Game Day (4/27/11)

Wednesday’s class was very fun and exciting. I was looking forward to class because it was Game Day. I brought in two games, Trivial Pursuit the Disney Version and Memory the Disney Version. If you can’t already tell, I am a Disney fan.  The first game I played was Uno. A classic card game which I haven’t played in a long time. There were a total of four people who played Uno. We only ended up playing one game because our game seemed to go on forever. Anytime one person got down to one card, they either didn’t have the correct card to move forward or someone threw down a “Draw Two” card or a “Draw Four” card so that they couldn’t get rid of their last card. I didn’t see a theme to Uno, but the process is to try and eliminate your opponent by having them draw up as many cards as possible or skipping their turn with a “Skip” card so that they miss their turn to get rid of one of their cards. I think Uno is a very fun game because I always find myself smiling when I play that game. It’s the fun of having your opponent draw up a lot of cards because the more they have, the less likely they’ll win. Also, you have to sort of be strategic with which cards you throw down. For me, I like to try and hold on to the specialty cards so that I can use them against my opponent when I see that their number of cards is dwindling down to a very small amount. I can then throw out a “Draw Two” which gives me an advantage to try and win the game. But also, this came is more of a chance game because if you don’t have all the given colors, Red, Blue, Yellow and Green, then the probability of you winning is lowered because if the a color is thrown down and you don’t have that color or the same card number, you have to keep picking up cards from the draw pile until you can move. So it’s a back and forth game, you just never know who’s going to win and the game can drag on for a very long time.

The second game I played was Sequence. I have never played that game before Wednesday. It turned out that my other two opponents never played the game before either. So we read the directions and started to play. At first, to me it seemed like a strange game, but as we started playing I got the hang of it and it turned out to be a fun game. It is a board game and card game mashed together. You use a regular deck of cards and each person gets six cards. Then with the game board, you have a specific color marker. Each time you throw down a card, you place your marker on that same card on the board, for example the nine of diamonds. The object of the game is to get five of your markers in a row on the board. Five in a row is considered a Sequence.  So it’s a game of chance yet with strategy as well. You have to carefully place your markers on the board in areas where you’ll be able to connect five of your markers in a row. But you never know which card you’ll pick up which makes winning a game of chance.

Our homework for Monday is to visually create nine games of our own. It sounds very challenging but at the same time fun. It also sounds like a lot of hard work but a challenge is always a good thing. I’ve already started drawing out a few ideas. Some seem good and some already seem bad but it’s a good learning process. Can’t wait to see what I come up with!

7 Deadly Sins (4/25/11)

On Monday, our class discussion was on games. What do games involve? How many types of games are there? Do they have a theme? When it comes to games, I don’t think about these questions at all. All I can think of is having fun when it comes to games and playing them. So what makes a good or bad game? Sometimes when a game has too many rules or regulations, it can be dull and boring. Other games involve a lot of activity and therefore can be very fun an exciting. This is something for our class to think about because our future homework assignment will be to create our own game. But for now, our homework assignment is to bring in a game on Wednesday for Game Day. The game we decide o bring in needs to be a multi-player game. We will be able to play those games and by playing them, learn the process of the game and what makes it a good or bad game.

For the remainder of the class, we went over our homework assignment, which was assigned on April 20^th. Our assignment was to bring in seven images each representing one the seven deadly sins. Honestly, I didn’t know all of the deadly sins and had to look up the meaning of each sin before starting. I used Google Search as a tool to find my images. It turns out that a fellow classmate also used the same image I did for the sin Envy. But I was not the only person who had repeated images in class. A lot of other students had the same images used to describe a deadly sin. Other than the one repeated image I had, I was very happy with all the images I chose. I thought that all my chosen images described the sins very thoroughly. As we went through everyone’s selections in class, I enjoyed seeing what other people chose as their images because everyone had a different view on what each sin represented. There were only a few images where I didn’t quite understand which sin the image represented.  But for the most part everyone understood the assignment and I think that it was a success as a class. Next time around, if we have another assignment that involves looking for images, I will try and stay away from Google Search and use other sources to search for my images.

The Design Process – Stage 3: Conceptualization

Conceptualization is the time where brainstorming is a large part of the process. This stage is also the time where the concept of the project needs to be visually presented so that the end user, fabricators, fellow designers, and the client can clearly see and understand the final result. When working on creating a new product, the designer usually has an idea in mind and needs to expand on that idea. The idea may not always be easily described because it may be something that has never been created before. When a designer has little information to work with, they need to rely on their ability to see the project in its totality. Here is where the designer needs to focus on filling in the gaps. This is where brainstorming plays a large role. A designer can brainstorm alone or in a group. Either way can be beneficial. I believe that brainstorming in a group is more beneficial because you have help from others and more opinions. Every person thinks differently and in that sense, everyone has their own creative ideas that can help move a project along. When brainstorming always ask questions like What? Why? How? It’s also a very good idea to write down all ideas or even have the brainstorming session recorded. Ideas will always be passed around and maybe one idea won’t sound good for this specific project but it can be useful for a future project. Never criticize ideas or have a negative attitude toward the project. It’s also a good idea to come up with as many ideas as possible. The more ideas, the better. A helpful tool for brainstorming can be using concept/mind maps. Other good advice is to keep a design journal and a sketchbook. The sketchbook is a good idea to keep on you all the time so that you can always be able to write or draw your thoughts and ideas.

Once you’ve brainstormed, it’s time to visually express those ideas so that they can be presented in a clear manner so that the end user, fabricators, fellow designers, and the client can understand it. Good ways to describe an idea is to a simile, metaphor, or analogy. Presenting the project is probably the most important step in the third stage because you want to make sure that your audience clearly understands the idea and “will see a plan for a solution of the design problem” (Aspelund 89). A designer needs to make sure that they cover all the elements of the concept and that they are excited about the project. A lot of visuals are helpful as a tool because words may not always be as understanding as images are.

The conceptualization stage is the phase where the designer really needs to get the project rolling and organized. Brainstorming is important in organizing the project in a sense that it allows the designer to create a structure for the project which includes form, function, materials and fabrication. It is the time where the designer can perceive the project in its entirety.

Aspelund, Karl. The Design Process. Second Edition. New York: Fairchild Books, 2010. 89. Print.

Storytelling and Simplicity (4/20/11)

The theme for this week’s class was still storytelling. On Wednesday morning, we laid out our homework assignment and walked around class looking at everyone’s work. The assignment was to choose three images that were unrelated to one another and that just by looking at the images in a certain order, it would tell a story. The majority of the images people chose did a very well job in conveying their stories. There were a few stories that Professor Jimmy chose and put them up on the wall. These were images that he didn’t quite get the concept of the story. We later on discussed them in class. For my images, I chose an empty plate, which looked like it had crumbs and sprinkles left on it, a curious looking girl, and an English bulldog lying on its stomach. I thought that this expressed a very cute story. There was an empty plate, a girl looking for her sweets, and a dog who looks like he’s/she’s very happy and possibly full. My images were one of the few that were put up on the wall. What I didn’t pay close attention to was what the curious girl was looking at. All I noticed was the curious girl. I didn’t pay attention to her surroundings. It turned out that she was looking at an oven door. Or more like looking to see what was cooking inside the oven. So when the images were put together, it didn’t quite make sense to have an empty plate, a girl looking into the oven, and a happy dog. Now, if I had cropped out the oven and only left the curious girl, it would have made a lot more sense. Some of my classmates understood the story. They thought that the little girl was looking through a window or screen door, looking for either the dog or for the missing sweets. I now know that I need to pay closer attention to my work and the images I choose. I want to be as clear as possible when I am telling a story. Especially when I am doing work for a client. I need to be extremely clear on what I communicate to them because I want to make sure that they fully understand me.

