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Soigné

These past seven weeks I’ve focused on creating a solution to a problem I’ve encountered for fifth-teen plus years; the similarity of shampoo and conditioner bottles and how a near-sighted person constantly feels the struggle of bringing a bottle within an inch of their nose just to assure them that they have selected shampoo or conditioner. 

Creating different bottles wasn’t enough for a new brand that would have to face a overly saturated market, there was to be more in depth design and thought put behind it to assure these would address the issue at hand while making a significant appeal to consumers.

With all that, I knew my bottle designs would have to be more than just two already seen bottle forms, there was a sense of needing to make sure to create something that was reassuring with every inch of the bottle that was being touched. 

My bottle designs are not only cohesive while being completely two different shapes, they also have raised elements and a color story that reassure the consumer they have chosen not only the right product but also the right product for their certain hair needs. Continuing with the visually impaired community, I knew adding braille was the obvious choice. The braille speaks to the collection and also the product that is within the bottle. I’m overly please with the way these turned out; not going to lie- tears of joy filled my eyes once I was ready to save and export the final file into Photoshop. Just from the challenge of learning a new program from scratch to seeing it come to life (virtually) is so gratifying. 

Keeping with my luxury for all motto, I look forward to continuing my research with pH levels and all hair types as this is more than seven weeks allows. I think having this research to show and then developing more of the brand to fit this aspect will set the bar high for other popular brands to consider following suite.

All in all, this short and sweet blog post was just a simple reflection of the one deliverable that took the most time and was the soul purpose and reason why i wanted to commit to this exploration of the others and thankfully while all my deliverables were great and significant to completing the overall project, my satisfaction in learning a new program quickly and creating my own 3D rendering continues to assist my decision on coming back to school and studying design once and for all. This semester has been wonderful and I’m beyond thankful for the amount of ideas I have in my arsenal when it comes to creating my portfolio.

THANKS!! 

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Inquiry 7: Sports + Moving Image

Wanting to give the animation method a spin since the beginning the semester, I finally decided for my final adventure to take on the task. With zero knowledge about After Effects, I began with tutorials upon tutorials. After five hours of watching many tutorials, I’ve realized I was still completely clueless on the program. 

Feeling defeated, I decided I wasn’t going to give up on creating some kind of moving image. So, I decided to create a GIF that would be showcased on all social media platforms for the Louisville Alumni Association’s promotion for the 2019 Homecoming week/game. Louisville Alumni has been trying extremely hard to make a more significant presences on social media and I felt having an animated GIF would help the cause.

With the imagery, I was forced to work within brand guidelines; but was creating a design that would keep the elegance of Louisville Alumni while communicating the proper information. 

Still Frames: Beginning to end

Below you will see a video mockup of what the GIF post would look like on Instagram and the actual video in detail. While I’m pleased with what the GIF looks like and how it successfully displays the information- I still would like to add more of a steady motion with After Effects to allow the viewer to see the visual information easier. Not to mention, conquering After Effects once and for all.

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Instagram mockup with the GIF for UofL’s 2019 Homecoming game.

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INQUIRY 7: Animated GIF for UofL’s 2019 Homecoming game.

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Human-Centered + Branding

Soigné /swän ‘ yā/: dressed very elegantly; well groomed.

Mission Statement: Our mission is to improve your beauty experience. We create extraordinary formulas, tools and hair care collections using the most powerful combination of nature and technology. Quality ingredients that marry botanicals with the best of lab-formulated. Fragrances that make the person sitting next to you lean a little closer. High-end technology and effective formulas with end results that make you sparkle. Every day is a good hair day.

Brand Guidelines: 

COLORS: Muted, rich colors. Changing with each collection. Two colors each, with the addition of black or white as a complementary color.

TYPOGRAPHY: GOTHAM BOOK, MEDIUM AND BLACK

LOGO: Should be in the darkest color used with the collection.

KEY ASPECT: Different bottle design per item within collections. Colors alternating to keep cohesion but also to enhance the difference between shampoo, conditioner, etc.

soigné | Detoxifying Collection: shampoo

soigné | Detoxifying Collection: conditioner

soigné | Detoxifying Collection: hair mask

soigné | Purifying Collection: shampoo

soigné | Purifying Collection: conditioner

soigné | Purifying Collection: hair mask

soigné | Soothing Collection: shampoo

soigné | Soothing Collection: conditioner

soigné | Soothing Collection: hair mask

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Music + Game

Excited for my first and most likely only time to attend the Grammys, I decided to take a fun spin on a deck of playing cards and incorporate one of my favorite artist through representative symbols and imagery.

