Semester Reflection

Graphic Design

4 Quotes Project

The Project

During this semester of e-Communication, my personal favorite project had been the 4 Quotes Project. The project centered around choosing four quotes and then using them to create visually pleasing typography. After finding one quote we would choose which words are the more important ones and make them have a serif font or cursive font, then put the rest of the words in a sans serif font. The point of the project was us to show off what we've learned from our other typography project, where we tool a font and remodeled it to look different for a card. 

The project itself took a long while to complete. Choosing quotes out of hundreds and thousands takes a long while. Although, it did not take as long as it did for choosing and editing a font for it. This process would have to be repeated four times and took me about 2 weeks to accomplish. 

Challenges

When I first started this project I had actually expected it to be very easy. We would pick four quotes and just design them. It seems like such a simple concept, but there really is more to it. I was already aware this would take a quite some time to actually complete and I did end up having some problems along the way. For starters, I had forgotten the hierarchy rule, that is the more important words would be seen as large and the less important would be small. In a way, I got excited when first starting the project and ended up using way too many fonts. For a long quote, at most what would be used is 3 fonts. For my long quote, I had used five. When it came time for us to review with seniors, I realized my very obvious flaw in the design. Choosing fonts becomes hard when there's a large variety of them.

What I Learned 

For this project, I learned how important using the hierarchy was when it came to designing. It's critical to not go overboard with the font or with size. I also learned that when it comes to designing typography it's a good idea to use your own designs rather than fonts. 

Feedback and Change

As priorly mentioned in 'Challenges', I had been struggling with making my quotes fit the hierarchy and using many fonts. With that in mind when it came to revising and editing with seniors I was mostly told to start again from scratch as the designs I had created were nowhere near as good as they should be.  So, starting with the long quote I began with shortening the amount of font I used. I kept two of the fonts I had originally used because I liked them and I thought they would suit in each other in the final product. I then choose another one, a much simpler sans-serif font, and added it into the mix. It ended up looking well as the new fonts didn't make it look as crazy as it had beforehand. 

Conclusion

I admit although the finished product does look nice, there a still many different mall details I want to fix. I believe that one of the quotes I chose is more suited for just simple sans serif font and not being turned into typography. The design process had taken a while and did get a little setback, but that's my own fault. My overall opinion how I had done was the designs had come out mostly just like how I wanted them to.

The Design History Project 

The Project

For our design history, we were randomly given a design topic or person to look up and study on. I randomly selected 'Futurism', a kind of design that was invented in the early 1900's by Filippo Marinetti in Italy. His new design was far different from any traditional design. It was insanely designed, made with words going everywhere on typography pieces, including upsizing or suddenly changing color and font midway through a sentence. The paintings are just as insane, focused on geometric shapes and color. 

The Challenges

I didn't have very many challenges concerning this project. it was easy to do a lot of research on the creator. It took a while to get everything down though. The biggest challenge I had concerning the project was keeping everything on time. We had a due date and I was mostly scrambling to keep up with everything that I do have accomplished by then. Marinetti had a lot to say about futurism and what it was, where he wanted it to go, how it was going to be revolutionary, and how he wanted it to evolve and become the main type of art used in Italy. 

What I learned 

Throughout this project, the first thing I learned was how important it was to be able to take noted and keep them well organized when researching an artist who made a new type of work. I also learned how important it is to set little goals. Rather than thinking, 'I want this whole thing done in 3 weeks', think ' I want to have the first three slides completely don't by the end of the first week'. This way it becomes easier to keep up with dates. 

Feedback and change

After creating the initial poster on paper with multiple different ideas I presented them to the seniors who come to help and encourage us with our projects. With my multiple designs, it was quickly decided which one was the favorite and I made that sketch the basis for my project poster. I didn't;t have a lot changes to make at all. Futurism is meant to be random and loud. So even mistakes would be considered part of the design in total. 

Conclusion 

The project was fun to make and research on. It took me a lot of time to get all the information in my head, but overall I think the project came out very well. The poster was made with the design basis I intended for it and the slides we also ha to create had a futurism look to them, just as how I wanted them to be. 

The Re-Branding Project

The Project

We were to choose any company of our choice and make re-make their trademark. The more unknown the place was, the better it was for us to design. While some people did go for famous brands, I ended up going for 'The Sunflower Cafe'. The cafe is mostly unknown to the public and I decided it would be a fun idea to try and rebrand ti. I started with sketching a lot of designs of fit. After I was done I choose my favorites and designed them in black and white on Adobe Illustrator.

