Graphic Design - Semester Reflection

            The first half of my year in Graphic Design we were able to learn twice as many skills as I had learned in the previous two years of the e-Communication program. The class started with simple projects, such as our Name Plates, and evolved to gaining the ability to brand ourselves as a whole.

The class grew as designers as we created posters for our school Homecoming, t-shirts to advertise school clubs, expressed stories through typography, created and branded our own imaginary company, and finally getting to chose a logo and brand for our future careers. We then went to create our own page portfolio on Adobe’s Behance in order to share our work with others. 

 

            One of the biggest struggles I had this semester was a lack of inspiration on some projects. Usually once I begin a design I sketch and find an idea that I really like and get motivated and excited to push it to the computer in order to get feedback from my peers. Unfortunately there were a couple of times this year that I struggled to find my inspiration to start a project. Working on my personal brand was a prime example of this. I had an idea of what I wanted and couldn’t seem to get there no matter how many sketches I sketched or inspiration I searched for. It is beyond frustrating to have an idea of what you want and are unable to get there. I worked with many different concepts, pushing them further and further until I hoped I would see one that I liked. Finally after fi

nding the fonts I wanted and with help from fellow students I was able to find the symbol to pull my logo together. I hope that in the future as I grow as a Graphic Designers I will be able to overcome the lack of motivation for all projects and be able to create something awesome.

           My strongest piece of work is most likely my graphics for the event before finals at Olathe Northwest called “Cram & Cocoa”. I was very inspired by the ideas and theme the administrator had approached me about. I work very long and very hard on it, and am overwhelmingly happy with the results. The information needed to put on the posters was a lot, and I struggled to include that alongside a graphic to represent the event. In the end it came down to a flyer void of the graphic but with the same elements as the poster in order for them to correspond with one another.

The work that I struggled with the most was probably my Homecoming posters. Due to missing quite a bit of school I was very time crunched with that project. When I returned from vacation my deadline was only a couple days away, therefore that week include me slapping some stuff together and calling it good. While I was proud that I had finished by the deadline with some pretty decent designs, I was also not as happy as I could’ve been with the end result.

This semester I have grown tremendously as a Graphic Designer. The process of creating designs has become much more clear and much easier for me. I have learned that not only does sketching help you begin your project, that it can shape your entire design as a whole. I have begun to reach out to my peers for critiques and assistance when my inspiration level is low. I’ve realized the effect of others feedback on a project, and how a critique can completely transform my design for the better. Not only that, but my ability to work with the software has further improved as well. This year compared to last year seems like an entire different program due to the amount of things I am able to do now, that last year I was not. I struggled slightly at the beginning of the semester with time management and meeting deadlines, but I have found that I have not been stressed about any of those things at all in this class. I hope that my knowledge of the programs, research and overall designing grows even more as I move through my next year and a half of e-Comm.

I hope that in the next semester and other years to come I continue to improve as much as I did in the last four months. I will make sketching and adding final touches to projects more of a priority in my free time, so I am not only doing all work at school and time crunching myself. I hope that we continue to create things in our own ways and continue with the freedom we have had this last semester. I look forward to learning everything I can about Graphic Design.