GRA310: Final Modern Typefamily Brochures

 Feedback from my professor was relatively positive, so only a few minor changes. The knock out type point size was reduce to a size that's more appropriate for body text. The body text examples were nudged to the right to prevent the text from falling into the gutter and I added the name of the type families to each of the brochures.

GRA350: Crowne Plaza Hotel & Resorts: Final Print

With feedback from my professor being generally positive, we managed to discuss a few minor changes to be made. I scaled the logo way down in order to draw more attention to the image and the headline. It also allowed me to make the headline type larger and open up the image size as well. The body text was also moved up in place of where the logo originally was before so that readers see the information right after the image/header.

Finally size: 7.5x9 inches

GRA320: Photoshop Composite

Working with the "Refine Edge" tool in Photoshop. Once you get the hang of it, it becomes a rather powerful tool to use. Also working with photo filters to give it a warmer feeling.

GRA310: Modern Type Family Brochures: Initial Concepts

Initial layouts/designs for the "modern" or Didone type families. I chose Bodoni, Didot and ITC Fenice for my brochure designs.

GRA210 Final Project: Fusion Ware Sales Sheet Mockups

Our final project for GRA210 (Graphic Design 1) is to design a sales sheet for a fictional company called Fusion Ware. Their main business is Firewall servers that focus on the security of internet connections.

So when looking for images on Getty, I primarily looked for computer hardware images like ethernet cables, computer monitors, server rooms, hard drives etc. I also looked for images of parents and their kids. Since the company is about security over the internet, instead of looking for images that would be a cliche such as a lock icon, I wanted to look for images that demonstrated security in a metaphorical sense, such as a parent holding a child in their arms. It would be a bit of a tough sell for the client simply because they are a computer hardware company and not a family-themed business.

Our prof said it was fine to download the free preview image Getty provides you when you sign up, unfortunately, the image resolution is quite low, so the images couldn't be enlarged as much as I would like without pixelating.

Here are my 3 concepts. My prof and I both agreed that the first 2 concepts are the best ones, so I will be submitting both concepts to him as the final product.

GRA270: Minimalist Posters revisions

So after an interesting critique from both my classmates and professor, I've made some changes to my minimalist poster designs. I feel that these revisions are a better solution for these designs. The initial concepts can be found here: http://graemethedigitalmediaartist.blogspot.com/2012/07/gra270-design-process-minimalist-poster.html

Got rid of the bloody hand print as it had more to do with CSI than Criminal Minds. The show focuses on the actions of the criminal, why they do it and figure out where he'll strike next. So I decided to use an illustration of a brain I found online.

Got rid of the shadow simply because I felt it was too distracting; takes away from the lock which is the primary element in the poster.

For Fast Five and The A-Team, I simply removed the type to avoid crowding the images.

Made the mask a surgical blue colour so it would be easier to identify as a mask and I fixed the perspective of the bloody droplets.

GRA241: Remake of the "Birth of Venus" by Botticelli

For our final assignment in GRA241, instead of doing the linocut assignment, we were tasked with taking a famous work of art and remaking it in our own personal style.

I chose the "Birth of Venus" by Botticelli. For the remake, I wanted to have the girl front and centre; I really wanted her to stand out in the piece. To me, she's the primary element that holds the piece together, everything else is secondary. I had a hard time trying to draw the human form of the woman carrying the dress; the dress she was wearing is big and loose so it covers up her form which makes it harder to draw. So I substituted for two doves carrying a white sheet of fabric. Doves symbolize peace and innocence which is another element I wanted to show in this piece. I left out the two characters on the left because I felt that they weren't as significant as "Venus"  in this piece.

Overall, I feel like this assignment was way more fun than what the linocut assignment had to offer. It is the first big illustration piece I've done in a LONG time and I certainly enjoyed creating this piece.

GRA210 Final Poster Concept: King Lear

Not a lot of major changes going on here; primarily just changes in the positioning and the size of the type used in the poster. Initial concepts can be found by clicking here: http://graemethedigitalmediaartist.blogspot.ca/2012/07/3rd-annual-toronto-shakespeare-festival.html

Final Design

3rd Annual Toronto Shakespeare Festival: King Lear

For our second to last project in GRA210, we were tasked with designing a poster for the 3rd Annual Toronto Shakespeare festival.

You're allowed to choose any of William Shakespeare's plays; I chose "King Lear", simply because everyone else chose either Romeo and Juliet or Hamlet. Just trying to mix things up a bit.

So the following are the 3 concepts I came up with for "King Lear". My prof and I both agreed that the last one is the most effective design, simply because the crown is an actual creation as oppose to just finding an image online and pasting it into the poster. I got the idea for the crown from this tutorial. I didn't want to use the 3D effect in Illustrator, simply because it would cause my own machine to lag. Tutorial: http://vector.tutsplus.com/tutorials/illustration/create-a-royal-crown-using-adobe-illustrator-cs5/

GRA270 The Design Process: Minimalist Poster concepts

For this assignment, we were asked to design posters for 5 different TV shows/Movies/Video Games/Book/Song using the "minimalist" technique. Not sure if I got the technique down right, but these are my initial concepts; I feel that the Storage Wars, The A-Team and Fast Five are the 3 strong ones here. Will get feed back from my professor on Thursday.

