Weekly Blog Assignments: 12 Weeks to a Better You

Twelve Weekly Blog Assignments:
Each of you should start an online blog site/Tumblr/Website that will allow you to use it as a place to archive your own thoughts about design and becoming a designer. The experience will catalog and inform others in your class (and beyond the classroom) and it is in this sharing of information that each of you will hopefully become inspired by one another. There will be weekly assignments, much like a design journal or a sketchbook, that will allow you to work outside the classroom on projects that make you think about design and art. Each assignment is due by class time each Tuesday. If you get behind, you can catch up at any time but the entire 12-week assignments should be completed by the end of the semester for a final grade that will count 10% of your final semester grade.
If you want to see some of the most amazing blogs from past design students then take a look at these:
http://jonmhart.blogspot.com/  
http://debushhhh.blogspot.com/ 

Week One: Best of the Best
Select 5 pieces of your work from the 3000 courses (GrD3000/GrD3150/GrD3200) that you feel was responsible for your acceptance into the graphic design program.
Entry by: Tuesday September 03

Week Two: Good, Bad and the Ugly
Good and Bad Design. Show your favorite and least favorite Designs. It might be print, film, web, or mixed media. Give credit to the work.
Entry by: Tuesday September 10 


Week Three:Trends in Graphic Design
Find a variety of contemporary trends in graphic design that you have an opinion about.
This might be video, print, gaming, illustration, web, apps, multimedia and all faucets of visual communication that could even include stage design, costuming, exhibition design, costuming, photography.
Entry by: Tuesday September 17

Week Four: Art and Design Inspires
Find any type of artistic work that truly inspires you as an artist. There are no limits here.
Be specific. It might be work you aspire to or work you find confusing and yet appealing.
Entry by: Tuesday September 24

Week Five: Block of Type
“Block of Type” is a project that should encourage further investigation of type in a very limited area.This project in the past has had many names such as “Type Detective” and “Font Hunt.” You are expected to document an area (or a city block) or area thereabouts which is rich with unique and unusual typography. Type that has been forgotten or has become part of the environment or is required for the benefit of society. Nothing is off limits in this exercise. This blog assignment will turn into a project in class.
Entry by: Tuesday October 01

Week Six: Personal Workspace
Personal Workspace. A visual(s) of where you work when you leave the classroom. It might be a particular table in a coffee shop or in your room where you’re organized everything around you in order to be creative. It’s wherever you feel most comfortable designing. You should be able to talk about it in class. What time of day or night is your best time for designing and what is your process for creating innovative and fresh designs for yourself?
Entry by: Tuesday October 08

Week Seven:Inspired by Doing
Books, Periodicals, Printed materials that have you have recently read or investigated. Find one moment in those materials which might have inspired you to create a fresh new design for yourself.
Entry by: Tuesday October 15

Week Eight: Checking In
Complete this sentence:
“Each week I feel as though I must check in at/with…….”
This again relates to what are your habits as a designer. It might be someone, someplace or something that keeps you coming back for encouragement or gives your renewed energy to continue creating. Share those places you feel you must visit every week to stay in touch with art, design, business, etc.
Entry by: Tuesday October 22

Week Nine: Archived Images
Archiving Images on Flickr or Instagram or another photo library app or online property.
Start a Flickr or Instagram account (which is free) and start archiving images and work on this site suitable for future use in searching for a job or internship. Build weekly on this site and add additional photography and work each week. At the end of the semester we will examine the work together.
Entry by: Tuesday October 29

Week Ten: Best T-shirt Designs
Best in T-Shirt Design:
Put up some of your favorite T-Shirt designs from your own collection or those you find on the web or in print that you would consider works of art. (your definition of that.)
You might even want to create some designs for yourself with a specific.
Entry by: Tuesday November 05

Week Eleven: Paul Rand
The Museum of Design Atlanta (MODA) is staging a new exhibition entitled " Paul Rand: Defining Design" that opens on October 27, 2013. It is an important exhibition that each of you should go see and study. I would like for each of you to write a response to this exhibition in some form. It can be as a diary/journal entry or it can be created into a print piece or video piece. Again, you're the designer. Experience the exhibition in person and then respond to it purely through the eyes of a designer. Strengths, Likes, Dislikes, Observations. www.Paul-Rand.com.
Entry by: Tuesday November 12

Week Twelve: The Art of Collections
This is what I collect. Demonstrate items that you might collect.
It might be artwork (paintings/drawings) or other items that give you pleasure as a visual artist. Collecting work and living around that work is important to creating a “creative nest” where you can draw inspiration. 
Entry by: Tuesday November 19

Week Thirteen: Video Day in the Life
A Day in the Life
Armed with still camera or video camera or even a tape recorder, I want each of you to document a day in your life that is centered around being creative (every day should be, right?) You can document your personal experiences during that day as it relates to whom you are and what you aspire to be. Length and content is up to you. Presentation to class.
Entry by: Tuesday December 03