The sophomore students worked hard shooting photos with a green screen background and adding their subjects into different scenarios. Below are a few of the best examples.
New green screen work
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A visit to the past
Shane Balkowitsch has been a great friend of the Graphic Design and Communications department at Bismarck State College. Each year he has generously welcomed students into his wet plate photo studio to see the process he uses to create amazing images. Thank you for your generosity Shane!
Unreal Reality
First year students rose to the challenge of rendering an item using nothing but the tools offered by Adobe Illustrator to achieve realism. Time-consuming and rewarding work that pushes the boundaries of what can be done in software that is usually producing flat designs. It’s always amazing to see the results.
Photoshop vector challenge
Photoshop handles vectors a tiny bit different than Illustrator. After I’m positive that Sean has done the heavy lifting of teaching the freshmen the pen too, we spend one day looking at vectors in Photoshop culminating in a 25 minute vector car drawing challenge with a $1 prize. Jaiden Ziegler from the M,W,F class and Sophia Jilek from the T,TH,F class both walked away a dollar richer.
Photoshop creatures
I make an attempt to come up with a replacement assignment for the Photoshop creature almost every year. I’ve modified the assignment a couple times, but eventually have come back to almost the spot where it started. This assignment does a good job of showcasing all of the skills the freshmen students have learned up until this point and provides some creative scenarios to learn a few new skills.
Thirst quencher
The class of 2020 created some spectacular beverage photos. I’m looking forward to seeing the food photos coming in a couple weeks, they will likely be even better.
GDC Club Enjoys Fargo Trip
Club members enjoyed a recent trip to Fargo where they experienced an afternoon of touring and accolades. Before the afternoon kicked off, the group enjoyed fantastic wood-fired pizza at Blackbird in Downtown Fargo. They also dropped in on GDC Alum Rob Burke’s business Yarn before heading to Spotlight Media.
That evening the club members attended the gala AAF-ND Awards Show at the Avalon where Kylie Susag walked away with a Gold Addy for her Batter Life Campaign. The GDC Class of 2019 took home a Silver Addy for their totally awesome, 80s-inspired PROOF Magazine. Ty Betts also managed to pull down $75 in prize money for winning two rounds of heads-or-tails.
Pictured (from left to right): Alyssa Simpron, Nathan Livedalen, Ty Betts (Vice President), Brady Braun, Carlee Gifford, Haylee Jones (President), Kylie Susag (Secretary), Marcus Taken Alive, and Jacob Schwarz (Treasurer).
What is that light in the sky?
We’ve all seen them, but nobody admits it … little green people in spaceships. Okay, maybe we haven’t – but it’s easy to imagine images of UFOs visiting good old mother earth. Here are a few that students created.
50s Smart Phone
Imagine if the smart phone was a technology developed in the 1950s. How would the advertising of that era showcase this modern marvel? Students in the Typography class were challenged with this concept. Given a stock image they were to design an ad featuring a smart phone being careful to use typefaces and design trends common in the 1950s. It was a great way to stress how important design details are to the historical context of a piece.
Monster Masquerade
Halloween was the perfect time for the first-year students in Sean Thorenson’s Digital Illustration class to create a series of seasonally appropriate ‘masks’. Using symmetry and only two spot colors, this assignment demonstrated the challenge of designing with limited color as well as the efficiency of the reflect tool. We have a lot of scary-good talent in this year’s group! Here are just a few of the illustrations from the classes.
