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Here are a few screencaps taken in the process of doing some of...

Wed, 15 Feb 2012 00:15:00 -0500

Here are a few screencaps taken in the process of doing some of my school projects! We have reading week in a few days so I’ll have some time later on to post final work as well as write an elaborate rationale as for why I had a photo of Professor Dumbledore open on Photoshop at almost two in the morning.

Yay cats!

I finally got off my ass and developed the first roll of film...

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 19:12:00 -0500

I finally got off my ass and developed the first roll of film from my recently purchased Olympus XA-1. I didn’t realize the lens had a fixed focus of around 7ft so most of my shots turned out blurry. It also doesn’t seem to like fluorescent lights as almost all of my indoor photos got this weird, greenish tinge. Note to self: only shoot with the XA-1 outside!

The first was taken from my bedroom window and the rest were taken around downtown Toronto. Please ignore that tiny red speck you see in a few of the shots; that was my scanner’s fault.

Here’s a special addition to my magazine collection:...

Sat, 28 Jan 2012 22:50:00 -0500

Here’s a special addition to my magazine collection: GRAPHIC is a bilingual design magazine published in Seoul, South Korea. What’s wonderful is that they take many liberties with the creation of each issue and are fearless with their treatment of type and image.

Inside you’ll see copy flipped and turned on its head; an issue that is spiral-bound while another is glossy with a book jacket that folds out; type that seem a little close to the edge but seem to work well that way.

This goes in hand with the style that GRAPHIC emulates—the style that originated in Switzerland in the 1940s or so—which is what makes it such a treasure.

Anyway, go to their site and flip through. They’re having a sale of the four issues I got!

Often the hardest part about being in any creative field, I...

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 00:44:02 -0500

Often the hardest part about being in any creative field, I think.

Some months ago I unearthed my baby book. It contains a bunch of...

Fri, 20 Jan 2012 21:06:00 -0500

Some months ago I unearthed my baby book. It contains a bunch of info such as my parents’ first thoughts about me (“Mama and Papa thought she was a baby boy. She’s heavier than her brother and sisters”), my favourite toys (“Squeeze ball, turtle, rattle, stuffed toys”), and my first words (“Papa, baba”).

The interesting stuff is the pages with my drawings, which were all done in 1998 when I was about 4. This was my very first sketchbook!

From all the misspelled names, you can see how much I struggled with writing the letter ‘Z’. Something else I noticed was that I was very fond of drawing tables, chairs, beds, triangles, stars, suns, and stick people with big heads and very short limbs.

On the second image you’ll see that my mom stuck a small envelope on the page labeled, “Hazel’s First Haircut”, which occurred on February 15th, 1995. My baby hair is still in there, by the way. Is that creepy or what?

As opposed to going out to buy a calendar for the new year, I...

Tue, 10 Jan 2012 12:00:00 -0500

As opposed to going out to buy a calendar for the new year, I decided to make it into a little side project to design one for every month of 2012.

To ring in the new year, I introduce to you this clean, unobtrusive January calendar which you can download and print out on plain, letter-sized paper (or colour paper if you’re feeling adventurous).

Ten points goes to those of you who know which typefaces I used! Hint: I use two of them on my blog theme. Am I becoming too predictable? (yes.)

I was feeling unusually crafty yesterday evening and came up...

Sun, 08 Jan 2012 12:00:00 -0500

The end result!

Find a journal with an elastic band.

Examine the binding.

Rip the first page from the front paper.

Rip the cloth that holds the pages.

Do the same for the back.

Cut the front endpaper.

Glue the front endpaper to back.

Make sure it closes easily.

Voila!

I was feeling unusually crafty yesterday evening and came up with a way to repurpose an old book as a cover for my new eReader.

My last eReader broke from being crushed under a few textbooks so you could say this was born out of paranoia coupled with a desire to be frugal instead of spending $20+ on the covers they sell in stores (which look terribly bland, by the way).

