Graphic Design Essay, Research Paper
Chaz Laughlin approached the stand and my first impression of him was of a small Italian business man with his gray suit and black shoes. A company known as Fearless Eye employs Chaz Laughlin. He has been working there for five years now. It s no surprise that the company has kept him for he is very talented with what he does. His job title is Director of Illustration, and with this title comes a lot of responsibility. He edits, produces and designs computer animated advertisements for companies around the KC area. He also meets and talks with the clients personally.
Before Chaz ended up where he is today it took him a while in a few schools to get him ready. He studied for a while in Wichita then came here to Kansas State and majored in graphic design. After K-state Chaz went to work for a company that dealt with computer games. He enjoyed working with the graphics and software on computers so he decided to go for some more schooling. He went to UMKC were he learned more about computers and computer animation. And now he is a successful computer graphic animator for Fearless Eye.
The first video that he showed during his lecture lasted a good five minutes. It showed most of his work that dealt with logos for companies and sport teams in the KC area. Included in this tape were animated ads for the Kansas City Chiefs, Kansas Royals, the Wizards, Fox News, Fearless Eye, and a few others, which I can t remember off the top of my head right now. The second tape that was to be shown had problems with it. For some reason in would not play so Chaz decided to show his resume tape. This tape included ads that were done by him a hundred percent, meaning he did the editing, lighting, textures, the whole thing. It was basically a review of the first tape with a few new ads thrown in there for car companies and sports teams that I didn t recognize. Now at the end of his resume tape there was a music video, this is probably what your other students were talking about when they said he showed three videos. This music video was included in the second tape, so therefor he showed two tapes. This music video was designed to send out a message to inner city kids about saying no to drugs. It was a rap video that had computer animation within it. The neat part about this rap video was that is showed parts Kansas City that I recognized such as the plaza and the Nelson art gallery.
The rest of the lecture Chaz gave tips on how to get a job after college. He shared some of his own experiences when being interviewed for a job. He somewhat sounded like a highschool counselor the way he talked about what to do in a job interview situation.
Before he ended the lecture completely he did a little question answer bit. The most interesting question I heard was: what computer software do you use? His answer for this was Adobe PhotoShop, Adobe illustrator and Miah. The first two I own versions of but the last one, Miah, was a new one to my ears. Chaz talked a little about Miah what it was capable of. Miah runs for $17,000!!!! And has been used to make such movies as Toy Story and Toy Story Two it also was used to help with the special effects in Terminator II.
One of the requirements for this paper is to list what influences the artist in their work. I m not sure what BS the other students gave for this but Chaz did not hit on this subject at all. The only thing I can think of that would possibly work for this was when Chaz was talking about his job working at the company that made computer games and how the graphics interested him. He said that seeing those big computers and the graphics and pictures that they produced made him want to go back to school to get a better knowledge on the subject and go into the graphic animation field.
My Opinion
I enjoyed this presentation made by Chaz Laughlin very much. I would love to be able to do what he does for a living right now. Art has always been fun for me and I love fooling around with my computer and making short films. I would love to combine the two later in my career and work for a company such as Fearless Eye.
The videos that were shown during the presentation were outstanding. I even noticed a few clips that I have seen on TV commercials. I m sure you know of the arrowhead movie that shows on the big screen at arrowhead stadium. Its of an asstroid and an arrowhead breaks off of it, goes through the earth, sores around and the crashes into some helmets of the opposing team on the arrowhead stadium. The clips were very impressive and the topic of special effects using computer programs was interesting and fun to listen to.
I enjoyed listening to Chaz Laughlin, and I hope that one day I can do something in his field of work.
I would also like you to perhaps take another look at my Memphis Box grade. I did not agree with the points that you gave me concerning the lid handles. I believe that the handles worked pretty well with the box. They were all that I had at the house to work with and I painted them blue to match the lining of the box, which was also blue in color. The points maybe were taken away because of the pins in the bottom. I was meaning to take those out. In my presentation that I made I told the class that I felt my box did not need legs to make it stand out. I felt that the blue siding made it stand up enough. I was fooling around with the pins, which I had found on the table at the beginning of class. I would also like to note that I did not receive any points for a presentation. True I did not say any vocab but I did make an effort to talk in front of the class about my box and how I did it. I can see how you could give someone a 0 in that field if they did not present but I think I should get some credit. I hope that you will take these things into consideration. Thanks for your time.