Andrew Russo's Design Blog

What Is New In The Path2Design?

2013-03-01T18:50:00.002-05:00

I have some awesome news! I was actually part of an article in the CM-Life newspaper involving my Design Bureau class! The article covers how we get to work with real clients in a classroom setting. Personally, I am working with three clients Solar Cycle Lights, Moore Hall TV, and New Central 34. Read the full article by following the link below.

CM-Life Design Article

Recently I decided to take some time to revise the Velo logo. This logo is for a business idea that I have in store, but still have a long way to go with building my web development skills before this business can move forward.

Below is a logo I worked on to show my appreciation of small businesses. This idea of #heartsmallbiz is a focus on the importance of small businesses being recognized in a local community. We are losing a sense of community with all of the corporate businesses leeching the profits and the entire idea of community away from the people. I hope to create an online community that will counteract this and give strength back into the idea of small businesses throughout our nation. You can show your love for small business by following the brand new Twitter account Heart Small Biz.

I also participated in a St. Patrick's day t-shirt contest for my Design Herd group. The idea was appropriated from the Lucky Charm's character with a couple mug's of beer in his hands to celebrate the Holiday.

In my Advanced Typography class we were assigned a unique assignment where we had to construct 3D type. The assignment was so broad that students have been scrambling to narrow down there ideas to one thing. One night I was at the library and happened to have my camera on me and the idea of creating the word "Face" out of library books would be a brilliant idea. I then went a step further and used books that only involved social media and the internet to give confused viewers an extra hint.

A few graphic design professionals came to CMU recently to speak to the designers on how to attract business, making the transition from school, building a portfolio, and considering making an online portfolio to increase exposure. Once I hone in my skills I will have a website up and running.

As for the latest news, I applied for a graphic design internship in LA through an internship program called "Dream Careers". The tuition is steep, but they provide you everything all inclusive. This includes housing, commuting to work, meals, facilities, speaking events, and other events. Everything is located at the UCLA campus and as a student of the program you are allowed to have access to the UCLA facilities. It also provides school credits and a 100% guarantee for an internship of your choice with some of the top companies like (Yahoo, MTV, Millennium Films, etc). They also provide other internships throughout the U.S. and even outside of the U.S. as well. I decided to apply to the LA program because it seemed to be the most suitable to my interests as a graphic designer. Working for an entertainment agency would literally be a nice taste of a dream career. So if you are interested in finding an internship that is catered to you, the ability to network with other interns, and make your experience more accommodating to the transition into a real life work situation then this might be a great opportunity to check out. The website to get there is is summerinternships.com.

If you are a student graphic designer and have any questions about building a portfolio, how to get into the graphic design program at your school, networking, finding tutorial websites, specific questions about my projects, or any other general advice I would gladly help you out. Please leave comments and suggestions as well because I will be happy to hear your advice as I continue this journey on the Path2Design.

The Art of Simplicity

2013-01-24T13:15:00.000-05:00

Today as some of you may know is my birthday. I am now 22 years old, so that means all of the fun birthdays are over and now I get to look forward to lower insurance rates as I move forward in life. That is okay though, I have already been dedicating my time into a new kind of fun, Graphic Design! This may come off as completely nerdy, but I'm okay with that, I found something I love to do!

Since I began learning graphic design in 2011 I have been constantly hearing, reading, and seeing a key concept of design. This key concept is simplicity. I use to think that simplicity was for the lazy designers that didn't want to make an effort in creating a worthwhile design. Boy was I ever wrong about that. The use of minimalism can be one of the most time consuming forms of design. Designers (for branding) create sketch after sketch of different designs attempting to make the most visual appealing, easy to recognize, unique, and relate-able design concept to fit the company.

Any design can take weeks of research depending on the company or product for it to be an effective design that a consumer can relate to. Some of the more recent books that I've read which all view simplistic designs similarly are

Logo Design Love (pictured above), Recycling & Redesigning Logos, and How to become a Graphic Designer without Losing Your Soul.

If you look at any of the "big name" companies out there you will notice that they all have simple and iconic designs. The reason main reason is that it can be easily identifiable for the consumer even when the consumer is whizzing by in a vehicle. I use to try to cram everything I could into a design because I wanted to show off my creativity. In many cases its okay to allow yourself to go creatively wild like I did on My Twitter background, but in other cases keeping it clean and simple can create the most effect outcome.

I recently joined a new website called Behance which allows an designer, photographer, animator, advertiser, and basically any creative person to create a portfolio for free! I have been looking at so many portfolios and getting some great ideas from all of the professionals out there!

Also, if you are a design professional, a couple of the groups I have been involved with since October may interest you as well. I am part of the West Michigan AIGA and the MMCA (Mid-Michigan Creative Alliance). If you aren't from Michigan, there are AIGA chapters all throughout the U.S. so you can find your local chapter at AIGA .

All of these websites provide great portfolios to view, creative events, job listings, forums, etc. The design world is growing and is becoming more and more connected as we progress in the future.

Manti Te'o on Catfish the MTV TV Show?

2013-01-19T16:24:00.002-05:00

Having an exclusive story with Manti Te'o is a great idea, but unfortunately this flyer is just as fake as Manti's girflfriend. I made this advertisement simply for fun this weekend after hearing this controversy drowning the news. Taking a break from TV was a must, so a creative design was in order.

The software program I used to create this advertisement was:

Adobe Photoshop CS6

In creating this advertisement, I appropriated the catfish logo, MTV symbol, and the largest image of Manti Te'o that I could find. Manti Te'o's body was removed from its background using the "Quick Selection" Tool, while the other two images were removed from their backgrounds by using the "Magic Wand" Tool. Catfish barbels, also known as whiskers, were added to spice up the satire of the advertisement and then a Luminosity effect was given to the image for its final touch.

