My Work - Final Flash Animation (Pt 2, Stg 4)

Here is my final flash animation entitled "My Work". It includes vector images I created as well as my photography (most of which has been edited in Photoshop and/or Lightroom). The video begins with my name and logo and then continues on to show some of my photography. Originally I had some wording after the photography, but I decided to add in some extra photography as a background for each text. The video concludes with my logo, the words "book now", and my email address. It was a triumphant feeling when everything came together and I mastered using frames and motion tweens. I am happy with the final outcome. I had never used Adobe Animate before so I definitely learned a lot doing this project.

Flash Animation (Part 2, Stage 3)

Using Adobe Animate (formally Flash Professional) was the biggest learning experience yet. I definitely found this program to be the hardest to learn out of all the programs that I learned during this course. It was a lot of trial and error after watching the videos. When I finally got things to work how I wanted to them and figured out how to do things the right way my work flowed wonderfully. I made use of the things I learned in the Lynda.com tutorials.

My animation is for my photography website. It is a trailer or preview of my photography work. All text and images are my own, created by me. My images have been edited in Adobe Photoshop and/or Lightroom. My logo was created using Adobe Illustrator. I imported all the images into Animate before I began creating layers. Once I was finished I converted my swf file to an avi file to upload to my blog.

Flash Animation (PT 1, Stage 2)

This is my first time using Adobe Animate (Flash) so I am still learning a lot. It has taken me a lot of practice to get each step so far. I have created an outline of frames so far (I will add more picture layers as well as wording). The animation will begin with an anchor vector image, followed by my logo (shown in the first picture below). After that it will showcase a few of my images (seen below; I will be adding more still). Before the images begin I am going to add text that says "Heather K Cook Photographer" and have the text animated. Everything I have tried with animating the text so far has either not worked out right or I just didn't like so I am going to go back and do that part after I am done adding in all my photographs. It is very much a work in progress.

Flash Animation Sketches (Part 1)

I wanted to tie this flash animation project in with my previous website design. I wanted to use it to create something I could use to promote myself as a photographer. I recently did my first professional shoot for a wedding and I am looking to get my name out there so I can get other jobs. I think creating a flash animation to promote my business would definitely benefit me and this project is the perfect way to try that out.

Here are my sketches. It will start off with my logo that I have previously created in Illustrator (for the website design project) and will go on to showcase my photos in different categories. This will show the viewer the different types of work I have shot so they can see what type of photographer I am.

I am excited to try out Adobe Flash and create this animation. I have never used it before so it will certainly be a learning process.

Design Competition - Part 2 - Final Work - Wolves

 Wolves

Here are the four photos I would submit to the BigPicture Natural World Photography Competition. My entry would fall in the category of "terrestrial wildlife". I have chosen four photos of wolves that I took at a wolf sanctuary in New Jersey last Spring. The concept of my competition submission is to raise awareness on wolves through photos. I believe the right photos can really effect someone. You can see a photo of an animal and be drawn to look into more information on it. That is my hope for these photos. That they will incite interest into the viewer and they will learn more about wolves. Wolves tend to be viewed negatively and I want to help change that and help people realize how important it is to protect them. I have used Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Lightroom on this project.

With each photo I began in Photoshop. I adjusted the color balance, and used a high pass filter to sharpen the fur. I also used the hue/saturation adjustment layer to enhance the colors in the fur. In the second photo I also enhanced the eye color, using the dodge tool. Once I was happy with my edits in Photoshop I went to Lightroom. In Lightroom I applied more sharpening effects as well has clarity and some adjustments in hue. In the first photo I cropped the other wolf out of the photo because he was too out of focus.

The requirements for this competition were 1-10 jpg photos. The file names were required to be as follows lastname_firstinital_category_title.jpg. The competition ends on 3/31/16. This contest is open to all photographers. I will not be actually entering my photos into the competition.

Design Competition - Part 1 - Sketches

I have chosen to do the BigPicture Natural World Photography competition. -  http://www.graphiccompetitions.com/jump.php?contest=bigpicture-natural-world-photography-competition

 

            The BigPicture Natural World Photography competition allows you to enter up to 10 photos. There are 6 categories or you can submit 3-5 images in the Coral Reef photo essay. The categories are: terrestrial wildlife - things with wings – landscapes, waterscapes, & flora – aquatic life – art of nature – human/nature. The competition opened on Jan 1^st 2016 and ends on March 31^st 2016. The contest is open to all photographers worldwide.