Challenges

After making six designs in black and white, I had a hard time choosing one out of the six. I liked them a lot and ended up only narrowing down to four before becoming stuck on where I should go from there. Thankfully, during where the seniors came to check up on us I got a few new ideas and thoughts on what I wanted the final product to be. Eventually, I narrowed it down to two. From there I started to create the mockups using those two. After deciding which one looked better I kept that one to be the official logo for my project.

What I learned

When I was creating my black and white designs one of them was a cursive font on a coffee cup. The problem with this is that the lines connecting the letters came off after curving them. I had to change the font for it. I didn't really learn a lot about this project as I was just using what I'd already learned from previous projects. Examples would be, how to edit a poster onto a billboard in photoshop.

Feedback and change 

Other than the off disconnected cursive, the most feedback I got was to continue experimenting with different fonts. Of course, I did do this, and it hiked me decide which one would be my final product.

Conclusion 

This was a fun project to work on. I did the most I could do and I had.a lot of fun designing the black and white logos and adding color to the final one. There are few things that I Ould change to this given the chance to ever do so. I personally like how this project came out, much better than I do the other two projects mentioned in this paper. 

Time

Staying focused on what I'm doing at first is very easy but eventually, I get tired of looking at the computer and I have to take a break. it doesn't help that before Graphic Design I've had my brain mostly fried from doing the math. Overall, I use my time in class to work on my projects. If I eve had finished early I would look through what I'd done and ask if there was anything that could be better. Outside of class I actually would sometimes look up typography on Pinterest to see what more professional graphic designers did.

Strength 

My biggest strength is my usage of Adobe Illustrator. For the past two years I have worked a lot with this program and is has become one of my favorites to use. I know all the commands for it and where to find more options to use on my designs. It is such a good tool to use for all types of design being done. 

Improvement

I did imporve a lot this semester. I faced a lot of challenges and I worked hard in order to complete everything I could. I struggled with font hierarchy, keeping time management and choosing designs from many options. I used Adobe Photoshop more, something of which I hadn't used in a while. And with practice comes improvement. I improved in using both Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator. I now know how to keep time of things and more of an idea of what's good for desings and whats bad.

Conclusion 

The e-Com program offers a lot to me and I have used the most of it this past semester. I've leanred more abour Adobe Phtoshop and Illustrator. I've re-Branded a company and researched about Futurism. I've learned better methods of reaserching and I've done a lot of designing concerning typography and more. It's been a fun go this semster at e-Com. I have to say my favorite project was the 4 Quotes project and I wish I could have improved on ome of the desings for it. Of course I also did enjoy re-branding and reading more about futurism. I think that overall this semester has been a great learning experience and that I did well.

Final

2nd Semester

What is 1 valuable takeaway I learned? 

   
     Coming into this class, I didn't know a lot about what I was doing concerning the programs we were using and what we'd be doing. I knew the basics, but I didn't know everything there was. I had a background of Adobe Photoshop,  After Effects and Illustrator.

My biggest takeaway in technology was getting a deeper understanding of multiple different programs. These programs included, Adobe Photoshop and Maya. We used both of these programs in just about all of our projects. usually just working with one was more common.

For collaboration, my most valuable takeaway was learning how to be quick when doing projects. It's important to keep up with the people I'm collaborating with. In our most recent project we worked in a team to accomplish a short film involving all that we learned in e-Com this year. While we were collaborating we decided what each of us should take on and all of us tried to work at the same pace so no one gets to far ahead and help each other out if someone were to get behind.

For communication my most valuable takeaway was that I learned that when talking its important to pick out the roles and decide who will perform them. Like I mentioned in the last paragraph, we worked on a project that involved collaboration. The main topic at the beginning was about what roles should each of us take on. These roles would of course have to suit our skills and I got put into the Maya role.

For project management I learned that it's just as important to set dates of when you want a specific part finished. In my last project we were in teams and this proved to be very useful. I was to finish all the objects we were going to need to be using by the end of our third day of working.

For Leadership I learned that having good control of what's going in in a team project is incredibly important if everything is to go well. Depending how big and what the project is depends if a leader is actually necessary, however. In my last project with only three of us working we didn't assign a leader of sorts, but rather kept reporting to each other where we were at so that we wouldn't get lost at any point.

Strengths / Weaknesses

     For my strength I've learned a lot about Maya and I believe the program is a big strength of mine as I've done well on the projects concerning it. Maya was a hard program to learn, it dealt wit 3-D objects that had to be manipulated precisely. The animating part of Maya was slightly easier, depending on how exactly the object had to be moved. The more complex the objects motion the more difficult it would prove to animate. Another strength would be Adobe After Effects. I like how I did on he explosion projects. I thought they came out well for a novice.

     As a weakness, I didn't do so good with Adobe Photoshop. I often confused layers and forgot to name the layers different in general. This made animating in Adobe After Effects difficult. Since then I've improved by checking the layers I'm in much more often. But I still need to fix that up more as I continue to make repeated mistakes of putting the wrong thing into the wrong layer.

