This is my Little Tea Book....

Hand made. Hand sewn. Pages dyed with different kind of teas. Collaged with type, drawings, tea bags, tea leaves, paper, and vellum. And some silly little tea poems and haikus that I wrote...

Art Director's Club

So SVA had a show which opened last night at the Art Director's Club, featuring junior and senior graphic design and advertising work. The show was AMAZING! The 3D work was mindblowing as usual, and I was overall impressed with all of the work in the show. I will post pictures soon, but for now, here are the two posters I designed that was accepted into the show.



FULL VIEW PLEASE! The above has small type!

Portfolio season!

In 1 month, I need to photograph my work, lay out, and bind a hardcover book. AHHHHH!!!

Language of Color

x-posted on my type blog.

For my typography class, we have to create a project about the topic of language. I chose mine to be about the language of color. My idea is a language swatch book, which informs how color is used to communicate in different cultures and societies. Here is my current progress:
















more to come! keep updated with this book's progress here.

menu #2

What I've learned this assignment: Designing in a different decade can be really hard. I did tons of research on Art Deco graphic design during the 1930s, and was inspired to create a menu in that tradition. Again, the hardest part was getting the typefaces to work. I am so used to using typefaces that are popular now, that when I am presented with really old stuff, I honestly had to play around for 6 or 7 hours until I got something I am somewhat satisfied with. Still in progress.




Then one more menu to go! All three due tomorrow! Wish me luck

newspaper menu

For class we had to redesign a menu from a little diner called Eisenberg's Sandwich Shop in the Flat Iron District. The place is really old school, and has been around since 1929. I decided to go with a late 1920s newspaper look. After spending hours upon hours of attempting to choose appropriate typefaces, and setting type and making it all fit, I realized that newspapers are very tricky. The type is still not set perfectly, but I have another week to polish it, so for now this is how it looks.

Typefaces: Bernhard, Caslon, Times, Trade Gothic, Clarendon, DIN

I tried.

ZAR Mag - cover

For editorial, we are designing and composing our own magazine. So far I only have one cover that I like so far. I have a lot of work ahead of me

Flashback

Due to the terms of service, I pulled off a photo album from my facebook account of all of my artwork from highschool. The result was a feeling of nostalgia, and I couldn't help but fall in love again with some of my work from 3, 4, even 5 years ago.

Liz-Chan.com revamped!

Check it out and let me know what you think!

www.liz-chan.com

Lolita Type Book

x-posted in my Type Class Blog.

The book itself has a shiny cover and some pages of acetate with overlapping design elements. I haven't jpeged the acetate pages yet. Will post photos.

The Incognito Lampshade

The INCOGNITO LAMPSHADE! The assignment was to take a household object and give it a new function; rebrand, repackage. This thing is huge....goes up to my waist.





Step 1: Remove lamp shade from its base. Step 2: Migrate to an inconspicuous corner with the lamp shade. Step 3: Place lamp shade over head so that it is completely covered. Step 4: Stand up straight, move as little as possible, and be silent until the situation is safe

Luxey - Clothing line branding and collateral

Sorry for the lack of posting. Here we go!



Luxey: my girly evening wear line brand and collateral based on the idea of "playing dress up" as a kid. The assignment was to pick 5 pieces from a thrift store and then brand a clothing line. Every box or bag comes with a charm that you can collect whenever you buy something from the store. I spent FOREVER on this assignment. I was so sick of gold foil, pink ribbon, and tissue paper afterwards.

For class, we've been keeping a journal for a couple of weeks now. It's a free association exercise we do in the dark or with our eyes closed. Taking three of these sketches, we had to "bring it to life" graphically.

I miss summer already

Sneak Peak

So my website, liz-chan.com has been needing a rejuvenating facelift for awhile. I finally got crackin' on it, and I am pleased with this mockup. Now I just need to make it happen and bring it to life.....the slicing, coding, etc. Hopefully I will get to all of that soon because I am pretty excited about how it's going to look. I was still going for playful typography, but designed it in a way where it was still fun, very "me", and (hopefully) memorable, while still maintaining the neutrality that a portfolio site needs so that it doesn't overshadow the work. I think scale wise, the images are going to be larger than it appears in the mockup at top....right now the sketch looks rather top heavy. Navigation will follow a similar structure as the current one.

Typeface used was Radio.

work in progress - poster

Posters

For my communication design class, we had to go to the New York Public Library, gather images from there, and then pick three to use in a poster. We had to use one word, and only that word, and integreate type with image.

For Play, I experimented with ink, brush, and bamboo pens until I got the spontaneous and gesteral effect I wanted that would go with the line quality of the image. I also tried to visually combine them, by making the stem of the P part of the neck and the descender of the y go into the shoulder.

In Anxiety, I did not want to compete with the powerful image, so I repeated it (because anxiety is worrying about the same thing over and over again) and molded it into an organic shape that would imitate ripples of water. Typeface used was violation.

The lettering for Sex was also done by hand. My goal was to do lettering that would match the style of the illustration and I borrowed shapes and lines from her tattoos and hair that would fit and wrap around the figures.

