March 4, 2010 - Dr. Suess Day

The local elementary school hosts an annual Dr. Seuss reading day for neighbors, which I participated in, whimsically attired. The first-graders (above) were very excited to see someone new wearing a funny outfit, and begged to be allowed to read. The older children were polite and appreciative. More fun pictures on my Flickr set: Seuss Day at school (opens a new page).

March 1, 2010 -
Political campaign logo
I'm working on a logo and other graphics for a candidate for Washington State legislature. The client wanted a lighthouse and tree to symbolize the district, which has most of Seattle's Puget Sound waterfront, a large island, and two lighthouses.

The logo has to be altered in a subtle way for different usages; for instance, a small round button (left) is going to be different than a yard sign, to fit the format. Similarly a web graphic, because of the low resolution of the screen, is somewhat simplified compared to images meant for print. For instance, I generally avoid italics in small screen text. A vertical text appears sharper.

The typical non-professional has trouble understanding the difference between a 5-inch web graphic and a 5-inch print graphic. At the same width, a quality print graphic is 5 or 10 times the file size, because it contains many more pixels and therefore detail. The difference is obvious if the printed images are compared: fuzzy edges vs. sharp ones.

March 1, 2010
Neighborhood photography

I came across this delightful swinging hobby horse in my own neighborhood, hanging from a tree.

It looks like it's made from a single old tire or inner tube, cleverly sliced.

February 10 , 2010 - Neighborhood typography
Another in my series of eccentric White Center signs made by people whose first language isn't English. Funny how the letters in NAILS are rigidly straight-edged, but the writer went free-form with the S. The rest of the text is oddly mixed cases, sizes and spacing. Feeling the sign needed a prettier touch, I suppose, the artist added hand-drawn palm trees, flower and butterfly. Obviously the sign on the right was composed by a different designer who used an actual font, margins, a border and illustration, with an equally eccentric result.

On a different note, EVERYTHING printed in Cambodian is beautiful, to my eye.

February 21, 2010  Collage memorial

I made another collage, this time to honor a friend whose life ended too soon. I didn't know her well, but well enough for an impression of a remarkably energetic, intense life: police officer, political and community activist, organizer.

I assembled the materials with the thought in mind that she enjoyed gardening, so I made that part of the symbolism joining the images. A unifying range of harmonious colors — greens, oranges, wines— helps bring together the elements, snapshots of a life.

January 10, 2010 -
TRIBAL BOOK RELEASE PARTY

My dance friends helped me celebrate my new Costume Goddess Tells All edition, Tribal Vibes for Bellydancers, with an evening of dance, hosted by Katrina of Skin Deep Studio in Seattle's Central District.

The book sold briskly as the dancers got a chance to peruse it for the first time. Some of those pictured on the cover or inside were buying extra copies for their moms.

Left, me with Seattle troupe Anwaar, three of whom are my Tribal Vibes cover girls.

Top row:
Lily, Aaminah. Marisol
Bottom row:
Chris, Dina Lydia (me), Joey-Michele

January 1, 2010 -
SELF-PUBLISHING PROJECT RELEASED

My new Costume Goddess Tells All edition Tribal Vibes for Bellydancers is in my hands, finally! I've already had many orders, including from Germany, Australia, New Zealand and UK.

Tribal Vibes is features a lot of eye candy. Left: Page 14 in the Photo Gallery, featuring Mardi Love and Tempest, with a vintage theme, including old-fashioned photo corners.

I had MANY contributors helping me create this, cause I am NOT Tribal -local Tribal/fusion performers, plus some international stars. A book release party at Skin Deep studio in Seattle my local contributors treating us to performances.
DETAILS HERE

XTREME SELF-PUBLISHING PROJECT
I am hard at work on Tribal Vibes for Bellydancers, a costume how-to book from my series The Costume Goddess Tells All.

The border design was originally from an old clip art book; I converted it to a sharp vector image in Adobe Illustrator. The photo is from a shoot I did with a local dance troupe.

I do the writing, editing, illustration, layout, and most of the photos. A commercial publishing house assigns these jobs to several professionals.

Self-publishing websites won't lay out a book with this many images—nor would I trust them to.

So, I correspond with dancers, designers & photographers; do photo shoots; adjust photos and retouch any flaws; make line drawings in Illustrator, and do page layout in InDesign.

If it was easy, everyone would be doing it. So I have very little competition.

I'd be glad to teach self-publishing basics to budding authors — when this is done!

