I’m alive I swear! I’ve been busy with work and catching up on adulting. The current library campaign has also been taking up a lot of my energy. (sdlibraryadvocates on Insta and FB if you wanna take a look!)
I’ve been trying to create posts highlighting library resources and spreading awareness of the proposed budget cuts. I also had to make Instagram and Facebook accounts. That was the easy part, figuring out how to connect them was more difficult. I printed off 30 posters at my local library and have yet to hang them around town. I’ll get to that on my days off, this Wednesday and Thursday.
An Instagram post I designed in Canva
In other news, I’ve been preparing for school and buying books. Hopefully, I can keep the momentum going in the effort to save the library! I was able to talk to the president of the SD Library Association and find out that there will be more resources coming.
The college homework saga continues! We are currently designing the nameplate, or title, of our magazine. After scrolling through adobe fonts, I finally found my font: casserole. Which is such a fun name and just warms my Midwest heart.
But picking a font was just the beginning. Now I have to expand my Illustrator skill set and figure out just how to manipulate type. I haven’t done a whole lot with typography so I consulted google and found these really helpful videos.
I learned a lot about the pencil tool! I’ve become so comfortable with the pen tool, that I haven’t tried it. That ends today!
Brainstorming
My magazine title is musings. After thinking and surfing Pinterest, I wanted to try incorporating a quill nib into the title.
some generic quill nibs (not my pic)
I started sketching how I wanted the nib to replace the i in musings.
some of my scribblings!some iterations
I like the one in the middle. I don’t think I need a dot for the i. This week, I’m going to check in with my teacher and get some feedback. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how to knock out the middle pieces of the quill either.
That’s all for today folks! Did you learn anything new?
Almost a year ago, an old friend gave me some cool old magazines. It was so cool to flip through them and see old ads and stories. There was a 1925 needlework magazine that was battered and it had such neat illustrations, that I just had to turn it into a zine. I did feel…
After a wild year of school, I think it’s official. I have senioritis. I’m not sure if it’s the gloomy weather or the final month before graduation, but I’m loosing bits of motivation and creativity. I’ve been working on little projects here and there to keep myself creating outside of class. I think this has…
I’m still at a standstill with my poster. I think I need some time away from it so I can attack with a new perspective. Right now I’ve gotten the website mock up done (below) The website mock up took ages! I had to make sure my colors were accessible. I used https://contrast-grid.eightshapes.com/. Something that…
In my Media Development class, we are mocking up and designing the interface of our own apps. This sounds pretty straightforward, but I’ve learned I need to know more about how to make proper surveys, determine my target market, add links to my social media stories, and create personas.
What I’ve learned:
I need to have a wider audience on social media.
If I want the best swath of information, I have to reach a lot of people. And as a person with a small personal following, that has made me get creative.
So some of my own suggestions for widening that survey scope is to post it to Facebook, Facebook groups, Instagram (stories and posts), Snapchat, Substack, Reddit, literally everything. Check out survey swap response websites, and text relatives who fall into the target market. Try it all, the worst they can say is no, or just not respond at all.
Ask the right questions!
Ask what is only relevant. People aren’t going to want to fill out any extra questions. Research what good questions to ask users. Articles like this are helpful.
Format your survey correctly
Run through your survey in preview mode if possible and see if friends can read through it. I sent my survey out into the wild and realized that where I had a short answer option, a multiple-choice format would’ve made it easier to analyze.
Get tech savy!
Learn how to post links onto all social media platforms. I had no idea how to post links on Instagram and Snapchat, but now I do.
That’s all I have for now! After I learn how to create personas, I’ll have more to update you on. What else should I cover? Let me know below.
