Video

Sustainability Video

17

I cannot believe it; school is almost over. YESYESYESYES!

Wednesday’s class was more of a filler, but it was very informative and helpful because Professor Moss talked about internships, which are very important to a designer as it gives them the opportunity to learn from someone who has experience in the field and it may jump start their career as well.  I know I need to look for an internship as soon as possible because I have two years of school left, and based on what I have seen and heard, most internships are not keen on accepting graduates but I could be  wrong since this happened to people who were in the medical field. To be honest, I found this lecture to be the most helpful as it is something that I can relate to right now. I’m not saying that the other classes were not helpful because they were, but interning is something that I had minimal knowledge about so this lecture helped me out a lot. It was quite naive of me to not believe that there are companies out there who will take advantage of their interns and that is quite sad because a bad experience like that can affect a person big time.

Haha wow, I’ve never typed this fast before. Like I said earlier, this lecture was extremely helpful as it was pertaining to internships. My dad’s friend offered to let me intern at his printing shop, but I was going to be in summer school so I had to decline.  I hope the offer still stands.

16

Oh Mondays. How I despise them with the intensity of a thousand burning suns.

Professor Moss showed the class a movie on AIGA, and while it was interesting, I wanted to work on my video project more because it’s due next Monday (um…tomorrow?). I forgot the name of one of the designers in the video, but I thought she was kind of like me because we tend to doubt our ability as designers. Fifty dollars per year is not a bad deal since I use to pay something like that for my magazines. I found the video interesting because it introduced me to some of the prominent figures in the design industry.

第十五課

Wednesday's class was quite uneventful. Okay it wasn't boring, but the class did not do much today except for talk about the final project. Oh my sanity. The topic of my final project is restaurants/cafes and waste; the reason I picked this topic is because I have gone to some cafes where if you reuse the cup they give you, they will take ten percent off the amount you have to pay. Another cafe I have gone to don't serve their dishes/snacks on plastic or paper plates but porcelain plates. I think another reason why I picked this topic is because I LOVE food which might make this project more enjoyable. After this, Professor Moss asked the class to create a storyboard for their video as it will give the class a better understanding of what they will want to do for their video.

I think that creating this video will be fun once I complete my research and finish taking pictures of the restaurants and cafes that I will be mentioning in my video. The purpose of this project might be to help us think critically about the topic of the video and also allow us to expend our creativity.

第十四課

In class on Monday the class presented the three non-related images they had chosen for their story. The images that I picked were of a little girl with fairy wings climbing a tree, a black and white picture of a tree trunk and the last one was a picture of a small gathering. I think I have a slightly twisted mind because the story that I came up with originally was about the little girl coming across a family that seems normal on the outside but are twisted and sick on the inside. SAD FACE. As the class looked at each three shot and talked about them, I realized that almost everyone had a different take on the story, especially mine because their stories were happy, and hopeful while mine was just...weird. After that, the class had to create several three shot stories using the images brought in by everyone. I think the purpose of these assignments was to make the class take into consideration what makes a good story and to be aware of the fact that others will read the story differently (but I think that's a given).

第十三課

In class on Wednesday, a three shot story was the first thing that was assigned to us by Professor Moss. We were also asked to critique the stories that were created by each group and at the end, vote for the best three shot story. After that, Professor Moss assigned our final project which is we have to make a video that has to do with sustainabilty and how it relates to the earth, people, and the world around us. I think this might be the reason why he assigned the three shot story because for a video is a story and for a story to be a good one, it has to make sense...well at least most of them do. Going back to the first few classes at the beginning of the quarter, I remember Professor Moss said that designers are storytellers as well because they create stories with their projects and the ending is either created by the designer or left up to the audience.

It is going to be a long two weeks...I can feel it -_-".

第十二課

The first we did in class on Monday was push the tables to the side and form a circle with the chairs. This took us about a few minutes because the first formation resembled some sort of oblong shape. After this was settled, we played a game that tested our attention and listening skills because if someone messed up, we would have to start all over again and man it would have been terrible if we were halfway around the circle and then someone messed up. Not going to lie, it was easy at first but as the game progressed, the pressure for me to not mess up grew exponentially because I was pretty close to the end of the circle. The purpose of this game might have been to...well, test our attention and listening skills since these skills basically everyone needs. After the game ended, Professor Moss went over the creative briefs that was assigned to the class last Wednesday. I was not familar with creative briefs nor did I know what they were, but after class on Monday, I now know that they were important for designers. The creative briefs will not only help keep me on track when I am working on a project, but also let my client and myself know what will be going on with the project.

I think the purpose of today's lesson was to (as stated in the previous paragraph) test our attention and listening skills. Well not really test, but it made us concentrate on the game because starting over is never fun. As a designer, I need to aim for perfection when it comes to my projects because the quality of the projects will represent who I am as a designer. Creative briefs are crucial for me because I tend to stray away from the main purpose of the project and if I have a creative brief with me at all times, I think it will help me stay on task.