Also in class, Professor Moss shared with us a book called French Fries by Dennis Bernstein and Warren Lehrer. This book’s format is like no other book I’ve seen before. It is a very creatively made book. The story is written as a play and inside it has an enormous amount of graphic designs and typography. When reading the book, you know it’s a different person speaking because each person’s dialog has a specific font color and font face to represent him or her. When I tried to look for this book on Amazon.com, I was blown away by how expensive this book is. For a brand new book, its $1,100.00 and used is from $250.00. That is insane.

For the remainder of the class, we got the chance to watch another TED talk. The speaker’s name was John Maeda. His name did not sound familiar to me, so I Googled his name and found out that he is a world-renowned graphic designer, visual artist, computer scientist and educator. He is currently the President at Rhode Island School of Design (RISD). He wrote a booked called Laws of Simplicity. His talk was very intriguing. It really grabbed my attention and he was very funny too. He has definitely experimented with anything and everything a computer has to offer. It was hilarious that he scanned French fries and created an image of French fry fields, and he also scanned in cheetos to create cheetos graphics. His whole theme is based on simplicity but as people, we love complexity. He ran statistics on how humans and simplicity are intertwined. How humans want simplicity, to be able to enjoy more in life, and want less work, or less pain. Everything in life has its ups and downs. As we get older, our brain strength, physical strength, vision and social responsibility will all eventually start to decline. But the positive side is that our wisdom is always growing. Also by being able to be apart of the TED experience, wisdom goes up at an even higher rate. I would one-day love to be able to afford to go to a live TED talk. I think it would be a very enlightening experience. 

Storytelling Continues... (4/18/11)

Monday’s class was filled with activities. We first started off doing a group activity by rearranging our seats in chronological order based on each person’s birthdates. Then we grouped up to do a story telling activity. Each person was instructed to select two random items they had and lay them out on the table. Our group had four people and so we had eight items total. Those eight items were a comb, lip balm, a leopard print wallet, ruler, sketch book, green flashlight, peach fusion tic tacs, and salad flavored pretzel snack. We were given 15 minutes to put together a great story and we had to incorporate our eight items into the story. It was a difficult start but once we came up with ideas, our story began to develop. We tried to stick to the normal elements a story has, which are to have a protagonist, an antagonist, theme, plot, conflict, and a resolution. We came up with a fantasy theme and gave our protagonist and antagonist names. From what we had to work with it was a good story. As for storytelling, I was the one who told our story. I felt like I didn’t do as good as a job as I could have. I may not be a good storyteller, but it is something that I know I need to work on. All the other groups also had great stories to tell. I enjoyed listening to all of them. They were all creatively awesome. Each story was very different. I remember the first story was a crime/murder story. The second story involved a chase between a thief and the victimized woman.  The last story was something out of the twilight zone. It was science fiction themed and very well told. It had a paranormal theme to it.

After our storytelling activity, we went over our homework assignment. It was to choose one phrase and then pick ten images that would change the meaning of that phrase. I chose the phrase “Never give up.” But I didn’t do a good job in changing the meaning of the phrase with the images I chose. The images I chose still related to the phrase, it didn’t quite change the meaning. I may not have entirely understood the assignment. As it turned out, I wasn’t the only one in class who didn’t understand. The whole class didn’t quite get the concept of the assignment. Some of our classmates’ works that we went over in class were able to change the meaning of the phrase, but only in a few images. Not all ten images changed the meaning of the phrase. Maybe at most three of the ten images changed the meaning. Because we didn’t do the assignment correctly, our homework is to redo this assignment and turn it in the following Monday. For some reason this assignment seems really challenging to me. I think that I need to take a different approach on how to do this assignment. I first started off with choosing a phrase and then the ten images that went with it. But this time around, I’ll choose the ten images first and then think of a good phrase.  This may or may not make a difference but at least I’m changing my process. It may just be beneficial for me in doing this.

