This is the final poster we created. The goals with my poster is to show to the Redwood community that achievement has no color, and just because you are of a certain skin color does not mean you are below another race. This poster creatively explores a serious topic like racism is by illustrating two people of different skin colors having a conversation, and there is a phrase in the center stating that achievement has no color. This poster is simple but very powerful so it is good to present to high school students since it is mostly illustrations it will engage them and catch their attention. The challenging part about creating our poster was to create something that would engage and catch Redwood students's attention. In order to solve this problem we thought of ideas until we decided to make our poster mostly based on illustrations so that it would be very appealing and catchy to the eye. Being mostly an illustration, it is easier to take in and understand. In the production of this poster we shared equal jobs of coming up with ideas that would catch students's attention by creating several rough drafts independently. In the end, we created this poster made of an illustration and a powerful phrase.

This design is my final logo. I think this logo represents me very well for the following reasons. First of all, the design uses my initials for my first and last name. It uses an H for Hugo that morphs into a C, the initial of my last name. This makes it feel like a more personal design. I also choose colors that create great contrast with each other. I used a green, and a gray to contrast with it, I used a light border that makes the logo look a little brighter. These colors make the logo look very unique and different, as well as bright, energetic, and happy. My design works successfully as a logo for the following reasons. First of all, it is a very simple logo, but it looks very amusing to the eye, and in my opinion it looks attractive in a way that would make you want to take a closer look at it. Even though it is simple it is still very effective. When you take a closer look at it, you can see that there is a mosaic pattern inside the circle. This mosaic pattern gives the logo a more "fun" look and makes it look very original. The piece of feedback that helped improved my logo the most, was that my logo was too simple. This was commented when my logo did not have the mosaic pattern in the back. However, when I added the mosaic pattern in the back, the people changed their opinions and thought that it now looked more complete. I think that overall this logo is very successful because of its simplicity, and its appearance to the eye.

1. This is the initial design that I created. Initially we had to create our logos in black and white, so the first logo is a basic black and white design, that due to its simplicity, doesn't disappoint me.
2. This is the second design, and I created it using Adobe Colors. This design is the required monochromatic design, which I actually was surprised by. I thought this design was going to be boring, but in the end the "cold" colors made it look very visually pleasing in my opinion.
3. This is the third design, and I also created it using Adobe Colors. This design is using a triad color scheme. Basically what this does is it uses three different colors on the color wheel. I had fun creating this design, and I think it is one of the most successful ones because of how different it is from the rest of the designs.
4. This is the fourth design, and I created it using a pixelated image that I liked. For this design I used an image that had a landscape in it so I decided to use green and blue. However, I am not sure about how the colors complement each other. Furthermore, blue being a sad, cold color and green being happy does not make sense. Overall I am not too happy with this design.
5. This is the fifth design, and I made it using a color palette from color lovers. The colors in this palette contrast with each other really well, and in my opinion it is the most appealing to the eye out of all of my designs. I think like this because the color of the border and the color of the circle are very quiet, while the green stands out a bit and makes it look energetic and happy.
6. This is the sixth design, and I made it by using an image that I liked found on Pinterest. What I like about this design is that it uses a variety of very different colors to make the logo stand out and look very energetic and ready. However, I think it looks a little bit too "aggressive" in my opinion, and not so much calm and subtle.
7. This is the seventh design, and I made this one by taking my fifth design and adding texture inspired by brands. Since I liked my fifth design so much, I decided to use somewhat of a similar color scheme, except using gray instead of green for the letters instead. Some brands give texture to their logo, so I decided to try it out with my favorite color scheme. The texture that I gave that logo gives it a mosaic kind of look that I am liking a lot. I like it also because it looks subtle and professional. Due to this modification and adding the texture, this became and still is my favorite design out of all the ones I created.
8. This is the eighth, and last design, and I made it by taking some colors out of an image of a sunset I once took. In order to create this one, I used a darker color like purple, and I brighter more fun and energetic color like orange is. I think the combination of these two colors gives the design quite a unique and interesting look. In my opinion it is one of the most successful designs I created because of the uniqueness behind it.

