Photography

Let's take a break from graphic design today and delve into the wonderful world of photography, shall we? I took a photography class last semester and I really feel like I learned a lot about editing photos to make them look professional. I would like to share some photos I took for my analog photography class last semester. I scanned the negatives (on a very, very expensive scanner) and worked on the photos extensively in Photoshop. Even though it might not look like it, each photo has several Levels and Curves adjustment layers and look vastly better than the original scans.

Visual Systems Process Books

For the final project for Visual Systems, we had to create a process book showing our notes from the lectures and our process for the two projects we had done during the semester. I chose to split my book into three smaller books that all obviously went together as a system. I chose to use the typeface Folio, because it works at both the large scale on the cover, and as body text. I am very happy with how these books came out; my paper cutting and book binding skills have definitely improved drastically in the last two years.

Visual Systems Posters

It seemed like I was constantly making mock-ups of posters last semester and the project I have to show you today is one of the reasons for that. Our second assignment in Visual Systems was to design a series of three posters for an exhibit at the Canadian Center for Architecture. We had to make posters for exhibits of the work of Richard Neutra, Louis Sullivan, and Frank Gehry, and we were given all the text. That posed a bit of a challenge since there wasn't an equal amount of text on each poster but we still had to create a system that would make it clear that the three posters went together.

When it came to sketching out ideas, I first researched the three architects’ styles and their impact on architecture history. I discovered that Louis Sullivan is essentially the “father of modernism.” He designed many of the first high-rise buildings and also used massive arches in many of his designs. Richard Neutra’s designs were all very geometric, combining metal and stucco to make light, open spaces. Frank Gehry designs in a deconstructivist style, where the form can take more precedence than the function. After I felt like I had a good idea of the architects, I sketched out ideas that were inspired by the posters. I experimented with grids, but ultimately decided that I really wanted t o explore the possibilities of having a large letter to stand for each designer being the focus of each poster. I was inspired by many posters, especially this one:



I love having a large graphic element like that and the typography is handled and balanced beautifully. In my posters, it just so happened that the first letter of each of the architects' last names mirrored their architecture style, so I decided to run with that when designing the main form of the poster.

Ode to Typography Book

Today's post is about my final project for Typography III, a book laying out the poem Ode to Typography by Pablo Neruda. We had to include the entire poem, and the book had to be tabloid size (11x17). With those parameters in mind, I read the poem several times to try to get a sense of what he was trying to say. Maybe I just don't appreciate poetry, but I found it to be overly long and repetitive. While at the end of it I did feel very appreciative of letterforms and all that they accomplish, I really felt like it took way too long to get there. In the end, I decided to use my own photography in my book to show the uses typography has had through history up to modern times. It gave me a chance to explore many different styles and layouts, and, while I did have some trouble reining it in to make the whole book cohesive, I think many of the spreads ended up working very beautifully.

The Crystal Goblet Book & Poster

The project I would like to share with you today is a book/poster for Typography III. We were told to read the essay The Crystal Goblet by Beatrice Warde and then lay it out in a way that showed our interpretation and opinion on the subject. The main idea that Beatrice Warde was trying to get across in this essay is that typography should only be used for conveying information; she believed that the typography itself should be invisible so that the message can shine through without distraction. I agree that there is a time and a place for invisible typography, but I disagree that it must always be that way. I believe typography can be an art form not in just laying out information but also in the way the letters themselves are constructed. While it may not always be appropriate, there are times when expressive, possibly unreadable typography can be used to get across a point or just be a beautiful form in itself. Typography is such a rich subject filled with meaning and history that I don't understand why Beatrice Warde believes it should be limited to just one purpose.

When it came to doing the actual project, I took inspiration from the layout of linotype books, since the typography in these books is not supposed to be invisible. In fact, the whole purpose of these books is to show the forms and uses of all the different typeface options so linotype machine owners will purchase them.



However, I decided to design some of my own letterforms which may not mean anything to us English-speakers but can still be beautiful in their own right. I based my letterforms on the typeface Poster Bodoni, designed by Chauncey H. Griffith in 1929 and based on Bodoni, designed by Giambattista Bodoni in 1798.

Poster:


Book:














In these spreads I crossed out what I felt were the most typographically limiting points in her essay.

I printed it on a textured cream colored paper, to try to soften the harshness of so much solid black on white. It also invokes a feeling of history, which is appropriate since this project needs so much historical context to be meaningful.

Two Process Books

Hi everyone. I want to apologize for not updating this blog for exactly two months now. It was finals time at school and I was too busy actually making my projects to be blogging about them. But now that it is summer, I'd like to share with you all the things I've been designing for the past two months. For about the next two weeks, I will be posting every day until I've gotten through the (way too long) list of projects still to be written about here. However, if you want to comment, I ask that you do it through either twitter (@karenkavett) or email (karenkavett at gmail), just so it is easier for me to reply. Thanks for reading, and let the blogging commence!

Today's book is actually from fall semester, from my Color class. It is my final book, and since I had to hand it in basically as soon as I finished it, I never had time to photograph it until I got it back about 2 weeks ago. It is your basic process book showing the projects done each semester with a short description of each one, but I am proud of the design I came up with considering how little time I had to put it together.







Another book I had to quickly make and wasn't able to photograph until now is the process book for the animation I made for Making Meaning during fall semester:



It is a fairly simple book, just going through the process of watching and transcribing the movie, looking for inspiration, storyboarding the animation, and finally making the final product.

Two Shirts for Two YouTubers

Today's blog post is about two shirts I designed recently, for Dan Brown and for WheezyWaiter.

Most of my thought process for Dan Brown's shirt is explained in the video I made for him:






I thought it would be a fun project since he has several clear graphic symbols that can be used to reference him and the Pogotribe community. I went through several ideas involving the Rubik's Cube, like having sillhouettes of different countries on the blocks, or even the letters in Hello World all mixed up on the Rubik's Cube, but they seemed unnecessarily complicated. Those ideas also didn't really involve the "eweniverse" idea, so in the end I went with the Rubik's Cube in space, which I think turned out pretty nice.





The WheezyWaiter shirt is much less involved, since I didn't come up with the concept; I simply put the design together. Alan messaged me asking if I could design a Coffee Craig shirt in the style of the Pizza John one, which was originally designed by Valerie2776. He sent me several photos to choose from, and I thought the one of Craig looking straight at the camera would be the most recognizable. I put it into Photoshop and removed the color and background, and then added posterization adjustment layer, which turned the image into only black and white pixels. Then I had to go back and burn and dodge parts of Craig's face so that it was recognizable as him without huge parts being in shadow or light without any detail. Once I was happy with that, I brought it into Illustrator and put a simple live trace on it to match the texture of the original Pizza John shirt. It doesn't look super professional and polished, but I think that is part of the charm of the original, and I wanted to duplicate that in Craig's shirt.

Both shirts are now available for purchase:
http://www.districtlines.com/17782-Hello-World-T-Shirt/Dan-Brown
http://www.dftba.com/coffee

Thanks everyone for reading, and as usual, leave any questions or comments in the comments section below.