EMERGE Closing Reception

On Saturday, April 16, 2011, I was able to go to Otis College of Art and Design on the west side of Los Angeles, for the EMERGE exhibition. It turns out that there were other exhibitions going on that day as well. One area was a very political exhibition called American Icons – Graphics of Patriotism & Dissent and the other was a photography exhibition. Professor Moss mentioned that going to the EMERGE exhibition would be a great experience because there are not very many exhibitions dedicated for graphic designers. This kind of exhibition is a once a year type of event. What I really liked about the event was that all the work displayed was by students from colleges and universities throughout the greater Los Angeles area. The area that they displayed all the work for EMERGE was sort of in this small back part of the exhibit. It was very crowded. I only saw two people I recognized there, Lauren from class and Rene from GAUGE. I said a quick hello to both of them. Rene was actually the person to tell me that the political exhibition was not a part of EMERGE. If he hadn’t told me that, I would have thought they were one in the same.

There was a variety of amazing work displayed from posters, photographs, booklets, a beer bottle display, music sleeves, letterheads and so on. One of the works that really caught my attention was a large scale piece where it had several images of women. Some of the woman’s portraits were made solely out of typography and the whole work was displayed in several pieces and was hung by wire or string. The work was in a way displayed in layers. Some pieces were a clear plastic plaque with text etched on it and it lay in a front of a portrait of a woman. They consisted of stories of women and the bad experiences they’ve had like rape or an abortion. It was very expressive.

All in all, I am glad I attended because I got to see a lot of great work. It really gave me an idea on how vast graphic design can be. Here are a few pictures I took while at the exhibition. 

From EMERGE:

From American Icons – Graphics of Patriotism & Dissent:

 

 

 

The Design Process – Stage 2: Identification

In stage two, Aspelund goes into great detail that designers’ main concerns should be problem solving, making decisions, and how to recognize and work with constraints. By being in this class, I have already learned that the main aspect of a designer is being able to come up with solutions to problems. The problem could be simple or complex, but still, it is the designer’s job to be able to solve the problem and be able to explain the solution. Communication is very important to a designer. This is because, when a designer works with a client, the client will not always be there to see the process on a day by day basis. So it is the designer’s job to keep the client involved and informed on a regular basis of what is happening with the project. The reason the designer was hired by the client is because the client has expectations and believes in the designer to execute their expectations. So if there are going to be changes to the project, there are going to be times when certain decisions will need to be made. For example, the first idea doesn’t seem to pan out, but there is another way to go forward, the designer has to be able to clearly communicate this to their client so that their client continues to be satisfied and will still be happy with the end result.

When working on a project, there are always going to be constraints. These constraints should first be looked at the start of each project. There are three areas in which constraints are determined by the needs and/or desires of the end user, designer and fabricator. Aspelund has an image of a mind map, or as it is called in the textbook, a concept map on these three constraints.

Within the designer’s constraints, are a series of other major constraints: information, time, materials, and budgets. A designer must be able to clearly identify these sub-constraints from the beginning of a project. I believe that the most important one is time management. Time on a project needs to be clearly mapped out so that there is enough time allotted per day on each task that needs to get completed. With the time management, other things also need to be factored in like daily distractions with phone calls, breaks, lunch time, and meetings with clients. Its also a good idea to make sure that the project is completed a day before the presentation day. Just in case there could be minor to last minute details to work on. The second most important constraint I would say is budgets. Once you have a budget, you can determine what types of materials you can or can’t use. Then lastly would be information. This would be the time to do your research on the project and the time to make several plans on the direction you want to take with the project. This is the time make decisions and to be sure that when you are communicating with the client, the information you provide is very clear and that the client fully understands what steps you are taking during the development of the project.

Other constraints can be unexpected. So always expect the unexpected because per Murphy’s Law, “Anything that can go wrong will” (Aspelund 51). If we keep in mind that unexpected things can occur and that things can go wrong, then we can try to reduce or even eliminate those problems.

