Self Examination

5 | positive
1|honest
2|adaptable
3|cooperative
4|hard working
5|skill

5|negative
1|apathetic
2|uncertain
3|shy
4|complacent
5|procrastinate

Overall the words that I chose are quite accurate as a team member. A member always have good and bad traits and that's why as team members everyone complements each other to make the team more stable. I think that's true, but for me I personally don't like being the leader, since I feel like it's such a big responsibility it makes my heart sink. I prefer to take orders and hear others, I know myself that I'm not open minded, but I'm only open to people I trust the most. I can work with other people as long I get to know them well enough.

i-n-f-l-u-e-n-c-e

My biggest influence is probably my dad. A great man with talents, even at his 50's going 60's he's always doing trial and error on many things, never ending knowledge. I learn from him most of the times for advices.

Moi Manifesto

number 1: man's best friend
If you have a pet, a dog, cat, hamster, or even a pet rock. Take them for a walk to get a fresh of breathe air.

number 2: clean, clean, clean
Always clean once a week.

number 3: eat
Don't mind the calories, you only got one life.

number 4: control the anger
Don't get angry over something stupid, smile and poke fun about it, because the other person isn't worth being angry over.

number 5: doodle
If you're bored, draw.

number 6: cook
Cook some food for yourself, instead of taking out. I don't trust other restaurants that often other than my own, because of people's stories of maggots and cockroaches, it scar me for life. Other than that... Come and visit my family restaurant at Tartan Fish and Chips in Oakville, 579 Kerr St. (we're also looking for full-time employees, if interested, bring a resume|bilingual Mandarin/Cantonese and English)

number 7: music
Listen to a whole variety of songs, from all over the world.

number 8: old times
Look back at your younger years and learn from it.

number 9: make mistakes
Learn from your mistakes, but don't make a dozen of mistakes.

number 10: DO NOT LITTER
If you find litter on the floor, why not pick it up and throw it to a nearby garbage. [You're doing something good for mother nature]

20 Words

1. Communication
2. Function
3. Form
4. Fun
5. Consume
6. Motivational
7. Emotional
8. Technical
9. Idea
10. Creativity
11. Personal
12. Appearance
13. People
14. Media
15. Questions
16. Thinking
17. Representation
18. Meaning
19. Understanding
20. Solution

#3 Design is

My final statement: Design is the appearance of functionality and creativity together.

Update: Design is

Design is function and appearance.

My articulated "design is" statement

"Design is creative and functional for a purpose through trial and error."

What I do in a Week

Doing this week "taking a look on how much you spend looking at technology" made me think. The more I think about it, the more I notice I relied more on technology, basically for everything. I'm starting to think the technology itself became a part of my life and that's not good for my health. I mostly use the computer more than anything else. So, let's take a look at the calculation of my week.
Reading a book/newspaper/magazine (approximately 3h 15min a week reading online newspaper)
I personally don't read books that much, the book that I probably have touched was Steven Colbert I'am America and so Can You (It's a good book, I would recommend it) and I read it for 50 minutes during my work break and I'm still not even finish reading it, because of a tight schedule with trying to get to work everyday.
I read newspapers online everyday to check out the weather and what's going around the world, especially on the Toronto Star, I don't believe everything they say, because it sounds biased and sometimes the story itself sounds really fishy, as if they're hiding parts of the story. Can't blame them, the government do 'own' almost everything. When I'm work I check out the Sun newspaper, it's the only newspaper that's lingering around, so might as well take a peak at it, not the best newspaper I might say.
Magazines I take a look at it once a week, just a quick read through, People's magazine has way too much advertisement I practically skim through like 50 pages of it until I get to the controversy stories or something that catches my high and they're like 2-3 pages front and back with size 12 type.
Radio (approximately 4 -5 hours varies days, 11 hours on Saturday)
When I'm at work 3 - 4 times a day, the radio is ALWAYS on, and when I say that, it's the same music playing over again (I hate 98.1) I've been listening to that station forever now, how I wish to change it, but I guess seniors like soft old music instead of punk rock, can't blame them. I'm only there for 4 - 5 hours until Saturday I'm there 10 am to 9 pm, basically I'm stuck listening to stuff I don't even remember.
Music (approximately 14 hours a week)
Music is my life. I listen to it when ever I get the change, when I'm driving I play my mp3 cd. While I'm home I play my itunes. And I don't drive that often only when I need to grab something and that takes half an hour or more depending where, back and forth. For school I play music when I go there, ranging from 15 mins to 1 h 15 min depending on traffic.
Movie/Television (approximately 1h 40min a week)
I don't watch movies anymore like I use too. I don't watch anything anymore. Only when the television is on, I take a peak for like 5 - 10 minutes and then I leave and the television is hardly on, only for dinner or so, most of the time.
E-mail (approximately 1h 05min a week)
I get 6 e-mails 2 - 3 times a day, there are some I don't even bother to open, because I'm just being lazy and I know it won't be that important. Hopefully. I usually take a quick peak at it and then close it.
Internet (approximately 35 hours or more a week)
Always surfing the net for information or taking a look at new products. I go online whenever I get the time to do it and I stay online until I got bed and that would be 5 hours or more.
I try to stay away from facebook, there are probably other things I want to do instead of going online there. I just plain don't go there anymore.
Video Games (approximately 2 hours, if I have time more than 2 hours a week)
Ah, yes. Video games. I play it when ever I get the chance and since it's reading week, well, I still haven't gotten the chance to play it, yet. But, I will. If I do, I probably play it for 1 - 2 hours for one day and I move on. It's a hassle to plug my PS2 onto the television and unplug it back and place it back into my drawer just in case if my dogs trips over them and drags my PS2 down, and this happen before. I don't play computer games anymore, only once in a while I go online to play multiplayer games on the net. And that would take me not more than half an hour until I get bored.
Cell Phone
I don't like using cell phone because my ears are already damaged as it is. I don't text message unless I need to. But, this week nothing

