wferre20's blog

I think the most profound change in me is the way I craft. The process work that I expect of myself has changed. I have learned to do better work in shorter time. This efficiency is tantamount in improving my design skills. I have learned the value of testing and retesting.   Gauging the audience not only with their impression of the artistry of the work, but more importantly their engagement. How do the viewers interact with what they are looking at?

For myself, on my journey I have become more fearless with my work, but now I have a better understanding on how to accomplish my goals so it becomes less a haphazard journey. Courage without direction is lunacy. For example, I had a rough idea I wanted to do something with a fox for my second project, but originally I thought the chicken would play a huge role. I was wrong. As the work and concept developed the chicken was discarded, as was the phrase the sky is falling. A new interpretation and understanding took hold through the refinement of the project. This new way of looking at the project created a disruptive wonder for myself. I also think the viewers are surprised by the interpretation of the project, but so far the audience ….the class and the people I tested it on got it.

In some ways I realize I still need to learn a lot about typography.  My illustration background helps me see shape and form, but some of the training I received makes my typographical choices weak. I believe this stems from an attitude that many illustrators have that the “designer” will do it. Or the idea that you got into image making not to play with type but to tell stories. If you do use type use it sparingly and play it very safe. I need to get over these attitudes and training if I am to improve as a designer. I need to discover what works, not what just gets by. I need to be as fearless with typographical choices as I am in image making. This is of course with a strong sense of direction that I need to keep developing.

Graphic Design to me is exciting. I feel it is a realm where I have vacationed, but now I am setting up residence. As a result of this class I am better understanding how the relationship between image and type relate. The connection to the underlying fabric of an image versus the individual parts make more sense to me now as I want to deliver stronger images to my clients and audience. Graphic Design like I said in class is a form of art that allows one to martial visual communication with great power. I am learning much.

This journey at SCAD is changing the way I think. I have to rethink the concept of craftsmanship. Refining a product after testing and retesting is taken to a new level here, but there is no question that this a model for success. I am changing to incorporate this method more into my work.

The end product is less about personnel creative vision, but more about the execution of the delivered message and the audience interaction. Authorship isn’t necessarily lost, but effectiveness of the message triumphs. In the end, that should be the point since all art is communication anyways. I’m learning.

My creative process often begin with a maelstrom of possible of ideas and directions. I have to usually channel what direction I want to go as their many sides to my artistic personality. However, I think in my heart I am a noble troublemaker.  I love satire or the hidden joke and love for my audience to participate in the discovery.

For many years I created out of either anger or fear. The reason for anger is that as a political cartoonist I would find something that bothered me and attack it. Almost thinking like a shark waiting for its intellectual prey would be my modus operand. All the creative passion that develops out of this need to beat an opponent would channel into a visual rage or scathing humor.

Though there was this flip side of me that truly struggled with the concept of failure. I could not fail. At all cost I would not let my ship sink. This came at a price though.  Would I give what is wanted or what is myself?

This struggle came before I realized that the two could meet in between through interpretation and personal discovery.  I spoke about this earlier, but there was a moment during my Illustration M.F.A. that I learned not to be afraid anymore. My greatest success for me personally was learning to be guided by discovery not by fear. This was an incredibly liberating moment in my life that changed me forever as an artist. This is why I am at SCAD. I love and appreciate graphic design.  I have done design work, but getting a M.F.A in graphic design is a big leap for me and I am working hard at it .

The truer I am to that wild sense of discovery the more likely I am to deliver that sense of wonder to  my audience. I do not care what the topic is…what matter is what happens as a result of me discovering it.

I think what I have learned is that graphic design really is a lens. It is not the same as an illustration or a photograph in that lens itself is not the same thing as the image it contains. In some ways I believe this is what makes graphic design even more powerful. Design has a discreet way of framing an issue that illustration and photography do not. In some ways I believe this makes design even more powerful. Great design can elevate photography and illustration, and doesn’t need either to convey a potent message.

We trust design. People depend on design for direction, safety and values in design can cause great influence. Design can sell and market and idea for good or bad. My focus on this project is propaganda, and I’ve come to the conclusion that not all propaganda is bad. However, propaganda has been used for incredible evil throughout history. Most notably the propaganda wars during the 30′s and 40′s saw design being used for its absolute worst. Though one of the best propaganda movements of all time is the Smokey the Bear campaign.