Each poster is pretty large....28 x 40 inches.

The more I think about it, the more I want to go into poster design too. I think I enjoy that along with editorial design the most.

New Typography

Check out what I've been working on lately.

Lately I've been feeling really inspired. I'm becoming more of a type nerd, day by day. My goal is to experiment as much as possible and play around with type this year. I mean REALLY stretch my limits. Letter forms are such interesting things to play around with.

Type Blog

For my third year typography class, each student has to have his or her own typography blog to update on our classwork and give each other feedback. We can also post things that we like that are type related. Here is a link to mine:

lizchantypography.blogspot.com

Candid

Rooftop Garden at the Met. 2 couples and 2 singled out dudes.

I don't know.

I am pretty sure there's 2 or 3 paintings/drawings underneath of this. And I am going to continue building more on top of it.

Pastel, cut patterned paper, acrylic, sharpie marker on canvas

A trip to the MoMA

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Social Life Magazine with Whitney Port

On Saturday, May 24th, Social Life Magazine had a party in the Hamptons, where I was able to meet our Memorial Day issue cover girl, Whitney Port from MTV's The Hills. She was a total sweetheart, and when I told her that I designed her cover story, she kindly autographed a copy of the magazine for me. Here are the spreads:

Social Life Spring Issue featuring Kim Kardashian

Beginning with the spring issue, Social Life is beginning a facelift! As design editor, my goal was to update the magazine in terms of layout and most of all, typography. We tossed the old outdated typeface, Ville de Geneve, and introduced new typefaces to the magazine, like Didot and Avant Garde. I learned a lot of things from this issue. High, elevated, and elegant design is A LOT harder than it looks, especially when you are trying to also make it refreshing and modern. It's a challenge I don't think I have completely solved, but I do know that SL mag is heading in the right direction.

052008

Merz design compositions

I am finally making my Merz post. In my basic graphic design class fall semester, we had to use elements from a magazine cover designed by Kurt Schwitters to recreate new design compositions. We did 24 designs per week for approximately 10 weeks. I have done over 200 variations of these. What I am going to show you is just a small slice of what I accomplished. Here is the original done by Schwitters. The following below are design compositions I have made derived from the text, letters, shapes, and images of that Merz cover:

Shapes

Untitled


Onion skins


Untitled


Girl in front of cabinets

More drawings

FULL VIEW PLEASE!!!!
I promise you the textures are pleasing to look at :)


Pen nibs


Beer Bottle Landscape


Caress


Water Tower


Onion

wow wow wow

It's so weird when I look back at my art from 2 or 3 years ago before I went to college. I think I did this in 2005? It's so different from the way I now create art. Good thing though.....I think my life as an artist would be terribly boring if I never change.

Flyer assignment

I am so sick of doing Swiss Design and everything about it (my basic graphic design teacher is obsessed!). I am tired of Helvetica and of grids, harmony, the golden section, and flush left rag right.....

So for my next flyer, I butchered it.


Hello dadaism? Man that last one felt good.

Magazine Covers

Yay for editorial design! It's my favorite, and finally I got the first editorial assignment of the year. I decided to get a head start on the cover designs due for next week...but mainly because I've been staring at my portfolio book for days and I need something new and refreshing to work on. I made two rough covers already, and I am not sure which I like better. Full view please! I love the imagery on the top, but the text flows and is more interesting on the bottom one. And I am still not 100% sure of my typeface choice. Opinions? I am probably going to work on a third one with highly experimental typography and space in the spirit of the designer David Carson. My goal is to make one cover that isn't as conventional looking with a very dadaist feel.

Target Assignment

For visual literacy class, we were given 7 targets that we had to transform graphically.

Portfolio Spreads

So my portfolio book will be roughly laid out by the end of today for critique tomorrow. I decided on going with a scrapbook theme for mine. Those who know me know that I don't plan on having kids of my own. I want to spend my life creating art and design, and in a way I guess my "children" are the works I produce. So I went with an old vintage family album theme, and here are some of the spreads I have done so far:







My biggest concern is the production aspect. What kind of paper to use? The materials for the cover? Then there's finding a good printer to rely on in printing and cutting my pages. And my biggest fear is binding this all together by hand and hoping that I don't screw up. I am thinking about using an off-white heavier paper that has somewhat of a texture to it. As for the cover, perhaps something cloth or fabric, with ribbon for the spine. In general, I want a very organic and personal feel to it. I am not sure if I should put a title on the cover or not.....maybe "Memories" or "Family Album"? Or would that be too obvious? I know one requirement to keep in mind is that my name has to be on the front cover or inside flap....and seeing that I won't have a book jacket, I guess it will have to be on the cover. Any suggestions?

040208

The Dead River Company wearing the buttons I designed. This was going to be a spread in my portfolio book, but I later revamped my book concept and this spread had to be taken out and redone to fit the new theme. I still really like this spread as a design itself though, so I kept it and refer to it as a "promotional piece" that I did for fun...which in a way is true because I definitely enjoyed shooting and designing this spread A LOT.

