Graphic Design

The past week has been a busy one, and I think that we are doing a decent job of keeping our heads above water. Of course treading water, which is often how we might feel, is not exactly forward progress. Hopefully this week for me has seen a little bit of both. A few jobs that have kept me occupied this past week involved making some visual materials for the Iceland Project, as well as for the Gratton Lab as a whole. One of the great things about being a grad student and scientist is that you have to learn, if not become proficient in, a wide variety of skills. These include writing, speaking, mathematics, and even visual presentations. I have a lot of fun working with visuals, and though I claim to be no pro, I am definitely much more adept at creating them now than I was when I arrived. This is nothing to say of the actual quality, only that I am much better at manipulating the necessary software!

One of the banners from my website.

One of the things that I have been working on lately is website design. I have recently designed my own website, which for good or ill remains something of a work in progress. I have to say that I had a lot of fun learning something new, and today I am capable of at least conversing about websites and able to manipulate a framework such as Wordpress in a way that I was completely incapable of doing only two weeks ago. Following this "success" I took up the cause of the Gratton Lab website, which should be unveiled in about a week's time. Hopefully I make the lab happy with my efforts!

Who wants free pizza?!

The other fun things that I have been working on recently are posters. In the past week+ I have made promotional posters for three events; the Dreyer Bros. talk at Hope College last week, a social event for Wisconsin Ecology (of which I am a graduate committee co-chair), and an effort by our college to recruit students for international internships. You can see from my work that I prefer dark presentations; it must play to the black parts of my soul. Maybe after seeing these you want to get involved. Or maybe you think they are total crap. I certainly wouldn't fault you for thinking the latter!

Bless,

Jamin