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第十一課

In class on Wednesday, the people who did not present on Monday presented today. After stalling for an hour or so, I finally decided to present my game board and to be honest I do not know what I was so afraid of because it was not as bad as I thought it would have been. I know that I was not as confident as I should have been when presenting, and that is something I should improve on because if I cannot sell my concept to my client, I will end up going nowhere in my career. I also know that I am quite sensitive when it comes to criticism, but I have to learn how to deal with it because criticism is meant to help me grow as a designer. As stated in the last entry, I think the purpose of this assignment was to force us to be creative and come up with an original concept that will appeal to the masses, and teach us how to sell our ideas to our client because it is important for us as designers to be able to sell it since they will have different designers fighting for their attention.

第十課

In class on Monday, we presented our game boards to the whole class. I did not go up on Monday because of reasons...okay I was freaking out and I thought I was going to vomit if I did. After each person finished presenting their concept, the floor was opened to the audience was to give the presenter some constructive criticism on their presentation and the concept of their game board. Whether it is positive or negative, the criticism that is given will benefit all of us as designers because constructive criticism is what it is, something that will help us grow. Ew that is so cheesy. The purpose of the critique and project might have been to prepare us for the bigger things in life because not everyone will be as nice when it comes to giving criticism.  

Even though I did not present on Monday, I still learned a lot from the critique because I can take some of the criticism and apply it to my game board and make it better.

第九课

Wednesday’s class was pretty mundane (I hope I don’t get in trouble for saying that). The class had to gather around the two desks that were pushed together and Professor Moss looked at half of the class’ concepts. I think the purpose of this assignment was to get us thinking about what makes a game successful because games are being released constantly, but not all of them last as long as Monopoly, or Candy Land. Based on what Professor Moss told us on Monday about Monopoly, I think the reason it is still quiet popular is because the concept is interesting and makes you want to play it again and again, and has a history that dates back to early 1900s.   I had no idea it coming up with a good concept was this complicated, and might explain why it took me a while to come up with some ideas.

As stated in beginning I think the purpose of this was to force us to think creatively and come up with an original game that is both interesting, and fun. It was not an easy task, but it did force me to think creatively because for a game to stand out and appeal to the masses, it has to be something that they can play over and over again and never get tired of it.

第八课

Monday was a fun day as it was filled with games! Yay for Game Day! Everyone brought in a different game and Professor Moss encouraged the class to play with different games with different people. Both of the games that I played required some creativity and thinking as one of them is similar to Taboo, and the other one is Cranium. While we were playing with the board games, we also had to take into the consideration several questions such as: ‘Is there a moral to this game?’ ‘How do we feel while playing the game? Anxious? Ecstatic? Determined?’ ‘What is the main point of the game?’ I kind of understood why he asked us to take those questions into consideration, but they slipped my mind constantly. Behind each board game is a concept, and since this is a concept development class, it is only logical for us to think about the concept of each board game.

 To be honest, I have never thought about any of these questions while playing games in the past because I was so focused on winning, but I think I understand why Professor Moss wanted us to think about what makes this game interesting and what is the concept behind it. It is also important for us to understand the concept behind certain games because then it will help us with the games we have to create for homework.  

第七課

In class on Wednesday, the class was divided into two groups and we had to discuss the questions that were posted on the class’s Facebook page. When it was my turn to answer the questions, it took me a while to gather my thoughts because I tend to become a space case when I am put on the spot. My answer to the first question was yes, I had received some negative responses from others when I told them I was going to major in graphic design. Most of them were from family members who were worried that I would not make it in the industry, and that I should seek a career that was more practical and safe such as business or nursing. I would be a terrible nurse because I am terrified of blood and if I was to deal with a patient who was bleeding profusely, I’d probably freak out and faint or vomit. My answer to the next question was I usually try to understand what needs to be done before working on the project. Another thing that I do when I work on something is sketch out several ideas and scrap the ones that look horrid or do not look as good as the latest sketch. When I am working at home, music is a must because it calms me down and it also gets me thinking about different ideas that I can incorporate into the project.  Through this, it was comforting to know that I am not the only one who freaks out over projects, and have the need to be the BEST in the class. After this, the class watched two lectures. I found the lecture that was given by John Maeda to be more interesting than the one given by Tim Brown simply because the former made me laugh. But both lectures were informative and the lecture that was given by the latter, while it was loaded and his call for designers to change the world was quite burdensome, was inspiring because it inspired me to create designs that will affect others in a positive matter, and hopefully lead to small changes that will then grow into something large. Am I being an overachiever? Without a doubt yes, but I want to make an impact on the world even if it is something small.

