KNIT KNIT KNOT

I'm going to REALLY miss my fiber elective.

Final taxonomy

Final product.

Ultimately, I'm happy with the turnout. I wish I had done more, but time is always an issue. And also, I didn't want to over do it. I liked that there was only five in the book, it made each one that much more special, and unique.

Throughout my taxonomy I had denotations, and connotations. My denotation was set in regular Cochin font, and my connotations were set in italics. Each of my patterns were a specific drop repeat pattern, so I named each one a name based off how much it dropped within an inch. My connotations were the pattern themselves, and what they portrayed. Such as, affectionate, rushed, or dainty.

The taxonomy was a lot of fun doing. I really enjoyed how much freedom we got within this project. It really helped me think more outside the box I think. Such as, picking a theme for our dot book was also fun, because how much freedom we had within it. Over winter break I'll definitely be making more patterns, and what not.  Making new marks would be an interesting twist within it as well.

SEQUENTIAL PROCESS

 LINE ONE SEQUENTIAL PROCESS: Starting with some main ideas about where I wanted the idea to go. Whiskers was an obvious, but still abstract way to go with the whole cat idea. So, I moved further into the idea, and found an object that would work well with the shape and idea of whiskers, a tree branch. I also did some iteration with my cat's paws, but they didn't work out as well, so I kept moving with the whisker idea. I vectorized it then at the very end moved the little tiny oval shape more to the middle to represent the nose.

LINE TWO SEQUENTIAL PROCESS: Starting with thumbnails of my  main ideas, I finally came upon, then heading into what tool I used for this specific marks, which was yarn. I thought this correlated back to my poem, because cats really like to play with string, so I brought in a toy they may play with. Then, showing some main marks that were made with leaves, then with the string. Finally it gets into what the final mark looks like, and how I vectored it, and finally moved one little fish shifting down a bit.

 LINE THREE SEQUENTIAL PROCESS: I decided not to show the whole idea with using my cat paws because i felt it would have got too confusing within the process. After starting the whole entire line over with the new thumbnail ideas and new tool I really got motivated to make it a successful shape. Starting with the thumbnails that I did in my art history class...then moving on to the flower I used. Then how I manipulated the analog shape, and finally deciding it looks better not manipulated, and finally how it looks with text.

Final reflection 02

Throughout this last project, the haiku project, we did several, several, several different processes. One was with analog shapes. We had to pick random objects that we could get dirty and have them relate back to our picked haiku. My haiku was a about a cat, and I thought it would be perfect to use cat paws as a mark for my final animation. So, I went through the process of have my cat walk on white paper while there was finger paint on her paws. She did not particularly enjoy this process, but it was fun to use something non conventional, and something other than just objects. Here are some photos of her paw prints: 

I wanted some part of the paw print to be the heart for my line that says, "or backyard love?"
After developing this idea in my head, and thinking it'd be perfect, I kept searching for different ways to portray this line with the idea of a cat and it being outdoors. In the end though I decided to go with a different mark and had to learn that sometimes the idea of something isn't always as good as the image getting the message across.

This is the image I decided to go with:

I'm happy I went with this image in the end, I feel it definitely speaks more to my haiku, and helped a lot more within my narrative.

All in all, the cat paw would have been a nice image, it just wouldn't have spoken as well to the idea of the haiku. But the tree shape that I used helped people understand the image and narrative better. The cat paw also would have been out of order within my haiku, the cat is introduced within the first line of the haiku, not the third, which is what I would have used the paw for. So, that was also not a well thought out idea. This whole semester helped me come to this conclusion, because this whole semester is about creating ideas to work, and visually communicate them to others.

Final reflection 01

Looking back at everything that I’ve achieved this semester in the graphic design department, I’ve honestly surprised myself. Coming from a community college to a pretty hard-core school and program was quite the jump for me. I’ve really learned a lot, and I may not be able to acknowledge them all, I know that I’ve had a drastic change in how I look at everything now. I can feel my eye get more cautious of things around me, and my judgment on certain things have changed as well.

Starting with project 1, the dot book, was a lot of fun. It was interesting to see how I could create some sort of a narrative within a book full of just dots. Yes, imagery helped a lot, but if all my dots within that book were black, you could still get some idea of what I was going for. Comparing that to this final project, the haiku, really helped with seeing a narrative within a haiku, and also how abstract marks can become something representational. Just how dots combined within a composition can become something representational. Another aspect of project 1 that correlated within project 3 is serendipity. Sometimes things happen for a reason, and something’s don’t happen for a reason. For instance, you have this set idea in your head about how you want something to look, but it never comes out that way, and within discovering how it doesn’t work, you find things that do, and even work better. Working through the compositions with in project 1, was so similar to finding the right marks for each of our lines in the haiku we chose.

Project two, the juxtaposition book, just didn’t see eye to eye with me. I feel that I had a lot of trouble within the entire process. I’d get frustrated with how things never came out the first time I did something, and then have to start all the way over. This was also very similar with how discovering marks and using the right tools, and words for my haiku came into play. After awhile though, you need to stop worrying about finding the one right answer, and just focus how YOUR right answer. This is definitely something I’m going to work on next semester for sure. Yes, most people in the world don’t mind being right now and again, but when it turns out to be that your wrong so many times it’s hard to see if you’ll ever get it right. Maybe I was too negative within this project, and got too down on the idea of everything being wrong. Which needs to stop, ASAP. Letting elements happen within the process is what’s so great about PROCESS. It makes it more interesting, and you just really have to learn to be light hearted within the process. If it doesn’t work out the first time, try and try again until it works best for you. Don’t get so wrapped up within the idea of THE right answer. MAKE a right answer.

