VIScom: semester reflection

for the first third of the semester, my goal was survival. plain and simple. it was about getting work done.

after the dot book, i was extremely disappointed with myself and the book. i realized that i was aiming and completion, and the work suffered as a result. from that point, i forced myself to not only get deliverables in, but to aim at making the smartest moves. i have a bit of minimalism in my blood, and i think one common approach throughout was conservatism. how can i say what i need to say using simple, clean, effective solutions. i think this especially served me well in the last project.

i think the next semester will be more about exploration. now that i have a bit of experience under my belt, i'd like to take more chances. try to branch out, especially with my analog skills. i'm jealous of some of my peers command over illustration, and i'd like to develop those skills in my work.

psyched.

VIScom: past project critique

though technically not a dead end iteration, i'd like to talk about one of my posters from project two...

this was my attempt to... push the envelope. one of the comments made during my midterm reviews with jamie and marty was to move outside the expected and to break out of my box more. where i'm proud of the attempt at introducing an analog element, the result is just... too much. the results i think crossed the line of taste. the "type" also isn't very legible. also, the connection between my line study and the photo has all but disappeared, which broke the goal of the poster.

VIScom: final statement

our haiku by robert smith:

in the falling snow
a laughing boy holds out his palms
till they are white

when going over the haiku, i felt that the haiku contained clues built in that hinted at the appropriate pacing of the animation. i thought about a boy holding out his palms until they are white, and the time that it would take for the snow to cover them. i applied that slower, dreamier feeling not only in the pacing, but in the transitions as well; making sure that no transition was too harsh, too jarring that it would knock the viewer out of this dreamy fog. almost every element enters and exits the stage via an alpha fade. i used a wipe to introduce text, and panned elements to create visual interest.

i also had the opportunity to break apart my icons because they contained separate shapes, i tried to take advantage of that opportunity in considering how those shapes enter and exit the stage in a way that best communicates the haiku, such as the footsteps entering one by one, the gloves covering the boys face, and the circle shapes exiting one by one so that the last shape is a sliver with the word "white" underneath before the screen blanks.

overall, i wanted to make a dream-like, contemplative animation that best exemplified the character of the haiku

VIScom: final haiku quicktime

 

song: "of the mountains" by dan deacon from bromst

check out dan deacon here and here

unfortunately, i haven't figured out how to transfer to quicktime without having the tracers.  the swf should have a clean transfer...

i honestly really enjoyed working in flash. yes, it was tedious and frustrating at times, but i enjoyed thinking in that extra dimension (time) as a designer. it was an interesting challenge to consider pacing and what that communicates to the viewer.

VIScom: taxonomy documentation

i really enjoyed working with sam. she was a task master! it was also great to get to know her better. i hadn't worked with her before, so it was a great opportunity...

VIScom: linear development

VIScom: Flash Terms

ALPHA seems to be the overall opacity of an object

KEYFRAME is an object that defines the starting and ending points of any smooth transition

SYMBOL can be any object or combination of objects, animation or a web button

TWEEN is the term for the transition between keyframes

...i think

VIScom: final haiku stills

visCOM: taxonomy book

because our items had such great narrative qualities, we thought we would begin there.

our haiku:

in the falling snow
a laughing boy holds out his palms
until they are white

our items:

stocking cap
wool sock
glove
cotton batting
sparkle felt
twig
hot chocolate
mug
marshmallows

we thought we would order our book based on how the items contextualize the haiku, and the order they would be employed in the narrative of the haiku. the little boy gets ready to go outside, so he puts on the stocking cap/wool socks/gloves.  he goes outside to play in the snow, represented by the cotton batting/sparkle felt/twig.  afterwards, he goes indoors to warm up with mug/hot chocolate/marshmallows.

from that order, we would group the marks made by that item based on how the marks were made- drag, twist, stamp, splatter etc.

the pages are folded 8 1/2 X 11

we decided on a coptic binding and laid out the book, arriving at four ligatures of four pages.

for the typography, we chose a roman garamond, and possibly an italic bodoni for accents

VIScom: haiku

sam and i, after spending a quite enjoyable time reading haiku, arrived at these gems:

In the falling snow

A laughing boy holds out his palms

Until they are white

 - robert white

Factory whistle screeching

this thousand-eyed body

sits in tall grass

 - paul reps

i like both of them quite a bit. the language in both pull the reader into the setting. they are also more... unique.  no raindrops on cherry blossoms or lily pads on a pond.  the second haiku even conveys a mechanical, insect-like movement in it that burns away any cliche tranquility.

VIScom: neighborhood poster iterations

1. overall, i think my pairings work well.  the connections are strong when viewed side by side.  in my compositions, however, i lose the pairings in a couple places in the first and third PnL compositions, as well as the third west side poster.  by incorporating more of the image, i could make a stronger link between the two worlds.

2. with the photographs, again i need to bring in more information to the composition.  my cropping is too tight and i loose some of the illustrative qualities of the area

3. the line studies i used are all photographed, manipulated line studies.  therefore, the edges are rough.  those qualities i can use to my advantage in providing a more seamless transition into the safari photos, but when viewed alone, need to be vectorized for a cleaner appearance.

