One More Week . . .

. . . of classes, then just one class session during finals week for final project presentations in Graphic Design II.

Yesterday, in Graphic Design, we each presented our preliminary designs for the logo and wayfinding for a fictional high-tech convention.

The technology I chose is MEMS (micro-electro-mechanical systems). As part of my research, I looked at all kinds of images on the interwebs, such as this and this and this. I based my logo concepts on some of the images I found. This is the one that other people agreed was the best.

There were some suggestions as to how to improve it, so there is still work to do.


The other class that I'm going down to the wire in is Flash. Today I spent a good 6 hours working on the final project for that class. The assignment is to create an nonlinear, interactive maze with sound effects.

Here is the opening image for my project.

 

When I presented my idea, I was told that I had essentially recreated Frogger. Not ever having been much into playing video games, I could only shrug.

Today, I had to make an adjustment to my original concept today, in the interests of completing the project. I had wanted to have two lanes of traffic moving in each direction for the chicken to dodge. However, I simply was making no headway toward figuring out how to combine and synchonize an animated movie clip and a button with a hit state. Finally, I gave up and went with a static maze.

It's not nearly as interesting, but I just couldn't keep beating my head against that wall. 

I haven't quite given up though. I'm still working on a test file, and if I can get it to work, I may still try to rework the project.

Post-Thanksgiving

The aftermath.

To be dealt with tomorrow.

Pre-Thanksgiving

Most years, I make a turkey at Thanksgiving, regardless of how many people are around to eat it. Usually, I buy a bird and pop it in my mom's turkey roaster. Pretty easy and straightforward.

This year, I'm experimenting.

I subscribe to the weekly newsletter from The Splendid Table. Usually, I will glance at that week's recipe and decide it's too complicated, the ingredients are too unusual to buy for just one recipe and then just sit in the cupboard, or it calls for tomatoes.

A couple weeks ago, however, it featured a recipe for Roast Turkey with 40 Cloves of Garlic and White Wine Pan Gravy. That got my attention.

Preparation for this meal started yesterday, when I prevailed on Tim to make the base for the gravy.

I also made the seasoning rub for the turkey, as well as a pecan pie (no corn syrup!) and rumballs.

All this cooking made for a large amount of dirty pots and pans, that had to be washed before I could commence cooking this morning.

Gullywasher

Not the proverbial gentle Northwest drizzle.

Hotel Logo

The pace at school is accelerating somewhat, now that there are only three weeks of remaining, not including finals week.

So far, so good, I think. I haven't received grades on my midterm projects in Flash and Graphic Design (Logo and Identity), but I believe I did well. In my Drawing class, I received something like 200 or 201 points of a possible 203.

In Graphic Design, the assignment was to re-brand an existing five-star hotel, and design a new logo and new website home page.

For my hotel, I selected the Grand Hyatt in Santiago. In researching images, I found a fair number of photographs of its 24-story atrium with this really cool window at the top.

That window was the inspiration for my logo and the name I gave the hotel, which means "star" in Spanish.

Mimosas

Every once in awhile, my husband and I like to have mimosas with our Sunday breakfast. And when we do this, I insist on making fresh-squeezed orange juice.

It's just so much better than packaged, processed orange juice.

But it was always such a production to use an old-style reamer.

So, awhile back, we were in a kitchen-supply store and saw this product.

Have I mentioned that I have a weakness for kitchen gadgets? While I'm all for versatility, sometimes it's just nice to have a single-use tool that does a particular job really well.

For instance, my cherry pitter comes in handy when I want to make cherry pie.

Anyway, this juicer, while smaller than what we would have liked, being designed for lemons, looked as though it would make the task of preparing fresh orange juice much easier.

And, if we make a point of using smaller oranges, it indeed fulfills its potential.

  

However, I'm thinking of asking Santa for the larger orange juicer.

Unzipped

 

I first noticed this piece of student-created public art at Shoreline Community College a while ago, and I still get a kick out of it.

Photo of the Day — Green Lake

 

A good afternoon for a walk around Green Lake. Sunny and brisk.  

Flash Midterm Project

For our midterm project in my Flash class, the assignment was to create two web banner ads, for a product, service, or movie (2 of the 3).

I did an ad for Full Circle organic grocery delivery



and Anna's Honey



Creating these was much more fun than I had anticipated.