You came back to Chicago to do BIG THANGS.

Listen to your art professors (they are quite wise).


• "Fine arts school can go beyond limits and the results can be controversial. Design school allows the artist to produce work to market oneself and the results are professional."

I never really realized this difference until my professor told us. It came about when one student came up with a concept, very original, yet very controversial during our advertising class. It involved a guerilla advertisement of abortion that was rather "IN YOUR FACE." It's important to consider what a passerby would think when viewing this advertisement. We have put our feet into our viewer's shoes. We have to consider morals and ethics and consider our own personal feels toward particular subjects. We also have to remember the projects we do in class are for our portfolio, so at times we have to lower the level of our extreme concepts. Professionalism in the graphic design world is number one when landing a job. We have to be respectful and open minded and not always let our feelings get the best of us when creating a project.


• "A gallery is just to make money. It's nothing glamourous. Selling art is NOT a need or a durable good, it's just an accessory. It is all about STATUS & MARKETING. The wealthy buys your art and tells others. When your artwork is chosen among others, it is caused by the right time, right place. It's pure LUCK.

I always wanted to open my own gallery exhibiting local fine artists work. For myself, I wanted to do this to showcase people's talents, not to sell and make money. I can see where my professor is coming from, and yes, it is luck if somebody wants to purchase your painting/drawing, but I find the most inspiration from seeing the look on a viewer's face as they try to depict the painting themselves and attempt to understand what the artist was trying to say.


• "Restrictions encourage creativity."

The more restrictions, the more creative the student will push themselves. In the real world, there are restrictions on colors, size, forms, trim size and there will always be a budget to abide by, so the designer must find the solutions fitting these limitations. These limitations only further pushes us to go out of the box when it comes to creativity. It makes us designers become even more original and stand out as an individual.


• "Let it bleed."

Images placed on layouts should always be pulled over the edge to the bleed line. This way, there will not be a thin white line shown after trimming the document down.


• "Comic Sans ruins moments."

Comic Sans really should never be used on ANYTHING.


• "Whenever you show me negative space, I'm thinking about what you mean."

It's all about METACOMMUNICATION. It's what you DON'T say that evokes emotion and causes shivers up the viewer's spine. Don't state the obvious when designing, create INNUENDOS - the most POWERFUL level of communication. In book designing, the front cover evokes the mystery. It is letting the reader know what they could know. It causes them to be intrigued.


• "Good typography is made when the viewer doesn't even have to read the words themselves."

We should think about the voice of the character who is saying the words on the page. Show the characteristic of the voice through the choice of type and it's placement on the page. Think about the time period that person is living in (for example, a quote from Thomas Jefferson has the American spirit, a serif font shows how its classical whereas a quote by J.F.K is more modern)


• "As designers, we should be literate!"

READ READ READ. Read everything. Read books from many aspects, man genres, many time periods. Develop your vocabulary and think about your own creative mindset when reading those words. What kind of scene forms in your head as you read the story? That's how powerful the writer and the designer is when creating books. Their words and choices of color/typefaces/placements helps push your imagination to a particular imaginary scene.

Wow, time really does fly by when you're extremely swamped with schoolwork, artwork, and planning out your future. Sorry it's been awhile since I've blogged. Now I've got the past quarter, the present quarter, and the future quarter to cover.

May I just say that as an artist and a designer, I feel myself growing a whole lot more. I've never found myself any happier than when I am on the computer, moving the mouse around, click click click-ing to illustrate my next concept. I find myself recognizing typefaces all around me (and at times knowing the name of the font). I get bothered by widows, raggedy rags, and rivers within a body of text. Graphic design has completely engulfed my mind. I've never felt like such a graphic design nerd (and proud of it).

Before I speak about my schoolwork, I want to share links to my online portfolios. Fellow artists, add me as a friend if you are involved with Coroflot, Flickr, LinkedInk, and Myspace.





http://erioapilado.webs.com

I've finally had the time to redo my main website featuring my photography, studio art & designs.


Coroflot design portfolio : http://www.coroflot.com/erioapilado
Portfolio features only designs from book jackets, illustrations, posters, interior spreads, and collateral work.

Flickr photography : http://www.flickr.com/photos/e_rioapilado
Photography online portfolio.

LinkedIn : http://www.linkedin.com/in/erioapilado
Networking.

