End of the Year Sophomore Reflection for Graphic Design

Over the semester in Graphic Design, we did many things to become stronger with not only our design skills, but our technology, collaboration, communication, project management, and leadership skills. Being in this class helped build those skills by having us do different activities such as, presenting our work to the class, giving criticism to our classmates, creating and updating a Bechance portfolio, having an organized server folder with all our work in it, and helping others to improve by giving constructive criticism. We also spent a lot of time, well, working with graphic design. Here I am going to reflect over the many projects we did this semester.

Nelson Art Museum Poster

Our first project was to create a poster for a fake event at the Nelson Art Museum. The event was supposed to be for a art showcase of a famous artist or movement. I chose constructivism as my movement. This took a while to do, as I had to do research over the constructivism movement before I could begin working in the style. Figuring out how to relate the Nelson Art Museum to constructivism was hard, but I managed. While creating this, I learned that a lot of current art movements are inspired by constructivism, and they utilize a lot of constructivism's main properties. I was told by my teacher and by my peers that it looked almost like a movie poster, and that the layout of the poster was really well done.  I'm really proud of how this project came out in the end. I feel like it follows the constructivism style well, and that it gives the information for the event in a clear and concise way.

Quote Typography

Our next project was centered around typography. We were to look up four quotes that we really enjoy or relate to, and then make a typography artboard for each quote. I had a lot of trouble finding quotes that I liked, so I chose two from a video game that I really like, and two silly ones from some YouTubers that I watch. Along the way I learned about how type should be arranged and that certain color schemes work better with certain pieces of art. Next time I do a project like this I might try to take it a little more seriously and choose some better quotes, but I don't have all day to look up a quote I like. I didn't really like this project. I'm not a huge fan of typography, since there are so many rules that have to be followed, and a lot of precise things like kerning and different fonts.

Company Rebrand Logo 

One of our more recent projects was to rebrand a local company's logo. First we had to come up with a bunch of symbols that we thought fit the company, and then we had to come up with some lettermarks that also fit the company. Once we found the symbols and letter marks that we liked, we had to combine them to make black and white logos. This was a long project that involved researching our company to get to know what they're about and then figuring out how we could a design a logo to fit the company's purpose. I had a hard time brainstorming the first symbols we made, as we had to make a total of 30 symbols. I thought this was a little ridiculous, and it quickly turned into busywork. After we had the six symbols we liked, we had to make 6 different versions of each symbol with different color schemes, resulting in a grand total of 36 different combination logos. Usually by this point we are supposed to narrow down our choices, but instead we just had too much on our hands. However, I feel like I learned to be more patient with this project. I was getting tired of doodling meaningless logos and switching around color schemes, but I managed to make my way through. I really didn't like doing this project, but I'm happy with my final results. I feel like my logos were thought out, original, and they fit the company brand.

Business Card, Letterhead, and Envelope

This project was our final project of the year. It involved taking our favorite combination logo from our previous project, and creating a business card, letterhead, and envelope for the company that we're working on. I enjoyed this project a lot more since we didn't have to create a billion different versions of the same thing. I feel like we had a lot more creative freedom with this project, too. I did have a little bit of a hard time figuring out the information that goes on the business card, however. I was told by my peers that the pattern on the back of the business card was cute, and that the borders on the letterhead helped guide the eyes towards the actual words that may be written on the paper. I'm pleased with both the process and the outcome of this project, as I had fun and I think my designs are well done.

Over the semester in Graphic Design, I had some productivity issues. I got all my stuff turned in, but I was easily distracted by my friends. Finishing early was hit or miss for me; I either worked on extra credit assignments or worked on my own graphic design stuff, or I talked with my friends. I did, however, work outside of class in Illustrator at home if I really wanted to do more work on a certain project.

I feel like I have a strong sense of design. I'm proud of most of my projects, and I try to help others who need help making a design look the way they want.

