End of Module Evaluation: OUGD405

What skills have you developed through this module and how effectively do you think you have applied them?

I’ve developed how I work in a group, baking muffins and working more independently. These skills were developed individually through each of the modules, for the How-to brief I really got into the group work because I really enjoyed having the multiple minds; I think I effectively applied that development by helping to coordinate the group into working roles and helping them using Adobe Illustrator. My baking skills developed in Typogateux, baking every few days through trial and error to get the muffins just right a real challenge and I think from that I can apply the skills to different areas of working from that. Working individually came naturally as with the briefs as they put me to research my own theme given in the research brief and put me in charge of the development of that.

What approaches to/methods of design production have you developed and how have they informed your design development process?

I developed my ideas my through my notebook because it felt more natural for me to work this way when I’m at a computer, this was during the research brief and jotting down my ideas while I worked felt the most suited to me. I think this then came then informed my ideas more when it was to development because I had it all in one place I could continuously work on it because it was always near me or in hand. This was then easier to translate onto the software on the computer because the notebook was small enough to fit on my desk while I worked instead of using sheets that would be behind me or elsewhere because they can’t fit.

What strengths can you identify in your work and how have/will you capitalise on them?

I think my strengths that have developed during this module would be how I research and develop my ideas, I believe through the use of my notebooks I think it’s something I’m going to continue to use this but create worksheets from my notes for presentations like how I did in the How-to brief.

What weaknesses can you identify in your work and how will you address these in the future?

I think my weaknesses lie in time management and blogging as I go, otherwise I get a backlog of work which piles up. To address this I think It’s best I do start doing the blog everyday as I work on it, I need to create a routine for myself when It comes to the development period in the work to iron out the issues before they pile up.

Identify five things that you will do differently next time and what do you expect to gain from doing these?

1.       Brainstorm more at the start of a brief to create more different starting points for myself in my notebook so I can keep that at hand instead of getting stuck in a single idea.

2.      Keep a brief at hand, or write down the requirements so I have a clear Idea of what I need to produce for each.

3.      Blog more as I go so I don’t get a backlog of work to do afterwards.

4.      Create more design ideas in the development period to have a bigger range of solutions to work from.

5.   Start to bring in InDesign into my workflow to take advantage of it’s software capabilities.

How would you grade yourself in the following areas?

Attendance: 5/5

Punctuality: 5/5

Motivation: 4/5

Commitment: 4/5

Quantity of work produced: 4/5

Quality of work produced: 4/5

Contribution to the group: 3/5

Colour Questions

Does it affect the way you see colours when through a certain eye?

As our eyes aren't exactly perfect, since nature rarely does anything identically our eyes have slightly more or less red, green or blue cones in either one of our eyes. This leads to our eyes seeing more of one colour than the other eye since it's more sensitive to that colour, an eye that sees red better has more red cones in it for example. The reason we don't see this imperfections when we're seeing through both eyes is because our brain is able to sort the good and cancel the bad out so that we can see without them, It's only when we look through one eye that we see these differences.

http://www.newscientist.com/blog/lastword/2008/03/rose-tinted-vision.html

Shining Film Facts: Development + Production

I drew out some preliminary sketches of how I would want the app to work, the layout of the app's structure and how it would flow if It was to be a real product, I wanted that be the first idea I had laid down so the rest could follow on from it. The ideas I had here involved film-reels and film negatives been the slides that would scroll along but I deemed them irrelevant. 

I had the idea from watching it again that I could structure it to be a long corridor, inspired by the corridor scene with Danny on his trike, I really liked the idea of using the doors (which play a big part/role in the film) to be part of this corridor where you could open a door to find a fact behind. Something in that relation. This then meant that there would be two layers to the slides, slides and facts along with a splash page as the introduction. I thought I'd go with the best 10 facts as my set amount to work too as that'd be 10 facts too, plus the splash.

For the splash I took a look into Saul Bass' ideas for The Shining movie posters, they were concepts I really liked that Kubrick discarded but I finally decided to use the Carpet pattern as the main feature pattern. I choose It because of just how iconic it is to the film how heavily featured it is when it comes to the film. The pattern is just as famous as the film because of it, you know shining when you see the pattern.

I thought up a few concepts for the corridor and the doors that could possibly feature in it, I decided to go with a flat 2D scrolling design as It would the best when it comes to translating to 2D and would allow me to involve more details without involving perspective into it. I also started to design out different parts, the arrows the handles, door frames. I used screenshots from the film for reference for the different doors involved. I then decided to draw out my fact pages.

I setup a layout for the fact page so it was in a tight column  I then thought I'd be best to have the door too in this way so when the door opens it doesn't disrupt the viewer and keeps a very clean and logical layout to it.

I did attempt to try and trace the logo from the Original film poster but It didn't really work, I found a imitation of the typeface online that I then used from Dafont. I thought it worked really well in hindsight, it did the job I wanted.

The first thing I created was the carpet, the hardest part I think, It was a awkward pattern to get right but I got it right eventually using the pen tool and expanding the line.

I attempted to try and imitate the carpet exactly as it is in the film, but i really hated it, it just felt too expected. I chose instead to use the lines from it, as above, and go with these instead. I choose the yellow from the shining poster to then use in contrast as the background. I created a tonne of manipulations of these to try and see what would work best. I used Futura for the typefaces involved for everything else because it was Kubrick's favorite font and was used throughout his work too. I then found it to work incredibly well with the design.

I started then to create the doors as well, using Futura bold for the door numbers worked nicely too so I kept with that. For the floor I used the perspective tool to apply the carpet to the same perspective to act as the carpet it is.I was really happy with the result of that, I created the famed room 237 door first including a reference to the door key Danny sees when he's on his trike.