I think this exploration was extremely fun, as I’m a huge fan of both music and playing cards. I think there’s endless opportunities in expanding this exploration into other musicians, music genre, and even decades of music. I definitely don’t want to stop there and would love to dig further into the possibility of making it interactive design with either the potential in a gaming app or even something that is virtual when playing with the physical deck of cards.

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Inquiry 4

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inquiry 3

H2O Run is a 5K race that partners with Clean Water Action that raises awareness of our water safety and how we can take action to make sure that the Clean Water Act stays intact.

h20 Run Logo

h2o Mark

h2o Run Promotional Banner

h2o Run Promotional Banner

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personal history + user journey

With little to no knowledge of how to bartend, I somehow was granted a bartending position at Mesh Louisville about two years ago. Having just a list of basic cocktails to learn, I was able to learn the ins and outs of proper measuring with counts and making sure the balance of sour and sweet was accomplished for the customer to NOT return their cocktail. Feeling confident, I thought I had this bartending gig under control, until it was time to create cocktails for a seasonal cocktail menu change. 

I’m not a very picky eater, however, I used to be and I feel I’ve wasted a lot of time figuring out ingredients and knowing how they taste and their distinct prosperities that cause their specific reaction on the tongue. I noticed this lack of knowledge when I couldn’t describe wines to customers and more importantly, the menu items to customers and what wine or cocktail I think would pair perfectly with it. I knew this would happen before I got behind the bar, but I didn’t fully understand how important it was in this type of establishment that changes their menu seasonally and has a wonderful chef who works extremely hard on creating these wonderful dish masterpieces for everyone to enjoy. Luckily, I had my husband who has a dignified palette that loves to just talk and educate me on these things. He had just taken on a new role as a spirit specialist with a distributor and was wanting to expand his knowledge with spirits and had just bought numerous of books on this subject. He gave me two books, The Drunken Botanist and The Bar Book, with each book dedicated to all the things I’ve been stressing about I found both books to really help expand my knowledge on what I needed to do with creating signature cocktails and allowing me to explore my palette more.

Having this experience and still working through it still because it’s a lot to learn, I felt that utilizing the two topics that these two books focus on and create a educational tool for anyone who is looking into becoming a bartender or one that is just starting off and wanting to branch their knowledge in all the possibilities of mixology. Which is why I created the concept called, The Botanical Bartender; an educational learning tool that incorporates monthly subscription boxes and online webinars to help expand the knowledge and most importantly, the palette of the amateur bartender. 

The Botanical Bartender will have three levels, starting with the basics and expanding upon each one of those in getting more detailed and involved with the ingredients and how they come into play with the cocktails. Level one will be dedicated to the spirits we’ve come to know and love and the natural source that created them. Level two will expand upon the basics and showcase other plants, herbs, etc. that can come into the cocktail through different syrups; both simple and compound. Finally, level three will get into the more complex science of creating tinctures, infusions, and bitters and the best ingredients that are used for those. 

Having these three levels in monthly subscription boxes will allow them to actually explore these ingredients but including a webinar will allow them to listen and follow with a master mixologist and have someone showing them and explaining the things that are important or notable when it comes to the ingredients. I would also like to incorporate distillery tours and master distillers to give an insight of the process of spirits and the importance of the ingredients and why they are so selective in making sure they are the perfect fit for their spirit. Having this to showcase through the webinar will allow people who are not capable to utilize distillery tours due to location and be able to experience this first hand through these videos. Also included would be information about the natural source, recipes, and the difference of geographical value to each ingredient and how it affects the taste of the ingredient.

I think this will bring a new concept to the monthly subscription boxes, especially when it comes to spirits. Right now, we see numerous boxes dedicated to spirits and cocktail making but it’s just showcasing certain brands that are available for purchase and a cocktail you can recreate using that product. Nothing out there really dives into the process of spirits and other crucial parts of cocktails and how there is endless possibilities in creating signature cocktails with the array of herbs, plants, fruits, etc. that are available to the palette. I think The Botanical Bartender will change this and could be potentially be picked up by other educational programs that are used for suppliers.

Example of the monthly subscription box 

Example of the bottle and the label describing the contents

Example of the brochure included in the box with brief description of the ingredient that is being showcased.

