graphic ramblings

It still needs work but this diagram on the suburban vs. rural edge I was toying around with caught my instructor's eye and was the ticket to redemption from the terrible critique/diatribe I received Monday. I'm planning on making the inset a really detailed line drawing, with no grey circle blob trees and making the inset bigger? And maybe not having it cut into the context drawing. I'm favoring a bolder, cartoony-er look because I hate the clean&slick-but-stiff or ethereal, dreamy fetishizing of data that we see in graphic design these days (I'm horrible with words at this moment), but I don't want to simply reduce everything to street sign icons, I'd like to create my style's own identity please. I mean as best as I can, because nothing is original anymore right?

Still needs a lot of work...

progress!

Hi. I just got really excited about reading up on/teaching myself how to make things glow in Photoshop. This newfound piece of knowledge will probably make my project 100x better. That is all. Plus, it is fun. Too excited to worry about getting sleep now!

tired...

This is exactly how I feel right now. Well to put it more accurately, how I felt when suddenly it was 3:00 AM after what felt like ten minutes after 2:00 AM. Time flies when there's not enough of it. Why am I up at this moment, you ask? I'm waiting for an email attachment to finish loading before I send it off. Actually I will be like the Westie in this picture probably 24 or 48 hours from now... if I'm feeling tired right now I haven't felt quite enough of it yet. Ugh, I'm hungry now, too.

source.

I want to snooze.

My sister caught me and BB snoozing after the first round of cooking on Thanksgiving!

Day 1 of final charrette and I'm already tired?! Working on my final design and I can't say I'm completely satisfied, but I'll have to give it more substance through the renderings and diagrams. AAAHH. Vibration collection, undulating lines and planes and mesh and flickering opacity all sounds cool but am I making it WORK? Drinking two huge mugs of vanilla and cinnamon black tea from Trader Joe's keeps me up with a subtle hint of nervous energy, but with the mess of rain yesterday and gusty winds today I want nothing more than to curl up in my now-warm bed (brought back a big thick blanket from home!) and sleep for a few hours to stave off the chill that sets in my bones from hours of working. I'm giving myself til 3 to finish this design, that's not much time!

strange days

Why do I always feel compelled to blog during the middle of charrette? First image is a quick, basic rendering study, second is an interior view with a material map/texture added on. I just realized kind of looks like that orange safety/construction mesh, SHIT, but I guess it has potential to be...memorable. At least the last image looks semi-cool, amIright? Need to do a few more renderings now, and the rest of the night/morning will be devoted to cranking out diagrams.

METAL

The highlight of my day was working with metal!

1. Dinosaur cut out of mild steel with a plasma cutter, cleaned up with an angle grinder & then filed down further with a regular, er grinder.
2, 3. Stainless steel sheets cut & crudely folded into these "aggregating units" for studio. They didn't aggregate in quite the way I wanted them to but I can now I guess I can give a bunch of cool-ish ornaments to people when Christmas comes around.

I was feeling really angsty tonight this week and I know it's just small stuff but I'm waiting for that moment when I won't take things so seriously. I really need to lighten up and stop obsessing on little things and focus on what matters. Life is great! Why can't I see that?

4:32 am friday december 4th, 48ºF outside and I'm inside wearing a big baggy thermal, flannel pj pants, wooly socks, & oversized moccasins while wrapped in my snowflake fleece blanket. My digits are cold, my eyes bleary, I have a handful of renderings to show for my project but I'm still working on the technical drawings... damn. can you say unmotivated? designing all the way up to the last minute and still not really sure what this thing is about. this is going to be disastrous unless I crank out some good, solid diagrams but right now, all I can think about it curling up on the couch or on my bed for a quick little nap. my back hurts and my neck's stiff, a little nap can't hurt, right? time to set three alarms and after I finish this rendering maybe I will settle for a tiny bit of shut-eye...

charrette starts...NOW

inspiration board.

Namibia desert | snakes | bird spikes | Air Force Academy Chapel | Corten steel | armadillo lizard | Sandra Backlund - Ink Blot Test | Frank Miller's Sin City | Lucy & Bart Exploded View

working on getting my semester-long studio project done. it's due May 1st, so less posting for now, unless I manage to squeeze in some quickie posts (which I usually end up doing).

FREEDOM(ish) in 7 days.

light study - fins

Some abstract (and rough) renderings of light and shadow studies for my studio project - a civic building in Boyle Heights, Los Angeles. Skin system composed of pre-fabricated louvers of corten steel and glass. roof not yet resolved. yum?