I am now done what seems to be the longest year of my life.. second year graphic design. I don't think I learned as much as I could have. It's hard when you don't always get along with the faculty or can't quite understand all the content that is taught. Even after talking to a certain teacher, I don't know what's changed. I did what I could to try and change it, but it was next to impossible to make any significant changes that would directly affect me. By the time anything was done, it was too late. So my only hope is that it helps future second year students to be the best they can. The last thing I want is more students having to go through this almost useless year. To top it all off, I was going into an evaluation with work that I felt could have been a billion times better, but I didn't have the knowledge of the tools to do it properly.
The last two weeks of school are always the toughest to get through. It's full of pain, anger, and exhaustion. It is the time of year when you have to fully devote your entire life to graphic design and nothing more. You give up family, friends, sleep (my least favourite. Oh how I love sleep), eating and even hygiene (though that is something I will always have time for.. no matter what!) for a 15 minute evaluation of your work. Is it even worth it? Yes. It doesn't seem like it in the days and hours leading up to it, even while you're in it, but hearing that mostly negative feedback is what makes up better designers. I don't expect to go in and hear "Oh this is fantastic! Absolutely amazing! You can just skip third year and we'll let you graduate now! You're just that good!" It doesn't work like that. We all need the critism to make us stronger designers. After all, there is no such thing as a 'D' designer. As I entered my second semester evaluation, I could feel the negative energy in the room. I knew they didn't like most of my stuff, but I just kept reminding myself "It's okay. This will only improve your work. Don't become attached to my work. It'll sting too much otherwise." It worked out pretty well actually. Not sleeping for the nearly 28 hours prior didn't hurt either. It was like being in a drunken state, which kind of numbs the pain of all the hate they generated towards my work.
As I left the evaluation room, all I could think was "sleep!" Eval had felt like a weird dream and it was all over. Now all I have to look forward is having a fantastic summer and all of things I hope to learn next year, in my third and final year of graphic design. As scary as it is, I'm ready for it and looking forward to my future, wherever it may lead me.
Wednesday
*Horrible Website...
While researching websites for a recent project at school, I came across this horrible example...
http://www.worldbestwebsites.com/
Look at how absolutely nasty this website is! You'd think that a website showcasing the best ones would take a que from its content and actually look somewhat decent. I guess they were worried that they'd have to use their own website as one of the tops if it was too good, so they made it as gross as possible. They could have kept it simple and made the top sites as the focus, but instead they opted for a black, white, yellow and pale blue colour palette. The banner at the top is enough to make me hit the back button. Why would anyone think that was a credible site with features like that? Were they drunk when they came up with this??? I hope so... because that is the only thing that can possibly explain this eyesore!
http://www.worldbestwebsites.com/
Look at how absolutely nasty this website is! You'd think that a website showcasing the best ones would take a que from its content and actually look somewhat decent. I guess they were worried that they'd have to use their own website as one of the tops if it was too good, so they made it as gross as possible. They could have kept it simple and made the top sites as the focus, but instead they opted for a black, white, yellow and pale blue colour palette. The banner at the top is enough to make me hit the back button. Why would anyone think that was a credible site with features like that? Were they drunk when they came up with this??? I hope so... because that is the only thing that can possibly explain this eyesore!
*Erica Iris Simmons
I don't really know too much about these pieces because the website was in a different language, but I thought they were different and needed to be showcased. I like that she used materials that pertained to the image to create it such as the movie reel to for Marilyn Monroe. These are very clean and I like their simplicity.
Tuesday
*Princess Margaret Home Lottery
OMG! I just went to the most fantastic house that I have ever seen in my whole entire life. No lie. It was the grand prize for the Princess Margaret Home Lottery. It's a $3.6 million dollar home in Richmond Hill. Girl please. If anyone deserves this home its me. The decor screams me. Everything is shiny and silver. I love it so much. It's all I can think about.
Just look at the outside! Talk about a house. I'd call this a mansion.
Just look at the outside! Talk about a house. I'd call this a mansion.
The house includes:
Boulevard 5 – 7,950 sq. ft.: Located in a quiet, treed setting. Soaring ceilings, impeccable detailing and the finest finishes adorn this 4-bedroom palace. A glittering mirrored mosaic wall surrounds a 2-way fireplace. Exquisite floors of white marble with silver-grey mosaic inserts. A dreamy kitchen with gleaming stainless steel appliances, built-in cabinetry with wrought-iron details on glass panel doors, finished with beautiful white marble countertops. A magnificent split staircase leads to the master sanctuary with a spa-like ensuite, an ultra stylish dressing room and a home gym.
Additional amenities include:• the lower level entertaining area (perfect for parties, poker and book club)• a rear covered "porch" oasis with hot tub and fireplace basking in natural light
Check out this link to view the house: http://www.helpconquercancer.ca/home/threedviews.php?page=3d0
As amazing as it is on the computer, you should really see it in real life. It's like a fantasy. One of my favourite rooms is the fireplace hall. It's kind of a pointless room, but in a house that big, you pretty much have room to do whatever you like. It's a somewhat small room with marble floors, a gorgeous padded bench in the center, a double sided fireplace and a fantastic mirrored glass wall.