Who knows, maybe this advertisement will become viral enough to get to MTV's Catfish and can work out a deal with Manti Te'o. I think this controversy and The Catfish TV show blend together really well and the people on the TV Show can relate to Manti's embarrassing experience.

The Graphic Design Program Begins

2013-01-13T22:05:00.003-05:00

The spring semester at CMU has begin and this marks the first semester that I have been able to take classes that are only allowed for students who have been accepted into the program. The classes on my schedule are:

- Intro to Western Art II

- Aesthetics

- Introduction to Graphic Arts

- Design Bureau*

- Advanced Typography*

The classes with the (*) are the Graphic Design major only classes. The introduction to Graphic Arts is for my Media, Design, Production, and Technology minor, but I think it will have some similarities to the Intro to Graphic Design class that I completed three semesters ago.

Design Bureau is going to be my favorite class because this class consists of dealing with actual clients. My professor is organizing our clients and then depending on how many clients we have, we will be split into groups or work individually. When conversing with my peers, there apparently have been some horror stories in the past with clients that have been very disobedient, ungrateful, and ultimately problematic. I see this as just being part of the challenge and it is simply business. The edge I have in this situation is that I was originally a business major so I have background knowledge on how to orchestrate a business meeting. I was also a salesman for Sears and for Cutco which has its extra benefits.

In this class the required textbook is "How to be a graphic designer, without losing your soul" by Adrian Shaughnessy.

How To Be A Graphic Designer, Without Losing Your Soul

I began reading this book today and I am already excited about sharing it with you.

Another book that I have been reading and would like to recommend to you is called "Logo Design Love" by David Airey. The title of the book is a giveaway, it obviously about logos, but it will give you an insight for any of you logo lovers out there or for those who wish to become one.

Logo Design Love

Advanced Typography will be a fun, but challenging class because of its intensity with type usage. I have often noticed that it has been tough to find a certain type choice for a specific project with a plethora of type options available. As I have been told, I will eventually figure out my favorite typefaces to apply to my style of design.

One of my major struggles is finding my style. I know that when you think of a specific designer or artist you will know their certain style. When I think of myself, I have no style to identify with but I'd rather learn everything I can because I do not want to be limited. This ideology of wanting to learn it all limits the ability to fine tune a specific style because the time consumed by other styles interfere with expanded my knowledge on the other. I think this is the point where a lot of college students are at, which is the stage of experimentation.

Learning all of these new things are exciting, but they are also overwhelming when you are trying to learn them all at once. This semester I am going to apply a tactic that I have learned from a couple of motivational speakers that I have been listening to on my iPad. I learned the tactic of goal setting in a unique way. Instead of cramming all of my goals together, getting overwhelmed, and then ending up getting rarely anything done, I am going set individual goals one at a time. I will not move forward to the next goal until I have mastered the previous goal (this only applies to projects outside of school work). Once everything is ironed out between school and side projects with this new goal setting routine, then this semester should be smooth sailing.

If you're a Graphic Design student and you are reading this, one tip I can give to you is don't be limited by what your professors teach you in school. Go out and learn everything you can on your own. You will learn so much more in addition to what you learn in school. Just don't get overwhelmed by it and learn at your own pace. I guess I'll add an additional tip. This world is becoming more and more interconnected so learn skills other than just graphic design because that will give you the edge against the competition and may be required for your jobs in the future.

Cyber Monday Craziness! Christmas List and the Future

2012-11-26T22:53:00.001-05:00

It seems to me that each year Cyber Monday has a stronger and stronger impact on holiday shopping. Malls and other retail stores won't go out of business because they are too convenient, but I am sure one of the reasons for starting Black Friday at midnight (in my town) was one of their ways to combat the overwhelming market moving toward the internet to buy their holiday gifts so they won't have to wait in those dreadful lines. The stores were packed at first, but around 3 a.m. they had cleared up which made me a fairly happy customer at Rivertown Crossings Mall in Grandville, MI.

Even though I think the local retail stores did a good job in combating with the long lines that people hate in order to draw customers, I think the online holiday purchases will grow this year. With that said, I am happy to know that my career choice in college is technology based. Lately, I've been diversifying my skills by tapping into coding with HTML, CSS, PHP, and Java so I will know the development side along with the artistic side of design.

Recently I created two websites. One website was for school and the other is my personal website to show a gallery of my works and for potential employers and customers to get in touch with me. The intention of my website for school was to create an online cookbook. I decided to create mine with a twist. I made the website into more of a contest for college students to win gifts cards by submitting their recipes that could be featured for a week.

The website can be found through school by going to Simple College Eats Website .

Although my personal website is a long way from complete, I have been enjoying learning new techniques as I go. The aesthetics of the website work, but as I have been reading more and observing professional websites, I realize that gradients and the use of shadows in the contents of my webpage look unprofessional. I'll be changing the website around soon, so you may see a different website in the near future. The link to my online portfolio (personal website) is Andrew Russo Designs Website .

As I have been using Adobe Dreamweaver and can confirm to you that this software is truly a useful tool. I am fairly new to developing, so for us "newbies" Dreamweaver is beneficial. I'm sure it has it great benefits for advanced users as while, so I will let you know when I'm caught up to that point or you can comment below to fill us in. The software undoubtedly helps me keep organized with my code. When I first started, I had a knack for string all of the code together and finding myself lost in it.

