STA Blog

Work from April

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I haven’t updated in a while due to a main project I’ve been working on being confidential so the other work I’ve been getting hasn’t been enough to dedicate a post to. Now, however, I do have enough material!

UTFC Work

I’ll summarize this as it’s work I’ve made posts about before. This month, I was able to complete a PowerPoint presentation for the textbook and I’ve also completed 2 banners for the project.

STA Presentations!

This was the first time I attended an STA presentation and it was a ton of fun! I learned so much about the work form other departments and got to see my fellow design STA’s present their work. It was a nice experience to cheer on all the students who work so hard in this department and I got to know some of the faculty better. It really put into perspective how tight-knit LAITS is and that it can really build connections and a healthy work culture.

Foundations of Data Science

I was assigned a new type of course graphics for the Edx department. I’ve never done this kind of work before and it was pretty intimating at first. My main assignments are to design a logo for the new class and animate it. I had know idea where to start but luckily I was given a sheet of past examples I could take inspiration from.

I also looked up how data science is normally represented and found some ideas to go off of. Here are some logo designs I was able to draft as of now.

After showing these to the client, they said that they really like the concept of the gears and puzzle piece look. They offered some notes on implementing a possible regression reference on the design so i’ll be looking into that.

April Updates

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Wow it’s been awhile since I posted! Here are the projects I’ve worked on since March 20:

STA Presentation PPT Template

Client/Prof: LAITS
Completion Status: Started on Mar 21
Staff Guidance: De’sha
Completed on: April 1

I worked on the presentation templates for the 2024 STA Presentation!

My hours per week are shorter than other STAs, so Leilani stepped in to finalize the template (below is what it looks like with my information):

My own STA Presentation!!

Client/Prof: LAITS
Staff Guidance: De’sha & Mike

This year I was chosen to present at the 2024 STA Presentation event! At this event STAs, staff, and alum came together to talk about the program and what we’ve done. I was super excited to be a part of it!

Here is the recording of the presentation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GMASUoQOcHs

Texas German Retractable Banner #11

Client/Prof: Margaret Blevins
Completion Status: Started on Feb 20
Staff Guidance: De’sha

I’ve been working on so many other projects I had to delay this one! This is the final draft of TGDP Banner #11:

Back to my Background Design Training

Client/Prof: LAITS
Completion Status: Started on Oct 25
Staff Guidance: De’sha
Completed on: TBA

It’s been so long since I’ve had the chance to work on this!! As a reminder, I am creating a tutorial for future STAs to learn more about Adobe Illustrator and how to create a background in the program. I really want to finish it before I graduate. Recently I just finished a draft 1 of the tutorial and it’s now gotten feedback from Leilani, so I’ll be incorporating that. But while I work on that here’s my cute tutorial header:

Week 4/15/24 – 4/19/24

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4/15/24 – 4/19/24

I’m continuing my training by doing custom course graphics for a made-up class. Below are the mood boards I created to give me some direction:

While waiting for approval for direction from my trainer- I looked ahead in my training and did an exercise from “History of Design” where I modeled a design piece after a movement. I chose the Pop Art movement and here is the portrait I did of my baby cousin as an alien.

Week 4/8/24 – 4/12/24

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4/8/24-4/12/24

I began my training by learning how to do style A and B course graphics! I also began the process of learning how to make custom course/studio graphics.

 

Additionally, I presented at my first STA weekly meeting. I presented a project called Project: S.O.R.C which I made for the 2024 AET showcase.

 

Below are the approved custom course graphics I made:

Week 2 & 3 – 4/8-4/18

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Week 2 & 3 – 4/8 – 4/18: Time to Start Training!

 

Intro Training: Style A&B Course Graphics

After completing my STA orientation, it was time to start my basic training. The first training course was a walkthrough on how to customize online course graphics based on two basic styles: A and B. Professors can choose from either of these depending on their preference and they will receive a simple and cohesive asset packet for their course. For the training, I chose to make graphics for my favorite class this semester: Social Psychology in Film.

Here is style A:

 

And style B:

This was pretty simple to complete because there are easy-to-alter templates already in place. It mainly consisted of changing color overlays to make a cohesive design and adjusting opacity to make the photo in style B subtle but still visible. I also learned how to properly organize and name files.

 

Intro Training: Custom/Studio Course Graphics

For the next training, I got to choose between two courses to make a custom set of graphics based on the professor’s request. I chose EAS1030: Earth’s Dynamic Environment II. The client notes said he liked orange, but was open to other designs. In my first attempt I tried to incorporate orange by adding a sepia filter over a collage of photos:

Draft 1

 

After working on this for a bit, I decided I didn’t really like the color scheme because it didn’t properly represent what the course was about. I thought the sepia color made it hard to see what the course was really about, which is the ocean and atmosphere. That lead me to my second attempt in which I stuck to blues and created movement by cutting and collaging images of the ocean and clouds. Here is a design menu of my second attempt:

Draft 2

 

I really like the depth and movement created by the cutout images of water layered on top of each other to look like waves. I also think using blue better represents the course topic. I posted this design to Basecamp and received feedback from the STA trainer. She liked the concept and suggested adjusting the blues for the in-studio assets because they can show up different on camera. I also lightened the blue of the buttons and other Canvas graphics because they were appearing black on screen. Here is  close up of one of the studio graphics, a mockup of the designs in-studio, and a design menu with the suggested changes:

Draft 3

At first I was a little overwhelmed by the design freedom of this training, but after a few attempts and valuable feedback, I came up with something that I really like.