Sketchbook Cover and Reflection

 

Overall I feel my sketches have improved through the semester. This can be seen best through the fruit still lives. The first sketch is done in pencil and has some shading but the shading really develops in sketch 6. Texture is also added into that sketch where it was not used in the previous one. My perspective seems to have improved from sketch 3 to sketch 10, with more accurate lines. I feel I can develop it even more through practice. My composition is strongest in sketch 4 and 9 with the use of the entire page. I still need to keep working into the shading and use of color in my sketches. Some of my line work needs improvement, but I have improved my skill with using a pen in sketching throughout this process. The flair pen is definitely my favorite sketching utensil now.

Process Poster

For this project the task was to create a poster of the process work from a project in another class in InDesign. The other project entailed making a 3D model of an abstracted room with a piece of furniture. The design idea was supposed to come from an artist of our choosing and the previous projects we had made, as well as a nature object. So for this project we had to show all the steps we went through to get to that final model including our concept statement. The poster had to employ color theory too. I started with a background knowing it would relate to the ocean, then went into finding a color theory. I decided on using a split complementary to blue, but when I used this on the text it showed up too dark so I tinted both the red-orange and the yellow-orange. For the grid layout I tried to find a way to make the photos of the shell line up better, but could not due to the object study. I found this layout was the best to show both to reasonable sizes. Originally I also had the 2D sketches smaller but there seemed to be too much open space in the middle of the poster then. I tried my best to match the blue in my study model to the image in the background, but could not use the sandy brown since it is not quote yellow orange. Then the yellow orange was too light against the right corner in the title so I decided to add a red-orange stroke around the lettering to help it stand out more. Overall I like how the poster turned out, but wished there had been a larger selection of fonts in InDesign. This one was closest to one I had on my personal computer, but I still feel it doesn't match as well.

Resume

For this design, we were to create a resume which included our logo and a background image. It is supposed to be well organized, readable and creatively designed. Originally I had the logo in the upper left and had my name and contact information in a block to the right of it, but I felt like it separated the pieces too much. So I moved them into this formation. Then when I added the background the logo's white space was too square and detracting. To solve that problem I added a gradient feather that diffused so it didn't stand out so much. I had tried to take out the white background all together but the logo blended too much into the background image. I feel now your eye first goes to the logo then across to my name, going down the page after that. The path in the background can then lead the reader back and can be symbolic of what is in the future. What I still do not like about the resume is that when printed the background image is more yellow than the green seen here.

Logo Design

For this design the task was to create a logo that reflects my design philosophy. Since nature is a big part of my design philosophy I started with a mind map of what I think of first when I think of nature as seen below. When I started creating my logo it mostly had trees as starting points for my name, then I though about trying to create an ocean type with my initials. Eventually I settled on a wolf created out of my initials howling at the world. I tried to display the fur like curves using the M in my initials and once I created the rest I realized I should try to add in fur quality near the face so I edited the K. For the moon/earth I started with the continents being a darker green but found they did not show enough contrast in gray scale and so I made it a brighter green. For the font for my name I thought a curvy or more decorated font would detract from the rest of the logo so I chose to go with a more straight forward typeface and edited the character height, width and spacing to make it more of what I wished for.