When we shared our sketches with our small group, I received several comments that helped me improve my design. One comment that I got on the word "Curious" was that the design would look better if it was more readable. Initially with the word curious, I wanted to make a design that included several fonts, different spacing, and different font sizes. This was because I wanted it to make it look like someone curious made the design trying out different things. However, when I got this feedback I adapted my design to the feedback more. With the word pessimistic, my peers said that my design totally fit the description of the word, so I made it look cleaner keeping the same design. 

I attempted to creatively create my designs in several different ways until I came up with my final designs. As I explained earlier for the Curious word design, I tried to make it look like a curious person had created the word. This was because of all the fonts used, the spacing between the letters, and the font size. The difference in all of these made it look like someone was curiously experiencing with different fonts, spacing, and size to create one word. With the design of the word Pessimistic, I had a clear idea of what I was going to do to make the design look pessimistic. I went online and researched a well explained definition of pessimistic. Someone who is pessimistic has little hope and bad thoughts about everything. For this design, I started out using a large font and as you read the word the letters got smaller trying to express little hope.

For this project, the I used one tool for each design, that was key to the success of each design that I completed. For the Curious word design, the tool that helped me the most, and was the most important for the success of the design was the pen tool. This was because with the pen tool I could create perfectly strait lines to create the letters, that no other tool on Illustrator can create. Furthermore, the pen tool helped me create very clean lines, and adjust the thickness of them to make the design more readable and amusing to the human eye. I think the design of the word Curious was very successful because I achieved the goal of making the word look Curious while at the same time have the design be pleasant to look at. For the Pessimistic word design I thought that it would fit the word a lot more if it was hand made. So what I did is I used the brush tool because with it I could create the design as if I was drawing it myself. This tool was definitely the most useful and helpful when creating this design because it allowed me to create the "Pessimistic" look that the word needed to feel Pessimistic. I think this design was also very successful because yet again I achieved my goal of "hand drawing" the word on illustrator to make the word look more Pessimistic. Overall, I really enjoyed this project because it made us the students think outside of the box to create a word design that will make it feel like the word itself.

The designer I researched, Joshua Brewer, has worked for twitter, and has created successful designs like the one below. This piece uses a Gestalt theory that in my opinion is the most effective one in any piece of design. This piece uses continuation because the branch is leading the viewers eye to the important information that the designer is trying to show. Continuation is when the human eye is drawn along a path, line or curve. This is very effective because it leads the human eye towards important messages that are trying to be sent by the designer. I believe this design by Joshua Brewer is very effective and successful because it appropriately utilizes the continuation method to create an effective and appealing design. This design also sort of includes some similarity because the circular shapes with the images inside of them, are all the same except for the image inside of them. The colors in the font also are very similar, meaning that similarity is also used here. Overall this design uses two of Gestalt theories in order to create a very successful graphic design.

A very common design that I know and like that follows a Gestalt principle is the Nike logo. The Nike logo uses the continuation Gestalt principle in my opinion, because you start looking at the top and your eye is drawn through the path of the Nike "swoosh". Obviously this logo is very commonly known and liked. I think the fact that continuation is used is the main reason for why the Nike symbol is popular and effective.

Letter Design Questions

I chose to do this design because it goes really well with the letter I chose. I chose the letter H because it is the first letter of my name. I chose a very creative design to create this H. I made two palm trees on the sides, and then what connects them is a hammock. Another reason that I chose to do this design is because I really like the beach, and palm trees represent this appropriately.

I would describe the style of my letter form as very creative, and original. This is because in my design, I use palm trees and also a hammock to show the letter H. It is a very creative idea because it is an actual thing made into a letter.

In order to support the style of the letter design as well as to make my design look a lot more real, I used materials like cardboard to make the trunk of the palm trees and grass like materials to create the leaves. I made the hammock out of actual fabric and used ropes to tie it to the tree. This made it feel a lot more creative and realistic at the same time.

1. Graphic design is utilizing images, pictures, and text in several different ways to create one image, a logo, or several images.
2. Paintings that lack combinations of color, different images, and text are one example of something that is not graphic design.
3. Graphic design is a different type of art because it includes a lot of variety of text, and images to create one piece.