Late Night Lynda

Remembering I have to watch these, I have to say that I'm not used to not recognizing file formats as well as I thought I did. I've known what most people know- .gif, .png, .jpeg, and some that I've used from art programs like .ai, .psd, .sai, .xcf, and so on. TIFF and PSB are very interesting and I have to admit very handy. It feels like they essentially do the same thing, it's just that one is able to handle a lot of memory compared to the other. 

A TIFF file is very handy and can be used to save layer documents and plays well with applications that cannot read layers. In fact, if the file is really large, Photoshop automatically saves it as such. It supports documents up to 300,000 pixels in either dimension, height, or width, and everything in Photoshop is supported. TIFF files can also save up to 4 gigs, but beyond that it goes to the other save file automatically.

Then there's the PSB. the PSB is automatically saved when you are saving a file larger than two gigs, specifically more than 4 gigs. It's a second choice option compared to TIFF for the first two gigs. It also saves all of Photoshop features. 

The thing I never understand really is JPEG. I've always actually hated JPEG, especially in terms of when it came to my drawings. But JPEG mostly pertains to pictures, or at least should. So in that sense I get it, JPEG is great because it keeps that high detail...unless you zoom in and you se ethat it literally changes the format of things and you can't manipulate it after... meh.

The thing I didn't know number wise for PNG is that it's limited to single layer, and that there's 256 levels of transparency- which to be honest I'm not entirely sure what that fully means exactly. 

Also- DNG. When the heck was that a thing? Digital Negative format- say what? 

Some light notes for myself to remember for later::

Halftone - resolution used for printing press, CMYK, dot pattern
Continuous Tone - used for Inkjet, photographic paper. 240-360 pixels per inch (ppi)

Week 6A l l Outside Work

We have finally moved into Photoshop! I am excited but also still a little curious to the feel of it. As a previous user of GIMP, I'm familiar with some tools but I know lots of things can be tinkered hopefully. We also were introduced to In Design's ways and how to tweak things in there.

Getting the homework from last class and finishing it up today- I feel like I can't complain anymore about Illustrator. I have never used In Design at all and I have to say it is a bit too complicated for my taste. I don't understand that when you place an item into a "document" that you have both the image and then a linked border too. I'm not used to having to move this link in order to have it in place so that I can position the images in. It's very frustrating.

Granted, after doing about seven images in, I have found out how to do it so that both are clipped together. I have to make sure to hold down the command key...or was it shift? Oops. Either way, it's something new to learn and I want to keep what I have so far, even though it's hella messy. It's just so I can look back and see my mistakes- or more so this is my first time using Design and at least I've been able to accomplish recreating the piece itself. 

Week 5B Outside Work

Finished our final concepts of the project along with figured out how to create a smaller, condensed version! Without any help I think I did okay- at least eye appealing wise. Maybe not so much calendar, but it truthfully did give me a bit of complications. Either way, I am thoroughly pleased with where I came from with my original design, and the dynamic shows between the original concept and the final one.

The smaller one looks like this!!

Week 5A / 5B l l Outside Week 5A

These past classes have basically been to work on our calendar project. I've done the needed editing (minus the fonts since my laptop doesn't have all the fonts like it does on the school computer) that I was suggested, and admittedly I have to say I am enjoying this version a lot better. It brings out a lot of dynamic things I don't think my original background would have been able to do. Also the free range of my spoopy dialogue for the pumpkins is a lot better than the original oval shape.

Here's my final with and without the calendar.

Summary of Week 4A - 4B l l Outside Week 4A

Killing two birds with one shot. On Monday we briefly went over things like copyright and a little more dealing with our calendar projects for the Smashing Magazine. In all truths I kind of forget what we mostly did Monday because it was mostly in class work time. I have this nasty habit of making elaborate and very condensed pieces to the point where I simplify everything and also change my theme completely. 

I also have a bad habit of following up with asking if it's okay to switch- but I think for the most part I am on the right track. I also plan on doing more than one calendar because of all the other ideas that I have in my head. My original idea was to have a graveyard with some jack-o-lanterns, a gate, a cat, and a full moon. My current idea that I have completed for the in progress critique is a simplified, vector feel calendar.

I chose to continue using the color palette I had found earlier for the night time halloween feel and I have also combined it with a candy corn color scheme I picked up for the colors of October, the days, and "Trick or Treat". I also just added a few grays to neutralize the colors and also work well with them. I have eight pumpkins all with different facial carvings, some grave stones, a black cat, and above they all say in a spooky kind of feel, "Trick or Treat!" I have also chosen to do every odd number a lighter color- mostly because Halloween falls on October 31st, so why wouldn't I highlight that! 

I think it has worked out well. I have other ideas in mind that I'll talk to Pannafino about- like my haystack idea. And I just came up with another idea of a "hear no evil" "speak no evil" "see no evil" featuring creatures that normally use these senses or rather do not have those senses. For example, hear no evil I associate with a werewolf. Speak no evil I associate a witch with due to all the spells she says. And to be mean, see no evil I instantly thought a mummy, ironically haha. Or I suppose if I wanted to, see no evil could  be a vampire! Too many ideas and I end up choosing none of the original concept hahaha. Funny how things work that way.

Sketches

I have a few sketches of what I would like to do- or at least concepts of my original idea. First we have the two main sketches, both kind of the same looking with a few things added to them for comparison purposes. 

Then I began thinking about simplifying some stuff, as I'm still pretty new to Illustrator and I want things to look well and at least to my standards- to the point where I won't bash my head against a wall due to AI frustrations. I thought why not try to zoom in on a location and focus on that? The one thing I would like to have, at least for this spooky concept was the gate and also the cat. So I decided to sketch out the cat up close with the gate it is standing on with the moon in the background. 

The following though is a little bit of a spin off of my original idea I came up with on my tablet- using the color palette I had found on Google. 

The last one became a late minute concept of mine and I keep coming up with a lot of them so it's a tad bit frustrating that I kind of want to do them all. What I recently thought of was what about Scarecrows? What about corn mazes? Corn fields? Haystack rides? 

The one I sketched out was a little concept idea of having three scarecrows in a corn field with the actions of "hear no evil" "speak no evil" "see no evil" with three small pumpkins below them and possible scarecrows scattered places. A lot of my ideas are simplistic and they would be mostly color filled, no lines (like the pumpkins for example) 

And that's pretty much it so far. Nifty eh? I hope so at least.

Pictures l l Outside Week 4A

This weekend was much busier than I had anticipated- and I didn't get all the pictures I wanted but I got most at least! I had to improvise for pumpkins mostly because they aren't really in season at the moment... Working in the wee early hours of 4am has its advantages and disadvantages also when it comes to taking pictures and also trying to show that I want this to be a night scene.

  

I'm fairly certain if you click the pictures the formatting of them will change to their original size. Sorry for the inconvenience! Also I started to take pictures of the two scarecrows around my house because my original idea has started to become a little too overwhelming, I'm trying to cut back and see if I can do something more simplified and also equal or more powerful like my original design idea was.

Victory!

So I didn't realize it but I have the trial at least for Illustrator on my computer... Decided to tinker around with it finally while watching the videos assigned for this week. It's especially helpful and I wish I had done that sooner. I have a way better understanding of how to use the pen tool, and I'm equally glad and successful at the other tools I have been shown and hopefully will be able to incorporate into this calendar project. It's also kind of nice to be able to use my tablet, because using the mouse is very tedious and I'm not used to mouse work. To share my excitement I drew this: 

yes, that's right. Be happy dog, be happy. For much excitement has happened within the past ten minutes of my experimenting!

Week 3B

In all my excitement with the new things we've been learning and starting to move into project wise, I kind of forgot to write something until now. We have basically been covering the basics of Adobe Illustrator and have begun our work in progress for the first project. I had a small idea of what Mind Mapping was beforehand due to Jerri's class that I had taken in the summer for Digital Art, but I didn't know much about the mood board. Either way, I have found both to be very handy in the little time I have just begun to really utilize them in a creative way. I have also started to become a bit more familiar with Adobe Illustrator, which is nice. I have ideas already in terms of what I would like to do for my project, and hope I can get approval and start on the ideas right away. As it stands right now, the one main theme I have in mind is Halloween and also just pumpkins in general due to a book I read way back in the day called, "Too Many Pumpkins!" 

Other than that, not too much else to report. 

Mood Board x2

Ok ok I may be a tad bit going overboard with this but I can't help it I really do like doing these things. This is for my second idea which I am starting to kind of lean toward. It's more a halloween traditional, pretty cliche feel. The usual spooky hilled grave yard scenario with jack-o-lanterns, flying ghosties, a witch in flying above in front of a full moon with a possible haunted house somewhere located on one of the hills. My big main thing is that I want to have the gate (like in the picture below) to have October either written inside like the gate in the mood board, or possibly have the letters on top of the gate. I chose to go with the Mona Lisa Solid ITC TT font for reasons being it looks to be able to fit the part of what I want, as well as I am trying to find different fonts to fit. I figure for a gate I want a very thin but also old looking(?) font to go with the gate's style and make. 