I just really need to improve attention span. I need to find some way to stop myself from getting distracted.

Overall, Graphic Design was probably my favorite class this year. I loved getting to create art digitally. I would probably change the amount of busy work we're given, though. My biggest take-away is that all art has value, whether you're a professional in the work-force or a sophomore in high school. For next year I'd like to become less distracted so I can get more work done. I'm really excited for next year, since I'll get to learn more about graphic design.

End of the Year Sophomore Reflection for Animation

Sophomore animation was, overall, very stressful. But I had a lot of fun in the class. My teacher was really great and the projects were interesting.

I learned a lot over the entire year. In e-Comm, we have five "guarantees":
Technology, Collaboration, Communication, Project Management, and Leadership.

• From technology, I effectively learned how to use Adobe After Effects and Maya to make 2D and 3D animations. We were taught these programs through various tutorials that taught us the basics of each program. This information is useful because I may need to make animations for various jobs. Learning After Effects was stressful, since there were so many different options for different things in After Effects.
• From Collaboration, I learned to better communicate with others to get group projects done through making a short animated movie with four other people. Learning to work with others is important because it happens a lot in many different careers, and if you can't work with others then you won't get very far in your career. I had a lot of issues working with others since I tend to be more shy towards those I don't know. e-Comm is helping me get over this though,
• I learned kind of the same stuff from Communication that I learned in Collaboration. I learned to better communicate with others over projects, even if they weren't collaborative. Even if you aren't working with others, it's good to get the insight of peers so you can have a better perspective of where you're going. It's hard to reach out to the people you don't know and ask for criticism, since you never know what they're going to say.
• Project Management taught me how to be better at keeping my files organized. Keeping a server folder and having to make sure all my files were in the right place, especially when working with After Effects helped me learn to be more organized. Being unorganized is one of the most stressful things that can happen to a person, so it's important to keep your things straight. I didn't really face many organization issues, since I'm already a rather well organized person.
• Leadership is probably the one I learned the least from. I'm a follower by nature, and it's difficult for me to take hold of a situation for others. I'm having a hard time thinking of any leadership skills that I learned. This is troubling to me since being a leader is a really good skill to have, even if it's hard to achieve.

I've also discovered some strengths and weaknesses while taking this class. I tend to get easily distracted by my friends or other schoolwork. However, I am also a fast learner, and even when I get behind I tend to catch up rather quickly. Since this class was very stressful, I've learned to manage stress more easily and take more breaks. I still need to work on not getting distracted, though.

With everything I learned this year, I'm probably going to try and apply animation to some of my works in Graphic Design next year. Having an animated graphic could add to the interest of it.

I would probably change the order we learn some of our major skills in. We learned special effects after we finished learning Maya, but since special effects is done in After Effects, it would make more sense to learn special effects while learning After Effects.

Overall, I really enjoyed this class. I feel like it taught me to be independent, but at the same time to rely on others for help and criticism when I need it.

Graphic Design Reflection 2016

What did I do this semester?

Raccoon

Our first Illustrator project was to follow a tutorial to create a raccoon, and then make the raccoon our own by adding various different decorations and accents. Then, we incorporated our raccoon into a postcard. This took a couple weeks to complete since learning Illustrator takes a while, and designing a post card can take a lot of time and effort. Sometimes when I was using certain pathfinder tools, Illustrator just wouldn't cooperate, and I would have to find some other way around. Along the way I learned how to use a bunch of different Illustrator tools, such as path finder tools and warp effects. My peers told me that they really liked my post card, and that it was really cute. Eventually, though, I had to change the background because when it came back from being printed it was too light and it was hard to see some of the other things on the card. Overall I'm really proud of the work I did on my raccoon, and it's one of my favorite projects

Vector Portait Challenge

After we had completed our self portrait vectors, we were told to choose another person or animal that we liked, and then we had to create a vector portrait of whatever we chose. I chose a shiba inu, because they're one of my favorite dog breeds. This took my a couple days since by then I had figured out how to use Illustrator, and it was also a small project. One of my biggest challenges was getting all of the "polygons" lined up so there weren't any see-through spots on the dog. Along the way I learned how to create "low-poly" pictures in Illustrator. My friends told me that they thought it was super cute, and when I put it on another art website it became pretty popular for a little bit. I had to change some of the "polygons" since they weren't shaped like try polygons if you looked close enough, and that was bothering me. This is probably one of my best works in graphic design this year, and I'm really proud of it.

