Please appease

I do not usually use this blog to air my own personal grievances because it is an art blog and not my bitching block, but today I must air out my head. If you look at this for art only then skip this entry.

I am feeling frusterated lately. In the design world and my own personal life. I have been hearing nothing but criticism. Constructive crit is all fine and good, but when I get "I do not like this" without any real design issues I find myself wondering where design ends and personal taste begins. It is a blurry line and as a designer I find myself stuck between a rock and a hard place. Am I being stubborn/closed minded or do I just have a different vision? I feel like I am at the point where I can make decisions for myself and know that they informed by a design objective. In my personal life it feels different. I have been feeling like I am not understood by anyone. I want to hear something and instead I get the exact opposite response. Sometimes I need validation not tough love. And I do not know if it is even tough love...more like tough hate. It has been making me an angry person. I do not need to be given reasons why I should do something or have someone say they think I am being irrational or mean. I want to be placated! I should wear a sign that says "Please appease."
In my microcosm of design decisions are based on briefs, mood boards, and concrete objectives. In my personal life I do not want to have a brief I want people to understand what I need to hear and not what they think I should hear. Is that too much to ask? I do not think so. What I really need is a break...which I will get in two weeks....not soon enough. I hope on my break that I am reinvigorated in all areas of my life. IN the mean time, if you see a grumpy looking designer do not try to pet or approach it, you may get bitten.

down and dirty

I do not have much time because of school finals. That being said JJ yahoo searched "drugged her" in yahoo images and I am the second image....I do not know how I feel about that.

The next and better question is why she searched "drugged her" at all....

http://images.search.yahoo.com/search/images?p=drugged+her&fr=yfp-t-501&toggle=1&cop=mss&ei=UTF-8

back to template box building.
Here is a little preview of my perfume bottle courtesy of JJ.
This is my sculpy model that I fedexed to a fabricator today for an appalling 40 dollars. The fully functional bottle with cad file and tinting is 400 dollars....I hope it looks good. Will post those pix when I get it back....heh

lallaaaaa

I had a clogged head on my printer, ran a cleaning program, and it made this really cool pattern. So I made it pretty...and funny

work in progress

These are the 3 packaging ideas I came up with today. All 3 of the packages are different shapes, but this will be the all over look from the front. All the banners are at different heights which I will correct when I am working on the specific dimensions. This is supposed to be fun packaging so I am excited. The green for the clean as a whisker is showing up strangely on the computer. It will be something a little more aqua and not so pastille and drab. Tip-o the big brain hat to JJ for coming up with Piddle pads....soooo funny and really cute...even though the idea of a dig peeing inside on a big fold out diaper is gross. In fact I know its gross b/c I have seen one in action. Small dogs can be so vile.

Four Paws logo design and packaging elements

This is the logo for four paws that I vectorized today and some design elements for the packaging. We have colors and bw logo treatments! Hurrah.

Shoppe

I have an Etsy account so hurra! It currently only has a couple of works. I an trying to decide what else should go up so there will be more work soon.

poor taste for a greeting card holiday

To be sent out to various design firms as a little promotional piece. Had to get second opinions to make sure it was the right amount of poor taste. I wouldn't want to offend everyone....

three legged bear

new little painting. Making this and other paintings into greeting cards. Will be launching my etsy site sometime this week. So stuff will be for sale. If you cannot wait the greeting cards are 5.5 x 8.5 glossy with envelopes. They are 4 dollars plus shipping. Also v-day card design which I will upload later. enjoy

book cover

I am going to be making canvas book covers that will wrap around books. I got this idea in the shower and I thought it would be cool. My favorite part of making books is the cover. So I have going to use printable canvas and have the white lines of the runners be de bossed. I think it will be cool and maybe do it in a variety of colors. I will post when I have done a test run.

leading the gift monkey

A personal note: I had an experience in one of my classes recently that has given me less faith in the creative process at my school. I presented my work and instead of being given feedback on how to make it more readable and convey my message, she gave me a design solution completely different from the direction I was moving in. Not only was it not my idea, it was contrived. I was extremely frustrated. This is not the first time I have been pushed in a very specific direction. The last time I listened to the teacher's suggestions, the end result was torn apart in crits and it really made me second guess myself. Someone in the class asked "what's wrong?" when I made a sour face and I wanted to scream. I like coming to my own design solutions; that is what being a critical thinker is all about. Up until this point, the teacher made a point to be oblique so as not to lead us. I have no problem with constructive criticism, but to feed me an idea, let alone one so contrived, makes me question some teacher's techniques. I am taking the Jim approach on this one and following my instincts. I am going to reassess my direction, pull back, and make the image read better. Sometimes learning means not listening to your teachers.