Experience & Approaches
By Edward Locke
For any questions, please send me an email ([email protected]).
My experiences:
I won an Honorable Mention from 1993 GoldStar International Design Competition for designing a multi-functional food processor system. I worked as full-time graphic artist and designer for corporations and institutions, and for local clients in the Greater Los Angeles area, on graphic design, art production and technical illustration projects. When I taught engineering graphics at Santa Ana College as a part-time instructor, and at the University of Georgia College of Education as a graduate teaching and research assistant, I taught some relevant principles and skills for graphic communication to students from diverse ethnic backgrounds.
My approaches:
My graphic design projects usually starts with market investigation, as well as library and Internet research. I visit locally available market places such as Ralphs, Albertson, Vons, May Company, Target, K-Mart, Wal-Mart, the Citadel, and many others, to investigate relevant packaging design, their layout, shape, color scheme, and the graphic elements they include, and take notes; I occasionally might purchase some products, especially those involving cartoon imagery in their packages. I browse through design catalogs, magazines, textbooks and others to get some useful inspiration. I search the relevant websites of relevant companies and studios, or interesting sites such as Google Image, also to get some useful inspiration. This market research is not necessarily connected with the actual graphic design projects at hand. In fact, I periodically go to local libraries with substantial collections of books on arts and graphic design, such as Brand Library and Art Center in Glendale, Los Angeles Central Library, the library of the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, and the art library of the University of California Los Angeles, browsing through books and magazines to get some inspiration from other professionals' works.
I usually carry a pocket-size camera with me to take pictures of flowers, trees, buildings, sky. and others; I also periodically visit tourist attractions such as Los Angeles Zoo, the Aquarium of the Pacific, Huntington Library and Botanical Garden, Santa Monica Beach, Disneyland, Universal Studios in Hollywood, Knott's Berry Farm, the Medieval Times, the Expositio Park with California Science Center, California African American Museum, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, the Museum of the American West (Autry Center) and many others, to take pictures of animals, fish, ocean, artifacts, and others; and these digital photos could be used as raw materials for my graphic design and digital photography projects. I prefer to use my own pictures instead of depending on commercially available stock photos.
As a continuing learning process, local museums, such as the Museum of Comtemporary Art in Los Angeles, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, Bowers Museum in Santa Ana, Orange County, the Gatty Villa in Malibu, and others, also constitute great sources of inspiration with their architectural, interior and environmental design, their permanent as well as temporary exhibitions.
The next step is "brainstorming" or generation of as much ideas as possible for the graphic design projects at hand, with some definite goals established as to what visual impact I want to have on the average consumers walking through the shelves in particular stores where the products will be displayed, or the office environment where the business brochures will be available, at the end of the market investigation, but absolutely without any particular restriction with regard to sizes, shapes, features, etc., and certainly without any criticism, self-criticism, or judgement; the key of conducting a successful "brainstorming" session is to "go crazy," or simply let your ideas go "wild" and come out of your mind in a free flow; I draw quick sketches (I do NOT elaborate or try to make them look "professional;" and I take quick notes; number, not quality, is what is needed in the "brainstorming" session. I make quick thumbnail sketches with ball-point pens. color pencils and sometimes markers, to establish possible layout, color schemes and composition of the pieces I am working on, such as posters, CD covers, food packages, etc.. Ideas so generated will be analyzed, compared, and combined to reach a more balanced strategy for the solution of the design problem at hand. Sometimes, several sessions of brainstorming might be needed; and the process might take from 3 hours to 2 days, continuously and/or intermittently, because creativity depends on inspiration, and the outbursts of inspiration are by no means similar to mass production on the assembly line. Taking breaks to refresh the brain and coming back to previously generated sets of ideas will be necessary in order to come up with the best initial design strategy possible. At the end of the step of brainstorming, a "final" set of graphic design ideation sketches for the initial design solution will be prepared for the "official" task of design. Occasionally, for more "innovative" design requiring more creative thinking, the "brainstorming" session could start before the market investigation process. In this case, market investigation supplies some useful tips on the use of graphic design elements at a technical level.
The next step is the actual design of the new graphic communication works, such as packaging, posters, brochures, signs, and others. Using the "final" set of graphic design ideation sketches as guidelines, I first launch Photoshop, and create the arttworks I need; next, I use Illustrator or InDesign to complete the projects with text and additional graphic elements needed. Occasionally, I will create 3D models of cartoon animals or other stuffs and generate 2D images for my graphic design as well as digital photography projects.