Here’s how I went about it:

Find a small hardcover notebook with an elastic band. Mine was actually an old weekly calendar from Chapters which just so happened to be the perfect size to hold my Kobo. Be sure to test that the device is snug when held by the elastic band. Finding the right fit is the most important step! Second most important is finding a stylish cover.
Examine the binding. By doing this you’ll see how the pages are attached to the hardcover itself. I noticed that in mine, the pages inside the book are held up by the front endpaper (the red paper in between the first page and the cover).
Say a small prayer to the bookbinding gods and rip the front page from the front endpaper. Just close your eyes, brace yourself, and rip! Kind of like waxing.
Cut through the cloth holding the pages together. You can easily rip it with your hands but it’s neater with scissors and feels less blasphemous that way.
Do the same for the back. Say another prayer to the bookbinding gods and tell yourself that you’re ripping up a book for a very good reason.
Cut the front endpaper. This is to hide the unsightly look of the spine. Be sure it’s long enough to bridge over the spine. Using an x-acto knife, a ruler and a cutting mat would probably be helpful at this stage.
Glue the front endpaper to the back endpaper. I used rubber cement to stick it on but other types of glue will work too.
Cover the gaping wound and be sure it closes easily. Don’t make the same mistake I did by gluing the endpaper to the spine! It won’t trigger the end of the world but it’ll be a bit stiff.
Tuck in your eReader and give yourself a pat on the back. Aww, look how cute it looks!

Advice to Sink in Slowly is an ongoing series of posters...

Mon, 02 Jan 2012 17:50:38 -0500

by Eleni Kalorkoti

by Richard Dinnis

by Rebecca Cobb

by Lizzy Stewart

by Coralie Bickford-Smith

by Cat Hayward

Advice to Sink in Slowly is an ongoing series of posters designed by graduates for the purpose of passing on advice and inspiration to first year students.

Although illustrators and designers are the people creating these posters, a lot of the posters also apply to those outside of art school, such as “Eat Breakfast”, “Remember to Breathe”, and “Casual Sex is Overrated”.

One of my favorites is Frank Chimero’s advice zine which you can print out to keep in your pocket for when you’re in doubt.

(via Brain Pickings)

I was trying to write out a list of resolutions for the new year...

Sat, 31 Dec 2011 00:57:38 -0500

I was trying to write out a list of resolutions for the new year but I think this piece by Erin Hanson of Recovering Lazyholic says it all.

Cheers to a better year!

Just finished watching Beginners a second ago and I loved the...

Sun, 04 Dec 2011 00:44:00 -0500

Just finished watching Beginners a second ago and I loved the whole soundtrack. Sweet, simple keys.

Here’s more first year work from my Communication Design 1...

Sat, 03 Dec 2011 21:20:11 -0500

Logo.

Logo with full name of the shop.

Exterior signage.

Front of business card.

Back of business card.

Here’s more first year work from my Communication Design 1 class! We were tasked with redesigning the logo of an existing print shop called Print & Graphic Depot. In addition to that, we had to show how the new logo would be utilized in things such as business cards, exterior signage, interior poster, envelopes, and invoice forms.

In creating this logo, I thought of conveying the idea of a depot or a depository (a place where things are stored) by having the letterforms essentially “hold” the colour ink used for printing (CMYK). I modified the counter of the ampersand to look like a droplet of yellow ink.

I wanted a logo that, when repeated, could make a nice pattern and be used as a design element for the business card and the envelope.

In my last post, you can see a shot of some of the process work I went through to reach this solution.

Aside: I’m not totally happy with what I did with the envelope design, invoice form and interior poster just yet so I’m going to do a bit more fine-tuning and then I’ll post the updated version up here.

Just a few quick shots of things I’ve been working on for...

Tue, 22 Nov 2011 02:13:00 -0500

Just a few quick shots of things I’ve been working on for these last few weeks of first semester. I think it’s a good idea to keep a documentation of the “in-between” stage from time to time. Will keep this in mind next sem.

At this point, everyone at school looks like they’ve neglected showering, sleeping and eating. But this is art school, so I guess that isn’t really out of the ordinary.

The end is nigh! Let gooooo!

ckck: A Specimen by William Caslon, Letter-Founder, circa 1728....

Fri, 18 Nov 2011 00:10:07 -0500

ckck:

A Specimen by William Caslon, Letter-Founder, circa 1728. View bigger!

I try not to reblog as much as I can on this blog but I almost pissed myself staring at the bigger version. Typography is a truly beautiful thing.