Reverting back to Cyber Monday, I of course did my research and found three things that I will be putting on my Christmas List this year. Now that I am advancing skills in design and dipping my toes into development, I am looking forward to start creating an e-commerce website where I can sell t-shirts with graphics screen printed onto them. This would be a hobby on the side that I would do on my spare time. With that said, I was checking out new printing equipment to print positives for screen printing. I watched a few tutorials and found Cat Spit Productions to be the most insightful. The screen printer I am looking for would be something small for personal use and I happened to find one just like it at Hobby Lobby. It was called a Speedball screen printer. Since I have no experience with the product, I can't provide you with any detail on its quality, but from watching the YouTube video above you can see for yourself its potential.

The next thing I came across when I was shopping at Best Buy were Epson printers. I knew that if I ever want to make quality screen printed t-shirts and any quality designs for customers or school then I need to get a quality printer. The students at CMU have printers provided for them, but the cost to print is extremely expensive at over $3 per print for an 8.5" x 11" print no matter how much ink is used. I have probably spent enough money to buy a quality printer at that cost. Another reason for purchasing my own quality printer would be for if I ever begin to get an increased traffic flow of t-shirt purchases.

As a beginning designer living in a rather small apartment I'd definitely choose one of these two options to kick things into gear:

The printer above is the Epson Artisan 730 Color Inkjet All-in-One and from the high reviews I think it would be a designer or even photographer that is running a small business or needs to produce quality work for school projects. It also has wireless capabilities which would be amazing because I like to move around the area and could print from anywhere on a smart phone, tablet, and of course on my lap top.

This next printer is the Epson Artisan 837 and is my personal favorite. The major differences that suck me in are that the LCD screen is bigger and that it can print rather fast but still holds its quality from the video reviews I watched. We all have those last minute projects that need to be completed so it that could definitely come in handy. It is also wireless and has a scanner like the printer above.

Lastly, during my perusing through the ads today, I came across this awesome stylus for the tablet
called the Sensu Brush. It is literally a paintbrush that works on a tablet. It also has a normal stylus pen that you can flip around for drawing.

"The rubber stylus is exposed when the brush is closed. This stylus is great for sketching and writing or as a general navigation tool. Grasp Sensu near the nib section and pull it out of the protective cap. You will reveal the capacitive bristles of the artist brush. Insert the rubber stylus into the cap and the cap becomes a handle for your brush." - SensuBrush.com

Check Out The Sensu Brush For Yourself!

As for my current projects, I am working on an animation for school and for a ficticious raincoat company called "Rubber's Raincoats". You can check out the poster I've created so far on the images section of my Twitter. Check Out My Twitter .

Feel free to follow me and or contact me at anytime! Take care everyone.

Graphic Design BFA Acceptance!

2012-11-14T18:21:00.001-05:00

I had forgotten to say that I finally got accepted into the graphic design program at Central Michigan University! Next semester I am officially taking a few classes that only Graphic Design majors are allowed to take. I'm very excited and am looking forward to acquiring new skills to become a professional graphic designer. Along with that, I am also pursuing the MDPT (Media, Design, Production, and Technology) minor. Aside from enjoying learning to build websites in CPS 165 and learning Adobe Flash in CPS 282, I am taking those classes for the minor.

I would really like to find and internship this summer to get a feel of what it's like to be a design professional, so if you know of any companies that are looking for help with graphic design please let me know!

Little Canoe

2012-11-14T16:33:00.001-05:00

I recently received my personal logo assignment back and wanted to show you all my creative idea I had for a design business called Little Canoe. I spent a lot of time trying to come up with the right logo and the logo that seemed to make the most sense was the hand drawn logo of Little Canoe. I decided to hand craft the business card to make it unique in its own way. I designed a picture frame using Adobe Illustrator CS6 and then cut each individual piece out and glued the pieces of the frame together with Scotch Quick-Drying Tacky Glue which actually worked out very well!

I used Photoshop to create the QR code within the picture frame. Just in case the business card is ever lost, the customer can still contact the company by scanning the QR code which brings the customer directly to the Little Canoe website.

Check out some photographs:

This is just one of the many projects I have been working on throughout the semester.

In my CPS 165 (Intro to Modern Website Design) class, I have created three websites. We were only allowed to use Notepad (Windows) or TextEdit (Mac) and couldn't use Adobe programs for anything besides the background.

Website 1

Website 2

Website 4

I hope you like what I have done so far! Please feel free to leave any questions or comments!

I Made It! Grand Rapids Art Prize 2012

2012-10-08T20:25:00.004-04:00

After many failed attempts on going to Art Prize, I decided that I just needed to get in my car and drive to Grand Rapids from Mt. Pleasant. Bear in mind that I decided to go after school on a week day with having class the next morning, but it was definitely worth it. The pieces I got to see were amazing! I even snapped a few pictures as I toured around downtown Grand Rapids. Check these out!

There Are No Brakes In The Car of Life

2012-10-03T22:39:00.004-04:00

There is so much to tell you! But before I do I just want to say something in addition to the title that you read above. Even though there may be no brakes in the car of life, as long as you hold your head high, the road will continue on so you will never crash and burn. Enough with the motivational speech and time to catch you up. Where have I been since mid-September you may be asking? Well, I have been attached at the hip with my laptop because I decided at the last minute that I was going to build my Graphic Design portfolio for this semester rather than in the spring. I finally completed it on Monday and turned it in on Tuesday which was only one day before the deadline. I have been so busy that I haven't even had time to manage my fantasy football team. I feel like I'm letting those guys down! All kidding aside, it really has been crunch time lately between the projects, exams, homework, quizzes, and a majority of the time devoted to building my portfolio.

