Saving for web...

Digital Skills Evaluation...

I really like my portfolio website and think the design and layout work really well. I love the simplicity of my website as it allows my work to be the main focal point at all times and shows a wide range of my work. The simplicity of my website works well with the colour pallet and font that I chose when researching as I made sure I chose a pretty neutral colour pallet using greys and whites and blacks keeping everything simple and set in the background to make sure the hierarchy of information was correct with my work being top of the list.

I think the home page of my website works really well because of the simplicity of it and the way you can immediately see snippets of each piece of work so if you were to see something that caught your eye you would immediately click on that image and it takes you to a page all about that piece of work in particular. However if I had more time to create this webpage I would have considered making the images more of a mosaic so it looked more attractive but I don think this is totally necessary as this could have taken the focus away from my actual work.

I really like the way my pages are set up so that they are all the same as each other just with different content and text on each page so they all correspond with each other. If I were to re make these particular pages I would consider adding some form of navigation so that I was able to move from one of these pages to one of the other pages of images. For example a smaller image of the mosaic could be placed at the bottom of the page to allow me to click onto each page from the page that I was on but once again I don’t think this is a necessary factor on my website and I don’t think it is something that will determine if my website works as a whole or not.

I managed the creation of my website very easily however I think I could have given myself some more time to work with Gemma to get all of the webpages finalised at the end of the project and given myself some time to make sure everything was exactly how I wanted it. I worked to a specific time plan and I think because I worked to this time plan it has helped me to create a more successful website. I think I also managed the creation of my website pretty well by using online tutorials learning myself how to do certain things on Adobe Dreamweaver like adding Java Script to my work as my tutor wasn’t available to help at this certain time.

I think the skills I have learnt throughout my Digital Applications folder, not only on Adobe Dreamweaver but on how to rapid prototype, how to research effectively, how to use a 960 grid to its best abilities, and why wire frames are so important and useful, will be carried on with me throughout the rest of my graphic design career.

I think I will continue to work on this portfolio website and constantly update it with new pieces of work that I create and hopefully will end up creating a blog section that I can update tutorials that I have made myself to try and get myself and my work recognised.

Although this website isn’t as professional and finished to such a high standard like the work of ‘Chris Spooner’ and his online portfolio I am really proud to say that I created this website as its my first ever attempt at making a website and my first ever time I have used Adobe Dreamweaver.

Digital Future of Graphic Design

Over the past four years that I have studied and worked in Graphic Design I have seen a vast change in designing for screen and designing for print and personally, I think the digital future of graphic design is very current and growing rapidly. I think digital is the future, but print will never be dead. I think one of the main reasons graphic design is turning digital is the sheer amount of smart phones that allow anybody at anytime to surf the internet, play on apps and view digital graphic design at any instance.

Personally I don’t ever think that the future of graphic design will totally be digital because I think there will always be room for graphic design in items such as packaging, posters, shop fronts, business cards etc. However I do believe that most of the items stated above could be created for screen and shown on the Internet. For example business cards would be produced on screen for peoples websites or could also be sent out as e-mailers. I think there are so many more current ways of showcasing graphic design than standard old school print.

Recently I have noticed that graphics that are printed have started to become a trend in the illustration styles of Graphic Design. I think this is a really important point to state as I think the future for graphic design can never be determined as one hundred per cent print or one hundred per cent digital as I think the trends that are set throughout the period of time will be very reflective for the future of Graphic Design. I don’t believe that by looking at any of the current trends will give anyone an idea on what the future of Graphic Design is because I think they change so randomly and at any particular time.

Taking a quote from a conversation between two graphic designers that I have found on the Internet: ‘Print isn’t dead, but it’s certainly not a David and Goliath battle anymore. David threw the rock and he won, but the rock didn’t kill Goliath. You have to eliminate paper before you can kill print design, and while the Kindle is a great gadget, it’s not making Hammermill think about closing down their paper mills.’ The quote was taken from ‘http://www.spoonfeddesign.com/graphic-design-and-the-digital-revolution’ and I believe that it’s a very important fact to state, as I believe that there will always be room for print. However, screen is currently doing impeccably well and seems to be the current trend, but believe me, it won’t last. Another statement that came from the same article was: ‘If you even change your terminology a bit, print lives a little longer. It’s about sensibilities more than medium. Instead of electronic versus print, it’s static versus interactive. Nobody stopped taking pictures when video cameras came into the picture, and movies or TV didn’t go away with the introduction of the home movie camera. But it did make the creative stop and look at what they were doing.’ I think this point is also something to think about as it states that design for screen is starting to happen more often and becoming more and more common but it doesn’t mean that it is going to stop print and original methods of graphic design.

