- PPD year review















Blog
As we were given the blog brief i realised the dimention of it. I realised that if i was capable of managing it well, by the end of the year i would end up with my work and research doccumented, and, the opportunity to show more about my personality as well. From the first post i focussed on giving myself (the student  junior graphic designer) a positive impression to the eyes of a potential employer. 

As i look now through the first posts, i realised that i’ve improved in the way i present things. If before i would use a quick iphone photo to show what i had done in class, now, when i report a project, i have a blog post always in mind. This made me work differently, i am now aware that as a designer, everything counts towards a good presentation. Whatever i do, from writting to sketches, i try to make it look visually good, just in case i might need it later (photographed, scanned...). Well, it is not always true, but i try.

I regularly post a link of my posts into facebook. What i intend with this is shouting to everyone - hey i am a designer. It is effective and i realised that people do actually go and see my work. Over the past eight months i had more than six thousnad visitors, over a bit more than one hundred posts. I have some nice comments. 

At the time of my first blog review, with Josh, i was told that i needed to use more images and less text. I took the advise on board, and indeed, the blog became more interesting. I ended up being forced to finish the day with something interesting to put on the blog. As a consequence, today i have my progress doccumented and it is really fabulous to look back. One academic year, i’ve certainly improved.



The first weeks workshops.
Well, these workshops were amazing. They were inspiring, challenging and fun. From them i understood the need of thinking fast and adopting the just do it mentality. I had (and actually still have) a servere problem with going into unexplored fields. I like to have the whole plan in my head before starting to produce. I like strategy, and seeing things happening one after the other, but realised with these workshops that i am also able to produce work when i just let things go, by doing, and doing and doing.  From these workshops i learned a technique - when i am stuck in a problem, i give myself two hours and i dont care what the result will be, but it has to be the best that two hours working fast will allow. It works, sometimes better than others, but it works. I cannot understand why i dont do it more often.



The mad collages project.
I know that the title of the project does not include “mad”, that the project was never meant to count for evaluation, and - worse of all - that the exhibition never took place. But... i loved the mad collages project and that is how i intend to cal it on my portfolio. That is what i thought when we were given the brief - One hundred collages? - In such a short time and having other stuff to do? - They must be mad! With this project i realised that i love working in the space between word and image that allows wit to exist. I produced one hundred collages on time and i am depply sorry there was no exhibition.



GDF project
Oh the GDF! I spent hours and hours on this, and, wasn’t able to come up with a very good solution, i like my idea but wasn’t able to produce the final outcome with the graphic design appeareance that i would like to. What i’ve learned the most from it, that i cannot swap from idea to idea all the time just because i am afraid of what i have to do, in order to develop it further. Instead, i need to explore, more.



GDA01 - Project in collabration with the Whynotassociates.
The reason i picked up this project was due to the possibility of working with suh a well known studio, and, to further explore the fields of brand and identity. I explored many very good agencies. By exploring identities i became aware of where are the states of the art in this field. Simplicity rules, and it is not a matter of filling every space with great skills of graphic design. I learned that, and tried to apply it to my design. The most positive aspect from this project was at the time of the crit with Paul, just after the date of formative assesment - i realised that no, what i had done was not good enough, yet i had the best mark in the group -  and this, made me seriously improve as a designer although i am not able to explain why.

Before crit with Paul Link01, and after Link 02.           


GDA02 - Project in collaboration with the institute of Contemporary Arts
This was a tough project. Tough because i spent a lot of time with nothing to show, and that was very... best word really is, depressive. I had many thoughts about quitting design. I just couldn’t come up with something to show. Days and days, and days, and days, with notthing. With this project i’ve learned that it is true, sometimes ideas come at the last minute, and if you keep calm, you can make them look good. Again, i had the best mark in the group. After this project i stopped caring about the grades, and here i started to explore more.



Final project
I consider this project as my favourite from the year. I decided that i wasn’t going to stress about it. That i would just explore, use the just do it mentality that i was forced to have in the first weeks. 
With this project i feel that my time is much better managed, and that makes things easier. I’ve’ve explored techniques i had never done, such as french folding, monoprint, patterns, mapping with type (although i havent done this workshop - blogs are really great for this) and others. I feel relaxed and i am able to produce stuff that i am pleased with, and actually, i must go back to it.

Great, great year.

Thanks.

1 comment:

  1. this year revew is a kind of deep trip inside your innerspace. I dare to say that you explore your inner creative capacities as well as your skills_and you make a bridge between your personality and the way you are discovering how to deal with its different aspects. This revew is an objective analisys of your work,its difficulties,barriers,problems and the ways you are discovering to deal with your SELF. And the best for me is that you enjoy your inner trip and discoveries and you are so very much open to unexplored fields..even if its a scaring activity!

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