Social Life Magazine

Some Spreads I have done as the Design Editor of Social Life Magazine:









The above "Behind the Shoot" page features my very own photography.

Philosophies

I like to create spontaneous art. To me it's the purest and rawest form, where the creative process is more important and the unknown can unfold. Planning and thinking too much is what causes me to repeat myself.



This is my basic philosophy and attitude towards my fine art. Art is about creating, and enjoying that process of creating in the moment for what it is, without worrying about what other people are going to think or how it is going to turn out. I am going to be honest, I don't normally like working on a painting or work of art for more than a day, if I even last that long. Once that moment is over, my creative energies are different and I just can't work on it the same way that I did before. If I ever do get back to working on something, I end up changing and transforming it completely to express this new moment.

I really want to apply this philosophy into my design work as well, but it's really difficult. Graphic design, in the real world isn't about creating, but about serving. You have to please your clients.

Or is it?

James Victore, who teaches at SVA, spoke to my visual literacy class about "anti graphic design", in a nutshell. He said that he designs because he loves designing. And because of that, clients buy HIS genius ideas for what they are.

I look up to that. I don't want to be a designer at age 45 still getting bitched at by art directors and clients. I am going to create and my ideas will sell. I want to break ground, start a new movement, and have everyone follow and want me to design for them, not in someone else's style, but my own. I know it won't happen overnight and we all gotta start somewhere, but this is my goal in terms of my graphic design career.

collage

A collage I did in drawing class. This time, we focused a lot on hands, arms, wrists, elbows, and sleeves, working straight from live models. I'm really happy with the way it turned out. I think this collage will actually make the cover of my drawing portfolio book.

Graphite, oil pastel, white tape, newspaper, brown paper.

Beverly Feldman

Here is a page I did for Social Life Magazine's 2008 winter issue. The page features an event hosted by Beverly Feldman Shoes. I personally attended the event and photographed it. Later I did the layout design of the page.

Assorted Design Post

For my Visual Literacy class, we had to design two postcards and actually mail them to my teacher's office. The first post card could pretty much be about anything: a visual statement that can be personal, political, social, nonsensical, abstact......anything. I decided to be funny and use some pictures I took awhile back from a time my friends and I messed around with bread. The bread man's belly is where I will write the address. For some reason though, when I uploaded the picture of the back, it became really low resolution and the lime green turned more into an aloe green. Imagine it 10x brighter.




The second post card had to make a statement about the United States through the use of the American flag or the dollar bill. I did a really simple idea, commenting on government surveillance on telephone calls.


I don't know if I posted this on my blog yet, but last semester one of my biggest and most challenging projects was designing a new typeface. It is a very very VERY tedious process. Most people assume that when it comes to typefaces, you create one letter, plug it into a program, and it makes the other letters for you. NOT TRUE. In fact, each and every letter, special character, symbol, and punctuation mark is designed by a human being. The biggest challenge is keeping everything uniform, aka the proportions: the heights, thickness and thinness of the strokes, widths, angles, curves......every aspect of every letter has to be consistent. Here is my very first typeface, named Flute (or my baby, as I like to call it). It's a very condensed typeface, with very odd skinny proportions and high contrast between thick and thin strokes. It's still not 100% perfect.....There are some refinements I still need to work on. But for the most part, I am proud of the many hours I spent on it thus far.


Another project we had to do in Typography class last semester was a packaging project based on the idea of pattern. We first created a pattern out of our initials. The floral pattern you see above on the chocolate box is made from combing E and C in Futura, which was then rotate repeated. We then constructed boxes and containers, and then designed the packaging for a product. In our product, we also had to include a statement or story about pattern and how it relates to our lives. I chose chocolate and I wrote about how chocolate is a lovely pattern we use to reach for comfort. I took it a step farther and turned it into a brand as well, called True Chocolate. The entire end result you see above was put together by hand. The box was built with mat board, the labels and tags were designed, printed, cut, and placed on by me. I definitely learned a lot about construction and being crafty in this project. It took me three box attempts before I finally got it right.



Reads: Chocolate. We know when we want it. We know when we need it. Chocolate is a lovely pattern, like a comfortable T-shirt we reach for over and over again. For every bad day, sweet tooth, holiday, or romantic dessert for two, chocolate is there for us. It's not just a best friend. It's a love affair. So look no further, because here you will find your one TRUE love.


Needless to say, my teacher did not like the original alphabet I designed in the previous post. Her criticism was that it was too illustrative and obvious....making the viewer too passive and not active enough in interpreting the design. As an artist and designer, one of the biggest challenges sometimes is learning how to take criticism, especially when the teacher tells you that you need to rethink your entire approach to the problem. It was a struggle, but I redid the assignment (keeping a few letters that were ok) and tried to be more simple, going by the "less is more" rule.

New changes: H is now Hot dog; I is now Ice skating; N is now New York Times; P is now pretzel; The rest are still the same, but most were visually redone.