Project 2: Materialism X 4

Set of 4

Economy & Emphasis 

Movement 

Balance

Proportion 

 I initially struggled picking a concept for project 2. I started with 'bling' but found it to be too specific and narrow. Once I chose materialism, my ideas came to life. After hundreds of sketches, I decided on four images to transfer and cut. Using proportion, movement, economy & emphasis, and balance design principles, I depicted materialism as an addictive, all-consuming condition. Above are the final designs on bristol paper painted with black & white gouache with details done using microns.

Tattoo Designs

Some tattoo designs I did recently for a friend...

Words come to life..

Finally our class project on Movement, Proportion, Emphasis & Economy, and Balance is complete! I am so relieved to be done with it after over 100 sketches and numb fingers from cutting all the designs. I decided on a concept of "Words come to life" through endangered species. Here are the final pieces and some sketches from along the way. 

The entire set...

Design Principle of Movement...

Design Principle of Emphasis & Economy...

Design Principle of Proportion...

Design Principle of Balance...

Word Maps

Word maps created in class to help with brainstorming for our sketches. Time to get rolling and finish up the many many sketches we have to accomplish!

Popcorn! (our first project in class: Claire, Morgan, & Maya)

This is our first project for Design Fundamentals 102. We took popcorn and dipped it in ink to make a sort of 3D collage, and then we photographed it. Then we took the photographs and made an iMovie, using the images for shorter and shorter durations to simulate the popping of popcorn. Enjoy!

Carmen Tan: An Introduction

Good morning, everyone!

My name is Carmen, and I was born and bred in the lovely city of Los Angeles,  California.  I am currently an Undeclared sophomore at USC, but I plan to transfer into Roski in either the Spring or Fall of 2014.

I have been interested in art ever since I was a child, and used to take drawing and sculpture classes at the LAUSD Conservatory of Fine Arts for several years.  My interest in design is rooted in my fascination with Fashion, as well as the various doodles and scribbles I used to cover my notebooks with.  As a web designer, I am very interested in how design can be used in a more technological aspect, and am eager to explore more of its concepts in this class.

One of the largest inspirations for my art is Alternative music, especially music that is particularly dark and poetic.  I also love bright colors and the way they juxtapose against the darkness, and thus, many of my paintings, drawings, etc. tend to be very colorful and vibrant.  Here are some of my pieces:

Doodles & Videos

My name is Rowena, and I'm a senior at Marshall. Growing up, I've always been drawn to all things artistic and creative. I tend to find beauty in anything and everything, especially the little things in life.

Here are a couple of doodles I drew for fun and stop-motion videos I've created for work, enjoy!

Hello, My Name is Tasia

Salutations fellow humans and designers!

My name is Anastasia Dedenbach, but that's a bit of a mouthful, so feel free to call me Tasia (say it like Tah-zee-yah) or Tas/Taz. I'm a second-year fine arts major, with an emphasis in design and intermedia. I also work as a graphic designer for USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism (you've probably seen my work on all of the boards) and I freelance here and there. You can check out some of the work I've done for that here. I grew up painting and drawing and have a huge passion for work done by hand. I really enjoy color theory and communicating depth without the use of black, and my favorite subject matter are friends and family. When I was 17, I had my own exhibition show at my high school, and you can see some examples of that here:

Now I like to use the computer more through digital photography or digitizing drawings. It usually looks something more like this:

I am really excited to get to know and design with all of you this semester!

Introductions for the New Semester

I am Dominic Seonghoon Kim and I am a freshman with a Fine Arts major at Roski School of Fine Arts, although I am considering changing my major to either Animation or Interactive Design. I may be somewhat of a quiet introvert, but I make my art and other works express my thoughts and opinions for me. Although I primary work with physical art such as pencil sketches and charcoal portraits, I greatly enjoy working with digital art despite just recently starting using programs such as Flash. I hope that this class of Design Fundamentals will teach me about the concepts of design and help me improve and develop as an artist.

During my first semester I made a self-portrait of myself when I just recovered from a cold. Unfortunately, I still had the cough left over from the illness, hence my somewhat disappointed facial expression in this portrait. I initially started the portrait using a wooden pencil to draw the general shape of my face and my figure before switching to charcoal sticks to add the shadings. I had thought to have myself stare at the viewer of the portrait, but upon drawing that shape I realized that I ended up looking like my father, which I did not like because I wanted myself to be recognized in the portrait instead of my father, so I decided to have the portrait me avert his eyes. I also decided to not color in the background because I was running out of charcoal sticks at that time, and upon taking a look at it I felt that it did not require a background shading.

Cooperative work: Cool Book

Cool Book is a book that collects fun staff. And we show these fun things in a way that things are shown on Internet, like Tumbler. We try to make some games that readers can actually play with their hands, like flipping, folding, cutting and drawing. We focus on the concept to make people notice more about fun things in real life rather than information from Internet. We make games that readers can direct play with simple but fun designs in this book.

My main jobs are pages below. The first one is a 3D figure I drawn. We originally want to put a pair of 3D glasses in this page so the reader can use the glasses to see this figure.However, because the limit of time and money, we do not completely finish this page.But the concept is really fun and is very suitable for the concept of the whole book.

This is a page of eyes that people can doodle on it. We provide a pen with Cool Book.

I got this idea from flipping works that show two opposite scenes on two pages.

I also did some other pages like animal models with simple colors that readers can cut them down and fold them to let these animals stand on the desk, but I forgot to take pictures. 

