Final Submission

Here is my final rendered site plan using PS. Unfortunately due to time constraints and the work load from my other classes and there final projects I have not been able to create the 3D walk though for this building. From the beginning I had looked at the walk through as an extra step to add more interest to my final project so I'm not to upset about not being able to get it done by this dead line. I had work my second submission of this project to an almost finished state in order to give myself more time to work on other class work.  That being said I have accomplished my original idea and concept with my site plan but I did add a couple more vehicles and also a swimming pool and patio furniture, all created in Auto Cad and colored in PS. I still plan on doing a 3D walk through for this project as it will be part of my portfolio for my masters program so for those of you who would like to see it please visit my blog throughout the summer as I will be uploading my progress. 

Also if anyone can help me out by telling me how I would go about being able to zoom in and post more close up detailed pictures of the different elements of my project I would appreciate it as I can not figure out how.   

Phase 2

This is phase 2 of my site plan. As you can see many textures, shadows and other elements have been added. The grass and street areas where created by adding noise and playing with the brightness settings,  inner shadows were added to give more contrast to the street. I created the small shrubs and vehicles in Auto Cad and then exported them to PDF witch was then opened in PS to add there color. Drop shadows and inner shadows were added to each to make them look like they were at ground level vs. the taller near by trees. The trees were created using different size brushes with a mix of opacity and colors and then the edges were burned and dodged to simulate the light coming from the upper left hand corner with shadows casting to the right. I may add a few more elements to this site plan just to fill some of the empty grass spaces, but I really want to try and get a 3D rendering of this building started so my time may be better spent there.  

Phase 2 Site Plan

Phase 1 Site Plan

Prelim 1

I have spent the better part on this week experimenting and making sure that everything that I want to accomplish with this project is even possible with the programs I have and so far so good. PS and Auto Cad have been playing nice with each other and my laptop has not crashed yet. I'm running 2 or sometimes 3 powerful programs all once plus having the internet open for reference so I was worried about lag or other unknown issues. So far this is the Auto Cad design I came up with, its a site plan of a home/office building witch I then took into PS to add color and render it to my liking. This is just the beginning so nothing fancy has been done in PS other than some color placement, but I did render some nice looking trees and those will make there way on to the site shortly. My main goal is to render this site plan completely and then do a separate 3D rendering using Sketch Up and Photoshop but thats only if I have the time, so hopefully things continue to run smoothly and I can get that done also.           

Design Competition Final

Here is my final Pepsi design for this competition.The design show cases Pepsi's logo progression though the course of there history dating back to 1898. Also shown on the box are popular Pepsi slogans that have been used for there advertisements since the brands beginning. The major difference with this design is that it offers the customer a verity of flavors all in one box. I chose to show Cherry Pepsi, Pepsi Max, Diet Pepsi and Classic as my flavors but any of there other flavors can be used. This being a 12 pack there will be 3 cans of each flavor with there individual logos on the package indicating what flavors are inside.      

Before Photoshop 

After Photoshop

The tools I used to create this were 3D extrude for the box, 3D revolve for the cans, the pen tool, and live trace for the logo, the slogan text has different opacity's of 20 and 45 to have the ghosted effect on the box. I had to turn all my art work into symbols in order to apply it to the sides of the 3D box, but since you can only apply one symbol per side all my thoughts had to be in place before this could happen. Once the symbol was made it just had to be scaled down to fit its proposed side. My final layout was done in AI then it was exported to PS were the gradient background was applied along with the text and some drop shadows and contours to the different objects. I am happy with my final product and I do plan on submitting it for the actual design competition for the Dieline Package Design Award. 

Design Competition Round 2

Mid week I decided to change my entry for this competition to a more popular and wide spread product re- design. Its not that I didn't like my original subject its just that I feel I could do more with this idea, and that it would be a better fit for the real competition if I decide to enter it, that being said I do plan on finishing my first entry at a later date just to see what I can come up with. 

My new entry is a re-design of a pepsi product. I'm going for a design that shows there logo progression though the course of there history dating back to 1898 and also there progression in the different types of flavors they have offered. My idea includes packaging that will show the many different logos throughout the company's history and also creating a verity pack that offers 2 or 4 cans of the most popular flavors all in one box. This is something I have never seen before and I think it will make for a great product as I know many family's that like several different flavors of pepsi but due to cost or refrigerator space a compromise has to be made and only one maybe two flavors make it in the cart, this product will allow everyone to be happy while offering maximum verity. So far I have used the perspective tool to create the box, 3D revolve to make the cans, the pen tool to recreate some of the simpler logos and imported the image back and forth from AI to PS for the shadows, highlights and effects.       

Design Competition Preliminary

     I chose The Dieline Package Design Award for my design competition. I decided to make a design that would fall under the art supplies category. My design is based around Prismacolor markers but its concept can be applied to any form of art media. My goal was take the simple and plain package design of these markers (witch was nothing more than a plastic sleeve) and completely transform it into a creative and useful tool. 

