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Jacob Dobson – Sculptor

I admit, I chose to take my Art History class online in the second half of this quarter (starting 2/19) because I was sure it would be a boring course (totally forgetting that being in an art college would make a huge difference…duh!)  Unfortunately, the school would not allow my previous art credits to roll over, so this will be my second or third time through.  Let me correct that… it will now be my third or fourth time through.  No complaints though… repetition is needed with my brain!

However, I am a note taker for a student at the Art Institute (through the Work Study program).  This quarter I am taking notes in Jacob Dobson’s Art History class and am finding the note taking a mesmerizing task.  I get so caught up in his lectures, which are fascinating, that I have apologized to the student for the massive amounts of notes I am taking.   [Let me also mention that the online course and the ground courses are very different.  They are even studying different periods in time, so I am going to get a broad art history education this quarter!]

NOTE: Below is a photo of Jacob Dobson.  I snagged this off of a photo I found online at http://www.jacobdobson.com/

His outlook on life is also amusing and, I admit, I am in agreement with it so far.  (He has a very dim view of our current pop culture and it’s effects upon youthful minds.  I really get into his diatribes on the subject, but often wonder what the youthful minds around me are thinking.)  Up to now they (and me too… I just don’t have to take the tests) are studying the 1300s-1500s.  We sort of side tripped on the whole Rome-during-Michelangelo’s-time, which was quite delightful, in part because he went to Italy last year and gave us first hand experiences with the art pieces.  He gets excited about what we are studying and brings a new perspective to things I have seen in books for years.

In addition to being trained in painting, he is also a scuptor. Being more of a 2D artist, I find that intriguing.   Last week he showed us the steps taken in creating this life sized statue of a child that was commissioned from him, and it gave me a new appreciation of bronze sculptures.

Check out his blog and the huge doorway called “Articles of Faith” that he is in the beginning stages of creating!  It is already creating a stir and 2 of the panels are in a traveling art exhibit.

Needless to say, in the 3 quarters I have been here at this school, I have been quite pleased with the overall level of instructors!  A totally different experience than IUPUI in that the training is relevant, current, and personal, in addition to having teachers who are “doing” as well as teaching.

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Introduction to Type

My Thursday afternoon class is Typography.  Not difficult, but definately time consuming.

The first project was to design the front cover on our binder using only one font type.  The writing is all the requirements.  The design was up to us.  I was so intent on the design that I messed up the oblong of body type, which I should know better!  I was not paying attention… hmmm… right brain (design) / left brain (technical).  One of the things I often forget is the need to use both sides of the brain!

The second project was to create the face of a famous person using a single font.  I was bored and feeling a bit down, so decided to reach into my childhood and do a cartoon character (that was allowed.)  It was fun.

Mr. Magoo in Matura font (can you see the letters that make up the various parts?  I used some straight lines and parenthesis on some of the long or curved lines, but otherwise tried to stay true to the font face.  The eye is an N, for example, the nose a C, the chin a G, the collar Ds, fingers Ms… etc.)

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Marketing – My Passionate Project

Suprisingly, I am truly enjoying my online marketing course!  We could choose any company to work with for 6 weeks and I chose Compassion International because I was curious about it.  Amidst all the research and statistics, I have found a topic that has sparked my passion.

Over 1 million children are being sponsored

The first week of the quarter, Haiti suffered a devastating earthquake, so Compassion International has been all over the Christian radio for weeks on end. 

The Compassion website is featuring the needs in Haiti

Compassion has been serving Haiti for over 40 years and were working with 65,000 children in that country prior to the quake.  As of this writing, they are missing a large chunk of those kids and working to find them.  A heartrending situation yet filled with wonderful testimonies of God’s Grace.  What is positive for this organization is that they already have many contacts via the local churches and organizations they work with, so they have been able to bring in support more efficiently than most organizations that are trying to help.

I also read the autobiography by Wess Stafford, “Too Small to Ignore” and it has impacted my life in ways I will probably not be able to fully appreciate until I can look back over the span of years.  It is up there on my list of the most important books I have ever read.

