I am super late in posting, so I am so sorry! I have just been reading through all of the great responses and trying to figure out just what exactly I do to enhance my abilities.
I found Jen and Katie's posts especially helpful, and I might repeat some of their points.
The first thing that came to mind when I read through these posts was to make friends and don't be afraid to shoot them questions! In undergrad, I interned with a photographer/designer who is now my brother-in-law, and I definitely use up my fair share of favors with him. I am always emailing him questions and he is always willing to help. Not to mention all the other great friends I have made in the program.
PS. if making friends is hard for you and you still have a lot of questions, the lab assistants are usually pretty friendly and knowledgable.
Secondly, I know that I should be doing a lot more drawing/painting/photographing/reading and all such activities, but life happens. However, I am putting a lot of effort into this program, which I feel has been a major improvement of my skills.
As for sites, I am a big fan of Pinterest and Google, but I am in the process of looking at some of these other great sources that people mentioned!
Okay, time for class :)
Thursday, October 2, 2014
Re: Honing your skills
In my spare time, which is seriously lacking, I have been designing websites - which I have spoken about in class. I enjoy it, and while the jobs are small right now - it forces me to challenge myself. I have started creating a network of people that I reach out to (some that goto this school, and some that do not). I also love research a plug-in or codes to get what I need, and modifying it based on what I am trying to achieve design-wise. I find this is how I am able to can developing and growing.
As for what has benefited me thus far, really it has been just having that designer eye. Even though I work retail, a lot of people ask questions relating to colors and visuals. It helps - although I would rather be at home, clicking away on major (tiny) details.
The sites that visit that usually help are pinterest and google. On google usually I find github, and a site called codrops has been a help to me.
Common Cold Question:
I wish I could be more of help here. I am teased at work though and in my family. It seems I am able to catch anything - even if its supposed to be not contagious. Remedies haven't worked in a long time with me. But I hear chicken noodle soup and lots of fluid should help (supposedly).
Feel better!
Re: Honing Your Craft
To be honest, its pretty difficult to spend time honing my craft in my free time because I don't really have any. With working full time, school and other side work I find that my classes and time allotted for school work is really my time to get creative with my craft. Being in this program has been the most beneficial tool for me to network as well as bounce ideas off other creative people. I'm sure like many of you, my friends and co workers are exactly design orientated all the time. It's nice to mingle and brainstorm with others who love design as much as I do.
If I am stuck or find I need to figure out something to sharpen my skills/techniques I do use Google and YouTube. Usually that is my go to! However, I also do a couple friends who I would consider 'experts in the field', which is nice so you can actually have a conversation. The most frustrating thing is to find that Google or YouTube can't really understand the question you are asking. With real people you don't have that issue. Or not as much...
I really like what Tiffany said about design books. Obviously, with digital solutions so easy to obtain I sometimes forget about the hundreds of books I have. Yes, they are not as easy to index to find a quick answer, but I do find that the information is rich and makes you look at whatever project/skill different. Big fan of design books. Thanks for reminding me to use them more often!
If I am stuck or find I need to figure out something to sharpen my skills/techniques I do use Google and YouTube. Usually that is my go to! However, I also do a couple friends who I would consider 'experts in the field', which is nice so you can actually have a conversation. The most frustrating thing is to find that Google or YouTube can't really understand the question you are asking. With real people you don't have that issue. Or not as much...
I really like what Tiffany said about design books. Obviously, with digital solutions so easy to obtain I sometimes forget about the hundreds of books I have. Yes, they are not as easy to index to find a quick answer, but I do find that the information is rich and makes you look at whatever project/skill different. Big fan of design books. Thanks for reminding me to use them more often!
Re: Honing Your Craft
Jasmine is posting from PARIS for heaven's sake, so I think she wins.
Anyway, I can totally relate to this post: I tend to have lots of grand ideas that I don't have the know-how to complete. And it drives me crazy because I'm the kind of person who thinks I should be good at everything.
As I mature, though, I think I'm feeling more at peace with the fact that I'll be good at some things, bad at others. Or maybe I'm just getting lazier.
In all seriousness, I think there are three things we as designers can do to handle our gaps in knowledge:
1. Make friends.
This is a less "LinkedIn" way talking about networking. Networking is not only invaluable during the job hunt, but also when you're more established as a designer and starting to take on more projects on your own. When you make friends with different skills, you won't have to turn down a project just because you don't know how to do every little thing it requires.
But, that doesn't mean you should take on every project, which leads me to my next tip:
2. Just say "no". (Sometimes.)
Not every project is going to be for you, and it's really important to determine what you can realistically teach yourself for a specific project. Consider your past self-taught skills record, the resources you have available to you (money for classes or software, like Lynda), and the time you can spend on learning a new skill - if you think you can realistically teach yourself how to illustrate in a certain style with all that in mind, go for it! Always be honest with yourself and, most importantly, with the client.
And, so, finally:
3. Always stay true to the three R's:
Read. Research. Repeat.
I just made this adage up, but, hey, that's how sayings get started, right? Pass it on. Anyway, doing a realistic cost/benefit analysis of teaching yourself a new skill is a good thing. But, realizing it might not be worth your time to learn the new skill does not give you a pass to be totally ignorant about it. A good designer should know the terms and trends for a wide array of disciplines, so do your research and read everything about design you can get your hands on.
Resource (a 4th "R")
I subscribe to Communication Arts and I really enjoy reading their columns every issue. They have people from a variety of disciplines talk about the creative work, and you get a lot of interesting perspectives from areas of design you might not be the most familiar with. Here's a link to the feed of CA columns.
Anyway, I can totally relate to this post: I tend to have lots of grand ideas that I don't have the know-how to complete. And it drives me crazy because I'm the kind of person who thinks I should be good at everything.
As I mature, though, I think I'm feeling more at peace with the fact that I'll be good at some things, bad at others. Or maybe I'm just getting lazier.
In all seriousness, I think there are three things we as designers can do to handle our gaps in knowledge:
1. Make friends.
This is a less "LinkedIn" way talking about networking. Networking is not only invaluable during the job hunt, but also when you're more established as a designer and starting to take on more projects on your own. When you make friends with different skills, you won't have to turn down a project just because you don't know how to do every little thing it requires.
But, that doesn't mean you should take on every project, which leads me to my next tip:
2. Just say "no". (Sometimes.)
Not every project is going to be for you, and it's really important to determine what you can realistically teach yourself for a specific project. Consider your past self-taught skills record, the resources you have available to you (money for classes or software, like Lynda), and the time you can spend on learning a new skill - if you think you can realistically teach yourself how to illustrate in a certain style with all that in mind, go for it! Always be honest with yourself and, most importantly, with the client.
And, so, finally:
3. Always stay true to the three R's:
Read. Research. Repeat.
I just made this adage up, but, hey, that's how sayings get started, right? Pass it on. Anyway, doing a realistic cost/benefit analysis of teaching yourself a new skill is a good thing. But, realizing it might not be worth your time to learn the new skill does not give you a pass to be totally ignorant about it. A good designer should know the terms and trends for a wide array of disciplines, so do your research and read everything about design you can get your hands on.
Resource (a 4th "R")
I subscribe to Communication Arts and I really enjoy reading their columns every issue. They have people from a variety of disciplines talk about the creative work, and you get a lot of interesting perspectives from areas of design you might not be the most familiar with. Here's a link to the feed of CA columns.
Re: Honing your craft
1 1) What ways are you furthering your skills in your
spare time?
I like to develop my
skills by thinking about concepts. In creative concepts we did a lot of
thinking about how to design by being innovative by taking a unique approach to
the subject matter. In my spare time I like to think about different concepts
for projects and I take my time working though them. Basically I’m assigning
myself homework and I give myself a deadline to work though it. Then I will
contact a professor usually Professor Gold and ask for feedback that way I
understand how my solution works for someone that isn’t me.
2 2) How has this benefit you as a designer?
I think doing this has
opened up the way I think about design. I mean we all look at websites, blogs,
pintrest and Bēhance to look at other people designs but this was no matter if it’s
at their level of design I am constantly honing my skills. Which will make me a
better designer.
3) Are there any sites you visit that help you sharpen
your skills and techniques?
I usually go look at Bēhance
and try to recreate things by goggling my life away.
4) Any secret cures for the
common cold? :)
I use Oscillococcinum which
is a natural cold remedy.
Wednesday, October 1, 2014
Re: Honing Your Craft
Hello from Paris! or should I say Bonjour!
This will be a short post, I only have qq5 minutes of free wifi on here and of course the keyboard is in french, so bare with me please! lol *
When it comes to sharpening up my skills on my spare time, I honestly haven;t done much. It is something I need to start doing more often, I think it would benefit me a lot I look foward to reqding with everyone else does to further their skills so I can get some ideas. When it comes to websites Pintrest, Pintrest, Pintrest ;) I also love Behanced.
Sorry for such a terrible post, but i figured something was better than nothing.§§
This will be a short post, I only have qq5 minutes of free wifi on here and of course the keyboard is in french, so bare with me please! lol *
When it comes to sharpening up my skills on my spare time, I honestly haven;t done much. It is something I need to start doing more often, I think it would benefit me a lot I look foward to reqding with everyone else does to further their skills so I can get some ideas. When it comes to websites Pintrest, Pintrest, Pintrest ;) I also love Behanced.
Sorry for such a terrible post, but i figured something was better than nothing.§§
Re: Honing Your Craft
To be honest, I'm not really furthering my skills in my spare time. I'm usually sleeping or watching Netflix. I know that I should, but since I started this program, I basically am doing as much as I can just to get my projects done on time while also working and trying to get some sleep every now and then. When I do have time, I end up wanting to do something that doesn't require much thought--hence, Netflix.
When I have an idea for a project that I'm not sure how to do but know that it can be done with Illustrator/Photoshop, I'm Googling those tutorials like everyone else. But I do have something to contribute to this conversation--I promise. I definitely think that I've been helped along in the program and my work because I can draw at least moderately well. I also definitely think that everyone can learn to draw.
While some people have natural talent, and some probably don't have as much, learning to draw is really more about re-learning to see than anything else, and there are things you can do to help yourself improve. When I was teaching high school English and trying to decide if I could do something more visual, less verbal, for a living, I took an intro drawing class at a local arts center. I hadn't really taken an art class since middle school so I had no idea what I was doing. One of our first classes, the instructor gave us an exercise from Betty Edwards's Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain: She showed us a poster-sized print of Picasso's portrait of Igor Stravinsky and told us we were going to reproduce it; then, she turned it upside-down:
Here's a write-up from a blogger who did the same exercise from the book, which is also where I got the image.
The previous class, she'd asked us to draw a tree, and many of the drawings had looked like clip-art/kids drawings of trees with a straight trunk and a blob for the leaves, so she'd realized that many of us were stuck in the verbal/sign-making-and-recognizing/meaning-making part of our brains. Bringing in the Stravinsky exercise forced us to ignore the meaning part of our brains and focus on the purely visual--the shapes and lines in the image, not what the generic concepts of "nose" or "legs" or "eyes with glasses."
For me, that exercise still probably has the most impact of anything that I've done to improve my drawing or graphics skills. I think just working/playing/doodling/practicing your old-school pen/ink/charcoal/paint-and-paper skills will help in the long run as much as any of the tutorials online, which are certainly helpful in the moment when you have a specific idea of what you want to do. Improving your physical skills can change the way you think and see, though, so that can give you infinitely more ideas to begin with. Then it's a matter of learning tricks of the programs, which sites like Lynda.com can help with.
Along with Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain, I've also found Lynda Barry's work to be tremendously helpful. Her books What It Is and Picture This: The Near-Sighted Monkey Book both present writing and visual art in an approachable memoir-like narrative with pages full of creative work. They're like primers in how to be creative, and present a pretty different version of how to draw, respecting individual choice and the process of finding a style or voice of your own. She also has a Tumblr page for a course she teaches at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, which includes some interesting, fun, creative and sometimes not-too-time-consuming exercises.
As to a common cold, I'm a big believer in the old-school sleep & lots of fluids method. I know sleep can't always happen the way we might like, especially with full-time work and classes, but it helps. Also, hot water, one bag of green tea, one bag of mint/peppermint tea, plus honey, and repeat.
When I have an idea for a project that I'm not sure how to do but know that it can be done with Illustrator/Photoshop, I'm Googling those tutorials like everyone else. But I do have something to contribute to this conversation--I promise. I definitely think that I've been helped along in the program and my work because I can draw at least moderately well. I also definitely think that everyone can learn to draw.
While some people have natural talent, and some probably don't have as much, learning to draw is really more about re-learning to see than anything else, and there are things you can do to help yourself improve. When I was teaching high school English and trying to decide if I could do something more visual, less verbal, for a living, I took an intro drawing class at a local arts center. I hadn't really taken an art class since middle school so I had no idea what I was doing. One of our first classes, the instructor gave us an exercise from Betty Edwards's Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain: She showed us a poster-sized print of Picasso's portrait of Igor Stravinsky and told us we were going to reproduce it; then, she turned it upside-down:
Here's a write-up from a blogger who did the same exercise from the book, which is also where I got the image.
The previous class, she'd asked us to draw a tree, and many of the drawings had looked like clip-art/kids drawings of trees with a straight trunk and a blob for the leaves, so she'd realized that many of us were stuck in the verbal/sign-making-and-recognizing/meaning-making part of our brains. Bringing in the Stravinsky exercise forced us to ignore the meaning part of our brains and focus on the purely visual--the shapes and lines in the image, not what the generic concepts of "nose" or "legs" or "eyes with glasses."
For me, that exercise still probably has the most impact of anything that I've done to improve my drawing or graphics skills. I think just working/playing/doodling/practicing your old-school pen/ink/charcoal/paint-and-paper skills will help in the long run as much as any of the tutorials online, which are certainly helpful in the moment when you have a specific idea of what you want to do. Improving your physical skills can change the way you think and see, though, so that can give you infinitely more ideas to begin with. Then it's a matter of learning tricks of the programs, which sites like Lynda.com can help with.
Along with Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain, I've also found Lynda Barry's work to be tremendously helpful. Her books What It Is and Picture This: The Near-Sighted Monkey Book both present writing and visual art in an approachable memoir-like narrative with pages full of creative work. They're like primers in how to be creative, and present a pretty different version of how to draw, respecting individual choice and the process of finding a style or voice of your own. She also has a Tumblr page for a course she teaches at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, which includes some interesting, fun, creative and sometimes not-too-time-consuming exercises.
As to a common cold, I'm a big believer in the old-school sleep & lots of fluids method. I know sleep can't always happen the way we might like, especially with full-time work and classes, but it helps. Also, hot water, one bag of green tea, one bag of mint/peppermint tea, plus honey, and repeat.
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