How did I use my time in class?

In class I really tried to maximize the amount of time I had in class, since there was so much to do with certain projects. I would often stay past the bell just to finish up whatever I was working on. If I finished a project early, we often had options for extra credit, so I would work on those projects. Outside of class I managed to get Illustrator at home and I really like messing around with Illustrator at home.

What are my strengths and weaknesses?

Strengths

I think that overall I'm really good at getting to work on my projects and finishing on time, and if I don't finish it on time, then I work hard to get it done as quickly as possible. I also feel like I learn quickly, and if you give me something new to do then I'll have no trouble picking it up.

Weaknesses

I often have a hard time coming up with inspiration. Almost all of my projects use the same or similar color scheme, and I feel like I could expand my horizons a little bit.

Summary

What did I love most about the semester?

I really loved just getting to use Illustrator more than I did last year. Last year I barely even got to learn how to use Illustrator, but now I know how to use it effectively.

What would I change?

I would probably change the amount of tutorials we had to do. Our teacher didn't really teach us anything, but she had us look at tutorials instead. I feel like if we had more time of our teacher actually teaching us, then our class might have done even better this semester.

Biggest take-away from the semester?

I learned a lot about project management this semester. I usually get really distracted when working on projects in other classes, but recently I've found that I've been able to just sit down and work better.

My goal for next semester.

My biggest goal is to be able to expand my design horizons. As I previously mentioned, most of my projects involve the same color schemes, and I'd like to change that.

Final thoughts.

I just feel like I've been really productive this semester. I'm super proud of everything I've done, and I've learned a lot along the way.

Animation Portfolio Reflection 2016

Worm

One of the first projects we made in animation was using the puppet pin tool in After Effects. What we did was first draw a worm in Photoshop, and then import the image into After Effects. Then we used the puppet pin tool to apply spots where the worm could move, and used key frames to make it look like it was moving. I picked this project because it was the project that really taught me how after effects works with the key frames and such. I feel like I did a really good job on drawing the worm in Photoshop, but I could have done a better job on where I placed the puppet pins, because at some points in the animation the worm does some weird stuff with his body. With what I learned for this projects I'm probably going to try and use the puppet pin tool more, since I don't really use it that often. I really like this project because I like what I made the worm look like.

Walk Cycle

When we made our walk cycles I learned how to time animations and how to set up key frames for a walk cycle. I picked this project because I'm really proud of my characters design and the background. I feel like I did a lot of work on my character's design. I probably could have made her less stiff though, since she doesn't move a lot. I'm going to apply more walk cycles to my animations with what I learned when making this animation. This is probably one of my favorite projects, just because of my characters design and how much work I put into the whole animation.

Hammer

After we were done with After Effects, we started using Maya. The hammer wasn't my first Maya project, but it was probably our first major one. Here we learned how to use the multi cut tool and the extrude tool by making our hammer's head and the part that comes out on the back. I picked this project because even though it was stressful, I was really proud of what I had made in the end. My greatest strength with this project was probably making the nails, since I didn't have any instructions on how to make the nails; I just did it on my own. With what I learned here I'm able to use the extrude and multi cut tools more easily since I know how they work now.

