Tessa's DMA Blog

1. What did you learn?

I learned more about the consumer/demographic psychology and how to design my product to effectively target the specific demographic that I am selling my product to. I designed a coffee brand and chose bright colors and a sleek look to make my product pop out to the extent of which it is not overwhelming.

2. What was easy?

I thought the easy part was picking the product that I wanted to design. I love coffee and thought it would be fun to design a coffee brand.

3. What was challenging?

I thought the challenging part was designing the symbols for each flavor; the hazelnut, pumpkin, candy cane, and french vanilla. I also thought it was challenging when I made these symbols into patterns on the product because I wanted the pattern in a specific placement of the product. 

4. How could your submission be improved?

I think my submission could be improved by adding even more detail into the symbols. For example, I could add more detail in the hazelnut by adding shadows and more depth to it. 

5. How could I improve the assignment for the next class?

You could improve the assignment for the next class by adding another lab for more practice on designing logos and symbols to help with the project. 

6. How might you apply your knowledge in future assignments or work scenarios?

After this project, I have learned the importance of product design. I have learned that you need a good color scheme for your project, your spacing needs to look neat and correct, and your font needs to correlate with the logo of the product.

7. How did a specific reading or video inspire or help you?

Looking at student’s projects as examples helped me think about what kind of product I wanted to design and gave me a better understanding of what Professor Dunkle was looking for in the project. 

1. What did you learn?

I learned that simplicity can be a good thing with illustration. Sometimes, I think that the more fun and out there an illustration looks the better but that is not always the case. From looking at examples of spot illustrations and different kinds of menus it seems that illustrations that are simple can have just as much personality. When looking at a menu, people do not want big, obnoxious, colorful illustrations catching their eye. They want to see what kinds of food are on the menu and the prices. Illustrations are very important but they are not the main purpose to a menu. Illustrations that exhibit simplicity can be just as fun by using limited color and having a consistent look. 

2. What was easy?

I thought the easy part was picking the fonts for the menu and creating the overall layout design of it.  

3. What was challenging?

I thought the challenging part was establishing a consistent look and feel across separate assets. I found this to be difficult at times because I was designing six different categories (breakfast, appetizer, lunch, dinner, dessert, and beverage) and some of them were completely different from each other like beverages and desserts. It was hard to find a consistent theme of colors and design styles to go along with each category but after a lot of redesigning, I eventually found one. 

4. How could your submission be improved?

I think my submission could be improved by adding more design illustrations to the menu. I like the simplicity of the menu right now but I think it would be fun to add more design illustrations to it like shapes and 3D images. 

5. How might you apply your knowledge in future assignments or work scenarios?

After this project, I have learned the importance of establishing a consistent look to a project. In the beginning of the project, my font did not go along with my illustration. I chose a thin line font that did not go with my thick line calligraphic style illustration. I changed my project completely after that but it brought an awareness to me that I should always be thinking about consistently when doing an assignment like that. 

6. How did a specific reading or video inspire or help you?

The Spot Illustration examples on Dribble helped me think of the kind of theme I wanted for my menu.

1. What did you learn?

I learned new terminology such as the term “onboarding”. Onboarding process is the user’s first impression of your application. If the app is designed effectively, the user has a positive response during the onboarding process. Pagination is another word I learned which means the results per view. I also discovered the different categories of the application such as front end (user archive, pagination, search, sort, filters, alerts) and back end (dashboard/statistics/graphs, user management, messaging). It was cool to learn this new terminology while creating my application!

2. What was easy?

I thought the easy part was picking the movie I wanted to create for my poster. I was thinking of my all time favorite movies and You’ve Got Mail was the first movie that popped into my head so I went with that option and am happy I did. 

3. What was challenging?

I thought the challenging part was creating the old iMac G3 computer. I originally was going to use an image trace on the original image but decided to try out the pen tool. I am not familiar with the pen tool so I thought it would be good practice. 

4. How could your submission be improved?

I think my submission could be improved by creating a better iMac G3 computer. As I already mentioned, I am not yet comfortable using the pen tool. After I drew the computer I could see some of the edges were not exactly how I wanted them. Some sides were curved and others were not. I think once I get more use to it I think I could create an even better computer with that tool. 

How could I improve the assignment for the next class?

You could improve the assignment for the next class by putting the option of using the Adobe wheel link on the Project 2 directions. I remember you telling us in class about this but I think it would be useful to have it on the directions page as well. I think it is good for people to remember how important color scheme is on the poster and to use that to their advantage while creating their poster. 

5. How might you apply your knowledge in future assignments or work scenarios?

After this project, I have learned the importance of color scheme (as mentioned in the previous question). At first, my poster had all sorts of colors and Professor Dunkle told me that the poster needed a sense of theme to it. The color scheme I chose were colors that reflected the 90’s. After redoing my color scheme I thought my poster represented a poster from the 90’s than it did previously. 

6. How did a specific reading or video inspire or help you?

The reading, “Meet 10 Hand Lettering Artists You Should Know” inspired me to seek different kinds of font styles and which style best suited the poster I was doing. 

1. What did you learn?

I learned the difference between using the paintbrush in Photoshop and the pen tool to draw in Illustrator. When I began this project, I was using the paintbrush in Illustrator which was very time consuming and difficult to draw with since I was using the mouse on my computer. I felt like I was doing something wrong and when I talked to Professor Dunkle about it he told me to use the pen tool instead. The pen tool is one of the more powerful tools to use while drawing a portrait and it takes less time. Once he told me that, I did not realize how much easier the pen tool was while doing this project. I’ve used the paintbrush in Photoshop in previous classes but did not use it for this class since I drew the portrait in Illustrator. The paintbrush is more adaptable and easier to use in Photoshop while the pen tool is better to use instead of the paintbrush in Illustrator.

2. What was easy?

I thought the easy part of the project was going into Photoshop and picking a filter like we did in Lab 1 for my portrait photo. I found this to be the easiest part of the project because it was not time consuming and there were very few steps you had to take to pick a filter that you thought fit your photo. 

3. What was challenging?

The challenging part was using the paintbrush tool in Illustrator to draw my portrait. It took me some time just to draw and fill in a facial feature of Ruth Bader Ginsburg. I was very precise and detailed with how I wanted the portrait to look and it took a lot more time doing that with the paintbrush tool. I eventually started using the pen tool which made it a lot easier. 

4. How could your submission be improved?

I think my submission could be improved by adding even more detail within my portrait. I think if I had more time, I could draw in more detail of her facial features by using shadows and highlights. 

5. How could I improve the assignment for the next class?

I could improve the assignment for the next class by using the pen tool in Illustrator which would allow me to have more time drawing in more details of her face. 

6. How might you apply your knowledge in future assignments or work scenarios?

I might apply my knowledge in future assignments by using the pen tool instead of the paintbrush in Illustrator. This would make me be more time efficient with my work and less stressful as well. 

7. How did a specific reading or video inspire or help you?

The modern illustration and illustrating people slides helped me with deciding what kind of portrait style I wanted to create. The illustration people slides gave me an idea of the shadows the artists used in their portraits and how they made them look so good.