To add to the immersion in this organization, I am using it in my Career Development class by collecting job opportunities as my homework each week.  In addition, my first project for the Script Writing course was to write 3 thirty second tv advertising spots on one product by week 4.  I did all 3 spotlighting Compassion in Haiti and making a call for donations.  The teacher was quite complementary and said he had nothing to suggest changing.  I think they came across so well because of how deeply I am getting to know and care about the “product”, thus it allowed me to write well.

Needless to say, I have fallen in love with this particular organization. 

On Feb. 2, Wess Stafford, the President of Compassion, spoke for 30 minutes at Moody’s Founders Week event.  The speech is well worth hearing!  If you have any feeling for children in poverty, this will give you hope and possibly help you understand a bit of why I have become so passionate about my marketing project.

Click on the Audio link

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A slow start

Quarter 3 started out slow and easy.  4 classes but none of them are too strenuous, and then on week 2 we did not go to class on Monday.  This was actually good since I discovered I had been fighting a sinus infection since early in Dec. (A doctor visit at the end of the year did not catch it although I told the doc that I had these symptoms prior to getting a cold.  Sometimes I wonder about my doctor!)  So, I needed the time to recover because I was feeling pretty lousy!

I do have the pleasure of seeing one of my Design Concepts projects on the wall this quarter!  See my Tacy kitty in the center?  I am delighted that she is the project that Beth selected! 

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A Mad Mix of Things

The three weeks break has gone by so quickly and now I am preparing to jump into the whirlwind of classes and studying again.  I keep telling myself to be patient because I am so very ready to be back to a full time job!  So while off I began job hunting again.

However, I spent the majority of my vacation finishing my annual family calendar!  This year’s theme was “A Mad Mix of Things” and is concentrated upon the things in our lives that bring back good memories.  I also threw in family history, as always.  My basis is this scripture:

Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.  –  Philippians 4:8

Examples: a couple of traditional style digital scrapbooking pages, and then a couple of pure family memory grabbers:

Below are the small records my siblings grew up on… next year, the large records.  I have started recording (I have a record player that digitizes the sound) the old gospel music from my childhood and hope to get copies to all of us eventually.

Technical notes:

  • 8 calendars printed on an Epson extra wide photo printer
  • Page size: 13×19
  • 7 pages of thick double sided matte photo paper per calendar (there is a cover /bonus page)
  • My own camera and hours on the farm photographing places we played and things from the past
  • Hours on the internet researching the 40s/50s/60s/70s
  • Some topics: Candy of the era, dolls of the 50s, toys of the 60s/70s, family recipes, family books, glassware and items that sat around the house, household furniture, old games, etc
  • Software platform: Powerpoint (very easy to use and my templates from past years are already set up)
  • Spiral binding and the hole for hanging provided by Kinkos
  • Total cost is approximately $40 each and a lot of time

I can’t say which ones are my favorites.  I love the one of my Great Grandpa, my Mom’s dolls, and the Christmas recipes (one in Grandma’s writing) and pictures from my Mom’s cookbook… but then I also like the modern photo page of our childhood haunts on the farm.  They are all so very different and they all pull on something warm within me, bringing prescious loved ones closer and making family bonds stronger.

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Merry Christmas!

Did you notice that my Christmas cards looked a bit familiar?  I bounced off of my classwork in Illustrator and Charlotte added the poem.  I like the work we do together!  Lainey decided to join the fun and provided the stamps with my own art work from Stamps.com.

 

Snowmen

Born in laughter

From banks of snow

Where mittened fingers

And cheeks that glow

Craft these very merry creatures

With eyes of coal

And frozen features.

Snowmen, snowmen

Everywhere,

Come to life

in winter air.

C. Franck – November 26, 2009

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Finals

This quarter I had my first ever “wicked” final – over 3 hours to complete a mini-project for Design Concepts.  I came out of that feeling like my head was a noodle and convinced that I will NEVER work for an ad agency.  However, I survived and that should count for something!

That afternoon was the Adobe Illustrator final… create a brochure with 25 criteria.  Not bad.  I came out of that experience thinking I just might actually enjoy working in Illustrator and that I really can learn the software. 

I went home to crash, only to be urged to give a potential web client a call.  Things are moving way too fast, but it is certainly very exciting!  If I were ready, I could be easily freelancing with several potential customers.  The need is certainly there.

