Dirty/Messy Project

This project was my baby! I loved working on it and it was a great experience.

There it is! it is over 70 inches long and about 20 inches tall. Its huge. The quote reads, "If you can imagine, you can create... If you can dream... You can become." 

This is where I started. I was going to do it all on one page, in four separate parts. Sketchbook style.

Then I was going to actually create a sketchbook, making each part of the quote on a separate page. 

After I nixed that idea, I was going to do it on four canvases. That didn't work out either. It needed to flow better. 

While doodling one day I got a great idea to put a cityscape emerging from a couple of houses into a booming city.
(Reflecting the idea of creation.)

Here you can see the first half. It is all hand done and cut out with an exacto knife. (I never want to use an exacto knife again.) The key words in the quote (imagine, create, dream, become) are all done in the same hand-made paper.

The last half is my favorite. The city is all hand done. The girl with the dream clouds is one of my friends in class. The child in the city is my cousin. and I hand cut the clouds as well as the text and the swirls around the edges of the clouds. (An idea appropriated form Denielle Emans!)

I had LOADS of fun in this class and I can't wait to start Typography next semester! I decided to keep Design as my second major and I'm excited to see what happens next. 

What I've Been Up To! Metamorphosis Project

This is all for a project in which we have to morph one image to another. The theme is social justice and we could pick any social justice theme we wanted. I chose bullying. More specifically, the bullying of girls who are not overweight, but are normal size girls who aren't tall and thin runway models. The morph shows how destructive taunting and bullying can be.

This picture is ALL of the pictures I gathered in the beginning so I could start tracing, collaging, and building the beginning and end pictures of my morph.

After I gathered my pictures, I started sketching and tracing bits and pieces of the images onto vellum paper. Vellum is like tracing paper but more crisp and velvety. I tried a lot of different things and went a lot of different ways in the beginning.

After I was done sketching, being frustrated, and doing absolutely nothing in class except playing with my kneaded eraser for a few days, I came up with these final sketches. I decided to keep these because they best represent my message. The first image for the morph is the top left image, and the last image for the morph is the top right.

This tiny pictures is actually of the morphing process. I have to add one more between number 2 and three so there isn't such a drastic change. I also have other details to add and fix on images 4 and 5. I'll be sure to post the final morph!

Peace and Love!

Shape Project

For this project, we were learning about designing figures in a format and establishing a visual relationship between these figures. We had to use overlapping, interlocking, mutual tension, abutting, and continuity. We also worked with forming a figure ground relationship. The white ground had to be an active element, meaning that it had to support the overall design, rather than just being a frame around the figure.

The design above is supposed to fit the parameters of the first design we had to do for this project. The parameters were to, "Cut a 4 inch black square of construction paper. Then cut it to make a flat, non objective design on white 8 by 10 paper. Cut and arrange it so that viewers will not recognize the original square." I used mutual tension in the circle of the middle of all the triangles and between the long rectangle and all the triangles. I used a little overlapping in the section with the triangles as well to make is feel like a continuous circle of triangles. 

I actually had a lot of fun with the design above. The parameters of this design were to use the 4 inch square and cut it up into pieces and make a flat abstract design on 8 by 10 ground and destroy the identity of the square. I began cutting bits and when I cut the "trunk" of the tree by total accident, I realized it looked like the trunk of a tree. I made the tree barren and added one lone leaf because it shows the autumn season coming, and the lone leaf symbolizes how it is coming very slowly for me. I love fall and I feel like it is taking a really long time for it to roll around this year. 

FALL COCKTAIL TEASER POSTER!

MY FIRST EVER REAL POSTER! 

I'm so excited, in case you can't tell. 

Special thanks to Tiffany Taylor. 

They're going to put it up around campus :-)

I'm so excited.

Line Project

These four designs are product of an activity we did with lines. There were four different designs that we had to do. Straight lines, diagonal lines, curved lines, and finally a combination of all four. We had to create these designs on an eight by ten piece of Bristol paper and glue the lines made of simple black construction paper with rubber cement. I had a really good time with this project because we didn't have many limitations The only parameters we had was that:

     1. We had to use one type of line and only that type of line per sheet of paper.

     2. The design had to be non-objective, meaning that the designs could not resemble something in the real world. I forgot about this small parameter when I got to the last design. I wasn't sure if it was a design that I could use, so I made an additional combination design that is not included in this posting.

     3. The lines in each design could not resemble a shape. a short and thick vertical line can seem to look like a rectangle unless you move it to the edge of the page. If it is at the edge, your brain will assume the line continues.

     4. The final designs had to be professional. The paper had to be measured exactly eight by ten, with straight edges. There couldn't be any rubber cement escaping from the edges of the black pieces of construction paper.





Straight Lines

The image to the right was the first design that I did in the project. I loved using the thick lines complimented by the thinner lines and making patterns with the lines. I had to be careful with using smaller, thicker lines because I didn't want them to look like a shape instead of a line. I avoided this by putting those types of lines closer to the edge of the page so the viewer's brain could continue the line off the page. I also was playing around with figure ground reversal a little, but it wasn't successful as I had hoped, because I didn't want to overlap my lines.

Diagonal Lines
This is by far my favorite design!!! This may be because I worked on this design for HOURS when I was at home one weekend watching a movie. I love the way the viewer can't tell if they're looking at different shapes put together on black paper or black lines on white paper. Again, I had to make sure the thick black lines that could have been mistaken for shapes go off the page so the viewer would see them as lines.

Curved Lines
The design to the right is one that I had no clue what do to with. I went into this design with no plan whatsoever and came out with something that looked like flames. However, it is still a non objective design because I didn't make this to look like flames. That is why I added the curved lines coming from the top toward the bottom. I wanted this to be an obvious idea of black lines on white paper, and I wanted the viewer to follow the lines up the page to the top and back down the outside of the page to the bottom. I was just playing with the idea of the viewer finding a scanning pattern up and down the page.

Combination

This design is actually wrong, which is really funny because I spent a lot of time doing it and really loved it when I was done. But then I reviewed the directions and remembered that the design was supposed to be non-objective, meaning that the design was not supposed to resemble objects in the real world. This, obviously, resembles objects in the real world. However, if you pay attention, I used all three types of lines in this design. The straight lines in the tree trunk, horizon line, and mast of the sail boat. The diagonal lines are in the branches of the trees and the snow caps on the mountains. Last, there are curved lines in the mountains, sail of the boat, and the water. 

I did an additional combination design that is not included in this posting. 

In the end, I had a great time doing this project and exploring different ways that I could arrange and play with lines and control the way the viewer looks at my work.