So...i haven't written anything on here in a long while. Mainly because no one reads it. So just in case anyone does read it here are some facts:

- I started this blog because i had to for a Graphic Design class.
- I rarely keep journals/blogs/diaries of anything. However i think i should start.
- I have posted random rants so i may seem like an angry/negative fellow but i assure you i am not. =] Well, most of the time anyway...
- I just learnt how to tie a tie today! =D
- And...i can be quite boring at times. =(

Well...thats it!

Industrial Design... A massive waste of time.

Here's why:

Good news: Its fun and you get a buzz from seeing things you've designed go from the concept stage through to the production stage.

Bad news: You'll never make it to the good news stage...well, maybe only the fun part. Maybe.

"...the design industry also has an abnormally high under-employment rate."

- Awesome!

"Starting salaries for a graduate designer fall at the bottom end of graduate salaries. The average salary for an adult designer with five years experience is currently (2006) slightly below the average adult wage in Australia."

- So, after 4 years of doing a Bachelors of Industrial Design i have to be in the work force for a further 5 years to just be slightly below the average adult wage? LMAO?

"In the absence of government regulation (which is highly unlikely), there is nothing to stop people with no training jumping into an already overcrowded market."

-Shit, i didn't even know you didn't have to have qualifications to be a designer! I should've just done something else, taught myself some 3d modelling shit and applied for design jobs... -_-

"...frequently require working long hours and hours outside of normal working time. If time pressures and working flexible hours are not for you then maybe design is not the right profession."

-Lol design is not the right profession for you? I think everyone who wants to make a decent living fall under this category.

Quotes taken from the Design Institute of Australia: http://www.dia.org.au/content.cfm?id=104

Website Link

Oh, here's the link to my website:

Design Documentation

Ok, first of all, I am not much of a blogger. As you can easily tell, as this is my first entry since who knows when. Pretty much this entry is to detail the steps I have taken to create my website. I don’t want to bore you too much so I’ll go over as briefly and succinctly as possible.

First of all, as a refresher I am doing the website vgmconerts.com and focusing on their upcoming concert Symphonic Fantasies. Essentially the music being played is from games produced by Square Enix. With that said, I can assume that game enthusiasts will be a major audience. However anyone who loves beautiful compositions will also enjoy the music being performed. Unfortunately you can’t please everyone, so in order to establish a proper theme for the website I decided that I would target it more towards gaming enthusiasts.

Seeing as these people love their games, it is inherently linked with technology. That is to say that generally these people will have pretty good hardware in terms of computers and a myriad of other gadgets. So…what is the new revolution in computer monitors? Wide Screens! That’s right! Considering people will mostly be viewing websites on computer monitors, this helps decide what resolution to make my website. I decided to go with a 1280x900 resolution because it accounts for 30% of users. (http://www.noamdesign.com/Web-Design-Blog/screen-resolution-statistics/)

With the foundation set, it is now time to begin designing! Yay!

I created a mood board to collate images that would relate to my website. Things I could draw inspiration from. Below is said mood board:

[insert mood board here]

From these images I devised a background I desired and a possible layout. I done some quick hand sketches so I could have a better visual on it.

I was pretty happy with the concept at the time. I really wanted to put my own artwork into it, however that involved a lot of drawing. I bit the bullet and decided to give it a shot.

So, I done some quick sketching and fleshed out the characters in the poses I wanted. These are actual Square Enix Characters whether they look like it or not lol…. My drawing skills aren’t that leet. The guy leaning is meant to be Cloud from Final Fantasy, the guy with his body facing away with long hair is Sephiroth, the girl playing the piano is Aeris and the guy with his back turned is Zack. In the game they’re all, I guess, fighters, so in order to make it seem more formal I decided to attempt to dress them up in formal wear.

In the end I scanned them into photoshop and tried to paint them, however it didn’t turn out very well at all… =(

Then, when I thought all hope was lost I was inspired by photoshop matte painting. (http://www.seb4d.com/tutorials/Mattepainting/mattepainting_english.htm) This tutorial gave me motivation to modify images to suit my needs. So to stick with the original concept of having a beach like background, characters in the foreground etc. I searched for a nice landscape picture.

Which I then photoshopped, using the clone stamp to get rid of the mountains. Played around with the saturation and light, and added the characters plus a piano and violin. Also modifying their saturation and light to match the background. I decided to paint clouds around the airship at the top of the image to make it really seem as though it were in the clouds. For the violin, I just used the clone stamp to make it look as though it got washed ashore. The piano kind of looks like its on fire, but its not! >_<>

In this next image I have used the dodge tool to produce light coming from the clouds. Kind of like rays of light and added the title. The font I used was ChopinScript and I wanted to add a windy effect to it, so that it somewhat blended in with the clouds. To achieve this I just used the smudge tool to modify it

Finally I added shadows to the objects in the image. I didn’t believe the girl fitted in very well with the rest of the image due her seeming very light in comparison to the other objects. So I used the burn tool to modify her, also to add the shadows.

Now to add buttons and a text area. I made the text area the same way I done the title. I just drew a rectangular box in another layer, copied the selected area and pasted it onto this new layer. I then made it lighter and smudged it. For the buttons I used the same font as the title to keep it in theme. They’re rollover buttons so that when the user mouse overs a button it adds an effect shown in the image below.

The End! So, that’s the story of how I came to design my site the way it is.