The contents required for my Graphic Design portfolio for the Central Michigan University Graphic Design program:

*A written form showing the grades I had in a few Art classes and included my signature

*One page essay of the reason why I wanted to become a Graphic Designer

*10 projects

*10 descriptions

Brownie Points (hopefully):

*Added a cover on the front of my portfolio that matched that basic design for the descriptions

*Laminated every page to give it a professional look

* For some of the designs I provided thumbnails for an easier viewing and to make my project flow more smoothly

Below is my portfolio from cover to finish:

That completes my portfolio! I hope you like it! I had to leave a couple parts of it out, but it shows all ten of my designs that I submitted for the program. Wish me luck!

This next piece below is one from my typography class. I decided to design the Ray Ban wayfarer sunglasses out of type. All of the type inside the image is about the history of the Ray Ban company and how it has been a significant part of our society's style for many years.

This piece below was created for my Art 117 (Intro to Contemporary Issues) class. It was created to match the similar style of David Hockney. It displays the style use of time and motion to represent what the human eye experiences in an event over a period of time. This particular project was created to represent a night of fun between college friends and capture the energy throughout the night.

Below are a few logos that I am working on for my personal logo. These are for my Logo & Identity course where I have to create a business card, letterhead and envelop. If you have any suggestions I'm open to hearing any of them.

Well there you have it! These project are what I have been devoting the first portion of my semester to. Feel free to comment and share your knowledge with me to help me in the process of becoming a Graphic Designer. That also goes both ways, I'd be happy to help you if you are need of any advice on project ideas too.

Portfolio Building and Projects

2012-09-11T12:37:00.002-04:00

Now that I am beginning to get comfortable with my school schedule, I am diving into the creation of my portfolio. I am getting involved in a student RSO (besides run club this year) called Design Herd. This RSO provides Design students to engage with each other to help create portfolio and they bring in designers from all over Michigan to give speeches and assist future designers.

I have designed a few new things since my last post and I have also began working on a couple of projects. For the portfolio, I am going to figure out a clean, simple, and efficient design for each of my projects so everything will be consistent.

My first project that I turned in yesterday involved creating icons for the art department. I realized that my icons did not pop out from a distance so it was overlooked during the critique. I needed to create a thicker stroke to make the lines "pop". Also, everyone seemed to be attracted to the circular shape of the icons versus the square shaped icons. With my design concept, the rounded shape would not work, but I could have had rounded corners like the icons for the iPod/iPad apps.

The other project above was created in Adobe Flash program using the pen tool. This was for my Intro to Multimedia & Design class. For this project, all we had to do was create an image, but for the next project we will have to animate it. I am looking forward to having fun with this!

So far it has been minimal work, but we are starting to get involved with more in depth projects such as creating a logo for a business, creating type that represents the two sides of an oxymoron (ex: bitter sweet), and creating a collage of photographs to depict what a human eye sees (inspired by Gail Hoffman), and so on.

I'll be looking forward to showing you the progress of my portfolio and future projects!

Its Time to Revive this Blog

2012-07-25T21:58:00.001-04:00

Wheeewww! This summer has been a constantly moving roller coaster and I don't think the brakes will stop until I am moved back into my apartment at CMU. Even then I'll be just jumping from one roller coaster to another as the school year begins. Okay, enough with the analogies its time for a recap. I have been reading up on graphic design works and also a HTML5 and CSS3 book for web design, but I haven't created any serious work besides a couple of fun projects on the side. I have been working and taking a class a GRCC this summer, but that is really no excuse for my lack of progress. The bittersweet truth is that this is the last summer that I am fairly positive I will see my closest friends that I grew up with on a regular basis, so I wanted to spend every available moment of my free time with them. I've reignited friendships from high school and grew closer to a lot of people this summer and ultimately it was a blessing to have the chance to spend my summer with them. I traveled, went to the beach, went boating, fishing, went to cottages/cabins, celebrated birthdays, river rafted, star gazed, concerts, and the list goes on.

I realize that this school year I will have to get serious and put my careless and happy-go-lucky ways behind me. I am finally moving ahead into my core courses for my major. Unfortunately my graphic design class at GRCC was cancelled for the summer so I don't have enough work to apply for the graphic design program this fall. On the other hand I will have all semester to prepare a strong and professional portfolio for the spring semester. If you have any tips that will help me with my portfolio I would be very appreciative.

I hope your summers have been as amazing as mine!

Pursue some path, however narrow and crooked, in which you can walk with love and reverence. - Henry David Thoreau

School is almost out!

2012-04-30T17:43:00.001-04:00

Hey hey so I've been reluctant on posting things lately because I've been so busy with the tail end of the semester. I have a lot to show you, but its either at home or I'm waiting to get it back from my teachers. I did go on a nature walk out here in Mt. Pleasant and snapped a few pictures, but nothing spectacular. I've been making plans with some friends about taking a hiking/camping trip this summer so I'm really excited to take what I've learned in photo class and apply it to some nature photography. Hope this year has gone great for everyone!

Hard Work Pays Off

2012-03-20T21:27:00.002-04:00

Look what I found on display on the second floor of the library! I spent a very very long time on the creations of the wire sculpture moose and the module project and it goes to show that sometimes hard work will pay off. I've never had anything on display here at CMU until now so this is pretty exciting! Hopefully I can eventually have graphic design work displayed in the future, but maybe I'll look into three dimensional design work as a hobby on the side since I really do enjoy that as well.

Logos for Companies Contests on Prizes.org

2012-03-03T14:29:00.001-05:00

Yep I'm on Spring Break and yes its very relaxing not to have projects due on a daily basis. I decided to make a couple logos and a t-shirt design to enter into some contests on Prizes.org. I figured this would be a nice way to improve my portfolio for the graphic design program.

Here they are:

I'll be working on a few projects to get a head start in my classes for after break. I'm also working at the Women's Expo at the DeVos Place in Grand Rapids, MI next weekend. I'll be working at a booth selling polarized shades and lens cleaning kits. If you're in the area I hope to see ya there!

Ahh New Haircut soo Short! Johnson Park & Painting with Light (Light Art Photography)

2012-02-28T22:54:00.002-05:00

Well hello again! I've been keeping busy especially since this is midterm week, but hey hey spring break is a few days away! So this weekend I went home to Grand Rapids, MI again to do a re-shoot of the "Capturing Motion/ Light Art Project". To be honest, I feel like this weekend turned out a lot better than the previous which made the trip home again more worth while. But of course its always nice seeing family and friends especially since I am gradually seeing them less and less.

What made the difference this week compared to last week were a couple of key factors. I didn't correctly change the ISO which is the camera's sensitivity to light. When outdoors the ISO needs to be decreased and when you are in an indoor setting you need increase the ISO. I also had to change the shutter speed for the capturing motion pictures to a lower setting from 1/60 of a second to 1/500 of a second or less. Some pictures I even took at 1/3200 of a second which those seemed to turn out the best with the snowboarding pictures.

Last but not least is the picture of the guys and my new hair cut. For three of us it was our first time getting our haircut with a razor with a 1 setting, so this was something new for most of us. We were pressured into it by our friend Jordan, but ah well they didn't turn out so bad. We thought we'd pose like we were "thugs" since we were all sporting the same haircut. I had to then add a brick wall background with grafitti on it with our nicknames Roose, BKing, DCrunk, and JReed.

I also just registered for a Typography class this summer, so that is going to be exciting. I may also register for Painting as well, but I'll have to see how much time I have available between online classes and the Typography class.

That is all for now. I have a diagram project due tomorrow which I have barely cracked into, but at least I finished my research paper. Wish me luck on my midterms for the rest of the week! Have a fun spring break everyone! Bring some sun back for me.

Spring Break Is Just A Week Away!!!

2012-02-23T17:06:00.001-05:00

Hey everyone! I've been pretty busy with projects and they are all piling up in within these last two weeks of school. Spring break is just over a week away, so it will be nice to catch a break from the constant projects that I've had to do even though I've enjoyed almost all of them. Unfortunately I'm not going anywhere for spring break this semester, but I guess I pretty much had a four month break while working in Orlando, FL at Walt Disney World last year so I guess it compensates.

Now for some updates. I was told yesterday by my 3D Design professor that my wire moose project was going to be in an upcoming art show so that is definitely exciting news! Also I have three projects completed for my Graphic Design class, one project from my Color & Composition class, and one project from my Photography class that you can look at below. I am currently working on another Photography project that I'll be completing on Saturday with the help of some friends from my hometown in Grand Rapids (I'll show you a couple of samples). I am also working on a Color & Composition project involving graphs and implementing a design relation to the content within them.

The photographs above display a flyer for the Air Zoo which is an actual Aviation Museum. The target market for this flyer was children and to make it interactive (making the flyer actually fly). For the target market I chose to create a simple design so it would be suitable for children. My goal was to design an easy to make airplane that resembled the notes kids would pass to each other back in elementary school. I didn't display any information on the outside of the flyer that would give away the "secret" of what was inside, so it would make the viewer more curious to look at what was inside. I created a paper-like style to the outside of the plane, but I abstracted it so it wouldn't look exactly just like a piece of paper.

This poster design was created for my Color & Composition class. This is a poster ad design of a concert held by Eric Church which is an actual concert that is happening tonight at the Kellogg Arena. During the critique I was told that this definitely represents country, but the style is a bit timid for Eric Church. Personally I think this works for a majority of his songs, but I should have something different because I reference the song "Drink In My Hand" for the class which gave him more of a "hardcore bad ass" approach. I just picked that song because its one of my favorites as of recently and I had not considered the relation between the poster and the song. I should have presented "A Lot of Boot Left to Fill", "Love Your Love the Most", etc. I guess ya live and learn haha. Oh and I created everything in this picture including the photograph which was taken in Mt. Pleasant, MI.

This is a letter head, business card, and envelope of a fake company that my professor gave us. Below is the scenario:

"Sixteen years ago a few friends in Minneapolis MN decided to open up a music instrument store, specializing vintage rock guitars. The named the store “Frets”. The first year of business was deadly slow, they barley broke even, but after a few years it started to explode. And soon they were expanding. Now they have ten stores and are looking to add three more. With this expansion they need an updated look and feel. You have been hired to create a new logo, and apply that to business cards, letterheads and envelopes."

*All photographs were taken in Mt. Pleasant, MI

These Photographs above are called Diptychs. Which are two photographs displayed side by side that relate to one another. My teacher made us draw a topic and we had to go out into the world and create diptychs that related to the topics we drew. The topic I drew was "change", so I had a little fun with it. I ended up choosing the first photograph because I thought it would be fun to use the topic literally and metaphorically. The photo is literally change, but it contains a metaphor of change over time from segregation into integration of our society. The nickels, dimes, quarters represent Caucasian's and the pennies represent African Americans (whites & blacks). I flipped the top picture upside down to give the impression as if the change would fall into the picture below creating the circular world-like shape of integrated change.

