Category: Uncategorized

This week we were able to talk with Ettie Wahl, director and local creative who works around Seattle. She talked about her personal life and how it has steered her towards a career in film and has inspired her works. She told of how she came from a long line of painters, and although she is not one herself, she draws a lot of inspiration from her family line. She left us with a parting thought, the natural world oftentimes inspires us and those moments contribute to our story. She wanted us to sit with that memory and explore the feeling.

I would say that I find myself inspired by a myriad of experiences and am constantly inspired by the people I meet. I believe that being queer has allowed me to experience the world through a very different lens and introduced me to people who if I had not met, would have sent me on a very different path. Additionally, because I’ve lived all over the United States and abroad, I’ve met many queer people who have different ideas of queerness and what struggles they themselves have lived through. I think what I find most inspiring about these people is that although we have similar lived experiences, we live extremely different lives with different values.

A lot of my personal projects are centered around this idea of queerness not being as generalized as lets say a rainbow t-shirt at target. It is very nuanced and varies between economic class, region, and sub culture. When I’m working on something that represents a story that is not mine, I try to represent that emotions I feel or whoever feels and channel it into a visual form. 

Last week we talked to two alumni, Spencer Glenn – Digital Designer (Class of 2019) & Todd Durboraw – Production Designer (Class of 2018) at Brooks Running. Both talked about their experiences working with different kinds of businesses such as working freelance, at an agency, and full time work as an in house designer. Today we’re going to run through some of the options we have after graduation.

With freelance, the biggest advantage I see is having a work schedule that you’re in charge of. You can pick your own hours and work when you want to. The caveat being that you are solely in charge of getting things done with your own initiative. Another benefit of freelancing is higher earning potential. By setting your own rates and cutting out middlemen, the potential of making more money is possible. Unfortunately, by being self employed you lose out on paid vacations, sick time, and other types of benefits offered by companies.

Another option would be working at an agency. Working at one forces you to innovate and work outside of your comfort zone by working with different styles. Additionally you may work with multiple clients at a time while also having a larger, more inclusive approach as you will have to target a broader audience. Unfortunately, working for a large agency typically means you are removed from the client so amendments and changes could be frustrating.

The last option would be working in house for a company. People often state that they feel closer to the company as they are able to see the brand evolve. The work is typically more consistent and allows you to work more closely with directors and decision makers. There’s also more opportunity for upward mobility. The downside could be the monotony of reusing assets over and over and adhering to the same style guide for years.

For me, I think I would like to work at an agency. I like the idea of working on a myriad of styles, concepts and people so that the work never gets stale. I don’t see myself being able to work freelance because I prefer a structured environment where work is consistent and I don’t have to chase after customers. Additionally I don’t want to hound people for my money or negotiate prices.

Full time designer listings:

MoPop Lead Graphic Designer:

https://g.co/kgs/KYGZ2L

Amazon Visual Designer :
https://g.co/kgs/DGQKVT

Midnight Society Multimedia Designer:

https://g.co/kgs/tM27Xa

We had the opportunity to speak with Cameron Karsten about photography and what makes a good photo. He mentioned 3 things that he looks for, textures, patterns and shapes. This week we were tasked with capturing 5 examples of these on camera.

Last week we had the opportunity to speak with Drew Hamlet, a designer for the Seattle Krakens. It was really cool seeing yet another facet of design I’ve never thought of and what really goes into creating a cohesive brand. One of the subjects he talked about was the “Hockey is For Everyone” events they put on where artists create jerseys to bring awareness to campaigns such as Black History Month and Pride.

We were tasked with creating our own for the minor league team, the Choachella Valley Fire Birds, and the theme be Coachella Art and Music Festival.

I started off by going to the festival website and see what color palette they were using. As you would expect they ended up going with a sunny orange and sky blue. This makes sense because its a summer event and the two colors work well together to create that feeling. Keeping that in mind, I took the team logo into Photoshop and changed the colors to match the theme closer.

Then I experimented with changing the panels colors and placement to see what would make for a good ration. Because the blue is more calming and less aggressive than the orange, I decided to make that the primary color and have the orange be an accent. After picking the color placement, next was the font that would be used. I decided to go with Condensed Fit as it is trendy and modern creating for a bold and unique style.

I like how the design turned out. I think it is very eye catching, chic, and something I would wear myself.

Last week Christina Wu talked to us about their evolution through their career and what realizations she made along the way. Throughout her journey, she found herself asking questions as a way to check in with where she’s at. It was very sentimental but also a good way to reflect.

The first two questions are “ Who are you?” and “What is it that you want to do?” At this stage I would say that I’m just a guy learning and exploring and I want to find the right path for me and settle the foundation for my future. I want to see what opportunities I can afford and the life I can build for myself. 

