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COM3024 Project 1 - 3 Final Compilation

Now we have come to the end of COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication, here's a quick look at my projects and progress throughout the semester!

As I'm looking back at all the projects we have done for this course, I greatly appreciate the time we were given to build our own personal branding while improving our design skills.

Project 1: Logo and CV

It was some time back when I read that personal branding and self-presentation is a growing indication of career competence. Through working on this project, I was glad that it was a kick in the right direction that got me thinking about the future and the way I present myself. It also got me thinking about who I want to be in my professional life, and by extension, other aspects of my life. Looking into colours and styles that would fit me as a creator and individual was an interesting process, and the outcome of this personal branding was incredibly rewarding.

Attached below are my logo (colour and black & white) and my CV!

Project 2: Advertising Poster Design

For this project, Mr Fauzi wanted us to strengthen our understanding of design principles and create a piece that we could add to our portfolio. I remember having some issues with the poster where I was stuck at a certain point and "felt that something was missing". In response to this, Mr Fauzi suggested repositioning the different graphic elements to play around with the poster's white space. He also emphasised on creating a connection between all elements so that they could come together as one complete piece. This was interesting advice to me and prompted me to reconsider the way I view design, because while the elements have to look nice, they need to come together to effectively tell a story instead of being separate bits that can seem thrown all over the place.

Project 3: Portfolio Showreel

This was the project I was most excited but intimidated by. Initially, I was worried about all the projects, music and text coming together as a cohesive final result, but it became a fun challenge to unite these different projects under the same music and presentation style. So it all turned out well in the end. I enjoyed being able to reflect on my past work and that it felt like a small celebration of my progress and growth as a creative (there's still a lot of room to grow, but it's still great to see where I stand and what I've produced so far)!

That's all from me at the moment!

[dejiaxuan]

Week 14: Consultation Week, Part 3

20/12/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

This week was the final week of classes and consultation. I had completed my video, and below the "Keep Reading" cut is my process (and Mr Fauzi's feedback)!

After last week's consultation, I started working on compiling my video.

The first thing to tackle was the music. I wanted the beats of my reel to align with the music's rhythm, and while digging through different music options, these were the few that interested me:

"Instructions for Living a Life" by Savfk: This ended up being the music option I went with because of the song's rhythm, vibe, and how it suited my work's style and tone.

"Gotta Go" by Tokyo Music Walker

"A FLOURISH" by Niya

"The Way to You" by Sapajou

"Malibu" by Scandinavianz

After that, it got easier to piece together my projects in the showreel and decide how I wanted to animate certain elements in my work. The fonts I decided to use were Circular Std and Poppins, with the former complementing the latter, which has been used in my logo.

Editing progressed smoothly, and Mr Fauzi mentioned that it was a good choice to align transitions with the music, and that overall it was good execution. He only suggested that I add a clearer call-to-action near the end of the video (which I did later on)!

The final video can be seen here or played below:

[dejiaxuan]

Week 13: Consultation Week, Part 2

13/12/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

Today was just for us to progress and get feedback on our showreels. I didn't manage to work on a sizeable bit of progress for my showreel, but I had drafted a rough storyboard to keep me on track and so I could envision what I planned to do for the video. Storyboard and feedback will appear after you click on the "Keep reading" tab!

This week, Mr Fauzi mentioned options I could use for the video editing process. While After Effects would give me the exact outcome I wanted, there was a steeper learning curve and time constraints (caused by the woes of being a student) could get in the way of that, but I could still achieve a "Zoom in" effect using Photoshop mask layers.

After receiving such feedback, I started planning what music I wanted to use for the video as it might also be good to have a song in mind first to match the beats of the showreel with the music, so I looked for royalty free music that would both work well as showreel background music while managing to briefly capture a semblance of my personality.

Following my storyboard, I also filmed a few videos and experimented with different lighting, angles and poses for my video thumbnail and introduction.

[dejiaxuan]

Week 12: Consultation Week, Part 1

6/12/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

With the semester coming to a close, lectures aren't being carried out. Instead, we are to focus on our final assignment, creating a Portfolio Showreel for ourselves. (As usual, more to come under the "Keep Reading" tab!)

My progress this week is as follows:

Looked for inspiration. I particularly was inspired by this video by Zlata Subbotina on Behance, which featured many smooth transitions throughout the video while effectively showing different artworks. The music was a good choice. Another video I found interesting was a showreel by creative agency Halo, which was light, fun, and once again featured interesting transitions while maintaining the tone throughout the video with the upbeat music despite having different clips and works being showcased.

2. Decide which projects to feature.

These were the projects I had initially chosen to feature, in this order as well. Mr Fauzi found Portfolio 2, the black and white illustrations interesting, mentioning that they could even be compiled and animated into a short film that could then become part of my portfolio.

[dejiaxuan]

Week 11: Portfolio Development and Presentation

29/11/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

It is already Week 11, so it makes sense for the third assignment brief to be shared this week. Other than that, Mr Fauzi also shared good portfolio examples, which can be found here and here.

Tutorial

During the Tutorial, Mr Fauzi briefed us on what we need to do for the third assignment, which included completing our e-portfolio (the very site I am writing on now), and to produce a portfolio video showreel.

Mr Fauzi also explained the video structure and how we would need to consider the timing for each part of the video.

Next week, we would need to show our intro and outro for the video.

[dejiaxuan]

Week 10: Digital Design

22/11/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

Lecture was kept very brief this week, with more emphasis being placed on Tutorial, where I worked on completing my second assignment - the Advertising Poster.

Lecture

For lecture, we watched a video where we were introduced to:

the basics of digital design,

designing digital materials such as social media graphics and web banners, and

preparing digital files for online platforms.

Below is the video, which Mr Fauzi paused at intervals to explain certain styles and elements to us.

Tutorial

During Tutorial, I once again showed Mr Fauzi my progress, starting with the Digital Poster. In Progress 1, I tried a more vibrant, lively style, with the downside of it resembling a postcard instead of a poster. In Progress 2 (as shown below), I tried combining the "ink" aspect of my book illustration workshop with a handmade quality, conveyed through the textured background, doodle lines, and images edited to appear grainy and cut out of a magazine.

Digital poster sketches

During the Tutorial session, Mr Fauzi often offered feedback as I tried to complete the poster, with the final look staying mostly the same as Progress 2, but changing a few things (such as the asterisk "&" and the doodle weight) to bring these differing elements together. After the A4 poster was completed, I worked on the vertical and square versions, which mostly consisted of rearranging and resizing the elements to suit their new canvas sizes.

Final Poster (A4, vertical, square)

After the poster design had been finalised, mockups were also created to envision what the posters would look like if applied to real-life situations. This included as a poster on the wall, during the workshop itself, and on social media.

Poster mockups (A4, vertical and square)

The project was submitted after all this had been completed!

[dejiaxuan]

Week 9: Motion Graphics

15/11/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

This week, Mr Fauzi covered a little of kinetic typography and brought us through grid systems. He also checked on our sketches for our Advertising Poster project.

Lecture

We watched a video where Mr Fauzi broke down keyframes and demonstrated how to animate typography.

This was followed by a lecture on Grid Systems, with important points being:

Grids are used to aid placement of design elements such as text and images to present a better user interface and experience for the audience.

The grid is seen as a guideline and should be a part of the designing process to produce impactful pieces.

Tutorial

During consultation for the Advertising Poster project, I showed Mr Fauzi my progress, including three references I had compiled and liked the style of.

Poster references I had found

Next, I showed him the summary for the workshop. Besides describing the workshop's particulars, I also went into detail about the target audience, including research that supported my statements. The third paragraph roughly explains my design choices and rationale.

After that, Mr Fauzi took a look at my sketches and suggested I could use elements from each of my references and incorporate them into my final design to achieve an interesting look.

My next task would be to continue designing digital sketches and progress to the final result.

[dejiaxuan]

Week 8: Visual Communication for Multimedia

8/11/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

This week, lecture touches briefly on (as you can see from the title) visual communication for multimedia.

