W E E K L Y . S U M M A R Y

WHAT I DID THIS WEEK:

• made an image from a poem
• posted about albums without sound
• made a design create - color splash
• talked about minimalism, design, and repetition
• design create 3
• design create 4
• made an original design project

This week went by much too fast. With finals sneaking around the corner, I've had a lot of preparation to do as well as basic everyday life obligations that always keep me on my toes. This section of the class has been my favorite thus far – I love working with, talking about, creating and discussing design. I've really enjoyed all of the media we've been working with as well as using photoshop (NOT Gimp). I think it's great that we can create completely new designs just from one image, which is exactly what photoshop allows us to do. In opening new doors to the world of design we can add to the never-ending field of creativity that we each individually contribute to.

original project - album without sound

So I really, really liked Eric Sena's Albums Without Sound project, and I decided I had to do one of my own. The instructions are on his Tumblr (side note - he followed me back!) and are fairly easy:

1. Go to wikipedia, click "Random Article" - Band name
2. Go to quotationspage.com and click "Random Quotes" - last 4 or 5 words are the album title
3. Go to Flickr and click "last seven days" - the third picture is the album cover

From then on, it's all up to you and your creativity! I went through this process and this ended up being the result...

I really like the picture that was chosen – I think it was called "A Soldier's Goodbye" or something like that. I especially like the cat because I love cats. The typeface works well with the image because it is rather simple and futuristic, while the actual photo is grainy and vintage. In contrasting these two themes I think I ended up with an album cover that really works.

d e s i g n create 4

The assignment for the fourth design create was to create a minimalist travel poster of your favorite or least favorite place. The Rackham building is my favorite building on campus, so I thought I would make a poster in it's honor. 

This was actually a little bit difficult to make mostly because, again, Gimp is so so hard to figure out – there isn't even a tool to make a triangle shape! Some of my corners are uneven and I think the last window on the right is placed a little bit off, but this is only because I could not figure out how to fix a lot of things, even after looking at gimp for so long. Anyways, my process was fairly simple:

1. Fill blue background
2. Make beige rectangle, add same-size rectangles to make the windows, color them gray
3. Make green rectangle
4. Make angled rectangles for sides of the roof by rotating them, color in with blue paintbrush to make seamless (this was the worst part)
5. Add text

Minimalism, Contrast, Repetition and Repetition

I think I have told you before that I am a minimalist.

For this reason, this part of our design unit was especially enjoyable for me. I spent a lot of time looking at minimalist images on flickr, google images, tumblr etc. and I honestly couldn't pick a favorite, so I have a couple example of minimalism that I really like that I will share with y'all.

Allard One on Flickr

airows on Tumblr

artssake on Tumblr

Let's start with the first image. There isn't a lot going on here, but the contrast of the blue and red definitely defines the image. Though it is pretty simple, the bold colors show a perfect example of how contrast can help a minimalist image. This image is compelling because we don't exactly know what is going on - where are these chairs, who previously sat in them, why are they here? From the dark edges and bright colors, we get almost an eerie feeling from this photo - again exemplified from the contrast. The two red chairs also help this image because they gives us one of the main design elements discussed from Williams: repetition. This repetition helps the image by giving it a bold blast of color and, as discussed by Williams, an element of recognition.

The next image doesn't contain much content, but I really enjoy it. Again, this is a prefect representation of Williams' discussion of both contrast and repetition. The same circles, same frame around the words, same font – repetition is a main theme of this image and ties it all together. The contrast is also very obvious. Like Williams discusses, "don't be a wimp about it"; either go big or go home. Don't contrast navy blue with royal blue, but instead contrast red with black, which is perfectly portrayed in this image.

This last image is probably one of my favorites. While there are plenty of different colors in this picture, they are all fairly similar and are repeated throughout the image – each square has (more or less) the same color scheme as the next. There is obviously repetition throughout the image, and this consistency helps bring the image together, once again bringing a sense of recognition to its viewers. The contrast is once again obviously by comparing each square to the next, since the colors contrast and compliment each other nicely.

All of these images are great representations of Williams' discussion of design through repetition and contrast. Each have repetition, or stick to a certain theme that evokes a feeling within the viewer, as well as a contrast that helps keep the image interesting, unique and beautiful.

Design Create - Color Splash

Ok, so did sort-of the inverse of the project, but I think this looks better than the other way around of color-splashing. I especially like the color of the rocks - I didn't even edit the color, they're really that bright!
This project wasn't too difficult to make. Here were my steps:

1. Selection tool (magic wand) > selected the fish
2. Split layers
3. While still selecting the fish layer, colors > grayscale
4. There you go!

This is as verbatim as I can fully remember (is that even english?), photoshop might have some different steps I missed along the way, but for the most part this was fairly simple.

albums without S O U N D

I really enjoy Eric Sena's style on all of his imaginary albums in Albums Without Sound. I also think the whole process that takes place in order to make these is so unique – a great excuse to get creative. While it was hard for me to pick a favorite album cover, I did manage to find one I really liked:

When it comes to design, I'm what you might call a "geometric minimalist" – a term I just invented. I really like shapes, lines, patterns, small details, curves...you get the idea. First of all, I think the colors in this cover are spot on. Complimentary colors (yellow and blue) obviously work really well together, so I really love how the artist chose to match these colors together (I don't know if he altered the image or not, but either way they work really well). 

The typeface is also very interesting. I love unconventional fonts, but really don't like when they're tacky, hard to read, and unoriginal. This font is exactly the opposite: the triangles being used to make up the letters end up forming an intricate, interesting pattern to look at, the words are not hard to read, and the transparency of the letters makes them look light, pleasant and almost fragile. The triangles also work well with the large yellow one , and the smaller one reflecting in. I really love the pattern inside the large yellow triangle – it reminds me of a corner of a building in Chicago that I really like.

I could definitely see this as a working album cover. It's pleasant to look at and beautifully simple, and I even think the artist name and album name sound completely legitimate. The relationship between the two also works really well, especially since "Yvonne Rudelatt" is an actual name that could definitely be an artist's name. 

Great cover filled with shapes, lines, and nice, complimentary colors; the perfect recipe for a perfect design.