5/4: Critique Career issue

Ok there were lots of chaos.

But we made it.



My first draft of military story was moved online only thus I got another piece about entrepreneurial spirit in Columbia.

Again, same old problem too many text. This time I was not worried at all, I did whatever design I want and waiting for editors to cut. However, this time, Erica said we should help editors by fitting as much text as possible. I guess it was the better solution since the whole issue was not well organized at the first, facing upcoming production, we should try to be the problem solver

It was the first time that before I started designing, I can almost see what font I want, I searched through dafont.com and finally found one. What I used to do is to wander through the whole dafont website, and trying a bunch of different types still did not find the perfect one.

I guess sometime you just need a tint of inspiration from somewhere unknown

5/4 You Can't Miss It

My infographic assignment is due Fri.

So here's some inspirations I found


10 Coolest typographic infogrpahics



no.30 SND inforgraphics prizes winners

Those are so cool I wish I could make them in the near future!

5/4: response: advanced design

Finally.

Still remember the minute I got the syllabus at the beginning of the semester my first response was: it's impossible for me to finish so many assignment (considering I have other classes). But now, only one left.
There are some much I love about this class it's hard to list one by one.
I do think this will be the starting point of my designer career. A great start.
Though I said that I am not a big fan of blogging, I guess I might still come back once in a while to review and to reflect.

Best

Chen

4/27 critique: royal wedding graphic for VOX

Something I love about VOX: FREEDOM!
Last Friday during my inforgraphic shift in Missourian, I took an assignment from VOX. It felt like going back to your parents' house after you got married (to Missourian)
I am never a princess girl and I definitely don't have any fancy for wedding, but I really love the assignment for royal wedding.
So, out of expectation, I did lots of cheesy stuff for the graphic and some of them were deleted later. I did learnt a lot when doing the graphic since I need to satisfy my own need for fancy stuff.
so my favorite part is the preloader, which was supposed to be even more cheesy (I want to make it into a expanding rose petal path connecting bride to groom, OMG that's totally not me).

v

if you haven't played with it, check it out here

4/27: You Can't Miss It

OATMEAL fun
This is a very funny website to look at if you are in final weeks.
I just had some problem with my trackpad and started searching for possible solutions online, then I came across this

and then I found myself in this situation when reading the post

and then I found myself doing lots of similar scribbles all the time 

This is what I sent to my friend in China (she's getting married and I can't be there)

and this is me writing my 25 page historical research paper

hope that's not too scary

So, check out the website, you will find yourself smiling at the post. That's better than the happiness brought by 2 lbs of chocolates.

how's the weather today

4/27 response: draft ipad presentation

I hate to say that print is almost in a dead valley since I love print design so much. But survival for the fittest, we have to embrace the fact that web and ipad design will eventually rule the world.
I had my first experience of designing on ipad on Thur. morning. Though I have to say that mag+ was very "beta" but it did free designers from lots of technique issues. I do have cravings for software techniques. I love flash, love javascript (which I don't know how to use) and love everything that requires coding. Am I weird?
There are truly lots of limitation for mag+ but something better is just round the corner. And there will be more such plug-ins and software addressing ipad magazine design. Sometimes I feel like that our design work are highly restricted by electronic technologies, I want to be the one that can combine both but at the same time I understand that individual time and energy are limited.
Anyway, let's all get prepared!

4/20: Critique the new pornographer cover

This 4/28 issue cover design is quite a challenge for me. First, my crazy final schedule only left me couple hours for the design, and second, it't one photo with three ideas, not the regular one photo, one illustration and one studio.

Thus, I decided to make all of them pop and trendy but with different "methodologies" (yes, I just took a break from my giant academic paper writing).

Though, not much time left, I still went through couple of their website and went to youtube for their music video and it turned out that I really like their music. 

They liked to combine lots of creative music elements and their mv are especially funny. Thus, "diversity" became the theme of the cover. And you can easily tell they are really a team of diversity: gender, age, even just how they all look like differently.