Category: Digital Communications Blogs

I  have been working on my Senior Mastery all week and I have been making relatively decent work on everything. I have been working on my promotional cards and so far I have 3 finished. I underestimated how long this process would take, but i’m not complaining. I enjoy spending the day working on the things that I really like to do this kind of stuff, so again, not complaining. I really like how a particular card came out, which was my Friday the 13th card. I like the way I interpreted the gradients and glows into it and I think it really made everything pop out a lot more.

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My annotated bibliographies came out pretty good in my opinion. I was really happy with the sources I was given and I am actually pretty excited to continue working on them. I thought they would be a lot harder to write, but I just followed the rubric and it was pretty self explanatory from there.

Im not sure what ideas I have for the door. I think the idea we all decided on is really good, which was to decorate the door to look like a social media page and go from there to incorporate everyones ideas all in one. I would really like it if I could dedicate a corner to my sisters father, just because it was not too long ago, and I would love to dedicate that to him. It wasn’t breast cancer, but it was cancer, and I think it should be recognized.

I am reflecting now on the notion that I’m talking about my senior mastery again, because it still hasn’t set in for me that I am indeed, a senior. I’m not entirely sure if I am ready to leave yet, but I am all ready to graduate this year. I will miss all the teachers I have come to know, especially Ms. Desimone and Decerbo. They are both what made my Junior and Senior years so enjoyable. I have been beyond blessed with the opportunities I’ve been given here at AAST. Thank You Ms. D!

The design I made for the South Carolina company was very simplistic, circular, and full of different tones of blue. I liked the idea of having diversity symbols in my work, and that symbol was simply two different tones skins meeting up for an embrace, followed by details of the company and of course, the South Carolina symbol. I was very proud of this work because In sense, it just turned out really well. I don’t really care of mind either way if it gets chosen, though. I, in all honesty, just made it to get the grade for Ms. D. I will definitely be excited if it gets chosen, but my hopes are not high. It is a circular design followed by a dark blue, light blue, and a dull blue, to kind of throw all the other blues into place and make them pop out even more in the illustration/logo. I added their slogan “Diversity: YOU spot it, WE stop it!”, and I think I tied it in really well using a black font, to really make it stand out out of the whole thing.

For my Senior Mastery this week I worked  on more promotional cards, also tried to start working on my Business Cards. I Downloaded a template and hopefully it fits the paper and actual template that I have to put in the printer. I started my fourth illustration for my promotion cards. The cards I have already are Heathers, Friday the 13th, The Outsiders, and now I am working on The Goonies. If you have any other ideas I would love the hear them, Ms. D! I plan on doing Dirty Dancing, Breakfast Club, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and maybe Hugo Cabret, but I’m not entirely sure if that is an 80’s movie. I digress and just say I may choose to do it anyway, solely because I really love that movie. I really am happy with the process and how I am doing my Senior Mastery, he only problem I have is the proposal. I used to be really good at writing, but now I can barely get out sentences without sing run on sentences and that such. I am hoping I will be able to pull together what I need to.

I have been working on a lot of different things for my Senior Mastery. I first started iff with the writing portion. I had t do my Description and Rationale and it was, surprisingly, very hard for me to write. I used to be a very good writer, but now I find it very hard to get the words onto a script. I also started on my timeline, my competencies, and my DC competencies. It is very hard to find what I am supposed to do, for all of the above, just because again, I am not a good writer. I have to figure out the total competencies that I will be doing and write about that, so it will be an interesting experience to see howmuch and what I will write about. I think I am on track right now, though.

My Senior year is off to a not so good start, because I have found I am very stressed with School, work, and other activities that I cannot juggle all of them at once. I have to create a lot of pieced of Design for Ground Zero, I have to take an online Math course, I have to work on my senior mastery, and I also have all of my academics. It is very challenging to juggle all of this and also find time for work and free time. I do not have a lot of free time even when I am out of school and find myself home.

As previously stated in my earlier paragraph, it is very difficult and I am finding that it is very hard to juggle all of the things I have to do this year. I also have not been able to finish my State Fair entry, and it will look very rushed and not well done, I am afraid. I am struggling to find what I am exactly supposed to be on track for for my Senior Mastery. I am afraid I will be slacking with this year, but I will try everything I can to make sure that is not so.

