Sunday, July 31, 2011

Exploring the use of Colour - Abstract Art

One of the assessments through this term is to explore the use of colour by creating 3 pieces of abstract art, each with a theme, the themes include:

- Calm
- Anger
- Excitement

Theme 1 - Calm
















The big inspiration of the Calm Theme is that of the ocean and the coastline, it's gentle and is somewhat soothing to the mind and soul (I saying this from experience as I use to live around the coast nearly a decade ago from now). For this theme to work, I experimented (and then implemented) the following elements: I went with different tones of blue as I feel that the blues are more of a stable and calm colour and I felt that minimalism works best with the calm theme, meaning that a minimal number of objects - preferably no more than 5 objects (this is represented by the blue spheres in the image).

In the article in ThinkQuest, Blues are often associated with being a calm and soothing colour.


Theme 2 - Anger
















When I was creating this composite Anger wasn't the only thing that came into my mind, other themes of this abstract art also include Chaos, Stress, Bitterness, Jealously, Revenge or anything that has some form of negative thoughts. How I made this work (well, sort of) is by making the use of the colour Red, as I felt that Red best associates itself with being loud, chaotic and anger in a general sense. In terms of the number of objects involved, it is the opposite of the minimalism in the 'Calm' theme, it's crowded, and every object shown is essentially using up nearly every bit of empty space and full of pointy lines and sharp edges.

In the article on ThinkQuest. Red Tones and Shades often represent Anger.

Theme 3 - Excitement
















There were a few things that came into mind with this piece of abstract art - Happiness, Confidence, Cheerful, Interest, Lively and Bright. So it was only fitting that piece of art is to be limited to brighter colours - preferably bright yellows and greens.

According to the Colour Psychology article on ThinkQuest. Yellows is regarded as a generally happy and uplifting colour, whilst Greens is a calming colour that helps out balance out emotions.

The symmetrical path fading to white I wanted to represent the path to excitement and what interesting things come at life. I wanted to have this artwork viewed from a first person point-of-view to give it that extra depth and meaning to this theme.

Illustrator Art - Finding Inspirations

Drakie here,

The type of art that I like is pretty much hard to explain, but I've always had a liking of abstract art, particularly those that have rather minimal elements or those that are full of colours. Here are some of the abstract works that I particularly like:

All the artwork I like is from DeviantArt













'Between Two Worlds' by Silster (http://silster.deviantart.com/art/Between-two-worlds-244341410?q=boost%3Apopular%20in%3Adigitalart%2F3d%2Fabstract%20max_age%3A744h&qo=86)













'Sea' by Jindra12 (http://jindra12.deviantart.com/art/Sea-216932884?q=boost%3Apopular%20in%3Acustomization%2Fwallpaper%2Fabstract%20max_age%3A744h&qo=279)













'Sun Dialing' by huMAC (http://humac.deviantart.com/art/Sun-Dialing-243725177?q=boost%3Apopular%20in%3Acustomization%2Fwallpaper%2Fabstract%20max_age%3A744h&qo=51)

In addition of this, I've always had a liking of the art style used in the old Soviet Propaganda Style posters (well sort of - even though most are simply parodies nowadays) as I've always have a fascination of how the typeface is used in what colours are applied and so on. Here are some that I like (Although I do take great care in regards to what material I feel appropriate on the grounds of research and what would be art, but I may make mistakes from time to time in terms of taste and relevance):

NOTE: I do NOT support communism in any shape or form, I just simply like the artwork, typeface and colours used in these posters






















'Club Poster Derek' by SgtPepper999 (http://sgtpepper999.deviantart.com/art/club-poster-derek-181692333?q=boost%3Apopular%20soviet%20posters&qo=79)






















'Red Cyclone NUMBER ONE' by angrymonkee (http://browse.deviantart.com/?q=propaganda%20posters&order=9&offset=360#/d3htss2)






















'propARTganda Exhibition Poster' by CrossMirage (http://crossmirage.deviantart.com/art/propARTganda-Exhibition-Poster-115274322?q=boost%3Apopular%20propaganda%20posters&qo=91)

Monday, July 25, 2011

Research and Experiment Techniques of Graphics Design - Part 2

Hello Again,

Like what we had to come up with the Circus and the Rock 'N' Roll Composites, we had to come up with another set of composites with a theme, this time being 'Thai Cuisine'. The rules are pretty much simple, I had to create five sets of composites, which is:

- Images only
- Images with Text
- Vector Art only
- Vector Art with Text
- Minimal Art

In addition, I cannot have the words 'Thai Cuisine', here is the result:

Sunday, July 24, 2011

Hue, Value and Chroma

The following images are to demonstrate experimenting with Hue, Value and Chroma, here is the result:

Hue
















Value
















Chroma

Research and Experiment Techniques of Graphics Design

Graphics Design isn't just about Images and Text, but also have to be either Instructional, Entertaining and/or Marketing (Advertising).

As part of this module we have to create works with a combination of images, vector art and text that delivers a message for various themes. Last week, there was two - Circus and Rock 'N' Roll

The first piece of composition 'Circus', requires 5 different pieces of work, which includes:

- Images Only
- Images with Text
- Vector Art
- Vector Art with Text
- Minimal Images

In addition, we CANNOT use the word 'Circus', in any of the pieces. Here is the result:





















Second composition piece that had to be done is 'Rock 'N' Roll'. Again, 5 pieces of work and the criteria for this composition includes the following:

- Images only
- Images with Text
- Vector Art
- Vector Art with Text
- Minimal Images

In this composition, we CANNOT use the word 'Rock 'N' Roll', here is the result for this composition:

Using Colours in Graphics Design - Part 2

Key Terms:

Hue - The term 'Hue' refers to pure colours, as those found on a basic colour wheel without any white or black pigments. The Six Major Hues are Red, Yellow, Green, Cyan, Blue and Magenta.

Value/Lightness - Value is about the application of black and white pigments used with the colour hues to create a desired level of brightness to the specified colour (whether it is about making the colour hue brighter or darker to the users' specification)

Chroma - Chroma deals with the use of greys with the colour hues and defines the overall quality of the colour hues. Chroma is about the intensity and saturation of colours.

SOURCES:

Wikipedia:

Hue - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hue

Value/Lightness - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightness_(color)

Chroma/Colourfulness - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorfulness

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Using Colours in Graphics Design - Part 1

Today we are currently studying the use of colour in the context of graphics design and have to look at various businesses and how they implemented the use of certain colours, here are some of the businesses:

The Lawson Motor Inn (http://www.thelawson.com.au)











Whilst Red is a generally loud colour, in some cases darker shades of Red can be seen as somewhat of a relaxing colour for some individuals/businesses. I felt that the dark red can work in some way because it  gives the perception anyone staying for the night, the sense of comfort and relaxation. But at the same time, this colour may not work for other places.

Although my personal preference for a relaxing and comfortable feeling would be a darker blue, something like the one below. The red I feel does to some extent work well with The Lawson Motor Inn









Hungry Jacks (http://www.hungryjacks.com.au)










While taking my little complaint on the logo design out of the equation (e.g. the logo should be made to be in line with Burger King). The colour used in the Hungry Jacks logo is appropriate in a business sense (that being take-away) and therefore should not be changed, as the use of the yellow and red combined sees the logo being loud and wanting to stand out (that being standing out throughout highways, shopping centres, airports, etc.), effectively wanting people to stop over.

Crown Custom Computers (http://www.crowncomputers.com.au/)






Whilst blue is described as a safe 'generic' colour for businesses. The blue used in their current logo I would describe somewhat a bit too bold. I would still stick with the whole blue theme, but change to something of more than a lighter blue, something like this:



I will be honest that it (the logo) should be completely overhauled, but this is about the use of colour, not redesigning logos and therefore would be out of scope for this topic.

Beyond Blue (http://www.beyondblue.org.au)










I personally feel that they shouldn't need to change their logo for the entire organisation. Given the fact that Beyond Blue is all about helping individuals dealing with depression, for example the use of Red represents Warmth and Coziness whilst the use of Yellow associates with happiness and about being energetic, easy going, etc.


Mission Australia (http://www.missionaustralia.com.au)










Although it is rather hard to explain this, the Mission Australia Logo is not that much to complain of, in fact, after looking at the services and how they strive to help out the disadvantaged. The use of the Bright Red is strong and somewhat makes sense with the heart logo (which should be represented in the colour red)




Forum 6 Cinemas (http://www.forum6.com.au)

(Forum Cinemas Wagga Wagga Logo)










(Forum Cinemas Tamworth Logo)










For starters, there is a hell of a lot of difference between the style of logo and the colour used in these logos. In the case of the Forum 6 Cinemas Wagga Wagga logo, the colours used in the logo simply will not work on multiple forms of media (May not work on a website but would look completely out of place on print media given the use of colour for the background). In addition whilst that the burgundy red would look best suited to a accounting agency or law firm, for a cinema, whilst they will try to look 'prestigious', that colour used in the logo (in regards to the Forum 6 Wagga Logo) compared to the look and feel within the interior of the cinema complex is anything BUT prestigious.

Now on to what the colour for the cinema logo should look like, a combination of a grey and red-orange for the text colours on a white background is what I believe should be used across the board (a unified colour and logo design combo applied to all cinemas), it should be something like this:














Anyway, in regards to the last logo, I've done enough ranting how out of place the colours used in a cinema

A3 Poster


Drakie here,

Sorry about the late posting in regards to the A3 Poster (though better late than never, right?). But here it is:



This poster was created with two themes: The first one is that I like to see myself being professional and somewhat artsy (is that how it's spelt?) - both in what I do and how I look and the second one is that I like to be seen as tech-savvy (which explains the binary numbers and hexadecimal numbers in the background).

On a side note, for reasons that I find difficult to explain, I've always had a liking of the colour and style used in the old Soviet propaganda posters (and for the record I do NOT support socialism/communism in any shape and form - period)

Sunday, July 17, 2011

Colour Theory

Today we are studying some colour theory work and this is the exercise called the Emotion List we had to work on: