Rising from the ashes…

Comes a new me. Yes, I am back. Not that anyone noticed but I return with new aspirations and something I haven’t had in quite a while.

Hope.

Peace.

Joy.

After a lot of heartache and trials, I’ve decided to truly lean on Him. I don’t know what He has in store for me, but I know I won’t be alone.

I am no longer a graphic design major. And I won’t say what I’m now studying or much detail. I can say that I’m waiting. It’s been such a long and arduous journey that I’ve grown quite a bit.

Does this mean I will no longer use any skills that I learned previously? No. God can use them if He wants and I can use them for fun. I should also probably now show what I’ve done before.

Here’s my candy packages that I did my sophomore year. Each had to be a different flavor and I planned on the folded boxes creating 2/3 of a circle from above.

And then there's the new logo! I'm so glad with how it turned out. I’ve made a couple of changes to the previous one and I think it shows how much I have progressed in my tastes. Cartoony beginning, mature negative space, playful and colorful, and now straightened up.

So now my new banner is up and ready! Its supposed to be a ticket to a live screening/recording of the podcast I’ve always dreamed of. It might become real in the future and then I’ll tell you the meaning behind the name. And if you’re wondering, the dates and numbers have no significance. Did I mention that the banner at the top is a bit distorted/blurry. Yeah I tried to fix that but its the best I can do within the size limit. But here's the original banner and the stub for you to keep if the podcast ever happens.

Dorisa Will Take A While

This is the class that involves the story from my previous post about my hymnbook cover. For my Intro. to Modern Publication class we were supposed to create a series of direct mail items for a company/service of our choosing. Our company or service can be made up or a real (actual logo can be changed) and we had to use that same company/service throughout the semester in every project. I tried to continue my Pokemon direct mail sales letter from my Copy Writing class but my teacher said 'no'.

So after a couple of minutes of being depressed I decided I wanted to do my series of direct mail on a made-hotel from my script. Before I was kicked out of Media Productions I took Broadcast Writing. One of my scripts became a whole story (not-yet-told) and there was a hotel I made up called the Belvedere Hotel. One of my upcoming events for the Belvedere Hotel was the grand opening of their restaurant/lounge named Dorsia. Yep I never forgot about Dorsia.

Front (you may notice that I used some images from LA Noire)

He said that I had a good headline and a very nice design. I just need to change the contrast to work with the logotext.

I also need to cover up Elsa for my portfolio/artshow.

Back (I deleted some unnecessary text and fixed a spelling mistake)

He also said the back had a very nice design.

To keep up with the 1940s theme for my script I made the design use black and white with a dark red gradient as the main background. To add a bit of elegance and class I put a damask pattern in the background. The symbol I used in my logo was actually made in my Graphic Design class for a previous project and then I added the rest of the words later.

My Graphic Design teacher thought this looked pretty good.

The font I used for the symbol and logo was Andes. For my copy I used Caviar and sometimes Champagne & Limousines, although that would mostly be seen in the rest of my direct mail series. I'm only showing my postcard project because this was my strongest project and I could have gotten an A- if I wasn't a day late. It wasn't my fault the printer wouldn't print out my project. I'm not bitter >:(

Stupid B-

Soylent Green

IS PEOPLE!!!!!!

        I just had to do that. Soylent Green has become infamously synonymous with my name among my friends and teachers at college. They all know it and have tried to stop my plans that involve it. It is unfortunate that only my mentor understands the humor I see in it. After three tries (or maybe four) of trying to do a Soylent Green project in any of my classes, I was finally successful. I was able to make a Soylent Green-like project for my Professional Selling class. My teacher had enough trust in me to make this. He doesn't know what Soylent Green is; I plan on telling him after my graduation.

       For this project we had to make a sales letter, but I had already done one in my Copy Writing class. However that one was for Pokemon, my teacher later regretted allowing me to do it on Pokemon. This class was a business class but our teacher understood that half of the class were Graphic Design majors. So he said we could design it and that the more realistic it was would give us a step up.

       I would have gotten a 96 on this project but it was late. My grade for it went down to an 86 for being a day late. He gave some pretty positive feedback on it – had a good opener, good testimonials, clear benefits, and a nice brochure. He also said I was a good writer and that my sales letter was really good. Too bad I'll have to explain what Soylent Green is after I graduate. Imagine his face ^-^

The font I used for the letter was Baskerville and Luna Bar for the logo.

Unfortunately this and the finished printed product are difference in color.

For some reason InDesign wouldn't give me the same color I had for my logo.

Had a lot of fun making the slogan. Again, only my mentor thought it was funny.

I originally made two versions of the symbol. This one seemed more like an energy supplement for those people who work out. A lot. The one I chose seemed health-foody and "all natural".