 

Well, here we are again, writing blogs and talking about how we are and what we are going to accomplish this year. I feel so nostalgic as I wrote this, but in a very good way! I am so happy and grateful to be back at the Academy to finish out my Senior year! So far what I have been doing since I got here was working on my Senior Mastery exhibition and my Promo cards for my Senior Mastery. I have been working on 80’s Promo cards that look like little collectible cards from various different movies. It has a very old. retro. vintage look to them and I absolutely them. Since I got back that is all I have been doing, regardless of the fact I have other things to do! I have been doing some research for my annotated bib. but aside from that it is all about the designs I have. It feels very strange to be back in this room as a Senior. I honestly never expected to come to the Academy and love it so much, but it happened, and I never want to leave! I will be very sad to leave when I graduate, but I will never forget the memories that I have made here. Our visit to the media center was very much needed because I was not sure how I was going to approach my annotated bib at all. I really didn’t know what an annotated bib was, to be frank. I sat down with Ms. D and Mr. Easter, I think that is how you pronounce his name?, and I figured out instead of connecting my pieces to modern art, I go even further back in time and figure out how everything influenced the 80’s with their culture and art and work from there. I am so excited to continue researching this and finding out how everything connected to make the 80’s style and 80’s style. I just have to say that I am a total nerd when it comes to the movies I have watched throughout the years, but nothing makes me happier than going back and finding an old 80’s movie and watching it over and over again. I love the nostalgia from it, even though it was not my time. I believe I was born in the wrong generation.

 

This year has been absolutely amazing and I am so grateful and blessed to be in such an awesome Major and with an incredible and understanding teach like Ms. Desimone. I don’t really know what to reflex on besides my Final, which was the Book Cover. I picked a book that I had started reading a few months ago, but refused to finish because I didn’t find much interest in it. I was really confused on the purpose of the book and I was in awe of what the meaning behind it could be, so I just stopped reading it. I learned rather quickly through some events that had happened what the book could really stand for, and thus, I started reading it again in a whole new perspective. I started really getting into the book within the last few days that I had to pick a book to do for the book cover, and I absolutely loved it. I started really getting into it and finally, I completed my book cover the way I saw the book through my eyes.

I will be coming back to this major next year hopefully with a whole new perspective. I can;t wait to start my senior mastery, in fact, I already have, but just more in depth than I have been this year. I am really torn if I want to just limit myself to the vintage works that I was doing or if I want to incorporate the photography I have been doing with it. I think it would be good to have a bit if diversity into my work, but I’m not quite sure if that’s how I want to do it. I really wanted to do a theme of Ginger Photography, bu I let it slide because I did not think I would have enough gingers to really do what I wanted, plus I didn’t know how I wanted to do it, so the idea was just not going to work. I can’t wait to see everyone, plus the new Juniors next year and come back, AS A SENIOR! I hope I will be a light to the juniors just as the Seniors were to me.

While I finished my Bridge Poster I learned a lot of different things. I think I learned a key value in what I want to do for my portfolio. I really want to do a lot of different things for my portfolio, which is the tricky part, but most of it will consist of Vintage works. I really want to include some good pieces of photography that I have, but aside from that it will be completely up o what I feel I have the most of. If I have more photography than Vintage works, which at the moment I do, I’ll have to go with that instead, just depending on the deadline I have at the end of the year. If I continue working on it through my senior year than I will probably do a little bit of both.

I am really juggling all my work right now. I have a lot of reviewing for US History, a lot of work to stay focused on for English 3, and A LOT for Web. I feel A lot was thrown in Web with the bridge project, my final, and the website. I have a lot to do on the website because I haven’t even started yet.

I am preparing by doing a lot of studying. I think will be fine for whatever English has to give me for a final, but History is going to be a lot more harder. I honestly don’t know how I am going to pass the History Exam. But I will try.

My favorite hobbies include singing, and going out and taking pictures of nature. I really like taking pictures as a hobby and am very grateful for being able to do it as an early career as well. I think I can really take in a lot of value and class from the photos I take and bring in more people who would like to pay me for doing their pictures. I really just want to be able to take pictures of what I like, but I will compromise for doing other peoples stuff as well.

I have learned a lot when it comes to poster designs an website making. I started off doing minor HTML things, but I then decided that I don’t want to do that for my website, so I made a website on word press, which has a little HTML work but nothing major, like coding your own website. As for poster design, I see myself making very vintage looking works in the future, even as I am. I really like making works like that, so for my bridge design I added my own touch of vintage wear and tear to it, and I think it really added some character to it.

My Final Bridge Design is a very subtle but attractive orange mixed with a subtle yellowish wear and tear. It has an all black silhouette of the bridge and it is revolved in a circle, a black one. It came out all in all not the way I had originally pictured it, but that is okay because I think it came out a lot better than if I had just left it alone. I really like it and even i it doesn’t win I’ll be okay with that because I was happy making it and at least I was able to have people judge it.

