11 Days, 12 Nights in an Art School Cubicle

What I Discovered

So I have about eleven days to finish everything. This is typically the part of the year I bring a sleeping bag and pillow to my studio. I'm going to briefly post some of the iterations I did for this week. Unfortunately, I didn't get to photograph them so I have to show the print files:

 

Basically, my main problem is I still haven't figured out how to get those secondary statements to align over the word bubbles. I think I'm grouping them better, but now weird parts of the statements are being called out by virtue of the overlap. The placement of the website could also be better I think.

Otherwise, I think the 'cropped' nature lends to better placement on the page. It also is a lot more dynamic than some word bubbles being dumped onto a page. I was designing for different formats too, like the 8.5 x 11, the vertical Diag Boads.

How I Spent My Time

A large portion of these last two weeks has been trying to get this to work on other formats, other media. I've also been trying to ask people unrelated to my project for advice and insight to see if they see anything at the last minute that we all can't since we've seen this so much. It's been helpful, but I still am a bit worried about how those statements go over the word bubbles for each center.

What's Next

Primarily, resolving the issue I mentioned above. Beyond that, I have a ton of work I need to print, then photograph, and condense into the identity guide. For the text, I basically wrote out what I wanted to say, then cut it in half, then cut it in half again. Luckily, uLitho prints small runs of books on good paper, so I'm not dumping this off at Kinko's and praying they don't screw it up.

So foremost, the book and the posters/handouts are most important. Then I'll deal with the website, that's something I can work on after things are turned in on the 6th. Mark wasn't too optimistic I'd be able to get a computer either, so I don't want to focus on that, only to not be able to show it. Besides, people who have webwork as their primary medium (Katie) should get computers first.

Aren't Things S'posed to be Gettin' Easier?

What I Discovered
You'd think at this time in the semester—if you planned accordingly—it should be relatively simple. Yet, todays critique still gave me more to think about. I imagine, next week's critique will give me more yet to think about.

Here are some ideas I heard:

1. Try seven colors, seven word bubbles for the general advertisement

2. The statements on the healthcare advertisement became too reductive and a lost a sense of tone

3. Said statements need to group better with the word bubbles (think tints, screens of color, make it slightly quieter)
4. Larger formats seem to be working well, but smaller formats become too congested

5. Think of the 8.5 x 11 pieces of paper as maybe a piece of a puzzle, where you only show a hint of the design

6. Explore vertical formats

7. Explore a Diag board

8. Explore the way the type [the statements] is rendered on the word bubbles

9. Some of the paraphernalia I created is an interesting extension of the posters—the posters still aren't quite there yet.

Basically, I think I need to take a few final whacks at the posters. My thoughts are, try to get a lot of iterations done between now and Thursday, and then after Thursday I'll have enough comments and criticism to finalize them. I can then focus more specifically on the identity book and website.

Here's some work from this past week:

I also have a rough draft of my book, but to be blunt it's a very shitty-shitty rough draft. I'm all right with that, shitty rough drafts have a point. It's just not worth showing yet. I'm hoping for a better outline on Thursday.

How I Spent My Time
I mainly just tried to come up with new iterations and new ideas, try to better focus my thoughts and best prepare for these last three weeks.

What's Next
It's time to lock in and get this bad-lad done. More progress on the book, more iterations with the poster (think of the white space) more in general. It's going to get very busy, very quickly.

Getting Closer

How I Spent My Time
We'll forgive that I failed to post before break, but work has been proceeding at a steady pace. I'll first show stuff I did the week of break.





I created a few new iterations of the general advertisement and a specific advertisement. To my count, these are the fifth iterations. I tried to incorporate comments I got before break and that Stephanie gave me. I'm actually very pleased with the general advertisement. I tried to pair down the number of bubbles, but I still think it's visually engaging.

As for the individual advertisement, I think I'm close—but not quite there. I can't figure out how to integrate the name "the roosevelt institute" fully with the bubbles, and if I need the other text.




I also printed to a scale of sizes, Hannah mentioned before break I need to not just default to 11x17. In my head, I wanted 24x36 since January, so now it's time to see if it works at that size. Here's an image of their relative size:


The other two things I've been working on over this last week is the website and book. Unfortunately, I feel like I'm at a point in the year where the closer it comes to April, the more difficult it is to change these. Books and websites require time to code, setup, publish, print, etc. I'm looking to create thumbnails of both for critique next Thursday. This way, I can get advice about the overall feel of both without having to do any coding or setup, and ideally any changes I need to do in the next few weeks would just be minor tweaks.

I was going to create the thumbnails for the blog, but that's my weekend goal, so I just took a photo of my sketchbook.


