it's sittable!

I was finally able to make it strong enough to sit in! I am so excited!!
Now all I have to do is clean it up a little bit and cover up the mounds of hot glue...
:)

the end of the year is almost here!

That's so hard to believe!  This semester just zoomed by.
So here's some more pictures of my chair!  It's MORE sittable than last time, but still not fully stittable.  I definitely still have some tweaks to make before turning in the final version on wednesday.  It's not as pretty as I wanted it to be....but that's because when I was working on it (at three in the morning) I was more focused on the structure :P

:)

Frame!!

I built my picture frame in the wood shop today!! Yippee!! I'm so excited to see it finished, and now it's out of the way so I can finish my chair.  The way I have the four sides laid out is supposed to echo the way that the legs on my chair bisect the seat.  I used two different kinds of wood to add a little more interest.  I think they work great together! I can't wait to get my pictures matted and put in the frame :)

 front^

 back^

:)

pictures of my first model

As I promised yesterday, here are some pictures of my completed model.  It isn't completely sit-able, but it's close.  It jut needs some more support with more layers of cardboard and something to hold up the back of the chair.  I would liiiike to make it a little it bigger and taller, but if I were I would have to start over completely and I know I definitely do NOT want to do that.  I will probably make it a little taller/wider for the frame.
Since my form is pretty simple, I would like to make the actual chair out of wood, but I won't know how much time that is going to take until our trip to the wood shop on Thursday. Making the entire chair compared to the frame wouldn't be too much more complicated as far as I know. But heck, what do I know about making things out of wood :P

(Sorry the third and fifth ones are rotated the wrong way....)
:)

ahh!

Oh crap, I haven't blogged in a very long time! 

I think this post would be more beneficial with some pictures, so I'll try and put those up later.  I don't have my models and/or a camera with me currently :)

I'm almost done with my first cardboard model.  I just have a few structural issues to work out for tomorrow's class.  I'm really hoping that the tape and glue that I have will hold it together well enough! I'm also REALLY hoping that it will be sit-able (I'm sure many of my class mates are having the same worry!). I'll put some pictures up later when I'm finished!

:)

barcelona chair

I have mixed feelings about this chair project....I'm excited to design it and I'm excited for the end product, but I'm a teensy weensy bit nervous about working in the wood shop!! I'm hoping and praying I'll come out of it with of all my fingers...
ANYWAYS, I researched the Barcelona chair.  I LOVE LOVE LOVE this chair! It's designed so beautifully and it's so simple.  I also love how modern it looks, though it was made over 80 years ago.  It was designed to be timeless, and Rohe definitely achieved that.  I really enjoyed reading about it's origins and how it was designed to accompany the interior of the German Pavilion at the Barcelona Int. Expo in 1929.
Im excited to start designing one that looks like it!

woah this thing is due tuesday??

ACK! Where did the time go?
hmmm what should I talk about...let's see. critiques yesterday.

I loved looking at everyone's books!  This project has been a really fun one and it's been really cool to see how other people want to show their experience. It was also fun seeing everyone pet my book :P I was hoping that would happen because that's really what my book is all about, and I want everyone to most importantly feel the experience since it pretty much IS the experience.

I think it was Jeremy who suggested using a collar as the binding for my book.  I really like this idea, and I'm hoping that I'll be able to use it while still being able to make the pages turnable.  I also hope that I'll be able to find some cheap collars at good ol' wally world :)

So that's about it for now!!
:)

pictures from my book!

Alright, so here are some in-process pictures of my book that I'm working on.  I decided to go with the circle shaped pages...I don't really have a reason for this other than I like it :)
I bought some fake fur to put in various spots in the book....I'm SUPER excited for that!

This last picture here ^ will be filled in with fur, so you kinda get an idea of what it will look like.

I'm really excited! I've really been enjoying this project.

:)

word list.

So hopefully I'll be able to put something more exciting up here.  I made a word list a while back when I was at the humane society, and I have a lot so I figured I would share! A lot of these words are going to be in my book too.

fur

smelly

purring

barking

sneezing

hair

shedding

tickling

tails

claws

scratching

hairballs

soft

sniffing

meowing

water

fluffy

rattling

squeaking

peeking

looking

spots

patches

stretching

sleeping

biting

playing

paws

so there ya have it!

:)

book book book

So I'm actually getting pretty excited for this book.  It's been pretty fun so far and I think it's only gonna get better!
The idea for my book is to have a round book (with about five or six pages?) with a cat coming out of each page.  I also want the case for the book to be a cage that looks like the cages that the cats are in (look at picture below!) so that you're literally taking the cats out of a cage to begin with!

I think I want to create it in the order of a story line, starting with choosing a cat from a cage and ending with putting it back.  I really want to put fake cat fur on the pictures of the cats, since obviously petting them is the main part of the experience.  (anyone know where to get fake cat fur?? i'm thinking hobby lobby!)

So, that's pretty much where I'm at right now!  

:)

who doesn't love kitties?

My eXpErIeNcE for this next project involves a lot of softness and cute!

Going to the humane society and petting cats!

