Culture-Shock

Culture-Shock

Posted by Rane at Monday, September 16, 2013 ✪ No comment yet

Our first project in Art Three was to incorporate text as an element, using the word 'Culture' as the basis of our theme. We had to brainstorm about twenty ideas that first came to mind (some of mine included languages, Starbucks, bathroom stalls, McDonald's, mythology, and culture-shock.) Next, taking ten of those ideas and narrowing them down and adding meanings in (American culture- Starbucks, music provides entertainment, graffitti provides inspiration, small towns promote community, etc.)

When Mr. Sands gave an example of an idea, saying culture-shock, I suddenly had this image of the Starbucks siren with lightning flashing and zapped hair. So, I chose Starbucks. It's a national symbol of early mornings, people rushing to work, a place for people to hang out in the afternoon, and a huge waste of money (if you go there everyday.) I don't hate Starbucks, I love their vanilla frappuchinos and I get one every once in a while. Starbucks, to me, was the easiest to make fun of.

My original idea was just to have one symbol. Mr. Sands mentioned that it might be cool to have about three. I went with that idea and tried to come up with different characters.   

My next challenge was to decide upon the text to replace the Starbucks Coffee logo. My friend, Michelle, gave me inspiration for one when she mentioned, "..white, upper-class wastefulness." I decided on three phrases, 'Duckface wastefulness', 'Burn your money', and 'Before it was cool.'

I decided I wanted to use photoshop as my medium because it would be easiest for coloring and to manipulate the images. Also, I have never used photoshop before, and I wanted to try it out. That was my risk for this project. But before getting started, I had to have a final draft of my images to copy onto photoshop. (sketch
  

After getting my picture into photoshop, I used a number of techniques. First, I had to outline my drawing and use the fill bucket to color in the black and white in the middle circle. After that, Mr. Sands lent me the Bamboo tablet and stylus, which I used to make my lines (especially on the hair) more smooth. I used the fill bucket for the green circle, as well. Mr. Sands helped me copy the star from the logo and I had to copy it to make six of them. 

Now, it was time for the text, which was the hardest part. Mr. Sands showed me how to make the text curve around, but for the life of me, I could not get it to fit. The text would not curve and when it did, it didn't curve fully around the circle, like I wanted it to. Then Mr. Sands said that I would hate him because I would have to type it out letter by letter. I didn't mind. :) It was a lot easier than figuring out that curve. 

Letter by letter, I typed out my logos during Thursday's lunch period. 

Here is my final project. I wanted to portray some stereotypes of people I thought would go to Starbucks a lot. Except for the 'Burn your money' one. That meaning should be obvious. 

~Kae