Confessions of a budding artist

                In life, there are those that are born with natural artistic abilities, and there are those that can only draw stick people. But that’s OK! We all excel in different talents. I would like to think that I can draw or design some things with some artistic value. I decided to take an artistic route with my free time, since I am extremely mediocre in sports.

 I did not know how much I love to design and draw until I got into some of my mass communication classes. In the mass communications program here at The University of Texas at Tyler, I was required to take a Media Design and Production class last fall where I would use Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator to create some design work.

My initial thought was: “ain't nobody got time to learn new software” with my different course work already piling up. This class introduced me into the world of drawing electronically. Technology has come so far by revolutionizing the brush and canvas.

My first attempt at Photoshop was mediocre at best, as seen below:

Yes, that's a duck face

            I attempted to make a movie poster depicting gladiators rebelling against fighting in arenas. I first started by compiling free domain pictures into my basic idea, with my Halloween costume making me a Roman leader. Yes, it’s a Greek toga, close enough.

I did not win the class movie design contest, as expected. I mean, seriously, the poster looks like a cheap 50’s movie.

But once Illustrator came around, I was confident and I was able to make a great logo design for Dunkin’ Donuts, as the class project allowed us to make a logo. Creating logos or other types of graphics has been great as it expands your creative mind. You're basically stimulating your creative capacity as you brainstorm on what to make. Not only that, but you also get to create what you're thinking right on the spot

Logo design project

Ever since then, I haven’t touched either software that much.  But it has changed now that I’m taking Visual Design!  Here is where I plan to beast my abilities and make some good artwork.

The good thing about art is that it is subjective, but sometimes it’s just biased. There are people that will not like some art because it is not favorable to them and what they like, and the artists will think their art is far superior because they made it. I’m neither. I tend to believe in my designs and arts if others like it. This is bad thinking, but in the marketing and PR world, I am catering to the consumer!