First Things First

My mind usually goes blank when I first read the paper of a newly assigned project. Reading it make me think of questions about how it should be, what way it should look. Letting a couple of days to wonder about the project gives me time to research about the main topic of the CD, which is Jazz music. So, taking a peak at the previous Jazz CD that was made by other students in the past gave me some ideas of how similar they all looked and how they are similar. Now it's time to do some deep research on Jazz on good 'ol Google. Looking up on Jazz's history of how it became and what mood it sets off when people hears it. After getting to know the music Jazz more, it's time for some thumbnails roughs to plan out what design I want it to look it. After many reconsiderations I would transfer the roughs to digitals. From there I would get some critque to see if I'm proceeding in the right direction.

Who Am I?

After the video of Ken Robinson speech about School Kills Creativity, it made me think about my past. Looking back at my elementary school I vaguely remember there was a music class, not sure if there was an art class. Back then teachers were strict about knowledge instead of letting our creativity out. I do agree with Robinson about schools taking away creativity, because creativity is also important in people's life, that's what makes us all different and unique. We all learn and inspire from each other creating something new each day. Without creativity it would become dull and repetitive like the school system. Also, with the new technology people would start using pills to balance a child's hyperactivity.
Who am I, in the context of creativity and design? The question is quite hard to answer, even I don't know where to start. Since, creativity is based on oneself, in other words if I were to describe my creativity I suppose it's from influences especially from my life experiences. Pop art is probably my first influential style, because of the solid crisp edges which creates a simplicity of art. In a way, Pop Art is associated with advertising, because it uses everyday objects as a subject.
If there were adjectives to describe me for design I would consider myself as, clean, symmetrical, easy, simple, and technical. These are some of the things I consider myself as, for now. It might change depending on other influences, but for now I' am who I' am.

What is design?

Design is important in today’s world, it’s what created basically everything from houses to pipelines. Without design there won’t be litter around, such as packaging, people seriously need to learn to throw garbage the right way, but also no fashion, television, money or anything. Everyone have his or her own opinion about design, there are no rights or wrongs, because it’s based on the person’s perception of design. I really think design is everything from nature to man made regardless, but I still don’t get why art isn’t design, even though there is a distinction between both of them, art and design both crosses the same principles one way or the other, so does that mean design is similar to art, but it can’t be consider art? Everything in life contradicts everything, I wonder why.

Design is consist of a working process; first it needs a client and target marketers to create. Next is to brainstorm and roughs, after this it’s alter the roughs and keep making it better until it’s down to perfection. So, a designer needs to be commissioned to create a design? But, artists also get commissioned too.

I still consider design as art because that’s how I see it back then and even now.