July 2 - MORE SIGNS IN THE HOOD

This eccentric sign in the multinational neighborhood was no doubt lettered by a recent immigrant.
The sign DOES have a sense of neatness, style and proportion...yet looks like it’s speaking with an accent. The odd spacing, the contrasting color of the periods, the differing thicknesses of the letters within a word.
They sell “A Lot of sea food,” I see. “Freshfish” is one word. Why "U.S. catfish"? Is foreign catfish suspect to their American customers? What is "CA-HE" and "Galugong"?“Free cut and clean” sounds like a classified ad in an alternative rag.

June 20

MORE SIGNS IN THE HOOD
Watch batteries. Who knew they could be made so graphically arresting? Compare this one with the groovy-style "Watch Batteries' sign below.

Art first glance, the lettering is a wood-type style, all capitals with big chunky serifs. A stencil alphabet?

But folk-artsy eccentricities abound:
The rectangular dots added over the capital "I".
The assymetrically placed arc of the word JEWELRY, melded with the word REPAIR.
The odd spacing - some wide, some overlapping, allowing REPLACEMENT and JADE DIAMOND to fit on one line.
The fat round commas, seemingly from a different style of alphabet.

I picture a grandfatherly jewelry vendor patiently painting the sign circa 1956, not concerned with classic rules of lettering.

June 16 - THOUGHTS ABOUT COLLAGE
For me, collage is the free-association version of graphic design. Much like real life, the images don't follow a tightly designed pattern - it's refreshing and relaxing to let go of that. They are layered, arranged, and embellished intuitively with 2-D and 3-D objects. Yet the spacing and color combinations should end up pleasing, not discordant and disturbing to view (unless of course that is the point). My goal is usually pleasing.

NEIGHBORHOOD COLLAGE: This one portrays my active and friendly community group.
I started the night before it was needed, finished at 3AM in a quasi-dreamlike state.

BIG & LITTLE SISTER COLLAGES: My "Little Sister" and I made these together
with her friends, to commemorate two years together. Art & craft projects,
field trips, costumes, theater, sports, just goofing around are pictured.

May 23, 2009

I've been posting my photography on Flicker. There you can see hundreds of performance photos of dancers.

Left: Members of the Blue Lotus Troupe at Seattle Folklife Festival 2009.

Most of the photos have been retouched to eliminate background clutter. That showcases the beauty of the dancer without unwanted and distracting details like sound system hardware and wires, floor tape, etc.

If I am shooting up at close enough range to create an unflattering foreshortening effect, I adjust for this by altering the aspect ratio slightly, especially from the waist down.

If the color is too yellow or otherwise odd due to stage lighting, I adjust so it's more natural looking.

Dina Lydia's Folklife photos on Flickr

May 9, 2009 - SIGNS IN THE HOOD: Watch Batteries
This is in West Seattle's Alaska Junction. What an eccentric sign! I'm strangely fascinated.

1. Is "Watch Batteries" the name of the shop? Seems odd! Watch batteries, sinuous organic script, and climbing roses are things that usually would not go together, right?

Is the owner saying: "I do mechanical work for a living, but at heart I'm a sentimental lover of nature and beauty."

2. The second headline— "Fast Quality Repairs"— is a different, equally ornate Art Nouveau style embellished with a wing and swashes, but the letters are oddly spaced and placed.

3. The phone number doesn't match the other lettering in color or style.

4. The (misspelled) phrase "Whole Sale Prices," is squeezed right underneath the second phrase and overlaps the phone number, as if it was an afterthought. But if so, why not make it a simple type style? It's a snaky script, though not matching the headline style (look at the W).

Then there's the huge flower, and the pocket watch perched on top of the headline script, containing a giant diamond.

UPDATE: It's been pointed out that the white lettering was probably done by a different, less skilled hand at a later date. If you cover the white kettering, the sign looks much less awkward.

Is this a relic of the 60s? Was the sign painter stoned or tripping when he created this art? Or does it go back even further? Someday I'll ask the owner.

May 7, 2009

I'll view my quickie SHINE video from Biznik in a few weeks. What is the purpose of the video (besides contributing to a film by the Biznik owners)? The consensus was: by letting people know who you are as a person (rather than a direct sell) helps them connect with you. Then they'll be more likely to want to work with you.

April 29th, 2009
"SHINE"
Wednesday 5/6: the largest collaborative social media film project Seattle has ever seen will be happening. I am excited to participate in SHINE.

Biznik.com, my business networking org, is bringing together a dozen professional video-graphers, expert interviewers and hundreds of Seattle's entrepreneurs to tell the story of small business in America. Check it out here.

I plan to promote Digital Genie and Costume Goddess by wearing a suitable genie-themed (yet tasteful) ensemble.

The 5th-grade "Little Sister" I mentor at Highland Park Elementary school informed me that she wants to be a businesswoman, running an international company. ~ Dina Lydia

UPCOMING: Multi-cultural design images in my own neighborhood.