I think the purpose of the questions in the beginning was for us see how others come up with their ideas, and if it sounds interesting, to give it a try because maybe it will work for us as well.

Wow, this post is filled with my feels.

第六課

Have you experienced your own or other people's fear-based reactions to your creative education and career choices?

When I first announced to my family that I was going to major in graphic design, a majority of my family members were skeptical and tried to persuade me into majoring in something more ‘practical’ like nursing. I would have been a terrible nurse because I am absolutely terrified of blood. I guess my own personal fears stemmed from my family members’ fears of me not making it in the design industry because I want to prove to them that they shouldn’t have doubted me in the past. But mostly, I want to prove to myself that I did not make a huge mistake by majoring in graphic design.

How have you successfully overcome these reactions?

To be honest, I am still working on it. There are times where I feel like I have wasted the past three years majoring in something that I am not capable of excelling in because it seems like everyone has the ability to crank out amazing pieces while mine are mediocre.  What I have been trying to do is tell myself that I can’t be good at everything, and as long as I try my best everything should be okay. It sounds cheesy, but it does help me get through the times when I doubt myself and my skills. 

What is your concept of your creative process?

The concept of my creative process is revolves around the instructions that are given by the instructor, and the ideas that come to me. If I do not understand the basics, there is a very high chance that I will screw it up somehow. Even though most people like to work alone, I like to work in a group because then I can ask others for their opinions on my project.

How do you approach creating, making?

The first thing I usually do is understand what needs to be done, and then go on to make a schedule that I should follow because I realize that I work better when I section out a few hours that will be dedicated working on my project(s). I also tend to like having music blasting in the room, particularly KPop (Korean Pop) because there is something about the beat and theme of the song that usually gets me going and thinking. As strange as it sounds, I also come up with decent ideas when I am in the kitchen baking something. I have no idea why this happens, but it does so I will just go with it.  

第五課

The main topic of yesterday’s class was visualization. Professor Moss went off on a tangent at the beginning of class, but I found it to be extremely helpful. As a designer I need to make sure that I know what my objective is, what is the intended outcome, and who is my audience.  If I do not know who my audience is, the final product will not be successful because I do not know what are my audiences’ likes and dislikes. After this, Professor Moss read a short story to the class and the class was asked to draw whatever came to mind at the end of the story. My friend told me that my drawing made no sense, and I agreed with him because it did not turn out like I thought it would. Towards the end of class, the class separated into four groups and we had to read out the taglines we had worked on over the weekend, and after that pick the one we thought was the best in our group. For our homework, we have to pick a phrase or word from the taglines we had come up with and find ten images that will change the mood of the word or phrase.

I think the main purpose of the tagline exercise was to get us to realize that designing is a group effort because if someone works alone, it is much harder and laborious since all of the work is put on them. When working in a group, ideas can branch out of a simple word or joke.I do agree with this because it took me a while to come up with ten taglines and they were mediocre at best.

第四課

Professor Moss began class by asking us if we knew who an imagineer was. I knew that the word was a combination of imagine and engineer n so I assumed that an imagineer was someone who created imaginations. I was not far from the actual definition, according to Professor Moss, someone who refines the details from an idea and make them reality. Graphic designers are imagineers as well because they listen to their clients and make their ideas reality. After the discussion on imagineers, we watched a lecture by Stefan Sagmeister. In the video, Sagmeister discusses how he works for six years and closes his design studio for a year while he goes on a sabbatical to recharge. While he was in Bali, he was attacked by the stray dogs littering the streets on a daily basis. Sagmeister took this unfortunate event and twisted it into something humorous by creating a shirt with the saying ‘too many dogs, so little recipes’. Once the movie ended, Professor Moss asked us some questions about the movie  and he went on to give a small blurb on how graphic designers are entrepreneurs because we, as designers, need to be motivated when it comes to our designs and take responsibility for our decisions and actions because no one will do it. I need to keep this in mind because I tend to blame my tools for my mistakes. Towards the end of class, we were asked to give taglines to an image of a coconut and an image of a paintbrush. This was both fun and somewhat stressful because it usually takes me a while to come up with a decent tagline. According to Professor Moss, the taglines that are not related to the image are the best.

When it comes to learning, it is always rewarding to learn from the best, and I think that might be one of the reasons we watched the video on Sagmeister. Sagmeister’s idea of working hard for a couple of years before going on a sabbatical is interesting and I might go on a sabbatical once I graduate from college. For me, going on a sabbatical might help me generate ideas. The tagline activity is important because as an aspiring designer, I should be able to work quickly and efficiently under pressure.

