Course Evaluation for Digital Media

Although I was a little wary about Digital Media when I first learned about the course, I ended up liking it a lot more than I expected to. It sounded impossible since I was so technologically impaired before taking this course, and the work did end up being hard. But I still had a great time messing around in the different programs such as PhotoShop and Flash. When I first made my poster, I realized that I had built up the work to be harder than it actually was. I became more confident with the skills I was learning how to use and I'm really happy I had the chance to learn more about this aspect of Radio and Television.

I think the lecture was helpful just to give us some background on Digital Media itself. It was good to know the history and reasons behind every aspect that we learned about and how they're used in day to day situations. The lab was helpful to teach me the basics of the programs we had to work with. It gave us an idea of the variety of tools we had right at our fingertips and lead us to explore further into everything we could do and work with.

I think that the lectures worked well for learning the background, but it seemed like it could've been improved in its format. Although it was a lot of fun to watch all the YouTube videos that served as examples of the ideas we were learning, it might've been more helpful to learn more about the programs we would use. For example, if we had learned about the different tools that PhotoShop had to offer and what they each did it might have been more helpful when we actually got to apply this in the labs. To improve the labs, I think we could have been more time efficient. We had to sit and watch the prof run the examples for the first hour of class even though it could've been done more quickly to give us more time to work through the tutorials. I would have learned more if I had more time to practice hands on with the programs while having the prof and lab assistant there to help me.

This course changed me in a number of ways. It changed my perspective on Digital Media and the type of work that it entails. Before I thought it only dealt with technical type stuff like creating computer software whereas now I realize it also includes making commercials, posters, animated film, websites, etc. When I first applied for RTA, I was set on doing broadcasting. Now that I've had a chance to learn more about the different options, I'm looking further into maybe staying in Digital Media or Audio Production. I realize that there's a whole world of possibilities for careers that would fall under this category and there were lots of things I enjoyed about working in Digital Media. I think it's helped to expand both my creative ability and improve my knowledge and skills with computer software. I am now able to think up my own projects and how I would interpret things differently from others. I can do anything I want through the software I've learned to use. Before coming to Ryerson, I had never worked with programs like Flash or DreamWeaver or even PhotoShop. Now I know how to efficiently work in these programs and make projects of my own. It's amazes me how technologically advanced I am after taking Digital Media!

The most important lesson I've learned from Digital Media is that I have the ability to learn and do anything that I set my mind to. As cheesy as it sounds, it's true. Before the course started, I was dreading how bad of a failure I would be when it came to animating a film or creating a simple poster. I had never worked with it and I built it up to be much worse than it actually was. Once I took the time to work with the software and explore all the tools that I had right at my fingertips, it was obvious that I could do anything I wanted to. This course has really helped me expand my personal skills and I really did love all the projects I accomplished [although I wasn't too happy spending a bajillion hours in the labs at the time]. The final products always made all the effort I put into them totally worth it.

Reflecting on Typography

For this open blog topic, I want to reflect on typography. I learned a lot about animation interactivity, and my favorite part about that topic was typography. I never realized how much work goes into animating a segment of words when I saw them before. Now when I look at small clips of animated speech, I know just how much effort someone had to put in to make that short 5 or 10 second animated film. Also, images that are made up with words need a lot of effort as well. I think it's awesome when I see a picture that's made completely out of words that relate to the overall image. I have a lot more respect for animators and anyone involved in graphics now. It's definitely not an easy job! Here are a few typographic images that I found and really liked.

Website pictures!

Some snapshots of the website that we created in class today!