Due to my lack of knowledge and time, I was unable to make an envelope for my sales letter.

This would have been the envelope I was going to turn in. (This SO doesn't look like Nookington's)

Even though he said I had a nice brochure I refuse to show it. It may be nice to him but he does not specialize in design. My art teachers would give me quite the critique if I showed them my Soylent Green brochure. I do like the alternative version of my Soylent Green logo so I might redo it in the future.

And yes, I do have too much fun with my projects. I use funny names and weird addresses – one address is at some cafe called Jo Mamma's or something and the other is My Mom's bakery something. Yeah, I like Regular Show. It's awesome.

GracieGrace Identity Suite

Whoops, I forgot to post this up. Well here it is now.
I had been planning on making something for GracieGrace for a long time, and only recently had I got inspiration for it. Whoa, bad grammar there. Sorry about that.

GracieGrace Logo

GracieGrace Business Card (FRONT)

GracieGrace Business Card (BACK)

GracieGrace Envelope

GracieGrace Letterhead

Like this identity suite way more than the Nookington's one. I had a lot more to work with in this one. A better logo, more background, and a consistent theme. I used a navy blue gradient, just like the one from their front sign and entrance. For the logo, I used a gold gradient, again just like the one from their front sign. The closest font I had that resembled the GracieGrace logo was the Baskerville font. I believe its already included in every computer.

I used the giraffe logo from GracieGrace as the pattern for the background, and used the lighter navy blue of the gradient, and lowered its opacity. I tried to resemble the floor inside GracieGrace, but I made the giraffes smaller, closer, and point in one direction.

My favorite one out of the identity suite is the envelope. I think it's the strongest in the identity suite, and kept the theme I was going for. And yes, I know it would be pretty expensive making the envelope, but keep in mind how expensive the products are in GracieGrace. I'm pretty sure they can afford to make these envelopes. My least favorite is the letterhead, I believe it's the weakest in the identity suite. It doesn't really keep the theme I was going for and I had the most trouble with this one.

Well that's it for the Animal Crossing identity suites. Next time I'll probably change my theme and have my own logo to show. And in the future, someone special will have a blog of her own. She's a talented artist but not in Graphic Design. That's my forte, but you'll enjoy her work nonetheless.

Nookington's Identity Suite

Okay, since I've back home, I have been playing a lot of Animal Crossing: City Folk. Now while I was trying to think of an idea for one of my planned projects, I thought about doing an identity suite for Nookington's. As you can see from the pictures below, it didn't turn out so well. But I can assure you that my next post with my planned project will turn out better. I really like the look of my planned project.

Logo

Business Card (FRONT)

Business Card (BACK)

Envelope

Letterhead

Yeah I know. These really aren't my greatest, but like I said, the next ones will be better.

Whoa! Drive-by Inspiration!

Whoa! No really it was. I got inspiration last night and stayed up, along with my sister, to finish this up. It wasn't originally meant to be Kind Lady from DDR. But my sister looked at it and thought it had some similarities to Kind Lady. Maybe it was just the sunglasses our model wore.

I used the font Andes with a small pink drop shadow. And then I used a lot of brushes that looked like bubbles and sparkles/stars. For the model, I used a layer mask to get rid of the background and used the Threshold adjustment layer. Copied the same layers and finally merged the four layers into one for the model. I used a background that looked like city lights and changed the blending mode to Hard Light to bring out the pink in the background.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot. I changed the banner and background into an extended version of Kind Lady with more sparkles. Yay... Might as well end with the original song from DDR.

Banner Turned Movie

I was originally planning on making a banner, but unfortunately it turned into an unrelated composition of inspirations. It first started with listening to the main theme from L.A. Noire, which made me wanted to use 1940s women as my inspiration again. You might recognize the same three girls used in a previous project. But then I was listening to ELO's "Evil Woman" and it started tumbling downhill with an idea for a movie.

This took a lot longer to make than my recent projects, but not from actually making it. Instead my problem was how to execute my idea. The inspiration was there but I didn't know how it should look. I had to move the elements repeatedly to figure out if it looked good or not. After many attempts, tonight I was on a roll.

The font I used was named NiteClub and I know the title and rating are more risque than what I'm used to. My excuse was that I couldn't think up of another name and I was too lazy to thoroughly search for a PG-13 logo that I wouldn't have to change. Why not PG or G? Well look at it, it doesn't exactly scream kid-friendly. Oh well, overall I really like it but I really wish that I had made the banner like I had wanted to. Maybe I'll just change the text if I can't make a banner by my deadline.

Meh...

