Here's a Treat You All Might Enjoy

One thing I've been curious about over the last few months is seeing what out VisCom instructors' own portfolios contain; what do our teachers do as designers themselves outside of the educational field. What first began as a harmless Google search led me to find the personal designer site of none other than our good pal, Johnny Gialanella, founder of Machine Shop Design Co.

At first I thought it might be kind of fun to explore the site, but as I explored, I started to find some really pretty neat stuff. Turns out, Johnny from the Midwest does fidel around with projects similar to the ones we do in class. For example, here is an example of an infographic demonstrating the proper technique when it comes to making Beer Mac & Cheese.








Now something I've noticed about Mr. G's portfolio is that the majority of his work utilizes subtle textures and pastel/desaturated color palettes.  This poster above is a great example of these traits, as well as the combination of multiple typefaces. If you'll notice, the "Pasta" section uses the same blue texture in the background as the fill of the pot below it. The whole thing had a good, unified feel to it and there's nothing visibly out of place.


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As for his presentation, G uses a cement kind of background for multiple pieces, something we haven't seen much of, but an interesting and creative way of personalizing and connecting a variety of different subjects. The drop shadow helps make the logo pop, adding to the presentation.

I think that looking at John's work helps give us a sense of what to aim for, and it tells us a little bit about our professor. In my opinion, it's a great resource for brainstorming and designer's block.

NOTE:

All in favor of John making some Beer Macaroni and Cheese, please comment "Aye" below, in addition to your response!

Creattica: Design Inspiration

Creattica: Design Inspiration

So, Since most of us know about designspiration, i decided to forego using that as this weeks post and instead found a very similar site. (designspiration is pretty cool if you haven't seen it already. It reminds me of pinterest, except cooler because its for designers.) The Site I found is called Creattica. As said before it I very similar to Designspiration but it never hurts to have more sources for inspiration. I know a lot of us struggle trying to finding something to do when it comes to a project and I always turn to one of these sites. Mainly for a little help for an idea, but also to find what is cool and "hip" I guess is the word kids are using these days. I don't want to  make something out dated and i want to make something that is going to stand out to someone and go "wow, thats pretty neat". Right? It is. Thanks to these websites, you can get that wow factor and help you find something that is "pretty neat".

With Creattica, you can look at what is new on there website and just browse through the front page for ideas, you can look at stuff by category by just using the Explore button or you can search for anything or something specific. 

I think this website will definitely be a great source of inspiration for me but also something cool too look at and also what you can do with certain things and certain programs. Being able to just look at what someone has done in photo shop makes me want to try it out and see what I can do. It also helps fine a lot of similar designs too so that you can branch off of an idea you have and see what you can do with it. 

My favorite feature though is the wall papers. I do like inspiration but being able to download a new wallpaper is pretty sweet too. 

Glitch Art: A Beautiful Error

       Don't you hate it when either your television appears all fuzzy and glitchy?  Or when your computer has a malfunction?  Well I have recently discovered what the itch is about the art of glitch.  In the last 10 years Glitch art has started to become popular all over America!  It is where you take a digital file and distort the data or code in a way that manipulates the file to make it look like it is glitching on purpose.  By controlling the way the file is altered, you create a visually interesting appeal as can be seen in the picture to the right.  It usually consists of pixelated and of a wide variety of vivid, almost psychedelic-like colors.  Glitch art can either be moving or static.  Many designers and artists are starting to either replicate these happy accidents in either Photoshop or it can also be done in TextEdit.  A lot of great examples can also be found on Tumblr.

       As it can be seen, glitch art is not like your normal media.  Today in magazines, photos are in high definition and altered in a different way so that the models (mostly women) are slimmed down, tanner, and longer hair; what is deemed to be attractive in today's society.  Glitch art shows people that photos do not always need to appear "attractive" and is displayed in a new light where it can be thought of as beautiful and considered to be art.  If you open your eyes and look around, you can see true glitches on a daily basis.  This video below explains what glitch is, how you can make a glitch, and why it is considered to be art.  Enjoy!