Basically, the websites first page is the tagline. You click that, and it moves to the lower left corner, and the policy center names and word bubbles grow from the dot at the end of the tagline. When you 'rollover' each policy center, the color changes from gray and the other word bubbles—except those associated with the policy center your mouse is over—dim out.

Click that policy center and the other word bubbles contract and disappear into the dot. Information about the specific policy center comes up, including meeting time, and contact information for that policy center's director.

I'll also have an about section, and if I do this in flash I'll have back and forward buttons. The technical side of things isn't threshed out, and while this all seems simple in thumbnail, it's pretty complicated on the web.

The book I don't have down quite as concretely. I know for the format I want the pages to be a little longer than wider, I've started outlining what needs to be in it. I know I want to photograph my work for the book. It will look a lot more professional to see it in realistic situations, rather than just a bunch of Adobe Illustrator exports.




As far as content, I know I need to talk about the advertisements (size, placement, color v. black & white, hierarchy), the web presence, and also some of the broader applications of the work (t-shirts, envelopes, letterhead, their yearly publication, buttons, mugs) to showcase its flexibility. Most of these things will be mocked up. I also need to outlinethe typefaces I chose, but more importantly I need to talk about why I chose this tagline, why I chose word bubbles, what tone was I trying to achieve for the organization?

I'm hoping to take this book and present it to the group at the end of the year and also have it sent to the national organization (who have apparently taken keen interest in the work I'm doing). Really, that's my goal. To have this adopted, to have this on campus next year, to have this used nationally.

How I Spent My Time
I'll admit, I was one of those who did not take the advice to spend break working. I went somewhere warm. It was beautiful and reinvigorating.

However, just because I was out of town didn't mean my project was out of mind. I started sketching ideas for the book and website. This week I began to solidify them more, I also made the new poster revisions this week, and printed them off already and have been trying to get advice from people on them. I started to explore whether I should use flash or html for the website.

What's Next
So I've been starring at these advertisements for two months now. I'm ready to get them to a finished stage, so I can print them out on really nice paper. I've been using crappy bond paper for the drafts. It's hard to work on the website or book when the advertisements change, but I am really excited to work on the book.

I really like the idea of condensing all I've done this year into something finite, presentable, and intelligible that I can use not only to persuade the Roosevelt Institute to use my ideas, but also to show others.

Before the Break

What I Discovered
This week has been more about feedback than anything, so I thought I'd talk a bit about a few of the things people pointed to as being successful, and where I plan to go from here.


In terms of a 'general advertisement,' this was most well received. In the other iterations, I tried to be more descriptive, but the sheer amount of information was confusing or hard to read. People pointed out a few things though.

First, there's a way in which the center names should be present, but just not as much as I was making them. Maybe they could float around the tagline, with lowered opacity. Also, people pointed out it may be better if there were multiple tails coming to a single point (like other iterations). It's also necessary to say it's a student group—but to try and do so in a unique way. Maybe "A New Kind of Student Group," something less bland than what's there now. Finally, the tagline works better as thin than thick.

The second image is one of my ideas for focusing in on an individual center.

I think I wanted to have it where it was zooming in on one bubble, making the others smaller. Again I think I erred too far on the side of information (same with the labels over it). People suggested having the center names somewhere else, and simply calling one of them out quietly so it doesn't compete with the overall.

Hannah pointed out, it feels like the tails of these thought bubbles need to come inward slightly somehow, to bring more focus to the overlapping areas. The text within the word bubbles is a bit too crammed as well.

What's Next
I was thinking last night… There will be one day soon when I write "what's next" and I'll realize the class is over, that I'm soon-to-be gone. Such a strange feeling.

For now, I think I've done a good job of exploring a lot of different options within this theme (two weeks, 30 iterations), and by doing all this work—some stuff that I knew might not work even as I was making it—I've been able to start making more concrete decisions.

Between now and Thursday, I'm going to be trying to focus on the two images above. It seems like I've got the symbols and information in the right ball park, now it's important to get all those symbols working properly with one another.

How I Spent My Time
I've spent more and more time hovering over my computer, working in Illustrator, and then exporting things to be printed than I care to really tell. I also started thinking about that postcard next week and what I'd like to have when I meet with Frank.

Small update

What I Discovered
So this past week has been all about getting different iterations ready for Tuesday. I'll just talk briefly about what I've done, then on to the images. I've begun to settle on a grouping of material that I feel is necessary for the advertisements:

1. The group's name
2. The tagline
3. The center names
4. The word bubbles
5. The mention of it being at the University of Michigan
6. Website link

Now the website doesn't actually exist yet, but as I said in my last post I'm fairly certain I'll be expanding this to the web and the domain isn't registered yet.

Other than that. I remember a strong preference for the word bubbles coming from a single point as opposed to all over. Hannah felt there was a really nice contrast between the dot next to the tagline and the text "The Roosevelt Institute." However, I kind of want that dot to somehow be a piece of The Roosevelt Institute.

Other than that, I've been trying to play with what is seen first. (e.g., is the tagline where the information starts, or is it what you end on). The compositions are still shaky, I'm just trying to figure out how all the symbols work together. There's also a grayscale version, because I need to see how it operates with that.









What's Next
I still have about three or four more ideas I'd like to have done for Tuesday, so I need to get those done and print of about 12–13 things. I hope to get good comments about them on Tuesday and then plug away at them more. Time is essential, but I feel I've been making good progress in recent weeks. Luckily, I finished my second rough draft last week, so I won't have that hanging over my head—I can just focus on this stuff.

How I Spent My Time
Unfortunately, I didn't make it to class today because I felt kind of sick. I wanted to get some comments about what I was doing before Tuesday. Otherwise, last week I spent a good time expanding my paper in some areas, making it more concise in others. I actually spent a little bit of time back on a roll of trace before I launched headlong into these new iterations. Then, I spent time in Adobe Illustrator coming up with these.

Rougher Drafts

What I Discovered
So my critique on Tuesday actually went really well, I got some very positive responses about the direction I was working in. I'll start by positing a few images of stuff I finished after I last posted. The page layout on these was all a bit sloppy, I was looking more for the way my elements were working.

What grabbed the most attention was this:

There is a way in which all these forms emanate from The Roosevelt Institute that is important, that they also overlap and work with one another. People pointed out though the way in which those thoughts attached was a bit disjointed. Luckily, one of my other iterations was revealing about what might work.


The thoughts come from an identifiable point. I'd argue too the page's structure and composition is just naturally a lot stronger, so that may have skewed the read for people liking it more. What's more, people said the tagline as an entry was very successful. Hannah said that there is this rhythm between the black dot at the end and the tagline and the boldness of The Roosevelt Institute. She suggested seeing if there was a way to make that connection even clearer.

I've also been thinking long and hard about this idea of 'kit of parts.' Old identities were really static. The IBM logo hasn't changed in forty years, it has clear rules about what colors you can put it in, what size it has to appear, where it can appear on a page. FedEx is also a pretty good example of this, so are many companies from the 1960s rooted in a sense of clean modernism.

New brand identities tend to be more flexible pieces, they are components of a puzzle that operate separately, as well as together and appear in different sizes, colors, on different materials. A recent Johnson-Banks identity for The Hue Center in Philadelphia really gets at this (and also I'm finding an eerie similarity of color choice).

Which brings me to the next part, there's ways in which I can focus on specific word bubbles for a specific event or policy center, say Health Care:


You can zoom in, push the other bubbles to the side or corner, make them smaller, so while all those components are there, the focus is very specific.

Also, I've either settled or have come very close to settling on a tagline.

It's descriptive, pointed, clear. As I said above, I've not really decided about how it will interact with the other elements, but people in my small group critique heavily gravitated to something succinct and punctuated.

There's a lot I need to think about next though:

1. What does this look like in grayscale (elephant in the room)

2. What other ways can these word bubbles appear as groups

3. How can you make the tagline the start or endpoint

4. How do I ensure people know this is at the University of Michigan

5. What about a web presence

That last number, I've been thinking a lot about. Sometimes a web presence for student groups is really pointless, but in this case it actually might be very helpful. Each policy center meets at different times each week. It would be nice to have a concrete place to list those times instead of having to e-mail.

Although I think flash is overused, this actually would be a good project to use it. I'm envisioning a website where it would have a white background and just the tagline. You click on it, and all these word bubbles of different centers come out from it, they're sort of floating around freely on the page, overlapping with one another at different times. You can click on one, and it expands and zooms in, pushing the others to the side. It lists the time, place, director and gives an e-mail contact.

Just a thought, it may be a bit too quick to think about a website when I don't have things threshed out entirely, but showing how this identity could transcend just a web experience could be

What's Next
So I'm really excited about my project. I can't say how happy that makes me. I'm finding that a lot of the grueling work and sometimes unenjoyable iterations I explored is leading me to a place that is meaningful and has room for exploration.

That all said, I'm actually going to take this weekend to not work on these things explicitly.

Say what?