Naturally the next question is why? Personally, I want to live a fulfilling life. I would say that so far I have lived a very unconventional life and experienced things that, to this point, has satisfied my idea of what life means. I believe that had I followed other people’s ideas of success and followed the road laid out for me, I wouldn’t quite feel the same. 

I see myself getting a degree to start building the next phase of my life. I am really grateful for this experience because it gives me the opportunity to open more doors. Where I want to be in the next 5 years is hopefully working a stable job that pays decently. 

The last question is, “what do you want to say?” I guess I would want to say good job. I think I don’t give myself enough credit for the things I’ve accomplished and to myself I would like to say “good job”.

Last week we had the opportunity of meeting Brooke Montgomery, a creative director and director for Cut. It was really cool meeting and hearing from someone who works for a company I’m familiar with and seeing what and how things are run behind the scenes. Cut creates interesting think pieces that are presented as fun videos that are easy and entertaining to watch.

An idea for a video filmed amongst my peers would follow a similar style to the Lineup videos that Cut produces. We would have 5 participants, 4 design students and 1 visual media student. The visual media student would be presented 4 portfolios belonging to the design students and would try to guess which portfolio belongs to who. This could also be done in the reverse, 4 visual media students portfolios matched by a design student. All the materials would already be provided given that we submitted portfolios to get into the program.

I think this would lead into at least 2 interesting conversations. Either that we judge people by their appearance and assume what their style is, or it’ll show that peoples art is identifiable to the artist because it mimics us and our lived experience. Oftentimes when I see other designers, I’m surprised at first by their style but once I get to know them more intimately, I see where their inspiration comes from and how it’s applied to their work. Given that the two programs don’t interact much with each other, it would be a perfect situation to go into blindly And with the ratio, it should accommodate for the the large cohort of design student to film students.

Last week we had Adam Knight come and talk to us about how he went about starting his own production team and what factors led him to success. It was really interesting listening to someone who essentially started with nothing when he moved to Portland and how he managed to create a strong network that built the foundation of his studio. He listed what three factors lead to success in his projects and reflected on how his failures shaped his future.

The three factors he listed were, delivery of quality work,  the relationships made with clients to instill trust, and bringing what you have to the table to provide value to a team. What resonated with me the most was the delivery of quality work and the failure to meet expectations not for a client or someone else for myself. 

Oftentimes as creatives, I feel as though we are our own worst critics. When you spend so much time working on something, it is easy to be hypercritical of things only you might see. It can become quite debilitating at times. I won’t go on to say that I allow myself to present things that are half assed, rather, the pressure to have work that is immaculate  inhibits my ability to finish work, which in of itself, is a failure to deliver quality work.

One of the realizations I’m coming to here at Seattle Central is how toxic the aim for perfection actually is and how it is not actually achievable with our workload and deadline, let alone with the experience we have. Rather than strain myself with minute details, I am learning to enjoy the process and use this space as one to explore. Without sounding cliche, I want to use my time here to be less critical and allow myself to make mistakes in order to learn and gain experience because I may not have a chance to do so once I graduate. 

Although I want to strive for excellence in everything I do, moving forward I want to set realistic expectations and allow myself to fall short from time to time. 

This week we had Brit Zerbo talk to us about burnout and how to avoid it as a creative. She brought up great points about taking care of yourself and taking time to recenter. That being said, we’re gonna talk about hard skills and soft skills.

I would say that my top hard skills would include my previous experience in tech, writing and photography. I guess if I decide to go the UX/UI route, having a knowledge of how logical and physical systems interact with each other would provide a huge advantage in knowing what is possible in design and engineering spaces. I assume that as a designer, being able to communicate with developer nerds would benefit me. Writing in any job is extremely important for effective communication. I also believe that coming from a photography background would be an in demand hard skill to have in a pinch if there’s issues sourcing a photographer for a project or having an eye for proportions and composition forms.

As for soft skills, I would say I excel in leadership positions, problem solving, and creativity. I’ve held many positions where decisive leadership was required whether I thought I was ready or not. Additionally, problem solving comes naturally as I use intuition to guide me through most things. I probably wouldn’t have joined the program had I not seen myself as creative.

Skills I would like to improve on while here in Seattle Central would be a mastery in Adobe products, UX, time management, and stress management. I think one of the biggest reasons I joined the program was to learn how to translate my ideas and thoughts into a digital medium. Without a way to effectively use Adobe programs, I’d probably be dead in the water. I also want to improve my knowledge in areas such as UX/UI and web design. I think these are very in demand skills that would make me competitive when job searching. As for soft skills I want to improve, time management and stress management might go hand in hand. These are skills I’ve always struggled with but as soon as I can manage my time management, I think I could regulate my stress.

Here is reenactment of me introducing myself/ an elevator pitch in a networking situation.

https://vimeo.com/796168829