#especially text and layout are things I really struggle with

[little-chaos-arts]

"Won't you drag the lake and bring me home again?"

Drown by Bring me the horizon

Have some itafushi angst *runs and hides*

[lowcallyfruity]

Sebepel headcanons 💞

😈 finally posting them after like 5000 months of procrastinating ☝️☝️ ummm they are long because well, I love them.

(about 1k words 😨😨😨)

Headcanons are like in chronological order I guess, from before they were dating to during dating basically 👍

I also changed my writing style/point of view (?) near the end, idk just wanted to give a heads up

Sebek being confused why he thinks of Epel so much. He’s just a human after all. I mean he is really cool and talented but still!! He’s a human. It’s strange to him.

Sebek treasures the squirrel plushie he got from Epels hometown

Sebek occasionally thinking about Epels hometown and wanting go there again.

Sebek getting frustrated and eventually decides to hang out with Epel more.

Sebek calls Epel by his name often instead of human. He calls him human sometimes but not as much as the others. People start noticing this and go “huh. Strange”

Sebek being nice to Epel and Epel being like “huh.”

Sebek hanging out with Epel often and giving him gifts and Epel being confused. Epel being like “this is….weird? I can’t believe SEBEK is doing this? Especially knowing what people say about him??”

Epel getting used to Sebek after a while and gladly accepting his gifts hanging out with him.

Epel eventually thinking its cute and endearing.

Sebek thinking Epel is really cool and strong and thinking he’s a very capable human. So much that he invites Epel to workout/train with him and occasionally to Diasomnia training sessions.

Epel really appreciating what Sebek does for him. Epel getting happy that Sebek invites him to train with him.

Sebek and Epel hanging out/training/studying in Sebeks room.

Epel visiting Diasomnia so much that he knows it’s layout and where stuff is.

Epel getting close Sebek and the Diasomnia gang.

Epel inviting Sebek to the Pomfeiore dorm and Sebek being nervous internally

Sebek becoming more nervous and self conscious about his actions and behaviors.

He doesn’t want to lose his beloved friend.

He doesn’t want him to this he’s annoying.

Sebek eventually getting over his hatred for humans and loving Epel to the fullest extent.

Epel being one of the reasons Sebeks hatred for humans starts chipping away.

Sebek loosening up with Epel and being much softer with him. He feels he can be more vulnerable with Epel.

Same with Epel, he feels like he can really be himself with Sebek.

Epel teasing Sebek a lot and vice versa.

Them sitting in silence doing their own thing <333 (huehuehuehuehue parallel play….)

Sebek hugging Epel tightly, baisically squishing him/crushing his bones

Epel getting used to Sebeks hugs and hugging him back the same

Sebek is so pathetic and such a loser. He tries to impress Epel but he struggles.

Lilia catching onto Sebeks crush on Epel and teasing him about it.

Sebek swears it’s not a crush.

Sebek talking about Malleus to Epel and Epel just listening quietly. :]

Sebek slowly talking about Epel more and more. The students can’t believe it! Sebek talking about someone other than Malleus or Lilia?! That’s insane

⚡️🍎⚡️🍎⚡️🍎⚡️🍎⚡️🍎⚡️

Sebek sends letters to Epel… because Lilia says that’s the old fashioned way to court someone! And it definitely works! So he should try it

The letters are a bit awkward and silly at first but Epel doesn’t mind…eventually they get really sweet,, and Epel thinks it’s cute but he’s still confused why he’s sending letters instead of texting, they have each others number after all.

Sebek starts texting Epel a lot, telling him all about malleus, things he did that day, and showing him things that remind him of Epel.

I like to think Sebek is a bit uncomfortable talking on the phone but Epel helps him get used to it.

Sebek learns how to play guitar for Epel. Lilia said it would be so cute to play him a Song

It’s night time when Sebek confesses, They’re sitting outside of Pomefiore just sitting there and laughing. It starts with “I think I love you” and from there Sebek starts rambling about how much he appreciates Epel. And the whole time Epel is just looking at him like “wow.”

⚡️🍏⚡️🍏⚡️🍏⚡️🍏⚡️🍏⚡️

Sebek talking about his lovely boyfriend who is the coolest guy to ever exist!!! (He might even surpass Malleus. Sebek is very conflicted) boasting about how amazing and strong he is for a human!!! How he’s very talented and skillfull.

Epel taking Sebek to his hometown to visit. Sebek being happy he can go back. He loves Epel’s hometown

Sebek going to Epel’s hometown often that he has now seen it in all of its seasons.

Epel speaking less formally with Sebek and occasionally going full blown with his Dialect.

Sebek wanting to learn more of Epel’s dialect and culture

Epel gladly teaching him

Sebek loves Epel’s accent so much.

Sebek genuinely being so happy and proud to have Epel as his boyfriend.

Sebek holding Epel’s hand tight because he loves him dearly.

When they held hands for the first time Sebek was so nervous he didn’t know what to do. (Internally he was screaming crying throwing up)

Epel wanting to take Sebek on rides on his motorbike

Sebek would definitely accept if Epel asked but he would be so nervous to do it

Epel wanting to do more stuff to show Sebek how much he means to him because Sebek does so much for him.

Epel asking Vil and and Rook for advice on gifts.

Vil not fully understanding why Epel is dating Sebek, but supports it anyway.

Sebek is just happy that Epel is his boyfriend and hangs out him.

Sebek introducing Epel to his family and Epel just being like “wow.” (/pos)

Sebek picks up Epel just so he can kiss him better.

Though sometimes, Epel will pull Sebek down to kiss him.

Sebek only kisses Epel on his cheek or hands because he’s too embarrassed to do it on the mouth.

Epel being awkward and rarely kissing Sebek, and if he does it’s on the cheek. Sebek is okay with it and wants to make sure Epel is comfortable

Sebek kissing Epel often. Sometimes in public. Epel starts finding it cute.

Epel getting more used to being affectionate and doing the same with Sebek!!!

Idk man they just love wholesome kisses and holding each other 😭😭😭😭

They probably had their first kiss on the lips in their junior or senior year. They were too embarrassed to try it before.

Sebek happy stims SO MUCH when he’s with Epel.

Epel loves it SO much because he’s just so glad Sebek feel comfortable enough around him…..

Epel giving Sebek apple carvings is a tradition.