We are now on break for 3.5 weeks, so I will not be posting much here.  However, keep tuned because you just never know what is going to happen next!

I did grab a shot of my poster (the Christmas tree) on the wall… it will be taken down after the first week or so of next quarter.

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Cookie Day should be a national holiday!

Finals week:  Monday morning I had a team presentation in Color Theory and the final test.  We were out by 9:30 and then it was all about Cookie Day with the family in Hagerstown.  This year we had 13 kids involved and it was a wonderful time.  What I found hilarious is that my sister had to explain to my niece and nephew that “No, Cookie Day is not a national holiday.”  The next morning I was up early with 2 more finals to complete. 

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Diety Final Project

Final Project:  A book incorporating what we have learned this quarter in Design Concepts.

Topic: Greek diety

When I was a kid I was fascinated with mythology, fairy tales, and fables (probably because I did not really grasp the full context of the story.)  As an adult, I find many of these stories really disgusting, so when we were told to pull a name out of the container in our Design Concepts class, my immediate thought was, “God, I really do not want to do this.” 

The answer seemed to come back:  “Accept the Situation…it’s just a class.”  So, I gave it up and was the first to pull a diety from the teacher’s cup.  I had probably 30 options and was praying I would not get Eros.  Voila, it turned out to be Eros, of course.  [Ok… yes, my friends who have known me all my life can really get the humor and irony of this particular choice (and they were sure to let me know that too!)  Do you think God might have a sense of humor in things like this? I was not laughing, though.]

However, I discovered that of all the stories, Eros is probably one of the more palatable!  Research elicited the suprising information that Eros’ story is the inspiration for Beauty and the Beast, and I actually found it a very interesting research project.  So much of our current verbage actually harks back to these ancient Greek stories.  Eros is also the same as the Roman diety, Cupid, and everyone has heard of him! 

There were so many potential directions with this story; however, I opted to work from the premise that if you can’t lick ’em, join ’em, and chose to go with the humor of the situation.  I also despise cliches and overdone topics, so that was the problem I decided needed to be solved… how can I take this topic a different and unique direction when it has been done and overdone so very many times? 

I will leave you to decide if I succeeded.  The design details are below the photos under the MORE tag.

Page 1 was an egg on black velvet paper for two reasons… it was the deepest black I could find and it was also going to be a “touch” book, so I needed things that could be felt.  An overlay of black feathers on acetate symbolized the bird.

 

 

 Page 2-3 was an illustrated spread.  The figures and Greek building to the right are raised off the page.

Page 4-5 has hand drawn, movable tags.  If you push them to the side, what they represent is written underneath, such as eHarmony.com, mail order brides, music, love potions, tv reality show such as The Bachelor, and matchmakers.

Page 5 has a letter with Greek type which is removable from the envelop.

Page 6 has embossed gold on the arrow and coming off of the broken arrow.  The words underneath say “Well…almost everyone.”  Basically demonstrating that even Cupid is not perfect.

I also decided to decorate the back of the book (not a requirement for the project.)  Below is a glimpse of how a portion of it looked when opened up with the two text panels enlarged.

More technical comments below:

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Illustrator Final: A Poster

We had a choice of 4 projects for Illustrator and I chose to do a poster.  This allowed me to play with my creativity as I worked on the project.  It also allowed me to choose a topic I thought would be fun. 

Something I am struggling with is simplification and distilling an idea down to its essence.  My mode of operation is to complicate and make things way too detailed.  I want to learn to create sleek, clean forms and communicate the idea with as little fluff as possible.  I feel I got to it with the stamp project, so I again worked on it with this one.  This is actually very hard for me!

Charlotte provided inspiration by sharing one of her Christmas poems with me… her work always inspires, even when it is just a simple poem!

Twinkling tinsel
Miniature lights
Colorful glow
On cold, wintry nights
Berry berries
Popcorn beads
Shiny balls
On triangle trees.

Project: Create a poster without using photos, images, or live trace.  It must be all our own work.

Topic: International Christian singer/songwriter Sara Groves’ concert for “Food for the Hungry” on Dec. 19th here in Indianapolis.

More technical notes:

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