Web 2.0 Characteristics

The five characteristics that define Web 2.0 are dynamic content, user contribution, social media, online applications, and harnessing collective intelligence. Dynamic content is organic and changes every second. It's basically a mash up of information. A real-world example of dynamic content would be the iPhone application that combines the yellow pages with Google maps. It makes it easier for the viewer to navigate their destination by seeing the address not only in writing but as well as on a map in relation to their location. User contribution is pretty self-explanatory. Outside viewers contribute their own information, ideas, creations, etc. into a website that allows other viewers to see their work. A real-world example of this, besides the obvious YouTube, would be eBay. eBay allows people to post products that they are trying to sell to other people. It also allows potential buyers to read the feedback these sellers have received in terms of their reliability with other customers. Users contribute to eBay in a variety of ways that allow a great amount of networking to happen. The third characteristic of Web 2.0 is social media. Social media is online media that provides opportunities for socializing, connecting, sharing, etc. The most popular forms of social media today would be networks such as facebook, myspace, and twitter. Each of these networks has unique ways that people can communicate with one another through the internet. Whether it be tagging someone in a picture, "poking" someone just for fun, or "liking" someone's status, there are a variety of ways that people are able to communicate through these massive networks. Online applications are the fourth characteristic of Web 2.0. These are applications that are generally thought of as things you would traditionally buy and install on to your computer. Using modern technology, people can now easily access this software through online applications and download it themselves right in the comfort of their own home. An example of an online application would be the Adobe Suite. A buyer can go onto the Adobe website and purchase a variety of packages that include different elements of their software such as Flash or Photoshop and pay right then and there. The software then automatically downloads with a few clicks of the mouse. This saves them the trouble of going out and buying a tangible version of the software in a CD form and having to install it all on their own. The final characteristic of Web 2.0 is harnessing collective intelligence. This characteristic enhances our productivity and saves us time since it assigns keywords to content. A real-world example would be the ability to bookmark a web page. By bookmarking a particular website, one can easily navigate back to the information they had found there that was relevant to whatever they were researching. It saves a person the time it takes to find that website once again and he/she just has to simply click the bookmark to find the same information they had found before. In conclusion, technology has come a long way from what it used to be. It's ever changing and is becoming quite advanced with the various applications and networking abilities that people are able to use today. Web 2.0 became a huge step up from Web 1.0 with its interactivity and dynamic data. We can only imagine how advanced Web 3.0 will be in the future and the amazing abilities that technology will have.

The Itsy Bitsy Spider Flash Project

Artist Statement
My interactive ended up being completely different than what I had first expected. I was hoping to do a poem, but since the ones I wanted to use were copyrighted, that idea was definitely gone. I then thought about doing an interactive assignment that was similar to the example of the “Seven Deadly Sins”, but having it on the “Seven Natural Wonders of the World”. After playing around in Flash last class, I decided I wasn’t as keen on this idea either. That’s when I had the idea of animating a nursery rhyme.
I chose “The Itsy Bitsy Spider” because it was one of my favorite nursery rhymes growing up. I remember learning the hand motions to this famous nursery rhyme from my grandmother when I was a little kid. This inspired me to go outside your normal cartoonish animation and incorporate my own interpretation to the assignment. I felt it was a fun way to change things up a little bit, but I was worried about the amount of work it would entail.
I started out the project by getting a friend to photograph my hands while performing the nursery rhyme motions. This took some time since I had to stop at each movement to have a snapshot taken. I then brought all of these photographs, approximately twenty of them, into Photoshop. Once in Photoshop, I used the polygonal tool on every single picture to outline the hands and crop them from the background. This was one of my most time consuming tasks throughout the whole interactive assignment. I then resized the image and imported it into Flash. I also recorded the guitar playing the melody of “The Itsy Bitsy Spider”. After debating about singing it, I decided I would add kinetic text for the lyrics and have the guitar as a nice background accent. After attempting to import the audio file as a .wav multiple times, I realized I had to convert it to an AIFF file in Audacity. This was a minor glitch that didn’t take too long to resolve.
Once in Flash, I imported all of my Photoshopped images as well as my audio file. I then created the “play” button after drawing my spider. Throughout the project, I would use a variety of my pictures to create the images of my hands moving. I had to keep watching my project to hear the music and time out the kinetic text so that the lyrics would match up with the background music. When picking fonts, I tried to pick different types that I felt corresponded with the words that they were scripting. For example, I picked a child-like font for the beginning and other words throughout the project. I also chose my color scheme for the backgrounds based off this child-like idea. Since my target audience is, obviously, a younger generation such as the 2-5 range, I chose colours that corresponded with this age. Blue, yellow, and pink are the classically known “baby” colours, which is why I felt they worked well with my project.
Even though this project was way more time consuming than I predicted and I had a lot of obstacles, I am still pretty happy about my final product. I know there are certain aspects that could have been better, but I still feel that I did a pretty good job, especially since it was my first time working with the Flash program. (Other than the tutorials we’ve worked on in class). I tried to include a variety of actions that we learned such as the spider button at the beginning and the ‘again’ lyric that I turned into a button at the end. I also used tweening, symbols, kinetic text, and many other elements. I knew that it would be a challenge, and I was surprised with how well I actually utilized the tools in the Flash program in my project. I’m very proud to call “The Itsy Bitsy Spider” a Michelle Chieng original!


