Example Logo

This is the logo for Zagora that I made using a tutorial.

If you want to make this logo, here's the tutorial:

http://abduzeedo.com/creating-crazy-cool-logo

Halloween Poster

A Halloween poster created using a tutorial.

The design elements I used were shape, direction, movement (kind of), type, size, color, and value. I used shape by combining circle and rectangles to make the tombstones, by using the outlines of bats and the tree, and by using a circle for the moon. Direction was used by indicating where the light of the moon was coming from and movement was used by the implied movement of the bats. Size was used by the different sizes of the many bats to add depth, and value was incorporated through the use of gradients to add more depth to the poster. Lastly, color was used to emphasize the letters that spelled "halloween" (type), and the colors also added a slightly creepy (or spooky) feeling.

I used alignment to line up the word "halloween" in the center of the poster and to align the circles and rectangles used to make the tombstones.The contrast was between the type and the background mostly so that the letters would stand out enough to be legible. The repetition was the bats and the tombstones so that the poster wouldn't look like abstract art or a collage, and proximity was used once again on the bats and tombstones so that they appeared close together, or grouped (after all they are similar objects right?).

Here's the tutorial for this poster (the instructions are a little confusing at the end):

 http://vector.tutsplus.com/tutorials/designing/create-a-fun-halloween-vector-poster/?search_index=8

Halloween Text

I learned a lot of interesting new techniques for effect. Most of which concerned either highlights or how to make a spider web. The most annoying was probably the spider web techniques mostly because every time I used the pencil-thin brush the stroke was a lot thicker than I wanted it to be. Also I learned that whenever you scale something to be bigger, it doesn't always come out the way you want it.

Here's the tutorial if you want to try it:

http://vector.tutsplus.com/tutorials/text-effects/how-to-create-spooky-halloween-theme-text-in-adobe-illustrator/

Pollution Advertisement

This is my fake advertisement for pollution. I used several gradients to add depth and used my dirty water droplet from before. The alignment I used was to the right to help with legibility and I emphasized the words I thought had the biggest impact. I repeated similar colors and patterns to give it a consistent look and I created a small contrast between the brown and black to emphasize the words that I didn't add a gradient or pattern to.

The "WOOF" Effect

The hardest step for me for this tutorial was the light step, because whenever I added the light it always made the fur layer stand out too much.

The easiest step was probably the fur steps because all I had to do was draw the fur on in whatever way I wanted it to look.

Here's the tutorial for this effect:

http://vector.tutsplus.com/tutorials/text-effects/create-a-furry-calligram-in-illustrator/

Lyric Typography

This is a typographic image of the first few lines of the popular song "Demons" by Imagine Dragons.

I chose to do these lines because they stood out to me the most (besides the chorus) and I chose this song because its a good song. I chose to express the word cold with a blue swirl with a gradient because that's what I think about when I hear the word cold, a cold wind. For the word fold, I chose to use a broken line as an imitation of a card being folded (as in bent) and I chose the color red, not only because typical cards have red backs, but also because the color dark red is can be associated with longing. The cross for a "t" in the word saints is because saints are usually found in churches and white means purity and gold means wealth (churches are sometimes wealthy). For the word gold I chose to use yellow sparkles because gold is shiny (ooh, shiny) and yellow stood out better than the gold I used for the cross.

For the orientation of the words I tried to keep them as close to looking like actual lyrics as I could and emphasized the words I thought were the most important.