Today we will be exploring Santa Monica and attending the AIGA inside the industry event. Last year I attended one of their events and was sorely disappointed. They talked about CS4's new features and went over each program. The people were snobby and not social. I didn't meet anyone worth remembering. I left early and my friend stayed to see out the rest of the event. Vendors lined up and met designers. The only redeeming thing about the event was the bag that they gave us with goodies in it. A few note pads and accesories. Other than that it was a bunch of 5X8 cards promoting different companies. There was an exhibit of package design and books for students and different designers at the entrance to view. A few of them were worth noting. I wrote them on the small notepad they had given me, to review later. Today we will take pictures with my new canon 30D with 50MM lens. I'm excited to take some pictures of the local and utilize my california roots.

Getting the sense of the NEW Site

Just completed the barebones for my site: www.eminentdesign.org/

Next I will be working on my myspace page and updating more samples of my work. I have a lot of layout work I want to display. Picked up my brochure from Sean Glumace yesterday. I will be working on creating more illustrations and learning more indepth about Flash. Web design this semester has been a very enjoyable experience. From the creation of forms to the integration of flash. I have a more indepth knowledge of how the parts create a whole functioning organizm on the web.

In one month I will be getting married and starting a new job. The wedding will be at my mothers new home in Laguna Hills. I could not have asked for more help. People have come in from left and right to help. I'm getting a sense of design ideas for illustrations as well. The new style concept is light, 60s colors and fluid text. I hate the blocky commercial fonts that clutter and bore our eyes from day to day. It seems over time people are trained to ignore the fact that the world is becoming even more mainstream. Even more commercial. Lets face it, readable type is practical, but that doesn't mean it has to be boring.

At the Art Insititute I was told to find inspiration from http://www.K10k.net. After extensively exploring the site I have found its more a spoof off of design than actually design itself. It has a European auro when it pops up in your browser with dots and lines on fleshy tones. I also found that the site has a very useful link for designers to learn the grid system. http://www.thegridsystem.org/

When I started out I had no clue what design really was. I discovered its not art. Don't fool yourself. Its a skill that is developed over time through observation of past designs. Its also an art that grows as you create it. There are some with strong concept, others with none at all. And I am the type that has to allow the design to grow. Just starting with A CONCEPT and allowing the design to create itself. That is why I am an artist. The artwork creates itself. The design does not. Designers work with a concept and follow it. No client wants to walk into a job trying to find a design solution not having any idea of what to expect. This field took me by surprise. It has challenged me in ways I did not think I could have been artistically. I have struggled the whole way. People see a graphic on a page and think its easy. Its not and I see that now.

burning midnight oil and struck gold

http://css.maxdesign.com.au/floatutorial/

Here are some more links I ran across while burning the midnight oil.

http://herr-schuessler.de/blog/jquerypopeye-an-inline-lightbox-alternative/

Getting the body background to work

http://mezzoblue.com/archives/2008/06/10/design_notes/

http://mezzoblue.com/archives/2008/

And some ideas for Lightbox solutions:
i.query.pop.eye
a russian javascript similar to lightbox, very hard to search to find the code and such. Couldn't get that working in my broken browser either.

Career Report

Today I completed my career report with little more focus that I already had. Crazy how discovering how many directions you can pursue makes you more confused on picking one. There is a world of opportunity out there and its about how you utilize your connections. There are many resources for designers. I just have to figure out where I'm going with it.

Creative helpful links

http://www.phplist.com/ < for marketing
http://www.tintmagazine.com/internships.html < internship online
http://www.colourlovers.com/ < color blog
http://www.n8w.com/wp/552 < all the illustration info you could ever want
http://www.illustrationmundo.com/forum/ < info about illustration
http://illustrationmundo.com/forum/index.php?topic=1896.0 / < mail in postcards