1. I learned a lot from doing this animation project. I found out how time consuming flash can be as well as frustrating. There were many elements I wanted to incorporate into my flash that I couldn't figure out or get to work. Even though there were many times when I wanted to throw the computer on the ground and give up, I felt very accomplished once the project was completed. I found that it can take a lot of hours to create a simple thirty second project which completely blows my mind. I have so much more respect for animators and people who work with flash on a daily basis.
2. I was very impressed with the other students' flash projects. Everyone had creative ideas and I think all the projects were pretty well done. It was interesting to see the various elements other people were able to include in their project and the tools they utilized in flash to complete their work.

Innovations in Digital Media

For my blog topic, I want to talk about the today's lecture where we discussed innovations in Digital Media. Technology is rapidly changing and evolving every single day. People have drastically changed the way they communicate due to these new technologies. Way back when, letters were the only way to communicate across long distances, and even then, the postal service wasn't always 100% reliable. After radio, television, and telephones were made, these became better and faster ways to communicate. Messages reached a bigger audience through these widespread devices and people became more accessible. Then the internet and cell phone came into play and they basically took over for communication systems. People can now e-mail each other at any time of the day or call/text a cell phone whenever they feel like it. This saves them from having to have any actual contact, which makes it impersonal. It seems that texting or e-mailing make people a lot bolder because of this fact and sometimes say things they wouldn't have the nerve to say in person. Once myspace, facebook, and twitter came along, things just got crazy advanced. You can now see all aspects of someone's life online without them ever knowing. You can also contact this person from great distances and even instant message with them over the web. People update their twitter accounts hourly and inform the world of their every action. Has technology gone too far? Not saying that I'm any better than anyone else (I, too, have a facebook account and am sometimes known to "fb stalk") but I still sometimes question the communication lines that we use today. Facebook is a great way to keep in touch with people, especially if you are great distances away from each other, but it still involves absolutely no contact whatsoever. It's so impersonal. That's why I prefer Skype or iChat since I can then see the person as well as hear their voice. This makes things much better than just "poking" someone on facebook or "liking" their status. I think that it's great that technology is advancing so quickly, but I also think that sometimes need to take it back and go the old school way. I love receiving letters, although this may seem like a medieval act in this day and age. I know that many people enjoy reading letters or long phone calls, so instead of just texting someone or quickly "facebooking" them, people should take it back a bit and actually pick up the phone!

Digital Media & Music Culture

Digital media has definitely had an impact on the music culture. Before there was graphic arts and designed album covers, people didn't purchase as much music. Records were packaged in boring brown paper with string to tie them together. Once Alex Steinweiss designed the first cover in 1948, sales of records skyrocketed. They increased 800%!This completely changed things because music culture became a huge part of the media and affected everything in it. The cover art became a representation of the artists, especially once they began to have a say in their cover art. Cover art became imperative to the music culture because it represented different genres of music, different bands, fashion, & it even went so far as to represent politics. Without digital media, the music culture would not be even close to where it is today and wouldn't be such a huge part of everyone's lives.
I definitely would say the way that I have enjoyed music has changed over the past five years. If you look back less than ten years ago, the iPod hadn't even been invented yet. People still purchased CD's to play in their portable disc players and bigger CD players at home. When the iPod was created in 2001, it turned into a music revolution. From that point on, the iPod began to become more and more technologically advanced. I went from playing CD's in a portable player to uploading music from my computer onto my iPod instead of buying the actual, tangible discs. I then upgraded to what I now have, which is an iPod touch. It's incredible how advanced technology can become in such a short time. The original iPod, although thought to be incrdibly small at the time, is now "chunky" in comparison to the newer iPods such as the mini, or the touch. I now have a touch screen device that is as thin as a pencil and can store games, music videos, movies, internet access, etc. It's really quite amazing to think how far music has changed over the past 5-10 years! I now can get on my computer and download any song that I want with just the click of a button instead of having to go out and buy the whole CD.
I think that the design aspect and how it affects the music culture today has definitely declined over the past decade. People now don't care as much about buying the CD's since they can purchase one song at a time. Therefore, the cover art isn't such a huge factor. It's not as common for people to even see the cover art of the song that they're purchasing or the artist. iTunes makes it possible to turn on your computer, and download a song without having to see anything about the artist picture-wise. Compared to the 40's when the digital media was first incorporated into the music scene, the significance of design has definitely dropped. Although it made a huge impact at the time, people aren't as appreciative of the cover art as they were before.