Myspace : http://www.myspace.com/erioapilado
Myspace networking with musicians. What I'd like to do is work with musicians and design their CD album cover art, flyers for promotions, t-shirt designs, etc.

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Type & Image : For our final project, we had to design the front and back covers and inside spreads of a Chicago Public Art Guide: Loop. We had to provide the photographs ourselves (except for the Buckingham Fountain due to construction). The bodies of text and other information (material, dimensions, location, artist name & artwork name) was provided to us. It was hard to take a decent photograph of the art pieces due to the winter weather, so several trips outside were made. The layouts and everything else were open to interpretation. Before we went on with the project, we visited the Joan Flasch collection at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. The book collection was inspiring! There was a plethora of different styled books, made out of different materials, some common and some uncommon. There was a book using an old JCPenney catalog and at the end a secret cut-out place for polaroid photographs of let's just say censored male body parts haha. The purpose of our field trip was to be inspired and maybe have it influence our own ideas for out books. One student at our final presentations used found paper and vellum to print the photographs and information on.

I had a couple issues with my own book. I wanted to do something extravagant, but time and money can always be an obstacle. I was the crazy one in my class to produce my own sketches of the photographs. I was at first going to have the drawings printed on a vellum sheet of paper overlaying the page of the photograph, but that's when the money issue jumped in. Also, it was extremely hard to have the drawing printed on the page in the EXACT placement of the photograph. While playing around on photoshop and being bummed out on what to do, I accidently just started "magic wand-ing" pieces of the original photograph and merging it with the sketches, and the results turned out to be own artworks of the art pieces. The photographs had a watercolor, painterly-like feel to them, and I absolutely loved it!

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Digital Photography : The last two projects for our photography class allowed us to do whatever we wanted. One of them, our professor tore out a random page in a dictionary, and we had to shoot photographs according to a word of our choice (and a definition of our choice). I chose the word parfait, because I thought it would be challenging to try and do food photography. Plus buying the ingredients and making the parfaits myself was fun to do (especially the eating part). We had to combine our learned skills of working with lighting from our previous portrait project. Plus, the challenge of having to title our pieces was new.

For this kind of photography, I needed to purchase and create my own "staging" for the parfaits to be shot in. My definition of a parfait was very straightforward, so it was a challenge to think of a twist in the concept.

parfait [par-fay] noun
a dessert consisting of layers of ice cream, fruit, and sauce, topped with whipped cream,
and served in a tall glass: a blackberry and apricot parfait
[French: perfect]

The theme of this set of food photography was turning the perfectly prepared parfaits
into criminals undergoing an interrogation method.

'Parfaits wanted'




The weapons



The usual suspects



The gang



Turn to your left



The tall one



Mug shots



Intimidation method



The meltdown



Guilty



Done

Our final project for photography was all up to us. And an artist statement was required to do (which definitely helps you understand why you make the design decisions and understand why you do the things you do in your own work, it's like a self-artist-analysis). I am a huge fan of PostSecret and I've always wanted to visually interpret my own secrets. I am a writer myself, so merging my art and writing was always something I love to do. Because these were photographs, I couldn't just paste or write words onto the physical thing. I had to figure out a way to involved the writing within the setting of the photograph. Ah, another challenge. I scribbled down many 'secrets' of mine while going through old and new writings as my research (btw, if you want to check out my writing go here http://shyshai.livejournal.com) Some of my chosen secrets are silly, and some are personal. Either way, they all kind of give you a feel as to my way of thinking and my perspective.


'More than words'
An individual’s personal life experiences affecting their inner thoughts becomes the essence of their character and is truly what sets apart their lives among the millions of others in the world. At times two or more people may share the same perspectives, but this can only be achieved if either end voices out their opinions. Writing and art are two of the many different outlets a person may utilize to get their point across. With writing, a person may attack with words, sentences, and paragraphs whereas with art, a person may pierce the canvas board with a paintbrush. Both techniques guide the creative juices in a person’s mind to spill out into the open.

For myself, I write out my thoughts onto paper as a way to organize the words jumbled inside my head and reflect on what experiences I may be going through at that particular moment. I also visually interpret how I view the world by drawing or painting. I hold art and writing very close to my heart and I decided to fuse the two elements into a photograph.