The pictures above are from the Photography 140 project that I'm currently working on. The objective for this project is to capture movement using light art and freezing images. These are a few images that I liked, but I have to redo most of the others this weekend.

Above was a presentation that was happening in the art building during my photography class and we had the opportunity to check it out. From what I was told, the class was melting metal. This gave me a good opportunity to add a few extra photos to my capturing movement project.

I feel that my projects turned out well. I am continuing to work on my presentation skills so I can give a better sell to my designs. Its a work in progress, but I am starting to get better as time continues on.

That is all for now. Have an awesome spring break everyone!

New CMU Facebook Cover & Learning Adobe Illustrator

2012-02-08T23:48:00.001-05:00

Hey there I just finished up a new Facebook cover with the CMU logo in it check it out!

Right now I'm working on two projects in class that involve using Adobe Illustrator. This program is pretty much foreign to me besides the Live Trace/Live Paint portion of it. I learned a little bit about layering in Adobe Illustrator, but as of right now I think Photoshop is a lot easier. That is probably just because I have been using that program for a while. I'm going to try and watch tutorials and learn some basic skills in Illustrator this weekend so I can catch up with the classes.

Good Morning! Check out the New Touch Apps from Adobe!

2012-02-07T07:35:00.004-05:00

I just watched an awesome video this morning about the new touch apps coming out in November from Adobe. I'm most excited for Adobe Photoshop Touch! That is going to be the hottest app on the market coming in November. You will be able to view your layers in 3-D, use the camera on your tablet to load pictures directly to the touch application, have the basic functions of an OS Photoshop program, and most importantly this can all be done by touch.

Photoshop Touch would be great for my intro to Photography class as an alternative way to edit your pictures from a tablet versus a PC/Mac

Adobe Kuler will be an awesome touch app for my Color and Composition because you can create all sorts of color themes using complementary, analogous, split complementary, etc. color combinations.

Adobe Creative Cloud could be used for classes as well so student can upload all of their work to a class folder from any location rather than just uploading their work only from the classroom.

So there are some really cool things coming into the market next school year. I still have a lot to learn from the programs I currently have, but I'll definitely look into these touch apps once I have the extra cash to get an iPad.

The Adobe "Creativity Unleashed" video is an hour and a half long, but its definitely worth your time.

This video explains the process and inspirations of this small design studio.

My First Photoshop Youtube Video

2012-02-06T00:05:00.001-05:00

I just started creating Youtube videos for people to see the process of what I am doing to create my designs in Photoshop. I'm hoping I'll be able to start doing full tutorials for people once I feel confident enough with the program to create things smoothly without having many mistakes. Well I better get to bed since the school week begins in 10 hours. Have a great week!

I'm 21! A Few Projects Done & Learning New Techniques

2012-02-04T02:26:00.000-05:00

Whew! I survived my 21st birthday last Tuesday, but I may have had a little bit too much to drink during my birthday celebration... But a 21st birthday only comes once! I still managed to get all of my homework done and get caught up with my classes, but I really need to establish a better system because I have been very forgetful lately. I have been so overwhelmed with learning new techniques for graphic design and photography that I have been forgetting small things left and right which could add up in the end. I think I'm going to buy a heavy duty planner that can fit a lot of information in it so I will be able to fit lists of things to do in it. I'm really trying to turn my performance around this semester especially because I am finally enjoying the classes I'm taking.

I have completed a few big projects since my last post and they have been very time consuming. I almost considered avoiding going out for my 21st birthday all together, but I ended up getting suckered into it. The main reason why these projects were so time consuming is because I couldn't successfully finish my project without changing something or changing it entirely to make it better. Sadly, I missed the turn in date this afternoon because I wanted to brighten up my poster picture and eliminate the white cloud specs that were distracting the image. I had all of the supplies, had my poster cut, foam board cut, and it was ready to be pasted on the board two days ago, but I decided to change it last night and the only place I could print an 11x17 poster was in the computer lab which was filled with classes until mine began. As a result I will be getting marked down on Monday. I just hope this doesn't continue because I am really trying hard to get my grade back up to a 3.0 or higher so I can apply for the summer Graphic Design internship through Disney. I believe I have the creativity to become a great graphic designer.

As for the projects I completed were a wire moose, multiple graphic design posters, a new Facebook cover design, I started a poster project for my cousin Liz Heys, and two Photography projects completed.

The wire moose I spent easily 3 days completing the project with minimal sleep in between. It was pretty much eat, sleep, moose from Friday January 20 - Sunday January 21. My goal was to have it be completely filled, but I had already spent over $30 extra on the additional wire and it was getting too costly. I'll likely finish the moose in the future, but it looked pretty good as it was in my opinion. My teacher came up with a creative idea about potentially adding a small motor inside the moose that made the antlers move from side to side. That would be pretty awesome if I could make that happen, but it would be a tough addition. The moose ended up being about 3 ft by 3 feet (from toe to antler)

The Moose:

The graphic design poster took up most of my time which I figured they likely would have, but I didn't expect making multiple posters having completed them and then deciding to change my ideas at the last minute. I assume this will come into play while in the field as well so it was good experience learning to make multiple completed poster ideas and having options to choose from even though all of the extra work will bring my grade down since it will be late.. Catch 22 right there I guess.

The posters:

This poster was my first creation. I actually really enjoy this one. With a few more modifications I think it could have turned out great. I was intending on creating a more space like feel contrasting white and black and then I made star-like shapes us different colors, opacity, and size. Below I was messing around with paint brushes and opacity and I thought it came out awesome. It gives off a sort of glow and the brush strokes remind me of cells within the body which I think it gave it a cool addition.

My intention for this poster was to show nature and the world giving a statement that our world is filled with color, but during the critique in class I was told that the background was too distracting and people thought that it gave off the "textbook" kind of look to it. I completely agree now that I look at it and it made me laugh. I really like the logo I made for (Graphic Design Central Michigan University) because it seems to flow and drag the eye down in a stair-like fashion, so I might create my own side project with the logo just for fun. I've been playing this game called Words with Friends a lot lately and I'm pretty sure I derived my idea from playing that on a daily basis.

This third poster didn't get very far into development and I decided to just scrap it. I was intending on giving the literal meaning of design for the background, but it just didn't seem to work for me.

This next poster I put a lot of thought into. I wanted to show a world without design and then a world beneath to show what design adds to the world. I ended up deciding that this poster was too plain, but yet again simplicity can also be a good thing. After a couple of days I decided I couldn't stick with it because I wanted to create something that was complex and creative.

For my final project I first began with the text. I followed a tutorial to help me create the 3D text with the glowing blue and green flares coming off of it to give it a unique effect.

First I rendered clouds with one pink and one blue overlay and then I used an abstract paintbrush throughout.

Next I tried flipping the pink overlay on top of the blue.

Then I tried making a more darker grunge kind of look to it which I truly liked.

I felt the center was just too empty so I added a few brush marks.

I then decided that it would be cool to add this 3D text into my original poster and see what it looked like. I really like it but the image didn't really pop out like I wanted.

I then went back to the blue and pink style because it made a good contrast with the bluish-green logo to help make it pop out for the viewer.

I decided that I needed to get rid of the spottiness of the clouds because it was taking away from the focus of the main element in the middle. Then I added a picture from a nude beach I walked by in Miami Haulover, Beach and edited it to make a fun statement rather than its traditional statement (ATTENTION BEYOND THIS POINT YOU MAY ENCOUNTER NUDE BATHERS). I was hoping that people would get a kick out of the addition of the altered sign especially with the actual hidden meaning behind it. I then completed the poster by adding the CMU logo, the website, and contact number.

The next project I worked on was for my Facebook cover image. I was tired of using images created by other people especially now that I have the ability of creating my own finally :). I used these color combinations because I wanted to give off the impression of the ocean under a setting sun because if I had the opportunity I would live ocean-side and be completely content.

I thought the jellyfish took away from the logo so I got rid of it and added and abstract feel to it with a graininess to add texture to the image. Finally I added my website below so people can check it out.

*Note these next 5 designs below came from someone else's poster project because we did an in class alteration project. The guy that made this design originally had a bright green grid and bright green words to follow the images. Our assignment was for each of us students to switch computers and alter someone else's final poster project 5 times and below are my creations.

For the first three I decided that it would make sense to use the internal colors of the smart object (the triangular forms) to add a kind of flow throughout the images.

With these two I rendered clouds to overlay the poster and changed the colors. I also changed the smart object to give it a shadow and more of a shine on the one to the left. On the right I gave it more of a crisp shadow, but I took out the bevel emboss and lightened the opacity to give the object a more transparent look. I'd really like to learn how he created those smart objects so I can create some projects of my own.

This image I took at around 4 in the morning a couple of days ago because I originally started out with and photo from a point and shoot which looked really dull and didn't have many details. In the color image I clearly had shadows under my eyes, so I lightened it up in the B&W version of it. Okay enough rambling, I used this photo for a project in my Color and Composition class where we had to use Adobe Illustrator and create a Live Trace of the image and then we used Live Paint to fill the image. The colors schemes we could use varied from analogous, complementary, split complementary, etc. For this first one I chose complementary colors. The reason it isn't just two colors is because we were allowed to use shades of that particular color. I chose blue and orange because the are my favorite and happen to be complementary to each other.

Below are some images from my Intro to Photography class. These photos are from two separate projects. In each project I had to shoot thirty photos, but I picked my favorites to show you. The first project was to pick a object and shoot 30 different photos of it to give you a sense of the different angles and views you can create from just one scene.

This next project was to find short and long depth of field images. Depth of field is the difference between the nearest and furthest objects. A short depth of field is where the object is in focus in the frontal portion of the photo and the background is blurred while a long depth of field captures the entire image in focus. We used a setting which is Aperture Priority or (Av) on my Canon DSLR. I'll be honest, I had a very tough time with the settings when I went to shoot the images. Mainly it was because I chose to shoot my photos late at night so I wouldn't interrupt people in the mail room, club house, and the fitness center. I didn't know until the day after I shot the photos that I needed to have a lower aperture (meaning it would allow more light into the camera), so I tried to recover my images through Photoshop> Adobe Bridge> Camera Raw to get rid of the noise and brighten the image a bit. I ended up editing every single picture I had taken, which took quite a few hours to complete. Unfortunately the color contrasts are different from my PC compared to the Mac computers we used, so the photos came out to being a lot more yellow than I had imagined. But all in all, I am learning even though I may be a little slower at it than the rest of my class.

As for this weekend, I have no projects due besides the Live Trace/Live Paint project that I showed you above. I have a few projects due later in the month. One project will be a research paper on Paul Rand who is a very famous logo designer (abc, UPS, IBM, etc.). He bases his designs on simplicity which I really need to learn because I always want to add more and more. I haven't developed a mindset to just keep things simple because simple can be more effective in many cases. My new project I am starting in my Graphic Design class is a letterhead, envelope, and business card design. This one will be fun to work with because we have two options that are already set up for us which is a instrument shop specializing in guitars or a muffin shop. In my 3D Design class we will be working on a project that uses repetition, so I was considering creating a project that follows the Amway pyramid scheme using dollar signs in a pyramid formation. In the rest of my classes I need to catch up on all of the readings, so I'll be in the library all day tomorrow. I'm making this weekend purely a work weekend so I can get caught up. I didn't do too well on my first couple quizzes in my class, so I'm going to start making flash cards for all of these various terms that I'm learning each day. Its too overwhelming to try and remember them from just reading.