第三課

When class started, Professor Moss asked everyone to arrange themselves in order according to their birthday. I thought this was strange and interesting at the same time. Once everyone was seated in correct order, he asked the class who thought that everyone was seated in correct order and who thought that there could be a mistake. To be honest, a part of me thought that there could be a possible mistake based on my past experiences with large groups and arranging them in chronological order, but it turns out that everyone was seated in correct order. After that was settled, Professor Moss gave a small blurb on how design is a group activity and that everyone, even the laziest person in the group, has the ability to be part of the project which lead to the next class activity. We were to come up with some criteria and use them to help us rank the comic we had done for homework. It did not take us too long to come up with what we are looking for, but the ranking process was tedious because of the lack of time. We completed the task with a few seconds to spare.  The last activity of the day was entertaining as the class was put into groups, and was asked to create a story using props that we could find.

I think the purpose of each class activity was to make us work in a large group because that is what it is like in the design industry. Like the super cliché saying goes, there’s no I in team. I am so lame. He also added that everyone should think about how they can further whatever process they are in at the moment and the consequences that may follow their choices. This is something I should keep in mind when I enter the design industry because I need to take into consideration how others will view my ideas.

第二課

In class on Wednesday, Professor Moss gave a lecture on visual literacy and how we as an audience should interpret images as we see them because the image could have a meaning that is completely different from the one we created in our minds. When Professor Moss asked each of us what we thought visual literacy meant, I thought that the definition was simple enough because literacy, according to Webster’s New World Dictionary, is the ability to write and read, and visual is based on the use of sight (Webster), so I came to the conclusion that visual literacy is the ability to interpret something by sight. He went on to show us a series of pictures and asked us to describe them without creating a story inside our head because we would be making an assumption, which is something that we should stay away from. I’m not going to lie and say that this was easy because it took me a while to get a hang of describing the image without going into too much detail, but once it clicked inside my head, it was not as hard as it use to be.  After that, the class watched a mini lecture that was given by Scott McCloud, a comic aficionado. In the video, McCloud was able to tell the audience about himself in a series of images that made sense.  I was amazed at how much McCloud was able to get in in a seventeen minute lecture and I think the reason it was so easy to follow, despite the shortness, was his ability to narrate the story in a sequence that made sense to everyone. For my homework, I am to depict the reason why I chose Cal State LA as the university I want to attend in comic book form.

The lesson that was taught on Wednesday was interesting in many ways because of the exercises I did in class. The exercise that was done with the pictures will help me narrate something without assuming what is or had happened. By assuming what had happened, it will become a problem if it conflicts with someone else’s assumption.  The discussion on visual literacy and the comic assignment will make me a better designer as it has taught me how to convey messages clearly because it is my job as a designer to get the correct message out, especially when it has to do with a client because they are paying me to get the message right.  

“Literacy.”  Webster’s New World Dictionary. 1990. Print.

“Visual.”  Webster’s New World Dictionary. 1990. Print.

第一課

I should have been posted earlier, but God knows I'm a fantastic procrastinator. This past Monday was my first day in the Concept Development class and to be honest, I did not know what to expect since my friends, who have taken this class already, had a different professor and each professor has a different teaching method. But I assumed that whatever I learn in this class will be beneficial to me as an aspiring designer because, while ideas are easy to come by, if I cannot communicate my message to my audience successfully, my idea is basically garbage. When class first started, we had to write down our name, tentative graduating year and major/option on an index card before handing it to Professor Moss. We were then asked to bring our chairs to the front of the classroom and arrange them into a circle because we were going to play a game. In the game, everyone was instructed to tell two truths and one lie when their name was picked from the stack of index cards and the people sitting down had to guess which one was the lie. When the game started, I did not have the faintest idea on how I could tell if someone was lying or not, but as the game continued, and the other students were asked how or why they thought that the student standing up was lying, I began to pick up on the small cues that were being given by the person standing up. Whether it is a small, not so obvious twitch of the eye or an obvious stammer, these cues allowed me to pick out the lie as they gave me the idea that something is not right because they’re reacting to their statement.

Whilst the game was entertaining, it was also Professor Moss's way of leading into a small discussion about the ten week project the class will be working on individually. He gave each of us a small apple, and for the next ten weeks, we are to render the apple seventy times. While this task may seem operose, I think it will make me a better designer as it is going to force me to think outside the box and be creative once I begin to run out of ideas. I think there are two reasons to why we played the two truths and one lie game in class; everyone had a chance to be the persuader and an audience member, and those two roles are different in the sense that one of them requires the person to think about how they are going to come off as convincing and persuade the audience, while the other role requires the person sitting down to carefully observe the persuader and pick up on small cues that they might give away unintentionally. Despite the difference in these two roles, both of them require the people to think creatively because one of them needs to be convincing and the other needs to think outside the box when it comes to picking up on cues. As an aspiring designer, I need to come up with creative ideas that will convince my client or audience to accept whatever I am advertising, which is what the persuader in the game had to do.

This is going to be an interesting quarter.