Matthew Lemmond

On Critique

Like it or not, critique is where I show and tell you how to get the grade you want and, more importantly, an attractive, award-worthy portfolio piece. Additionally, it’s where you can pushback with counter ideas, clarify your ideas, “YesAnd” my ideas, improve my ideas, and ask questions. Like it or not, if I’m writing the problems and grading your solutions, wouldn’t it follow that you want to know and clearly respond to my instruction? Also, have you ever struggled with the software for a couple of hours only to resolve nothing? Critique is where you can find solutions from your peers and me. However, critiques are pointless if there’s no significant application of my instruction, and your pushback is based on doing less between the critique and the due date.

On Rough Draft Videos:

Increasingly, visual communication designers are expected to make more and more complex imagery. And while computers can help us more quickly make worthy things, they can’t tell us which things are worthy of making. That work happens in the designer’s brains and finds manifestation in some form of “rough.”

Whether designing a video, game, tattoo, app, dog, poster, toilet, etc., “sketching” a “rough” idea is crucial in design, especially if someone pays you money to make the thing!

I hope each of you sees the value of quickly making a rough draft because it’s an excellent way to combat “fixation.” I hope you remember this skill and apply it to your future workplaces.

Logo Lounge (S)

https://www.logolounge.com/search/?q&credits=Matthew%20Dale%20Lemmond

Logo Lounge Bio

If this bio were a timeless logo, let’s call it a bio-logo, it would read something like this:

“I am Matthew Dale Lemmond, and I design logos.”

However, on the back of a logo rides many hopes, dreams, and fears of an organization. Consequently, an alternative draft of this bio-logo might read:

“I am Matthew Dale Lemmond, and I studied design at OSU and NCSU. I teach design at the University of Tulsa. Before that, I taught at KSU, blah, and blah. I have logo design experience dating back to 2007, including organizations like OSU, the University of Notre Dame, blah, blah, and blah. Logo design books like blah, blah, Logo Design Love, Designing Brand Identity, and Logo Lounge (1, 2, 3, et al.) are very influential in my work. I sure hope you contact me for your next project because I’d love to create the thing (logo) all your customers most emotionally react to for the next 40+ years of your organization. I blah, blah, and blah.” You get the point.

Good logo design lives in this problematic, tiny, messy, magical place between not saying enough and the temptation to say too much.

Colours In Culture

https://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/colours-in-cultures/

Colourmusic

Open-Ended Question: How can non-objective motion graphics communicate the meaning of instrumental music? How can non-objective motion graphics perfectly match individual sounds in instrumental music?

Special Guest: Lead singer of the Oklahoma band Colourmusic, Ryan Hendrix, spoke to students about the meaning of his instrumental music.

Practical Effects: Students were encouraged to film and include “Practical Effects” like smoke, sand, water, etc.

Non-Majors: Some student solutions in this playlist include non-design, non-art, students from majors like chemistry, geoscience, biomedical, biology, and engineering.

See the 12 best student solutions below.

UX/UI Interaction Design Principles

Open-Ended Question: How can interactive design (UX/UI) components communicate and practice design principles?

Non-Majors: All of these solutions are from non-design, non-art, students from majors like chemistry, geoscience, biomedical, biology, and engineering.

Beneficiary: The beneficiaries are learners new to UX/UI design principles in interaction design.

Click “Read more…” to interact with three of the best student examples.

Crowdsourcing DataViz App (Fall21)

Open-Ended Question: How can a crowdsourcing app resolve a user’s complaint by empowering them to input a small amount of data and see the impact of their contribution (DataViz) on a larger community?

Students worked in a group and individually through:Benchmarking, Personas, Pain Points, User Journey Maps, Scenarios, Task Flow Analysis, Wireframes, User Testing, Naming, Branding, Lo-Fi Prototypes, Hi-Fi Prototypes, and an Explainer Video.

See the two best student solutions below.

Risking the Physical and Digital Experience

Open-Ended Question: How can the digital experience of playing Risk feel more physical? Within the assigned context, how can the UX/UI be improved when playing Risk digitally?

Hand Lettering

Open-Ended Question: How can the design of a phrase communicate its meaning through hand lettering, typography, color, and subtle motion? 

It was my pleasure to lead the students below through this hand lettering project at KSU back in Spring 2021. Special thanks to guest speakers Justen Renyer and Pouya Jahanshahi (OSU faculty). Students credit: Abby Swafford, Cameron Wasinger, Emily Graham, Maddie Brown, Mayra Sigala, Meg Brekke, Molly Galitzer, and Sarah Onken.