Project: Course Graphics – Petroleum Extension (PETEX) Pipe Maintenance Training
Client /Prof: N/A
completion status: WIP
staff guidance: Stephen J Lundy
STA team members: Ingrid
description/plans: Design course graphics for Petroleum Extension (PETEX) Pipe Maintenance Training
To be completed: January 21st, 2022 tentative

Really quick, I will document a series of drafts for my fifth and final course graphics project.

The graphics are pretty light for this one, with no animations, and mostly slide graphics. The reference slide looked like this:

My very first draft was a cartoony pipe graphic, which may have been a little complex

For the second, I tried following a tutorial to simulate a 3d pipe, which may look too retro

Looking for more references, I took inspiration from this Google result:

And made a flatter pipe graphic

Deciding on a better layout, I simplified it and reintroduced a very soft gradient, but it still looked pretty retro.

Checking Behance for contemporary references, I realized a lot of modern design with gradients adds a grainy texture to spice it up

So I tried the same thing, and it is my personal favorite so far

At Suloni’s suggestion, I made a few desaturated photo edits as well. All are awaiting client feedback.

Course Graphics – GOV 360F Global Governance

Project: Course Graphics – GOV 360F Global Governance
Client /Prof: Terrence Chapman
completion status: Completed
staff guidance: Anne Burke
STA team members: Ingrid
description/plans: Design course graphics for GOV 371U
To be completed: Monday, January 10

For this course, I had a lot of creative leeway too. I kept it a little simpler; the professor suggested photos of world leaders or international org buildings, and since avoiding faces for studio graphics is one of the principles I was taught (it distracts from professors), I went with multiple views of the UN building.

I submitted 2 drafts to the client. Both have an exterior photo of the UN building in New York for the slides, and an interior shot of the General Assembly for the studio background. One is a lighter, more muted daytime exterior photo, with a monochrome interior.

The other was a flashier nighttime photo, with a full color interior.

(Sidenote: the General Assembly room seemed the most professional, but I reviewed all the others in my research – have you seen how crazy the Security Council room is?)

Once the flat graphics were finalized, I once again drafted an even simpler storyboard for Rachel to make pretty.

In her final draft, she added some of those world leader photos from earlier to spice it up, at Maddy’s suggestion.

One design question that came up was whether the intro had to directly transition into the course title slide… I told Rachel I believed it should, but Maddy said it might not matter, so the other Gov course does not transition as smoothly with its animated intro.

Course Graphics – GOV 371U Politics and Film

Project: Course Graphics – GOV 371U Politics and Film
Client /Prof: Shannon Bow O’Brien
completion status: Completed
staff guidance: Anne Burke
STA team members: Ingrid
description/plans: Design course graphics for GOV 371U
To be completed: Monday, January 10

My third official course to design graphics for did not specify a style and came with an exciting note:

“Notes: The professor does not have strong opinions on the look of the course, so there is a lot of freedom here.”

My first idea was to do a movie theater theme. I reasoned that, since this is a Gov department class, the film aspect really stands out; I would have made the graphics more political if it were the same course in a film department. You start outside the theater, with a flashy marquee sign for the course title slide.

For the neon sign, I initially tried following a complicated tutorial from a search result, which gave me a rather… plasticky result.

Starting from scratch, I considered some principles I had learned in drawing, from imitating Star Wars special effects: to make something glow, make it white or off-white, with a surrounding gradient of the actual color you want.

Then, for the lecture title, you have the seating area inside.

And then, for the content slides, a gradient resembling a screen.

For an example of how this looks in powerpoint:

I went with a similar dark red theme for the rest of the assets. The Studio background is a still from Dr Strangelove, which is not only one of my favorite movies, but mentioned in the curriculum and an excellent example of a politically charged film.

I also got to try my hand at animation, and by that I mean drafting out a storyboard in Paint.net on a day I was working from home without access to photoshop, and letting our talented Rachel do the hard part in After Effects.

It came out quite nice!