Poster Project

'Ello. My poster project is now up under the BLAHjects page. Swoop in on that . . .

2nd and 3rd Erasures

As with all of my DMF1 projects, go to the "BLAHjects" tab on the home page to view them along with the descriptions/response. 

2nd

Original

 Erased

Original 

Erased

First Erasure

Original

Erasure

Reflection on Scratch Composition Assignment

Working with flat color was fun and challenging—in the best of ways. The absence of continuous color directs the viewer’s focus to the simple outline of an object, and working within the “confines” of that simplicity is wonderful. Simply wonderful. I like the idea of taking a step back and focusing on simple shapes and colors to convey a message. With the recent increase in the accessibility of cameras that shoot in HD and deliver photos bursting with colors and detail, we have found ourselves bombarded with loud and complex photography; thus this assignment was refreshing for me.

All of my Scratch compositions were created with the intention of illustrating a scene that correlates to a memory of mine from or an idea of Ashland. In “The Guardian” I wanted to convey a large and colorful, yet slightly obscure being that sat up in the hills and watched over the town. Eventually I settled on a large bird that sat on Mt. Ashland and watched over the migrating birds. Working with simple shapes such as ovals and triangles, it was simple and effective to portray such a bird.

I employed simple shapes again in “Snow Angels” to set the scene with a snowy wonderland filled with sparse and simple trees. The stars in the night sky were made using only two triangles of varying scale. The “angels” were the most involved of anything in that composition—the wings took numerous vectors to create the look I was going for.

The final composition, of a full moon, is again set in Ashland but features a central and prominent full moon of pure white set against the black silhouettes of simple trees and mountains. I made this composition and later used it as a poster to advertise a full-moon bicycle ride around Ashland the same night. While this intention influenced my process, the simple colors and shapes allowed me to create an impactful and effective “poster” that garnered a decent amount of positive feedback.

I choose the colors that I used first to accurately represent the real-world thing that they were coloring, and second to (hopefully) work well with the surrounding color. Both of the first compositions were more realistic than stylized, though I put more thought into trying to use the same “family” of color in the third. Oranges and whites were used a plenty, with black being featured quite well, too. I thought that the small white bike wheels paralleled the large white moon well. 

Type Compositions Reflection

I had never used Photoshop before taking this course. The difference in scale between what I knew two weeks ago and what I know now compares rather well to my fifth type composition. That being said, I find it intuitive (at least on a Mac, can’t speak for the PC version) and incredibly fun. In design I have always loved it when there are enormous differences in scale and many of my composition represent that love. Everyone loves tiny things; I think we all yearn to be small again in someway.

Speaking of intuitive, working with layers wound up being just that. As I was working on these compositions, I realized that I delineate parts of my life into layers, too, though never exactly realized it. Working on bicycles can be similar to using Photoshop in that you can break the bicycle and its respective repairs down into tasks or layers. The background layer is cleaning all the dirt, dust, mud, road grime, etc. off to get it to a “working” base, of sorts. After that comes many other tasks, many of which need to be “applied” in a certain order because they interact with and affect the other tasks. Of course it is much easier to go back and change a layer in Photoshop than on a bicycle, but the general idea is the same. Naming the layers certainly helped, as did turning the visibility off and on when needed.

In most of my compositions, the letters wound up being the figures more than the ground, although in some they were both. I liked the idea of breathing life into an object that usually does not see any. The A’s in number four are supposed to be salmon swimming up stream, and the little A’s climbing the big one are obvious mobile and alive. I’ve always thought that little things have a tendency to look very much alive when juxtaposed with much, much larger things, as shown in number five and number two. Life is wherever we choose to find it and finding it in letters was exciting and fun.

(all of my projects and essays for DMF1 are also found under "BLAHjects for DMF1 under the header image!) 

SCRATCH Image #2: Snow Angels

SCRATCH Image 1 "The Guardian"

Composition 5

Composition 4

Composition 3

Composition 2