I won an Honorable Mention from 1993 GoldStar International Design Competition for designing a multi-functional food processor system. I worked as full-time graphic artist and designer for corporations and institutions, and for local clients in the Greater Los Angeles area, on graphic design, art production and technical illustration projects. When I taught engineering graphics at Santa Ana College as a part-time instructor, and at the University of Georgia College of Education as a graduate teaching and research assistant, I taught some relevant principles and skills for graphic communication to students from diverse ethnic backgrounds.
My approaches:
My graphic design projects usually starts with market investigation, as well as library and Internet research. I visit locally available market places such as Ralphs, Albertson, Vons, May Company, Target, K-Mart, Wal-Mart, the Citadel, and many others, to investigate relevant packaging design, their layout, shape, color scheme, and the graphic elements they include, and take notes; I occasionally might purchase some products, especially those involving cartoon imagery in their packages. I browse through design catalogs, magazines, textbooks and others to get some useful inspiration. I search the relevant websites of relevant companies and studios, or interesting sites such as Google Image, also to get some useful inspiration. This market research is not necessarily connected with the actual graphic design projects at hand. In fact, I periodically go to local libraries with substantial collections of books on arts and graphic design, such as Brand Library and Art Center in Glendale, Los Angeles Central Library, the library of the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, and the art library of the University of California Los Angeles, browsing through books and magazines to get some inspiration from other professionals' works.
I usually carry a pocket-size camera with me to take pictures of flowers, trees, buildings, sky. and others; I also periodically visit tourist attractions such as Los Angeles Zoo, the Aquarium of the Pacific, Huntington Library and Botanical Garden, Santa Monica Beach, Disneyland, Universal Studios in Hollywood, Knott's Berry Farm, the Medieval Times, the Expositio Park with California Science Center, California African American Museum, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, the Museum of the American West (Autry Center) and many others, to take pictures of animals, fish, ocean, artifacts, and others; and these digital photos could be used as raw materials for my graphic design and digital photography projects. I prefer to use my own pictures instead of depending on commercially available stock photos.
As a continuing learning process, local museums, such as the Museum of Comtemporary Art in Los Angeles, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, Bowers Museum in Santa Ana, Orange County, the Gatty Villa in Malibu, and others, also constitute great sources of inspiration with their architectural, interior and environmental design, their permanent as well as temporary exhibitions.
The next step is "brainstorming" or generation of as much ideas as possible for the graphic design projects at hand, with some definite goals established as to what visual impact I want to have on the average consumers walking through the shelves in particular stores where the products will be displayed, or the office environment where the business brochures will be available, at the end of the market investigation, but absolutely without any particular restriction with regard to sizes, shapes, features, etc., and certainly without any criticism, self-criticism, or judgement; the key of conducting a successful "brainstorming" session is to "go crazy," or simply let your ideas go "wild" and come out of your mind in a free flow; I draw quick sketches (I do NOT elaborate or try to make them look "professional;" and I take quick notes; number, not quality, is what is needed in the "brainstorming" session. I make quick thumbnail sketches with ball-point pens. color pencils and sometimes markers, to establish possible layout, color schemes and composition of the pieces I am working on, such as posters, CD covers, food packages, etc.. Ideas so generated will be analyzed, compared, and combined to reach a more balanced strategy for the solution of the design problem at hand. Sometimes, several sessions of brainstorming might be needed; and the process might take from 3 hours to 2 days, continuously and/or intermittently, because creativity depends on inspiration, and the outbursts of inspiration are by no means similar to mass production on the assembly line. Taking breaks to refresh the brain and coming back to previously generated sets of ideas will be necessary in order to come up with the best initial design strategy possible. At the end of the step of brainstorming, a "final" set of graphic design ideation sketches for the initial design solution will be prepared for the "official" task of design. Occasionally, for more "innovative" design requiring more creative thinking, the "brainstorming" session could start before the market investigation process. In this case, market investigation supplies some useful tips on the use of graphic design elements at a technical level.
The next step is the actual design of the new graphic communication works, such as packaging, posters, brochures, signs, and others. Using the "final" set of graphic design ideation sketches as guidelines, I first launch Photoshop, and create the arttworks I need; next, I use Illustrator or InDesign to complete the projects with text and additional graphic elements needed. Occasionally, I will create 3D models of cartoon animals or other stuffs and generate 2D images for my graphic design as well as digital photography projects.
Edward Locke's SuniSea Studio
Important Websites and Webpages Navigator
At the bottom of the Home page. Please click the Home button below to return to the Home page.
Important Websites and Webpages Navigator
At the bottom of the Home page. Please click the Home button below to return to the Home page.
Contact Information:
[email protected] | Phone number for clients only. |