_end of semester statement

I’ve definitely learned a lot over the course of this past semester – many things which both supplemented as well as challenged the lessons set down last year. I learned to push in numerous different directions here – even if I had my own reservations about something. Doing so helped me to learn to experiment, step outside my own comfort zone, and not be afraid of failure. From each direction I tried, regardless of whether they resulted in success or not, they all contributed to my decisions made, eventually coming to a final solution. But what was definitely the most stimulating thing these past few months was the assimilation and implementation of ideas across the classes.

While we did work on sometimes very different projects; each with varying concepts and problems to contend with – there were still numerous levels of learning and parallels being drawn between the three. Things I learned from Michaels could very well translate into tasks in Jamie’s – or vice versa.

In Michael’s Image Making course, I learned to develop my own image-making skills, which would carry over into projects undertaken in my other two studios. With assignments such as the Seven Deadly Sins or the Six Degrees Project, I learned to look at different angles and such when photographing my subjects, or conveying an idea through its indexes or symbols, rather than the literal depiction. Lessons here easily translated over to other assignments such as the Placards done in Visual Communications, or the Lecture Poster in Typography 2.

In Jamie’s Visual Communications course, it was a challenge to establish my own cohesive, legible and working visual language; especially one that could appropriately convey my chosen subject matter, and be applied to different types of media. I had to learn to understand things such as the subtleties between revealing complexity, and removing complexity. These things and much more factor in to all that we as designers need to contend with. For the work that we produce shouldn’t just be a piece on the wall – they’re large working ecologies. Lessons learned here often paralleled, such as in the Placards and our Type+Image Books.

And finally, in Michael’s Typography 2 course, aside from trying out both analog and digital means of exploration, I was able to work with typographic hierarchies, and type’s ability to influence meaning. We did a substantial amount of research in this course as well, and thus I had to familiarize myself with how to control this info through hierarchies – and then implement them in things such as Magazine Spreads. Things I learned here were adapted into things such as our 6 Degrees Project, or the Placards.

All three courses taught me the importance of creative problem solving, exploration within defined parameters (whether it be our own or someone else’s.), and the importance of exploration – And it is a blend of the three courses that I hope to take with me into future projects.

_placards: digital process

1.) Initial Concept Sketches + Notes:

I toyed around with a number of different concepts during the initial stages of this placard project: where sushi is found, physical attributes of the dish, cultural associations, symbolism, etc. In the end, I decided to explore sushi in regards to its physical attributes and cultural associations.

2.) Image Collecting:
To get some idea of what kind of direction I wanted to push in for the placards, I began to simply collect as much imagery as I could find. The fact that the final placards were to be of a relatively small size, the process of collecting images I could use was much easier, and resulted in a larger cache of possible pictures I could use.
There weren't any real restrictions I set down for myself during this phase of the project - a lot of the images were related to my concepts, but some weren't. All in all, they helped me to brainstorm for possible solutions.



3.) Slicin' n' Rollin':
Question: So what can happen if you take an image and treat it like you might a piece of sushi? At this point, I began playing around with making slices of my selected imagery, and interweaving my icons into it.
Also, I printed out my three selected icons (temaki, maki, nigiri) onto sheets of vellum and cut them out, to give them a quasi-translucent quality. That way, when they are overlain on my images, some of the colors and hues could bleed through. It felt like a better thing to explore than the simple starkness of a black and white icon.






4.) Placards
Early drafts of my placards.








5.) Placard Revisions
At this stage, something I needed to seriously consider was how to integrate my type/copy writing. I scanned it some handwritten text of my selected words, and composed them digitally in Photoshop:


Placards with hand-generated type:




There were some problems with these first placards with hand type though - some of the writing felt too awkward (i.e. "cold"), and needed some refinement. I also adjusted some of the colors in the placards.

6.) Final Placards:
The final three placards I presented for final critique:



Notes, points for improvement from today's critique:

• Rework, refine "Raw" placard. Raw meat is somewhat illegible.
• Push more with type, such as in "Raw" or "Colorful."
• "Cold" - perhaps lighten image, to help with type's legibility.
• Think about how to make the type expressive. (ie. "cold" could be white?)
  

_placard revisions

_placards progress

Physical Attributes:








Cultural Associations:

_final magazine spreads + project statement

Project Statement:

For me, this project was very challenging, whether it be from the organization of information, the furthering of established visual language rules, typographic hierarchy, or just legibility in general. But it's also a fine assimilation of the things that we've been learning in both classes as well.
One of the first challenges I had overcome was definitely how to organize all the research I had done into a visually cohesive and legible infographic. There were numerous levels of complexity that I had to contend with at one time - forcing me to go through four different paper prototypes before finally graduating to a digital translation of my idea. But it was a necessary ordeal - once I had resolved my major issues by hand, they were infinitely simpler to consider once I moved into the digital realm.
On the other hand, I had to look at this project from a typographic standpoint as well. If my infographic was the core of information, then the magazine spread is that which houses it. Both are equally important - and needed to complement one another. Blending the two together was much more than dropping it into my InDesign document and calling it a day. But that’s why I can appreciate that the progression of both the spread and infographic happened parallel to one another – so I learned to implement similar languages to each. And thus, by learning to contend with all these aspects, I've hopefully compiled the works from both classes and composed them into a visually working ecology.

_Infograph + Magazine Spread Revisions.

After Friday's small group critiques, I made some revisions to my infograph, as well as the magazine spread which houses it:
Took out the "old" texture background - tried an image of a makisu, or bamboo sushi mat instead. I chose this type of texture/image instead to allude to the spread's title image. (See below.) I've also moved the infograph's title to outside of the piece itself; so now it sits above the infograph in the spread's red bar.
Currently researching major events of the 15th - 18th century, to add to the timeline.


View of the infograph placed in the magazine spread:
Old version

_digital infograph

Preliminary digital version of my infograph. Incorporated dotted lines as connectors between the timeline and countries, Japanese names for icons (as suggested in group critiques on Friday.) The texture on the infograph's background is comprised of old parchment textures that I scanned it, with other miscellaneous crinkled paper scans layered on top.
One of the first things that stands out to me is the white of the icons. That color is present only on the timeline, and nowhere else. So currently, I'm trying to think of ways to perhaps resolve this.







In other, infograph-related news; I couldn't sleep on Friday night for whatever reason, and ended up making a very different infograph during this bout of insomnia:


It essentially graphs the amount of time I spend using Adobe Creative Suite programs, (Photoshop, illustrator, etc.) compared against other activities of my daily life. (sleeping, studio, etc) I really don't know why I chose a circular format; when you're infographing at 4am in the morning, one doesn't really dwell on details such as that.
Granted, there's a lot of problems with it...I'm probably misleading viewers into thinking I sleep, browse the internet and work in studio at the same time.

_sushi through the ages_infograph

"Sushi Through The Ages"
Paper Prototype Infograph Progression

Version #1: Initial infograph draft. Lots of legibility issues; needed to work on copyrighting. Timeline is evenly spaced; misleading in regards to chronology. Map and editorial text seems incidental. Lines from icons to cities are not working, type is haphazard.

Version #2: Icons on timeline have now been staggered, more appropriate to conveying progression of time. Need to line up text, explore different lines to connect cities to icons. Map and editorial still incidental.

Version #3: Chose "Sushi Through the Ages" as title for infograph, need to add subtext to clarify what is being graphed. Dotted line on timeline is not working.

Version #4: To balance out the two countries, added prefecture regions to the map of Japan, edited out editorial text and secondary map. Went back to solid black line for timeline. Currently refining dotted line styles for countries and icons.

_inforgraphic references.

I type this entry from the luxury of my own apartment - for the powers that be decided to knock down a tree, a power transformer, and all power in the design building. Anyways:1.) I was of course drawn to the patterning of dots generated by this particular infographic. For the amount of info it alludes to, there doesn't seem to be too too much visual noise.

2.) In later revisions of my infograph, I started looking for more organic, natural connection lines that I could use in my own timeline. I really liked the smooth, flowing curved lines in this particular example.

paper prototype.feedback

Critique notes: (revised)

• Format is interesting and effective.
• Legibility issues in regards to the size and location of countries in relation to one another.
• Graphic's purpose is not too clear?
  
• User friendly and uncluttered.
• Smaller maps = incidental. Integrate with the other maps.
• Indicate travel direction.
• Explore patterning.
  

For Monday, I hope to clear up some legibility issues, consider the orientation and placement of the included information, etc.

_sushi chronology

_project statement

For me, this project was an in-depth study of an idea's simplification and refinement. Though in the initial stages I worked with detailed drawings of the sushi, I learned to refine the idea at hand, taking away any superfluous elements for a more visually compelling icon set.
Scaling the icons was an interesting challenge as well - for it forced me to consider how I could make my chosen visual language work at different sizes. The application of color made me look at my icons again from a different angle - for as designers, we all will have to grapple with a multitude of different parameters. I often thought of the entire process as an algebraic inequality.
For example, let's say A is the icon refinement, B is the scale, and C is the color. I would often ask myself, if parts of A and C were modified, how would that affect B? (Or vice versa.)
Thus by having to contend with issues such as visual languages, scaling and color application, I pushed my own understanding of communication visually.

_icon naming?

When it comes to naming a piece of art or essay I may have made or written, I often use one of the following methods:

• Method A: Select a word that I feel is most strongly associated with the piece, look up a synonym for it in a thesaurus. (i.e. if the word selected was "shadow", I might call something "penumbra.")

• Method B: Flip through a book or text, place finger on random words. (i.e. I flipped through a medical textbook when looking for a title for an essay about Artemisia Genticleschi. I came upon the word "catharsis", and came up with "Catharsis of Sufferance."

• Method C: Ask someone else what they would call the piece. You would be surprised at some of the responses received.

• Method D: State what is presented. (i.e. "Still Life with Charcoal.") Note: This typically only results in mundane titles, and I only use it if nothing else works.

I thus proceeded to apply all four methods to naming my icons set. Unfortunately, they all produced more or less lackluster results.


Method A Results:

I also tried the thesaurus widget on my computer, but all it told me that sushi was a noun (duh), and what different types there were.


Method B Results:

Book: "Asian Cooking" - Helen Aitken

• Wok
• Hokkien
• Tablespoon

Book: "Rakkety Tam" - Brian Jacques

• Bulrush
• Tree
• Wind

Book: "The Cheese Monkeys" - Chip Kidd

• Soured
• Face
• Mouth

Method C Results:

Question: "Hey you! What the fuck would you call this?"

• "...sushi?"
• "sushi."
• "food."
• "A poor, monochrome representation of the colorful culinary delight that is sushi."
• "Your lunch?"
• "Why didn't you share?"
• "...art??"

...ouch.


Method D Results:

• Sushi.
• Food.
• Soy Sauce.
• Sake
• Wasabi on plate?

Conclusion(s): These methods don't really work in regards to naming icons.


Instead, I just jotted down some random words and phrases that came to mind with sushi:

• Zushi - Transliteration of the word from Japanese
• Sushi A Go-Go
• Goes best with soy sauce
• "A poor, monochrome representation of the colorful culinary delight that is sushi."
• YOU CAN'T EAT THESE
• Delicious Coma
• Kakoii - "cool"
• No refrigeration necessary.
• Digital feast. (lame)
• iSushi.
• KANPAI! ("cheers!")
• Icons from the Sushi Bar
• Eat me.
• Sushi Culture
• Raw Fish and Seaweed Culture

_final icons

Final Icons: