Designing Critique

Critique is a funny thing. It is something that people dread to hear but need to know. While feedback is crucial, especially for people doing work in a creative capacity, official critiques can be quite intimidating, especially in the classroom.

Before getting to the critique however, one must have work to present! Elizabeth Resnick's article Design For Communication provides a format to help artists and designers understand their work.

Resnick provides five steps to help stimulate ideas for artists.

Step 1: Define the problem and establish your objectives.
In other words, when designing, it is important to realize what, why and who you are designing for.

Step 2: Do the research.
Unless one is designing just for fun, chances are they are designing for an assignment or for work. If this is the case, chances are there are guidelines and reasons for the creation of the design. It is important to really research ideas and anything else that will assist you in coming up with a spectacular creation.

Step 3: Develop your ideas by brainstorming.
Although we've been told and reminded about brainstorming since kindergarten, it is a crucial step that oftentimes gets skipped over. It's important to allow yourself that time to really let the ideas flow.

Step 4: Analyze your ideas in terms of the project objective.
Allow for critiques. As scary as they can seem, they can really help improve a project!

Step 5: Implement the final.
Take the ideas from the critique and find a way to execute your idea. "A good concept poorly executed will not reveal the potential of your ideas to others" (Elizabeth Resnick).

Once your artwork is done it is time for the final critique, it is important to remember that despite what people say they are suggestions not orders and that no matter what, it is intended to help you!

Tangible Design

Design is often considered to be used primarily for art, however I tend to take for granted the practicable uses that design posses as well. In reading chapters 13 and 14 of Digital Foundations I was not only informed, but also reminded of the very prominence  design has. The major example that the book uses is news paper layouts.

Through the use of design tools such as InDesign and Photoshop, newspapers are able to create perfect columns such as the ones found in The Washington Post. When we read the newspaper, nine times out of ten we do not even realize the design behind what we are reading. In actuality, design is in everything.

In reading the chapters from Graphic Design, I loved looking at the visuals that provided a more creative paradigm for common and typical concepts such as patterns and texture. One thing that really resonated with me with texture. Not only do physical designs have texture but through certain elements online, designs can posses various textures in the digital world as well.

The following are examples of this digital texture: