4th & Littler : Design Studio

created by:

Justin Barr, Zach Burch, Angela Comer, Jeanelle Echols, Sean Ferguson, Corey Fuller, Kyle Gandy, Rachel Morgan, Jared Nixon, Ed Russell, Justin Steir

A few of my favorite things...

Hello. I suppose I should introduce myself. I'm Kelly Lester, a senior in the UCO graphic design department and fairly new Ink Tanker. As you may already know, Ink Tank is a student-driven organization within the UCO Department of Design. Our purpose is to raise funds and awareness. Conditions are bleak. Classroom space is limited. Supplies are sparse. And yet, the UCO Department of Design graduates some of the best designers in the state.

To give you an idea of how great our need is, I'll tell you a little story. Yesterday in package design we had presentations. Our classroom has no area to present (it's actually a conference room/computer lab/studio that we use as a classroom out of necessity.) So, we presented in class, placing our packages on a table. The classroom was so packed (no pun intended...) that many students had to stand... some even in the hallway!

So, I ask you to help out and give to worthy cause. If you can't donate cash (which is what we need in order to get a building of our own,) then buy a t-shirt (coming soon...) or buy some delicious Ink Tank cookies (available soon..) or come to our fundraiser this fall...

With all that said, I'd like to leave on a happy note...with a few of my favorite things... things that inspire me:

Kelly Wearstler.
Kelly is an interior designer with an amazing graphic sense. She comes from a graphic design background...she even interned with Milton Glaser. She has an innate sense of color, texture, and pattern. She mixes unexpected elements together to create a unified, complex interior.. her interiors are dichotomies. Often she explores masculine v. feminine, light v. dark, western v. eastern, and traditional v. modern... sometimes in the same room. Check her out at www.kwid.com

Wes Anderson.
I love Mr. Anderson's work. Especially my first love, The Royal Tenenbaums. Anderson's use of color, time, and place are breathtaking. His films have a sense of history about them, like you've known his characters for years. The graphic design work in his films is amazing... the books covers, labels, and typography make me swoon!

Hoefler & Frere-Jones.
I have long lusted over H&FJ's typographic masterpieces... I stare in wonderment at GQ... I swoon over Martha Stewart Living. I love their typefaces. If you haven't seen Helvetica on DVD... get it! The special features have interviews with these two dudes. Their type translates non-typographic ideas perfectly. Time, place, style, attitude. Their typeface Gotham is Americana lettering at its best. Martha Stewart just lost her exclusivity contract on Archer, a font they created especially for Living, and now its available to the public... and I just might buy it. Check out their website...www.typography.com

Things I Have Learned

One of our recent class assignments was to create five compositions using type and image to communicate five lessons we have learned in our lives. This was inspired by Stephen Sagmeister's Things I Have Learned in My Life So Far (http://thingsihavelearnedinmylife.com/). This was a really enjoyable project, and a great excercise in self-reflection.

Here are a couple of examples of my work.

National Typographic

Check out the new video from Inktank. We had a lot of fun producing this 4 minute look at typography and how it effects us all, even though we don't always realize it. More videos to come in the future.

Dave Werner and Matt Gagnon

If you haven't heard of Dave Werner and are in the design community then you are missing out on a spectacular designer. Matt Gagnon is an interior designer/architect from New York who has some amazing stuff.

We had a presentation called Talk the Talk Walk the Walk today. Matt and Dave gave a presentation on what they've done, what they are doing and how they got where they are. Matt spoke about how he went about getting where he is more than how he does what he does.

Dave went second and presented on self promotion. It was incredible. He's an amazing presenter/speaker. If you haven't been to the website that put him on the map, go there.

okaydave.com - Dave's Portfolio

okaysamurai.com - Dave's Blog

mattstudio.com - Matt's Website

The poster for Talk the Talk:

-Rage Kage

Introduction

Hi I'm Rachel. I guess you could say I am the token female in the group, providing the female perspective if you will. Believe me it's an interesting position to be in, but I can't complain. This is actually one of the best group experiences I have had in my college career. I have the good fortune of working with four other amazing design students, who all bring a very interesting and unique view point to the table. We are all leaders and contributors, and the work that ensues is always an interesting, usually humorous journey.

This group actually spurred from a group project that took place last semester in Package Design class. It sort of spiraled into something larger than itself, and now here we are, in Inktank. Inktank is a group project, a forum, an exchange of ideas, a studio, and a class all rolled into one. The ultimate goal is to take the knowledge the school has given us, and give back by helping raise awareness and fundage (yes I know it's not a word) for the design department. In these first formative months we have created logos, fundraising packets, and a video about the world of type around us. Below is my design for the inktank logo. Check back for the type video, as well as the package design project that started it all.

-Rachel

Stefan Sagmeister

The University of Oklahoma managed to scrounge up enough money to have Stefan Sagmeister come speak yesterday. It was awesome. Going into the lecture I had automatically assumed that Stefan would be pretentious as many other big names in the design world. He was very engaging and entertaining and gave everyone there some insight into what his thinking process is and how he got from A to B on several of his recent projects.

I took a few things from the lecture to heart and plan to start doing them very soon. The first thing I'm going to do is start writing in a journal for 10 or 15 minutes once or twice a week. On several occasions in the past I wanted to remember when and what I was doing when I got an idea and couldn't. The second thing I'm going to start doing is having some guts. My design work is good but tends to be on the conservative side as far as execution is concerned. Im going to really try and stretch myself on my next project and see where it takes me.

If you ever have a chance to see Stefan speak I would highly recommend seeing him. Anyone in any field could certainly find something inspiring to take home with them.

-Rage Kage