:D

As you can see I'm pretty excited. I love cats, 'nuff said. 

So I think that my book will involve something that you can pet, since that's a big part of my experience.  I think that it will also involve lots of eyes looking and waiting for you to pick them out of all of the cats in the room.  I've been contemplating how to portray smell in a book....cats and dogs have that very distinct smell that may not be the most pleasant, but it's definitely one of the first things you notice when first walking into the humane society. 

So here's my experience video.  As you can tell, all of them are very interested in whoever happens to be in the room :)

:)

el cartel final!

Well here is my final poster! I'm pretty satisfied with it, except for the bottom left corner (with the mood stuff).  I have been staring at it for the past two days, and that is the best way I could think of to organize them.  I thought maybe using real pictures (instead of my little cartoony drawings!) would help, but I wanted to stick with the colors I had chosen so to show the color palette that would be used in the interior of the treehouse.
:)

we love posters!

So my poster's been coming along pretty well...I'm more satisfied with it now (especially that I have some awesome pictures thanks to Nathan!), but it still needs a lot more work.  I've learned some new tricks too from Jeremy using InDesign and Photoshop/Illustrator.
I suppose I'll put some pics up!

This is the picture I'm going to use for the foreground of my poster.  I really like the angle...you can see the roof and get a good sense of the window at the same time!

And this is the inside picture!! I reallly really realllyrylayerlyllyyyyy love this one.

:)

design design design.

WELLL...
as far as this poster goes....I'm struggling a bit. (or I was..)
And I don't know why, I figured it would be easy, me being a graphic design student and all. The night before the two poster ideas were due, I didn't get one wink of sleep.  I stayed up the entire night working on them, because I wasn't satisfied with anything that I made. Even after finishing, I was completely unhappy with both of them.  But after class on Tuesday, I saw some new directions that others were going and I really saw what I needed to do to my posters (in other words, completely start over).
So far, I've realized that in every poster sort of thing we do, I have always put too much stuff on it, and it's confusing as to what the main focal point is.  It's something I've really been trying to work on with other stuff I make (but I ultimately failed with these two posters...even after staying up for ten hours working on them!).  So that's what I'm going to try and do with my revised poster for Thursday...completely strip it down and only use the essentials.
There was something that Jeremy said on Tuesday that really struck me too (I even wrote it on my hand in sharpie as to remind myself!!) He said: "I'm smart.  The solution is smart. So how do I portray it?"
This encouraged me too, because after my dissatisfaction with my posters, I was extremely discouraged and I had no idea how to move on.  It reminded me that I AM smart, and I just need to figure out a way to show to others my ideas clearly and effectively.

So here I go! I'm off to do some designing!
:)

yayyy

So...after staying up until 4:30 this morning working on my treehouse, I have come up with a concept!! It's super exciting.
My tree has four main branches that kinda spread out from each other.  They create a form that would be capable of holding something in it, so I came up with the idea for it to be holding an orb shaped treehouse.  So far, I had planned for it to be just have one main floor with windows and such, but after talking to Jeremy I decided that I need to sketch it with many half-levels(?) that give the sense of being "held".
My persona is someone who needs to get away from working, parenting, or whatever is causing stress to a place where they can relax and enjoy nature.  I would like to include many windows and an optional sunroof to get the open air feeling.  I would also like to put books, rugs, pillows, candles, and music inside to create a soothing, relaxing aura.

treehouse!

So we have now moved on to the treehouse project.  I'm really excited for it! I already have a lot of sketches of my tree, and I'm going to start looking for ideas for the actual structure of the house.  I'm still trying to figure out what kind of persona will be living in my treehouse...I've been thinking I could use it for recreational purposes or maybe a place just for relaxation.  I think that after I find a good structure for it, I can figure out what persona works best with it.
Here are some pictures of my tree! I'll put up some sketches in the next post.

:)

Experience videos!

This first video is Miss Chloe! She found the bathroom right away.














And this is Miss Nikki! She also found it right away.














Because the signage worked so well, we only need to make a few slight changes.
:)

Lindley bathrooms

We are currently in the process of testing out our solutions to our problems.
We went back to Lindley and got a feel for where our signs will go and how big they should be. Today we made 9 signs to put up, making it easier to find the restrooms.  We chose to do our signs in blue, as a general "bathroom" symbol, but we also chose to use arrows that look like they came off a rose compass (to tie in with the geography/geology content in the building).
We are gonna start testing either today or tomorrow! Should be pretty exciting to see if our plan works out well or not.  Hopefully we won't have to make any major changes.
I'll try to put up pictures soon!
:)

back to school/wayfinding

Well, we are back into the swing of things with this new project.  We were a little confused in the beginning, but I think now all of us have a scenario and we have a plan of what we are going to do.  Here I have a sketch of our scenario:
A student living in the dorms (templin etc.) arrives on campus and really REALLY has to use the restroom.  The closest building is Lindley Hall, so they choose to find a restroom there.  The restrooms are really difficult to find, and they're in a big of a hurry to go and then get to class.

Here, I listed some simple things for our AEIOU.

I'll put up some more stuff after we've done more research!!! 

:)