First Project Hand In

This week I had my first proper hand in at university. I was really surprised how not stressful this was compared to the hand in days at college. It may be because this is more like an interim hand-in. My work isn’t actually graded till December. But it was still much more laid back compared to what I’m used to.

So I had to get my poster finished because it was due to be handed in on Friday. I was almost done before the reading week. I should really have used that time to finish my poster but I made the decision not to. So I was back at uni and had to finish the typography.

This part was the most annoying because the typography was almost there. I had to take what I’d done in Illustrator and move it over to InDesign. We had never used InDesign for posters at college so I was a little surprised to learn it is the preferred software to use.

lives of others poster shown on computer screen

From there I had to get the type just right. I was designing a poster for The Lives of Others. This meant having four words to lay out on the page around the image which I had also taken a few weeks before.

This meant making tiny changes to the typography. Did the “T” of “the” align vertically with the “L” of “lives” or was it aligned centrally. How much smaller was “the” and “of” compared to “lives” and “others”. I’m used to working with type but I’m not used to focusing so much on the tiny details.

Which I guess is a good thing because it’s the one thing I didn’t learn in college. But it’s also frustrating when something doesn’t look the way you want.

ART THEORY CONFUSION

I had my last lecture for my context module this week and I really don’t know how I feel about this course. It’s basically the art theory classes. And it’s really interesting. We started off learning about the brain, how people see and how that can be used in art. But it has gone on to look at semiotics and postmodernism and everything has become confusing extremely quickly.

page of lecture notes

I feel like I almost understand what we are being taught. But for this module, we have to write an essay analysing images from one artist or design movement. It’s hard to see how what we are learning relates to what we have to do for the outcome. Especially since the later lectures have been more about philosophy than art theory.

GRID-BASED-DESIGN

This week I also started working on my next project which is to create a publication about Modernist art. It’s quite funny because this project is almost exactly the same as a David Bowie project I did not too long ago.

I feel like I’m a little behind already with this project. I probably should have started doing some research into Modernism during the reading week and didn’t. It’s something I really have to get started with because I know just how much work is involved with this sort of project.

david carson presentation at topform

As part of this new project, we got a talk on grid-based design. It’s really interesting to see that ever since humans started writing they have been using some sort of grid to aid them. This particular course focuses on typography a lot more compared to other graphic design courses, so I got to hear just how important the grid is when designing. It was quite funny listening to this after meeting David Carson the week before who is renowned for not using a grid.

THAT’S ALL FOLKS

I think I spoke too soon about this course being really easy with little work to do. This week was particularly stress-free but I know this next project will have lots of work involved. Not to mention the many workshops I will be doing on top of that.

MORE IN THIS SERIES

Comments

2 responses to “First Project Hand In | Art School Diary #8”

Dan Antion

May 12, 2019

I published a training newsletter using InDesign. I learned what I needed to know, but I don’t think I ever got very deep into the weeds. It seems to be so powerful. Good luck with all of this,

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1. BluChickenNinja
  
  May 18, 2019
  
  Thanks. InDesign is great. It’s amazing what you can create with it.
  
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First Project Hand In | Art School Diary #8