      

Design Contracts-Resource #2

While browsing the recent articles of Smashing Magazine, I stumbled across this gem: The Collective Legal Guide for Designers (Contract Samples).  This article contains a list of project examples you may come across in your free lance work & examples of contracts specific to that type of work (web re-design, symbol set, graphic design project, etc.)  I think this is a great way to browse the contract that pertains to your needs in order to get a more specific & effective contract that works for you. Check it out & see what works for you!  Again, these are examples.  There is always room for modification.  Hope this is helpful.

20 Motivating Design Quotes

While using Stumbleupon, a giant mash-up of everything cool, I found this great article called "20 Motivating Design Quotes for Graphic Designers."Though a lot of them apply to artists in general, it really made me rethink how I design or how I came to want to design. A few definitely caught my attention and stirred up more thoughts than they probably should have.

"Every child is an artist. The problem is staying an artist when you grow up." Since I could hold a pen, I have been drawing in every single Disney book I had, on every wall in my house, and on all the tables up until mid-teens when I began to enter contests for drawing and painting. I know a lot of people that said they wanted to be an "artist" when they grow up when we were asked in elementary school, yet I am one of two in my graduating class of 120 kids to go on to pursue an art degree in college. I think a lot of people get the creativity pushed out of them because they "need" to pursue a more "realistic" career. For me, I'm glad I was able to stick with what I love and enjoy every minute of it (except for when I'm an hour before a deadline and only halfway done).

"Good design is all about making other designers feel like idiots because that idea wasn't theirs." Let's be real, whenever we present work, all of us see at least one design and think, "Why didn't I think of that?" It's part of making what seems to be obvious strengthened by good design and concepts.

"Those who do not want to imitate anything produce nothing." We all derive inspiration from somewhere and I know sometimes it feels like everything has already been done, but I love this quote because it shows how you need to find inspiration from something to create the wireframe for a design. It could be shapes, colors, textures, or anything that you see and moves you to create something even better by being influenced.

You should definitely check out the other quotes, they could make you rethink an idea so simple and inspire your designs!

The Designer's Toolbox: You Bring the Inspiration, They'll Worry About the Rest

Hey guys!

As designers, there are a lot of numbers and resources that we need to do our jobs well. Templates, dimensions, and conversion factors are all huge necessities that can be as hard to find and scattered as they are essential. They're not all that creative or overly-interesting, but without them our jobs would be a lot harder.

For designers who wish they had one bookmark to point them in the direction of these essentials, The Designer's Toolbox may be the answer! You can find envelope sizes, examples of different styles of binding, web standard dimensions, and more on this sweet website!

The DVD/CD Label Resource on Designer's Toolbox

It'd be a rough task to list out all of the things that make this website so handy, but make a point to follow the above link and check it out for yourself! It's made my bookmarks list, and I hope it'll make yours too!

The Infamous Third Dimension

 Can a graphic designer be a sculptor?

  This is a bit more of something I'd like to open up to debate rather than a commentary on a particular style. Everybody loves good design and everybody loves good typography but something that I feel is somehow inherently implied with both of these is that there are only two dimensions to them. Typography is almost always done on simply an x and y axis much in the same way a graphic image is. I've seen examples of people like Stefan Sagmeister do astounding things with three dimensional design but other than him I'm afraid I don't have many popular examples. The images I provided are ones I had to go and find but I'm afraid I don't know the artists.
  I suppose what I'd like to know is, at what point is a sculpture a design? At what level does the classical "art" of paintings, statues, and the like become simply design? Does the old Italian argument of "Colorito vs. Designo" come into play? Is Graphic Design exclusively limited to graphics? I'd like to think not and I'd also like to think that they can be concurrent on a great many levels. I'm not the most skilled artist nor the most talented with computers but sculpting and working with a z axis is something I truly love doing. I can't seem to find many places that find that kind of design anything other than experimental though. I would love to be proved wrong on that.
  You could say I have a bit of an old fashioned mind on this subject thinking that sculpture lasts longer than painting but to be honest, they add a sort of flair and intrigue that out cities and citizens need more of. Can a graphic designer work exclusively in 3d and still be called so? Let's start and argument in the comments–all technicalities are considered.

