Website

Hey All,

I finally set up a professional website, even though its only on my school server. If you haven't already checked it out, I'll link the page here. You can leave me comments on here.

PS. Semester grades posted: 3.67 GPA and Dean's List!

Merry Christmas!

Oo la la

Feté Event Planning Logo

-An upscale event planner based in the Connecticut area near NYC for elaborate events such as weddings, birthday parties, and corporate events.

Just finished the logo today. As I was researching the project, I came across some images of the old mirrors with the decorative gold trim. They seemed to posses a lot of the qualities that I wanted to portray for this logo. I originially had the ornamentation placed on top, but discovered that it gave a totally different feel for the logo and it was exactly what it needed. So then I started working with colors and tried to stay away from going too feminine because it was already a feminine logo. Orange is not a color I use very often (mostly because I hate it), but it gave the logo a more ambiguous feel as well as keeping it classy and simple. I knew from the beginning that I wanted to use a completely separate color for the accent, so I used a complementary blue gray to satisfy my taste. This logo came surprisingly quick for me, and I'm really looking for the rest of the branding for this company. Let me know what you think :)

Finalized

Final Lancaster City Logo

This is my finalized version. I was trying multiple colors out but I was afraid to use a darker color and pull the attention away from the text. This gold seems to balance well with the whole logo. I also added a very small stroke on the outside of the text to make it stand out just a bit more, i didn't want it to be too noticeable though. I was also given the suggestion to add an extra line connecting the two curls on the ends, and I think this gives it more of an architectural feel. Thanks to the help of a few people, I was compliment on my statement for this logo. "Wow, she can design and write."-was the direct comment from my teacher.

"The City of Lancaster is a culmination of unique architecture and artist expression. This logo is a reproduction of the ornamentation seen on the older buildings around the city, which gives the base a solid structure to balance the classic text. The colors continue the theme of representing the city while keeping the stylish appeal. In its entirety, the logo remains eloquent while still grasping the edginess of the artistic city."

Their comment: "We really enjoyed the modern and classy touches of this logo. We thought that it was a strong design and definitely had heir of prestige too it. That being said, it may be better used for something more official or bureaucratic, while we were looking for something a bit more fun."

Oink Oink

"Cheap" Travel Magazine
Adobe Photoshop

Just finished "painting" this is photoshop. Honestly not the easiest thing to do, and there are quite a few mistakes that i can't fix but i won't point them out. The project: create a magazine cover about cheap travel. The catch: paint it all in photoshop. This program is mostly used for manipulating photos and combining images and such. For this project, I started with a completely blank sheet and painted my entire cover. The background, if you can't tell, is a topographic map of California (completely made up) that i literally just used the paint brush and textures. The piggy bank was created using shape selections and paintbrushes and different opacity to create the dimensions. This file has about 45 layers, which just proves how hard it is to paint in photoshop, especially when your not a illustrator. Gimme some feedback as always :)

Ol' Lanc Lanc

Lancaster City Logo
Adobe Illustrator

Our newest project in Design Studio involved a real client, the City of Lancaster. We were asked to create logo that describes the city to be used on workers shirts and items sold for the city. My logo uses some influences of the architecture from around the city. I wanted to keep it classy with my font selection but give it a bit of style and flare with the design. I'm pretty set on keeping the font black, but i'm still undecided on the color choice on the bottom piece. I would LOVE your suggestions, especially if you've been to Lancaster. (They're looking for an outsiders view to give and insider appeal.) Let me know what you all think :)

Bubbly

Personal Logo
Adobe Illustrator

Here it is folks. Sarah in logo form. My design studio class begins designing a personal logo for our stationary and business cards. This would be the logo to describe me and my design style. I had quite a bit of difficulty discovering a logo that really fits my personality. This actually happened by accident while I was fiddling around with colors on my other (not so grand) logos. The color struck me as bubble gum and I ran with it. My teacher pointed it out right away as being a real "Sarah" design. Classy but still has personality. Please give me your thoughts.
Tell me this is not me!?! :)
(once i get my business cards printed i'll be sure to print ya'll some)

Change

Change (CD Cover)
Adobe Photoshop CS4

Yay for school starting!

First project for my photoshop class. We were told to bring in pictures of change. That was our only description, the rest was up to us. So I went out and took photos of actually money change and spelled out the word "CHANGE" on different surfaces and textures. I merged 5 photos together and created a grungy texture for my CD cover. It didn't take me very long so I got to add a lot of extra grime to the edges to give it more of a grunge rocker look. I downloaded the actual photos wrong from the camera so i know its not very crystal clear. oops. Comments welcome :)

Streamline

Vanity Fair Streamline
Adobe InDesign

My final project for History of Graphic Design. We had to create a postcard to promote a show for a certain time period that we have learned about. I chose Streamline and focused on the Vanity Fair covers of that time. The front is just close ups of the different logos of the covers. I continued the theme by adding "STREAMLINE" in a similar font to keep with the flow. The back is just the full Vanity Fair covers and the mailer. Just to show you how much my proffesor liked it, this is an email he sent me the week before it was due.


Hey Sarah-
I'd like to have a 300 dpi version of that killer Vanity Fair postcard for Friday.
If you do not have a CD to burn could you have a PDF ready for next class at 11 (and we'll transfer then)?
You probably noticed it's one of my favs and I need (good) student work to submit to our institution. Also -remind me if I forget (I’m old!).
And in closing . . . I want to take this opportunity to tell you that you have been a great artist to have in class and I think you will do well. Keep at it, and set the bar with your best project. Let all others either equal or (even better) make you reset the bar even higher.
Thanks! -Kevin


So needless to say, I was pretty excited about it. I think I'm getting a good grade on that one :)

Divine Dining

Food Magazine
Adobe InDesign

After coming up with a title for my food magazine (thanks mom), I decided go with a Japanese theme. This issue of Divine Dining is based on Japanese foods, especially sushi (my favorite!). My designs and layouts are based on the simplicity of Japanese design. I had way too much fun with this project and even added extra pages and everything. These are just a few, my cover and two spreads ( two pages, same topic, one cohesive design ). You already saw the wine advertisement that is included in this magazine. I do realize you can't read it but if you would like to see more let me know and i'll send you the full thing (there is true articles in there about sushi). Its pretty much awesome, if I do say so myself. Would you buy Divine Dining magazine?

(and i just realized how many parenthesis i've used in this little shpeil so i apologize.)

Jammin in Russia

Pearl Jam Poster
Mixed Media
Design Studio

After quite a few hours on this project I finally completed it. This was actually due last week and I got an A-, Yay! I also was in Ocean City that weekend and had a rough time finishing before monday morning's class. Nonetheless, I am pretty pleased with the final piece. Our project was to create a poster for our band (Pearl Jam) and have it reflect the country, pulled at random, that the band was playing in. I pulled Moscow, Russia. This is such an iconic recognition of styles for Russia so I knew it would work nicely. I used newprint as a base and tracing paper streaks over top (not very visible in the picture) along with the red shapes in tracing paper on top. The upper and lower white rays were then glued on. The three guitars came next. Each guitar neck transforms into the Russian church form. This also helped identify the city of the concert. The one guitar is larger with the smaller two placed behind it which also goes along with the Russian poster theme. The last white ray was placed over top with Pearl Jam written in a Russian font. The guitars were so difficult to color in without leaving streaks (also not very visible in the picture, thank goodness). And now that I've written a book about this i'll leave the comments up to you :)

Squeeze!

Divine Dining Magazine Ad
Adobe Photoshop

I have no idea where this thought came from but it makes me giggle. I'm in the process of designing an 8 page (possibly more) food magazine called Divine Dining. I'm probably having way too much fun with it. We have to include a food advertisement as one page in our magazine. I decided to use the wine Darisciah that I had made up for another class. I started with a photo of the grapes that were originally on a vine. I also had a photo of a wine glass. I cut both out and pasted them together in one file. I had to use another copy of the wine glass over the grapes so they appeared to be in the glass. The saying on the right is just a random thought in my head. It seemed to go well with the wine. Now you can't tell me you would never see an Ad like this is a food magazine. I'm quite excited about this. I would love to hear everyones thoughts on this!

(sorry if its difficult to read, it didn't download very well to the internet.)

Whitewater Rafting anyone?