I think another objective to consider about the digital future of graphic design has to be web design and the constant demand for websites. In the last few years I believe that web design is one of the most up and coming parts of the design industry and I think the fact that a lot of people are wanting motion and interactivity in there designs is reflecting on designs turning from print to screen as a printed poster or leaflet cannot be interacted with other that it being picked up and read from. However I think even though there are some ways of getting around font restrictions there are still some restrictions with certain fonts and this is a let down on designing for screen so this is one reason why I think the digital future of graphic design may still be with print rather than screen,

New inventions such as Apples iPad, and different tablets, in my opinion are what are to blame the change and the digital future of graphic design on because of the ways that designers are going to have to adapt to working and the ways they are going to have to produce graphics have all changed because the way the graphic are being seen and the sizes they are being viewed in have changed drastically over the past few years.

To sum up what I think the digital future of graphic design is I would state that within the next twenty years I would expect up to 80 per cent of graphic design would be being created for screens for items such as smart phones and tablets and I think designs for print will become increasing more rare as well as more expensive because there will be a smaller population of printers and designers that design directly for print.

Overall I think the digital future of graphic design is developing rapidly. But so is everything else…

creating a rapid prototype in Photoshop...

Originally creating my rapid prototype was quite straight forward because I already had my site map and a wire frame that directed me thoroughly in what I wanted to create. However once I had created my first rapid prototype I decided that it didn’t look how I wanted It as it looked a little bit too tacky and didn’t really match with the work that I have produced and the work that I was going to put on my website.

I changed my wireframe but kept my site map the same as I thought it was a good idea to still keep my website as simple as possible as I didn’t want my website to take the main focus away from my work. I tried a few different wire frames that I had produced and came across one that I think works really well.

The wire frame and rapid prototype that I have chosen to work with is a very basic home page with my name and three ‘call to action’ buttons that navigate you down the long page to different parts of my site. I think this wire frame works particularly well because the simplicity is really good and it allows the client to see that my work is clean, fresh and modern. When you scroll down the page the next thing that you see is a slideshow of my work and this will showcase all of the work that I put onto my site and if you click on the individual piece it will take you to a different section of the long page that will then give you information about the work. The information will include a short sentence about the brief, a sentence about how I felt when creating the piece of work and a sentence on how I thought the work turned out.

I think my prototype is really effective and will really help me out when creating my website. 

               

Creating my Portfolio website...

Kevin Lucius - Review

http://kevinlucius.com/

I really like the layout and simplicity of this portfolio. I think the layout of the work really works well because it is very easy to see and if you want to look at the work in more detail it is easy as all you have to do is click on the image and it opens it up in a 'light-box' effect. Most of the different portfolio websites I have looked at all seem to use a light-box when showcasing their work. I think this is useful when trying to keep the main focal point of the page the actual work and I think it would also be a good idea to use a zoom option on the light-box effect to make parts of the work even more prominent. 

I think the about me section on the right hand side of the home page is a very useful part of the website as it allows the client that’s viewing the portfolio to look directly at the designer, see what he looks like and see the thing the designer is interested in outside of his work based life. I think this is very important for any client to show that the designer has his head screwed on and is sane.

I think Its very useful to state places that the designer has worked for even if the work he done there was voluntary it shows there flexibility and that fact that they have actually worked to specific deadlines etc (also in the right hand column).

I think the way Lucius has set out his work into different sections really works well however I would possibly have longs to different parts of the page at the top because at initial glance it only looks as if the designer is showcasing his personal work, which is also important but not what the client is specifically looking for.

I also think it is very important for the designer to state where they live as this designer states he lives in Chicago so it would be harder to communicate with someone in a different country compared to someone two or three doors away.