Sebek started to put preserving spells on the apples so they wouldn’t rot

Epel is Sebeks number one supporter frfr 🙏🙏🙏

Epel made Sebek want to do handcrafted things again…. They started doing woodworking together

Epel compliments Sebek a lot and it makes Sebek feel like the specialest guy in the world. He loves it so much. But they also leave him a mess

Epel goes to Sebek for compliments because he thinks they’re cute, and he feels very validated around Sebek

Epel and Sebek are the biggest hypemen for eachother. “If you guys don’t cheer for my boyfriend I’m going to blow this place up” type shit

Sebek gives Epel his jacket often because Epel loves wearing big jackets. He also likes how he looks :3

Sebek will go to Epel’s games and sometimes even practices and cheer for him like crazy. Probably the loudest guy there. (Leona finds it annoying, but whatever)

But a lot of times he will stand and stare in awe of Epel’s skill. He’s so talented.

When Epel is done with a game or practice most of the time Sebek runs up to hug him or grabs him by the shoulders and tells him how amazing he was!!!

Epel will also go and see Sebek in the equestrian club!!! He thinks Sebek looks really cute (and stupid) and is just so endeared by him

Sebek walks Epel to class as often as he can,,, he thinks it’s sooo cool of him

When Epel saw Sebek with his hair down, he freaked out. He looked SO handsome. He couldn’t function for like a week, he would just keep thinking of Sebek.

Sebek was SO embarrassed, he couldn’t believe his boyfriend saw him like that. Epel assured him it was fine.

Epel wants Sebek to keep his hair down more often,,,, Sebek says that maybe one day he’ll do it more.

[malacandrax]

what's your process like when making comics? especially during the thumbnailing/drawing part, that's what i struggle with the most

Tbh most of it comes through practice. The main thing I think is important to figure out is how much text you personally fit onto a comic page. That way you can look at the script and split it into pages. Its much easier to start thumbing when you have a set amount to work from.

On standard pages I generally aim for 5/6ish panels- a page splits fairly well into three rows of varying sizes, and you can chop those rows up to get some interesting shapes. Even my weird wiggly ones kind of fit the three row idea.

So uh, if I’m doing it for myself it’s much more interesting for me if I get to make decisions while I’m inking, instead of making a detailed sketch and copying over in ink. I vaguely plan the bubbles and panels, and get the character sizes/angles down to make sure it looks interesting and flows well. Before I ink I usually add the text (It often bites me in the ass if I don’t.) 

It’s a bit like going from thumb to final without a sketch. I don’t draw Much but I do figure out the flow of the bubbles, and the size/angle of the figures so it’s not boring.

If its for something professional I go into much more detail, and also have a real thumb stage where I try out different layouts etc.

Honestly it's probably helpful to find some guides to making comics, there's so much to learn that will help with decision making! Idk tho, even two squares with some text is a comic, and you can always start there! Some of the best comics are really simple.

[marciaillust]

Heyooo! It’s me again (i hope i’m not bothering you by asking questions like these) I started making a comic and I’m struggling with the typography

Any tips or recs to look? I really like your work and that’s why I am asking :)

Heyo!

I can dish out a few tips but they aren't really hard rules so take them with a grain of salt and artistic freedom.

The most important thing imo is the presentation of the text on the page. The shape and number of speech bubbles will be registered way before any of the contents so it needs to looks the part. 

The first tip would be generally avoid the speech bubbles being overly thin and long. The example below is pretty tame but believe me, I’ve read comics with the wormiest of speech bubbles and they tend to not look good.

Sometimes the automatic alignment of the text will look closer to a square (especially if there are many short words in a sentence) so feel free to go in and move the text around via the enter key so it looks more like the rhombus. You won't always be able to achieve it especially if the first word in a sentence is long (e.g. the word "hypothetically") but a rhombus should be the goal.

While we're on the topic of speech bubbles I like mine to have really short "tails" (the bits that indicate who is speaking), unless I REALLY want to make sure the reader knows who is speaking in a scene.

 Also I always make the tails point directly towards characters mouth unless it would make the scene confusing (for example if two characters have mouths really close to each other or something, I might make one tail point a bit higher/lower/to the left/right to differentiate between the two speakers. But that’s like a super specific problem and could be avoided with proper frame layout.)

And like, never skip the tails unless its the same character monologuing at length. Nothing breaks emersion more than when you have to stop and turn into an investigator to determine who is speaking in a scene.

Now for the fonts themselves, in my opinion the size of text should be unified between speech bubbles and across pages when it comes to a single font. Example, all casual speech - arial, 14; all thought bubbles - Calibri, 15. 

That is of course unless there is artistic merit to changing the font and/or font's size. Making someone yell, suggesting a threat or sarcasm, indicating a playful tone or something akin to that -  lean into what you're trying to communicate visually.

All fonts are not made equal and sometimes you will have to adjust things manually e.g. letter spacing or line spacing. Generally I try to keep the spacing the same regardless of the font, e.g. "yay exciting" had massive gaps between the lines which I've shrunk to make it look more visually cohesive with the rest of the dialogue. Same with these ones:

At the end of the day typography and everything pertaining to speech bubbles is design work and what designs do is communicate a message and serve a function. I’ve had this picture saved on my pc for years now (reverse google search doesn’t tell me who made it but it’s like the bible to me so I will share it, I am almost certain it was made by tryinghuman but I might be wrong):

Really every part of a speech bubble can be “designed” down to a single word. The position of text, fonts, the shape of the bubble etc. And every change will culminate in an effect and the goal is to have that effect reflect what you’re going for.

Make it legible or illegible, make it see-through, capitalise one word, cover speech bubbles up with other objects, make them crack or fall apart. Not every speech bubble needs special treatment! But once in a while it’s nice to throw something different in to spice things up.

Also, and this is a rule that was bestowed upon me during a graphic design class, don’t use more than 3 fonts per page (again, unless there is artistic merit to it like e.g. purposefully trying to communicate a sense of chaos. Otherwise it just looks a bit unprofessional. In my opinion anyway.)

And the last thing I will say, and this mostly applies to comics in English, is some “speech” fonts include capital “I”s both with and without serifs. The serif I should generally be reserved for the pronoun “I”.

There is so much more when it comes to text in comics like the flow of bubbles across pages, splicing text across bubbles for communicating speech patterns or intentions of the characters, and there are tutorials about it out there but I wasn’t able to find my favourites on command............. sorry................ But I’m peppering this in just so you’re on the lookout for all the other cool things that go into comic making :)

Hope this helped!