Overall, this is a book of real games that readers can directly have fun. And I mainly did pages of games that readers can play with their hands like cutting and flipping. However, because of the limit of time and money, the book itself is less attractive. If we could have more time to focus on the material of the book and put other tools like glasses and pens in the book through a fun way, this book must be better. 

Reflection on Collaboration

The Say Thank You Movement was a collaborative project rooted in the idea of giving thanks in a more significant and meaningful manner through thoughtful and personal design.  This movement is a call to action and a reminder that "thank you is not a static word; it's a responsibility to pass on the love received."

Check out our movement, the stories behind our postcards, and see how you can get involved at: http://thesaythankyoumovement.tumblr.com/ or follow us on instagram @thesaythankyoumovement

This collaborative project has been my favorite design project thus far.  I learned several valuable lessons about designing in collaborative groups.  This included the importance of strong, clear communication to avoid misunderstandings during the production process.  Communication is an art in itself.  It is important to focus on the positive and simultaneously push each member to their full potential to create a strong, cohesive final product.  Furthermore, being passionate about a project is helpful--passion fuels greater creativity, increased dedication, and an overall enthusiasm about the project that makes staying up until 3am worth it.  Finally, I learned that you do not have to know everything about design if you choose team members that have distinct values and talents to add to the project.  The project has given me the confidence to approach future design collaboratives with excitement for the challenges.

--Amanda G.

Collaboration Project: Hangover Elixir

For the last design project, we paired up with students in the upper level class to collaborate on something of our own creation. I have to say that this was my favorite assignment so far. It may have been stressful at times and we didn't always know what we were doing, but it was so much fun to work with my fellow students and I think we did an excellent job! It was a great experience and I feel I contributed a lot to the project.
I now present the result of several weeks' worth of sketches, brainstorming, reworking ideas, mock-ups, facebook messages, and more reworking: Hangover Elixir.

Our premise for the project was to find a niche in the juice market and create the packaging for such a product. The result is shown above. We envisioned a brand of pressed juice designed and engineered to reduce the effects of last night's party. There are four different labels - The Usual, The Physical, The False Dawn, and The Apocalypse - and each juice treats different hangover symptoms. We wanted a blend of older print and modern color and layout in our packaging that would blend with a simple glass bottle. Credit to myself, Connie, Brittany, and Karen. 

 We also hid a fun fact about hangovers under every cap and made a booklet containing information about the product and each of its designers.

Cool Book

For the group project, we created a book. What we set out to do is flip the concept of books on its head, both with the materials the book was created out of and the content. We know that reading a book is inherently passive, but our book, Cool Book, pushes the boundaries of traditional book making challenging the concept and the convention of books. Readers can directly interact with Cool book, coloring, connecting, cutting, drawing, flipping, and folding. With simple design and fun games, Cool Book forces people to interact in the physical world rather than the digital. Cool Book believes in physicality and it aims to bring the style, design and content of the Internet to your hands. The content of Cool Book is displayed in a way users receive information on the Internet –– an amalgamation of randomness and versatility. With a focus on tactile design however, Cool Book reminds people to cherish simple fun and physical relationships. Cool Book focuses on the concept rather than the object. The idea of palpable fun is art.

I produce the description you see above, which is utilized in the beginning of Cool Book to orient the reader. I also created more than 10 pages used in the book from random facts, to personal photography. 

In the end, I was extremely happy with the concept, but I imagine the execution could have been better. If we had printed the book professionally instead of bound it ourselves, the product could have been better. 

Here's a link to the photo set: 
http://www.flickr.com/photos/eswatkins/sets/72157637713693145/

Collab Project

My group for the collaborative project designed a surf brand, complete with logo, surfboard, and apparel. I personally loved this concept because I am a huge beach girl (Santa Cruz native)! We decided upon the brand name High Life, inspired by many stereotypes of surfers. Since I was raised in a beach town, I am very familiar with the different types of surfers and the habits that they posses. Our brand name incorporates their favorite beverage (40's), their agriculture fetishes (stoners), and their crave of the ocean life (the euphoria that comes with successfully catching a wave).

My first assignment within the project was to design the logo! After dozens of attempts in my sketchbook, this was the design we chose to work with:

Since our brand is represented by a squid, Geo had the brilliant idea to incorporate the tentacles into the logo! After he drew that and Julian added color, this is the final product:

There are certain aspects of the original that I wish had been retained (the relationship between the letters and the circle), but overall I think it has a great surfer feel about it. I think this logo could definitely be seen on stickers and surfboards everywhere someday!

Reflections on Collaboration Project

The collaboration project was awesome! I enjoyed making new friends and being able to see what I will be doing in the next few years here at USC. Moreover, I know what to expect for that particular class, which is more satisfying than not knowing what to expect at all. My partners from the 402 class were Julian and Huey and they did a great job at showing me how to go about planning and putting into effect the actual project itself. I thought it was super cool to see my drawings (the cyclops squid eating the fish) on a surfboard as well as all the other little characters on clothes and hats because it inspired me more in regards to my aspirations in the fashion industry. What I also liked were the critiques because I got a sense of what to look for in everyday designs such as the kerning in typography, whether the typography suits the targeted audience, the spacing of objects on a certain design, etc.

We had such a great class on Thursday! Making journals was a really cool lesson and I thought every single one looked amazing. (If anybody wants to remind me of all the supplies we used, I'm half tempted to take a trip to Micheal's and start making these as gifts.)

Here's mine. Sorry I didn't get any process photos.