-Alex Steinweiss, cover art for Frankie Carle.

-Alicia Keys cover art.

I definitely think that many artists have found their inspiration from some of Steinweiss' original designs, such as Alicia Keys.

Animation/Interactivity assignment

For my animation assignment, I was hoping to animate a poem and thought of "Where the Sidewalk Ends" by Shel Silverstein. The reason I chose this was because it was one of my favorite poems when I was younger and I've always enjoyed Shel Silverstein's work. If I am unable to do this poem, I was also considering doing an animation on the 7 wonders of the world. I think both of these projects would be really unique and interesting while working with Flash. I was really inspired by the stutter step project that was an example in lecture. I'm hoping to maybe make my flash project (if I do the poem) similar to this one. If I do the seven wonders of the world, I'm hoping to model mine after the seven deadly sins project shown in lecture. I liked both of those projects and am hoping to be able to create something just as unique. I will definitely need to practice working with Flash before I can create my animation. So far I've done okay with the tutorials in class, but I've never worked with the program before this class so I still have lots to learn. I think this will be my biggest obstacle. Once I figure out all the techniques that I want to incorporate into my project, I think it will be pretty successful. I'm going to be incorporating a voice over into Flash as well as adding lots of pictures. I'm a little anxious about this project, but I'm still excited to learn more about Flash and create another Digital Media project that (hopefully) I can be proud of!

FSU? Shoe Company--Poster

Artist Statement

The inspiration for this poster came to me when I was watching my friend skateboard. My idea came from watching his different tricks and seeing the angles that the board could make in contrast to the ground and his body. I photographed him with the intention of creating a skateboarding poster and focusing more on the board. After going back over my photos, I began to edit the photo I used of his legs and the board for my skateboarding advertisement. While playing around with Photoshop, I realized that his front shoe was going to be my main focus of the poster, not the board like I had originally intended.
After I realized that my project was going to focus on the shoe, I quickly began to redo the edits I had previously made that isolated the board in contrast to the background. Although Photoshop was difficult, and sometimes very frustrating, to work with, I slowly began to find different ways to incorporate the things we had learned in Digital Media. For example, I felt that I represented the CRAP principles well through the variety of elements I added to my poster.
My main element, contrast, is shown through the shoes, first and foremost. They draw the viewer’s attention right away, which was the whole idea behind having the bright blue. There is also contrast in the background due to the layering of the city versus the brick wall along with the water and the concrete. I felt this element was a unique way of showing different aspects that make Toronto the great city that it is. Not only is it a city of many skyscrapers, but it also has a beauty to it that is shown through this poster. I wanted to have the body and the board overtop of the city to show the focus of the advertisement as well. Through the person and the skateboard, I felt that a viewer might be inspired to buy these shoes to achieve their goals as well. Another important element included in my poster was alignment. The city background was put on a slant in order to align with the brick wall that was behind my subject. I felt that the waterline being connected to the concrete at an angle was a cool way to add a different type of alignment.
By doing a poster for FSU? Shoe Company, I had a chance to work with Photoshop, which lead me to find a more creative side of myself. I really enjoyed not only taking the photographs, but also making decisions when it came to incorporating different colors, pictures, fonts, etc. Even though I faced many challenges when it came to the actual editing, I was able to produce a poster that I proudly can call my own original design. Before this project, I was not very excited to working with Photoshop since I had such little experience with it and felt inadequate. Now I am anticipating working with Photoshop in the future and creating even more intricate and exciting projects.

Comments

1. I learned a wide variety of information when dealing with this digital media project. I found out how to navigate more successfully in photoshop. Through working extensively with this program, I now am able to isolate objects, such as the shoes in my poster, and change their color or the background around them. I can also incorporate various images with one another and blend them together in a more professional way.I also discovered different techniques that deal with typography and design elements. Through the hours spent in the lab working on my poster, I realized that I'm going to have to be more patient when learning how to navigate new resources such as photoshop or protools. If I work on being patient, there is still an infinite amount of new things I look forward to learning.

2. I found the in-class critique of my work very helpful. It was good to get an outside opinion on the work I had done and to also receive some constructive criticism. For the most part, my classmates and professor found my poster interesting and thought I had done a good job working with the different elements of design. One of the critiques was on the font I used for the FSU? Shoe Company label. Professor Warwick told me he felt that it was an inappropriate typography for the message that I was trying to send to the viewer. I agreed, but I had been unable to find a more appealing font when working with Photoshop. He also critiqued the angle at which I had incorporated the background image of the city behind the skateboarder. Although I wanted to add the element of alignment, I can definitely understand where some people would prefer a straight line. I was complimented on my use of color as well as the isolation of the shoes. I felt I did a pretty good job and my classmates seemed to agree with me. I was proud of my first finished Photoshop project & I can't wait to complete more!

Typography

In this image, words are making up the picture of a hand signal typical associated with "rock on" or "rock 'n roll". Not only are they creating a world renowned hand gesture, it is the words themselves that make this image unique. I feel that this typography is very effective for the message the artist is trying to send. The image contains sayings typically associated with rock music such as "rock on", "rocker", and "stick it to the man". The hand symbol also contains other sayings such as "heavy metal", "attitude', and "classic rock". The words that make up this imagery are all sayings that are associated with "rock 'n roll". This typography is definitely supporting the central message and the theme of the overall design. I'm not one hundred percent positive of the font used, but it looks pretty similar to Rockwell bold or a similar script.



The above advertisement for Special K demonstrates a great deal of typography. It incorporates a variety of fonts as well as images to go along with the words to give the viewer a visual idea of their message. I think they did a good job of getting their message across to the consumers. They creatively incorporated their product into an interesting image for the viewer. This advertisement promotes Special K and appeals to the reader by saying it will help one "manage your weight". It's a clever way to entice a consumer into buying their product. For this reason, I feel the typography was very effective for this advertisement. It grabs the reader's attention because of how unique of an advertisement it is. There are a variety of fonts included as well as various bold, italic, and regular texts.



I really liked the idea of the above image. It's title is "death by typography" which was a pretty clever idea. I think it promotes the idea that words can hurt much more than physical pain. Although there are not legible words that form the imagery of the gun, it is still a very effective use of typography. The viewer can still clearly see the various letters that make up the gun. I like the fact that you can still distinctly see the letters such as the 'r' that makes up the trigger or the 's' that is found at the butt of the gun. The artist included the word 'bang' coming out of gun which further promotes the idea of "words can kill". If this was the message the author was trying to send, I think they promote it quite well. I think they used the font "courier" in a bold type or something very similar to that style of script.

Sources:
http://fc05.deviantart.com/fs13/f/2007/018/6/7/Death_by_Typography

http://www.pics24h.com/img/artwork/minimalist-typography

GLOW magazine; September issue

The Colour Wheel & All It Encompasses

In the past Digital Media lecture, we discussed colour schemes and various terminologies associated with the colour wheel. Therefore, I have decided to discuss all aspects of the colour wheel in great detail. The colour wheel is said to be a visual representation of the underlying color theory which is a set of principles used to create harmonious colour combinations. The colour wheel was first invented by Sir Isaac Newton in 1706, who associated each colour with a note of a musical scale. Sir Isaac Newton began this colour wheel by splitting white sunlight into a variety of colours. His original colours included red, orange, yellow, green, cyan, and blue light beams. After making these distinctions, Sir Newton joined the two ends of the spectrum together which showed the progression of the colours. A century after Sir Isaac Newton made his discovery, Johann Wolfgang Goethe decided to take a deeper look into the psychological effect that colours seem to have on people. He observed that yellow gives the feeling of warmth whereas blue gives the feeling of coolness. He then divided the colour wheel into a plus side and a negative side. Colours on the plus side of the spectrum appeared to produce excitement and cheerfulness such as red, yellow, and orange. Colours on the negative side are associated with weakness and unsettled feelings such as blue, green, and purple.

The colour wheel most commonly used today was developed by Johannes Itten, who is a Swiss color and art theorist. His colour wheel is based on red, yellow, and blue as the primary colours and includes twelve hues. The twelve hues are made up of the three primary colours, three secondary colours, and six tertiary colours that are made up between the primary and secondary colours.

There are six major colour schemes that are most commonly associated with the colour wheel. The first is a monochromatic colour scheme. This scheme uses variations in lightness and saturation of a single color. It looks clean and can go well together with other monochromatic schemes of a different color, and it is especially easy on the eyes in the hues of green or blue. The second is an analogous color scheme. It uses colours that are adjacent to each other; one color is dominant while others around it are used to enhance the image. The third colour scheme is a complementary colour scheme. This consists of two colours that are opposite of each other on the colour wheel. It's best utilized when you compare a warm colour against a cool colour since it creates a high contrast. The split complementary colour scheme is the fourth major colour scheme. It's a variation of the standard complementary colour scheme, but it not only uses colours opposite each other on the colour wheel, it includes the colours adjacent to them as well. It provides a high contrast like the complementary scheme, but with less tension. A fifth common colour scheme is the triadic colour scheme. It uses three colours equally spaced around the colour wheel and is popular due to retaining harmony and rich colors. The last common colour scheme is known as the tetradic colour scheme. This is the most varied colour scheme because it uses two complementary colour pairs. A characteristic of this scheme is that it is hard to harmonize.

By learning the background of the colour wheel and all the various colour schemes, I now have a better understanding of Digital Media. This information will help me when it comes to creating visual projects such as the poster or CD cover. I will be able to utilize the colour schemes in order to make my projects visually stimulating. I look forward to incorporating the colour wheel and all that it produces into my future Digital Media projects.




Works Cited:
http://www.color-wheel-pro.com/color-theory-basics.html

Photoshop!

the "before" picture...




We did a variety of tutorials that worked with Photoshop this past week in my Digital Media Lab. In the above picture, I had to convert the image to a black and white image. I also isolated the blue helmet in order to have the main focus of the picture on the biker and his helmet. The blurred background is another element that makes the viewer focus on the biker. It was a fun tutorial and very useful for future projects!



...the after picture!

C.R.A.P. Images

This Koodo ad demonstrates aspects of the CRAP principle through the various design elements it incorporates. The contrast element is shown through the disproportionate mouth and head. People are drawn to an ad like this because of the distorted image of the person's head shown on the billboard, not just the vibrant color. Also, the contrast of the lettering size is another visual element that draws attention to this Koodo ad. The element of alignment is shown in this ad through the placement of the main attraction, which is the person, as well as the company's name in the corner. The text is uneven which makes the advertisement even more interesting for the viewers walking by. Overall, Koodo did a good job of incorporating the CRAP principle to their commercial as well as making it humorous for potential consumers.



DKNY did an incredibly well-crafted CRAP advertisement. This ad is visually captivating through its unique projection of a "cartoon-like" picture and particular attention to small details. Contrast is shown by the use of green and red which are complementary colors therefore even more eye-catching. The different sized text and text colors also make the readers' attention focus on the more important words such as "BE DELICIOUS". The CRAP principle is also represented in this DKNY advertisement by the repetition of the apple theme. The red apples, green apples, and then apple-shaped bottle of DKNY perfume bring another interesting visual aspect to this ad. The apples also represent the proximity aspect of the CRAP principle due to the distinction between the red apples and the green apples. Being grouped together on different sides of the page contribute to the consumers' visual stimulation when seeing this advertisement. This DKNY ad caught my attention and made me want to go sample, if not buy, their perfume.



In this Febreze commercial, the CRAP principle of repetition plays a large role. The actual image of the shade outlines are repeated many times as well as the shade designs themselves. Each separate shade pattern is shown at least twice in the two rows of shade outlines. The alignment principle can also be applied to this Febreze Flameless Luminaries advertisement. Although the top of the ad has centered shapes in rows, the off-centered, tilted luminary shade draws the viewers' attention. In the bottom right corner, the company name "Febreze" also demands the audience's attention due to the placement as well as the background shape of the "wafting scent". This Febreze advertisement layout was well done based off the CRAP principles that it followed. Even though Febreze incorporated repetition and alignment into their ad, I feel that they could have utilized the CRAP principles of contrast better. Contrasting elements add more interesting images for the reader to be enticed into buying various products.