GRA241: Remake Assignment: The Birth of Venus

So instead of doing the Linocut project, our prof decided to give us another project instead. For this project, you have to take a famous piece of artwork and remake it with your own style. I chose 'The Birth of Venus' by Sandro Botticelli. I remade the famous piece into a cartoon. He are the concepts:

The first concept, I wanted to focus on just the girl. Instead of having the other woman with the dress ready to cover her up, I decided to replace her with two birds carrying a piece of cloth.

This one is mainly focusing on the two girls. I'm not sure if I'll end up with enough time to remake all four people plus colour it.

SCA266: Short Stories Book Cover: Rough Concepts

So our final assignment for our Photography class is to build a cover for a short story. We had a set list of stories to choose from, I chose "Greasy Lake". The story is about 3 friends who travel to Greasy Lake as their hangout looking for trouble (drugs, sex, alcohol etc). However, they run into real trouble after one of their friends gets in a brawl with a biker.

With both designs, I went with a vignette effect. I find that it helps focus the viewer towards the focal point of the design. The first cover I went with a black and white and an accent colour. The red type and the blood on the hand against a black and white background will really jump out at the reader and grab their attention. The bloody hand relates to the brawl one of the characters gets in. The hand is not mine, it's there just strictly as a mock up for the real composition.

Cover Design 1

Cover Design 2

When I got the bulk of this design done, I got the "movie poster" vibe with this one, so I went with it. Added a blue hue to the picture and the vignette to make the image look more eerie and ominous. The shooting location was a pond area in my neighbourhood right next to a shopping centre. It had heavy tree cover and murky, dirty water, so I knew right away that this location would be the best place to shoot my pictures.

Black Creek Pioneer Village brochure: Rough Concepts

For my Photography class in Graphic Design (SCA266). As a class, we took a field trip to Black Creek Pioneer Village. While there, our task was to take pictures to be used in a brochure mock up. It's very neat, picturesque place, so good photos were in good supply. If you block out the sound on traffic along Jane Street and Steeles Avenue, it's like stepping back to the 1800's. All in all, a very nice experience and a very fun project in the making.

Inside Spread

Outside Spread

GRA230: Typography Book cover

For this assignment, we were to design a book cover for a novel from a selected list. I chose the book 'Slaughterhouse 5'. It's a story about a U.S. soldier who gets captured by German soldiers and imprisoned in a disused slaughter titled "Slaughterhouse 5". Synopsis here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slaughterhouse-Five

We had to design 5 covers as rough concepts and then choose the best design and refine it as our final cover.

Initial designs:

Final Concept:

I like the Stencil typeface because it reminds me of the way military units would mark crates for rations, medicine and weapons, given the fact that this book is set during WW2, I figured that typeface would be appropriate. The deep red is a very eye-catching colour, it shows the aggressive, gory nature of the book. The red to black gradient symbolizes the "out of body" experiences the main character has during the story; believing he travels backwards and forwards in time, jumping to all these different scenes including being abducted by aliens to a docile, post-war lifestyle.

Einstein Magazine spreads

For GRA210 (Graphic Design 1), we were tasked with creating 2 magazine spreads for Physics giant Albert Einstein. The first image is a 2 column spread and the second is a 3 column spread. Designing with a grid in mind is great way to balance out the spread and make it much more appealing, design wise. I find that the 3 column grid was much more effective as a layout than a 2 column grid. It was easier to break up the text, in order to make it more readable. The narrower columns made for shorter line lengths, which makes text easier to read.

Here are my spreads.

GRA220: Raptors Survey

This is the first post I've made for my Software Training course, mainly because everything I've built in that course has been relatively straight forward. This Raptors survey project is probably the most challenging one I've encountered thus far. Lot's of finicky formatting of the copy (hanging indents, text wrap, paragraph rule, find and replace, setting tabs etc.) Took about 2 and half hours to complete. A tad frustrating at times, but the end result is quite nice.

SCA266: Contrasts

For our second Photography project, we were given a list of contrasting words that corresponded to each letter in the Alphabet. Since my first name starts with a "G" and my last name starts with an "N", I  had to take pictures for Left/Right and Patterned/Plain

Left/Right

Patterned/Plain

Left and Right

Patterned and Plain

GRA230: Phrases Project

So for my typography 2 course in Graphic Design, we were given a list of 5 phrases: Baggy Jeans, Born to Be Wild, Jumbo Copies, Revolution and Whisper Stutter Shout. Choose 3 of those phrases and set them in 5 different typefaces, ones that convey the meaning of each phrase.