What will I do with what I learned?

    After learning everything that I have from this class, I am interested in learning more. I will continue to apply what I learned into any situation or assignment that is necessary. What I'm hoping to do is to actually get the adobe programs for personal use and continue to use it for experimentation with I have learned from this class. Animation has been very useful for teaching me how to create and use original characters. With that in mind, I want to create more characters ad go on with animating them. I also want to continue working with Maya as it's very hard to use and I'm hoping I might be able to apply what I learned from there into a new program.

What would I change? 

     Given the chance to change anything, I would've put more effort into my photoshop projects. In these projects it was common for me to mix up layers and forget to name them. I didn't think it was important but that was a large fault of mine. In Adobe After Effects there are many different ways to command a composition to move or change opacity, etc. When using a lot of compositions it can get messy to work with. if I could change anything about that I would've liked to try to memorize all the short cut commands to only access one command at a time rather than all of them at once. In Maya I would want to change small things. In one project I didn't align the walls perfectly to the project so I'd want to change that. Also I never did a lot of grouping in Maya, so I'd like to change that too, to see whether it would affect my projects in a good or bad way.

Conclusion

     I've learned a lot in this class from when I first started it. I've gained a lot of valuable information concerning the many types of guarantee's. Through the projects we did to complete everything I gained a lot of new information about how to make different shapes in Maya and how to use green screens in Adobe Photoshop. My favorite project was the snowflake project, where we used Maya to make snowflakes, which was very fun to do. Of course, this is all thanks to my teacher, Mr. Olsen.


Maya projects:

Adobe After Effects:

     

The Bounce

        To make an animated version based off of real life is not easy. After bouncing  balls and video taping it, we took measurements based on the video and used it to create an animated version of it. The tennis ball and golfball were smaller than the bowling ball so they mostly bounced higher. They were all dropped at 5ft. Mine turned out as well as it can get. The times were calculated using Microsoft excel and it came out okay. I would change it a bit on how I took times to make it more accurate then it is now.

Container

     
      Animation has so far proven to be a fun course and this project that we worked on recently is certainly interesting. All companies that sell food have a certain type of braining on it, to prove it is there. The font and colors along with the same of the company and actual product name is all oaths. We were to choose a good of our choice and make a label for it and then put the actual label on the container. In this case, I chose popcorn. Popcorn was simple and easy to do. We designed the label in photoshop before actually adding it into Maya. I believe mine turned out well, however I would like to change the Nutrition Facts to be more realistic.

Marks

Trademarks

     All companies of each sort have a trademark, of which is designed by a Graphic Designer. This last week in e-Com we have been learning more about trademarks and the many types that exist. types include: symbols, pictographs, letter marks, logos, and combination marks.
Symbols are marks that don't have any type and are used to identify corporations, agencies and institutions. They're very gestalt, however without any type, they can be hard to match with their company and also are very expensive to promote.
Pictographs are symbols that are international. Examples would be the no smoking sign and disables parking space sign. However they can be confused with marks from corporations.
Lettermarks have letters and numbers rather that pictures to form their trademark, always being an abbreviation of the name. These are usually very bold and outgoing making them expensive to promote.
Logos are word/s in type are the full name. They're easy to prove and give the full name but, have a complex gestalt.
Combination marks are a combo of symbols and logos, w word being pared with a graphic image. This is also known as a signature. While these are very easy to recognize they have a very complex gestalt.

Key Ideas

Marks are very important and come in all types, an important aspect about designing them is to first decide what kind of mark to design, whether it be a symbol or logo. Symbols should all be designed to be with a one color aesthetic, only adding another color when the symbols needs a certain part to be enhanced. Before making any kind of mark, what should first be considered is how much money is available, as some marks are more costly to make and promote than others.

I was taught a lot about marks and I believe the most valuable trait I learned was the difference between all the marks and the advantages/disadvantages that go a long with each of them. I hadn't very aware of the importance off which kind of mark to use until now.

Conclusion 

In graphic design the type of mark used when creating one is incredibly important. There are so many kinds of marks each of them with their own uniqueness and disadvantages.  Learning about them will improve my work when designing one.

Typography

Learning About Typography

In e-Com we focused on learning through a series of videos and an article given to us online. These all focused on the subject of typography, which we are currently learning. 

Videos

The videos taught us the importance of fonts and the feeling they give off depending on the one that was being used. More covey style and cursive fonts would be used to show off something luxurious and a loud capitalized font would be for something important. We also learned about serif and sans serif fonts. Serif being the fonts with the 'tails', such as the one I'm using writing this. Sans serif is just the opposite. Sans, meaning 'without' in French, is for fonts without the tails. All these aspects are very important to graphic design as typography does take up a good portion of it.