Quiznos utilized the CRAP principles well in their display window sign. They incorporated the element of contrast in their signature symbol of the big "Q" as well is in their name. By using the complementary colors of green and red, Quiznos made it hard for people passing by to miss their company title. Also, through the utilization of the text formatting, this advertisement draws the customers' attention to the word "TOASTY". Since it is written in such a large font, this word is the first thing people see when looking at the window sign. Such a large word with a very delicious meaning behind it entices viewers into ordering a "toasty" sub sandwich. The repetition CRAP principle is shown through the color scheme of mainly red and white found on this Quiznos advertisement. The green word Quiznos therefore stands out, creating another contrasting element. The alignment of the sandwich and the company name "Quiznos Subs" add a separate aspect to the sign. The viewer first sees the delicious picture of a sub sandwich and then is shown who will sell them such a delicious meal. The whole sign, from the top with "mmm...TOASTY" to the bottom, draws customers in due to the delicious thoughts that it brings to mind.


The CRAP principle can be very effective when utilized properly. Some of the elements are more useful than others due to the visual stimulation that they create. By contrasting fonts, colors, font sizes, etc. people can be drawn in to the advertisements. Based off the above advertisements, such as the DKNY perfume ad, the element of repetition can also be very effective. In order to create a certain type of mind set for the reader to gain off the ad, the use of repetition is imperative. I feel that alignment is a shortcoming of the CRAP principle. Although it can add to the uniqueness of an advertisement layout, it does not always contribute to the advertisement over all. In many advertisements I came across, the alignment of the ad was centered, but it was still effective. I also found that the proximity aspect of the CRAP principle was one of the lesser used, less effective elements. Although the DKNY ad used it properly, many times ads cannot contain the same images over and over while keeping the advertisement interesting due to limited space. Depending on how they are executed, the CRAP principles can really make an advertisement interesting and eye catching. If not utilized properly, these principles really can make an advertisement look like CRAP

Works Cited:
Cosmopolitan Sept. 2009: 49+245. Print.

Vegas Night Postcard

This Las Vegas Night postcard was designed and edited through Photoshop in my Digital Media laboratory class on Wednesday, September 16, 2009. My first experience with Photoshop went pretty smoothly when it came to cropping images and importing outside pictures. I also was able to use my own judgment when it came to the color scheme and sizing of certain elements in this postcard. I enjoyed working with Photoshop and look forward to my year ahead and the projects to come that deal with Photoshop.

First impressions of Digital Media

Before coming to Ryerson, digital media used to be a sparingly used term in my life. Whenever the term 'digital media' was brought up, which was a rare occasion, images such as magazines, television, or video games would pop into my head. I had a general idea of the term in the sense that I knew it was a big part of our culture in this day and age. Technological advances have definitely made digital media into a huge part of society, as we know it.

After the first lecture on Tuesday, my impression of digital media was definitely altered. Not only did the ideas of magazines, television, and video games come to mind, but I also realized the huge network that happens behind the scenes for digital media. I realized that the term digital media also encompasses technologies such as cell phones, Internet, and iPods. Devices such as these are used to communicate more efficiently and have advanced our society as a whole.

The lecture made me interested in discovering the different ways that digital media affects everyday life. Although I was a little wary about the course, based off of the description, the lecture made me anxious to begin and better myself in the terms of digital media and everything that it consists of.

I think that it’s important for Radio and Television Arts students to take a course such as digital media in order to have a complete understanding of the industry. It gives students an advantage to be able to know how everything works, especially in such a technologically advanced program such as RTA. With the knowledge that digital media will provide for me, I’m fully confident that I will be able to become an advanced and well-rounded student.

Marshall McLuhan stated that the “medium is the message.” Essentially, he meant the information is less important than how you are sending that information. Based on my limited knowledge of digital media and what it entails, I disagree with McLuhan’s statement. I feel that the message is equally important as how the message is sent. The audience must be able to comprehend the message, but they also must be able to easily access the message via Internet, television, radio, etc. The medium and the message are both crucial to the public. Once learning more about digital media, I may change my opinion depending on the knowledge I gain, but as of now, that’s my conclusion for McLuhan.