Through visually interpreting my own secrets and thoughts, I enable the audience to have a glimpse into my mindset. Throughout the process, I explored the creative possibilities that were available in creating an interesting setting for the models and objects to make the viewers yearn for more information due to the shortened statements written out within the photograph. Because these statements are secrets, I purposely cropped out and darkened facial features of the models to keep it anonymous as well as produce a mysterious atmosphere within the environment. The statements in the actual photographs are shortened versions of the actual title of the piece to make the viewer yearn for more information and understanding. My photographs have hints of what I may be trying to speak out, but it never is in full explanation. I would like the audience to take a chance and come up with their own interpretations. My secrets are influenced by the experiences I have undergone. Some are serious and thought-provoking whereas some are random and comical. This goes to show not all secrets and thoughts are meant to have a pensive mood attached to them, but rather some depicts an individual’s traits and habits.

My intentions were for the viewer to analyze the meaning of my notions and hopefully open their minds to a different perspective with the possibility of building a connection with their own views on life.





I feel as though I'm ready as hell for 'love' again (or maybe for the first time)
but I refuse to search for it.



My parents don't know I have a tattoo.



I have a chocolate addiction.



Lust was my best friend.



Helvetica is my "always" font.



I keep you nearby.



To this day, I still question if I've ever been in love.
And I still question which guy I was really in love with first.



I will forever be haunted by a ghost of the past around my birthday.



I'm ready.

I don't wear my heart on my sleeve.

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Now for the current quarter, a hell of a lot different than my past 2 quarters. I'm entering the near-end of my junior year. Things are starting to get intense, my skills and creative process are being put up to a test and challenged every single time I walk into that classroom. We are introduced to producing a process book, which some students say is busy work, but my professor explained the purpose of them very clearly. In the process book, we must organize our written thoughts and sketches. Organization is key (and thank goodness I'm very organized and anal about things, if you walked into my room, everything is set at its correct space--wow, I must sound crazy right now). We have a section for our thumbnails, our detailed thumbnails, prototypes, swatches, typeface examples, research, our written concepts, printed computer progressions, etc. It sounds like a lot, but it's soo helpful. If I were sitting with a client and they asked how my design process was and how I came about with the final outcome, I have that process binder book to show and go through each step of the way.

Professor JMoore:
In a fine arts school, a student can go beyond limits, and at times their work is controversial.
But this is a design school. You produce work to market yourself, so it must be professional.

There are also quarter long projects, with many more critiques within the class time and many more deadlines and revisions and such. We're given a piece of the project, and once we've gone through the process of sketches, critique, revise, critique, an A-OK from the professor, place onto the computer, critique, revise, critique (sometimes it's repeated more than 2 rounds), etc etc. And then we have the opportunity to make slight changes to anything we've produced along the way until the final presentation. Talk about a long, long design process.

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Graphic Symbolism : A course without using type for probably the first half of the quarter? TYPE, my FAVORITE, I had to give up for awhile! This is one of the classes where we have a quarter long project. At the first day of class, we went through many logos such as UPS, NBC etc. and talked about the shapes and colors and the background meaning behind the logo. Paul Rand, the greatest graphic designer, was the base of our influence in class.

For our project, we had to produce our own company. I chose a chocolate company (reference to my secret photograph 'I have a chocolate addiction'). We worked on our logo for probably half the quarter, designing it on illustrator. I think I've illustrated so much this past quarter, but practice makes perfect right? We had to work with no color at first (not even a grayscale!). My professor said that a logo must work in black and white before color is placed in it (color just enhances it). After doing so, we could finally come up with a name for our company and find the correct typeface to place within the logo boundaries (thank you dafont.com!). We then had to make sublogos, which would become the different departments of our company (those had to work in black and white as well).

For my company, I named it D'Lishas ('delicious+elisha=d'lishas heh? heh?) My departments would include milk chocolate, white chocolate, and dark chocolate. But then you know with chocolate, there's a buttload of kinds, so I had 4 main categories: fruit filled, nut filled, caramel filled, & no filling. For our final presentation, we have two boards to make: a concept board (describing the company, why we chose the colors for the logo/sublogo, why we chose the font, etc) and an execution board (placing our main logo onto clothes, packaging, etc) Some people are illustrating, but I am currently planning to make a chocolate bar wrapper. The main thing we had to remember was that our logo must be legible when resized bigger and especially small sized.

*I am still working on my whole project so I will post up the final results in my next blog.