Article

Now knowing the importance and personalities of fonts, the article focused on combining the fonts. All fonts, having a given trait, can be combined usually if they have a similar trait among them. Of course this isn't for all fonts. A loud sign font could be paired with a more simple and neutral font. to fonts sharing a similar design of professional could be paired together as well as long as they didn't compete for attention too much. Oftenly paired would be a Serif font and  sans serif font. Of course this is also a very important aspect of graphic design as well, paring up font to the match the style is a a necessity to make good works of art.
My favorite part of this article was the part that talked bout context. It's important that smaller fonts are still legible, which is something that is very valuable for future purposes.

Take Away

From the videos I believe the most important part that I learned was learning about the voices that the fonts give off, whether it be swirly or simple. I never took fonts into so much consideration before this. I mostly thought that if it looked good, that's it. However this has opened my eyes to how important fonts are. The impression they give to the reader is important for a work of graphics design.

Key Points

1.) Pairing

In typography putting two fonts together or maybe even three it's important to have them match, as in having a similar theme and not over power each other. 

2.)Hierarchy of Fonts

This just means the fonts that stand out more are bigger, such as titles. More simpler fonts that are used for context would be smaller. 

3.)Complementary 

A lot like pairing, fonts have to complement each other as in if one is large and extravagant then the complimentary font should be small and simple. 

Conclusions

Learning about typography has been a good experience and will affect how I create my designs in the future for the better. The videos helped me think of the importance of how the typography looks ad the article taught me the necessities of pairing up fonts. 

Snowflakes

Snowflakes in e-Com 

his past few weeks in Animation, e-Com students have been occupying themselves with the snowflake animation. The goal of the project was to create multiple snowflakes and animate them to fall down. The animation would be posed in a way to look like the camera, or person, was looking out of a window.

Creating Snowflakes 

We started by creating polygons, which was very easy. These polygons would be about a 1/6th of the size of what the final snowflake would be. After drawing pattern of stripes, it was mirrored over the x-axis then we made 5 more copies and arranged the six in a perfect circle. After adding more details to the final product we would begin animating.

Animation

Animating was also simple.  We picked a starting point and an end point for each of the snowflakes on a timeline. When it was finished all the snowflakes would come down. Also making a wall with a window on it, to make the effect of looking out of a window. Positioning the camera and then rendering the short video went smoothly for me. This was the final product.

Final Product

Ice Cream Project

Maya

During the another week in e-Com we continued our focus on Maya projects. This time our assignment was the 'Ice Cream" project. This consisted of us using bump textures in order too make our spheres look more like ice cream. The bump textured were easy to get too and I used the 'cloud' 3d texture on my ice cream. It worked very well and the product came out very nicely.

Next we went ahead and flattened a large cylinder, which would be used in order to create a 'Lazy Susan'. This is where I started to animate. Using the time line I had the cylinder do a full 360 in the span of 120 frames. The fill product came out like this:

The Pen Project

Animation class has always been fun and recently we've been working with a new software names Maya. This time it was in our mindsets to create a pen, modeled after one we actually owned. I chose a orange pen I kept around and began to model it.

The final product :

The pen went very well. I started with cylinders and from there, continued by shaping them and then eventually adding color into the mix. 

Salt and Cup

This week in e-com the class continued their work in Maya this time to create a cup and salt shaker. We used new tools and methods, including lofting and revolving in order to create the two objects.

Starting with the cup, we used  NURBS. In which we then started by simply tracing out a profile image that was half of what the official shape would be. Then using the rotation tool we brought in around to create a full cup. After assigning a material to it, the cup was finished. I wouldn't change anything in the process of how I made the cup since it came out very well.

With the salt shaker, it started with creating a shape and making copies of said shapes. With four copies some distance away from each other vertically we then used lofting to connect all 4 shapes together to crate one shape. This would be the base for the salt shaker The cap was a flattened sphere which took its place onto of the body. The work I did on the salt shaker went well and there isn't much I would do to change it.

Hammer in Maya

In e-commmunicaiton recently we've been using a program known as Maya which enables us to build  objects in 3-D. For this week my class has worked on the Hammer project in which we have been given the task to build a hammer and nail in Maya in order to broaden our understanding on how and when to use certain tools. 

Modeling 

In this case I started with the base, all known as the handle of the hammer, and from there worked up to the actual Hammer head. From there I used the extrude tool that allowed me to extend the back of the nail head into two separate pieces. From there I was off too do the head of the hammer, the part that hit the nail. Here, I ran into some trouble. It took a while but by using the fill tool I was able to fix blackholes that had gotten into my design. After finishing the build up for the hammer I got to work on the nail by starting with a cylinder then making it thinner , except for a part at the top giving it the look of a nail. Then using the scale tool I entered vertex mode and made the point of the nail. 