I'm all about the balance. I have a lot of passion for what I discovered, but I haven't quite found the direction I want to take it in. Looking at the timeline, I see that our next small group critiques are the class before our next rough draft is due. I don't think it's wise to do both concurrently. So I'm going to bury myself at Espresso Royale and get my second rough draft out of the way before I start to work again—that way it won't be hanging over my head.

How I Spent My Time
This week I looked through my thesis again and marked it up myself. It was like a Vietnam flashback, very evident I wrote it in the four days before break ended. I also spent a boat load of time creating those final iterations and printing work out. I've been going around, seeking out advice on them as well.

Okay, that's enough.

LESS TALK
MORE WORK

Bubblegram

What I Discovered
So at the beginning of this week I tried to take a few ideas that I had pursued last week and refine them further and test out another idea:






What I learned was what I'd been told already both by Chris Pullman and a few others in small critique. The conversation seems more like a binary, and with the quote you can particularly see how it gets confusing. While with the key words it's really nice I can work the name it, not much is said by it. Near the end, with the multitude of thought bubbles and shifting hues seemed to be more expressive of the group.

So after talking with Erica for a bit, I started working on some new iterations, focusing on color, conversation, multitude, and networks:

I find these to be a lot more meaningful, it's more playful, more visually engaging, less rigid. I'm using the same style of tagline in both, both I still haven't settled on that. It's been evolving in response to the criticism I've had.





I also have to admit, it's kind of interest how indirectly influenced I was by the poster I did for the faculty exhibition:


All these thoughts about connectivity and overlap were circling through my head and weighed heavy when I created it. So maybe, I should instead say the faculty poster was influenced a lot by IP.

What Next
I'm not quite done with stuff for Tuesday. Erica had a really good suggestion about how maybe these word bubbles from different sections can play with one another, where the yellow turns to green, and the red to purple, etc. I also want to do another 13" x 19" with different tagline ideas. The descriptive route seems to be working more. But with a few more iterations I'm going to try to have 8–10 things to show on Tuesday to get feedback on.

How I Spent My Time
These past few weeks I've just tried my best to approach the problem from a different, more playful, more open direction. I've been trying to worry less about the level of refinement and just trying to put forth different ideas. I'm finding though, that a level of unrefinement might actually be valuable.

I also spent some time looking through my paper, since turning it in I'd really done nothing with it. I realize we are supposed to shoot for five pages, but the writing tutor was constantly telling me not to be afraid to expand and elaborate—I'd realized large passages I'd cut were actually quite useful. I'm just going to write more for the second draft, if it turns out to be ten pages, so be it. I feel like I need the room to really rigorously discuss my influences and how I found things weren't working. But, that's a couple weeks off, trying not to worry about it quite yet.

Group Groping

What I Discovered
I've been trying a new approach this semester.

Last semester I really enjoyed looking at other people's work and going through a list of blogs I love for inspiration—but I found I was actually becoming quite depressed about my own work. I think there's a point I hit where it became distressing to see other people's professional, finished projects each and every day. You don't have any context, it doesn't give you any idea of the struggle they went through to produce their work, and makes it seem as if it was effortlessly produced.

So I've tried to stay away from the daily blogs and simply focus more on creating new ideas for my own work and it seems to be working better.

I met with Chris Pullman today—a bit nervously I must admit—but actually his comments seemed to echo a lot of what the half-group said on Tuesday, that it seemed I had found something rich for investigation.








So I think the venn-bubblegram is a useful device, but I still want to push a few other ideas around simultaneously.

What Next
I think I've come across a really interesting idea, but I need to ensure I don't limit myself strictly to what I've developed. Be free, allow the elements to play around on the page and see what's successful. Some notes I jotted down between teh two meetings I had were:

1. Seems like opposing ideas
2. More about center area
3. Multiple voices, multiple bubbles?
4. Common hues, similar ideas
5. Taglines very instructive/helpful
6. Elements aren't all quite working together
7. Parts seem moveable/adaptable
8. Different shapes creating something more coherent?
9. Arrangement of bubbles

This is the stuff between now and next week I'd really like to explore.

Also, thinking about my timeline, I may not have made progress toward in selecting a logo, but I am working on the advertisements a lot earlier than anticipated. Through those and the concept of the tagline, I am actually making some decisions about the logo, so I'm fairly pleased with my pacing.

And for the record, I have to say, I really appreciated the time in class to work. I know not everyone used the time wisely, but getting some room to worry less about deadlines, papers, resumés seems to make me less tense and feel more confident about exploring.

How I Spent My Time
This week I didn't do as much work as last—I was more interested in feedback from people about the direction I was taking. I tried to work on another idea I was having (shown above).