I also want to use Times if I can and it isn't too overwhelming since the piece may have a lot of contributing factors in it for the graves. I did a little "digging up" (ha ha, funny) and tried to see if we had any fonts that were actually used for gravestones back in the day. Also in terms of texture I don't think there will be too much if I am able to do that- just some grittyness for the graveyards but maybe also some rusty spots on the gate. Granted this is only if I decide to actually make it pretty detailed. I have started to enjoy making simplistic ideas mostly based on shapes and just the plain color. I think the color palette will work fine since it's mostly dark colors and I can probably use the range to my advantage.

The Mood Board

Here is what I have so far for the mood board. My first idea which is based on everything pumpkin. I would like to make it minimalistic, no lines just the shapes and colors. It will mostly be warm colors with some added cool colors (like on the palette) and have pumpkin theme everywhere ranging from the actual pumpkin, to food, and also to beverages. 

I would like to make another mood board for another idea I have currently that I kind of want to do a little more. It will be more halloween-esque, and consist of the usual night time graveyard with the large gate having O C T O B E R on the gate itself. I would like the full moon, and some graves, along with maybe some spooky trees and ghosts floating about, and a witch in the background. I don't want it to be too visually overwhelming, but at the same time I'd love for it to have that spooky creature and ghoul theme to it. 

a little bit about the story board I have right now- the current Types I chose were Curlz, Academy Engraved LET Plain, and Handwriting. The design for the kitchen is in small portions on the bottom. I'd like to have the round chairs and table, but I want it to be in a homey type kitchen. Various foods like pumpkin spice lattes, soup, pie, and seeds, and some candle scented things and only a small variety of other fall seasonal drinks and foods. That's the plan so far. Pumpkin patches optional, same with carved pumpkins too.

Mind Mapping

This is my mind map. I have a few ideas already in my head, mostly themed toward Halloween, food, pumpkins specifically, and possibly weather related. 

Eight Logos

it's a little big, but here I've got the original .tif file alongside my version of the logos along with the layers to show that the work has been done.

Week 3A

I finally finished the Logos project. I've gotten a better grasp on how to use Adobe Illustrator in terms of the pen tool and also the shapes tool. I didn't think it would take so long, but I'm glad it's finally over. Seven in a half hours long phew. I know some things are sharp if you zoom in to like 1200%, but at 100% it is pretty spot on.

Now all I have to do is start and finish watching the videos on Lynda.com. More to come soon.

EDIT;

Watching more of the Lynda videos, I had a familiarity with CYMK and RGB in terms of what these colors are used mainly for. CYMK for printing purposes, while RGB for the net. I'm also angry at myself for not watching these videos sooner haha, but I'm glad I know these things now regardless. I mostly finished the logos with the shapes and the pen tool, but some of these other tips could have helped finish it too. Some options and controls have familiarity to them also, but there are places I didn't realize that can make things easier- like up at the panel bar for the stroke and fill on the bottom as well as the align tool. I also wish I watched the paths too- but I'm also proud for the most part I figured it out very messily all on my own. The tips help, and I'll keep them in mind for future projects. 

Edit 2: 

With the whole paths section, I never really thought of the paths being the underlying structure of a piece itself. When first starting in AI I had accidentally hit ctrl + y a few times because in other art programs I work with, it's the "undo" button for me. Now that I know what exactly ctrl + y does and what it means in AI I have a better understanding of it compared to having no knowledge of it before.

Week 2B

Today was mostly going over how to do the basics in Adobe Illustrator- and admittedly I take back saying that it's similar to other digital art programs. To each their own, I have been more experienced with Photoshop and what I normally use, Paint Tool Sai. I am not used to the pen tool and I find it a little challenging (although that is to be expected if you're new to working AI in the first place). I do like playing around in AI to be honest, and some things in the previous videos I know how to do and it's a nice refresher. I like the ability to allign things very easily if need be (like letters or shapes all lined up in a perfect row when they are disheveled). The assignment we have for this week that is due on Monday is a little rigorous, but I'm sure I'll be able to do it. I have a small advantage thankfully of having AI on my laptop- so since I am a commuter not having to travel back and forth from school to home on the weekend is a major plus. Oh well, challenge here I come!