             The two will be using Adobe applications I will be using are Photoshop and Lightroom to edit my photography. 

My submission will include photos I have taken of wolves. I want to use this competition as a platform to raise awareness on wolves. To speak of how important they are and how we need to protect them. I will include the following photos (these are the photos before editing).

It was hard to create sketches for this project so I just included the photos I will be using for the competition submission.

Website Design - Part 2

I ended up taking elements from all three of my website concept sketches and putting them together to create my website design. I used Adobe Illustrator to create my logo, my header font, to color the anchor image, and part of the font on the booking page. The website design itself was created using Adobe Photoshop.

I downloaded the anchor image from here - http://www.flaticon.com/free-icon/big-anchor_85117
I downloaded the social media icons here - https://www.iconfinder.com/icons/740151/facebook_media_online_social_icon#size=128
All photographs are mine, taken by me. Everything other than the anchors and social media icons were created by me.

Website Design (Part 1) - Sketches

Here are my sketches for 3 concepts for my portfolio website. I tried to keep all of my designs clean. I don't like anything overly busy and I am a fan of clean design so that is why I went in that direction. There will be a lot of photography included and navigation is pretty easy and simple in all three designs. I am playing around with a few different logos in these designs as well.

 Concept #1

Concept #2

Concept #3

I am not yet sure which concept I will go with, but obviously there will be anchors involved.  ;o)

Final Logo Designs

      Here are my final three logo designs - EmpireX, Vamphunter, and Elvish Lands.

      For EmpireX I combined two of my sketch designs (2 and 3) to create a new design. Originally I created design #2, but I just didn't like how it looked. I used Medievalsharp for my font to write out EMPIRE. I then created two swords. I watched a tutorial on YouTube, https://youtu.be/VX7Yv_Zo-j4, on how to create the swords. The sword was created using the rectangle tool to create half of the sword and then I used the reflect tool to add in the other side. I added color and a gradient on the metal part of the sword. I made a duplicate of the original sword and then rotated them. I then brought them together so they intersected. 

      To create Vampirehunter I used Showcard Gothic font to write the word. I then used the polygon tool to create the vampire fangs on the V, and the sharp points on the bottom of the P and R. I did have a hard time getting my triangles to match up exactly. It took a lot of trial and error and I had to rewatch a few of the lynda.com tutorials several times.

     The first thing I did to create Elvish Lands was to search the web for the right font. I searched elvish fonts and wasn't really too happy with the ones I downloaded. I ended up doing a search for celtic fonts and found a font called Stonecross. I used that to create the words Elvish Lands. I then selected the text and clicked the mark envelope button to get the warp options. I chose the bugle option and played around with the percentages until I liked what I saw. I then created the leaf to go over the i. To make the leaf I used the ellipse tool, then used the convert tool to change the shape a bit, finally I used the pen tool to create the stem. I rotated it, shrunk it down, and placed it over the i.

    This project was definitely a learning experience! I had to rewatch several of the lynda.com tutorials. I think for my first project using Illustrator it didn't come out too bad. I look forward to building my Illustrator skills further.

 

Identity Design & Branding (Part 1) Sketches

The above sketch includes the two concepts below: 

My first concept is a medieval theme. EmpireX and its games Stormy Skies and Elvish logos will all have medieval style fonts and incorporate some medieval graphics (like swords). This concept will include dark colors (black and deep red). Sketches 1, 2, and 3 show this theme.

My second concept is a fantasy theme. My fonts will have sharp edges similar to those in my medieval theme. I will use greens and golds for these logos. I want there to be a bit of an earthy feeling to this theme. Sketches 4, 5, and 6 show this theme.

The above sketch includes my third concept, which is a horror theme. For this concept the games will be called The Night Realm, Vamp Hunter, or Wolf (obviously I will only include 2 games but I had 3 game ideas for this concept). I want to use Gothic style fonts and affects like blood dripping from the fonts. This theme will also include dark colors (reds, blacks, greens).