Christian Owens evaluated his progress in learning Adobe Illustrator and After Effects software skills. He designed a logo for his company called "Cartoon Productions" using Illustrator. He struggled at first using the pen tool but improved at tracing portraits. For a client project, he created mood boards and logo designs for a sports academy. His final design of a running stick figure was chosen. In After Effects, he completed motion graphics tutorials and was assigned to create a storyboard and 30-second video using the client logos. He was pleased with his final project but would make changes to some speeds and animations if he did it again.

1. Christian Owens
Evaluation
We started the Unit by learning computer software skills such as: Adobe Illustrator
and After Effects. With Adobe Illustrator we had to design our own logo for what we
would be called name. I called myself Cartoon Productions because it means
creativity and a variety of things can be designed to fit this name, so I am not bound
to one set logo. Then we had to use the pen tool feature on Illustrator to trace over
specific images and try to make them look like the image from far away. At first I
struggled using the pen tool because it was new to me as you can see by the eye in
stages because the lines are not fluent when doing a rounded shape. When I moved
onto the four portraits exercise. I believe that I have improved, as I slowed down
when doing parts of the portrait that needed good detail.
After we had finished the adobe exercises, our client the Salford Sports Academy
came in and told us what they want for their new logo and gave specific information
to who the logo was for. I compiled a presentation with the client brief giving me a
good understanding of how the logo was to look. Inside this presentation I also put
together mood boards showing that I had a good grasp on what the clients were
talking about. I would have added more to the mood boards but I b elieve that there
is a sufficient amount of information to get the grades I want.
For Task 5 I had to experiment with designing different logos that fit the client
briefing. At first I design things from shields to simple shapes such as pentagons
with the name inside of them. Some of the designs I did, did not fit the client
briefing because they didn’t have the name of the college and because the logo had
to fit across all different sports such as boxing, football and rugby. At first I was
frustrated because all the logos I had made didn’t fit the brief. Then I made a small
stick man and shaped it so it looked like it was running and worked from there. I
was impressed with my final design as it fit the brief quite nicely and was not a very
complicated design compared with previous logos that I had made. I liked the final
design and so did the clients as my design was chosen by them and adapted to the
way they wanted. I was happy with the adaptations they had made to the design and
was pleased they had picked mine. I would not change the way I experimented,
because that is what led to the final design.
After everyone was at the same point and the clients had chosen their design. We
moved onto learning After Effects, were we had to follow a series of steps (Tutorial)
to create a motion graphics called “Devils Rides Out”. I think I followed the tutorial
quite well as I have used after effects before so I had small bit of experience. My
motion graphics came out quite well with some faults because I misheard or I did
not know what was happening on the tutorial. After the Devils Rides Out I was
assigned with making an E4 sting without a tutorial using the knowledge I had got
from the other motion graphics.
After all the knowledge I gained from those exercises, we were assigned by our
tutor to create a story bored for the Salford college logo and my logo that the clients
had adapted. We were allowed to create anything we wanted with the logos but it
had to be 30 seconds long and use all of the designs that were given to us. I created

2. Christian Owens
my storyboards but got them the wrong way around and had to swap tem around. I
am happy with storyboards and feel that I can execute them onto after effects with a
little help from my tutor. I did not have to change my idea when transferring from
storyboard to after effects which I was pleased with because it meant that I was
comfortable with what I was producing.
To finish I produced my after effects project of my storyboards, I was happy with
the result I got. If I got to do this again I would change the speed of some parts
because I felt that they were taking too long and the person watching would get
bored easily. Also i would make more time to make the running animation on the
stick man more fluent and like he is actually running forward. I could do this by
using flash ad animated the parts of the body better. I used 50% opacity for the
video version of the logo as some parts are small and blend into the video at times.
To conclude I believe I have made sufficient step towards the computer software
side of the unit. With my logo being chosen I would not change anything I had done,
because that got me to the final stage process. With the after effects process I would
have taken a little longer to make sure that each part fluently fit together and the
speed of the video was faster so that people do not get bored easily.