Lecture

Visual communication is a way to efficiently communicate ideas through graphics.

Visual storytelling and visual communication helps clarify information and delivers messages in an effective manner.

Tutorial

For Tutorial, Mr Fauzi briefed us on our second assignment, where we were informed that we needed to come up with an event based on our interests. The next requirement would be to design an advertising poster for this fictional (or not, in some cases) event.

For this project, I was interested to do something related to books and/or illustration. A few ideas are as follows:

Children's Book Festival

Book Illustration Workshop

Literary Scavenger Hunt

Literary Feast and Book Sharing Session

This Week has been brief, but by next week, more progress should and will be made!

[dejiaxuan]

Week 7: Visual Communication for Web

25/10/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

This week's lecture focused on web design principles and fundamentals. I will also share my progress for an Illustrator exercise where we need to create a basic typography postcard. This "agenda" will once again be explored further under the "Keep Reading" cut.

Lecture

There are two web design methods: responsive (changes dynamically based on screen size) and adaptive (content is fixed in layout sizes that match common screen sizes).

Types of web design can vary greatly, with each having different purposes and features.

Some tips about beginning with web design include:

Observing how HTML, CSS, and Javascript work,

Looking for inspiration from diverse sources,

Focus on the user experience, and

Take note of typography used.

Tutorial

We were given a typography exercise to work on over the mid semester break, which involves finding an optimistic/positive quote and design a postcard with emphasis on the typography.

Below is my progress:

First, I begin with the Ideation process. This involved listing a few quotes I was interested in exploring further, including:

This world spins from the same unseen forces that twist our hearts.

To become presence, means accepting the risk of absence.

What is essential is invisible to the eye.

It is only with the heart that one can see rightly.

During the process, I brainstormed a list of elements that could be included within the postcard. After settling on the quote that would be used, which was "it is only with the heart that one can see rightly", I made thumbnail sketches of potential execution ideas. This was followed by the searching for relevant inspiration. I decided to go for a "space" theme with simple graphics to reflect the style of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's Le Petit Prince, which is where the chosen quote is from.

The next step included progressing with the Execution in Adobe Illustrator itself. I wanted the main focus to be the heart (both word and graphic), hence the reason "heart" is the only word being emphasised within a glowing heart shape. The background is a freeform gradient that hopes to emulate the look and feeling of outer space. The glowing star shapes are meant to further imply the setting of outer space while drawing attention to the centred text. True to the Le Petit Prince style, a texture has been added to the background and the stars have been distorted to be imperfect geometric shapes in an attempt to replicate the hand drawn artwork found in the source book.

Here is the Final Result. I have added small glowing ellipses to look like distant stars as well as a flare effect around the heart, which further reinforces its importance to the overall design.

[dejiaxuan]

A1 Submission: Logo and CV

19/10/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

The day has finally arrived to submit the first assignment - our personal logo and CV/resume! Although I have handed in the first assignment in Google Classroom, here is what I have submitted in JPEG and PDF form.

My logo (JPEG) in colour, and black & white

Here are the links to the PDF versions (because I've tried but can't figure out how to embed a PDF within a Tumblr post):

Logo PDF (all 3 versions): https://tinyurl.com/y3v36cpn

As for the CV, this is what the final result looks like:

My CV (JPEG)

CV PDF link: https://tinyurl.com/mryadawj

That's all for today!

[dejiaxuan]

Week 6: Visual Communication for Print

18/10/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

This week was rather straightforward. We went through 10 tips for designing good posters.

Lecture

As mentioned, here are the "10 Tips for Great Poster Design":

Make the poster easy to read from a distance: Besides being legible and easily digestible, key information should be arranged in an easy-to-read hierarchy.

Create good contrast so that key information can once again be viewed easily.

Consider the size and location of the poster: Consider the design's eventual placement so that visual contrast can be created accordingly.

Make a mini version: What this means is to make sure the design is versatile enough that it can be adapted and used across different platforms (e.g. social media, websites...).

Use one big visual: Use one dominant image with a sharp focal point to create intrigue.