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Digital Layout & Composition : AH! A class doing stuff I just love, love, LOVE to do. LAYOUTS! Especially magazine layouts! Working for a magazine is a dream of mine. PRINT magazine --ahh, watch out, I may be your future employee. I love that magazine (especially those covers!) GRIDS GRIDS GRIDS were the main emphasis of this course. This is one class we don't have a quarter long project (plus I'm familiar with my professor, cuz I've had her since the beginning of my career at ILIA, so I know her work style). It's just something about bodies of text, messing with the kerning/leading, fixing raggedy rags, etc. etc. that just makes me go crazy happy! The only different thing for this class was working on a new software: QuarkExpress 7. Talk about OLD SCHOOL! I've missed using InDesign throughout this course. QuarkExpress isn't so bad, but I've been told that many companies have upgraded to InDesign. But still, it's good to learn a new software and have a background in it.


Our very first project was to be a reporter ourselves. We had to attend a cultural event in Chicago and take photographs, as well as write our own article from our experience. And yet another good accident happened for me! I was planning to attend an Obama exhibition which featured collected artworks across the nation that were made to support his presidential campaign. (Plus it's Chicago, Obama's hometown, how cultural is that?!) Since we were using cameras, we had to call and make sure taking photographs were ok. I called, and no, it wasn't. Damn! So I had to have a back-up plan, go to the Art Institute museum (honestly, I wasn't very excited). But on the way walking to the museum, I passed by the Obama exhibit. My fellow classmate just said to take a chance and go in and ask the security to take a couple shots for our school project. Done and Done. That exhibit was UH-MAZ-ING. It was so inspiring to see how our current president INSPIRED others across the nation.




Concept: I wanted to show particular works in the exhibit, but crop out the photos to a zoomed in portion to give the reader a preview. This way, they may go to the exhibit themselves to see the artwork at it's whole state. The colors are obviously varied in the artworks, so I wanted to keep the spread colors at minimum as to not distract the colorful photographs.

'Face to Face: Barack Obama portraiture at its finest'
Obama’s campaign for presidency not only turned heads his way for support in votes, but also caused an eruption of creativity across the country. Graphic prints, photographs, videos, and posters soon emerged all serving the same purpose –spreading the word on Obama and revealing to the world how this single man became an inspiration on their creative endeavors.

The Chicago Tourism Center has assembled an exhibition named “Officially Unofficial.” Featuring more than 100 works from various artists and designers throughout the United States, the exhibit allows the city of Chicago to witness the impact of imagination their president had. The pieces collected visually communicate the message ‘hope for change’ through passionate expressions in the graphics and words selected. Obama’s face appears an innumerable amount of times in the artworks and our country’s patriotic trio of colors fills the gallery space. The patriotic atmosphere these pieces emit reveals the artists’ dedication to Barack Obama.

Some artworks featured were commissioned by the campaign whereas independent artists produced other works. The exhibition includes Ray Noland’s “GoTellMama!” poster series and Shephard Fairey’s “Hope” poster. The Obama 2008 logo and branding is showcased featuring the development of sketches to the finalized Obama logo. The show involved the following curators: Nathan Mason from the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs, Scott Thomas, a former design director of Obama for America, and Ray Noland, a local Chicago artist.

Many of the works, ranging from prints to videos to posters, maintained the main purpose of supporting Obama. The graphic elements themselves in several of the pieces were portraits of Barack Obama with a single bold word or a catchy phrase. Some portraits were stylized whereas others were drawn in a realistic fashion. A binder full of smaller prints assembled in numerical order featured the reasons why Obama should be elected president. On two separate walls hung two large posters of collages formed from Obama silhouettes, United States flags, Obama faces, and words from his speeches. The groups of Obama-inspired artwork filled the white walls of the gallery space and invited those who passed by the building to step into this beacon of hope.

Officially Unofficial can be viewed at the Chicago Tourism Center located on 72 East Randolph Street directly across from the Chicago Cultural Center. Running from April 1st to May 31st, 2009, the free gallery is open to public on Monday-Saturday 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and on Sunday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.


A project I've just finished recently required us to do an interview paper on a Chicago employer. We had to contact them ourselves, and set the time and place to do a professional interview. It's very hard to contact the design firms downtown, but LUCKILY (I'm just full of luck this quarter aren't I?) I had a former professor to interview, my typography professor Maia Wright. I was able to go to the University of Chicago Press to interview her (she works full-time as a book designer at U. of C. Press). The interview went very well, and I learned a whole lot from her. She gave me a lot of names that she found their work influential that I could research on. Her passion for typography inspired me. I absolutely love type, and I really do see myself working as a book designer, or working for a magazine for layouts. Pretty much ANYTHING with typefaces, I know I'll be involved in.