As an ex editorialist I am very cognizant of my opinions. I start with them as a baseline and try to recognize my bias. The key to editorializing in my opinion though is to be able to argue the counter view effectively so your personal idea  can stand the test of opposing ideas. Like chess, it’s good to be a step ahead. Regardless of me editorializing or not I think this has informed my creative practices by motivating me to research. I also have come to the belief that regardless if you are editorializing or not, every idea needs a case. One should be able to defend it. So even if you are not arguing, the work should still be a great argument regardless.

If anything my experience at SCAD has been one big lesson in disruptive wonder. I mean this in the most positive way possible. I have learned so much about using materials that I would have never thought of using or trying things that are new to me that I would have never dared to do before. I think back on my typography class specifically where I for the first time thought about making a three dimensional representation of typography.

Being a 2-d person my whole life this scared me. However, the project forced me to think creatively out of my box, and more importantly out of my comfort zone. I ended up designing an exit sign that instead of saying exit…it says “FATE.” I hang it in my classroom so that every student who walks out the door of my classroom walks into their fate. I used a laser and fiberglass and various computer programs like Corel Draw that had me rethink what I thought was possible with the materials.

For my other work, I use various chaotic thought exercises to develop ideas that assist me with developing analogies such as actor/stage/action that take me to unexpected places with developing ideas. Through understanding Anderson, I have learned that I could push my work even further using her methodology and will continue to do so. Her record player has left a lasting impression on me that has changed my fate as a working artist…hopefully for the better.

One of the things I will take away from this project is overcoming blocks into my development process.  The biggest fear I have to overcome was to embrace hand lettering. In the end, I still chose a digital type because I thought it unified my images better, but I was all ready to hand draw the type. This is a huge personal breakthrough for me.

I was always told when I was younger that my penmanship was terrible. So I feared using hand drawn letters. When I was working as a cartoonist my editor would ask me to take care more in my lettering. Personally at the time I thought the image was more important not fully  understanding the one section of an image that is terrible can wreck the entire symphony.

Later when at Ringling studying illustration I had instructors who said that lettering is not the realm of illustrators, but designers. The safe way to treat type is to use type that type that already made. Therefore this type is already successful.  So print it out and draw from already digital type or find type, but never make your own.

During this project I was thinking through drawing type and the class really seemed to enjoy some of my mental dalliances in different directions. In their comments I found confidence to try things I would have never would have dared to do with type before. I would not say my journey is completely over that my foray was a complete success, but every fantastic journey has to start somewhere. I’m just glad I had such a great class to get me started.

Every journey may start out with an intended destination, and you may get to the place where you intended to go. However, it does not mean you will be the same for it. The current exploration I have had on this project has had me see things in my creative process I never expected. I almost feel like an astronaut in my own mind.

The hardest part of the journey for me was the quick the long turnaround time. I know we had a lot of work due in a short period of time, but the thinking stage is taking longer than I am comfortable with. I feel like I tend to over think things and this can be dangerous territory for me. Though in knowing this I can explore better why I think I go off the rails sometimes.

This truly has been a personal discovery journey where I feel like I am on my own personal Star Trek.

In the illustration and painting world we call hueristic biases blind spots. Often times when creating a complex image it is a good idea to flip your image over or turn it over onto its side to see it from a different perspective. However, the question is why is this even necessary?

Our mind can be fooled. I often describe to my students that what we do when we create images can appear as magic. The reason the coin in the ear trick works is because of misdirection. The magician is exploiting the fact that our minds have certain cognitive biases that can be fooled. Our intelligent minds overcompensate for survival purposes. We develop biases based upon experiences, culture and context. In survival mode, these biases can be life saving or help us find a quicker unfortunate end.

Understanding we have these blindspots can help us over come them, and enrich our experience of admiring skilled practicioners whose work is so finely tuned it appears as magic. Sometimes it takes an outside influence to make us see things that we didn’t catch on to, or to know even existed. An outsided source can help freshen the stagnate pond our minds can become. That is why working in groups can help us finely tune our senses, makes us aware of the blindspots to processes so that we too can make magic in our designs.

