Day 19

Final day!! 

Today was the last day of Art 220 Concept Development. We concluded our class by celebrating and watching the videos we made about sustaining the earth to become a better place. Everyones videos made an impact, and it made me think twice about the lifestyle I have. I gained many skills from this class, like working more as a group, problem solving, and the many alternates in finding solutions as a group. My favorite problem solving obstacle we had to face as a class was the one where we played the game with this is a "who" a "what" a "bottle", etc. It was fun and challenging at the same time, but it made me realize we really need to work together to complete the game. 

Here's a link to the video I made for class. 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6LPpDxhCmg

Thanks Jimmy for the great class! 

Day 18

Seriously the question of what a designer is a question of controversy. Debating between a secretary of the English department can "design" a flyer and call her a designer is the right label. To an extent there is a design but it does not necessarily mean its done correctly using one serif and one san serif in a layout, or any other detail we pay attention to when designing a flyer.  In class we agreed that design consists factors of unsightliness, desirable, commercially successful, viable, and adds value (sometimes). Ultimately, design creates visual communication that is pleasing to the audience.

The Sirken Robinson TED TALK was something I won't forget, he is a very intelligent yet comical speaker I have watched on TED. What I gained out his talk was that creativity is as important as literacy, people grow with creativity. He also brought up the obvious question I have always asked myself and others around, why is art/dance always on the bottom of the totem pole?? It's the creative things in life that make an impact in peoples life as well as the basic things like Math or English. Why not give the same emphasis to art/dance as given to the basic fundamentals, shouldn't everyone get that chance? 

Day 17

Little rant in the beginning of class really caught my attention today, since I never really thought of why people buy Apple products. My response, why not. It looks cooler than a PC, its fast, I feel connected with my society,  the graphics are amazing for designers, and the list goes on... 

Watching short films on what AIGA is, is really informing and I didn't really know about it till now. I would see posters and signs around the art building and would just brush past them. Now that I have a brief background knowledge on what AIGA is, I want to get involved and see what I can gain out of it and what I can input into the graphic design world. AIGA originally stood for American Institute of Graphic Arts, but now its considered to be known as Professional Associating of Design. The oldest chapter is the LA chapter. It was founded by 14 people in 1914. It consists of 22,000 members, 64 chapters, and most of which are college students. The benefits designers gain is a sense of community, a place to share info, understand one another and respect. 

All this information was presented to us through lynda.com, I urge everyone to check out this website, its very beneficiary.  

Day 16

Today in class, we watched a short film about "Relative of size of things and the and effect of adding another zero" by Charles and Ray Eames  that was narrated by James Franco. Charles and Ray Eames are known to be a famous design team. I had seen the clip before in middle school, high school, and when I went to PCC. For some reason I can't stop looking at it even though I have seen it numerous times. Everytime I get a different message out of it.  The message behind it is simply beautiful and genius. I would have never thought of representing the universe the way it was presented to get a feeling of relative size in such detail. 

Now thinking about the final project, how or why does the topic I chose make a difference in sustaining the earth in a positive way? This is just one of the questions i thought of when I finalized on what my topic should be. Who my audience is? What visual material am I going to use? What song is going to be playing in the background? These are the problems I need to find solutions to. Let the brainstorming begin! 

Day 15

3 SHOT STORY...

Thinking of a story and relating it to an audience to understand the concept is complicated to represent in 3 shots. Hence the problem we had to solve in class today. We divided into groups of 3 and had to work together, and come up with a story line in 30 min. Afterwards the class had to decide which 3 shot story communicated the best. Whichever group got the most tallies, that group won a prize. My group was the fortunate group to win this contest in class since we had a clear simple message in our 3 shot story. It was about a man and a woman meeting, falling in love, then having a family of their own at the end.

We were introduced our final to create a 2-3 min video that has to do with sustainability with the earth, people, or/and environment. Im thinking of doing something that has to do with water or air pollution, I'm not sure yet. 

Day 14

Can you say mind blown? Todays introduction problem solving game was intense. It's a type of game where all of us need to work together and listen to one another to make the game flow without messing it up. Object of the game... LISTEN and pay attention to your surrounding and try not to get distracted. Communication is key in any group problem. 

Planning out a brief is what people use to communicate through paper about their company/project. Time, context, and ethics are valuable in this process. It is all about the experience a designer creates to keep the client/ audience satisfied. Designers like us should use a method known as S.W.O.T. Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, Threats. When thinking of what to write in a creative brief.  

Day 12 &13

Game Design Critique Days

During these two days, we spent a vast amount of time on everyone to give them feedback on their game concept. I'm grateful for having two days to do critiques because these critiques we do in class helps each of us grow individually as a better presenter and self confidence in our work. even though talking in front of the class can be nerve wrecking sometimes, I gain a lot out of it. Giving criticism is the best advice to give to people, saying it looks nice does not cut it, it does not help the person you say it to because it can always be better somehow. 

From the critiques I received from the class i learned that I need to be more patient with my audience I am selling my game to. Being clear, precise, and to the point is my goal in a presentation.  

Day 11

Gathering around the table and looking at original concepts for games was interesting. The fact that mostly everyone who presented stuck to the basic board game route was interesting since we live in a technology savvy community. And the usage of DICE was crazy. It is kind of hard to think of original ideas for games, but once the ideas are let out, the good ones come back to back, at least it did for me. While i was brainstorming for ideas, I too kept using a dice as a way to move a pawn or decide something, then I starting changing it up a bit so the games I create won't be boring. Hopefully the game I decide to stick with and present catches peoples attention and would want to play. 




Now for the game I am going to create, here's a preview of what it consists of...

Day 10

Game Day!!

Playing a game, and actually thinking of the concept of what the designers were thinking when creating this novelty game is difficult for me. At the end I suppose i was able to figure it out and balance the fun with the educational. The games I played were Catch Phrase and Cranium. Catch Phrase was confusing at first, my group tired a couple ways on how to play it, the first 10 min we played it was okay, and we were all going at a normal pace saying its a fun idea.. After when we googled on how to play with the actual rules, it was a very fun game. Very fast paced, pressured, it gave me anxiety at one point cuz I really wanted to win.
This comes to show that rules make everything happen in a game. When we put the boundaries to the game it made it all happen. When time was up, my group realized we were still playing and were really loud, cuz of how into it we got. Cranium was fun but it was too slow for me so I kept getting distracted easily. 






Looking at the new design for the game catch phrase makes so much more sense. 

Day 9

Who knew mind maps can be shown in several different ways... The main concept i got out of the whole Mind maps slideshow was to get everything out on the paper. The key point is to just do not think about it. The mind needs to be clear of the "stupid" ideas, in order for the good ideas to come out. This is why doodling helps, it gets the useless ideas out of your head, and lets the good ones out. Why aren't people implementing this in their creative process? I don't know, but it would be interesting how I can do when I use this method. 

Having to imagine a scenerio like winning a lotto was fun. I had so many ideas on what to do, how to use it, who to tell... I started drawing out my ideas after a certain point b/c I was tired of writing them out, even before Jimmy told us to draw stuff out after he had given us the task.  

Always important factor to keep in the back of your head when starting a project, BREATH!

Day 8

     There is not a perfect soul out there. If there is, then something is wrong. There can be points that come close to being almost perfect, but there is only so much a human mind can grasp. There will always be someone who is greater than another in something, while some are better at something while the other isn't. When these two people come together, they form a bond that makes products almost perfect. In the design world, things are done collaboratively. This is the only way a person can reach that "perfect" quality they are looking for. 

     The significant factors a group definitely has are to create, solve, understand, respond, and utilize. These five factors come from the "Designer of 2015 Competencies." No single designer is likely to have all these factors to its maximum usage. People may get inspired to reach to their full expectations by restricting themselves. This happens among us all because restriction brings creativity to an artist. This idea was brought to me through the movie, " Freedom on the Fence." 

Day 7

         Sitting back in class and listening to other people's stories of how they came to be a graphic design major was interesting. I did not know the possibilities of the problems people could run into. Listening as to how they overcome these problems, makes me feel I do when i think of my major. I am in it because I'm passionate and so are the rest of my classmates. We love what we do, and that is my we want to make a living out of it, no matter what obstacle comes our way, even if we struggle a bit at times, there will aways be a way to solve the problem. 

Day 6

     Who thinks of problems for a whole class to overcome? That's right Jimmy Moss. Todays group problem for the class was to alphabetize ourselves by our first name in a reasonable amount of time. It took us about 10 min to figure it out... I think we did okay given the fact that some people were still signing in as Jimmy prompted the class to solve this problem. 
     Jumping straight into the questions, where we got to see how Elizabeth Gilbert and Paula Scher use their creative method :

1. Have you experienced your own or other people's fear-based reactions to your creative education and career choices? 
- All the time! I still get asked this question on a daily bases. It may sound something like, " What possessed you to do something in art? Why not a doctor or a lawyer? That's where the money is..." 

2. How have you successfully overcome these reactions?
- The first thing I set straight is when they say "art." Yes my major is categorized as art but, my option is graphic design and visual communication. There are many directions one can go by majoring in art. The road I am currently taking is the designing aspect. As I explain to people the connection between the two, they see the passion I overflow with when explaining. It truly is something I feel one with when trying to figure out a problem for a design. 

3. What is your concept of your creative process?
- My concept for a creative process is similar to Paula Scher's process depending on my mood. When I'm in my zone, I come up with a few amazing ideas from the first few sketches, the rest usually come out not as creative, or it just doesn't have the oomph. This happens rarely. The other creative process is doing over 200 little thumbnails, then taking a step back and choosing my top five.  