RGB color leaf

So here is my RGB version of my leaf. I ended up taking a swatch out due to the color not having enough impact within the leaf at all really.  I'm not completely sure if I grasped the idea of the whole RGB thing, printing is a very confusing process.

It did definitely help within my color book though, color correcting I hope will get easier with time (obviously).

Final Haiku Animation

Why so scrawny cat-2 from Taylor Pruitt on Vimeo.

Music: Michael Giacchino, "We're in the club now".
 

Response: Paul Rand

(1) Paul rand was a very famous designer mostly known for making large corporation's logos. He is definitely well known and very influential in design today.

(2) There are a lot of different transitions within this animated interview. It uses zoom very effectively, as well as pan. After seeing this animation it basically made me want to start mine all over because it was just so seamless and seemed completely effortless. I definitely would like to progress to have great "unnoticeable" transitions throughout future animations.

(3) Yes, the quote, "Don't try to be original, just try and be good." is cheesy. But it's nice. and I don't think that he's really trying to get at the aspect of everything looking good, and nice. I think that he is trying to say that do what you like to do, and do it the best you can. Also, I feel that it could mean that in order to be good, you have to bring your own personality into it, so it is apart of you, possibly until it consumes you.

Final storyboard update and linear progression

So finishing up the animation and what not I felt the need to update my final storyboards. I took away some shots and ending up not having the fish leave the frame while their on. It definitely brought everything together and helped me show what I was going for while having the fish take the audience through the animation.

Starting out with drawing thumbnails for the line "or backyard love" was DIFFICULT. I just couldn't get the idea of just a heart out of my mind, so I instead of using my cat's paw to try and get a heart out of it, I decided to nix it and start fresh, and I'm quite pleased with the result. I think it feels backyard-esque and gives the shape of a heart. 

COLOR BOOK UPDATE

So, hopefully these are close to what each classification represents. Finding every characteristic within fabric/clothing is tough, because there's either not enough, or too much. We'll see how these work. 

CDF update

SO....due to us not having class this week, I'll give you a low down on how my photos are coming along. I took a lot of photos over the break, I just don't have the actual camera that I took them on. I'm hoping to get them before the book is done for sure. So. I am also working on the grid for the calendar...coming along fine. I've got a pretty basic idea down, but I'm going to expand off of that and make a second one for an idea.

Progress on animation

Why so scrawny cat? from Taylor Pruitt on Vimeo.


I've tightened some stuff up and did some easing throughout to try and help with the unfinished look. It's hard to judge these things after you've watched it one bajillion times, so I'm still thinking about it.

CDF Leaf colors

Picking through color aid, then picking through pan tone, and then finally cmyk was quite the process. Trying to find the right colors to match my leaf, of Course, I'm not exactly sure if this matches exactly, but I feel it's pretty close. It's an interesting process to go through though. Knowing how to print off set is obviously going to happen, and I'm glad I got to know how the printers work.

Taxonomy update

Some options to decide between. I want to add color to my taxonomy, I just don't know how well it will translate. I'm leaning more towards the black just because it is more readable and it matches the pattern's tone of the black. For now I like the layout I have for the text. I'm still deciding about the table of contents. I'm kind of thinking about having one page with all of my patterns, but of course at a smaller size.

I would also put the images on my tea dyed paper, and then have the text on the vellum. I'm not exactly sure what to include in the table of contents I was thinking just what denotation and connotations were and where my patterns were throughout my book.

For the cover I'll print on butcher paper.

CDF weekly update

Here are some examples of what we were doing in Color class this week. We had to take our 3-D letter form that we assembled and vector it and add PMS (pan tone matching system) color to it. While delineating line, shape, tone, and texture. Messing with the colors was fun, but dealing with texture was not a good experience, I'll probably try and find a more simple texture and hopefully be able to deal with it in a simpler manner.

Tweaking web layouts

I have come to find out that it takes a while to get a feel for these things . Intuition is what it is all about, and developing that intuition also takes time. I really want to keep at it though. I think this will definitely be something I try and work on over Winter break. Or at least study them more by looking at a lot of different books and see how each type of layout works, and doesn't work.

For now though, I'm pretty sure I'm decently satisfied with what I've done to them. I've also learned that giving enough space for each part of the layout is crucial; otherwise it is illegible.

There are some tweaks I'd like to throw out there that I'm thinking about though. Which is on the first one, I'm not sure if I want "Fallout" (in the title) to line up with the second paragraph. And in the third one if I should leave in both circle images, or to just have one, or none at all.

Final Storyboard

Finishing up my final storyboard was relieving to get done, basically because it's obviously so much easier to do the animation now. The idea is set, and yes...there can be some tweaking, but hopefully not too much.

Patterns

My final patterns for my taxonomy.

I was wanting to silk screen the marks that I used throughout this pattern, but considering the aesthetic look of the book I felt that the harshness of the marks over the pattern would turn out looking more incomplete rather than just having my patterns and text. So, now I think I'm going to deal with just text on my vellum pages explaining the denotative marks and the connotative marks throughout the patterns. 

 

Haiku text with image and Storyboards

 

After working through several iterations with my shapes, I feel that the final static shapes with type work a lot better than what I had in the beginning. The problem I kept coming across was trying to keep the same are of type on each composition, but since my three shapes are so different in shape length and height it was difficult to correspond the text in same area on each frame. Working through it though I found somethings that relate. So I decided to leave my text in the center, but I just move it from the center then to the right then to the left to fit within my object

Working on my final storyboards I decided between two different A to B, B to C, and C to A transitions. In the end though, I feel that what I have is the strongest.

Web layout update