Identity System & Self-promotional Pieces

Here is a photo that documents my finished identity system. Included as show from left to right are; cover letter, large envelope, resume, CD jacket & CD containing a PDF of portfolio samples, thank you card & envelope, leave-behind booklet and business card.

My intentions for creating this system were to showcase my personality, design skill and fine craftsmanship in a cohesive and professional manner. Please feel free to let me know what you think! Click on the image to zoom.

Guest Speaker Notes: Chad Owens

§ Do NOT make a themed portfolio or include pet projects such as drawing or photos, RATHER build these skills into a design

§ If you call a studio

o Say, “I’d like to show you my portfolio.” Or “My professor said that I should show you my portfolio.”

o Not: “Do you have any job openings?”

§ Learn how to work quickly

§ Learn program shortcuts

§ Summer is a dead time for the graphic design industry

o Work should pick up around September and be consistent until May

§ Companies usually hire you initially for your type-setting skills

o Make sure your portfolio is free of orphans & widows and doesn’t overuse hyphens

o We want them to know that we will fix mistakes and not make them clean up after us

o The more sooner you are good at type-setting, the sooner you will get to do real design work

§ If you see a job you really want, be persistent & network

§ If you quit designing, you WILL lose your skill – KEEP IT UP.

§ Some places you will fit in, others you won’t. Find someplace where you fit in.

§ Don’t stay in the same place for too long – you will find more success with diverse opportunities.

§ If you want to eventually start your own business, you should begin building clientele on the side as you work for someone else.

§ Contracts

o He has never seen contracts work

o Get half of the payment up front

o Agree to only do three rounds of changes

o No redesigns without extra payment

§ Learn about printing

o Mistakes are very expensive

o Learn from others whenever you have the chance

o Working on your own will cost you a lot.

Garner Printing Co. Tour

Today I went on a printing facility tour with my graphic design capstone class of soon-to-graduate seniors. We visited Garner Printing Co., a company with a combination of offset and digital presses with the ability to handle a variety of printing projects. Garner is part of Consolidated Graphics, one of the leading commercial printing companies in the United States.

Check them out: http://www.garnerprint.com/index.php

Proofed project in the final prep stages before going to print.
A machine in the process of producing complex folds on mailable brochures.
The die-cut machine in the process of cutting out paper CD cases.
Our tour guide demonstrating a trimming machine.

AIGA Get a Job Bootcamp

Today I participated in the second annual Get a Job Boot Camp presented by AIGA of Iowa. The purpose of the camp was to give young designers, such as myself, the tools to grow in our field and help prepare us for the future of the design industry. Professional members of the organization shared their experience and advice about their design careers and prepared a series of presentations relevant to design.

The first presentation was called How To... During this time, I received information about how to find a job, how to start the search and how to recognize all potential opportunities to get my name and talent out in the real world. The presentation also gave me tips on how to market myself and present my portfolio.

The second presentation was called Defend Your Design. The presentation gave advice on how to explain design decisions to tough clients and how to answer tricky questions during an interview. Information was relayed through a series of short skits about real life scenarios.

Lunch was a time to work on networking etiquette. Each participant was assigned lunch tables randomly and after we were seated there was a short presentation about the dos and don'ts of networking over a meal. We were then challenged to practice our skills while dining with fellow boot camp attendees.

After lunch, participants were given the opportunity to have portfolios reviewed by professional members of AIGA. This was an excellent time to get constructive criticism and helpful interview advice one-on-one. I feel that through this experience I was able to improve the layout and pacing of my portfolio book. During these reviews, I was asked some really challenging questions that caught me off guard. Since the reviews earlier today, I feel that I have already become more confident about my portfolio and learned how to better talk about my work.

College News Design Contest: Call for Enteries

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ADAI Portfolio Viewing

Today I took part in a portfolio viewing - an event sponsored by Art Directors Association of Iowa (ADAI). The viewing started at 2:00 p.m. at the central library in downtown Des Moines and occurred prior to an awards ceremony for the annual ADAI student exhibition show at 3:00 p.m. I took this opportunity to show and discuss my graphic design work with attending area professionals. I had several discussions with students, design professors and professional graphic designers about my work and received helpful feedback about how to improve my portfolio. I received advice about how to better organize the projects in my portfolio, how to improve the presentation of existing work and ideas for new pieces to include that would make me more marketable as a designer. I feel that this viewing has been extremely helpful as I am currently in the process of reorganizing and updating my portfolio to utilize once I begin job searching. Not only did this opportunity provide me with valuable feedback, but also helped me to become more confident in presenting and talking about my work to others.

After the portfolio review, I stuck around for the awards show and was able to see all of the student work that was selected to be apart of the ADAI student exhibition. It was exciting to see the quality and craftsmanship of work produced by other college students. I found several of the identity systems and packaging projects to be most interesting and inspirational. It was very refreshing to step out of my own work in design and see what others are creating around me.

Lisa Fay & Jeff Glassman Workshop

As an extension to the performances that I attended on March 23 by Lisa Fay and Jeff Glassman, I opted to check out a workshop put on by the duo earlier this evening. The workshop started off with an explanation of scores created by the duo. Scores are instructions for movement represent in 2-dimensional drawings, designs, notations and structural patterns. Scores of often created with some sort of graphic medium existing primarily on paper that allow the actors to take their performance ideas from mental images to stage actions that can be documented and performed. Scores are a way to notate the body and the way that it is to move through physical space. The duo also explained a technique called "pivots" that they use in many of their performances. A pivot occurs when a position or movement stops midway and transitions to another, completely unrelated, movement.

In the workshop, students and faculty came up with brief situations to act out. We practiced the scene over and over again to gain a sharp understanding of the specific movement that we made and when and where each movement occurred in space is we made it. After we had a grasp on how to act out our specific scene, we were asked to act out the scene completely solo, but as if our partners were still there. After this exercise, we were asked to combine one persons movements from our group with the movements of one individual from another group. The two disparate scenes then occurred simultaneously to create one new, abstracted scene.

Participating in the workshop allowed me to understand the skits performed by the duo earlier in the week on a whole new level. Although the skits can make sense on a purely theatrical level, they are developed through a very exact and technical process, allowing them to exist as a specific an unique art form of their own.

Above: A variety of different scores created by the duo to map complex movements.