Current Sta
This week I worked on some concepts for the title of the Spring 2026 STA Roster Poster. Im trying to go for a more “quick tag” look on the title, however I’m not so sure yet on the readability aspect of it. I will probably also try a few bubbly looking ones to see how they read:
After spending the past few weeks working on completing the initial STA orientation and training tasks, I can say I’ve got a much better understanding of the different programs within the Adobe Creative Cloud. I had a lot of fun designing a bio for myself, especially playing around with image effects and patterns within Adobe Illustrator. I also enjoyed creating a caricature of myself on Procreate!
For this training, my main task was to create a comprehensive set of course graphics for a UT course. I chose to work on creating assets for LEB 320F Foundations of Business, Law/Ethics, taught by Professor David Quintanilla, as it is a course I am currently taking.
➜ Design Direction: My goal is to create a puzzle design that represents the intersection between law, business, and ethics, using distinct images from each field. Also, understanding law cases are about putting pieces of the puzzle together, so this imagery fits in multiple ways!
➜ Wall Monitor: Next, I iterated upon a wall monitor design.
Shown below is my first wall monitor design (left), and the design I created in response to initial feedback (right). After creating the first design, I was advised to add a more centralized component to draw attention to the presenter, and to follow a more collage-inspired concept.
After creating the second design, I received feedback that the central image was a bit distracting, and may take away attention from the presenter. To address this, I created a full collage with all images/cutouts equally emphasized. After playing around with color and texture, I arrived at my final wall monitor design:
This was my first time using Adobe Photoshop, so it took me a bit of time to get acquainted with all of the tools! However, I had a lot of fun, and definitely learned a lot, from using the background remover, overlaying textures, adding drop shadows, and more.
➜ Full Course Graphics Set: My next step was to use this main graphic/imagery to create a full set of course graphics, including a vertical monitor, Ipad overlay, canvas assets, and a powerpoint template.
➜ Reflection: I think this training helped me get over the hurdle of being intimidated of Adobe products and the vast amount of tools available within them. I learned that as long as you have a clear vision, and are willing to ask for help (thanks to Lila and Google), it doesn’t take too much for a design to come to life!
For this project, I have to make the poster which displays STAs from the various departments within LAITS. With the theme being graffiti, Im choosing to go with a more traditional tag-like style in order to have the most readability and not distract too much from the STA’s headshots. Here are a few design styles which I am thinking about incorporating:
All three of these styles have a distinct look to them, but have the ability to be meshed with hard edged text and other assets, making them good for this particular project. As a very quick 5 minute idea, I am thinking of incorporating a graffiti design somewhere which says “LAITS STAs”:
Here are the original designs:
This is an alternative design that attempts to make the text more organized and readable.
And these are recreations of the original design with minor changes to the colors, addition of a gray branding bar at the bottom, and removal of the longhorn logo in the background of the wheel.
After ensuring the text is editable in Adobe Acrobat and getting feedback from my Art Director, we decided to stick with the original designs and sent them off to the client!
Two weeks ago, I completed my STA orientation. A few of the projects involved included an “all about me” bio page, a banner for this blog, and a caricature for the 2025-2026 STA overall blog. I lovedddd working on the caricature specifically.
I had a lot of fun with these tasks! It was an interesting challenge to decide how to represent myself with a limited amount of time and set information to include.
After two weeks as a Design STA, I’ve finished up my orientation and have gotten through a solid amount of my trainings. This past week, I started my first project and have been receiving feedback from my fellow STA. I’ve enjoyed working on this project as it’s a text logo, something which I could improve my skills on in Illustrator.