In Advanced Motion Graphics, we were assigned the science fiction parable Scales, and instructed to design a title sequence for a hypothetical film based on the short story. The video is my interpretation, designed over three weeks in Cinema 4D and After Effects.

I came to this solution pretty late in the process. I spent most of my time working on this concept, before ultimately abandoning it:

A short one week assignment for my motion graphics class: a title graphic for a fictional indie band.

This is by far the most bad-ass video of an insect you will ever see.

(Source: vimeo.com)

I’m also taking a Packaging Design class, in which my first project was to redesign a Soy Sauce bottle. This is my design—I’m going for a very clean and authentic style, featuring the Safeway house brand.

This semester at CCA, I’m taking an Advanced Motion Graphics class. This is my first project: a short video which visually illustrates the feeling one gets when going clubbing and drinking, and the night gets crazier and crazier, until it morphs into something that isn’t so fun anymore.

Partying is fun, but it’s important to know one’s limits. I’ve made that mistake many times, and have had many a regretful mornings.

Lament of the Delicious Librarian

Jessie Char:

I did some thinking and came up with a concept to pitch: a booth modeled like a cozy library with bookshelves that look just like the ones in Delicious Library. We could dress as “Delicious Librarians” (don’t tell me that wasn’t clever!) complete with nerd glasses and name tags. My coworkers and I stayed up late one night planning everything out so we could present the idea to Wil. He loved it, and gave us the go-ahead to do the booth as long as he didn’t have to do any work on it; he was busy trying to ship an app, after all.

In 2009, I attended my very first Macworld. In the Mac development industry, Wil Shipley (founder of Delicious Monster) is somewhat of a legend. Having had a few online conversations with Wil, I went looking for the booth to introduce myself and say hello. The booth was fantastic, and I met and chatted with Jessie and Maja. I’m ashamed to say, though, that until today I thought that they were booth babes.

In this industry, where white, asian and indian males are the de facto standard, it’s sometimes surprising to see anything else—and that’s kind of fucked up. Mea culpa.

(Source: jessiechar)

Working on a totally unrelated project, I made this image which ended up not being used, but turned out to be a great desktop background. Full-res download of Space Rainbow.

At the end of Level 3 at the California College of the Arts, it’s not uncommon for graphic design students to spend twenty hours a day on campus, fueled by gallons of Red Bull and dreadful coffee (and for many, handfuls of Adderall).

Why, you ask? Because we to finish our projects for the semester, polish off all the work we’ve done over the past two years, and present it to an intimidating panel of faculty and design professionals. After presenting and talking about our work for 45 minutes, the panel goes away to deliberate and writes up a grade and a feedback sheet which sets the tone for the rest of our path through design school, and our design careers thereafter.

The day after the presentation, after the celebratory hangover has passed, we are assigned a 6’ by 6’ exhibition space, in which we curate and present our strongest work done at CCA. My exhibition is pictured above.

Enter the Dragon

Mike Lee:

With what we now know about extremophiles, meteors, and the tenacity of life in general, it seems clear that life or its precursors are scattered around the galaxy like the seeds of a great tree. Every time the seed of life lands in a habitable zone, it sets off a timer as evolution races to reach a stable state before exhausting the available resources. Those that do get to move to the next level. Those that don’t….

There is a threshold and we are very close to not making it. There’s a non-zero chance the carbon dioxide we pumped into the air has set off a methane cycle that accelerates global warming, that we’re already too late, and that we might not have 100 years. We need to starting thinking on a global scale about our place in the galaxy. Who cares what kind of sneakers you’re wearing? Why are we still killing each other?