During one of the lectures I have been asked few questions about my creative history. I have decided to post my answers here that could give you an insight of who I am as a person and a designer.
The very first question was “Who am I as a designer now?” I couldn’t think of any reasonable answer, because personally I don’t think I’m a designer just yet, even though I’m doing some work for university. Of course I have my own interests when it comes to thinking about designing as well as any other things I’m interested in, but I believe it takes more time than just 1 semester at university to actually become a designer. A designer isn’t just combining images and text like google says, it’s so much more. It’s understanding not only of design process, but also ability to solve design problems. So to answer “who am I as a designer now?” I would say that I’m a learner who tries to be open-minded when it comes to approaching variety of design challenges.
I came to study here having my main interests in website design, installations and logo design (especially metal, rock band logos). This is what I based my personal statement about as well and since this day I don’t think it has changed. In general, I’m very excited about this semester, because finally I will get to design my own website. Hooray.
Even though I have my goals in design, I’m also interested in photography and video making. To fulfil this need I have become a fashion blogger, which gives me opportunity to use both – photography and video making. So far I’m very happy as to how it turned out to be.
When it comes to things I have liked last semester – one of them is definitely a video editing. I always loved making video either it was for school or something for my own use. The trailer I was making helped me explore a new outlook in video making, I have never been using collages of different video in the same frame before. Here’s the video I have made as a trailer for my artist book:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ipQD5NEyOE
As I have Youtube channel for my blog mostly related to fashion, I have decided to use collages of different videos in the same frame as well. Here’s the link of one of my videos where I have applied this thing I have learned:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiVTUA11rXI&t=5s
I have also enjoyed making an artist book itself. I have been working mostly with collages of pictures I have taken inside the Cathedral, some colours etc. When we have been introduced in one of Visual Communication lectures to different collage techniques, I instantly liked them. At that point I didn’t knew how I should create my artist book, but because it was about light in architecture of Coventry Cathedral where a lot of abstract art has been used and the windows been made using a lot of different methods, I’ve thought I could use collage methods that I’ve learner in class as well as research some more. So even though I have enjoyed making artist book, I guess it was because I was able to use variety of collage techniques to create something abstract.
How did I got here?? All of this takes me back to the past and wonder how did I actually got here? Well, the answer might seem simple at first, but actually it’s not, not at all. For starters, most of my life I was convinced that I will be doing information technology or computer science. I had extended levels of IT, maths, physics at school and I must say I was happy about it. Somehow it haven’t worked out in the end and I’m not going that deep into it, but after I have finished school I have decided to take a break and go to work in England. I have lived in here for a few years before I have decided I that I want to study, but I had no idea what should I study. I was already blogging at that time, so I even had thoughts of studying digital marketing, but I decided it’s not for me. I was even thinking to study fashion design, because my blog is about fashion, but I thought it’s hard to make a living and it might become too much for me, because fashion is more of a hobby. to me The other thing I was considering was photography, simply because I love photography for most of my life, but then again, I felt this isn’t it. I have noticed that most of my life I was interested in arts, even though I wasn’t drawing for ages. That’s where I remembered about graphic design and decided to look more into it. For my surprise, it turned out that it’s something I could actually study, because it teaches to do a lot of different things I show my interest in, hence I thought it’s a perfect course for me. I was also looking into a lot of different universities, but I had a feeling I want to study somewhere in West Midlands, that’s how I came across Coventry University and started considering it as an option. In the end when I was looking into modules and general thing what is taught in this university, I have decided that this is the university I actually would love to study in. To my surprise, I was accepted and this is where I am now. Hooray.
The last question I have been asked was “Is something in my past when I was little that first caught my interest in graphic design?” After I’ve heard it I instantly knew the answer which is “yes, absolutely.” I may have not realised it at first, but the more I look back, the more I realise that it might have meant something. The very first thing as far as I remember it was when I haven’t got the internet on my very first PC, I used to draw with paint. While other kids used to play Solitaire and Pinball, Paint was my type of thing. Since this day I remember we even used to have competitions with my friends as to who is going to draw a nicest room with straightest lines. The worst thing was when the lines couldn’t connect nicely together and we had to make it perfect. What I used to do is literally to zoom in extremely, so I was able to see all the pixels and work from there till I get the result I wanted. The other things that I realised only later is that I was always interested in graphic tees, especially band merchandise. Even now I have a lot of them, despite the fact that I wear less than half of it.
To be honest, I enjoyed answering all of these questions, because it made me think about things that might actually mean something when it comes to becoming a graphic designer. I hope you all will enjoy reading it as much. 🖤
