Month: April 2021

This was my final full 4 day week at Danica, things have slowed down now. But just like real work that happens, so I have been mainly asking if others need an extra hand or some help on a project. On Monday I handed in a packaging update, and I passed it onto another person to work on. I finished some final packaging update edits I needed to do and worked on a typographic Swedish sponge cloth design for Ecologie under Danica. 

I also helped someone out on a project which was a website banner ad for Mothers day. What is really nice is whenever the team needs feedback or help we can post our work on basecamp under different project sections and people are pretty fast at responding. I would say so far using basecamp and slack for communication has been pretty good and that is also where tasks are assigned and project briefs are assigned too. I guess what I realized through this process is that project briefs aren’t formatted exactly like school and sometimes the information will be in different places or you will have to ask for more clarity but I suppose that is the transition from school to work. 

I also worked on a quick packaging template design for someone, and on Wednesday handed in my final surface design project which was the typographic design for Swedish sponge cloth. For all my work I have been using my sketchbook, pencils, watercolor, illustrator, procreate, wacom tablet, and photoshop. Out of all the programs I probably used illustrator and InDesign the most so this was definitely a learning curve with illustrator and I realized how much I need to learn still regarding shortcuts and how to work quickly and efficiently. I actually realized with my final surface design project I didn’t hand it in properly, which I found out Wednesday night so I handed it in on Thursday morning. I hadn’t placed the actual artwork into the template but used a jpeg instead. Luckily we had wiggle room with time so it wasn’t an issue but never be afraid to ask more questions and clarity because sometimes miscommunication can happen even when you think you know what your doing it never hurts to double-check your work. 

Lastly, I helped a few other co-workers out on little assignments, such as Pinterest image saving and uploading to server and Pinterest hunting for image inspiration and word ideas for the taro card project. And at the end of my Thursday I was working on a few edits for the internal Danica cards before I put them on the server. The cherry on top for this week was a zoom event we had for people in the Danica office, I attended the Woman in Beer History event which was very interesting learning about how influential and prominent women were in the beer world. It was really nice to just hang out with my co-workers and have an awesome host for the event. Even through the pandemic, you can still manage to have fun, even on zoom.

Stay tuned for my last two days at Danica 🙂

This is what a packaging template can look like and where all the information will be replaced.

This was the Mothers Day banner ad for website I was working on.

This was the taro card inspiration I was adding to.

This is a sample of the internal cards I am editing.

This week was very nice and smooth. Since my check-in meeting, I started looking at some Skill-Share videos and realized how helpful this resource is and would definitely recommend using it. I plan on watching a lot more videos to learn and build some more skills in my tool kit. This week I got feedback from the key account buyers on a specific doormat design I was working on. They must have liked it but wanted some modifications made. The project actually got passed along to another designer to finish it off and do the final touches. But I am excited to see the final artwork and if it gets printed on a doormat in the future.

I continued working on packaging updates for various templates, organizing information, and styling it with certain fonts and icons. I am working on my last surface design project for a Danica Ecologie Swedish Sponge Cloth. This design is very typographic and playful so I can have a lot of fun with it. Mid-week I was working on some trend research and Pinterest pinning for fall 2022 and was a part of some meetings to discuss trends that are happening and what the future looks like design, colours, patterns, and more. I finished off my week by finishing off packaging templates and did a Mothers day banner ad for Danica’s online website.

Everyone at work is very busy and looking to hire more people to expand the Danica team in many areas. I am working on chipping away and finishing projects since the practicum is flying by and I let my team members know if they need extra hands or help I am available. I was hoping to learn some more about pattern design but if time gets away I will probably watch videos on Skill-Share about it. This was actually my last week in person at Danica as we decided it would be best I work from home to leave the workspace more open for others and because of COVID risk increasing so, I will be working at home for the remainder of the time which is okay but I will definitely have to come back and visit the office again when things are more normal and say hi to everyone.

Stay tuned for my last full week at Danica 🙂

My computer workspace area.

Waiting room area at front desk area of Danica.

Me and the Danica sign 🙂

My mom bought me a Danica tea towel which I am in love with. This is a Water colour design by Caitlin who is a surface designer at Danica.

Me very happy about my new tea towel. Love that this packaging is all paper and no plastic. It sort of looked like a picture frame.

This was an interesting week. Monday was a rough day not going to lie, I am like an open book so I am going, to be honest, and not sugar coat it. Monday was my check-in day with myself, the practicum host, and the practicum instructor from school. I am not sure what I expected going into this meeting but definitely wasn’t in the right headspace because there were a lot of tears on my end haha. I can laugh about it now but at that moment I honestly just felt embarrassed. Reason for crying, hearing critical feedback from people you look up to or care about is hard, and I tend to beat myself up over these kinds of things because I care too much and it hits the heart more than the professional surface layer.

My practicum host had so many positive things to say but when it did get more critical I focused more on that. I have insecurities about my skill level in executing projects fast and efficiently and working in various programs. So it is one thing knowing this about myself but hearing it from others is another thing. I know it was a good thing to hear and remind myself of where I am at and what I can grow and improve upon. And I hope to do a lot of growing after my practicum ends. What I need to learn to focus on is the little successes and goals rather than the whole picture because sometimes it can seem overwhelming and too much. And I was told some wisdom that we are still students in this process and it’s okay to be learning, making mistakes, and asking lots of questions.

This practicum experience has flown by and I think it’s because I am have been busy and having fun. The team at Danica has been so kind and supportive and I wouldn’t change a thing about my practicum placement.

My path after practicum or school ends may sound like an unconventional one compared to my fellow classmates but I intend to do volunteer work, work in a summer arts camp, start my own dog walking company (do the branding of course myself) Learn and grow more as an illustrator and build up more clientele and go back to school to become a high school art teacher. Now that I believe is my destiny but I wouldn’t know that unless I had all these different experiences up to this point.

Quick rewind back to my week though, sorry I got a bit sidetracked in the future after Monday my week continued with working on packaging updates handing in a key accounts surface design project for a doormat. And lastly, I ended the week by making some procreate sketches for my next assignment. For the remainder of my time at Danica, I am going to ask for tips and tricks on learning the adobe suite from the team and watch skillshare videos each weekend.

Until next week 🙂

New dog visiting the office!

Sketches for project on procreate at home.

Coloured rough sketches for sponge cloth design.