Other than creating a magazine spread for this project, we also had to make a magazine cover (either a made up magazine or an existing magazine). For mine, I made it up.





Concept : My concept for the magazine, Ink’d, was to use the printing colors as the main colors for the cover as well as the spread ⎯cyan, magenta, yellow, and black. The magazine would be featuring a montly interview of a designer of a big city in the United States. In this month’s issue, a Chicago designer was chosen: Maia Wright. Because she is a book designer and a typography professor, the speech bubble on the cover contains various terms for type anatomy and layout designs. An illustration of the Sears Tower was chosen which best represented the city of Chicago. The speech bubble concept as well as the color pallete was carried into the inside spread. Maia’s own work is very clean and follows a tight grid, so I wanted to do the same with my layout. The simplicity of the layout allows the ready to not be distracted by any other graphic elements.

'Talking type with Maia Wright: Her passionate love for letters'
Earning her Bachelor in Comparative Literature at Princeton University, Maia thought design was a hobby on the side and was unaware than an individual could work as a designer for a living. When writing her thesis, Maia merged her passion for typography by using many forms of type. For two and a half years, she worked for a design studio that was a different environment than her current job. She has been working as a full-time book designer at the University of Chicago for four years. She also works part-time as a typography instructor at the Illinois Institute of Art-Chicago. Maia also works as a freelance designer and has designed environmental graphics, branding and print collateral.

At the U.I.C. Press, Maia designs about 40 books a year. Given a book summary, Maia has an understanding of what the country and time period the story is set in to gain ideas of the typefaces to use, photos, charts, and other design elements. The interior book includes the layouts of the body of texts and type specs. She would have to design the title page, table of contents, chapter openers and the sub headings. The knowledge of the trim size and page count is essential to fit certain number of characters in the assigned page count. Maia has freedom on the choice of typefaces for the interior whereas when designing the book jacket, marketing sales and the author has a say on what should be on the cover in order to advertise the book in the store. At times, Maia could illustrate her own book cover, but if the author is a long-term client of the company, they would have a say in the final book cover.

Maia brought along several books she designed in the past to physically show me how the process goes about. The manuscript was filled with numbered lines of text and type specs written on the sides to inform the typesetter the font style, size, and leading of the paragraph. She explained how her choice of typeface was influenced by the typefaces she found in the photographs placed in the context of the book. For example, one book was about the history of the Woolworth building and the construction of modern day New York City. When viewing the photographs, Maia found a typeface used on a store awning and decided to find a similar font that fit the anatomy as close as possible to use as the main typeface for the title and chapter openings. She then explained how because a page in a book is very complex with a number of details, she must make everything work together so that it is almost invisible when a reader flips through the pages and not be distracted. As for the book cover, Maia showed a printed draft and explained how she cannot finalize the cover until she knows the size of the spine of the book.

During the weekends, Maia spends her time as a typography professor at the Illinois Institute of Art-Chicago. Being a former student, I was fortunate enough to experience her style of teaching. Maia explained her own expectations for herself as well as her expectations of the students. She strives to get the students excited about the material and to communicate her passion for it. She has also found designing the syllabus and website in a clear format is a form of practice for information design. As for the students, Maia wishes for them to engage in the class and take the time to put in the hours into the work. She also would like them to be devoted to the design process. In her mind, it is all about the thumbnails, not the end product. “You may be skilled in sketching,” Maia says, “but you must know how to present your ideas and how you came about the final idea to the client.” When it comes to her philosophy on letting students utilize their creativity, she believes restrictions encourage creativity. The more restrictions, the more creative the student will push themselves. In the real world, there are restrictions on colors, size, forms, trim size and there will always be a budget to abide by, so the designer must find the solutions fitting these limitations.


The final project for this class is to make spreads on a collection. A catalog. It could be something like shoes or something abstract. For me? I chose to be abstract and challenge myself (again). I chose to do a catalog of past relationships/flings (romantic of course). My research will involve me getting in contact with ex-beaus (I'm still friends with the majority of them). Ten is the limit for this project. I'm planning to have photographs of the ex's either with us together (if I still have them) or single. Or maybe do an illustration of the photograph being torn apart or burned. I want this to be comical, featuring their profile and text about what worked, what didn't work, why we broke up, etc.

*I'm currently working on this now so I will be posting my final spreads in the next blog.

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Collateral Design : What is collateral design? A series of printed materials that go together for a specific reason. So therefore, this means a quarter long project. Our client is the Art Institute of Chicago and we had to choose an artist to create an exhibition for. We were to write a research paper first to get to know our artist and art movement. I chose Claes Oldenburg (the sculptor who creates enormous sculptures of common objects and placing them in a different context through use of materials). I decided to do an exhibition of the sculptures being placed throughout the Chicago loop. Date, times, kind of event was all up to us. We are to create invitations, posters, brochures, and booklets (ones that would be in gift shops) YAY, now I can work on InDesign :)

The process book for this goes more than thumbnails. We had to go to stores (Blick's, Paper Source) to find paper samples and such. It's pretty much like we are really working with the client trying to promote our ideas professionally. This is the first course that requires us to dress business casual during our final presentation. Intense right?

*I am currently producing work for the project so I will be posting the final items in the next blog

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3 more weeks til summer break. Then 3 weeks of summer break, then SUMMER QUARTER BEGINS. How intense. I've been trying to plan out the rest of my senior year in order to graduate by June 2010, and I will be going through a lot more work (but I can handle it, I'm a fighter) I have 4 more quarters til graduation, that means 72 more credit hours WHICH MEANS 2 quarters of 20 crd hrs and 2 quarters of 16 crd hrs. Full-full time and full-time student. I'll be doing 20 credit hours this summer quarter. And hopefully I can find an intership soon. Lots to do! But I'm beyond determined.

The next 5 courses I'll be taking will be Concept Design, Designing for Multimedia Displays, History of Graphic Design, Print Production and Corporate Identity.

Wish me luck!

June 2010. My expected graduation date. So many things have been on my mind as of late! The future is what's been running through my mind non-stop, and at times it's caught me off guard on how quickly time is passing and how I'm halfway through my VC program at school! I admit I had a few weeks of doubts in my art and where I was heading in my life (truly tired and uninspired), but with the help of good friends and support from everybody, I'm out of that funk and back on track. I know I've got so much more to do and prove to myself. Transitioning from a fine arts student to a design student (creating those art pieces on the computer) was really tough (and still is) to get used to, but every time I see those flyer promotions and magazine layouts, I just get this push within myself.


You shouldn't doubt your work. If you do...you need to do more to convince yourself
cuz you know all of us "shai fans" can't get enough. -m.dam

It's people like you that motivate me to become someone greater than myself. -i.navejas

Reality has been hitting me pretty hard, and it's time to make tough decision about what I'm going to do in my future. There's a lot of sacrifices have to be made. As much as I love Chicago, and have missed my hometown in the suburbs, I know that realistically I've got to finish my education here and make my impact while I'm here and then head back to my family in Texas and help out paying off the loans. Work, then pleasure my mother always says. I know I can always return to Chicago in a couple years on my own when I've got my career going on. I always have to remind myself the reasons WHY I returned. I'm here to learn and grow as an artist/designer. I'm here to make something of myself and follow MY dreams, even if I'm leaving some people in my life. I'm here to inspire and be inspired.

I've been trying to get a job, just to make some extra money and have been job hunting until it really hit me, I should really find an internship that is related to design. This can give me experience before even getting a real job when I graduate. It's amazing how much outside work you've got to put yourself through other than finishing projects for a grade in school.

I've had discussions with some of my professors and have taken advantage of asking them about careers and such. One of my professors gave me his insight about art, particularly the whole painting and trying to sell your artwork. He stated that an art gallery is just another way to make money and how selling art is not a need or a durable good, it's just an accessory. Your status and marketing, plus the right time and right place -pretty much pure luck- are the factors in selling an art piece. I'm not sure if I agree with his statement, but it's a good perspective to hear out. I always said I wanted to open up my own gallery somewhere in Chicago or NYC some day in my life, and honestly, I'd love to open it to give other artists the opportunity to try and INSPIRE others. Making art is my outlet, and my way to express what I'm feeling at that very moment. It has never been about the money for me. That's how I feel and have always felt. I guess listening to this new, kind of harsh, perspective of art affected me and discouraged me for awhile, but I've overcome that obstacle. If this is the way other people view art as, I'm determined to convince them that there's more to it.

