No matter who complains you always have shadows of doubt. This, on top of the fact that design by committee never seems like a good idea, was why I was worried when 32 graphic designers had to agree on a theme for our Senior Portfolio Review (SPR). The meetings were a mess with no clear direction, leaders thrust into power with out any kind of training, and no clear deadline to be finnished by. I knew two things, our only hope was to pick 1 person to design it and let them work and I did not want it to be me*. Rachel had a great idea and direction of using CMYK because it is the core of what we use** and it would nicely show off the full color postcards we were printing. For all of our sake she was chosen after some preliminary designs and we were all very happy with the results.
Until we sent it all out and two TCNJ alumni had not so nice words about our SPR theme of CMYK. One of our best teachers assured that the one student was horrible and to not listen to a word he says and the other was so insignificant that he could not even remember her***. We all knew what he said to assure us was true and got angry at the alumni instead of depressed for ourselves. We pushed on and the SRP was an amazing success.
While it didn’t bother us the shadows of doubt had lingered in the back of our minds. No one wanted to be called a hack as you were graduating. We were never fully vindicated till I found an article from LogoLounge.com about Fifteen trends in logo design for 2005. On page three I was shocked to find CMKY as a design trend! Even if you disagree with the trend I am beyond happy to know we were with the times with out consciously thinking about what other people where doing. We did what felt right and it worked.
I’m not recommending being trendy but it’s hard to deny that graphic design is very close to fashion design and trends are important in both. It’s a fine line to walk and I’m happy that it seems our senior class walked it very well.
- CUB, ResLife and Campus Life we’re gonna be the death of me. ** though being the odd one out with web I used RGB. ** He then went crazy himself and started psychoanalyzing the people the email was CCed to.