Front panel of brochure.

Second panel of brochure with brief history of ingredient.

Third panel of brochure; in this case, agave is the major plant used in tequila, so this will give a brief history of tequila.

Fourth panel of the brochure; which is important terminology of tequila and the different classifications that tequila comes in.

Mockup of the homepage of the online portion of The Botanical Bartender.

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place + product/app design

After many years of working retail and hospitality positions, I’ve learned that the best way to convert a new customer into a recurring customer is by a VIP/rewards program that will reward the customer for their support. With seeing the success of these programs, I felt this could be a great idea for the Louisville scene to adopt; more specifically, the restaurant scene.

To begin this process, I looked into a couple concepts that have already been established in the city. First was the Urban Bourbon Trail. The trail has multiple restaurants participating, and with every purchase made, the customer receives a stamp in their passport. With six stamps, the customer can take their passport to the visitors center and receive a t-shirt. While I think this is a great concept, that could potentially lead into more ideas, I feel this is driven towards visitors to the city, not locals. 

Second, I looked into Louisville Originals. Louisville Originals only has nineteen participating restaurants and about half of these restaurants have been on the scene for more than ten years. While these restaurants are still striving, they don’t really speak to the growth or the variety that our restaurant scene has evolved into. Also, a huge flaw within this concept is that it has a physical card for the users to use. While typically all VIP/reward programs come with a card, I’ve noticed after multiple failed attempts of acquiring people to sign up for the program that one of their main reasons that they don’t sign up is they don’t want another card to carry around with them. 

Lastly, I researched Do502. While their content is great and I want my app to potentially have the bountiful amount of information, their app is just sad and lacks so much potential. So taking all these things into consideration, I decided that the best way for the Louisville restaurant scene could create a reward program would be through an app that eliminates the need of a physical card and would allow individual restaurants to set their own rewards to give away and choose how many visits it is required to obtain the reward. 

502food is an app design that allows users to research restaurants via either cuisines or neighborhoods and with each restaurant having their own QR code that will be printed on a purchase receipt for the user to scan into the app that will allow the app to track their progress towards the reward. With all the information users will need in making their decision on what restaurant they will like to spend their meal at, I wanted the app layout to be simple and easy for even the most incompetent user.  

I created the app in Adobe XD from scratch and while I was creating the app, I thought of numerous things that would elevate the app into its fullest potential:

1. While a rating system for the restaurants would be a great start to letting users provide their own feedback, a rating system for their menu items would increase feedback for the restaurant and help them make the decisions in how they can approve certain items for more customers to enjoy.

2. Giving users the ability to rate everything from the restaurant as a whole down to a certain menu item will give us the information in order to create top ten lists. These lists can be directed towards a certain cuisine down to the best desserts. I think top ten lists are easy and fun ways to get to help persuade a customer to trying new things.

3. Lastly, once all the kinks are worked out and the app is fully running with all the potential that has possibly thought of- this reward app program could branch out into local shopping, attractions, bars, etc. The city of Louisville is constantly becoming more independent and weird, and the locals love having the ability to support locally so why not reward customers for helping out our local community. 

I definitely think this idea has potential with further exploration into all the possibilities, I can really see something like this hitting the streets and becoming successful; especially if participating restaurants were willing to create decent rewards that customers feel is appropriate for the amount of visits they are asked to come in order to receive the reward.

login page

homepage

cuisine page

neighborhood page

favorites page

individual restaurant page

mobile mockups

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tiffanyfeimerdesign.com

At last the spring semester is coming to a close, to which it means we are to construct our personal websites as the final project. Engaging every single bit of information from codeAcademy to prototypes, I knew I wanted my clean aesthetic to really show through with my personal website. Simplicity is key for me, I want the viewer to be engaged and impressed with the work that is being showcased; the work speaks for itself. 

I began with Squarespace as my hosting site. It was a struggle at first but with some time and patience, I created the website. Being able to have somewhat of a free range with layout composition in XD all semester spoiled me. I wanted to flip text into a vertical line; but wasn’t able to with Squarespace. I plan on working on this with CSS code this summer, as I was afraid of ruining everything I created before the final.

Having my website completed and ready for the real world, I conducted tests on performance. I noticed that the images were taking too long to load and learned a valuable lesson about how to properly save images for web. Image files and orientation of text were my only two problems I encountered, which was bound to happen. I know that the world of technology is forever changing while still having so much growth to encounter and to have problems like these are what to expect when being a designer. This course has shown me how much there is to learn when it comes to UX/UI design. It has brought out a new love and interest that I didn’t realize I had; which is exactly what I needed to see and feel as the technological world continues to grow and my design abilities grow with it. 

With all that being said, check out my site! tiffanyfeimerdesign.com 

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PSA: Respect the peach!

It is funny how we as society have sexually objectified a piece of fruit. Every one, or everything in this case, is at risk of being sexually exploited. Although having this modern-day connotation of a peach representing a human’s behind led to a informative and relative concept for an Ad Council campaign that is based off a blue law in Virginia.

For project five in web design, we were required to select a blue law and establish an Ad Council campaign that would entail a series of three web banners/billboards and a responsive website for both desktop and mobile devices. For me as a designer, I want to make an impact on my audience and usually that forces me to think of legit situations (or potentially real situations) in which there is an understanding that engages and hopefully leaves a lasting impression. I initially selected the blue law: In Indiana, no one may catch a fish with their bare hands. I had this whole idea of cleanliness and sanitation that revolves around handing washing and preparing food. Being in the restaurant industry I saw the connection, but after peer reviews I was the only one still seeing the connection. After some time thinking about what feedback I had received and researching more into the initial blue law, I realized it was a bit far-fetched and really would have been a harder concept to create a campaign with. So I went back and did some more research of blue laws.

“In Virginia, a man may face 60 days in jail for patting a woman’s derriere.”

At last, I found my blue law. Happy with my decision and thinking about how appropriate it was with the #MeToo Movement that has taken over 2017-2018 (and rightfully so!), I was plague with a new dilemma. How to keep it relative without using the actual #MeToo Movement. I knew it would have the connection, I mean how could it not?, but I wanted and needed it to be my own in a sense. That is when a crucial part of feedback was given to me, are we going to see the peach emoji? Bam! I had an audience and I had a subject to tie everything together. 

My audience would be female teens to young adults, more specifically college students; the age in which everyone has grown up with technology and use it more than any other age group. My purpose to promote awareness of cyber harassment, along with sexual harassment and how it is just as pertinent as physical harassment. I wanted a clean layout for both my billboards and website; catchy, attractive, and informative.

I believe I achieved a successful, attractive cohesive look for my campaign. When I think of the age that I wanted to reach, I think of less is more. I believe that with the constant, chaotic everyday world everyone is living in, we have a developed a smaller attention span and we are intrigued by short and quick informative bits; something quick that provides the most vital massage. With that I wanted plentiful white space and easy, quick reads that are catchy, yet informative. 

Billboards:

Image-Dominant

Text-Dominant

Image + Text

For my billboard/web banners, I wanted a clean design with crisp colors that would pop against any city background in a public space. Thankfully the beautiful, crisp colors of the peach popped so nicely against a white background. I wanted to tie in the illustration aspect of the emoji into the actual peach, which is why I created a vector drawing of a leaf to be attached to the real peach image. It hindsight, it may have only been needed for the image-dominant banner, but I enjoy having it on both peach images.

Mobile Website:

Homepage

About

Other Resources

Desktop Website:

Homepage

About

Other Resources

For my website, I wanted the same cleanliness and white space to be mimic from the banners into my overall website design. This was rather hard to achieve with the mobile website as there is hardly in space to begin with. So having to begin with the mobile portion of this campaign was smart in order to make sure I am providing the proper proportions for such a small screen. The desktop website was simple once everything from the mobile website was decided. It had me thinking maybe there is too much white space; but I don’t think there is too much white space as my banners had the same amount of white space and that was what made it so clean and crisp looking.

After presenting my campaign to the class, I was very pleased with the positive feedback I received. Especially since my audience is the age of my classmates. To hear that everyone really enjoyed my vision and supported/understood the purpose, was beyond satisfying. There was a few mentions of the body copy of the mobile site needing to be larger; I totally agree. I think that was a constant struggle throughout the entire project, as I mentioned before with having such a small canvas/screen to begin with. Even through testing the prototype on my smartphone, I still never got a confident feel on the body copy. It is definitely an adjustment I’ll make.

I really enjoyed this project; it was a great beginning to see different components to an entire campaign (or project) in which you must assure everything is cohesive in purpose and design. This project and the previous project have really made me enjoyed learning more about UX design, especially knowing how much this is just the beginning of the technological advances that will be made in my lifetime. We’ve already come so far (well, since I’m older than the rest of the classmates and have seen the beginning of the internet and where we are now), that knowing and continuing my learning about UX/UI design is so important for staying compatible as a graphic designer amongst such creative and innovative designers in the world. The crazy thing is how there is just so much more to learn, too! Looks like my summer plans have just been made. 