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News: I have been networking with musicians via Myspace (the greatest spot to be introduced to a variety of music all over the world). Music is another love of mine and it's inspiring to witness musicians spreading the word about their music. I love how there's this bridge built between art and music. Album covers and promotion flyers is a major interest of mine. I've actually got folders of cover art/flyers on my computer that I have seen on the internet and I've kept because their design and layouts are just amazing. Other than networking musicians, I am chasing after another goal of mine to design graphic tees and have partnered up with another great artist and classmate of mine. It's grand to find somebody who shares the same passion and determination as me.

On March 6th, 2009, our school's annual Fashion and Media Extravaganza (FAME) is being held at the Harris Theatre at Millenium Park. I've submitted some of my photography to it and fortunately have been accepted! Hearing this news that I was one of the chosen ones out of the million of students who entered was another push for my motivation.

On April 1st, 2009, I plan on contributing to my old middle school's Festival of the Arts. They have asked me to have my own little "Alumni Spotlight" gallery at the festival where I will have some of my work hung and also be there drawing new pieces. I'm truly blessed to have been asked to do so. And I can't wait to see what those 6th-8th grade art classes have been doing. I haven't been able to guest speak since November, but I'm hoping to some time soon again.

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Digital Photography for Designers: This photography class has been challenging throughout the quarter. I've been learning how to communicate a message or emotion in a photograph with the use of lighting, perspective, and small tricks done by adjusting the settings on the camera to create a CREATIVE EXPOSURE. The hardest part of the projects is finding the time to shoot, especially during the winter time where the cold & snow can sometimes stall you from proceeding with your ideas, but I've managed to accomplish them. I've also been gaining some knowledge about digitally enhancing a photograph on Photoshop --manipulating with colors, levels, curves and using tools such as dodge and burn. Abiding by the "Rule of Thirds" when cropping photos is especially held of high importance with my professor. Centering is a no-no. There's so many steps to go through with photography from setting up the scene or looking for one, shooting it, transferring it onto the computer, manipulating it to your own creative piece, and then sending it off to print professionally --all that time is worth it in the end.

Shutter speed : Motion blur/Motion still







Perspective







Portraiture

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Type & Image: The more I'm in this class, the more I fall in love with Typography and layout designs. Walking around the city, I see all these billboards, advertisements on benches and walls of buildings and I just think to myself of the typeface name, haha it's ridiculous.

In the following project, we had to photograph scenes or objects that had our assigned letters, in my case O, H, I, E. I struggled at first and went searching throughout my apartment things that represented the letters, but later on I viewed some of my photography for my actual photography class and saw so many letters! Even to this day while walking around the city, I see V's in the bridges over the Chicago river, H's in buildings and so forth. It's amazing how type is literally ALL AROUND US, it's just up to us to recognize and appreciate it. After finding our letters, we had to search through various typefaces and match them with the letter in the photograph according to their characteristics -condensed, rounded, curved, geometric, angled etc.










Another project I recently finished was a calendar layout project. Luckily, I got my birthday month, February =). HELVETICA was our chosen book font, that font is EVERYWHERE and I've got to say, it is my favorite. When it comes to layouts, I am a fan of minimalism and simplicity. I believe less says more. Circles, lines, squares --absolute favorite elements of mine. I am also a big fan of two-toned layouts, and our chosen book color was a turquoise color (which happens to be one of my favorite colors). Abiding by the GRID is the most important when doing layouts on InDesign. I really, truly believe I've found my passion in this graphic design business, and I definitely see myself working for a magazine in the future (besides, writing is another passion of mine).

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Form & Space: This class isn't a friend of mine, but I've been pulling through. It's interesting to learn about 3D and finding creative ways to utilize materials, but building things just has never been my forte. But of course, you've got to get out of your comfort zone and go out into that new territory and conquer as much as possible. This is my last foundation class in my program, so I am trying to make the most of it.

Interactive design: Created an art gallery featuring tiny photographs of my own work done in my photography class. I used acyrlic painted bristol paper and used simple triangular shapes to create the photograph holder and also made small benches. The design of the gallery itself was placed in a symmetrical manner.



Mask: I am very much interested in the 1920's Jazz Age (remember my Great Gatsby book jacket?) We had research tips on african masks but I didn't want to do the usual, nor did I want to do some cutesy mask. Using styrofoam, glue, feathers, acrylic paints, and sequences, I created a flapper-like mask. I tried to make it as glamorous and beautiful as those flappers in the 1920s.