Shading

For shading I made the handle of my hammer a wood brown in a typical hammer fashion. The hammer itself was of course a shade of grey along with the nail. 

Lights

There are three types of lights used in lighting and I used all three of them in my project. The key light, the rightist and main light, focused on my hammer and shone a light straight onto it. The fill light came in on the side to give more shape to the project. He back with was in the back and shone off the top of the hammer. 

If I had to do this again I wouldn't change much other than how I built the top part of the hammer since it had started glitching and creating black holes. 

Semester Final Graphics

Graphic Design     

     The first semester of graphic design was a fun one. using what I learned this year and what I had learned the year before, multiple projects were created. Some were harder than others, all completed as to the best of my abilities. 

Fall Raccoon

The first project that I started this semester was the Fall Raccoon project. The project took all of us at the least two weeks since the project was our first one and bound to take a long time to create. I managed my project by dividing it into two sections. The first section being, to create a raccoon and other fall items, the second section was to create a fall scenery to suit the raccoon using the other fall items created in the first section. 

Challenges 

A big challenge for me in this project has actually been the scenery because I was unsure of how to incorporate the other fall items I created into it at first. Gradually, I got an idea for what I was going for. 

What I learned and Overall 

In the first part I learned how to create berries, leaves, nuts, and a raccoon in Illustrator. I mostly learned how to use some tools that I didn't know how to use at first. When communicating with my peers, I came to the conclusion I needed to add a better grass outlook. That's how the stokes of paint, mimicking shreds of grass came into place.  I do believe there is more room for improvement, when it comes to shading and how the sky looks like. Overall, I like how it turned out in the end. 

Typography Thank You

The next project we began to work on soon after this one took us a much longer time lasting at least 2 weeks for each of us. Now, using the raccoon we had originally created in our Fall raccoon project we were to create a card of any holiday or occasion where we would incorporate out raccoon into the card along with creating typography to suit the final product of the card. I started the project with an idea in my mind about what I wanted it to be like. Like I did with the Fall Raccoon I split the project into two parts. This time the first part would be designing the outlook of the card. I chose a Thank You card and blacked out my raccoon with a beige color out my raccoon and added in onto a lighter shade of the color. The second part was composed of making the typography for the card, then adding it into the first part.

Challenges

My biggest challenge was surely creating the Typography for the project. I knew where to start but had no idea where to go from there. I used a font to start of the basis of the typography but I didn't use it well and at first it looked horrid. I then changed fonts, which made a huge different as this font looked much better and suited the card better than the last font.

What I learned and Overall

While making this project I was sure to collaborate with some of the people around me to see if they saw anything off that I didn't. One of them saw I had a made a mistake regarding where the text on the back of the card was supposed to be placed and I corrected it. On the project I'm actually very satisfied with how it turned out it the finale. Despite my previous trouble with the typography, the type suited the card I liked the final look of the project. 

Infographic

The infographic was my favorite project to make. We were to pick a topic and then gather information on it to create our final product. At first I wanted to create an infographic on infographics for irony but I wasn't able to find good statistics to suit it.  then decided to change it the a real problem our world today. Basically speaking about child poverty in Africa as that is a big problem in todays world. For project management I split this project into three sections. The first part was to complete my outline of the project on paper. Second, to gather information on the topic I chose, third, I would start building the infographic.

Challenges

When creating the infographic I originally had a hard time deciding how to present my statistics using graphics and how I should center my information around those graphics. In the first infographic I created I started off with a munch large space but ended up cutting that space in half to better suit the graphics. 

What I learned and Overall 

During this project I learned the importance of color as I at first had a different color scheme than what I would eventually have after, The color are meant to suit the subject and also grab the attention of anyone passing by. I did also ask my peers for feedback in which they commented to me about the graphing tool that was available in Illustrator that I hadn't known about, which is how I came to create the graph in the upper right corner. In the end, I liked how the project came out. It looked nice, suited the topic I chose and had good statistics on it.

Vector Project

The final project we worked on took almost a month to complete as it was much more difficult than all the other projects. We were to take a photo of ourselves and vectorize it by adding vectors, then coloring them all in. This project was simple despite its difficulty. I ended up having to stay after in order to complete the final project.

Challenges

Work management, unlike all my other projects, was trouble with this one. Because I had to come after school I was having trouble organizing what would be more important to work on. My face? Or my hair? If it's my face then which feature would be easier to finish? It took a while to work everything out. 

