Why From Left to Right?

A-Hem!  My blog's name/title came before this videos release on 10/21/11.

I think this whole new experience, attitude and direction I'm aiming for is skillfully explained in this quick video.

My new science

Eye think I'v been brainwashed

I love my Droid X.  Just as much as I loved the original droid, the Motorola A855.  Soon, it will be the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, and I have no shame in admitting I'm super excited about this phone.  The one thing I will not miss with this new phone is the red glowing eye followed by a robotic "Drroooiiiiidddd" announcement.  HaHa, if you have had any of Verizon's "Droid" line, you know exactly what I mean.  No matter what though, whenever you hear that sound, or see the eye, you know exactly what it is....Kudos to Verizon's branding and marketing.  Verizon played a big part in exploiting the android OS in a iPhone dominated industry.  The G1 was originally released on 10/22/08 on T-mobile, and honestly had a hard time getting noticed.  On November 6, 2009 Verizon launched the Motorola Droid and The Droid Eris by HTC, and the android OS gained in popularity.

The thing I love most about the android OS, is the ability to unlock the device from manufacturer and carrier restraints and customize the phone the way you want.  Coming with a background in computers, and hacking, and tinkering with stuff, I was all about it.  Even with my windows mobile phone, I was hacking it, and changing stuff, aka voiding my warranty.

Throughout the lifespan of my Droid phones I have themed my phone in so many different ways.  Some of them using applications from the market, sometimes changing icons directly in the system files, which requires "root".  I intend on sharing this info too!!  I remember staying up into all hours of the night messing with my phone, changing the layout and design of the phone.  I also dabbled in a little programming and manipulating the .apk files, which was fun too. Creating icons, wallpaper, and changing the way I used and interact with my phone was something that kept me focused.  So last year, I told myself I was going back to school for graphic design and I want to design graphic user interfaces for mobile devices and websites.  Well, here I am :p

Symmetrical

Asymmetrical

Radial

crystallographic

My 2nd project for 2D Design has been assigned.  The theme or main focus is Balance.  There are a few ways to express this, using symmetrical and asymmetrical art.  Using a radial effect and crystallographic (all over pattern) is also another way of showing off balance.  Once again my teacher left if open for us to draw whatever our hearts content.  I had a hard time figuring out what to draw for this project.  I'm so use to being given direction and specifics with assignments.





One of the patterns I thought of doing was the droid eye!  Leaf patterns are too obvious and easy....yes that's what I was originally going to do, lol.  So now I'm in the process of drawing eyes, 18 of them being exact and determining how I'm going to go about this project.  It's gonna be interesting to see where this goes.

So this is what I'v done so far, and right now I'm just messing around with colored pencils and trying to draw different designs for my Drrrrrroooooiiiddddd eyes, I'm going for the crystallographic symmetry.

Project 1 completed - Except....

I had it critiqued also in class.  Great comments on the simple design.  For example, crumpling up paper and painting over with grey for mountains, blending  various greens for HUGE blades of grass.  The vast expanse that's captured from the point of view.

  Who else likes minimlistic wallpaper?

Except this lady bug.  Suggestions?  More details?  Leave a comment for me!

Tuesday's Type: Gratifying Graffiti

I'v realized that I need to get some structure to this blog. Best way of structure for someone like me, is of course establishing a routine. Welcome to "Tuesday's Type" (possible change) where I'll choose a typeface a week.  I'll Talk about it a bit, show examples, research & apply some design tips/options, rate it. I'll add whatever I can to make the particular typeface monopolize the week's post. Ok?  Ready. Set. Go!

I went hiking today with friends and we found this area of the park covered with graffiti. My head has been flooded with Art and Typography for the past few weeks.  So I whipped out my phone camera and took pictures and thought this would be the fitting typeface to talk about.

Graffiti comes in many different forms tho. Images and lettering that are painted - usually spray painted - scratched, or marked up all over someone else's property. It's taboo and gets you in trouble without consent of the property owner.  Rebels Rejoice!

Graffiti also has also become pretty intertwined with Hip-Hop culture....and dirty subways.

Here's some examples using a Graffiti style typeface

     

Use it For

• Hip-Hop album covers, events, flyers!!
• Urban atmospheres in design
• Large flashy attention grabbing ads
• Great way to emphasize 3D effects

Skip it for

• It's difficult to read often.....much too often
• Can't be used for user interfaces on cellphones/tablets 

I'll also be including fonts I talk about for download.  Click here to get the ones displayed....don't go all clickin at once now....:)  Yes, I know the pic sucks, spacing, placement.  I'm The New Guy!  This is warm-up stage still.

Click here if you want the fonts below.

I can do WHAT? with letters

Heres some cool lookin typography examples

Cuttin' and Pastin'

A different medium: it's been awhile since I had to complete an assignment without a computer

What's all the "bull" about the lightbulb?

Tonight while driving to grab some Starbucks (btw, not normal for me) I was thinking of my current topography project and new art project.  For typography, I have to pick a subject/topic, cut out 9-3inch squares from magazines and tell a story on topic, using only text, while showing various forms of type, texture and weight.  I'll post pix when done!  For art, we have to draw a picture showing symmetry, radial, or pattern based.  Long story short, I realized I was getting upset for a few stupid reasons.  My Typography class, the teacher didn't show us an example, or provide a helpful way of how the assignment should be done. No topics, No requirements.  My art teacher rocks and showed a few examples, but he left it open to draw whatever we want, however we want.  Expand our creativity.  I even remember him saying that he never had a "free for all" for whatever he wanted to draw or paint until his 3rd year @ RIT. 