Meh, I won't explain how trying to make silhouettes turned into this.  I also did a shoddy job with the warp tool.  Oh well, my main concern now is to make a banner.  I kind of have an idea for it and some inspirations for other projects.  These next ones will turn up better.

Jumbled Inspirations

After finishing the project for my church earlier this weekend, I decided to do the norm. Sit in front of my computer 'til late or early morning. Yeah, I don't go out often. But I had inspiration hit me after listening to my favorite game's soundtrack.  This is the song that gave me an idea.

Yeah, I love DDR's dance/house, disco-style music. It's just so fun. I love how the cover art for the songs are bright and colorful with an awesome silhouette. Simple but effective.  And that's what I thought I should try to replicate.  However, it kind of got out of hand.

I also wanted to use pictures of 1940s women since I like how they used little makeup, and simple but beautiful hairstyles.  Too much of LA Noire this past month. I tried using the same colors that I thought about whenever I listened to the soundtrack. Unfortunately, I don't know how to make the same silhouettes without taking too much time.  This project was on a whim and I wanted to make it fast in fear of losing my inspiration.  Instead I opted for the same method I used with my roommate's picture. I didn't get the original feel of disco/dance/house music and instead I got a 1940s Charlie's Angels-esque perfume ad.

Oh well, I still like it. It's not perfect, and I should've corrected the outlines to be more curvy and less jagged. This took me about an hour to do, and I used a font named 'betty noir'. Honestly, would you buy a perfume like this?

One Heck of a Weekend

Crashed a wedding, did someone a favor, attended a gathering for fellowship, asked for forgiveness, forgave a bunch of people, made new acquaintances, and got back my inspiration.  All in the span of this weekend.

Wow, and people think I don't go outside often.

At this certain gathering I met a person who reminded me of a joke my old roommate (not my previous model) made from an incident that happened in her biology class.  I'll get back on that later.  This of course reminded me of another joke she made while doing her famous impersonations.

She made a prank phone-call to one of her friends while acting like a Chinese woman taking an order from a restaurant.  This restaurant was named The Golden Chopstick Society.  So I, being silly, decided to quickly make this in honor of my old roommate.  It's not perfect, but I had fun making this.  Now this is only for fun, and I already know that there are restaurants named Golden Chopstick(s).  But this is a fake restaurant with no malice or offense intended.  This is just one of the many precious memories I have of my roommates, and I hope to continue making things like this.

Still Alive

To the dismay of many around me. Yes I'm not dead, just back from college.

Actually, I've been home since mid-May but a lot has happened since then. I was very depressed and had constant nightmares of going back to college. The thing is: my college is on the other side of the country. And I always feared that I would never do all the things I wanted to do before going back. Why is that important? Because my college is also VERY strict, and I'm scared of losing the freedom I have here. But a friend has helped calmed down those fears.

I also feel bad for never emailing my old teachers and acquaintances. The blame belongs to the very same college I'm fearful of. As said before, the school is strict and I have limited access to internet. Not being able to use my own email and not being able to update my blog. But wait there's more!

First semester was terrible, I've had to start all over with Graphic Design (learning just the basics), lose inspiration, and even lose the love I had for Graphic Design. I really want to bring that back into my life. This is something I have to pray about.

But all is not lost. Second semester was when I finally smiled during school. That may seem unimportant, but keep in mind: first semester was REALLY BAD. I won't give all the details except for the fact that I smiled more often.

Might as well show the only graphic design projects I've done in college (aside from class projects).

My mother sent me a picture of my younger self. My job was to get rid of the glue marks (evil popsicle-stick frame), pen scribbles, and marker... marks. Of course I covered my ugly mug with the Laughing Man logo to save everyone from the horror that is me. But my mom was very pleased from the restoration. Wish I could show you how bad the original was.

I can't believe how many years have gone by since this picture was taken. And now I'm no longer the happy-go-lucky kid I used to be. After watching over pre-schoolers in Bible Vacation School, I wish I could tell them to never take this time for granted. But they probably wouldn't understand, and it might be best that they don't know what's ahead of them.

Come on, don't start getting sentimental now.

This entry was for a contest all Graphic Design majors had to participate in. A lot of things went wrong during this project. Lack of inspiration, upcoming deadline, and an overexposed photograph. I took the picture of my lovely model the night before the deadline and worked on it the day of the actual deadline. Not my fault for a lack of inspiration.

Since the photo was over-exposed to the point where I couldn't fix it in time, I decided to just outline my model's face. By the way, that lovely outline belongs to my old roommate who took the time to put her hair up and have many pictures taken of her. I messed up the outline by trying to make the lines sharper and less blurry. But instead they became pixelated. It only took me twenty minutes in total to make the outline, the background, it's gradient, and the oval pearl necklace. Yeah, not much.