Ice cream

When we made our ice cream, the only really new thing we learned was how to add bump maps to our materials, which adds a sense of depth and texture to your objects. We also learned how to animate in Maya, but that was pretty easy as it uses key frames just like After Effects did. We put the bump maps on the ice cream and the cones. For a while my bump maps would move awkwardly while it spun, so I needed to figure out how to make them spin with the rest of the objects. I feel like I could have done something to make the lighting better, since it's really dark in my scene. 

Pen

Our most recent project, and also part of our final, was to model the pen we were using to take notes in class. Luckily, I had a pretty easy pen to model. When I was making my pen, I didn't really learn anything new, since we were using skills we had already learned, but I may have figured out easier ways to do certain things. I picked this project because it's probably the thing I'm most proud of from this semester. I think I did a really good job on making the pen proportionate to what it looks like in real life, but I feel like I could have done a better job on making the clip part of the cap. Making this pen has really helped me be more independent in Maya, since we didn't have a tutorial or anything on how to make a pen, since we all had different pens.

Reflection Over e9

This blog post is dedicated to reflecting over what has happened over the past first year of my time in e-Comm. It will be long but it's good to reflect over what has happened, especially when you learn as much as I have in only a year of high school.

What have I learned?

Over the past year I learned many things about how to create digital media, such as videos, websites, animations, and graphics.In regards to animation, I learned first, how to use Photoshop and how to set it up for animation, and then I learned different techniques of animation. In video, I learned how to take different shots properly, and then edit those shots to make a video that looks nice and makes sense. We did web throughout all four quarters, and in web I learned how to use Dreamweaver to make html and CSS codes to make a website that has a good color scheme and doesn't look like a mess of poor coding. In graphic design, I learned more about color theory and how different elements of design work together to make something that looks nice.

How did I learn this?

I learned by listening to my teachers when they were giving demos and writing notes. I used my notes to help me along when I eventually got to make my own project. When I forgot how to do something, I could just look at my notes to help me figure out how to do something.

Why is it important?

This is important because these skills will help me through my next three years of high school and eventually help my in a computer career if I should choose one. These skills are also nice to have if you just feel like creating something, like I really like to use Photoshop to make different things like phone backgrounds and gifs.

What are my strengths and weaknesses?

I feel like my strengths lie in using Photoshop, whether it be for animation or graphic design. Photoshop was just made really easy to use, unlike Illustrator , which I feel like it was almost made to work against you, I'm so bad at it. I feel like I do an alright job in web design stuff, and video was never really my favorite thing.

What am I doing with what I have learned?

Most of what I do with these skills involves making edits and gifs in photoshop. I like to do this for things like different video games and T.V. shows and post them on websites like Tumblr and Twitter, or Facebook if I feel like showing my stuff to my family. (I'm not on Facebook, like at all.)

What would I change?

I would kind of like to change how we're taught. Sometimes teachers will sit there and demo for the entire hour and have us take notes, and it's just about as boring as watching paint dry. I appreciate being able to take notes, but maybe we could work WHILE the teacher demos, and take notes as we go, so maybe we have something more interesting to do? It's hard to figure things out because not everyone learns the same, but these are just my opinions.

In conclusion,  I really enjoyed my first year in e-Comm. My favorite part of e-Comm has to be working with Photoshop, since it's so easy to use and you can do so much with it. I feel like I've learned a lot, and that these skills will be useful in the years to come.

e-Comm Final Project: Product Creation

Color Vision Logo

Over the past several weeks we worked in groups to come up with a product and make graphics (logo, business cards, coupons, etc.) animation, website, and commercial to advertise our product

What was our product?

My team's product was a pair of glasses that allows people who are colorblind to see in color. Our team name was Color Vision, and we all worked together to make different attributes of our product.

Where did we excel? 

I felt like my team did best on our graphics. We each worked on different graphics, while I made the logo that would go on each of our different kinds of graphics.

Glasses made in SketchUp

Where did we struggle?

I felt like my team struggled the most with communication. We had group members that were gone often and we neglected to communicate that we would be gone, which made our group a little behind.