What I learned and Overall

My technical skills surely improved during this project as. I spend a lot of time with the pen tool creating multiple parts before adding even more onto that part. When asking for what I could improve on with the other students It was suggested I don't copy the exact color of whatever part of the vectored part. The light on my face made some of the colors look weird I changed some of them to better suit ht final image. In the end, I didn't like this project as much as the others, but certain parts on the project turned out extremely well. 

My Strengths and Time Management 

When talking about my strengths, I have to say project management as I never really get off topic on what I'm doing or when talking to my peers. I also usually split the project down into parts then set a deadline for each part in order to ensure I have everything done. I get something done before a deadline, I look for something improve or just get started on the next project early. I also have to pride myself on creativity for what I did on the Thank You card with creating a silhouette of the raccoon and for the topic I chose in the infographic and how I chose to present it. Last, I tend to pick up on things quickly so uI never had any problems on being behind or not understanding how to use a new tool. I often try out new tools and look in different sections to see if there's anything new for me to try out.

Improvement 

What I need to improve on for sure is shooing statistics in graphics as I had struggled with that in my Infographic project. I also need to improve more on using some of the tools such as the pen tool. During the final project I had issues when creating my hair. Something else I nee to work on to to continuously ask for feedback from my peers. Although I did too so during my projects I get the idea thatI need to do it more often. 

Behance

Whenever finished with a project we were to create a new file where we would put a step by step process on how we created each project. For the fall raccoon I was very specific with my Behance, clearly showing the step by step project. I did the same with the Thank You card, also adding a mock up with this one. The Vector and Infographic were much more simpler, Showing what I did along with a mockup to go along bedside it. Each of the Behance's creating are linked with each project.t 

Summary 

I've had a fun time this graphics semester. I'm satisfied with the work I've done and how well it turned out. What I enjoyed most about this semester is the Thank You card project as I found it very fun to create typography. If I had to actually change anything I'd just change how I worked on my final project. Now I know a lot more about Vectors and how to incorporate one thing into another. For next semester I'll have to see if I can improve on Time management and collaboration. 

Semester Final Animation

     Animation is a complicated form of art. There are different types of animation for starters, such as 3D and 2D, all of which can be created in different programs. During this year of animation I learned a lot about how to create these types of animations and even created one myself. Her the multitude of projects I've so far created I'll be discussing five. 

Maya

Maya Castle 

     This year we learned about a new program known as 'Maya'. It centers around 3D modeling and animating, which is new for all of us as we have only done 2D. We were all learned new technical skills, though being taught the basics of the program, starting with making shapes then learning how to make those shapes different, whether it as with colors or size. Afterwards, we learned how to put the shapes together to create something new and how to put on textures. Using the tools given to us we created a castle using 'extrude' and other utensils. I started with a tower, creating a large gray cylinder before adding more shapes onto it. Afterwards came the walls, rectangles with smaller squares extended out. Next I added on a texture of white bricks, since I felt like that was best suited for a castle. In the end I had four walls and four towers which I organized accordingly to create my final product. 

Maya Lighting 

     Of course, shapes aren't the most important aspect of animating. Lighting also takes a big role, not only in animating but in theater and in movies. Dramatic lighting can give a sense of dread to the viewer, putting in harsh lines on shadows where half of a face, for example, could be filed with get and the other half not even able to be seen because of the shadows. For a more comedy, no-so-scary movie, the lightening would be more 2D, coming from all around and giving a shine here another. 

     The main parts of lighting come from the key light, fill light and back light. All important aspects of lighting, each with their own role. The key light is the main light to focus on as it's the one that creates the most light, so where it shines is the brightest. The fill light is as the name says since it used to fill the space that the key light doesn't cover with light, usually at a lower hue and not as strong. The backlight it places behind whatever subject in being focused on, it provides a shine onto the subject as it's usually aimed from above. 

     We created an example of this in Maya. Since this project was the final one for the semester there was a limited time to complete it. Through project management, I separated the project out to get it created in the span of time I had left.  it started by creating a simple sphere before making is gold and adding shine onto it. By using booleans we subtracted parts of the circle out of place to leave a final shape. from there we created three lights, the key, fill and back light to illuminate the shape. This was a more difficult project as it required a lot of learning to actually complete, overall I'd change nothing bout it since it turned out exactly as I wanted it too. 

