Another week has gone by, and another week has gone by where I didn’t complete any of the goals related to time management that I had . . . in my defense, this was the most anxiety-inducing week (for reasons I will not get into that also have nothing to do with ds106), so my free time was spent resting and trying not to explode into a thousand pieces instead of working.
But, lucky for me, this week seemed a little easier! Maybe because I’m comfortable with design and enjoy it. I actually ended up having a lot of fun working on everything here!
So here is the tale of my anxious anxious anxious anxious ANXIOUS week (in ds106):
On Monday, I did nothing. Actually, I might have commented on a few posts from my memory, but I think that might be it.
On Tuesday, I also did nothing. Maybe commented, but I feel like I didn’t because Tuesdays are usually long days for me.
On Wednesday, I did something! I did a Daily Create, here is my post on Mastadon related to it! The prompt was to post a gif related to your first job, and this was the gif I posted:
I worked at McDonald’s!
There’s some irony in the gif, because yeah it’s Ronald McDonald, yeah I worked there, but the irony is that I did not have a good time. I did not YIPPIE! It was during COVID and I was soooo stressed out, and working only made me more stressed to the point that I literally had to quit for my own sake. I don’t look fondly at the memories.
That was all I did Wednesday, although I may have commented some! But . . . I don’t remember . . . it feels like Wednesday was a week ago.
On Thursday, I started to do real work! I, of course, started with the Daily Create. Here is my post on Mastadon.
We were asked to find a song that could represent your theme song. I thought for a really long time on this, because I really wasn’t sure, but I eventually came upon Anna Sun by WALK THE MOON, a song that has been one of my favorites for a while. It’s not my most favorite ever, but something about it feels empowering, and if I was walking forward dramatically, with all eyes on me, I think this would be my anthem.
I also completed the Design Reflection, where I went on a circlular rant about social psychology and if first impressions really matter (the answer? it depends). It was inspiring to read all of the media and watch the inteviews with Chip Kidd and see how some designs were made, the inspiration behind them, the use of different colors, etc. It was so interesting to me.
I talked about how I love judging books by their covers, despite the phrase being to not judge a book by it’s cover. I think it’s fun! It’s like a game to me, and if the cover ends up depicting a different story than the real story, I think that’s really interesting. Personally, I believe that shows just how everyone can interpret a different story in their own way. It shows individualism in the way we all think and make impressions and perceptions. It’s really cool, God, I love psychology.
I also completed the photoblitz, which I had a lot of fun with! I chose to think out of the box for some of the prompts (mostly because I had to), and I think it really got my brain working. In the post, I also talked about how it allowed me to feel appreciative of the little things around me in my direct sight, the things that go unnoticed. I brushed dust off of things I hadn’t touched in a while and relived memories.
It was really warm, I think. I wouldn’t mind doing another photoblitz!
On Friday, I decided it was time to finish up all of my assignments. Work was canceled today, so I had all day and told myself to give myself breaks, but . . . I almost didn’t. I just worked and worked because I was so inspired to finish everything, and I had a good time!!
I started off with the Daily Create again, and here‘s my post on Mastadon.
I titled the word for the the In-Between Time as Dreamy-Psychedelic, and used this picture as reference.
I love the art behind psychedelics and I really think they portray this idea really well. This weird inbetween being awake and not being awake. Almost paralyzed, I think. It’s really weird!
I guess the idea is a subgenre of psychedelic art, so that’s why I called it dreamy psychedelic. I imagine this subgenre, this feeling, it visualized through bright colors, but maybe they’re a little faded, and there are shapes and swirls that have no start nor no end. Everything is connect, yet nothing is connected.
It’s a mess! That’s what it is
It’s really cool though.
I also worked on my Demistifying AI assignment. This one was frustrating for me because I do not like the idea of AI art, but I will admit that I had a bit of fun coming up with ideas. I talk about it more on the post with my different versions from different prompts, but I just really don’t feel comfortable with this idea. I feel as if it will constantly learn, and to learn, it takes from real art, from the Internet, from prompts people give it, and so forth.
I saw that someone ended up doing their assignment using two different AI image generators, and how both produced completely different images despite the same exact prompt, and that made me wonder: how differently do they work? And also, is it possible some AI models know better than others? Do they take from different sources or the same? I wonder about the actual models of them, but it’s interesting.
I also had fun looking at other people’s images they came up with and what their prompts were. It was interesting to see what everyone was thinking of. Some of them were a little all over the place, but that made them really cool!
But . . . needless to say, the assignment did not demistify AI and still made it feel really weird.
I worked on two different Design Assignments. The first one, I was prompted to make a business card, so I created one based on my couse character, Sol! Here is Sol’s business card:
There is more reflection on my thoughts and my process in the actual post, but I had a lot of fun with this! I wanted to keep the central idea of the sky and Sol being a painter, but after I finished, I realized that I wished I put in more of the storytelling aspect. Sol’s theme is that they paint the sky filled with stories, but I only really mentioned that they paint the sky.
I talked about drafting up other designs, and I think that’s what I would want to do sometime. I hope I could portray the storytelling aspect for Sol then, or show a story they could tell through the sky painting!
My final assignment was another Design Assignment in which I had to create a cartoon version of me! Here is what I made, as well as a little draft of Sol!
This was so fun, because it challenged me to go out of my box with art styles. I have a cuter art style generally, but my art is always messy and sketchy, whereas cartoony styles have to have crisp lines without a lot of detail, because in a comic, they have to be able to be drawn quickly and to tell the story without needing all of that detail.
As you can see, I couldn’t help but go into a little detail a bit . . . shhh…
I hope that if we do more design assignments that I’m able to do more drawing prompts and work on different styles to improve my art. I kind of gave up on art a couple of years ago, but it’s a little nice to bring it back!!
This was my overall week! Outside of my terrible anxiety, I had a good time with the prompts this week! I think I’m biased because I do like design though . . . but this was really fun! I’m excited to see what we do next week.
As for my goals . . . I really, really would like to actually do my work not just on Thursday night and Friday . . . SO! Goal (for the 4th week in a row) is to work on my work Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at least. If I can log on and work a little bit on Tuesday and Thursday, that’d be great, too! But the other days, I have a lot of free time that I could work.
I said next week will be the one . . . it was not, but NEXT ONE!! I meant it please I really do mean it.