[ifernaldarts245-02]

This week and the week of fall break has been great. This project plays to my strengths and has allowed me to express my own creativity while still showcasing the ability to adhere to a client's requests. I really like how everything came out considering I really do not like InDesign. For the colors I found a purple I liked then manipulated the CMYK values proportionally to get a differing color with the same shade and that's how I got the green color. I was struggling a lot with were to put the text especially with the 10pt size limitation but I feel that I solved the issue in a creative way. I am really happy with how this project turned out and I feel the things that were easiest for me was creating the letter and the character design portions but I struggled when it came to layout which I know I need to improve on.

The reading this week was very informative and helped with a couple symbols I didn't know the name of or the use of. We did however go over a lot of the stuff talked about in class so it felt a bit repetitive but also was a good reminder to strengthen what I thought I knew. The most informative part was the editing section because I had no idea what almost all of the marks meant. I can also see this information being helpful in the future if I ever work somewhere that requires text proofreading that I will then have to edit as a part of a design. Editing soft copy was pretty self explanatory to me and the hard copy was what was really new to me. I'm sure I will forget most of the symbols for hard copy editing but the author left a list at the end of the book that I can refer to in the future.

[b1mbodoll]

i keep getting asks regarding the blog that the anon questioned me about and i dont wanna flood my blog with this bc i feel bad so i’ll answer these here! and please don’t twist my words!!! i am allowed to feel some type of way abt this situation! at first i was giving them the benefit of the doubt bc i don’t wanna point fingers or seem like a mean person bc i wld hate to be thought of as a meanie T_T but im just gna reply to these real quick pls do not be rude or hateful to me, my nonies, or the writer!! thank you.

first: i do not know the writer at all, nonie! but i can understand why you would think that

second: i understand being upset for me, i’m also a bit bothered by this if m bein’ honest :( but i do not want anyone being rude to them or sending any hateful messages! i also noticed the emoticon and how they switched up the link titles so it wasnt exactly the same but :T there’s nothin i can do abt it T_T m too afraid of confrontation

third: i can understand why you’re upset about the “tone tags” thing! as someone who is audhd and relies on tone tags the majority of the time, it’s a little upsetting when people don’t do their research on the topic T_T but i’m not saying they didnt! i dont know them personally nor do i know if they’re nd! but i do see why you think it’s bothersome, nonie! blog tags are Not tone tags

fourth: idk if this was meant to be disrespectful to them bcz again i struggle with reading and processing tone, especially through text T_T but like i said earlier i understand being upset for me bc i am as well, considering i’ve spent so much time prettyin up my blog n making it a reflection of my personality n it makes me a lil sad when people jus’ take that from me without even asking :( it’s such a silly thing to be upset about, i know, but im rly proud of how my blog is set up n it sucks having it copied

fifth: i hate being bothered by something like this but i get where ur coming from anonie T_T this isn’t the first time i’ve noticed someone copying little bits of who i am -_- but i’ve never said anything bc like i said i hate (!!!!!!!) confrontation n i won’t say anything to this writer (and neither should you guys!!!!!!!) either :x but i have and i do notice when people take my lil phrases n terms of endearment nd blog related stuff like my tags n layout T_T n it bums me out so bad bc i try so hard to show my personality thru this account n ppl just take pieces n agh!!! idek what im sayin im jus a lil upset rn :T

anyway!!!!!! again guys please, please, please don’t be rude or mean or send hateful stuff to other creators!!!!! i choose kindness n it’d mean the world to me if you all did too <3 n sry if i seem silly for letting this bother me T_T i know it’s kinda stupid but i’m autistic and idk if anyone else struggles w this but i really really really get upset over stuff like this T_T anyway that’s all !!! rmb to be kind pls

[spikeinthepunch]

i feel like it may be worth just rambling about my website and what things id like to do with it in terms of rehauling the look. i am always the type to say "no, this will stay in my brain until i know for sure what i want to do". but that often means fleeting ideas dont stick and not talking about it makes it hard to properly envision

my website kind of got a solid look mid-early last year after i learned more html formatting and i quite like it- a landing page, a home page, and a few spin off pages (project site and coffini outlet). i didnt feel like i acheived what i wanted to emulate out of the old web though- making the page feel like a proper "home" or diving into my own personal world.

i mostly considered the first solid design to be temporary as i figure out what i wanted to do with a theme that felt more homey, but that didnt happen for a variety of reasons.

the main struggle out of all of it is actually making the assets. there is a lot of ways i could tackle the "old internet" look with assets. low quality jpegs? pixel art? low poly 3d gifs? many other things i am not experienced with making either- and the aesthetic i think i would go for most is pixel art. and even outside of the style is just SO much stuff to make. i gotta make the background? the containers? the buttons? the borders? scroll bar? and every other little decoration!! it is overwhelming especially when i dont even know if i can make it all myself in a way i like because i havent done much pixel art.

in terms of what i want to do though (lets not forget i am writing this to also remind myself what i want to do) outside of my annoyance for procrastinating- i want to rework my landing page to be cuter and more themed. everything to be more themed. obviously i lean a lot on space aesthetics, and would certainly want the landing page to be about that. either something like, a spaceship gif and the puffs of smoke linking to the homepage/etc. or a solar system. home page, i still want to be similar layout as to keep it easy to navigate... but id want to carry that look very heavily still. want think giving the containers a sort of mechanical sci-fi look would be neat, like youre inside a ship. or maybe make it look like holographic screens (id want to try and keep my light color text on a dark background look). for coffini outlet, i want to make all the graphic myself and probably alter the layout a bit? but not too much, as i think this one is ideal for reading still. so really, just a more original header image. for my project page? i quite like it as is, i made it more recently with some help of a template.

so those are the thoughts i have. aside from the aesthetics i know i really want to improve on my code in terms of making it semi workable on phones but also way more usable on different window size.... currently this is a big problem still on some pages:

improving the technical side of the website is important and i think my meds working will help me focus on that a bit more in terms of...learning how to lol. and i do want to sit down and learn properly about the aesthetic parts i feel i dont have the skills for too- ive kind of put a lot of that onthe backburner with all the fan art i have gotten into as well and i feel like i want to pull away from it just a tad in order to focus on original things.

