Wiibounce was an interesting experience that really opened my eyes. It's kind of hard to explain, but I read a quote that relates:
"So, here I sit - the equivalent of a graphic design short order cook just waiting for someone who might appreciate a true gourmet."That's basically what I felt when doing designs for Wiibounce. I was just doing quick turn arounds for a client who really could care less about how good the design was. Which is fine, I'm not bashing that side of design, I realize there are clients that just want something done to get the information out there and don't have a huge budget to hire a design studio. But that's not what I want to do with my career. I don't want to be churning out frequent buyer cards, and gift cards (which don't interest me at all). I want to be creating interesting, thought-provoking stuff and that requires interesting clients that actually care about the design. I just hope when I graduate I can get a job at a great design studio, because it seems that is the key.
This summer has also been the summer of Studio Ghibli I've watched just almost every Studio Ghibli film now. I think my favorites are: Spirited Away, Whispers of the Heart, Pom Poko, and My Neighbor Totoro, Nausicca, and Laputa. I do not like: Grave of the Fireflies, Ocean Waves, or Porco Russo. I hope Ponyo is good. Its got the cute character down.
This is a little drawing of Totoro and Mei. Totoro turned out a bit skinny and leaning to one side and the two are standing on different levels, but oh well. I'm going to create the girl into a vector image and try and make it an amazing color vector to try and get better at vector-ing.
Audrey Kawasaki is my favorite artist and about once every few months she sells prints of her new paintings for around $300. I would love to own one, but definitely do not have that much money to spare. And all the ones recently have been very small (8.5/11) and dont seem to be worth the money. So... I decided to create my own. So I picked one of my favorites and traced it on a window (I knew I would never be able to draw it as good as her, and I wanted it to be as close to the real thing as possible, so it was a guilt-less trace. Normally tracing is like quitting to me). So then I painted it with gouche and I the original Kawasaki is painted transparently on wood, but I didnt have wood large enough so I used water color paper, and painted it opaque with bright colors instead of transparent just to see what it would look like. Plus I knew I could never replicate her painting skills so why not do my own?
Of course its no Kawasaki original, but it will do as a Kawasaki tribute on my wall. She is so talented. I really love all her stuff.