For the door Jack chops down I tried to get the peeling of the wood right but It was hard to achieve because   of just how wood splinters it was hard to appear realistic, but I suppose it doesn't help that it's a vector and not a photograph. I got to a result I was satisfied with and left it with that because I thought it was convincing enough after spending to long on it. I created the door from the previous to match for these ones.

Also including the axe afterwards as an afterthought to act as a reference. For the fact page I used a screenshot I took of when Danny is in the storage room as it was one of the only ones of him standing I could find of him in the film awkwardly enough.

I tried to create detail for the elevator using the pattern that features on the top and creating the dial as I thought It was essentially when it didn't have them it looked really odd so I needed them details to create a distinction from the rest. Getting the blood right coming out of the door was difficult because I didn't want to include so much detail you'd never see in the rest and keeping this to a minimum was hard because of this. It just looked drapery instead of been blood pouring out. I took a screen shot of Shelley running up the stairs from the scene the fact page mentions to then use her as part of the info-graphic.

I wanted to add in some plain doors as well so I numbered them from 201-246 (201 been a 2001: A space odyssey reference), I took a picture of a AT-AT walker because they're the ones featured in the Hoth battle so I'd have that link connected. It took awhile to get the snow right because the snow flakes looked like flowers.

Here I used the picture from the maze they had setup to film in to use for my fact page, I thought this was effective, I didn't have many ideas how to show this fact outside of this.

I used Google maps to and using London as a start, I choose cities that were far enough away, surprising found out that Middlesbrough Is very to 246 miles! I found a different picture of the UK to use and then applied the line the road followed on-top to create the image.

I used the perspective here to get the x50 to the right angle with the arrow the same, I made the tennis balls have the same perspective by changing their sizes which worked really effectively.

I drew out Redrum with the line tool and then applied the brush tool to it to create the same effect that would have with crayons, I really liked how it turned out when it was sized down tool. 

I drew out the guy, I didn't want him to be perfectly sausage like ---  like how the ones for toilets are. I didn't use the same image of Danny here because I the people who auditioned weren't him, so I wouldn't make sense. I wanted them to be all anonymous. Danny been the red one, this visual clue hints to that and I believe it worked.

For the pie chart I roughed in my sketches I found difficult to incorporate into the design here because you need alot of information for a pie chart I tried to simplify it down as much as I could to work and I think the idea is got across, You see the biggest amount top and you see the biggest amount on the pie chart so I believe it to have.

Indesign Software Induction 2

Induction 2

Photoshop and Illustrator files, and images aren't actually put into Indesign, they are linked into the Indesign file. Below in the box here you can find the images you have included into the design, double clicking onto them displays and highlights where they are in the document. Hovering over the image link in this box below shows you where the file is located, the one that is linked. 

Stay Organised

This explains the reason why there is low resolution images in place of the ones put into Indesign, it's because indesign is for only arrangement, when it's printed Indesign puts in the High-resolution version of the image which is then printed. This keeps the file size of Indesign small allowing the software to run fast, unlike other programs where files are imbedded instead of linked.

If ever when there is a file missing which is linked to the Indesign document there will be to clues to finding out if one has gone missing, within the links file there is a red hexagon, as well as one on the frame where it was before it shows another red hexagon in the top-left corner to tell you it's not longer linked. When a file is still linked, there's a chain-link shown in the place of the red hexagon.

When creating a document with Indesign it's best to create a folder where the images for the document can be always kept so that you don't accidentally lose any of the images linked to the document. Keeping the Indesign file alongside the images when taking it back from computer to computer.

 

Because the image files are linked it means we can edit and image while it's still there and once it's saved it'll automatically update, this is one of the big advantages of using the method of file links instead of embedding.

Alt+Double click

Edit Image shortcut. 

Changing and saving the image in photoshop or illustrator, once saved instantly updates.

Edited Image.

Photoshop files offer the ability to use transparency within Indesign, only when saved as a PSD.

Transparent Image.

If I wanted to have guides on every page, I can use the master page to setup grids I want to use throughout my document if It's a publishing type, or if it's just a series of posters for example. Whatever I do to the master pages applies it's self to all the other pages, I can also do page numbering through this way also. You can see it's from a master page by the little A in the top of the page.

If I want to see how my document is gonna look I can use the keyboard short cut 'W' this then displays the pages as the below is shown, no guides and everything that is of the page is no longer shown. There is also the presentation mode which then takes up the whole screen but this can be accessed this from the bottom of the left toolbar. 

You can also change the stacking order akin to illustrator by going through Arrange > and choosing one of the options to either bring of push back or forward within the layout.

Text Wrap

There is also the option to text wrap an image if it overlaps on top of a text frame. The text wrap can be found within Window > Text wrap. The left option is as normal and all the others wrap around the image, once I've done this I doesn't have padding around the image. These options become available when you've clicked one of the text wrap options at the top. Increasing these then increases the padding around the image. This only applies when you have clicked onto any frame, image or text.

If I have an transparent image like the one I created and I want the text to wrap around the image and now the frame, only on the 3rd option can I do this, but by clicking onto the drop down and selection Alpha Channel. 

I can also curve the side of text by using the text wrap by creating shapes to then shape the text how I want, I can also do this using the pen tool as well to create custom shapes, to then shape how the text flows.

I can then use the type tool to then place type within shapes as well, using the same shape to form the side of text I can then place text inside a shape to become a frame. This can be edited just like in illustrator because it's a vector as well.

Because shapes created in Indesign are vectors (with pen-tool) this then means I can edit illustrator vector shapes within Indesign by copying and pasting them into Indesign I can then edit the paths.