07 November 2009

VA: Senior Degree Project Survey

1. what gives you energy?

coffee, inspiring work, breaks, appreciation.


2. what roles do you take on as a designer?

making people happy through my designs. If I can see someone who is engaged in my design, and they have a smile on their face, that's all I want.


3. if you had $100,000 and could not spend it on yourself, family, or friends, how would you?

I would give it to children's shelters and/or women's shelters.


4. …if you could only spend it on yourself?

pay off loans, buy some sweet clothes, and probably the rest would go towards my home/apt (furniture, decorating, RENT, etc)... so if I wanted to move to a city that was really expensive to live in, I could! And get a awesome job there!


5. if you never had to work again, what would you do with yourself?

create art and travel the world.


6. in your mind, what are the most critical needs in the planet going unmet today?

global warming issues (sustainability, pollution) and basic human rights issues like racism and sexism.


7. what are the most critical needs in this country?

the extremely uneven money distribution, with people in poverty while others are spending three million dollars on bathroom tiles, people not recognizing that we can live on less, or should be happy with what they have. We're all spoiled and selfish, and that ruins everything.


8. what are the most critical needs in this city?

crime prevention

9. what are the most critical needs in this neighborhood?

crime prevention

10. what are your most critical needs?

social skills.


11. what’s your favorite play activity?

decorating/cleaning my apartment, shopping (if I had money), drawing/working with paper, reading magazines and going on ffffound, watching good movies.


12. what do you enjoy reading or looking at?

beautiful and amazing apartments with lots of character, people's personal spaces, minute fiction, especially fiction and poems written by people I know, fashion/home magazines, ffffound, lookbook.nu.


13. what visual things have held your attention for more than a year?

home decorating, fashion, soft, subtle, and quiet imagery, people watching.


14. what kinds of places are you drawn to?

laid back environments, like the northwest... seattle/portland. Easy going and artistic communities, farmer's markets, thrift stores, anthropologie. happy & generous people. visually interesting places, like a run-down gas station in the middle of nowhere, places that aren't at all serious.


15. what are you passionate about?

happiness, kindness and understanding, family and true friends. memories, art and culture, diversity, humor, originality. finding the beauty in the little everyday things. the future of the world. thinking about the past and trying to understand how it's influencing me and my peers today, and what we'll be like in the future.


16. what has been your most memorable crit at kcai so far?

a crit in foundations that we had on our tree projects. we had been photographing the same tree for three months, and it was awesome to see how everyone's turned out from so much ongoing work, and how diverse and creative the projects were.

17. which project provided your single biggest learning experience?

probably the collection website we built in information architecture- I learned a lot about web design and infographics, worked on my illustration skills, and writing skills, etc... but I'm not sure.


18. how was your pre-kcai portfolio different from the one you have now?

it was all illustration, painting, and collage. I didn't know that much about art before I came here, and certainly nothing about design, except that it was done on a computer most of the time.


19. who do you want to be?

I don't want to be just one thing... I want to be a graphic designer that works in a small firm with friendly people, working on beautiful things that make people happy- like fun books, magazines, stuff for kids, packaging, etc. but I also want to return to working on fine art projects as well, and writing possibly? interior design maybe?... but overall, I just want to be happy, whatever that means- lots of money, no money; married, or single, in seattle, or staying here, doing graphic design or something else... whatever. I just want to be proud of myself, and glad to be where I am in life.

20. how would you describe your work process?

I think about it in my head a lot, maybe sketch some things out, think about what it needs to function as, and who it's meant for, and slowly work it out from there. I make lots of trial color palettes, look through tons of typefaces, and create imagery that relates back to the tone I want.

21. how is your design unique?

I try to always have some sort of character in my work, so it feels more human and friendly, and I try not to be too serious.


22. what design skills are you lacking?

technical skills! I don't know most key commands or shortcuts, I can't figure out coding, I don't know how to animate things, use after affects, or dreamweaver, and I know very little flash. I can't come up with new ways to navigate a website, or think about motion (time based media in general?) I have problems with all of those things I think.

23. in what area of graphic design do you still need to learn the most?

web/interactive, and motion. I think packaging design too?

24. what kind of project will help you learn the most?

hmm... if I don't want to do web/interactive and motion, should I try and think of a project that works with these things? So... something that deals with packaging!


five-minute questions:

1. where is communication design headed in the next ten years? be specific.

all web/interactive design. yay. no tactility. fuuun.


2. what’s your pie-in-the-sky dream design “job”? what is your dream design project?

Something that deals with fun editorial design, formal and compositional issues, packaging, working with my hands, photography, print media. Chronicle Books!!


If anyone reads through this, lemme know how you think all this relates to a possible senior degree project for me! That would be much appreciated. :)


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