[everygame]

Wishbringer (PC)

Developed/Published by: Infocom Released: 1/5/1985 Completed: 20/07/2022 Completion: Finished it, 100/100. Trophies / Achievements: n/a

Brian Moriarty has a couple of sad Infocom milestones in his career (which I should note have nothing to do with him directly) Wishbringer, released in mid-1985, was the first game the company would release after dooming the company with the ill-concieved Cornerstone project and would be (as noted by the Digital Anitquarian) “one of the company’s last genuine hits” and his next project, 1986’s Trinity, would be (according to Wikipedia) “the last game released by the company when it was solvent.”

Oof.

I hadn’t originally planned to play Wishbringer–I was going to skip ahead to A Mind Forever Voyaging–but Wishbringer is particularly mentioned as a bit of a hidden gem in the Infocom catalogue and being intentionally designed as an “introductory” text adventure I was interested to see how Infocom’s design continued to evolve since the willfully obtuse Hitchiker’s Guide.

Well, the answer is… I think the answer I’m coming to is that I don’t think Infocom actually had a particularly consistent design philosophy. I suppose it’s early days in game development, but it really feels like each “implementor” was treated as an author not just in terms of content and writing but also design (and, in fact, if you read Stu Galley’s “Implementor’s Creed” written in 1985, as much as it hedges, it seems to imply such a thing.) 

This means that, well, advances weren’t necessarily consistently brought forward, and even for an “introductory” adventures, a lot of decisions are made here that represent, well, bad, unwelcoming design. And often, it’s the little things. By this point, you’d think, inventory limits would be a thing of the past, and even Hitchiker’s Guide has the sense to make you drop something randomly when you pick up too much and offer a bag of holding (admittedly only if you can work that out*) Here, you struggle with what feels like a very strict inventory limit and a wide-open map with a roaming enemy, making it risky to drop something you might need.

*I thought maybe the wizard’s hat here might be a bag of holding, but it just seems to… destroy items. And you will almost certainly use it immediately in one of the more obvious puzzles, so…

Of course, it actually is “educational” for a new infocom player to deal with a lot of frustration, even if I think it’s pretty unintentional. Take the opening: you’re given a nice clear goal and then quickly bump into your first puzzle that locks you into a small area and has a fairly obvious solution. That’s good! But once that’s out of the way, you basically unlock the entire map and have a strict (and honestly unnecessary) time-limit to complete your first task, at which point the map–while keeping the same layout–changes significantly, rendering some items totally inaccessible for the rest of the game.

What’s even weirder about that is some of those items are necessary to use the titular wishbringer, which was explicitly designed to be a pressure-release for new adventure gamers allowing themselves to “wish” their way through puzzles! So very quickly Wishbringer hits that problem (or perhaps intentional feature, such as in Hitchhiker’s Guide) that you’ll have to restart or restore earlier saves in order to even really get the sense of the game. I’m not sure it’s as bad as Hitchhiker’s Guide–I think as far as items go, if you miss one that’s needed to wish, you can solve the puzzle, and vice versa–but at least once I locked myself out of an area completely with something I still needed to do in there, forcing a restore.

I suppose you could say I’m being a little hard on this for, basically, having all the usual problems, and probably especially because I can’t help but compare it to my high watermark for Infocom (so far) Planetfall, designed by the more established Steven Meretsky. But I was definitely struck by the fact that–as is often the case–the prose only served to obfuscate rather than help a new player. Indeed, sometimes the text used to try and help a new player only made things worse! That area I got myself locked out of? I got myself locked out after the game told me I “didn’t need to refer to the switches to in this story” when what I actually needed to do was specifically refer to the FIRST switch and the SECOND switch.

(That one ended up in a trip to the invisiclues, unfortunately.)

So I don’t think is particularly successful as an introductory adventure–certainly no more than Planetfall, even accepting that that one has loads of empty rooms–but it doesn’t mean that I actually had a bad time with this. It is honestly rather charming. You play a day-dreaming postal worker who ends up in an evil, mirror-version of his seaside town on a quest to rescue a black cat (my favourite!) and as much as I’m not crazy about the map, I kind of get it–I think I’m just “spoiled” by Hitchhiker’s Guide’s self-contained vignettes (anyway, it’s not particularly big and it does have a central fountain hub). The puzzles are not hard if you follow the rule I always forget (examine, look behind, in, under and around EVERYTHING) and have a few restores under your belt. The story is no great shakes (outside of a weirdly dark story in the manual which doesn’t really relate to much) but, and I might be presumptuous here, there’s a Loom-like whimsy that implies Moriarty is more about giving the player a sense of place and feeling rather than a particularly deep narrative. And a few of the twists and turns are clever enough that I chuckled.

It’s a game I found myself a little more frustrated by than I hoped to be while playing it, but it’s a game I already think about warmly in retrospect. It doesn’t have anything about it that really blows your socks off–no Deadline chases, no Planetfall narrative thrills, no Hitchhiker’s meta gags–it’s just sort of sweet, like a kids’ fantasy novel that you read in an afternoon while feeling poorly because it just takes you somewhere pleasant for a while.

Will I ever play it again? It feels like one I’d return to, and it’s made me think that I should return to the many Infocom adventures from the pre-Cornerstone golden era I’ve skipped one day. 

Final Thought: Actually, speaking of kids’ fantasy novels, there actually was one for Wishbringer! And there were other Infocom books too! But my understanding is none of them were particularly good (though perhaps Wishbringer is the highlight.) As a huge fan of Nintendo’s Worlds of Power books–I read the hell out of Blaster Master and Castlevania II–I have to admit I’m interested in seeking them out anyway..

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[doiknowwhatimsaying]

shipka..

In the first half of Jody Shipka’s Toward a Composition Made Whole, she pushes us to rethink what we mean by composition, arguing that it’s not just about writing words on a page but about using various modes to communicate effectively. This really hit home for me, especially since I gave a presentation on multimodality for my ENG 7805 class last semester. While preparing, I realized that I actually prefer single-mode communication. I get easily overstimulated when there are too many things happening at once, like music, images, and text all competing for my attention.

Reading Shipka’s book made me reconsider my initial discomfort with multimodal content. She makes the case that to communicate well today, we need to understand how different modes, like visuals, layout, and sound, can work together to enhance our messages. She argues that mastering these interactions can make our communication more effective and engaging. So, I started to think that maybe my struggle wasn’t just about being overwhelmed but about not fully grasping how these various elements could complement and interact with each other.

Shipka’s insights tell me that instead of seeing my preference for straightforward text as a drawback, it could be a starting point for learning how to blend different modes more seamlessly. Her exploration of how different modes interact in the first half of her book helps shift the view from seeing multimodal composition as confusing to seeing it as a rich opportunity for deeper understanding and better communication. Her work provides a fresh perspective on how we can use multiple modes effectively, and it’s making me rethink how I approach and integrate various elements in my own compositions.

[mikaelalai-ardn631]

WEEK 9

What and who will you portray?

My photography series aims to portray everyday people and explore a more personal space of theirs, which is their bedroom and see what sort of things they like to collect. 

What might you communicate visually through the concept of portrayal?

Visually I might communicate how many different people have different styles, are different ages, show the way people decorate their rooms but we all are the same in the way that we collect things that we have attachments to. 

What is your position on your subject matter?

I have included myself in this series by starting the series with a self portrait as I felt that it was necessary for me to show the personal side of myself and my room if I was going to do the same to other people. 

What is your voice? What is unique about your subject or your approach to it?

I think this project is unique in the way I can really explore ideas of identity and individuality. However I feel as though there is almost an underlying critique of consumerism and capitalism because for myself personally, my collection has accumulated this much because of capitalism.

What do you have unique access to? A group of people, a place, a situation…?

I think I have unique access to lots of different people who I KNOW have collections of things that could be interesting to photograph. I can show the range of things that different people and age groups can collect.

Consider the important role the title takes in communicating your intention and how audiences might ‘read’ the book. What is your working title? 

My working title is currently “Bedroom Archives” as I feel like that gives the audience a pretty good idea that this series has something to do with bedrooms.

What would you like readers to think and feel?

I would like the readers to feel like they are taking a look into these random strangers lives and getting to know the different personalities of them by the way they pose, dress, decorate their room etc.

What is the role of the text within the book? How does the text relate to the story the images tell? How do they work together?

I think text is important in a portraiture series as viewers can learn the names of subjects and especially since I want to explore ideas of identity and individuality in my series, it's important to highlight things like people’s names.

How many shoots do you require to gain adequate coverage and successfully tell the story? 

As my concept requires me to photograph many different people, I expect to do at least 10 different shoots so that I can get a wide range of images.

Do you need gear and support with your shoots? What is your plan?

The only gear needed is a reflector and tripod. As my project focuses on people’s bedrooms, I don't really need anything else. 

What software and workflow will you use to edit, process, collate and design your photobook PDF?

I will be using camera raw to do post production editing on my images. Then I will be using Lightroom Classic to collate my images into a photobook with text. I did struggle a little bit with the text on LRC so I might also use Adobe Indesign. 

What is your research plan? 

I have looked at other photography series about people and bedrooms. I have seen the different ways of composition for the bedroom and models which have inspired me. 

What other photo books have you looked at? 

Other photo books I have looked at include Happy Victims by Kyoichi Tzuzuki, Inheritance by Andrea Stern and At Home and Aboard by Robin Morrison.

Are there decisions that have yet to be made? How will you resolve these?

I am photographing a wide age range of people so I am still trying to decide if I want to narrow it down and keep my subjects in the same age group. It will depend on the type of images I have taken and the layout I want to do.

[vhendersonarts246-01]

Blog for ch: 11 Typographic Design 

Okay, so this is probably the thing I struggle with most within my major. I always have a challenging text into something like an image or another symbol. I will get better as I work on it of course, but I really appreciate clever logos for this reason. I also remember doing a project that was basically 11/6-9, where we made letters with silhouettes of flowers in my other typography class. This was one of those projects I looked back on and wish that I could’ve worked on again because I know a lot more about the software and vectoring now. A lot of the work in this chapter reminds me of Paula Scher and the way she makes type, even traditional serif typefaces, seem so silly because of the letters bouncing around and changing angles. My favorite part of this chapter was probably the last few pages but especially the last one, it’s very captivating. It uses text to make something that feels almost like a mosaic, an artistic kind of beautiful. 

This week we finished our posters, AR type posters, and postcards for our National Park project, and then presented them in class. I’ve been working lately on my process book, and I’m enjoying it so far. Working on book and magazine layouts is one thing I enjoy more than others and it’s relaxing in a way. I hope this one will be the same. I have my layout on paper for what I want to do and have come up with a mood board and color palette which will both be applied to InDesign soon. We also began a new project where we have to design some branding based off a slang word, so I plan on starting that this weekend. Looking forward to it. 

[k-shah-arts246-03]

chapter 10

Something I struggle with when creating a composition like the process book spreads is having the images and text be cohesive instead of two separate elements on the page. I liked the quote from Armin Hofmann about placing text inside the picture instead of on top of it, that’s a really helpful way to approach graphic design, especially things where there is one large image with accompanying text. The jewelry store poster was a cool example of this that almost gave I Spy books, the text was moving with each element in the picture instead of placed over the top of all of it. It was also cool to see the case study on typographic film titles and see how each scene progressed. They were the same image but zoomed in a certain way to create a smooth transition between each. The True Lies sequence was probably my favorite because of the 3-D effect. I really liked how the first words turned into the second. Title sequences tend to pave the way for the rest of the movie and act as an intro for what the feeling of it is, so it's interesting to see how different ones are made and pieced together. 

As I'm designing my process book, the struggle I'm having is trying to figure out interesting compositions of the images and text that aren’t too repetitive with the other pages. I don’t want each spread or page to have the same layout, as that makes the book boring. So far, I’ve been playing around with multiple columns to avoid chunky paragraphs, and wrapping text around the images for more interest. I'm also working my wave design into the spreads to fill some space and keep my theme consistent, but trying to make sure I don’t use too many colors on each spread to overwhelm the work itself. I pretty much have all the elements of my book, I just have to spend this weekend piecing it all together and figuring out my final compositions. 

[designresearch604-ahnesshim]

Week 1: DRS ll Tutorial

The Creative

Who is doing the creative practice & underpinning research ?

I am still in the stage of discovering and learning but I was very much inspired by a graduate, Jordan Tane. Instead of focusing on the aesthetically pleasing designs and producing aesthetically pleasing designs, she found that research was a fundamental stage when beginning to design something or even starting on a design project. 

In that she found herself producing more meaningful and designs that relay a clear and concise message, a message that is fully understood to the target audience. 

Who am I as a designer ?

As mentioned I am still in the stage of fully understanding and growing as a designer and I think that there is always room to grow and develop as a designer and is never a steady linear line. 

However, a few things I’ve realised the past year and a half at AUT, I always make sure my work is meaningful and purposeful. In the process of designing I always question myself, “is this needed?”, “is this design purposeful and does it give purpose?”

What are the influences on me as a designer & where do they come from ?

I think learning to love a project and having passion for the project is quite important, something that really has impact on me as a designer. If I don’t enjoy it I feel that I design quite poorly. Therefore, whenever I am handed a brief I try find a bit of love and let that fuel me. 

I also find research interesting prior to the actual design work and that research helps me to produce assets and designs. I also look at similar and also different works such as physical material, layout of text, images and also on behance, pinterest and other existing creatives and designers. 

How can I unpack the personal design ideologies that shifts cultures, ethics, responsibiities that impact my design-thinking ?

I think having active conversations of the idea and also realising arising or even ‘problems’ that have existed and still exist can impact design-thinking and especially when coming to design, thinking about the implications it can have on others and what impact you want your design to have on others would be a way to unpack design ideologies. 

How might I expand my visual vocabulary by understanding the environmental, social, cultural, political contexts of my design influences ?

Reflecting on each of your design work and fruther pushing your project or your work, outside the box, not simply just outlining the brief but to push beyond and see what and how it impact it had or has on others. 

Where do I stand in relation to my practice and what do I value ?

Seeking feedback from peers, lecturers and even people who do not have any experience with design or knowledge in design is important, rather than trying to toughen it out by yourself. Allowing other and new perspectives and an outlook onto your design work will give you another new perspective to look at your work. Also staying true and create original designs but also finding enjoyments and love to the project youre working on. 

The Creation

What is the nature of my communication design practice + research ? 

I like to set deadlines but also allow myself to be flexible within that . I also tend to produce quite a lot of assets and research throughly, therefore I have a pool of information and assets I can pull from.

How does my environmental, social, cultural, sub-cultural, political contexts and influences show up in my work ?

I think these almost come very naturally, I don’t really have to force it. However, I do have to do more deep diving if it is something I want to use in my work. 

What key themes, ideas and conversations are speaking through or in my work ?

I found myself drawing to themes of identity a lot, even throughout high school. It’s something that I’ve always been quite passionate about. 

As a Kiwi-Korean, born and raised in NZ, I’ve struggled a lot with my identity growing up. Korean’s would say “i’m not korean enough” or, “I’m white-washed.”, and Kiwi’s would say, “I’m not a Kiwi”. I’ve always felt somewhat a little different. 

These themes were a common and reoccurring ideas in my design work. 

What specialist subject do I want to convey in my work ?

I still resonate and still am learning more about myself and I want to convey similar themes that I have found myself being drawn to.

Are there any specific techniques and crafts I want to hone in within my practice ?

I would love to learn more about lino printing, the slow craft of carving and ink rolling and the pressing is a beautiful process and something I would like to learn. I would also love to learn more about photography. 

The Creative Communities

Who are the local & global creatives, designers, illustrators, and photographers that you want to connect with ?

Seachange, Milk studio, George Haijan are studios and creatives that I am quite interested.  

What are the influences on them and what engages you in their work ?

Seachange’s design is a lot more groundbreaking and very new and fresh. They come up with effective but also category-breaking designs which are very clever, which makes me more interested about their work as well as milk studios.

George Haijan on the other hand, very artistic and crafty. He collages alot and uses pops of colours throughout his work which I find very interesting. He also uses the colour pink alot throughout his artworks. 

In what ways are they collaborative and engaging with communities ?

In ways they are are being collborative with materials and tools that help them to create these pieces of work, but also evoking feelings in work they produce. 

The two studios draw targeted audiences eyes to their branding, packaging. 

What impacts, concepts, thematics, and organising principles are at play in the creative practice ?

I think research, interest and passion in the project play a huge part in what they design and create artworks. Iterating, developing and also pushing the edge and being quite playful in what they create - breaking boundaries. 

Creatives wanted, wanted more alive than dead...

What excites you in the design and creative communities you are investigating ?

Although the end product is very exciting I think its the process and the thinking behind these end products. It is very exciting to see and reflect at how and what inspired them to create this in the way they did. I think that is what excites me the most. 

Who would you want to share a meal with ?

Who would you want to work with ?

I would love to work with George Haijan, learn screen printing, and very hands-on work which I love. 

Who would you want to mentor you ?

[fraserwallace55]

Rationale

I would have adjusted this to make it better if I had time to do so.

For my type specimen booklet I chose to explore the sans serif typeface Condor, created by American typographer David Jonathan Ross. I decided to go with this type after coming to the realisation that the original one I found to use in initial tasks wasn’t going to work, since it had no font families at all, along with only being in capital letters regardless of what was typed. Condor had 6 weights, italic versions of all of those, along with compressed, condensed, extended and wide versions in all these weights too. I also found that there was a much better, albeit vague connection with it to me, that being how it has a fair resemblance to type used in my family’s crest, but as a sans serif typeface rather than the original serif one used.

For the booklet’s palette I struggled for a while to work out a solid palette to use for it, and for a while I was working in black and white. I had committed to a simplistic duotone idea for the booklet’s general structure, since I found that would be a good way to keep the type prominent but also a strong way to differentiate and in a way isolate certain elements without making things overly intrusive and hard to focus on. Since I had no overtly personal preference to a certain colour, I never quite settled on something until I thought of using a mid red to pair with the white I knew I was going forward with as the other prominent colour. This was inspired by a rough combination of the two red tones used in my family’s tartan. I contemplated and partially experimented with how to implement the two tones of red as a flank to the main red I created along with the gold/yellow present in it, but with the direction I was going in with the structure of my booklet I couldn’t find a way to make these colours work in a way that was purposeful and effective. Due to this struggle, I ended up sticking with the very simplistic palette of the tartan inspired red, white and black, where I could try and form a slightly minimal and precise design with ideally a high emphasis on the cohesiveness and contrast of the different flat coloured pages within the booklet.

To begin experimenting with this typeface while simultaneously making it personally relate to me a bit, I incorporated my Pepeha (including smaller sized rough english translations of each line) along with occasionally adding words and phrases that relate to myself and some of my interests that shape me for each spread that included them prominently. I also made the type 3 dimensional like a pseudo 7th weight, which also made it much more decorative, which is why I largely limited it to being included in the cover pages of the booklet.

Outside of the text I tried experimenting with making use of images as something to fill in the red areas of the booklet in order to give more depth, but the ones I tried colour matching and putting into place didn’t really work in the way I would’ve liked, even when I turned them into a vector. Their detail I felt was way too high and thus made the booklet quite unbalanced, since the flat balance of its half red and white structure got disturbed by the additions I tried to implement, while also distracting from the main focus of the type a bit too much with this incorporation.Eventually I found that I could make use of my typeface for this extra detail, and using the outlines made some subtle details in every red area of the booklet. A lot of my page layouts, even though I had sketched initial ideas for them changed a lot, especially the weights spread (pages 14 & 15). This was mainly down to uncertainty about sizing and placement of certain elements, while maintaining a balance I was happy with, along with the dimensions of each individual page, which to me was quite unusual in the sense that I wasn’t used to it.

Overall, I learnt a lot from the creation of this booklet, including InDesign itself which I tried to almost exclusively make it in so that I wouldn’t be inclined to fall back on the more familiar Illustrator. I did struggle a bit with the layout of each of my spreads, which is probably where everything becomes a bit weaker in general, but I still feel that it turned out alright for my first attempt at producing something in an Adobe program that is completely new to me.

[epicdogymoment]

hey!! hope you don’t mind me contacting you - I saw in a tag that you found my literacy comic hard to read and really appreciated hearing that. organizing information clearly and accessibly is something I’m always trying to work on. I made the comic with my own visual/reading needs in mind, but I obviously only have my limited and personal experience!

I didn’t expect the comic to get traction before I edited in a transcript today, so I’m very grateful someone added an ID.

no pressure to answer, but if you have the bandwidth, do you mind telling me what made the comic hard for you to read? (layout, size or style of lettering, style of writing, color contrast, or something else?)

if you have extra bandwidth, besides including plaintext ID, do you have any suggestions about what tends to make things easier to read for you?

just gathering info for future projects, but I completely get if you’re not feeling like answering in detail. thanks so much either way! hope your day is going well.

hi! would like to start off by saying: i totally don't mind at all, and i'm glad you've decided to send this in, really.

link to the comic mentioned

[rest of the answer under the cut]

i should probably mention that i am in no way an expert in comicking or layout, just someone who struggles with reading comics sometimes, so definitely feel free to take all of this with a grain of salt

i'd say that the first thing that jumps out at me is that it's a lot of small text. it does read better on a computer screen (which is what i assume it was originally drawn on/meant to be read from) but on a phone screen, it really is hard to read

^ especially this section from the second page. while i do think the panelling here is quite smart, the text in the leftmost panel (the "tweet") and the rightmost panel (the "text messages") is far too small to read comfortably compared to the rest of the text, especially since they're both tilted

^ another textbox that's a little hard, also because of the slight odd angle combined with the size of the text

^ although, i found this one comparatively easier to read. the larger text really does help.

another thing that made it more difficult for me to read was that the order of textboxes was obscured by the layout sometimes, most obviously in the first page

^ after looking at this page for a while, it's obvious that the rightmost panel is supposed to be read, then the middle panel. but at a glance, it's not really visually clear, and the flow of the text is already a little harder to follow

it might be clearer to shift things around a little like this:

where either the entire middle panel begins lower, or the text and images start a little lower down.

^ similarly for this panel, it's a small thing, but the order is slightly obscured because the left panel (the first panel) is noticeably lower than the right panel (the second panel)

i've spent a lot of time picking apart your comic.... so i'd like to at least end off by saying that i really did enjoy it, even if it was a little difficult to visually latch onto for me! it is really lovely to look at visually, the colours are pleasing, i love the texture, and i was definitely happy to see an adapted version of that essay (which i just so happened to read recently. funny how that works)

anyway. once again i'm glad you decided to send this ask in, and i'm very, very happy to help. i sincerely hope that you found this helpful!

[originalpinkranger]

In Sickness and in Health - GSR

So, this was kind of therapeutic for me. Inspired by this post by @addictedtostorytelling. I, um, my husband and I have been trying to get pregnant for a while and it’s been a struggle. So, after I read her little meta, I got inspired and it’s something that I NEEDED to write. So, here you go. Something that wouldn’t stop flowing today. Enjoy!

In Sickness and in Health

GSR - Rated G

“No man, like I legitimately think Grissom knocked her up.”

 Greg whispered loudly over the lab table, Nick narrowing his eyes at him from his position at the other side.

 “You can’t be starting rumors like that man. Especially about Grissom.”

 “Hodges told me!”

 Now Nick really didn’t believe him. “And you honestly believe what Hodges says?”

 “No, but I have proof!” Greg stood up and moved over closer to Nick so no-one could hear him.

 “This is the text I got from Sara,” Greg cleared his throat and read the text to him in his best ‘Sara’ voice, “Greg, please make sure to follow up with Brass on the Carson case. I’m not feeling quite right today so I won’t be in. Also, please tell Warrick to get with Hodges on the trace analysis from the Wilson DB. Thanks.”

 Nick looked at him unamused. “Nowhere in that text does it say, ‘Greg I’m pregnant’.”

 “Okay but hear me out. Sara never misses work. She came in with 102 fever once and didn’t blink an eye. AND I had to stop on the side of the road yesterday so she could puke. I’m telling you man. Grissom knocked her up.” Greg put his phone back in his pocket and stood next to Nick with his arms crossed, grinning at his potential discovery.

 “Alright boys, what have you got for me?” Catherine sauntered in, standing in between them. She surveyed the both of them and realized something was off.

 “Alright Greg, spill, what is it?” Catherine put her hand on her hip and leaned against the table, waiting for Greg to open like a can of biscuits.

 “Greg here thinks Sara’s pregnant.” Nick spoke for him, letting the air out of Greg’s balloon.

 Catherine stared at Greg like he grew another head.

 “You can’t be serious…”

 Greg threw up his hands in exasperation.

 “I swear no one believes anything I ever say! I’m taking my ball and going home.” Greg snatched the folders he was working on off the table and stormed out of the layout room.

 Catherine shook her head and turned her attention towards Nick.

 “You know Cath maybe he’s right.” Nick leaned forward on the lab table and Catherine followed behind him, putting her glasses on to look at a case he was working on.

 “I did see her eating crackers and drinking a 7UP the other day. I have my suspicions. A woman knows.” She spoke as she looked over the document, clearly unfazed by the whole thing. “I guess all the jokes about Grissom’s virility will be put to bed.” Catherine put down the folder and smiled, bemused at the idea of Grissom being a father.

 Nick pondered. Maybe Greg (ney Hodges) was right. A slow smile started to form on his face.

 Grissom. That old son of a gun. He took a mental note to stop and buy some cigars on the way home to congratulate him.

 The next day, Nick walked into Grissom’s office with a fancy box and a huge grin on his face.

 Grissom looked up at him over his glasses.

 “What is it, Nick?”

 “I just wanted to come in and congratulate you.”

 Grissom really looked at him now. “For what Nick?”

 “On being a proud papa!”

 Grissom took off his glasses and set them on this desk, threading his fingers together.

 “Excuse me?”

 “Yeah...”

 And so.

 “Hodges had told Greg that Sara was pregnant because she had to go out of the room quickly because her stomach was queasy, and Greg got a text that Sara wasn’t coming in because she and I quote ‘wasn’t feeling quite right’ and he had to pull over the other day for her to puke on the side of the road and Catherine said she saw her in the break room drinking 7UP and eating saltines so I put two and two together and just wanted to congratulate you.” He took a long breath and opened the shiny, wooden box he brought with him.

 “So, congratulations daddy.” He grinned at Grissom.

 Grissom looked down at the box full of cigars and then back up at Nick. He rubbed his eyes with his hand, then, pointedly

 “She has the flu, Nick.”

 “Just the flu?”

 “Just the flu.”

 “Oh.”

 “Also, smoking is bad for you.” Nick closed the box slowly. His face fell and got red with embarrassment.

 “I…” His mouth open and closed like a fish, not knowing what to say.

 Grissom helped him.

 “You can leave now Nick.”

 Nick stuttered an ‘I’m sorry’ and showed his way out of Grissom’s office.

 Grissom leaned back and sighed heavily, his mind drifting to Sara at home.

 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 Hearing the keys rattle in the door, startled the bundle of fur at the foot of the bed and leapt up from his position by human number 1. Barking his head off down the hall and to the door, tail wagging uncontrollably, waiting for what was to come next.

 “Hey buddy. Have you been taking care of mom?” Grissom bent down to give Hank a scratch behind his ear and Hank thanked him by licking his hand.

 Hank then turned around and ran back towards the bedroom where Sara laid.

 Grissom heard a loud sneeze.

 He sloughed off his jacket, hanging it up in the closet by the door and toed off his shoes.

 He made his way to the back bedroom but stopped at the fridge first to grab a water for Sara.

 He stopped at the doorway.

 “How are you feeling?”

 She blew her nose into a tissue and sniffed.

 “Like I got hit by a Mack truck. Although at this point, that may be more pleasant.”

 He chuckled and made his way towards her, handing the bottle to her. She took it from him and took a long swig.

 “Ugh. I haven’t felt this bad since I was a kid.”

 Grissom reached up and put his hand on her forehead. “Cool to the touch. Looks like your fever broke.” He slid his hand from her forehead to her cheek, stroking it softly with his thumb.

 Sara leaned into his touch and gave him a soft smile. “Mmm. Thank you for taking care of me.”

 “In sickness and in health, isn’t that how it goes?”

 Her smile got wider. “It is.”

 His mind drifted back to the events of the day. “So, um, today was interesting.”

 She quirked an eyebrow at him and brought the bottle to her lips to drink, “how so?”

 “Hodges started a rumor that you were pregnant.”

 She spit out her water and choked slightly, gasping for air as he rubbed her back.

 “Excuse me?! How in the world- “

 “Because of all the times that you needed to throw up. Everyone just assumed. I got an earful from Nick in my office. Standing there with a box of cigars.”

 She leaned back on her pillows and sniffed. “That’s…quite an assumption.”

 He nodded, “it is.”

 The silence was palpable.

 Sara picked at the lint on the bed sheet and didn’t look up at him. “What is it, Sara?”

 He knew when she got quiet, she was analyzing something and trying to figure out how to put it in words.

 “…would that be such a bad thing?” She looked up at him slowly, searching his face for an answer.

 Now he was the one that quirked a brow at her. “Sara…”

 “Gil..I…” She started and then took a deep breath and continued, “you know that I had a less than stellar childhood and I guess I never really thought about the idea of having a child because of the childhood that I had and thought that maybe I would be a terrible mother because I didn’t know how to nurture a child or how to take care of one but maybe…” She drifted off and looked down.

 He lifted her chin and searched her eyes, “Maybe what honey?” He said softly.

 “Maybe I’d want one with you.” She whispered with so much hope in her voice.

 He sighed. He knew that his answer had to be carefully chosen. It’s true he was never good with words, but this answer had to be worded oh so carefully and be the right one.

 He thought about what to say and straightened his gaze at her. “Sara, with my age and my hearing, are you sure that’s such a good idea?”

 She sniffed again, not sure if it’s her sickness or fighting back tears. She reached for his hand and held it.

 “Gil, I know that things have been complicated, but when I was in that desert, I had a lot to think about. Especially about us. And maybe, maybe I thought that I would never get the chance to be a mom. More of a what if. And now I have that chance and maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad thing.”

 He really looked at her then.

 “Sweetheart, is this something that you really want?”

 She squeezed his hand.

 She nodded, “yes, it’s something I really want.”

 “Okay.”

 “Okay?” Her eyes lit up.

 He nodded his assurance this time and squeezed her hand back.

 Then.

 “ACHOO!”

 He really belly laughed then. Her sneeze breaking the intense conversation and his silent relief.

 “Let’s focus on you getting better first and we’ll talk about babies. For now, hydrate and sleep.”

 She didn’t argue. Sara shimmied down the covers and he pulled the sheets over her shoulders.

 Hank circled next to her and laid back down, making sure that she was safe and sound, doing his natural duty.

 Grissom smiled and leaned down to kiss her forehead as she drifted back off to sleep.

 Closing the door to the bedroom, he walked to his office and fired up his laptop. He put on his glasses and Googled.

‘Men over 50 and being a first-time father.’