My History With Graphic Design
Design in general is something I have always been interested in and loved doing. Whether it be moving the furniture around in my room and redecorating the house or designing a poster for a class, I’ve always gravitated towards the aesthetics of life. I enjoy making and appreciate good art of any form. I have loved technology and computers since I was as little as I can remember so it only seems right to combine the two! I have always gone above and beyond when assigned a poster or brochure or illustration in school because I always have so much fun making them. As I’ve gotten older and artistic assignments in school became more rare, I haven’t had a reason to create graphic art so I have lost my love for it. For this reason, I am excited to dive back into it and learn how it can become a part of my everyday life possibly as a major and then as a career!

Type Design
After reading the chapter, I was surprised by how many different paths a graphic designer can take. One path in particular that I found to be intriguing was a type designer. I had never thought about how the fonts I’ve become so familiar with came to be. I would be interested in learning more about what it means to be a type designer and what kind of work would be available. I think the psychology behind how and why font affects the way we percieve something is fascinating. Linguistics and written language is something I’ve always questioned and been interested in so I’d love to learn more about the process of creating fonts.

I always doodle things like this in my notebook:

Advertising Design
Another field of graphic design I would find interesting is advertising design. I find the way our brain can be persuaded simply by colors and shapes fascinating and I would love to learn how to use that information to make someone feel or think a certain way. Advertising and commercials are such a huge part of todays world. There are so many famous logos and commercials that everyone has seen or heard of and could recognize as belonging to a certain company. I would love if something I designed ever became that well known. Again, the psychology behind the design and the reasons for the shape and color and whatever emotion the ad is trying to portray is something I would love to learn more about.

Here are some ads/logos that I think are particularly effective/inspiring:

I think this is very shocking and not normally socially accepted to illustrate something so evil and therefore it really gets the attention of the viewer. It makes you think of smoking much more seriously and maybe this image will be stuck in the viewers head when they smoke because its so harsh. Its a very honest approach to anti-smoking ad, its not sugarcoated at all, and therefore very effective.

I think this is cute and creative. It makes Heinz seem less of a factory and more of a fresh farm. Whether or not thats true is a different story but this makes the viewer feel like Heinz ketchup is as fresh as a tomato itself.

I think this is so exaggerated that its actually funny. A man is supposed to look at this and think that if they use this cologne they will develop these great muscles and veiny arms and be super strong and tough. It’s so ridiculous that it actually works. I think this ad is funny and effective for giving Old Spice a very “manly man” reputation.