Another good point that Aspelund brings up is sustainability. Aspelund goes to say, “To design for sustainability means to reject the notion that we can take what we think we need from Earth and its ecosystems without regard for future inhabitants” (Aspelund 57). “We must design products that are reused, recycled, or biodegradable at the end of their life-cycle” (Aspelund 59). Designers should take the initiative and really think about the materials they are using for their projects. In being the creator of a new product, they are also being conservative in using resources efficiently and effectively.

Aspelund, Karl. The Design Process. Second Edition. New York: Fairchild Books, 2010. 51, 57, 59. Print.

The Message an Image Conveys (4/13/11)

Our homework assignment to present on Wednesday morning was to choose a a simple image, and come up with ten words or short phrases that would change the meaning or the story of the image. We were to present our image on presentation board and have our ten words put into a clear pocket so that our words could be read easily. When class started on Wednesday morning, our assignment was presented to everyone in class. We gathered around each image and went over all ten words. Some words really did fit with the image, others did not. Fellow students also brought in new ideas of what words could fit the image. Some assignments were really well done, others were not. But it was a learning experience. To be able to see how words and images play and work with each other.  On Tuesday night, when I started on this project, I didn’t know what words to choose. I found a really awesome image in a magazine for Dr. Pepper’s Cherry Cola. In the advertisement, it already had the slogan, “Amazingly Smooth”. So I steered away from that and tried my best to pick out good words. The dictionary was very handy when working on this assignment. When it was time to look at my image in class, a lot of different ideas came up. My favorite was when Professor Moss said, “Edward’s Choice of Drink” and “Twilight Number Four” since I am a fan of the Twilight Saga books. I was even sorry I didn’t originally come up with those ideas. Another cool part was that when the image was flipped vertically, the story of the image changed again. It looked like a Volcano or possibly red smoke. 

The best image out of the group I would have to say was the gold fish in the glass tank which had a large shark fin strapped to it. Whoever chose that image came up with good words and short phrases. One phrase I can remember was “Rebel without a Cause”. There were many ways to spin around the story by playing with multiple words and phrases, even thought was just one image. 

After we finished going over our class work, Professor Moss brought in a series of advertisements that were similar to our assignment. They were advertisements that chose images and phrases that really made you think. The words and images really caught your attention and some were even humorous. But there was one image that Professor Moss singled out and pinned up on the wall. It was obviously an advertisement for Band-Aid. When I first looked at it, I automatically thought it was the hand of the Incredible Hulk. I related the image to that because in the advertisement, there is an image of a huge green hand with thick veins. On the index finger, there a band-aid wrapped around it. We spent a lot of time on this image, trying to dissect it and what it really meant. I thought of it as a representational image because we all know it’s an image of a hand, even though the hand is a green color. But we couldn’t figure out if the image was computer generated, real with make-up on, or a cartoon image by just looking at it. Just by observing the image, a classmate mentioned that to him, the hand was in a pose often used in the classical age, like the famous sculptures made by the Greeks and Romans. Another student pointed out that it looked like it was in the same position like the statue of David by Michelangelo. This conversation was really starting to build up. More people were starting to participate in the conversation. Then there was a revelation, someone said that the hand reminded her of Michelangelo’s painting in the Sistine Chapel. In the image, the green hand resembled the hand of God. That is what the company Band-Aid wanted to convey. That this flexible Band-Aid is so strong, it is strong enough for the hand of God. (And even the hand of the Incredible Hulk.) These two beings are thought of as being invincible, unable to be injured, sending its viewers a very powerful message indeed. I learned a lot from this one image. I don’t believe any normal person would really take the time to dissect the image. They would probably just assume it’s the hand of the Incredible Hulk because that is an image they can easily identify with. But sometimes it can be really fun and interesting to find out what direction the designer was going towards. That everything is creatively thought out and made for a reason.

