Week One
Prompt: What do you hope to achieve in this class by the end of the term? Are there special projects or technologies you’d like to see covered by the end of the term? Is there a site (or two) that gives you butterflies in your stomach? What is it?
Response: I hope to gain a better understanding of coding and the process behind it. I was very nervous coming into the class because I don't have any experience with this subject whatsoever. After one week of it, I am feeling a little more confident. Before I took this class, I thought that coding would be entirly too difficult for me to learn, but so far, so good. I also hope to be able to learn how app and user experience design is done as well.
The site that I have always found inspiring is the Collins website. Collins is a design agency founded by Brian Collins. Both the work and the website have always been very inspiring to me.
Inspiring site of the week: We Are Collins
Week Two
Prompt: What are planning to do for project 1? What content do you plan to show? How will you make each page unique while maintaining a cohesive design across the project how will your color palette, imagery, and typography choice complement your subject matter?
Response: For project 1, I'm planning on making it about my favorite tacos. I plan on giving some context and history for each kind of taco and where in Mexico they are popular. For added text on the side, I plan on including some of my favorite recipes and sauces. To make it cohesive, I plan on having a similar color palette throughout for one of my ideas and for another, I plan on including a lot of stacked images.
The site I always tend to get lost in is Giphy. It's such a fun and ammusing site to be on and I tend to spend some time there and forget about the other news that tends to fill my screen. I'm a huge Dodgers fan and I espescially loved seeing the baseball gifs there recently.
Inspiring site of the week: Giphy
Week Three
Prompt: I want you to clearly imagine one user who'll love to use your Project 1 website. This user could be you, it could be someone similar to you, it could be someone completely opposite from you, it could even be a non-human animal or an alien or an amoeba. You get to choose. Really imagine what they are like in their mind. What do they spend their time on? what are their hobbies, clothes, music, favorite foods, books, tv. what's their personality like. Once you've imagined this person. write about them. just a paragraph, three to five sentences. try to have fun with it.
Response: I think the majority of people would enjoy this website because a lot of people enjoy tacos, but if I have to narrow it down to a particular person it would be someone that is interested in different foods and cultures. This person really enjoys the historical context included in the website and the images used. It would most likly be the fictional character Charles Boyle from the NBC show "Brooklyn 99". He seems to be the kind of "Foodie" that would repost this website and have his own personal favorite recipes included.
A site I have always thought was well designed is The New York Times. I think their heirarchy is really well established and effective.
Inspiring site of the week: The New York Times
Week Four
Prompt: Make a list of 5 things to keep you going when you feel resistance or discomfort.
Response:
- Excercise
- Listen to relaxing jazz
- Listen to a podcast
- Breath deeply with my eyes closed for a while
- Drink some tea
Spin design agency out of Europe has had a really cool website. It is a very simple homepage and yet has some awesome movement with their projects and how they're displayed.
Inspiring site of the week: Spin
Week Five
Prompt: No prmopt. Only responed to Umoju Miller talk.
Response:
Week Six
Prompt:Why did you choose the business/cause that you chose? Why do you think your redesign will be better? What area/content will you focus on in your redesign? Look at two other similar websites. What stands out about those sites? what bothers you abut them? How will you improve things in your own design.
Response:I chose to redesign one of my favorite restaurants in Portland, "El Burrito Azteca". They have two locations and they could use a bit of a redesign. I've been going to this restaurant for years and I've never been disappointed. Great food, at even better prices! I think my redesign will be better because I will focus on a simpler layout, their website now looks a bit harsh. My big focus will be to change the colors of the background and to create a menu page so that it's a bit easier to read. Right now they have the menu on their main page which is a bit hard to read.
Inspiring site of the week: I was browsing through Medium, and I came across this website that was linked by the Medium.Design team. I went through this site and loved how the type was used throughout. Actual Soucre
Week Seven
Prompt: Focus on Project 2
Response:
Week Eight
Prompt: Read this article on mobile first design and share your thoughts on mobile first vs desktop first.
Response:The speed in which designers, developers, and companies have to adapt to the changing user is incredible. It’s fascinating how quickly Internet usage on mobile has skyrocketed in the last decade, and, at the same time, it shouldn’t come as a surprise. The cost of smartphones has decreased significantly throughout the years, meaning more people have access to them, where as laptops and PCs have remained fairly expensive and unattainable. What that means for developers and designers, both experienced and new, is that the approach of designing for desktops first is just about gone, if not already. Now it seems that it’s strictly mobile first, or better yet, designing the two side-by-side. What was really interesting about this article was the inclusion of the graph that shows mobile usage surpassed desktop in 2016. In a matter of 7 years, mobile was able to overtake desktop. Fascinating. Even more interesting to me is trying to look to the future. What’s next? What will designers and developers have to adapt to in the next 7 to 10 years? Is it wearables like watches or smart glass?
I've been using the wetranser website for a couple of weeks and the animations and interactions that's on the site are really fun and engaging. They're mainly just ads for different produst, but I like the way they're presented.
Inspiring site of the week: wetranser
Week Nine
Prompt: What is your "why"? Read article and answer this question.
Response: Graphic design, and design in general, is a passion I discovered only a few years ago. My father is a construction worker and my mom worked at a dry cleaners, so I was never exposed to arts or design from my family, I didn’t even know it existed. My family didn’t even have a computer at home until my senior year of high school. Design really became visible to me because girlfriend mentioned that I liked things that had a very particular look to them, so I googled those things and noticed that graphic design was at the center of it. At this stage in my life, I was making half-hearted attempts to go back to school, but wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. I had already changed my major twice and was a couple of classes away from reaching my associates so that I could transfer out, but I was unsure what I wanted to pursue. I was directionless. At this point, two major things happened, my girlfriend helped me discover that a degree in graphic design was something I could push toward, the second being my only sister gave me a call saying that she and her husband were expecting their first child! I was going to become and uncle. That was all of the motivation I needed, I had discovered what I wanted to do and I discovered my “why” at the same time. The following Monday I enrolled in graphic design classes, I later got my Associates degree, transferred to PSU (first in my family in a university), passed the stressful portfolio review this past spring while being under lockdown. They are my “why”. I want to be a good example to my niece, I want to help my parents as they get older, and I want to be able to build a good life with my girlfriend of 7 years.
Week Ten
Prompt: Before the final, please write at least a few paragraphs on your design process and reasoning for the design decisions you made on your project.
Response: