Content

In class today we brought in our 3 "prototypes" and looked at them with the light. I realized that my favorite design was very simple and didn't look very interesting on its own, without the light. Im going to work with more complex designs inside and making the shape more interesting while still keeping that simple streamline design overall. I'm really enjoying this project. I'm actually looking forward to experimenting with it this weekend and trying a few new ideas. Hopefully by Tuesday I'll be pretty much done and wont have to do too much more before Thursday. I'd like to not have to do anything dramatic in 2 days. So this weekend will be filled with me experimenting with different designs and fine tuning everything. I'm gettin super excited to see everyones final products. Going through the other classes I saw a lot of designs I liked, it will be intersting to see which designs people choose to refine.

Monday November 15th

Today in lecture we walked around to everyone's BIG words to see where they placed them and how they created their letters. My group was going to put our word EXTEND on the rocks crossing Potter, but last minute we decided to move to the bridge and I think it worked out a lot better. It was really visible and the lake looked less green on that side. My favorite word that we saw on our "tour" was Constrict. That was an awesome place to put them and they were constructed really well. I think that Contrast was a very well executed one as well. It was very creative and different.

I think I got my exercise for the day walking around campus so much and climbing up and down the hill to Potter multiple times.

Class Thursday 11/11

Today in class we worked on finishing the construction of our big letters. My group successfully got everything we needed done! Good thing Jon ran to the hardware store to buy us paint because we discovered the hard way that spray paint really didn't work. I'm interested to see on Monday where people decided to put their letters and how they constructed them. I'm just hoping it isn't rainy and gloomy then like it is today. I think I finally have my color designs finalized. Margie really helped me pick out the best ones and I think we both agreeded on everything to change. Overall, I am a lot less stressed than I was two days ago. This project is going really well.

October 26th

In class we critiqued our final posters for the 3rd project in groups and then we worked on giving new ideas to people for their words and what they could do to make them better. This helped me a lot because I was starting to run out of new ideas and getting other people's input was nice. Working on the pathfinder exercise helped me figure out the different ways that I could use the computer to find solutions as well.

CONTRAST

–verb (used with object)

1. to compare in order to show unlikeness or differences; note the opposite natures, purposes, etc., of: Contrast the political rights of Romans and Greeks.

 

–verb (used without object)

2. to exhibit unlikeness on comparison with something else; form a contrast.

3. Linguistics . to differ in a way that can serve to distinguish meanings: The sounds ( p )  and ( b )  contrast in the words “pin” and “bin.”

 

–noun

4. the act of contrasting; the state of being contrasted.

5. a striking exhibition of unlikeness.

6. a person or thing that is strikingly unlike in comparison:

10/12

Today Margie looked at all of our refined drawings and helped us figure out how to arrange them on our grid and what other changes we should make. This really helped me because Margie had a lot of ideas about the drawings I was having difficulty with. She also helped me arrange things in their individual boxes to make them more interesting. I'm actually starting to feel ok with this project now, things are falling into place.

Tuesday October 5th

So in class today we basically did one giant critique and went around to mark which sketches we liked best out all of the different techniques for everyones object. It was really tedious and took FOREVER but it was definitely worth it for me to have people's feedback and Margies. It helped me figure out which one to use for my final. I think if I had to choose on my own it wouldn't have been as good.

I got complimented on my gestural one, woo! I think it was the only really good sketch I had.

9/28 Class

Today we worked on more sketches in class that focused on conveying the function, texture and an index of our object. For me, texture wasn't that hard because my object isn't completely smooth like most people's objects. The most difficult was function because I could only come up with a few and trying to sketch 20 different ways to describe the function for pliers. Indexes were interesting, I actually had a lot of fun drawing them, but I had trouble thinking of more than 2 things, like function. I'm curious to see how the hybrid sketches go for me. I don't want to run out of ideas halfway through.

Photomedia

So I'm a photomedia major. I love photography - all aspects. So right now trying to figure out what exactly I want to do with it is difficult. I think working commercially might be fun for a while, but I think I would really love to have my own studio and do portraits and things like that. But I know from former teachers that commerical is where the money is made.
I started taking photography classes in high school during my sophmore year. I was one of those young girls who took pictures of anything and everything and put them all up on facebook. Those pictures have since been removed, but I soon started learning that photography isn't about just snapping a picture. I learned how to look at things differently. I continued with photography classes through my senior year.

The first photographer I learned about was Ansel Adams. I think his photography is outstanding. I mean really, isn't that picture gorgeous?

IDEO video

The IDEO movie was a great way of showing us how mapping works in the real world. The IDEO team was given a short amount of time to redesign a shopping cart. The group really didn’t have a set leader and no one was stuck in their office. Everyone threw out the most ridiculous and random ideas until they felt they had enough to work off of. Then some people went and did actual interviews with people at grocery stores to get their feedback as well. They had several “teams” build make-shift prototypes and show them to the entire group before they settled on one final design and made a final prototype. The end result was pretty amazing. While their uncanny and unusual work techniques might have seemed too unorganized, it allowed them to express their own ideas and ended up in a much better product.

first post!

Well this is the second week of our second project, redesigning a poorly designed object. I have to say its been a lot harder than I expected. First of all, our group had so many ideas on ways to improve it took some work to cut back and figure out what were the most important things in our re-design. Secondly, working as a group is a lot more difficult for me. I didn't realize how independent of a worker I am until we started this project. Working with people who have different personalities and who are in completely different majors than me will probably help me learn a ton more because they can bring in different ideas. I guess I'm just struggling with this project a lot because I really don't like industrial design. I mean, I think it's pretty neat but all this sketching of mundane objects doesn't appeal to me. Neither does re-designing them. I wouldn't mind taking pictures of these re-designed objects, but for now I'll have to resign myself to getting this paint roller redesigned...