There is one more thing I would like to add. I got a Graphics Tablet from my parents for my birthday! Its a Wacom Intuos4 wireless tablet. I am so happy that I got this because this will greatly help me with my projects now and in the future.

I hope you enjoyed this post and I would be grateful for any suggestions or comments. If you have any questions whether its about my projects or any general questions then please do so. I'll be happy to answer them.

Let the Projects Begin!

2012-01-19T13:19:00.001-05:00

Its the second week of classes and we have already dove into and completed some projects for some of my classes. In my Color and Composition class we completed our first project and critiqued them already. We made a miniature 8x8 composition with cut outs of items from home. I used magazines, old wrappers, cup holders, etc. to get my colors. The projects ended up looking like miniature mosaics which were pretty cool. We also created two color wheels through Photoshop. One was a standard 12 color wheel and the other was a gradient color wheel.

Here is the tutorial for creating both color wheel's (tutorial by Lynda.com):

In my Graphic Design class we just finished a project of logos using our initials, but you had to distort them on Photoshop to create the initials into an object other than what would look like letters. We had to create ten logos and these are what I came up with.

I am already starting new projects in my classes so I'll be posting more pictures and designs soon! Have a great weekend!

Spring Semester Has Begun!

2012-01-12T18:45:00.001-05:00

I began my spring semester at CMU this past Monday and now my first week is almost over. The classes I'm taking right now are awesome and I've learned quite a bit in just the first week. I am taking Intro to Graphic Design, 3D Design, Intro to Photography, Color & Composition, and the History of Modern Design. The teachers are pretty cool and the awesome thing about taking all Art classes is that I'm taking more than on class with most people that are in my classes. I'm currently working on a logo using my initials in Graphic Design. The cool thing about this project is that you have to try and create a logo with the letters of your name, but instead of having the letters being legible, you have to create an object out of it to be your logo. I learned the controls for my DSLR camera which was very helpful because I had little to no knowledge at all about DSLR cameras. The other classes we haven't gotten too far into, but I'm sure they will develop into being good classes. So as for right now this semester is off to a good start. Once I complete my projects I'll likely upload them onto here for you all to see. I hope everyone is having a great start to the new year!

Its Been A While

2011-11-29T17:28:00.001-05:00

I have been very busy the past couple weeks with the semester winding down and I have a project due that is worth an exam grade for my ART 105 class. I went home this past weekend to celebrate Thanksgiving with my family (which was a nice and relaxing time) and came across my old portfolio that had work dating back from my Freshman year in high school to my Freshman year in college. I'll eventually snap a few pictures and upload them to the blog, but I have only put an hour of work into my project that is suppose to take 8-10 hours so I better get to it! I'm almost done with this semester at CMU, so I'll have plenty of time over break to learn more detail into the software programs. I'm excited! Take care.

Digital SLR Camera

2011-11-13T18:43:00.001-05:00

Its required for me to take a photography class in order to obtain my Graphic Design degree, so I decided to do some research on digital slr cameras (a camera is required for the course). I sent an email to my future professor and she gave me these two options for entry level photography.

Nikon D3100

Canon EOS T3

So I did some research and realized that those definitely are the best options and would be perfect for my degree program. I ran across a very useful guide on amazon.com that gives tips on what type of digital slr is useful for a graphic designer.

Check it out:

Buying a Digital SLR

Its Friday, Friday!

2011-11-11T12:55:00.001-05:00

I can't believe how fast this week blew by for me. I've been deeply concentrated on working with Photoshop and the past couple nights I've lost track of the time. I'd sit down shortly after dinner and start working and then I'd look at the clock and realize its midnight already. I've been focusing mostly on working with projects on the 99designs website because those are actual projects for companies and you can actually make money off of them. I have noticed that my skill is far inferior to the skills of a majority of the people in the contests, but I am learning from their work and from the design briefs for my future and that was all I intended. I think the work I have done so far will be great for my portfolio because, of the three projects I worked on, they were all on a very different spectrum of design.

The first project I worked on was a t-shirt design. This person wanted a unique t-shirt design for their company, so I submitted a few ideas using an image that they provided for anyone to use in the contest. I don't have much skill in women's t-shirt designing but I thought I'd give it a shot anyway.

The next project was to work on a poster for a company that organizes parties to sell makeup. I noticed that my skill was very inferior to the other competitors, but this was my first poster I have ever made using entirely Photoshop, so I learned quite a bit making this.

This final project was right down my alley. I had the opportunity to compete to create an application button for an online company and spent many hours creating different designs. I noticed I spent a lot more time on designing this than the others because this company interested me in the service that they provided. I need to learn to focus more time on designs that I may not necessarily have an interest in because any type of project could be given to me when I am actually in the field of work. Having a wide range of skill sets will set me apart from other designers that only have a specific skill set of design.

Spending this week on applying the skills I have learned was a great experience, but I realized I have so much more to learn to actually have the competitive edge against other designers. Most other designs were so much more intricate in the way they were created and I want to learn how they created their designs. This next week I'll go back to the drawing board and start viewing more tutorials rather than focusing my time on contests. I hope you like what I have done so far and please share any comments and/or tips you have for me. I'd be happy to hear from you. Talk to you all again soon!