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Beautifying my wireframes.

In continuation of the sitemaps and wireframes, I built my website redesign for the Family Scholar House and I must say I’m pretty pleased with the final product. I learned how important a successful wireframe is when conducting the overall layout for a website; essentially having a wireframe with all the headers and body copy eliminated the headache of having to figure out the important informative content to include and allowed me to focus solely on the cosmetic look of my design. 

I really wish I had gotten the cosmetic look completed a little bit sooner so I had the opportunity to work with the Invision application; I think having the components that invision has available that XD doesn’t could really showcase my redesign to it’s fullest. However, with how simple the navigation is in general, I think XD worked just find for this assignment. I’ll definitely revisit this assignment and export it to Invision and develop those characteristics prior to portfolio day.

My only personal critique for myself that I think I should further explore is my solution to the other pages under each section of the website; which was mentioned in my prior post. As you can see above in the image, this is the Our Story page, and at the bottom toward the right, immediately before the footer is this line with links of more information about the organization. I don’t know if I’m completely settle with this outcome. I definitely think on this page, compared to the other ones with this line of other links, there is a spacing issue with how close it is to the fact located above it. I think it would be a good idea to explore the idea of drop menu that would pop up when the viewer hovers over the navigation title; which this is something that would’ve been done in the Invision application successfully. So, I do think it’s something to look at when I return back to the project and have the chance to finally learn Invision. I do like the solution I did come up with, too. The navigation is simple and straight-forward; which I believe non-profit organization sites should be. The sole purpose of their sites is to be an accessible way to inform people about their organization, which I think I did well. I think the most important information is showcased within the body copy of each section and then there is the opportunity for the viewer to continue their reading about the organization if they want information. 

After reading the feedback following the presentations, I think some of the ideas given to help enhanced the site were a little vague or not as constructive as I had hoped for. I do think my site has a positive emotion behind it; whereas the images are showcasing single parents and/or children happy and loving. To me that is a positive, loving family vibe that is also reflected in the care and resources the Family Scholar House provides. Now, I do think I could have had more picture of the single parents with their diplomas or studying to showcase the organizations ultimate purpose of helping single parents graduate with a degree, but I also think that would’ve been shown in the other pages that I didn’t do for the assignment. So, maybe this is something I do in continuation for my portfolio; along with a fillable form with prompts that would be the application process in order to become a member within the organization. Presentation-wise, I should’ve been better prepared in the points I wanted to discuss. I felt like I was almost repetitive with somethings I said. 

Overall, happy with the outcome and I think it was a strong design for what I wanted it to serve, direct and informative. I’m looking forward to develop the overall design in Invision and having a solid presentation of this site for portfolio day.

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My wireframe prototype for Family Scholar House. Read more below to find out how I dissected the current website and redesigned a more up-to-date, user-focused website that promotes their cause and engages the viewer to learn more about their organization more successfully.

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sitemaps + wireframes

What’s the problem? When selecting a non-profit organization’s website to develop an improved sitemap and wireframe, I wanted to utilize an organization I believe in and one that was lacking essential elements that were preventing the website from being successful and user-friendly; this is why Family Scholar House was selected.

Already providing the valuable information one needed to work with as body copy, the current website for Family Scholar House lacked a few components that are essential for an efficient website; organization, visual hierarchy, images and graphic icons that drive important stats, and fillable forms/call to actions that engaged the user to apply and/or sign-up right at that moment. 

Below you will see two images. First is the current layout of their “Join Us” page. As you see they explain what they provide and what the qualifications of current and potential participants obtain in order to be considered, but it is lacking a fillable form or a call to action that will get them to a fillable form that prompts the user to apply right at that moment instead of telling the user to open another tab and compose an email; which they lacked prompts for the potential candidate to include in their email that speaks to why they should apply. This is when I determined that a call to action leading to a fillable form could be beneficial.

Second image is the current layout of their “Get Involved” page. You will notice the section regarding monetary donations is double exposed. There is information about how one can become a sponsor with recurring monthly payments but there is a lack of organization as there is no separation between each level and also one-time donations. Additionally, I decided another call to action leading to a fillable form to apply for volunteering opportunities could increase the volume of volunteer applications; engaging users to act now instead of later.