Whitewater Rafting Brochure
Typography
Adobe InDesign

The top picture is a the cover and backside of a three-fold brochure. The bottom picture is the inside spread of the same brochure I recreated for typography. I was given an old brochure that was poorly designed and had to include the same type on my new brochure. (And let me tell you it was not fun typing all of that in there.) Hopefully you can notice where the folds would be, otherwise its quite difficult to imagine the 3-fold. Since there was a lot of copy text in this brochure I wanted to make the pictures much more interesting, hence the big wave. I was pretty happy with the layout and my teacher seemed agree. Obviously it'd be much easier to see in person all folded up, but this works for now. Would you pick up a brochure if it looked like this?
I also have a graphic tech magazine coming up in the next few weeks that I'm very excited about, so keep you eyes pealed!

Ten

Pearl Jam Album Cover
Mixed Media

This is the second piece of my Design Studio series, the album cover. If anyone knows Pearl Jam, they've become quite political. This cover is a silhouetted outline of the band members with the block over the eyes. The outline is intended to be slightly off and appear as if it is one continuous line uniting the figures. The background is watercolor to look like parchment paper. The white outline was then painted on in acyril and the colored blocks were pasted on top. Considering the fact that markers bleed on watercolor paper, I had to place a piece of acetate over the entire cover to include the Pearl Jam logo. It all took a good amount of time and lots of stress, and in the end I'm still not completely happy with it. Attempting to get the acetate to stick to the watercolor paper, and the watercolor paper to stick to the mat board, was quite a hassel. I still think it would all look better if I could have done it on the computer :)

Wine

Darisciah Wine Label
Adobe Illustrator

For my history of graphic design class we had to create a wine label that represents a style that we have learned. This is a wine that I made up with a label representing the Vienna Secession. Vienna Secession reflects Gustav Klimt's spirals and sense of symmetry. The font and colors also evoke Vienna Secession, although I modernized certain aspects such as the overall shape of the label. My professor announced during critique that it was one of his favorites, thanks to a senior designer who was quite helpful with the final piece.
Darisciah= DAnielle tRISCIa sarAH
(the fabulous roommate threesome)

Mumbo Jumbo

Mumbo Jumbo
Adobe Illustrator

Mumbo Jumbo: (noun) Unintelligible or incomprehensible language; gibberish. Language or ritualistic activity intended to confuse. A complicated or obscure ritual. An object believed to have supernatural powers; a fetish.

The latest typography project. We were instructed to come up with a design that used only typography of a word and its definition to create something that evokes the feeling of that word. After struggling to find a word, i came up with this crazy way to make the word one continuous line. Since we can't use lines or any illustration other than text, I replaced the line with the definition of the word. So each outline is actually another string of text defining Mumbo Jumbo. And let me tell you, my eyes are mumbo jumbo after finishing this. This was a really fun project and it turned out much better than my intial thoughts of this project.

Pearl Jammin'

Pearl Jam Logo
Hand rendered
Ink on vellum

My design studio professor is very involved with the music industry. He just moved to Lancaster from LA, where he designed many different band albums, logos, posters, and t-shirts. He based our syllabus and projects off of one band, randomly chosen out of a hat. My lucky pick for the rest of the semester is Pearl Jam. This being the first project in the series, their logo.
At first I struggled to include the hard edge of Pearl Jam, while still staying within my style. My professor was glad to see my sketches of this logo. I really think I kept it classy with that rock edge that Pearl Jam portrays. And yes, it is all done by hand, I'm a perfectionist when it comes to these projects. There will more Pearl Jam merchandise throughout this semester.
Please comment. Constructive criticism is always appreciated!

Double Time

Double Time Font
Adobe Illustrator
By yours truly :)

This is my latest font design for my typography class. I thought this up last semester and hand rendered a few letters. This semester I have to design the complete alphabet on the computer. It gets kind of tricky making all the curves nice and smooth, and i'm still working out the kinks, but I really excited about it. My professor is excited as well. This is obviously only a few letters because I haven't finished yet, but let me know what you all think.

Cheer Explosion!

Victorian Era Personality Poster
Adobe InDesign

This is has been a long overdue post but i'm finally getting back into the groove. My History of Graphic Design class started off pretty interesting. This is our first project in which i took a more modern approach to the Victorian Style posters (much like the old western "wanted" posters). Considering cheerleading is quite upbeat and fun, i figured my style should reflect that as well as keeping in line with the Victorian guidelines. I must say i probably crammed way more information on a 5x7 piece of paper than anyone else but i like it. It was also a fun project to start out with. Most of the smaller bodies of text include definitions or quotes. The long text toward the bottom is one of my favorite poems that NCA reads every summer. If you get the chance, check out all the little details and let me know what you think. I know i definitely enjoyed this project.