For my Communication Design 1 class, we were asked to design a...

Wed, 16 Nov 2011 00:01:00 -0500

Spirit Tree Apple Sauce

Spirit Tree Croutons

Spirit Tree Apple Cider

Spirit Tree Bread

For my Communication Design 1 class, we were asked to design a new logo for Spirit Tree Estate Cidery as well as develop a set of branding standards/guidelines for the labels of four of their products by redesigning them.

The logo (click images to get a closer look) shows an apple and a droplet of apple cider, which is what this company is known for. I made a subtle reference to the “spirit trees” by creating a tree bark line design that would unify the set of labels. They’re a fairly new company so I didn’t want to have the labels appear too traditional but I also wanted a “local homegrown farm” feel so I chose the typeface Caecilia in two weights and Clarendon for the wordmark.

Instead of purchasing stock photos, I went and took some of my own. So what you see here are the croutons, bread and apple juice (which looked close enough to cider) that came right out of my own pantry!
We didn’t have any apple sauce at home and I didn’t want to buy a jar of it that no one in my family would eat, so I ended up making my own homemade sauce with some apples lying around. Turns out they’re not that hard to make! I used this recipe.

I was actually really surprised at how well my photos turned out! Special thanks goes out to Justin Buenaflor for lending me his DSLR.

The Sore Thumb

Sun, 13 Nov 2011 15:45:00 -0500

As I walked into my living room this morning something caught my eye amid the teetering pile of unread newspapers, flyers and catalogs which are ever-present in my home. Can you spot it? It’s quite…spotty.

Upon closer inspection, it turned out to be a holiday catalog for the Real Canadian Superstore. Aside from the fact that it is way too early to be thinking about Christmas, it’s a pretty top-notch catalog and a great example of how design can make people look twice.

In the grand world of design, it’s by no means revolutionary. But when it sits beside other paper ephemera it stands out like a sore thumb (a very pretty sore thumb, that is).

Unlike the flyers on the right, it isn’t bloated with photos of products and copy set in starkly different typefaces. It’s apparent that a specific set of rules were devised to unify each page—from colours to art direction to body/heading type—and the result is a catalog that, in it simplicity, is very pleasing to the eye.

More like…”TOO MUCH IS OFTEN TOO MUCH”.

Since I really enjoyed writing this post, expect more like it under the new design spotting tag! I find that as I’m learning more about design, I’m becoming increasingly aware of it around me and I think deconstructing it through blog posts will help me become better at it in the long-run.

I’ve tried to research the people responsible for the design of this catalog but it’s proving to be more difficult than I thought. Let me know if you know?

As evidenced by my last post, I’ve been really down in the...

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 16:09:00 -0500

As evidenced by my last post, I’ve been really down in the dumps as of late. But I’m happy to say that in small ways, things are finally looking up! Not only is my class cancelled tomorrow but this Creative Mornings session with Jake Nickell (co-founder of Threadless.com) really has me feeling pumped about this idea I have…

Needless to say, it feels really good to be excited about something again :)

When people ask me how design school has been, I tell them that...

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 20:18:00 -0400

When people ask me how design school has been, I tell them that it’s been tiring. Some days I feel inspired and grateful to be at OCAD studying graphic design, other days I feel frustrated and I question whether this is all worth it. But mostly I’ve been tired.

It’s hard to feel enthusiastic about school when it’s so draining. But I guess this is all just part of the transitional period from high school to college. Here’s hoping that by second semester I learn to cope better!

This illustration by Jeff Hamada is so apt because my sister actually pointed out how dark the bags under my eyes are getting. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry…

I wanted this blog to become an ongoing journal of all the...

Sun, 16 Oct 2011 03:13:00 -0400

I wanted this blog to become an ongoing journal of all the things I learn and experience in the process of going through design school and so far, I haven’t really been doing this. My bad! I hope to rectify this as I adjust better to school and the growing workload. But enough about me—let’s talk about this image!

My Typography 1 professor included this in her lecture about type classification last week and it kind of made my heart jump (despite my sleep deprivation, lack of satisfaction regarding the work I handed in late and self-loathing because I love my prof and I really really could have done better on it and see what design school is doing to me?!). These covers were really gorgeous, but I understand that T Magazine has stopped designing their covers this way, which is quite unfortunate.