Sitemaps and wireframes: Having explored the page throughly and seeing slight flaws to their overall organization and accessibility to all potential users (i.e. majority of their stats and donation forms were in downloadable PDFs that not everyone has access to), I conducted my sitemap to have six main categories of navigation that would be divided up into subcategories that pertained to the main category. I decided to include more of the information that was given through the PDF files on the current website and tied it into the proper categories.

With a sitemap completed and approved, I started drafting ideas for my wireframes. For my five wireframes, I focused on the Homepage, Our Story page, Becoming A Member page, Get Involved page, and the Sponsorship page. I believe these were the best for a starting point to convey the overall flow of organization and navigation points for the website. If I could add another, and maybe I will for the upcoming project, I would show a fillable form that I was discussing earlier that I really believe would bring a great deal of success for the page and the organization as a whole. Back to the wireframes, I focused on making sure what the current site was lacking was carefully considered and resolved. 

First, I focused on the organization of each page and the visual hierarchy was clear and easy to understand. I stuck with this theme of certain sub-headers (sometimes doubling as a call to action) were framed within a scholar banner- like shape that played into the organization. I worried it may have gotten to redundant, so I made sure to vary the number of them with each page.  These banner shapes gave a really great directional purpose for the user to continue to scroll down the page and further their exploration of the information being provided. 

Second, there needed to be more quick fact briefs that are key in explaining how successful the organization has been up-to-date. I felt placing graphic icons that relate to these facts above the copy would be a nice, attractive break from type. Adding more imagery to other pages was a great space filler, while also achieving an emotional connection for the user.

Last, I wanted to make sure the call to action had a presence that said, “click me!” This was one thing I felt was a big flaw on their current website and knew this was an area to improve on. On the Become A Member page, I have the call to action immediately located underneath the qualifications banner to prompt the viewer to get the process started immediately. Same with the Get Involved page,  I have a call to action that pertains to each way of helping the organization out. I do think I could align those call to actions in the center more to the banner so they are essentially under the point of those banners.

After the group critique, I got the confirmation from my fellow peers that the banners are done in a way that doesn’t seem redundant. I definitely need to rework the sub-headers links/pages that are beneath the main header to let the user know these are other pages with more information. I do not think graying the current page really is doing that successfully; it was suggested to repeat the bar over top of the header like shown in the navigation bar. I agree that is one way, but I’m personally thinking it needs a new placement. I do agree that there can be some alignment resolutions when it comes to some of the call to actions and the secondary headers in the banners on the Get Involved page. All things I plan on resolving for the next project. Even though the donate now call to action is double-exposed on every page in the header and footer, I do believe I should have another call to action within one of the subcategories on the Get Involved page. Only because it is almost expected to be there for users when they are navigating a non-profit website and immediately look under ways to help or get involved for a one-time monetary donation. Maybe this is not necessary, I will continue to ask others their opinions as I construct my website for the following project.  All in all, I feel the navigation of my site is successful and resolved the problems that were easily noticed on the current website. 

codeAcademy // HTML Tables + CSS Selectors + Visual Rules

Last week’s codeAcademy is a bit confusing as I couldn’t figure out how I got three columns in the final project-- until I realized I switched two of the characters in the closing tag to cause an incorrect code. It’s funny how easily these things can happen and how hard it is to find the actual problem. (Luckily, no computers were harmed in this slight confusion.) 

This week’s codeAcademy was fun. I think the CSS aspect of coding will be more enjoyable to read and learn more about; duh, us designers are all about the appearance of the final product.

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decompose + compose

I’ve been really nervous about this web design course for the entire winter break; I was worried about the amount of code knowledge I was going to need when coming into this semester and I was fully relieved to know we are expected to know nothing. 

Composing a webpage: For my homepage that would describe two truths and a lie about me, I wanted to compose a game that would be a branch off my ‘portfolio’ section of my hypothetical webpage. The very first page you see has three circle images that correlates to either the truths or the lie. 

As the user moves the mouse over the image, the image would fade out and a ring around the image would illuminate while the truth or lie would be summarized in a few words. The image below shows you what every circle would look like for presentation purpose only; in reality, they can only be “highlighted” if the mouse is essentially hovering over the image. These images are considered my main call-to-action.