In learning about how to see design in different places we learned about Rob Forbes ability to find design in unusual places. He talked about how Havana, Cuba was an inspiration as anuntouched playground for his imagination, undefiled by lecherous advertisements. This unit had me rethinking where my mental playgrounds were, and how whether or not I was using my correctly in my work.

I concluded I wasn’t. If the ocean and the sea means so much to me why do I not see it reflected in my work more? I do have illustrations of the ocean and oceanic inspired creatures, but that isn’t the argument that Forbes is making. Does my line work reflect the ocean? Am I looking to the ocean to inform me as a design source or am I using it merely as a bookmark of memories?

The more I thought about it design wise there is so much to learn from the ocean. I started reflecting  on the cultures that were directly influenced by their relationship with the ocean. What does their architecture look like, what is their cuisine, how does their art reflect their design sensibilities? I began thinking fishing towns of the northeast or the surf culture of Florida that I grew up with. The islands of the Pacific with their own unique design sensibilities are so radically distinct in contrast to crab fishermen in Alaska though they fish the same sea . There is just so much there that I could draw from that I never thought to in this way before.

The issue is not so much subject matter. It is seeing design relationships. Color variance in the ocean serves as a function that can be inspiring. Some colors are meant to draw attention…a question for a designer is how? Some colors are meant to blend in… a designer question is when is that appropriate and for what purpose? The  contours of a coral reef can create amazing patterns in contrast to the behemoth mass of a whale. These size variances raises the question of design relationships which is a great question for a designer to ask.

Is the ocean the only answer…no, but it is a good one, and a great one for me.  The ocean has been an important symbol all of my life. I was raised breathing the salty air and feeling sand in my toes. I feared the dark waves and saw the fins of creatures that would take a life. I swam swirling in its greens and blues, and shared meals from it, and learned some of my most powerful life lessons on survival from it. I have read that some call the oceans mysterious, and they are, but I will yearn to make them less so from a design perspective for myself.

I work with my school’s chapter of the Technology Student Association. This is the largest nationwide technology competition in the country with over 1500 hundred high schools competing. Last year we were national champions and this year we are hoping to repeat. This is an exciting group of students to work with because my students are a blend of future engineers and artists

One of the lessons I teach them is that technology is nothing more than a tool. A hammer can assist with assembling a house. In the wrong hands it destroys easier than it can build. However, in the right hands a team of master craftsman can use it to build a skyscraper, a cathedral, a hospital or whatever those masters’ dream.

One of the events I am coordinating with my students is video game design. We are using a 3-d engine called Unity and various 3-d modeling software packages like…Mudbox, 3-d Studio Max, Solid Works, and Blender. We are also using standard design programs like Photoshop and Illustrator.

Our goal is to use this technology to assist in leaving an emotional impact on our audience. We want to utilize it to create connections to people. So our first goal was to develop from the word empathy. We wanted to use the technology to help people connect to a character, a place or an animal. The students and I brainstormed as a team and we felt that turtles would make the perfect character to empathize with because of the hardships they go through just in the first few months for their survival.

Particularly in Florida, turtle nests are under constant threat of humans stepping on them or light pollution confusing the direction they go. Raccoons will raid the nest. After the turtles are born and rushing to the ocean, crabs and birds prey on them. Once they make it to the sea, sharks and squid attack turtles. What makes matters even worse is human netting and pollution.  Animal interaction with turtles may be considered the circle of life, but human impact is devastating the turtle populations here in Florida.

Our team feels that our approach to this project could be very informative. However, the problem is how to make this video game playable and engaging.  I asked my students for words they felt associated with this early life of a turtle. They kept coming up with words like fearful, horror, and scary. Statistically the first 24 hours of a turtle’s life can greatly impact their lifespan which can be up to 80 years. So our design quandary is how to make an educational video game, which causes one to empathize with our turtle character, and captivates our players.

We decided to take an Alfred Hitchcock suspense direction. Our concept art will borrow from the themes of pulp movie posters and 1950’s monster movies. Currently, the students are researching font types, doing character development and board coding. However, our goal is to create empathy with our turtle character and to spur those who play into being more responsible. My goal as instructor is to engage our team with responsible design that can be fun. This class has helped me to understand how to instill that in my students better. All the artwork is very early concept work.