Here’s a brief type history lesson from the article itself (written in 2009):

In an age when the rest of the world has given up on Blackletter typography, also known as Old English or Fraktur lettering style, newspapers haven’t. Newspapers began using Blackletter for their nameplates around the mid-19th century because it printed dark and dense, important when printing on crude groundwood paper. The letter forms also had an air of authority and incontestable truth about them, as if taken from ancient manuscripts hand-drawn by scribes or a bible set with movable type carved by Johannes Gutenberg himself.
Interestingly, the New York Times “T” Magazine, the ultimate word on contemporary fashion and design, did not try to buck tradition and choose a 21st century font when it began publishing in 2004. Instead, it let artists and designers reimagine its Blackletter “T” logo in their chosen medium. For many of us, the “T” art has become the favorite feature of the magazine.

— “Making Blackletter Hot!”

This is an excerpt from a documentary titled, Lessons for the...

Wed, 28 Sep 2011 15:35:00 -0400

This is an excerpt from a documentary titled, Lessons for the Living which “reveals a unique subculture of Hospice volunteers as they reflect on their experiences and philosophies of life and death.”

Kathleen, the woman in the video, was both a hospice volunteer and patient. I think her attitude towards this touchy subject is one we don’t hear about often. Instead of hoping to somehow evade death, she was at peace with her mortality and yet refused to let it get her down.

You can watch the trailer on the website and while you’re there, you can watch another though-provoking excerpt by Mark, who started volunteering at the age of 18.

MAKING FRIENDS: OCAD Attracts A Variety of People

Sun, 04 Sep 2011 01:36:00 -0400

I recently got my own copy of the school agenda book from OCAD University—which is the art and design school I’m attending this year—and this was one of the guidelines published within. I thought it was funny (and true for the most part), so I’m posting it here.

Kudos goes out to the OCAD Student Union for making such a well-designed, not to mention highly entertaining, agenda book.

Here it is verbatim:

At first glance one is likely to say to themselves, “Wow, what a bunch of hipsters.” The truth is, we’re not hipsters, we’re the people hip have been trying to emulate. OCAD faculty, by means of an interview process hand picks certain kinds of students. By the time we arrive at OCAD U the majority of us fit into one of the following denominations:

DO-IT-YOURSELFERS: This rag-tag group is pretty easy to spot; self-patched clothing and homemade jewelry or accessories such as woolen hats and scarves. These are the most likely people to give you a birthday present so make sure you share your favourite colour with them, else you end up with a pair of beige woolen mittens.

THRIFTIES: If you’re having a hard time spotting these folks, think to yourself, “What would my grandpa wear if he were my age?” Floral patterns and paisley are key to any thrifty’s heart. These are the people most likely to be seen on campus with a fedora or a pair of leather shoes. They’re also the most likely to be seen in a Goodwill or Value Village.

FASHION CENTRIC: Essentially the living, breathing American Apparel ad, the fashion centric are the most likely on campus to have clean and pressed clothing. As every article of clothing, down to the socks, is obviously fresh from a designer sweatshop, your first superficial crush at OCAD U is surely going to be one of these kids. You’ll either learn to dig a little deeper in your affections or you’ll be surprised to find a great person under that fashionista exterior.

VEGANS: A disproportionate amount of OCAD U’s vegans have dreadlocks, so they’re pretty easy to find. Another way to tell if someone is vegan is the hemp accessories and clothing. If you’re trying to impress one of them, refrain from wearing that leather jacket, then hold the bacon at Karine’s. A common mistake at OCAD is offering the kid with the dreadlocks your joint before offering it to anyone else. Don’t just assume they’re into Rasta culture, start with a conversation on the environment or something. If you’re looking for these kids outside of school, try Kensington Park.

ACCIDENTAL “HIPSTER”: Though they definitely can’t be called a “hipster”, they sure as hell look like one! Don’t be fooled by the plaid flannel shirt, thick-framed glasses and bicycle cap; these kids are simply victims of circumstance. Sure they’re likely to be seen at a house party drinking tall cans of Pabst, but that’s just cause it’s cheap, okay?!