Graphic Design is My Passion

Hello everyone! To start off this week I am going to reflect on some readings and watchings I did.

The first video I watched was “Great Design Is Serious, Not Solemn” by Paula Scher. This video was amazing as Paula really dove deep into the process behind her creations. Actually, this whole video really resonated with me. What specifically resonated with me is Paula’s idea of shifting being unqualified from a bad to a good thing. Paula expressed the benefits of being unqualified through her story of helping design theatre spaces when she had never done it before. Her fresh eyes and inexperience was a great asset as she created a space that was insanely unique and well organized. This really relates to my life because when I first started my job I was tremendously unqualified. This “obstacle” actually became a benefit as I brought a new perspective and outlook into my job. Moreover, the idea of playing and creating for oneself and not for others resonated with me. I really like how Paula expressed this as serious vs. solemn because it describes a lot of things in my life. Namely, how I always produce my finest work as a joke or for me and not when I actually have to produce fine work. These lessons of being unqualified and playing in design are what I am going to take with me to tackle this week’s work.

Another video I watched this week was “Design And Discovery” by David Carson. In this video David covers some of the work he has done and the analysis behind it. I did not particularly like his style as it felt illegible to me. However, David Carson says that sometimes legibility does not mean it communicates well. This was an interesting thought because I always tell clients at my job that they want perfectly legible things. Now, I somewhat realize that this may be driving them away from artistic decisions that are just as good (if not better) than legibility. Something that resonated with me about the David Carson’s video was his idea that people will become more and more important. Our lives, feelings and history will become a necessity to use in design. He stressed that we need to use who we are in our work. David continues this thought by expressing that inserting our narrative into our work will help us enjoy it more. I think that this idea of putting ourselves and our identity in the work will be something that I will use throughout this design week.

The last item I am going to reflect on are the Canva tutorials I completed. I completed seven different Canva tutorials. I am going to be real with you, I thought I was a Canva expert. WELL IT TURNS OUT I’M NOT FOLKS. I have never felt more schooled by a tutorial ~in my life~. I think the most important lesson I learned was all the keystrokes and shortcuts in Canva. Specifically, how to navigate the layers or objects in Canva. Who knew that Command + click would easily let you go to the object behind the one you clicked on? I didn’t! Essentially, the Canva tutorials really heightend my knowledge of the software and these skills will definitely be something I use this week.

These readings and watchings did all present somewhat different and similar ideas to the concept of design. Firstly, Paula and the Canva tutorials advocated for more clean and clear design. On the other hand, David Carson indicated that legibility does not mean that a design communicates well. He almost expressed an idea of making the viewer work for the message. I think these different perspectives are both valid and have their time or place. In Paula and Canva’s case, the items they are producing need to be clear and understandable in a short amount of time. In terms of David’s work, the viewer is going into the experience with the idea of analyzing and unpacking the work. Thus, he can embrace abstraction and making the viewer work for the message.

Additionally, Paula and David both deal in emotion and the response of the viewer. However, the emotion Paula looks to inspire is intrigue whereas David looks to spark a longing or sadness in his viewer. Canva did not really delve into emotional responses from viewers in the tutorials I completed. Again, I think these different approaches relate back to the work that they do. Paula and Canva work to inspire curiosity and follow up in their logos/designs whereas David needs to evoke emotion in his viewer.

Furthermore, all of the readings or watchings I did this week express the idea of being unqualified. Paula says this through her theatre space story and David mentions that he is by trade in sociology and not design. Moreover, Canva is literally a design tool for those who have no design experience. Once more, I really like this idea of being unqualified as we need a naïveté for artistic reasons. We need this innocence as the “unqualified” person will not have these superficial, established rules in their head. For them, it is an open field and not a track full of obstacles. In this perspective, is the beauty of innovation.

All in all, I enjoyed these readings and watchings as they have helped me get into the right mindset for design week. Learning these different approaches and tools has helped me demystify design a little and make me feel more confident in my abilities.

Well, that is it for now. I’ll catch you on the flipside.

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