*Pinhole Photography
I stumbled upon these images on the website http://www.stumbleupon.com/. The images were captured using a pinhole camera with an exposure of 6 MONTHS! These are quite incredible and I love how they turned out. Here is one example of Justin Quinnell's pinhole photography. More examples can be found at: http://www.pinholephotography.org/gallery/slow/index.html
This is Bristol's Clifton Suspension Bridge.
"The image was captured on a pin-hole camera made from an empty drinks can with a 0.25mm aperture and a single sheet of photographic paper.
Photographer Justin Quinnell strapped the camera to a telephone pole overlooking the Gorge, where it was left between December 19, 2007 and June 21, 2008--the Winter and Summer solstices. (That's a 15,552,000 second exposure.)'Solargraph' shows six months of the sun's luminescent trails and its subtle change of course caused by the earth's movement in orbit. The lowest arc being the first day of exposure on the Winter solstice, while the top curves were captured mid-Summer." Says the caption found below the photograph.
This is Bristol's Clifton Suspension Bridge.
"The image was captured on a pin-hole camera made from an empty drinks can with a 0.25mm aperture and a single sheet of photographic paper.Photographer Justin Quinnell strapped the camera to a telephone pole overlooking the Gorge, where it was left between December 19, 2007 and June 21, 2008--the Winter and Summer solstices. (That's a 15,552,000 second exposure.)'Solargraph' shows six months of the sun's luminescent trails and its subtle change of course caused by the earth's movement in orbit. The lowest arc being the first day of exposure on the Winter solstice, while the top curves were captured mid-Summer." Says the caption found below the photograph.
I find these very unique and beautiful. They almost look like paintings.
Monday
*Designism: 100% Bullshit
Do you know what you're eating?
A series of posters created by me and another girl in class to bring awareness to genetically modified foods and pesticides. We decided to do a photoshoot of a classy lady having a traditional dinner (chicken and vegetables) but she is wearing a gas mask. While doing research for this project, we found some pretty shocking facts about genetically modified foods and pesticides and we put these facts onto the poster hoping to shock consumers into making wise choices about the foods the purchase and eat. Some of these include, buying locally, growing your own food, eating organically etc.
A series of posters created by me and another girl in class to bring awareness to genetically modified foods and pesticides. We decided to do a photoshoot of a classy lady having a traditional dinner (chicken and vegetables) but she is wearing a gas mask. While doing research for this project, we found some pretty shocking facts about genetically modified foods and pesticides and we put these facts onto the poster hoping to shock consumers into making wise choices about the foods the purchase and eat. Some of these include, buying locally, growing your own food, eating organically etc.
The tagline we used in the bottom poster says 'According to the World Health Organization, 10,000 PEOPLE DIE annually due to pesticide poisoning. Three people are poisoned every minute all around the world. We put our trust in our government. We are entitled to know what's in our food. We are not being protected. Our government is hiding secrets within private documents about our food system. We feel this is... 100% BULLSHIT'
We hope that by bringing shocking statistics such as these we can change the way people buy food and ultimately how people make food.
*Halloween Themed Photoshoot
This is a photo taken for my photography class for a halloween themed photoshoot. The final photo had to be turned into a poster for some event or a movie. I turned mine into a movie poster for a movie I made up called 'Slow Painfull Death'. This is actually one of my favourite photoshoots that I have done to date. It was different from what I was used to doing. Making the cuts or bruises was the best part of the whole thing.
NO ONE WAS HURT IN THE MAKING OF THIS PHOTO haha
*Package Redesign
Club House Food Colouring.
The orignal packaging (left) new package created by me (right).
Front/side view
Side/back and top view
Side and front view
Package redesign for a class project. The objective of the project was to take an already exhisting package that was boring or poorly designed. I decided to redo the food colouring package because I thought it looked tacky and needed some major improvement. I started with the shape of the package and opted to have a square shape with holes at the top to show off the unique lids. The colour was the next thing I needed to focus on. I accidentally made the package black, which surprisingly worked out better than the white I originally had it. It made the neon colours of the rest of the package pop. The lines of the front and top of the package are to represent whiped cream and frosting, something I think food colouring is used the most for.
The orignal packaging (left) new package created by me (right).
Front/side view
Side/back and top view
Side and front view
Package redesign for a class project. The objective of the project was to take an already exhisting package that was boring or poorly designed. I decided to redo the food colouring package because I thought it looked tacky and needed some major improvement. I started with the shape of the package and opted to have a square shape with holes at the top to show off the unique lids. The colour was the next thing I needed to focus on. I accidentally made the package black, which surprisingly worked out better than the white I originally had it. It made the neon colours of the rest of the package pop. The lines of the front and top of the package are to represent whiped cream and frosting, something I think food colouring is used the most for.
*Red Sea Beer
This is the beer bottle that I recently designed for a school project. The idea of the project was to design a new identity for a fictional brewery called Pilton. We could either keep their current name (Gusto) or create a new one. I decided to go with Red Sea, named after the colour of the beer. The company is a small one that creates a quality rich, foamy red coloured beer.
I liked the idea of using a transparent theme when creating my bottle/packaging. I wanted as much of the bottle to be showcased as possible. The bottles have been frosted so that the font is clear and shows off the repeated 'RED SEA" logo in the background. All of the information about the beer (size, alcohol volume, etc.) are on a label that covers the lid. The whole idea was to keep the beer very simple and classy so that it would appeal to the target audience. (25-50 year old male, who watches 1.5 hours of TV a day, reads a national newspaper, makes approx. $60,000 a year and drives a European style car.)
The carrier that it comes in also follows these characteristics. It's made out of recycled plastic and is only held together with gold gromets. A dark red colour is used in the logo to make it pop and is placed directly over where it would be on the bottle that lies behind it.
*My New Baby!
2010 Dodge Challenger RT
Matte black racing stripes
Interior. Look at those leather seats!
Oh how I love this car. I know this doesn't have a whole lot to do with graphic design, but look at this car! It's gorgeous! Black paint with matte black stripes, keyless start, gigantic rims, hemi engine. The list goes on and on. Loves, loves, loves it!! It's so fast too and the bass is incredible! I would live in this car if I could. Too bad it doesn't belong to me.... it's my fathers. Oh well, I can still drive it and admire it's gorgeousness all I want! haha
Matte black racing stripes
Interior. Look at those leather seats!
Oh how I love this car. I know this doesn't have a whole lot to do with graphic design, but look at this car! It's gorgeous! Black paint with matte black stripes, keyless start, gigantic rims, hemi engine. The list goes on and on. Loves, loves, loves it!! It's so fast too and the bass is incredible! I would live in this car if I could. Too bad it doesn't belong to me.... it's my fathers. Oh well, I can still drive it and admire it's gorgeousness all I want! haha
Wednesday
*Creative Logos
Here are some creative logos that I came across the other day that use imagery or a play on words to represent it. I think it is a more creative and eye catching way to make a logo work. The pendulum logo is a great example of this. It incorporates an old pen tip and slightly angled the inner part to look like a moving pendulum. The Rocket Golf idea is another example. The shape the two golf tees create leaves a rocket in the negative space.
*It's a love/hate thing.
Dear Second Year Graphic Design,
I think we need to work on our relationship. It's been a year and a half and I'm not happy. In fact, I haven't been for a while. I can't remember the last time you made me smile. Remember last year? All the late nights we spent together? I used to have so much fun with you. Now I can hardly stay with you past 5pm. What happened to us? When did it all fall apart? I miss what we used to have.
Maybe we need some therapy? What if we try something new?? We could learn some new techniques and work on this together as a team. I know you're stubborn and I knew that when I met you, but I think I can change you. I need to change you. Will you change for me? I want to learn so much from you, but you make it impossible. I love you, but I can't be with you if you don't consider me or my feelings. I'm only human. I know you have high expectations of me, but I can't do it if you won't listen! I've tried talking to you before and even asked my friends to help, but you never change!! So, I'm giving you an ultimatum. Either you change how you treat me or I'm going to see someone else. I can't stay in this toxic "relationship" we have if you don't make some changes. I know I'm not perfect either, but I've grown because of you. I want more. I need more. If you can't change then all of this will have been a waste of my time. Fix it or I'm gone forever. Baby you know I will always love you, so please think about this. It's really important that you take this seriously because this is your last chance. I'm not kidding.
Love always,
Melissa xox
I think we need to work on our relationship. It's been a year and a half and I'm not happy. In fact, I haven't been for a while. I can't remember the last time you made me smile. Remember last year? All the late nights we spent together? I used to have so much fun with you. Now I can hardly stay with you past 5pm. What happened to us? When did it all fall apart? I miss what we used to have.
Maybe we need some therapy? What if we try something new?? We could learn some new techniques and work on this together as a team. I know you're stubborn and I knew that when I met you, but I think I can change you. I need to change you. Will you change for me? I want to learn so much from you, but you make it impossible. I love you, but I can't be with you if you don't consider me or my feelings. I'm only human. I know you have high expectations of me, but I can't do it if you won't listen! I've tried talking to you before and even asked my friends to help, but you never change!! So, I'm giving you an ultimatum. Either you change how you treat me or I'm going to see someone else. I can't stay in this toxic "relationship" we have if you don't make some changes. I know I'm not perfect either, but I've grown because of you. I want more. I need more. If you can't change then all of this will have been a waste of my time. Fix it or I'm gone forever. Baby you know I will always love you, so please think about this. It's really important that you take this seriously because this is your last chance. I'm not kidding.
Love always,
Melissa xox
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)