Logo: Draft

For our logo assignment, I decided to create a logo that could be used for this blog, Pier 24 Design. When I decided to create a name for the blog that would be showcasing the visuals that I would create for Com 210, I wanted to pick a name that had some significant meaning to me. I’m turning 24 in a little over a month, so I will be 24 when I finally graduate from college. I liked the idea of including the word “Pier” in the name because I’ve always loved the Huntington Beach Pier. Growing up in Huntington Beach, CA, I’ve met friends on the pier, and spent parts of dates walking on the pier, and the pier has been in the background of many of our family photos. Besides going down to the beach for obvious recreational reasons, my family and I will also go down to the pier after family dinners to walk around together and attempt to “walk-off” all the food consumed. I was enrolled in the Huntington Beach Jr. Lifeguards program for 2 consecutive summers when I was in middle school and have swam around the pier at least 4 times; swimming around the pier is a mandated activity at the end of the summer for all jr. guards and upon completion you get a sticker that says “I swam around the HB Pier”.

I decided that I wanted a really clean, simple logo. I made sketches of different angles of a “pier” with “Pier 24” written next to it. I had some sketches that included the ocean but after having trouble creating a “wave shape” with the pen tool on the RSS logo tutorial, I decided against incorporating waves and the ocean in the logo. I also decided that I liked the idea of a black and white logo with maybe a minimal amount of color. I worked with the rectangle and rounded rectangle tool to create the pier and the pilings. I decided to create a small balloon using the ellipses tool and filled it with a crimson color. I used the pencil tool to create the balloon string and added an drop shadow effect to everything in the logo as well. I went with the balloon because it is a celebratory icon. I’m graduating soon (hence the crimson color) and I’ll also be celebrating another birthday soon. I also liked the idea of placing the balloon over the “i” in “Pier” because it also could serve as the dot for the “i”. Let me know what you think of the design. I’m open to any and all feedback.

Illustrator Tutorials

These are my completed Illustrator Tutorials

Collage: Final

The thing about people is that part of our personality comes directly from our genes. Certain genes mutate and are affected by our immediate environment and so they are altered over time, but the foundation of our personality, essentially, comes from our ancestors. As a result of taking psychology classes for my minor, I’ve come to the conclusion that part of knowing who you are, is knowing who you came from. A little bit of me came from each and every one of these women. Family is important.

I got the photos from my mom and the background image from Shutterstock. I added the Film Grain filter to the background and I added a Sepia filter in the Photo Filter adjustment to the background as well. I used the Stroke Effect to add the border around the background and I changed the color of the text in the border to more of a cream color in order for it to stand out better. I also added the Stroke Effect to all of the text in order to bring more definition to the lettering. Since most of the pictures were already in a “sepia” style lens, I just cropped and retouched Henrietta’s, Louise’s, Kathleen’s and Linda’s photos using the different adjustments. I went heavy on the contrast and darkened the images to help bring out more of the detail in the backgrounds as well as on the clothing. I had to use Free Transform>Distort for all of the images as well as the text in order to get the pictures to line up with the frames already on the background. For every picture, I added a Sepia filter in the Photo Filter adjustment layer.

My mom’s photo started out with a bright orange/red hue. The photo was originally a color photo but do to the poor quality of ink and it not being stored safely, the color in the photo did not age well. I used the spot healing brush tool to get rid of the dust and scratches on my mom’s photo. I used the eye-dropper tool to match the color of her lips and then used the paintbrush tool to draw out the ink stain. I had to fix the farthest left tooth as well. The tooth fix was noticeable so I ended up sort of giving my mom a whole new mouth. I received a lot of feedback about my mom’s photo and how it stood out compared to the other photos because of how red it still was. I used the Exposure adjustment and made the exposure -1.oo and the gamma correction 1.00. I used the Color Balance adjustment and made the Cyan to Red continuum -60, I made the Magenta to Green continuum -2, and I made the Yellow to Blue Continuum +15. I added the Photo Filter adjustment and made it a Sepia filter and made the density 100%. I used the Brightness/Contrast adjustment and made the Brightness a 4 and the Contrast a 90. Then I added another Sepia filter in the Photo Filter adjustment layer and made sure that the density was also 100%. I’m a lot happier with the photo because it is definitely more similar to the other photos.

Citations of Images Used:

Shutterstock Image

Collage: Draft

Henrietta is my great-great-great grandmother and the picture I have was taken shortly before or after she married my great-great-great grandfather. Louise is Henrietta’s daughter, making her my great-great grandmother. Kathleen is Louise’s daughter, also my great-grandmother. Kathleen’s picture kind of says a lot about her; she was the rebellious child and this picture was supposedly taken at a “club” that she wasn’t supposed to be at. Linda is Kathleen’s daughter, as well as my grandmother. Sandra is Linda’s daughter and, since I’m sure you’ve put the pieces together, my mother. I added my high school senior picture and, give or take a few years, we are all about the same age in our photographs.

The thing about people is that part of our personality comes directly from our genes. Certain genes mutate and are affected by our immediate environment and so they are altered over time, but the foundation of our personality, essentially, comes from our ancestors. As a result of taking psychology classes for my minor, I’ve come to the conclusion that part of knowing who you are, is knowing who you came from. With the exception of Henrietta and Louise, I know that I definitely share some personality traits with Kathleen, Linda and my mom. Once I find out more about Henrietta and Louise, I’m confident that I’ll share a few personality traits with them as well.

I got the photos from my mom and the background image from Shutterstock.com. I added the Film Grain filter to the background and used the Stroke Effect to add the border around the background. Since most of the pictures were already in a “sepia” style lens, I just cropped and retouched Henrietta’s, Louise’s, Kathleen’s and Linda’s photos using the different adjustments. I went heavy on the contrast and darkened the images to help bring out more of the detail in the backgrounds as well as on the clothing. I transitioned my photo from color to sepia and made similar changes to the coloring as I did with Henrietta’s, Louise’s, Kathleen’s and Linda’s photos. My mom’s picture was kind of a hot mess. There were scratches and dust all over it and there was a weird ink blotch on her mouth. The color had not aged well over time, and turned into this reddish hue.

I used the spot healing brush tool to get rid of the dust and scratches on my mom’s photo. I used the eye-dropper tool to match the color of her lips and then used the paintbrush tool to draw out the ink stain. I had to fix the farthest left tooth as well. The tooth fix was noticeable so I ended up sort of giving my mom a whole new mouth. I had to use Free Transform>Distort for all of the images as well as the text in order to get the pictures to line up with the frames already on the background. I also added the Stroke Effect to the text in order to bring more definition to the lettering.

Collage: Photo Collection

These are the photos I will be working with for the upcoming collage assignment.

Photoshop Tutorials

These are my completed photoshop tutorials.

Topic for Spring 2012 Semester: “About Me”

Welcome! My name is Kristin Newton, and this is Pier 24 Design. This blog was created as part of an assignment for Communication 210: Multimedia Content Creation, a course taught at Washington State University. As this semester continues, I will post media content that I create that will surround the theme “About Me.” It didn’t take very long for me to go through the pros and cons of selecting “About Me” as my topic for this semester. The positive reasons included that: I’m extremely knowledgeable about this particular topic and I knew I could find plenty of resources to help me complete the assignments for this semester (if needed). I couldn’t think of any negative reasons for selecting this topic, so I sort of knew right away that I had found a keeper.

There were various other topics that came to mind, however. Topics that I am also very knowledgeable about include but are not limited to: pugs, wine, eating, the beach, volleyball, pretending I know how to surf, baking delicious treats, pretending I know anything about automotive repair, etc. I thought that I had gathered a very well-rounded list of potential topics, obviously, but I wasn’t sure how far I would really be able to go with each of the previously mentioned topics. So, it was then decide that “About Me” would be the topic/theme for this semester’s assignments.

I plan to take more of an advertising approach for the assignments in this class. All the media content that I create and post can and will act as a form of self-advertising that I can show potential employers. Not only will they be able to see what I can do with the Adobe software we will be using, but they will also be able to see what kind of person I am and what I’m all about.

Kristin

(If you want to know more about Kristin, you can check out the “About Kristin” page or her other blog, One Life. Many Loves.)