4. How do you approach creating, making?
-When approaching to create something, it all depends on my mood. Sometimes I work with a group of people doing my work as I listen to music, then ask the people around me what they think ( I have been using this method more often). I also like to go to cafes and work on my designs and ask random people that know nothing about the concept and get their feedback, then backtrack it to the people who do understand the concept. (this method is always enticing because the feedback I get from the random people are always interesting and make me think twice about the choices I have made about my design layout.)

Day 5

I had never actually sat down and thought of who would design the back of a quarter. Let alone someone ask me the question, what do you think should be on the California quarter. A bear? The beach? the possibilities are endless as to what can be on the back of the quarter to represent California the proper way. Even though this topic wasn't part of Jimmy's lesson today, it was very enticing to think about. 

Jimmy had the whole class relax and focus on a made up story. Then draw the ending of it where each one of us opened a door that had our name on it. After looking around and seeing that many people found it creepy,adventurous, sci-fi,  a few including mine was far from the creepy stand point. It is fascinating to see how each and everyone heard the same story but had a different ending, having one little detail set off the whole mood of a story is a big deal. Imagining and coming up with different ideas is the key to having a successful outcome. Like always said "two head are better than one." 

Day 4

       When Stefan Sagmeister's TED talk was presented to our class, it made me think of the limits I can acheive as an individual. Sagmeister's plan to take a year off every 7 years is pure genius. It helps him sit back and recuperate all his ideas throughout the years, while he is taking the year off he generates new ideas and puts them to the limit each time. I kind of started using Sagmeister's mentality to take off time and unwind. I find it relaxing, and when I come back to start on my projects i feel energized and new when I look at the work I need to complete. Take the apple project for example, when I started working on it the first day i wanted to do 10 at once, as i got to the fifth one, i started getting bored. When I went back to it a few days later, I had many fresh ideas and actually wanted to complete the task. This concludes as a rationale at the end of it, I got inspiration throughout the days I  did not work on it, and was able to create. 

Day 3

       Todays introduction to class was extraordinary. I had never really done anything like that in a classroom, although I have done the exercise where everyone orders themselves according to birthdate at a seminar; having a larger group was definitely the challenge we all faced in the beginning. Once the process was figured out we just had to trust our gut. (Of course the class had completed the task perfectly.) By having to do this exercise as soon as class started, was  a form of a group problem solving. Which led to the main topic of todays lecture, "Design is a collaborative profession." It is the type of thing where, a group is needed to achieve great limits of goals. The process is what makes or breaks the solution. Once a consequence is set, the goals are easier to achieve such as money, grade, life, or simply making something better.  
       My favorite part of the discussion we had in class was about the tangent on parking garages. I thought it was ridiculous how a designer can mess something up such as placing an arrow on the floor, to guide one out/in a parking garage. GIven the fact that, it is their profession to know how to problem solve.   >_<

     

Day 2

     Visual Literacy was the focal point of our class today. I got to learn that images speak a million words. Looking at an image for 20 minutes is different than reading about the image for 20 min. When looking at the image itself, people get judgmental rather than focusing on the actual image itself quickly, but then we are able to focus on the nature of the image. The importance of communication is vital in the setting we grow in. When there is a comparison between color and black and white, that is another story within itself. Imagining a colored image to be black and white is interesting to me. In class, there was a bit of a dispute about it being more powerful when it is in color or black n white. It was in image where an American flag is folded around the casket, and is being lifted by the military in uniform, in honor of the deceased. This image is very powerful since it is in color, when i imagined it to be black and white I felt like it lost its power. The colors on the flag and the colors of the hats and belts according to rank was what made the image have that oomph. When it becomes black n white, that detail translates as all gray.  
     With these in mind, comics came to play a huge role in creating visual communication. Where people learn from everyone, follow no one, watch for patterns, and work like hell. It is a place where placing images instead of words, to create a story with emotion. After everyone in class drew there comic version of how they made it to CSULA, it made me think, if someone had written these out, I don't think they would've gotten the same impression from it as they did when they looked at them. Images gave it more of a personal touch. 

And so it begins!

     First day of class (art 220 Concept Development) was interesting and definitely rememberable. Instead of having a professor stand behind a desk and talk to the class, he came down to the same level as his students and talked to each and every student. When everyone was seated in a circular setting, each student was handed an index card where we listed our name, major, and the year we plan on graduating. By having these index cards passed around rather than the professor pick a name each time, it made the ice breaker game a little more personal. We started off with an ice breaker game where each person says 3 things about themselves but 1 of them is a lie and the rest of the class needs to figure out which 1 of the 3 is a lie. Some did great, where others were completely obvious when they lied. I felt caught off guard so mine was pretty lame.  

     This was a fun and creative way to start a quarter. After everyone had the chance to talk, we went over the syllabus. The one thing that stuck with me till now is the word, didactic. Jimmy (professor) used this word to explain to the class  that his teaching style for this class is not didactic; once he said this, all I can think in my mind was, "this class is going to be a challenge, but a fun one," it is one of those classes where I look back and say, "I can't believe I am capable of that." Looking forward to this quarter.