Once the user has clicked on an image and try to “guess” if it is indeed a fact, a new page will appear with the answer as the header. The subheader is the truth or lie, which is followed by body copy that goes into more informative detail about the truth/lie. Below is an example of what the fact/fiction pages would look like.

For this fact, I saw an opportunity to share a social sharing button that would link the user to my instagram page to learn more about my experience with having my design in a runway show. I thought it was a nice change to showcasing the social sharing buttons in the contact portion of a webpage. In addition to the social sharing button, I also had another call to action with the Learn more about Peace Over Violence button; being part of promoting a great cause like Peace Over Violence was great and continuing my support by extending a link to their website was just an added bonus to bring in another call to action.

Decomposing my webpage after a critique: All in all I thought my webpage was easy to understand and composed a clean layout. After reading my in-class reviews and stepping back from the design, I feel there is definitely some changes that could be made to help with the success of this project. First, I would add a portfolio link within my navigation bar-- maybe decrease the size of the navigation links. The main calls to action could be tweaked in a way that would be easier read as calls to action instead of relying on the user to immediately know that they have to drag their mouse over the image. I think the bread crumbs are very successful but I think this project would have been better suited as part of the about me section instead of a part of my portfolio. The Instagram icon could be scaled a little smaller. The body copy could have less characters per line to allow more white space between the body copy and the image to the right. Needless to say, I’ve learned quite of bit about the importance of a webpage’s composition and how just like print, visual hierarchy is very importance in assuring the correct format of information is being relayed to the audience in the way the creator wants it to be. 

Within time, my fear of web design will diminish as I continue to learn more about coding and other important elements of designing a web. Along this journey, I must be open to constructive-criticism because like I said before, I know nothing and I’m only going to learn if I continue to ask questions and request constant feedback.

codeAcademy // HTML: Elements and Structure lesson

I’m beyond thankful for this website. I found this lesson to be very informative and really easy to comprehend. I’m extremely glad Code Academy is part of this course-- it really is a great learning tool for someone who has zero clue on what they are trying to do. Looking forward to the other lessons!

[tiffanyfrevillehitegd-blog]

Art205, how I love thee.

If you remember far back to post number one, I explained how I used three traits or skills in my first project- curiosity, problem-solving, and strategy. While I knew it was not the only traits/skills I would use the entire semester, it was the three main ones that pushed me to create successful pieces of design work. This course generated my curiosity of how things are created, how do I communicate my ideas effectively, and more importantly, was returning back to school and pursuing a degree in Communication Art and Design the right choice? 

The six projects we were given engaged and challenged my creative thinking/problem-solving and artistic abilities/strategies, something I had been missing in the past five years working retail. All of this curiosity and coursework lit a flame in my heart and soul that had been out for far too long, and this is why I am applying for the Communications Art and Design program with the University of Louisville Hite Art Institute; to enhance my conceptual development, my compositional style, and technical knowledge.

From highs to lows, each project gave me a new way of thinking about concepts and how my approach will connect with the audience. Curious about what connotations might be brought to the table, the stages of development within every design project delivered new thought-provoking questions and resolutions that were needed to give me the confidence in evolving my design. Every struggle became a learning experience, every learning experience became a confirmation that I made the right choice in coming back to the University of Louisville.

I decided it was time to go back to the University of Louisville and get a degree in Communication Art and Design. I knew that obtaining a degree in design would open unlimited possibilities while giving me the challenge I need everyday to continue to strive for greatness, and accomplish these new career goals. My plan is simple while in the program, to consume everything there is to consume within the Communication Art and Design. To engage the professors and other students to their, and mine for that matter, fullest potential, so I can learn what the expectations are within design and real world. To ultimately take everything I have learned and experienced and put forth in reaching my career goal of becoming a Creative Director.

I am taking this second chance to get everything right this time. I have grown into a strong adult with much to offer and learn. So much so, that I will not risk losing my career and life goals again. I will embark on the next three years with a positive attitude, and a recognizable drive that correlates with my retail experience. I believe with the knowledge that will be instilled from the Hite Institute, my impressive management experience, and my curious creativity, my career goal of becoming a Creative Director is extremely possible. Yes, I understand that it will take time to achieve this honorable position, but if there is anything that I have learned from the past five years, it is that being driven and being more than willing to learn pays off. It is recognized and more importantly, makes me feel empowered; this is how I am and continue to be with design.

I can’t wait to see to learn more. I’ll be taking this summer to watch more tutorials, read about other graphic designers and expectations, and practice, practice, practice.