4. i feel the type choice is appropriate.  critiques have been in scaling (overpowering in PnL #1 and west side #2) and case choice (all caps in the west side comps).  the integration of type into the composition is improved from the first round of iterations, but still needs to be resolved in downtown #1 and west side #3.

5. composition has been improved from the first round of iterations, now working more with the frame to create more excitement.  overall, i'm really proud of them.  in west side #3, i need to close the gap a bit more (though i don't want to merge the two sections.  i kind of like the anticipation of the line study sneaking up on the virgin mary while her back is turned...  not in a sinister way, but as far as creating tension goes).

6. the connection to the neighborhood is lost in the downtown compositions due to a lack of contextual information.  power and light works well because of the incorporation of the line study.  the two together actually provide more insight into the development of the district.  though maybe a bit literal and heavy handed, the image of the deteriorated virgin mary works well to describe the west side because of its strong latino cultural influence and the rough, low income underside of the neighborhood.

VIScom: photo safari/line study pairings round 2

curvilinear study
facade of bartle hall downtown









angular study
office building downtown

mural southwest boulevard
angular study









one of my favorite projects so far, simply because i love my city.  i've always looked forward to opportunities to represent my hometown, and these photo safaris are a great excuse to shed some light on the subtle beauties of kansas city.

interestingly, i actually had a very eye-opening experience shooting around southwest boulevard.  there was a piece of graffiti in the frame of a picture i was taking.  lining it up, a random guy walking down the street stopped me and asked me to not take a picture of the graffiti because it was a gang tag.  evidently within the week there had been a murder in the neighborhood, and these tags had gone up around the area as a sort of a stamp of authority.  he thought that by showing these them, it would be disrespectful to the families and the neighborhood as a whole.  he wasn't mean about it, but almost sad.

while we were talking, a gentleman who was working in the garage with the above virgin mary mural walked out.  the three of us talked about the history of the neighborhood.  though it has its quaint restaurants and bright colored facades, the neighborhood has had a lot of problems with crime and poverty over the last couple of decades.  in the 50s, southwest boulevard was a largely middle/lower income irish-catholic neighborhood with its own problems.  there was a large influx of mexican families over the next couple of decades.  according to the people i met, because of citizenship issues and other things, employment was near impossible for these families to come by.  to make do, the kids starting selling drugs.  while it might have immediately put food on the table, it sunk the neighborhood into a cycle of poverty and violence that it hasn't really been able to pull out of since.


the guy walking down the street was one of the people who brought his family to the neighborhood in the 70s.  the gentleman from the shop had been living in the area since the 50s, so both had a great perspective on how the neighborhood had developed.  i don't know how the project is going to shape up, but i would love to be able to focus on the southwest boulevard neighborhood.  i talked to the guys i met about the project, and they asked me to come by with the finished product.  so maybe there's a little more motivation with the third pairing above to make sure it's the one i get to focus on...

VIScom: 6 X 6 line studies

progression: black line decreasing in size.  groups of black lines growing.  white space between groups increasing

randomness:  pattern.  randomness in group spacing.

regularity:  progression within regularity.  decrease in black line.  decrease in white space.  regular spacing between groups creating pattern.

typeONE/VIScom: final word list

when beginning the book process, my initial subject was media personalities and their abuse of power...

more than anything, the subject fulfilled a homework assignment.

over the course of the project, i was unsatisfied with the the subject and couldn't identify with it's themes.  after talking to a junior about the book and his experience with the project last year, his suggestion was to use a theme that excited and interested you or the process could be a long, grueling process.

i knew i wanted my book to be a positive expression, rather than a book of grumbling and whining about the media.

"harmony" came to me through thinking about the visual forms i wanted to create...  sweeping, elegant curves in balanced compositions.  this brought me to:

harmony

balance
cooperation
symphony
congruence
vibration
synergy
order
oneness
tranquility




after review, many of my words were redundant and the theme itself was a little too vague to provide a clear concept.

i shifted my focus to the idea of harmony in the musical setting.  a lot of the terms, though used to describe musical expressions, provided a lot of visual cues.  the crossover interested me and brought me to:

harmony

consonance
balance
unison
resonance
construction
dissonance
symphony
root
simultaneous

viscom: readings and sagmeister video response

i see graphic design as an opportunity for influence; as a megaphone to amplify my ideas to a broader audience.  it's almost a secret language in which we as designers send our subversive agendas.  similarly, the readings suggest that graphic design is the filter through which information is fed through to the people, and that ultimately the designer is responsible for creating and setting the limitations of that filter.  based on the video, however, austrian born designer stefan sagmeister seems to be at the mercy of the design rather than the design at the mercy of the designer.  this passion, as well as a willingness to "have guts" in design, is evidently the key to great work.

viscom: why graphic design?

what drew me to graphic design was capitalism at its best...  product packaging, advertising, branding.  even as a kid i was asking myself why i was so attracted to a product or image.  

i'm not so proud to say it, but graphic design is a very eloquent power trip.  we use beauty and harmony as tools of influence.  that notion appeals to me...

viscom: example of graphic design

Opus 73 / Radio Nederland 1973/ Dick Elffers (from grainedit.com)

this record cover by dick elffers, employs examples of layering, in the dots on top of the circular patterns, as well as correspondence in the similar shape, size and color of the smaller dots