Before I started
taking visual communication classes, I thought that I would just be learning
how to use programs. Little did I know that there is so much more to visual
communication than just knowing the computer! I first realized this in my 2D
class while learning about the principles of gestalt. The teacher was
explaining something I had always felt was there but I couldn’t put my finger
on it. I had subconsciously known that something pulled a design together and
made it unified. After learning this I couldn’t wait to find out more about how
to make my designs work.
I feel like I
progressed most in my visual communication class. My first assignment was to
define graphic design. I
looked at various definitions and combined them into this sentence: Graphic
Design is a creative visual process using typography, symbols, and
images to communicate a message or idea to a targeted audience. I was early
to class the day this definition was due and decided to draw an image of an eye
with a triangle projecting from the center and the word “communication” because
I was thinking about the class I was about to attend. When the teacher was
lecturing he pointed at the image I had drawn and said “this is visual
communication”. That is when it struck me that my drawing had sent the message
as well as a sentence could.
Looking
back at my work, I realize I have learned about the strengths of image, typography,
and configuration. Simplifying an image helps it become easily understood by
the viewer, as exemplified in my “toucan image”; while combining many different
images creates a whole new meaning as demonstrated in “Visual Rhetoric of a
Microphone”. In my “Performing Arts Poster” and “Leonardo Brochure” I learned
about creating hierarchy in typography. I feel my
strongest work is the configuration of typography and image in "toucan
O" and "Typogriffin" because letters and imagery have become completely
inseparable: letters are the image, the
image is letters. I cannot wait to apply what I have learned and learn even
more in the semesters to come.
I feel like I have
come a long way from where I was before I began working towards my BFA. My experiences
thus far have molded me into a designer.
A designer creates messages that people can understand in a visual way. I
find myself analyzing design all around me from a cereal box to the billboards on
the freeway, wondering if I would have done it the same way. I see design. I
appreciate design. I create design. I will make visual communication my career,
continuously building on the knowledge acquired from my professors, employers,
and colleagues.