Tips on pursuing an Art Education

[Dogenzaka]

Pursuing an Art Education
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Well some of you know I just got back from NYC and studying Graphic Design. I learned a lot of things while I was there, what looks good on a resume, what doesn't, and most especially the details to creating a portfolio suitable for sending to art institutes.

So, I'm going to assume some of you have been doing tags, wallpapers, etc. here and found a fancy to them. You like arranging stuff in a unique way that represents an idea or photograph in a way it didn't before.

Perhaps some of you are thinking of studying Digital Media, Graphic Design, Animation, Web Design, what have you thanks to your immersion in this community.

Maybe some of you are even thinking of building a portfolio.

Well considering just how wrong of an idea I had of art school, the design field, portfolios, etc., I'll try to enlighten you on what I've learned.

First of all "Art" and "Design" are two completely different things.
The things you're doing here will help build your artsy side, but in the design world you won't be making much anything like that.
http://forums.khinsider.com/graphics...ml#post4232724

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the portfolio

So you stumble upon some art schools and realize they ask for a portfolio. What is it? What needs to be in it? WHOMG I DON'T HAVE 15-20 PIECES OF WORK I CAN SHOW TO A PROFESSIONAL INSTITUTE WHAT DO I DO?!?!1

Well first of all, calm down. If you're class of 2010, you have plenty of time anyway considering art schools tend to be some of the schools that accept applications the latest. Some deadlines are as late as January to February, but you have to check with your school.

First you need to know what Art Schools look for in a portfolio, what it is, what they don't look for, and what they hate.

Most Art Schools or art departments of universities/colleges ask for 10-20 pieces of your best work. An assemblage or collection of your work is what's called a "portfolio". You can either have it in slides (this is quickly becoming outdated and most art schools won't require this format), a neat 8.5 x 11" portfolio with your work organized, or a website with your work or a CD with all your work in .JPEG files.


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What they look for:

• - They want a broad range of your talents. Everything from sketches, paintings, to finished works, to sculpture, photography, whatever have you.

• - They are mostly interested in the Fine Arts in your portfolio. Meaning, they like the good old-fashioned stuff. While you are certainly welcome to include video, music, posters/etc. that you've done, what have you, they are MOSTLY looking for old-fashioned Fine Art mediums.

• - The majority of your portfolio should consist of drawings, sketches, paintings or completed works done from OBSERVATION. Taking a figure-drawing or life-drawing class while you can is one of the best steps you can take to impressing art schools and building a portfolio.

• - Self-portraits. Art schools love self-portraits, if you can represent yourself in a unique way that lets the portrait reveal something unique about you.

Take Norman Rockwell's (Parson's alumni) self-portrait, for example. It's not a sterile, straight-on frontal view of the head. It shows his quirky attention to detail of studying himself in the mirror. It reveals something about him.




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What they don't like:

• - ANIME SKETCHES. (if you absolutely want to include one, make sure it's finished, beautiful, unique, and displays your creativity and uniqueness in an uncompromising way).

• - Drawings done from imagination or crazy unrealism taking up a large part of your portfolio. These sorts of works certainly help show what kind of artist you are, and your creative side, but they should not take up the majority of your portfolio. It should be a small fraction of what you show an art school.

• - They don't necessarily dislike drawings done from a photo, but they should not count for a majority of your "observational" works. Observational works truly include work done from studying an object in 3D space.

Therefore, your portfolio should contain MOSTLY observational drawings, paintings, works, sculptures (lets say 2/3rds) and the rest (1/3rd or so) can be other things you've done to show your creative talents (t-shirts, posters, imagination concepts/drawings, paintings, collages, videos, photography, music).

Think of it as a pyramid.

The broad foundation, the majority, of your portfolio should be your observational works...any sketches, self-portraits, paintings, or photography of things observed in real life.
The smaller, sharp tip of the pyramid of your portfolio should consist of your creative works, imaginative drawings/paintings and things done in different, creative art mediums. This gives the "peak" to your portfolio, an icing on top of a solid foundation. It helps give a broad, yet detailed view of who you are as an artist.

Your work should try to be entirely original. If it includes work or photography from other artists, make sure it's under creative commons license

This is what Parson's has to say about their portfolio requirements:
" The kind of work you should submit in your portfolio depends on the program or first-year option you are applying to. For the Design and Technology first year option, drawing, video, photography, animation, or websites, blogs, videogame mods or other media are applicable.

For the Foundation first year option, Drawing is the most important aspect of a freshman applicant's portfolio. We encourage you to include work done from actual observation (life drawing). We discourage work copied from two-dimensional sources such as photographs. Applicants to the first-year Foundation Program are also discouraged from focusing their portfolios on a single field of study, such as fashion design, illustration or graphic design."

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You may be asking, "Why do they care so much about sketches of observational work? Don't they like my cool poster or sig or web layout?"
That's a good question.

You see, art schools are more interested in how well you apply yourself to the traditional mediums of art. They want to see how well you can translate an object in 3D space, on to paper or canvas in two dimensions. They want to see how well your eye can catch the volume, contour, value and color of the world around you and transpose it onto a flat surface.

If you have talent in the traditional, 2D mediums, you can easily transition into the digital mediums.
While they are interested in seeing how far you've pursued whatever you want to study (Graphic Design, Illustration, etc.) on your own, they are more interested in your paintings, photography, sculptures and sketches.

You're going to school so THEY can teach you the rest, and they will. But in order for them to see that they can nurture you in the media arts you are aspiring towards, they need to see if you've got the "eye" first.

Imaginary art, anime sketches, concepts, etc. are all subjective. A portfolio reviewer can't reach a meeting point with you in critique in proportion, technique, etc. if it's simply work done from your head. After all, who can judge that?

Observational work allows them to see how you interpret the real world around you.

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In conclusion:

• Your portfolio should consist of 10-20 pieces of your best work, focusing on your broad range of talents in a variety of mediums.
• Life-drawings or observational drawings straight from a real-world subject should be the focus of your portfolio, both finished and unfinished pieces of this area of interest. Finished works show your attention to composition, and unfinished show where your eye places the most beginning emphasis on.
• Drawings from imagination, conceptual drawings, or "cartoonish" sketches can be represented, but must be in the limited minority of your applicational portfolio.
• Oh, and if you are thinking of pursuing fashion, of course the majority of your clothes sketches will be from imagination and design, but include them anyway because you're applying to fashion.
• Take classes to try to develop your proficiency in observational drawing, if needed. Figure drawing classes work wonders. I only had 5 days of figure-drawing at my program, and yet I have almost 100 sheets of figure sketches I can edit to put into a portfolio.

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the programs

If you want to be a Graphic Designer, there are four essential programs you will learn throughout your college education, but it's extremely beneficial to become fluent in them before you leave high school.

These programs are Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe InDesign, and Adobe Dreamweaver. (For Illustrators, Adobe Flash is also a recommended tool)

Adobe Photoshop:
Is an advanced photo-retouch and image-editing program. You can do almost whatever you want to pictures or works in this program, and it is entirely pixel-based.

Adobe Illustrator:
This program is mostly used to design logos, signs, text/typography, symbols, shapes and vector-based art. Although it has many of the same functions as Photoshop, its locations are in entirely different spots so you basically have to learn everything all over again. The program, however, is imperative to the professional world. It works off vectors, which are based off geometry. In other words, everything you create in Illustrator is based off points and geometry. So no matter how large or small you make your work, it stays the same quality because the math to map out its position is still the same. These are "vectors". This is why it's completely different from Photoshop.

Adobe InDesign:
This program is mostly used to arrange everything made in Photoshop and Illustrator. The ultimate tool for designing print/magazine sources, and page layouts ready for print.

Adobe Dreamweaver:
Never used this program, but I will soon, and it's basically the tool used to design web layouts for the internet. The "InDesign" of the cyberworld.


Adobe Fireworks:
The beauty make-over program of web-design, I suppose. Allows you to add special functions and features to your websites, and really make them shine. This is often used in conjunction with Dreamweaver.

Learning these programs will help you create digital art in a broad variety of mediums.

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art schools

There are many, many many art schools. You may be confused on where to apply, what to look for, etc.

There are Fine Arts schools/institutions, colleges/universities with good art departments, liberal arts colleges, etc.

You need to figure out what kind of degree you want.
The BFA (Bachelor's in Fine Arts) consists of mostly about 75% (I think) studio courses, and 25% liberal arts electives/courses (things you can choose outside of your field of study...a second language...business.....history/writing....etc.)

A BFA has obviously a more concentrated field of study in what you want because it's 3/4ths studio courses. You won't come off as well-rounded as students who take more liberal arts courses. But you will show more experience in your field.

From my understanding, the BA (Bachelor in Arts) gives you more freedom in studio/liberal arts courses. You can choose to display yourself as more well-rounded and able-minded in another field like business, math or a second language, for example. You are therefore more prepared in the outside world in case you can't always get a job in the arts.

You may choose to go to an ART school with Fine Arts degrees (such as SVA, Otis, what have you), or go to a school with a great art department and choose from that or a BA with a bit more broader learning.

Regardless, in Graphic Design, most fresh graduates only make around $30,000 a year. After a few years you can climb up the ladder and make more, however.

I'm going to list some art schools I know of.

Parson's New School for Design - One of the world's top-design schools. Pretty hard to get in. It is mostly known for fashion, however, and its fashion department is one of the most difficult in the world. Outside of that, however, its other fields are often considered to be average, or not as good as some other schools (Graphic Design students from Parson's, for example, have nothing against SVA GD students). But Parson's has a great-reputation and a well-known name behind it, so regardless, if you go there, chances are you will have a great job when you graduate.

Pratt Institute for Art and Design - One of the country's top art and design schools. It's ranked upon the top 2 for Industrial Design and Interior Design. Its other departments are of high reputation as well, and it's the only art school in NYC with a real campus. Students usually go here for BFAs. Great reputation and school.

School of Visual Arts NYC - One of the world's great art/design schools. It only offers BFA degrees, however, it has arguably the best Graphic Design department and study you can get in the country. The GD students that come out of here are incredible and highly sought-after in jobs. Its other departments are great, too. Keep in mind though, this is a school for students serious on studying mostly just art in their field.

Cooper Union - Possibly the world/country's best school for combining sciences and the arts, mostly referring to Architecture. The school is one of the most selective in the country, and accepts only based on merit. If you're interested in studying Architecture, Engineering or the Fine Arts, and you have incredible grades to go along with that passion, consider applying to this school. Why? Free tuition. There are less than 700 students in the school, and since every person that graduates from there is so stinking rich, they give back to the school enough for the school to offer free tuition to anyone who is accepted. The Fine Arts and Engineering departments are great, but its Architecture department is tough as nails to complete and to be accepted in to.

Otis College of Art and Design - This school has a lot of sister influence from Parson's, but it's in California. It's a great school overall to immerse yourself into fashion, the media arts or other fields. Fashion department is really good. I'm really interested in its Digital Media BFA. The school has an impressive reputation and it wouldn't be a mistake to apply.

The College of New Jersey - Often called the "Public Princeton" university, it's the largest college in the nation offering majors in a wide variety of studies. Its art department is surprisingly wonderful, offering degrees in Graphic Design and Digital Arts. Nice campus, a very friendly student population and helpful teachers makes it a great place to study art, and yet immerse yourself in other fields of study such as a second language.

Don't worry if you're not interested in these, there are many other great art schools, and other local colleges and universities with great art departments!
Check schools you're interested in to see if they have majors you'd like, or a great art department.

To get good scholarships at art institutes, it's usually determined upon grades, so don't let those slip!



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I'll edit the post with more insight and info later. Hope this was helpful.
Please let me know any questions that you might have.

[Charlie]

I got into Otis <3
and thanks Dogen, this will really help out in the long run.

[Dogenzaka]

No problem <3
Will update with moar.

[Salty]

Those are some awesome tips, I'll look into some of those websites.
Thanks for posting =D

[Color Me Evil]

lol RISD?

[Dogenzaka]

Oh yeah, Rhode Island School of Design? Forgot about that one. Don't know much about it though.
Also FIT (Fashion Institute of Technology). California College of the Arts, too.

[Charlie]

I got into CCA too.
lmfao.

Just so you know, kids --
art schools are expensive as all hell.

[Dogenzaka]

Yeah. Depends on where you go, but Parson's for example is $17,000 a semester. Pratt and Otis are similar, I believe.

Then again, Harvard is $44,000+ a year so it's clearly not the worst lol.

[Reflection]

aghhh i need to get my grades up and back into other medias.
this is so helpful dogen <3
thanks :3

[Happy Holocaust]

My mother uses (or used to use) a program called Adobe Fireworks (which was once Macromedia Fireworks before it was bought) to splice up website layouts, then you save all those images and whatever, and drag it into Dreamweaver. In Fireworks you are able to add rollover functions and features similar. Dreamweaver simply codes the website for you, mostly, though there is more that you can do. So I'd throw up Fireworks there, too, imo.

[Dogenzaka]

Oh yes, I had seen Fireworks in use at the program I was at, but we didn't really play with it because we were more focused on InDesign/Illustrator/Photoshop. Good program, though I've never used it myself.