Things I would change or do differently:

Our group's commercial

I would really like to have the option to choose our groups; I didn't know a lot about the people in my group and being a shy person, I didn't open up a lot to them which I feel was a disadvantage.

How did I improve?

I feel like, despite being incredibly shy as previously mentioned, I did become a little bit better at working in groups. I have never liked working in groups because I'm one of those people who likes to have things my way, but I had to deal with that and go with other people's ideas.

The Orthogonal Cube

Orthogonal Cube

A super cool shape

The orthogonal cube is a super cool shape because it's so simple, yet incredibly iconic. It's sleek, an easy to make.

I'm not just going to talk about a shape, though

I really want to talk about the e-Comm. program and how incredible it is. In e-Comm you lean a ton about how computers work and different careers involving computers, such as animation, graphic design, web design, and video.

You start out in one of those strands, with web design put in throughout the program, and learn about that strand for a quarter, then move on to the next after that quarter.

Computer skills are important

You really learn a lot in the quarter you have with each strand, and sometimes you use skills from one strand, and apply them to the next. Even if you don't plan on going into a career based around computers, these skills can still be useful to know. Maybe you're making a business and you need to design a website, or a logo. Maybe you need to make a commercial for your business with an animation in it. You can also use skills from video to make that commercial.

Don't take special programs for granted

These programs are so helpful. From e-Comm. to Animal Health, all of these 21st Century programs can help you find a career, or provide job experience. It's smart to get into a class or program that provides real life experience and skills, because in the long run, you really will find those skills useful.

What is Graphic Design

Graphic Design is used in almost everything we do. It's used for advertisement, media, menus, brochures, comics, and so much more. Most people can find some relation to Graphic Design in everyday life.

Game Posters:

Monument Valley

One of my favorite things to do is play mobile games on my phone. Monument Valley's poster is a good example of a really great design to get people interested in a game. It's simplistic, has colors that look nice together, and a character with very little detail to them. The small amount of detail might get people curious and make them want to play the game to find out more.

What drew me to this game?

I thought the poster for this game was fascinating. It's simplistic, has colors that look nice together, and a character with very little detail to them. The small amount of detail on this character intrigued me since I've always been attached to minimalist-type objects.

Counting by 7s
by Holly Goldberg Sloan

Book Covers:

Books are another great example of graphic design's presence in every day life. Many people choose to pick up a book based simply on it's cover, which is a valid response since well design covers are one of the many things that draw people to a book.

Why did I read Counting by 7s?

As I said before, I'm attached to simple objects. The cover of this book really only consists of three colors: white, teal, and red. While the cover is very simple, the red pops out somewhat, which really made me notice it at the library.

Why does this matter?

As said before, people are drawn to what they find pretty. A well designed poster or cover can make people more likely to use your product. People try to find something they can relate to: whether it be colors they like, shapes, animals, certain settings, or maybe even just words.

e9 Promotional Video

What is this?

Recently in class you project was to make a promotional video for the Freshman class of e9. It was really fun because we got to go film around the school and in other classrooms so we could film friends that weren't in out own class!

What is it meant to do?

This video is meant to be shown to eight graders coming into e-Comm next year, and also their parents at an open house night where eight graders can come to learn about e-Comm. It was meant to be fun, for the eight graders, and informative, for their parents.

What could I have done better?

I feel like I could have gotten a lot more filming done. I had to reuse several clips, making it repetitive. Sometimes I could use different parts of the same clip, making it a little different, but other than that it's not that hard to see.

What do I like about it?

I really tried to edit the video to the voice over that goes along with it. Some parts acted kind of as a queue to start a new clip that fit with what our narrator was saying, which really helped edit it.

What's next?

This is likely our last project in the video strand of e9 for the year, and I will be moving on to graphic design soon. Video was really great because filming was a fun way to see the school, and editing was cool because we got to mess around with music and make a video that meant something.