This is totally different for me.  I'm used to things like writing a code in c++, being told what syntax to use,  putting the code in order and the way it NEEDS to go and getting that one outcome. Same for accounting, and math, and Barf!  Even my daily job is linear.  Tech support is soooooooo linear.  I Think I'v wired myself that way tho, and it's time to get my feet wet and set off those sparks again.  It dawned on me, that I can't get frustrated about this.  This is what being creative is all about I'm realizing.  Creating from nothing.  Receiving very few details and then taking a fantastic voyage through the depths of your mind.....your experiences....your feelings.  Talk about a paradigm shift!


To top the night off, I got home to a interesting, yet very fitting zodiac.


Yup, I'm Taurus....the Bull


You may be involved in a continuing conflict between your job and more personal activities that truly express what's in your heart. But it's challenging to put your efforts on a path that's closer to your passion when you are being rewarded monetarily for the professional work you do. Instead of choosing one over the other, find ways to bring new life into your creative endeavors through self-discipline. Practicing time management should enable you to juggle your calendar and do everything you want.

Attention to detail.....Damn you Typography!

As I'm getting further into the curriculum of Typography, I'v realized these 2 courses I'm taking almost contradict themselves.  I have my 2D dimensional design foundation class (we'll just call it Art class going forward) that embraces going with the flow, and not being so controlled.  Then Typography where it seems there are all the typography rules - frequently misused - that you have to follow.  Yes, that was a hyphen used incorrectly for a em-dash for semi-aesthetic purposes.   Plus I have no idea at the time of this typing where the em-dash is, nor want to investigate the whereabouts.  Haha.

I thought the blog was looking a bit bland so I started using the dynamic templates that Google provides for Blogger.  They also provide you the option to write your blogs in HTML format, which I'm not too familiar with yet.  I'm gonna teach myself tho, because how else am I supposed to get the typography examples to really show up they way I want.  Anyway, until then I'll be using the easy tools provided to spice up the blog, starting with the layout.  +1 for the blog!

The 2nd week of class I had a quiz on the anatomy of a character.  Talk about a slap in the face of anal retentiveness.  I say that just from the realization of how important attention to detail is when it comes to using typography effectively.  Like something being bold or italicized, and why it's done and whether you used a computer formatted bold or the truetype bold of the font.  Trust me, I can't show the example now, but there's a difference.  Also the importance word spacing and kerning  is starting to brainwash me. Kerning is basically adjusting the spacing between 2 letters that look too open or too tight.  Look at the letters AV together...see all that open space, kerning the pair would bring them closer together.  So, I realized the brainwashing was taking effect when I would read emails from work.  People would be bolding words, or changing the point size of the font, doing cutesy fonts and just sending out...awful looking emails.  I only saw awful now, because I'm recognizing the difference, and I Effin' love it!

One way or another I'm going to incorporate the skills I'm learning for typography into the blog.  I'd much rather show small caps or a crafty initial letter to start a paragraph than just talk about it.  This week, I'm taking a thorough look through my blogging options and to customize it more.  It's those little things that make the difference.

Project # 1 - Re-Introducing The Inner Child

For the past 2 weeks, since I finished the 12 techniques warm-up we have been working on our 1st assignment.  Our teacher introduced the assignment by going off about children's books, and how you can find alot of great artwork within them.  He brought in a few examples and one of the artist/authors that caught my attention was Eric Carle.  Check him out at his official website here.

 

"The Very Hungry Caterpillar" sounds like my kinda book I'd read growing up, given my insatiable appetite of food, mind you, I never did read it tho.  This is one of Eric Carle's classics.  Besides being educational and filled with positive messages, the artwork he uses is very distinctive throughout all of his books.  He uses collage techniques, and cuts paper that he has doused with various forms of the 12 techniques we practiced.  Check out that seahorse!!  Not Only do I love the colors in it, but it's cool to be able to recognize the blending technique used and how some colors overlap others.  This guy has made millions just by playing with paint and cutting out shapes.  Work It Out Eric!

So our 1st project of course is pretty much going in line with this style of art and using the techniques we practiced to create a piece.  Cutting required!  Here are some explanations and some pix of my progress.  I just take snapshots from my Drrrroooiiddd camera phone, so forgive the quality of the pics, I'll try to enhance em at some point.

For my project I'm doing a lady bug perched on grass with a pasture and mountains in the background.  I'v been feeling kinda lucky lately, which is why I think ladybug was the 1st thing that came to mind as the main attraction of the piece.  However, the ladybug will be the last thing I work on.  

So this is where my orderly, logical left side comes into play, hehe.  I gotta plan this stuff out of course!!!  I knew I wanted to set the background 1st, so I blended blue and purple with a saturated waterbase to get the sky effect going, and just made a solid green for the bottom half, which is gonna be grass n' stuff.  I also crumpled a bunch of paper and then painted a grey mix over it which would create a perfect snow capped mountain effect that sits in the background.  I also painted a huge sheet of paper with a blend of greens....dark, light, overlapping, which I'll be cutting out at some point for the blades of grass.  I ended up folding the grey crumpled paper and tested out my mountains which worked out great!  Cut em out' and plastered them into place.  I added yellow for the pasture below the mountains.  How I'm gonna work that into play, I still have yet to come up with.  But wish me luck, and I'll be sure to be post further progress and final outcome!