Storytelling (4/11/11)

At one point in my life, I wanted to be a writer because I loved creating my own stories. I am a huge fan of fantasy and science fiction stories. But I never did go out and write an entire novel. I may still have some short stories I wrote, somewhere in storage but none of them were ever completed. When I go and think back to those days I used to write, I never did any sort of brainstorming or mind maps. I sort of just started writing away with whatever came to mind. As I look back now, I wonder if brainstorming or creating a mind map would have made a difference in completing my stories.

The reason I brought up how I once wanted to be a writer is because yesterday’s class was all about storytelling. It was interesting how class started off in the morning. Our morning discussion was able to lead into the class topic on storytelling. Class started off with Professor Jimmy Moss asking a fellow student how her weekend was. She said she had the chance to visit an exhibition where it was a parody of Disney characters. Disney characters were drawn in a sort of twisted way from what they normally would look like. Artists were creatively expressing a different side to the normal happy, kind, and friendly characters. So Jimmy asked us, how is Disney so successful? We all know that Disney is an extremely successful multi-billion dollar company. They are the largest company in the world who has hired the most artists and designers. But how have they lasted so long? And what it comes down to is that Disney stays on a strict guideline as to how they convey their stories and their characters. Their characters appeal to children because they are not scary or indecent. They are cute, friendly, and funny. Disney has embedded this vision to their audience and has been extremely successful in keeping to their vision.

So after talking about Disney, we moved on to the topic of storytelling. What are the elements of a story? As we brainstormed in class, we came up with a lot of terminology involved with stories:

Beginning	Setting	Rising Action	Suspense	Sex
Middle	Plot (Plot Twist)	Theme	Experience	Different View Points
End	Mood	Metaphor/Symbolism	Interaction	Voices
Characters	Conflict	Relationships	Fantasy	Narrative
·       Protagonist	Climax	Moral	Tragedy	Biographical
·       Antagonist	Resolution	Expression	Romance
Cliffhanger	Gore	Humor	Dialog

After taking the time to write down all of these words, Professor Moss said all of our answers were correct. We then moved on to watch two videos on TED.com. The first video was Amy Tan, the author of the Joy Luck Club. The second video was Elizabeth Gilbert, the author of Eat Pray Love. I think the reason for watching these videos is to help prepare us for our final. Jimmy gave us a quick description of what it would be. It’s going to be a 5-minute video of our self, expressing how we create something from nothing.

As far as storytelling went, I enjoyed watching Elizabeth Gilbert’s video most. She didn’t use images from a PowerPoint presentation when she did her talk. She just spoke and in doing so, really captured my attention. It had to do a lot with her body language also. She walked around the stage a bit and as she spoke and used her hands as gestures when she spoke. But you never lost focus of her face as she spoke, she may have used hand gestures but her face and voice were the focal point. I really liked what she had to say as well. She was a very good motivational speaker. She talked about how her book Eat Pray Love has been such a “freakish success”. And now everyone is going up to her asking her if she is afraid that her next book will fail miserably or that her next piece will never be as good as Eat Pray Love. She admits that yes, she is afraid. She states that she is 40 years old and that her best work may already be behind her. But so what if that’s the case? She says that creative minds need to live, and not go down that dark road of feeling doomed or turn to drinking as a solution. Her motto is that she’s not going to let that stop her from working. We should all find a creative process, even if it is to get inspiration by talking to an invisible being, a  “genius”, as the Romans called them. Elizabeth Gilbert is going to continue to write and tells the rest of us that we should not be afraid, but continue to do our job, whatever it may be, and keep showing up.

This is extremely good advice to a designer because there are always going to be moments in our lives when we have “writer’s block”. When we have an idea in mind but are stuck in a sense that we don’t know how to get to the next steps. This is the best time to go back to where your inspiration originally came from and look at it again in a different way and get reinspired. With Amy Tan, during her entire talk, she had a bag on the floor in front of her. At the end of her talk, she revealed what was in the bag. It was what she called her muse, her inspiration. It turned out to be her dog. That is where her inspiration comes from. Not all of us will have a muse, but if we believe in the idea of a muse being something that’s real, then it gives our mind that extra creative boost we need in finding our ideas.