Use plenty of space: This is so the design does not appear complicated.

Include a call-to-action so people know what to do after seeing your poster.

Create focus with typography: Sometimes using only typography and colour is enough to draw attention and create visually interesting posters.

Use a cool printing technique: There are many forms of printing to experiment with, including letterpress, screenprinting, foiling and so on.

Have fun!

Image taken from Martin Péchy

Tutorial

Mr Fauzi looked through our logo and CV design for the last time before submission. Here is the progress I have shared:

Vector logo progress (both black & white and colour)

CV reference and progress (including sketches, ideation, first variation, and second vaiartion)

Final CV design

Mr Fauzi shared that I had made good progress and mentioned that my work was ready for submission.

[dejiaxuan]

Week 5: Design Thinking and UI/UX

11/10/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

This week, we covered design thinking basics and UI/UX in class.

Lecture

Design thinking is a user-focused thinking process that follows a few steps:

Empathise: In this stage, a designer observes, engages and discusses with the user about their current experiences and emotions. Through empathising with the user, the designer can get to know and understand the user and their experiences with the specific product or design.

Define: Define the users' needs to get an idea of what you need to do or if there are any issues you need to focus on.

Ideate: Get outside perspective regarding any findings you have made. Process any potential options, come up with solutions, problem statements, challenge current assumptions and come up with innovative solutions.

Prototype: Create a mockup of the product/design for people to view or test.

Testing: See how people understand and use your product to evaluate what can be improved, implemented, or improvised.

As Mr Fauzi shared, the spirit of design thinking is "it's not about the answer, it's about asking the right questions". Before asking any questions, it'd be best if we could evaluate and try to process the whole situation on our own first so we can ask advanced questions that would aid the project along even more.

Image by Karl Solano

Tutorial

Today was our last consultation before submission of the project next week. I showed Mr Fauzi my progress on the logo, including digital and vector sketches, before continuing with finalising my logo and CV.

The comments Mr Fauzi shared included:

Narrowing down the vector sketches to Nexa Heavy, EB Garamond, and Libre Baskerville. I would need to choose between one of them and work on the finalised version.

No matter which font I go with, it would be best to make the length of the "j" a similar length with the stem of the "d" character. This would be to create symmetry.

Digital and vector sketches for my logo

[dejiaxuan]

Week 4: Composition & Layout

4/10/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

For Week 4, we were introduced to the basics of composition, the Rule of Thirds, and the Golden Ratio.

Lecture

The basics of composition include:

Focal point: When contrast is created within a design to highlight or draw attention to important information. A tip when creating a focal point is this: simplicity is key.

Scale and hierarchy: To create a sequence/arrangement where the audience's attention will be drawn to certain aspects.

Balance the elements

White space: Helps to create balance as well.

Image taken from Matt Artz

As for the Rule of Thirds, we watched a video about it.

As usual, here are a few points to note:

Use natural leading lines, diagonals, and framing to lead the audience's attention to the picture's subject.

Find a contrast between the subject and background.

Fill the frame.

Place the dominant eye in the centre of the picture.

Create patterns and repetition, and find ways to interrupt the pattern to spark interest.

The Golden Ratio

Image taken from Purpose Studios

Used to create natural and organic compositions, and is commonly found in nature.

Useful in determining dimensions of the layout. To apply it, set dimensions to 1:1.618.

Tutorial

Mr Fauzi looked over each of our progress for the personal logo design.

My progress, including Inspiration / References, Ideation and Hand drawn sketches.

While Mr Fauzi believed that number 1 and 10 had potential, we ultimately decided to go with the first logo due to its legibility and versatility. He suggested adding my name in readable text right above the "X" so the audience would be able to understand what the logo was all about.

The next steps in the assignment would be:

Refine the logo through digital and vector sketches,

Create the vector logo in colour and in black & white, and

Apply the logo to a CV.

[dejiaxuan]

Week 3: Colour Theory & Logo Development

27/9/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

As the title suggests, Week 3's lecture focused on colour theory and how we go about developing a logo.

Colour Theory

We watched a video that explained colour theory basics.

Some things mentioned in the video include:

Primary, secondary, and tertiary colours

The colour wheel consists of hue, saturation, value, and temperature

Colour harmony "formulas": monochromatic, complementary, split complementary, triadic, tetradic, and analogous

Logos of well-known brands were mentioned as examples of memorable and effective logos during the lecture, including that of McDonald's, Starbucks, Nike, and Adidas, to name a few.

Logo Development

How to develop a logo:

Define your brand identity

Seek inspiration

Determine logo style

Choose a type (wordmark, letterforms, monogram, symbol, abstract, mascot, emblems, combo, dynamic)

Decide on a colour scheme

Pick a font

Outline a logo shape

Create a logo

Refine the results

Make a final decision

Put your logo to work

To read a more in-depth version of the logo designing process, click here.

Interesting points brought up during the lecture:

"Pink is the new black", which we were told is a saying that aims to reinvent the way people view the colour pink, introducing it to a wider audience as a trendy and timeless option.

Non-primary colours can be complicated when determining their emotions/conveyed message as they are essentially mixtures of primary colours.

When designing a logo, it's important to consider the brand's personality and the intended target audience.

It is important to know your dominant brain so you can cater towards the "weaker" side and balance it out for maximum productivity and to enhance individual wellbeing.

Advertising focuses on "how to sell" while branding has an emphasis on "how to sustain". And that's what branding is - designing an experience.

Tutorial

For this week's tutorial, we were required to start working on our logo development, with the end goal of creating a logo for our personal brand.

To get started, we needed to:

Look for References, and

Begin the Ideation process with hand drawn sketches.

Having only ever created logos for other brands and companies, this is all incredibly exciting! When I heard the Assignment Brief, I immediately thought of the Tolkien symbol, but we shall see how things go.

[dejiaxuan]

Week 2: Advanced Typography

20/9/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

Week 2's lecture focused on the basics of typography.

Lecture

Anatomy of a Typeface

(Image Source: Material Design)

Baseline

Cap height

X-height

Weight

Things to take note of:

Hierarchy

Leading

Kerning

Some key points are:

Typography can represent a specific brand and identity.

Kerning, which is the space between each individual letter, is often overlooked but demonstrates attention to detail.

No widows, orphans, and forced justified type should be included in any design because of the rivers it may cause. When taken out of context, this may sound odd. But that just goes to show how interesting design vocab can be.

Tutorial

For this week's Tutorial, students were required to start a blog, which would become a place we share our artwork and processes. It would also potentially even becoming our portfolio later on (hence the origins of this blog is revealed)!

We were also encouraged to create a Pinterest board to collect art and design that inspires us. My board can be viewed here.

Other than that, we played a game where we had to adjust the kerning for each word. My final score was 86/100!

If you'd like to give the game a go, here's the link: Kern Type

[dejiaxuan]

Week 1: Course Introduction

13/9/2023

De Jia Xuan / 19112523

COM3024 Advanced Graphic Communication / BA (Hons) in Advertising and Branding

It doesn't say specifically in the title, but this series of posts tagged "com3024" and "advanced graphic communication" are to document my progress and experience throughout the course Advanced Graphic Communication (COM3024).

To learn more about me and what this is all about, visit the about page!

Mr Fauzi, the course's lecturer, went through the Course Outline in class. He also addressed any questions or expectations we had regarding the course. For instance, we were informed that we would primarily be using Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator throughout the duration of this course.

For easy reference, here are the Course Aims:

Increase student’s creative confidence and thinking while learning how to successfully communicate a message visually.

Allow students to decide what type of lighting to use in a given situation to produce optimum results.

Provide students with the real life application and mastery of graphic design skills such as elements and principles of design, typography, color theory, and layout.

And here are the Course Learning Outcomes:

Produce visually compelling and effective messages for different mediums through the application of advanced graphic design techniques.

Adapt professional communication skills with peers to promote divergent and creative perspectives and individual decision-making.

Incorporate understanding of user experience design and its impact on visual communication to create effective visual messages for various mediums such as print, web, and multimedia.