I think I could add a lot more to website because at the moment it is very basic with simple animations on the home screen window boxes, but I think it looks really nice. I will add a lot more of my works onto it and hopefully that will do the trick to make it look even ore amazing than I think it already is. I hope that once I feel more comfortable using HTML with Word press then I will be able to make my website from scratch, but I don’t think I am at that point that I want to do that just yet. It has a lot to do with the works I’ve trying to get through, which the majority is of vintage works. I think this will be a really attractive page when I am done.

I have not been as efficient lately as I would like, and I admit that. I really have been slacking and I need to get back on track. I have not been doing anything lately that has been helping me learn and create my website. I really do find no interest in doing HTML and I hope that there is some way I can make my website someway else. I’m hoping that there is an easier way to do a website that Ms. D will allow me to do instead of doing a from scratch HTML website, seeing as I haven’t even started coding for it at all.

5 Illustrator designs I have are all made with distressed looks. It is probably my biggest strong suit in graphic design and I really like it. I like the way they look and come out after I finish them, and to me, they really do look old and worn. They are very simple yet not simple because I take a lot of time to make sure they look just how I imagined them, and they usually do come out just the way I want. I am really happy with these and the one listed below has to be my personal favorite for multiple reason.s The first reason being it was my first distressed work that introduced me to my love of distressed works, and 2 being that It came out really well and old looking and I have it posted in my room framed, just because I love it so much.

I have to start working on works in Photoshop. My attitude is this; I really dislike Photoshop and the least I have to do in it the better. For me, I believe editing a photo in Photoshop adds up to the fact I haven’t made anything in it by hand. I would much rather prefer to edit my photography in Photoshop and have that count as a Photoshop creation, and I really hope it works out that way or else I’ll be a little upset with myself for not thinking ab out this sooner.

 

My entries for the Art fields and Show are the same, but with different descriptions. I used the same tree in the snow picture for both because I felt really proud of that particular picture and how it was taken so nonchalantly and how unplanned the picture really was. It was so simple and yet simplistically nice that I though it would at least make it into one of the two Shows.

My Earth Day at the Bay poster was very similar to you can make a different poster in the way that I did the same masking photo for texture over it, just because it had a nice papery look to it, and all in all it is just my favorite texture piece I have. It consisted of a “Bay”, which I tried to create, but it didn’t really go well. Following, it was also brought with a nice cursive-ish font to follow under it (or above it?). I think I could have done a lot better with it, but I am still satisfied with it.

I am planning to do two things with my portfolio. I really like to do distressed works of art, such as very old, vintage, retro works. I have quite a large variety of works lined up that I have made, but I also want to include some of my photography, so My logo (which I have two) includes a vintage looking logo with my initials, and a piece of photography I took with my initials.

I have really been stretching my individual skills over break at Ground Zero. I recently have been granted an opportunity to become a full staff member within the year if I can get together a good portfolio together. I am excited for this opportunity because I really would love nothing more than to be able to work full-time there when I get out of High-School. I feel so at home and welcomed there and I can’t possibly think of a better working environment than there. It is a very high goal of mine to step up in the Graphic-Design field.

I believe my service learning presentation went very well. I really like how my presentation and slides came out in general. I like the picture I took in the background, because it was one of the first pictures I took for the church when I put it up on the website as a background. I was really happy and quite proud to be able to show off a few works that I have done for the church because I was just really happy that someone could see what I had done, and all on my own at that. I was a little nervous, as I’m sure everyone else was as well, but I have been going through a lot lately, so for me to build up myself to talk in front of everyone about something I really enjoy and enjoyed to do in my time of finding myself, it was a bit relieving.

I hate HTML. I learned the basic things on Lynda.com, but I really have no other interest in learning anything else, even though I know I have to. I will continue to try and do some things in it, but I really would rather not. It is something I just really have no interest in, and I kind of envy it in a way that I really really do not have any intention to do anything with it. I will watch tutorials and things for assignments that are huge, but again, I really have no intention to do the small works for the class if I don’t think I will struggle significantly, grade wise.

I learned a lot this week on Photoshop, surprisingly. I am not a huge fan Photoshop, but I did have to learn a few things with Bryan, my mentor and co-worked, because we had a album cover we were designing for a local band called Oceans Orange. We edited and took shots of the band for a music video called “Lights Out”, and I think it came out really well. I took a lot of picture to put on their Facebook page, and I would encourage anyone to check them out because they really are a good band.