Monday, April 25, 2011

Personal Review, Graphic Design


Above are some of my recent designs. Elements I try to include in my pieces:

-simple graphics
-minimalism
-lots of negative space
-bold colors
-vintage backgrounds
-sans serif fonts (gill sans and champagne & limousines in particular)
-smooth, clean lines
-silhouettes
-halftone patterns
-sun bursts
-paint splatters
-minimal text
-grunge

Artist Review #17: Ishimoto Yasuhiro

Ishimoto Yasuhiro's most famous work was completed from 1953 to 1954 and documents the Imperial Villa of Katsura, a Japanese town that was established during the 17th century in the Imperial era. The structures that comprise the village incorporate many elements to be found later in Modernist designs, yet also reference ongoings of the 17th century.

Yasuhiro was trained in a manner that referenced the Bauhaus, and he learned to pay attention to shapes, shadows, and angles when looking at his subjects. When he turned his lens to Katsura, he was left with images that resembled "the grid-like composition of a Mondrian painting." His clean aesthetic and lack of excess in his works align with the aims of both Modernism and the traditional Japanese architecture style.

His compositions are clean, his tones are rich, and his focus is crisp. Together, these elements allow Yasuhiro's works to be visually stunning and appealing to me as both a lover of architecture and as a photographer.

Artist Review #16: Jason Mullins

I found Jason Mullin's work while stumbling for photographs; the first images of his that I saw were these and I was instantly captivated. The water and sky in each of these appears like smooth, unscathed glass, when in reality, it may have been a windy, turbulent day. I looked up the techniques associated with milky-looking water (I knew it had something to do with a slow shutter speed and high aperture, but I wasn't sure how one went about guessing at such long exposures), and came across numerous blog postings. The second link included (the link that doesn't lead to Mullins' page), has info concerning the lens filter that Mullins likely used. Apparently I need to invest in a cheap-- but not plastic-- neutral density filter. The darker, the better, because the longer the shutter speed will be. A functional (as opposed to deformed) tripod would also be helpful for such shots (thank you, darling brother). Supposedly the milky skies and waters were really popular a few years ago, but have since gone slightly out of style. I feel like with the right subject, the kitschiness could be avoided; I think Mullins does a good job of avoiding the inspirational poster-y look in his works.

Links: http://www.jasonamullins.com/

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Artist Review #15: Andrea Gallo

In attempt to accumulate the amount of credit hours necessary for graduation, I opted to do a Public Relations and Marketing internship with the UR International Theatre Program. Although the internship was decidedly less design-oriented than I had anticipated (in fact, it's mostly just press releases and flyer distribution), there are some aspects of the course that lend themselves to Illustrator and Photoshop.

In lieu of a final paper, Nigel, the Artistic Director, assigned a final project incorporating all the skills we learned over the course of the semester. From press releases to radio spots to poster designs, we've been preparing for this all semester.

My first approach to the design was as follows:


Although I spent numerous hours piecing the components of this design together, they still felt disconnected and the work seemed overly busy. I then decided to look at what other people had been creating. While looking through google images for designs, I found myself drawn to minimalist posters. Although minimalism is generally associated with the 60s and 70s, it's recently made a comeback. Here are some architectural posters I found particularly captivating:


I love how the designs are clean, elegant, bold, and crisp. Although the designs are simply white text and designs on black backgrounds, they manage to incorporate all that is essential to the buildings they exemplify. When I blended the silhouettes of my components with simple colors, I would up with this:


Although I would have preferred to use smaller, less noticeable text, I feel as though a theatre poster necessitates big, bold show times and production titles. The fonts were particularly hard to get for the design; I wanted a serif font that was militaristic, eroded, slightly antiquated, and readable from a distance. I finally settled upon an edited version of American Typewriter, found on dafont.com. (I would be lost without this site). All in all, I liked the inspiration that Gallo's work provided. The simplicity, I think, makes for a more stunning result; my first attempt seemed far too cluttered and the second is more consistent with my aesthetic.

Links: Dafont.com