Monthly Archives: October 2021

Midterm Project: Book Covers Galore and guidelines for the critique.

Important information below

A few notes in preparation for your midterm critique: Per City Tech requirements you will receive a midterm grade via email after the critique. This evaluation will reflect your standing in the class. In order to succeed you must present all the projects below and be prepared to discuss what you learned, and what challenges you faced. You are also required to speak 3 times about other people’s work. All your work must be uploaded to your site by 6 PM on Wednesday. I expect quality work and nothing less. Your book covers should be professional. If you are absent without prior notification or a doctor’s note this will be reflected in your midterm grade.

Lastly, I will have drop in office hours on Tuesday at 5 PM and again on Wednesday before class at 11 AM. If you have any questions or need help this is for you. If you are unable to attend and struggling with class please let me know in advance.

Below is a list on the projects that need to be presented. Details for each assignment can be found in previous posts.

Openlab sites: Creating blogs, evaluating and customizing templates, uploading media Emphasis on professional presentation, and personalizing the design. Understanding the dashboard.

Logos – design concepts: composition, negative and positive space, design with a message. Introduction and navigating the Adobe Illustrator environment, understanding difference between raster and vector, creating scalable objects, basic vector tools including shapes, brushes, direct select, fills, strokes, text as object, exporting

Silhouettes – Mastering vector drawing with the pen tool (curves and angles). Understanding color information, RGB, CMYK, swatches, libraries, gradient, transparencies

Business card – Kerning, leading, tracking, grids, writing on paths/grids, rulers, guides, smart guides

3 photoshop composites – Downloading large images, understanding resolution and dpi, selecting methods, select and masking, subtracting and adding to and from selections, quick mask, layer masks, custom brushes, adjustment layers (nondestructive), clone tool

Photo Restoration – levels, curves, healing tools, content aware – photo correction

Book Cover or Album cover – Combining all the tools from photoshop and illustrator/Clipping masks.

Midterm Project:

For your midterm project Project please Album Re-design a book cover/or an album cover. You may also create an original design. Please consider how the story or the music influenced the choices you made. You may use both Photoshop and Illustrator.

Next week we will have a midterm critique. Each student will have approximately 5 minutes to present their work. Please make sure your openlab sites are updated.

Specs:

dimension – 1:1, CMYK, 300 DPI, export as .png

When you upload your final cover please briefly describe your process and explain why you made certain aesthetic decisions.

The Magic in Photoshop … photo restoration ooh la la la

Last night we went over the spot healing, healing tool, patch tool, and the content aware tools. We also continued to explore adjustment layers. We also looked at customized brushes and replace color brush.

For Homework please find a an old, destroyed picture to restore. You may use content aware healing tool as well as adjustment layers. They are due next week.

Next week I will be having one on one midterm conferences with everyone. So please make sure your OPenlab e-portfolios are up to date. Let me know if you have any questions!

Moving on to Photoshop

Hello all,

I’m excited to be moving on to Photoshop but a little bit of housekeeping first.

Please have ALL your illustrator projects finished and uploaded to your Openlab sites by next Wednesday , 12 PM. I’ll be going through them. You are responsible for the Logo Project, the Silhouette Project and the Business Card.

You are expected to come to class at 6PM and to stay there for the duration of the class. Participation is part of your grade and will affect your attendance. This means a requirement for the class is to give others feedback, share your work and ask questions. Together we are stronger and smarter.

There is a lab component to the class but you are also required to do approximately 2 hours of homework week. Midterms Critiques are coming up so please stay on top of the projects.

OK! Photoshop …

Last night we went over many things. They include resolution, image mining, selecting with multiple tools, adding and subtracting from selections, select and masking tab, quick masks, and briefly layer masks and adjustment layers. If you google any of the above topics you should be able to find tutorials etc.

Here is a link to Adjustment layers: Brightness Contrast, Levels and Curves.

HomeWork:

Please create three images: Specs: 10″ x 12′”/300 DPI/RGB

1) Scale – combine at least 2 images that play with scale (Think giant puppy)

2) Time Machine – Combine at least 2 images that integrate different times (Think Neanderthals on Iphones)

3) Hyper Realism – Combine at least 2 images to create an image that look “realistic” but could never exist. (Think Mermaids and Centaurs)

As stated before you expected to do 2 hours of work at home. We will have some time in class to troubleshoot and look at work in progress before moving on.