Adobe

Walking Animation

     3D projects were not the only projects we focused on. Near the beginning of the year we learned how to make a walking animation through Adobe Photoshop and Adobe AfterEffects. This was a 2d animation and a long process as it all began with creating a character. We all collaborated with each other to scramble some ideas for an original character to use in the animation. My character originally was a robot looking creature that I wasn't so fond of. I continued drawing random sorts of animals and creatures before creating a blob. Mostly out of boredom and lost hope, I gave the blob arms and legs and then decided this would be my character. Thus came Bob the blob.  Starting with drawing photos and then outlining them to upload onto Adobe Photoshop. 
     In Photoshop I had cleaned up Bob the blob, something that was one very easily by using different tools created a floor and sky for Bob the blob and added some extra images for the end of the animation. Then all of what was created Photoshop I moved into AfterEffects. Animating Bob the blob to walk was a challenge for me, however after re-doing the animation multiple times I finally got it to the point where I was satisfied. This project is a large building block when it comes to animating as walking is a fundamental characteristic of people. If I had to change anything about the project I did I would make Bob's steps longer as I felt they were too short. In the end it came out well.

Muliplane

     The multiplane animation was first introduced by Walt Disney who noticed when filming an animation that specific parts, such as the moon enlarged when zooming in. This is not good, as the moon does not actually enlarge in real life, in order to make the animations seem more realistic he made planes. One plane could get bigger while the other one stayed short, thus making animations more realistic and more better.
     With this in mind we began to make a multi-plane animation of our own. This project is also a fundamental piece to animating as it revolves around making a scene move in a more realistic manner. My greatest strength in this project was designing al the layers in photoshop as I painted the sky and shaded the grass to look just right. eventually we moved the project into Aftereffects where I had trouble animating the final product. The screen is shaky and the layers don't flow together as well I hoped but that's how I found out I accidentally, while in Photoshop, had saved some parts onto layers they weren't supposed to be on. But, nevertheless it looks alright and I'm fond of my color scheme. 

Animation

     The biggest project we worked on was making an actual animation that incorporated both walking and the multi-plane. I started with my story board which took me. long time to create, but was one of my favorite parts of doing the animation. Doing the storyboard gave me an idea of where I want to go with my animation and eventually I had it all put down and ready to go. By using the same methods in the walking animation to get the characters into the screen I editing the out just like before, also creating lots of different backgrounds in the process. A strength here was actually animating it all together as I had experience from doing the past two animations. In the end it looked good, although sadly without sound. If I could do it again I would figure to a way to add sound onto the video. 

Animation

    My Animation centered around a girl ordering candy then getting it taken away by Bob the blob, who thinks the candy is his. After a small conversation about who the candy really belongs too Bob the the blob proposes a race between the two to see who will get the candy. The race ends with a tie and neither of them get the candy as it gets stolen by a figure.

    I used puppet pin, rotation, position, and opacity in the animation in which I learned how to put them in place much better than I had before. One of the troubles I went by when doing the animation was when I had to make the figures of the girl and blob first disappear under and then appear over a plane of ice. I eventually managed to get past this obstacle by making two different layers of ice. I also had to use the walking animation again in the skating part which ended pretty well I believe. The first time I did it I just used Position but this time I also had to use rotation. The animation came out pretty well for a first timer.

Panel Video

The multiplane animation was first introduced by Walt Disney who noticed when filming an animation that specific parts, such as the moon enlarged when zooming in. This is not good, as the moon does not actually enlarge in real life, in order to make the animations seem more realistic he made planes. One plane could get bigger while the other one stayed short, thus making animations more realistic and more better.

I made mine with five layers. Since this was my first time using more than one plane I admit that I made a multitude of mistakes, the min one being accidentally painting in the wrong layer. The animation part turned out better however. The part that I started with and my favorite part was doing the sky as it turned out the best layer and looked really cool in the end. I built up from there adding a back layer, a wall layer, a medium layer and a front layer. This is how it turned out.

Bob the Blob

Overview
These past few weeks in e-Com all us students have busied ourselves making a character and then teaching it how to walk. For my character I made a blob then gave it arms and legs, hence the name, 'Bob the Blob'. First we drew our characters out before snapping photos of them and inserting those into Photoshop. After editing each of the photos we then pt them all into Adobe After Effects where we animated a walk for our characters.

What We Learned
For this project we learned quite a bit, starting in Photoshop where we had too use the Dodge and Burn tool for shading and learned how to take out character from a photo to something more animated by adding color and re-lining all the edges. After putting into After Effects we learned how to animate the movements of the legs, basically adding rotation and potion to them in order to made it look like it's walking.

What Went Well, What Could've Improved
I think the walking cycle and my editing of the character went along very well and if I had to change anything it would be that of the grass because of how bland it looks compared to the rest to the animation.

FINAL PRODUCT:

InchBandaid

Overview
You may ask yourself, 'What is an inchbandaid?', and I'll tell you it's an inchworm that looks like a bandaid. This last week in e-Com we were to create an inchworm in Photoshop, transfer it to Adobe After Effects, there we would learn how to use the 'Pin' tool to make it move.
It was easy to accomplish making an inchworm in Photoshop and I admit that it took me some tie to get used to using it like a puppet in Adobe After Effects. At first it took me a while to understand how to move it correctly and effectively but in the end this is the result:


What I Learned
First and foremost I learned how to turn a normal looking inchworm into a bandaid. Second I learned how to use the 'Pin' tool in After Effects to make it move. we were to put 6 pins on the worm in total then as the video went on we would move the points that controlled to worm to make it look like it was inching across the screen.

How it Went
Overall, I think my project went really well. The worm inched across the screen and left, all while looking like a bandaid. If I was to do this again I would definitely try to improve the worm in looks but there than that it all went well, except for the few times in the animation that the worm overlapped itself.

Bouncing Ball animation

The Project 

This is the new bouncing ball animation, much like the one done originally last year. Overall we created a scene and ball in Photoshop then brought it to life in After Effects. Going through Photoshop was easy, creating three separate layers, one for the ground the sky and the last one for the ball. After adding highlighting to it we the transferred it to After Effects. In there we added animations to the ball, basically making it move across the screen and putting squash and stretch along with rotating it along the way.

What I Learned 

Before this project I had never really used After effects so through the duration of this project I learned a lot about how to use it correctly and easily. I learned how to use tools, such as, the rotate tool, the move tool, and the anchor tool. Also I earned how to squash and stretch effectively to really make it look a bot more realistic here and there.

Next Time

If the occasion ever cam where I would do this project again I would use squash and stretch more effectively and add more rotation onto the ball. Maybe add n a sun and make the clouds move as well in the background. Also, maybe I'd make the balls bouncing pattern more unique.

Using Photoshop

     Another school year, another blog post. At the start of this years graphic branch in e-Com we started with Photoshop. I, myself, have never had the occasion use it before and I actually had a lot of fun going through the tutorials that were given for us. The concept was simple. We'd follow along on a video on our own in photoshop. So far with the tutorials given to us, this is some of what I have accomplished:

      Now, in some of the photos you provably don't see whats so 'Photoshop' about it. Starting with the black and white photo of the younger boy, originally his face was covered in mud and dirt. Using the 'Spot Healing Brush' and some masks here and there I was able to eliminate most of the original stains that were there. 

     Then, the one right under it of the lady with her navy jacket on. In the photo that we were given, there  was a tag hanging out right where you can see her left arm touching her jacket. But where, you may ask, has this tag gone? Using the 'Clone Stamp' and the 'Healing Brush' all evidence that the tag was even there is now gone. 

     Last but not least we have the lady on the top with her blue dress and purse. In the photo given you could see to the left of her the spot light stand which, was not wanted at all. Using the tool known as 'Content Aware Fill', it was easily taken off from the photo. 

Skills

    My personal favorite tool to use out through the whole process was actually the 'Healing Brush' tools. Spot healing brush was used to get rid of stains and unwanted bits and pieces here and there, while the regular healing brush was able to help erase evidence that a much more obvious object ever existed. I know it will be incredibly helpful in the future because you never know when an unwanted object or spot might sneak its way into your photograph.

Strengths and Weaknesses

     Probably my biggest strength was being able to get through all of the tutorials given to us easily and quickly. But my weakness lies in the quickly part. I'm sure I might have skipped over something while trying to complete the project. While all of my final products turned out rather well I admit maybe in one or two if you look close enough you might find something off.

What could've been done differently

     For starters I definitely could've taken my time more and made sure to review everything that I had done. Other than that all I can think of is double checking that my final product looked like the final product in the tutorial as well. 

What I'd do the same

     Everything else most likely. Following along with the video rather than stopping it then working and also using the tools in the exact manners as shown in the videos is what I would keep the same if I was ever to this all over again. 

Final thoughts 

     Learning how to use Photoshop has been a fun and long experience that isn't over just yet. I'm looking forward to what I'll be using photoshop to do in the future and I really like how all my products came out in the end. Here are the rest of the examples that I'd created throughout the following week:

Animation's Importance

     As a kid, most of us grew up with some sort of T.V. in the living room or kitchen where we would always watch cartoons while snacking or having dinner or maybe not eating anything. These cartoons are a form of animation. Animation is a huge influence on us since we've been seeing it almost for our entire lives. 

     The original animation was the magic box (1650) that would display images in a fashion to make them look like a character was doing an action. From there is started to grow into longer animations telling short stories with crude pictures. Eventually those curse pictures turned into vibrant colors, much better designed and much longer. Eventually going to 3-D and lasting hours long.

     Animation has almost lasted 400 years and is still growing and getting better every day.  In the link at the end, it talks all about how animation has evolved from the magic box to Walt Disney on the big screens.



Link