     Almost all fine art supplies are sold as individual items, far to often I find myself having to purchase not only the item I went to the store for but also paper, sharpeners, erasers etc. not to mention something to hold all these loose items. What I am hoping to design is a portable, travel station one that comes with everything an artist would need to get right to work as soon as possible. I'm aware there are similar types of items on the market but none that I have seen that include professional grade art supplies as an all-in-one type of package. I hope to include in my design an area to store the media whether it be pencils, paints, pastels, or in this case markers. also a paper supply either a pad or removable book. This will be marketed as an artist on the go item and many factors will be taken into consideration such as weight, size, amount of storage, and above all cost. This preliminary work is a rough concept of my ideas and it is in no way a final product. Any suggestions on what else this kit should include or comments on design ideas are welcome.   

Final Album Cover

Here is my final album cover design. My first submission was basically worked to my liking but I have been adding small things throughout the week that I feel add to the realism of an album cover. The shadow was difficult to get proportioned while still having it line up with the person but with trial and error I got it to a point were it looks acceptable. Although I'm sure this album does not require a parental advisory tag its addition helps with the design of the album cover. The anniversary label was found on the web and re-worked in PS to read "20th Anniversary Edition" then scaled down and placed as if it were a sticker advertising the CD.

Album Cover Preliminary

For this project I decided to recreate the cover of a Doors album. I found the original from a Google search of album covers and thought it would be interesting to add a wood grain effect that I learned how to do from this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfmj4xunvBk after that the doorway was made with the rectangle tool and the light shine was made with the pen tool. The figure was made up of rounded rectangles and a circle for the head all merged together to made it one object. I'm not complete yet but this is my progress so far.  

Original 

Sorry class I am a bit late uploading any progress but for the past week I have been seriously ill with temperatures of 104 and strep throat. I have been working on this design here and there when I was able to and I'm happy with the results. My process and tools used are below, comments and suggestions are welcome.

I first started out by taking a photo of a sneaker which I then uploaded to PS to remove the background using the quick selection tool>selected the inverse>erased the background.

Next the new shoe was opened in AI where I used several ellipses to create the general shapes of the different panels of the shoe. All the ellipse that made up a certain area were then merged and colored to form one shape then the warp and pucker tool were used to get the final edges cleaned up and straight.

Setting certain layers above and below others meant that my lines did not have to be perfect since the above layer was going to cover the ones below.

Each shape then had its stroke applied to outline the edges and at this point I was done with the shoe in AI but to give it more dimension and texture I took it back into PS.

With the shoe back in PS I added effects such as inner shadow, bevel, emboss, and texture. Each panel of the shoe had these effects altered differently to give them the look of different types of material. For example the sole of the shoe looks more rough and grainy than the smooth toe section, the padding where your foot enters appears to be made of cushion or soft material and the shoe lace eyelets and check mark look as if they are made of a reflective metal.

To finish this off I made a copy of the base layer and placed it below all the others, then used the gradient tool and played around with a color and direction of the fade until I found something that showed off the final shoe well.  

Artist Statement

My back ground in art started at a young age mainly inspired and supported by my uncle Ed who was an artist/musician. He always encouraged me to draw, paint, and trace, anything that involved the use of my hands to create, this lead to a few local art shows but nothing more and I soon lost interest for a while but as I grew older I would have cravings to create and it was in 2006 that I started to get back into art for pleasure. I would like to consider myself a jack of all trades but master of none when it comes to the different art mediums available today. I still enjoy a watercolor painting or pencil sketch but I like to branch out and explore many different types of ART or at least what I consider to be art. Some of the not so common forms I have experimented with are auto painting through use of a HVLP spray gun, airbrushing, pin stripping, powder coating and spray painting or (tagging) all of which I have enjoyed extensively. I soon realized that I would like to get back to the smaller projects ones that were not so time consuming so I jumped into art mediums that I had never used before such as oil & acrylic paints, charcoals, artists quality markers, pastels (soft & hard) and pastel pencils just to name a few. I have really taken a liking to the pastels and find that I currently reach for those more than any other medium. As you can see my art background is kind of all over the place but I like it like that, I feel I have a well-rounded knowledge of many art forms and techniques and have used those skills to build upon the next and the next.

However digital art is where I lack the skills and that is why I’m taking this course and ones like it in order to get a solid foundation of what these programs have to offer and to see if they can somehow benefit me. Having only worked with Photoshop CS5 for the first time last semester I did find it useful but more geared toward photo editing and enhancing a good tool to have in your tool box but not really my cup of tea. My expectations for Illustrator are higher having heard great things about it and what it has to offer and after watching the posted videos and many more on you-tube and the internet I’m excited to get started with this software and find ways to adapt it into my other interest.