1 and critiquing them. This was interesting because I have never done a critique before, so it was challenging to learn not to say words like "I like" or "I don't look." Next, we moved on to Project 2, which used letters as shapes. This project took me a while to make a product that I enjoyed. I had difficulty making each of my artboards different, not only with typeface but design as well. My first artboard became my favorite because of the repeating circle shape throughout, which I created through the word gamecock. This week's reading was very interesting because it talked about how to become a graphic designer and what you must do to succeed. For example, Lynda Decker stated that when hiring, she looks "for a desire to learn, curiosity, and a sincere desire to contribute…" (page 39). This stuck out to me because I believe desire sets a good graphic designer apart from a great one.

[spowellarts102-05]

This week in class, we have been working on our first project, a six-word memoir. Overall, this project was a great refresher with Photoshop for me.  Getting used to Photoshop 2023 was new for me, but the program had a lot of new features I was excited to use.  We learned how to remove watermarks, add effects to works, and play with layers.  Also, this was my first time using AI, which was a ton of fun and crazy to think about how far technology has come.  Although this was fun, I am excited to create my own images from scratch and develop art from there. When completing this project, I wanted to play with drop shadows and fonts to emphasize tone.  In my one artboard, I added a drop shadow with curved text, and I am very excited about how this one turned out; I think it adds to the image underneath instead of taking away from it.  In my second artboard, I struggled to add a fun effect to emphasize the memoir.  My main goal was to add but not overwhelm; I think that line is easily crossed.  I tried to limit myself to 2-3 add-ons per artboard, but as you can see in my “in-progress” photos, sometimes it's hard not to add just one more effect.