Shoe Art by Sloth

This is Timmy Hamm AKA SLOTH.  He is a young talented artist/designer from the north Phoenix area.  Sloth first started off as a graffiti artist hitting walls all over the valley and moved onto tagging trucker hats and shoes for his friends from school.  I first saw his work when I was into graffiti while living in central Phoenix years back and noticed his unique style and how different it was from all the other surrounding pieces.  I’ve followed this guys work for a few years now and watched him progress into a self made designer who has a brilliant way of marketing himself and landing amazing gigs designing for companies the likes of Vans and Red Bull (click the link to see his process of painting the shoes).  

His style is really unique and different compared to so many other designers of this day and age and his personality really shows through his work.  There is something inspiring about someone who found something they love doing and has turned that passion into a profitable business and has fun while doing it.  As a of recently he has become completely self employed as an artist and designer and is a one man army behind the Sloth tag and business.  Hope you enjoy his work as much as I do.

You can follow his blog here

Hand Drawn Type (and why it needs publicity)

   I've always been infinitely jealous of people who have this talent. To be able to render words with the clarity of a machine is a skill that I don't think is nearly publicized enough. When we are younger, good penmanship is always stressed but never for the right reasons. We have to lean cursive and honestly, how useful was it? Compare that to this for just a second and think, "That looks way cooler and could definitely be useful to me now." Hand typography and calligraphy are like lost arts in today's society and that just bothers me. I wish there was a class somewhere in this school where we could learn how to do this because it just blows me away with the level of detail. I'm assuming the key to it comes from lots and lots of practice along with having reasonable artistic skills.
   There are scores upon scores of blogs and such on Tumblr that can give you more examples of beautiful work like this. We as the next generation of designers should try and spread awareness of just how awesome this skill is and try to do it ourselves. Before this class I had no idea how much effort was put into the creation of words and letters. People outside of our field find this science and craft typically boring or confusing so it should become part of our responsibility to show just how awesome and important all of this is. If everyone in the world had just a little bit of this skill, we will have drastically reduced the number of chicken-scratch writers out there, myself included.

What Font Should I Use?

            I found this awesome article on Smashing Magazine called “What Font Should I Use?” It has some key points & reminders for graphic designers when choosing fonts.  First off a little bit about Smashing Magazine; It is a website that publishes articles mostly on web design, but is not limited to, for designers to come & read for some insight.  I find it very useful not only to just browse articles & see if one appeals or applies to you but also to search for examples for your own inspiration.  There is also a breakdown of subcategories in the left column of the website if you want to browse particular areas of design.  I think this website is another great reference for any designer for inspiration or insight into parts of the design world.

            Now about the article “What Font Should I Use?”  I think this article is a good reminder for designers of how & why we should choose the fonts we do depending on what it is for.  I thought one good point was how designers need to know the types of font families (geometric, humanist, old style, transitional, modern, and slab serif) in order for a better understanding & application of these fonts to our work.  I think as designers we a care more about the feeling & mood the font conveys(which don’t get me wrong is important) for the particular piece & forget the importance of having a fundamental understanding of the fonts structures as well.  This is also important for the next point they make with mixing fonts.  I like the key part of this point: “keep it exactly the same, or change it a lot.”  Sometimes it can be challenging deciding which fonts to mix together & why.  This fundamental point is always good to have as a guide in the back of your mind when placing fonts together.  Overall I think this article is a very useful reminder of the basics of choosing fonts & is a good reference that I think designers should reread from time to time to keep themselves in check!

Street Art Influence on Graphic Design 5644

 Since I was 16, I've had a huge draw towards street art and graffiti. The medium has grown immensely in the past decade incorporating several real life issues into street art to educate the public in a more "hands-on" way with politic and coroporate issues that may otherwise go unseen. I often feel cliche mentioning that my favorite street artist is Banksy, but his work is so original and fascinating and conveys some of the deepest meanings that street art has ever seen.
Now that I am working in the graphic design field, I find myself pulling inspiration and stylistic elements from street art into my projects. I enjoy the simplicity and bluntness that street artists use to get their point across and i often try to incorporate the straightforward attitude into my design pieces. I recently read this article which interviews Australian street artist/ graphic designer, Water, and I found a lot of connections in the way he describes the relation between his two passions. I hope you guys find a little inspiration in not only the article, but Banksy and the street art style as a whole. (If you find this interesting, I HIGHLY recommend the documentary "Exit Through The Gift Shop")