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Show Transcript

Hello and welcome Kathryn Calderon. I’m really excited to have you here today. I have to tell you, we have so many people that we bring on the show and you were the most difficult to get. I was like, wait a minute. How does that happen? How does a 23 year old become impossible to get? So I’m super excited to have you here today. So the reason why I brought you on the show was because you are our designer, you do design for Foresight Strategies, you do our magazine, you do all of our collateral, all of our logos, everything you do for us. And I just think you’re fascinating. I love your ideas. I love the fact that you’re cutting edge. You’re very in tune to the future and the future of design. So you’re also a contributor on my magazine and you have shows you have so much going on. So I wanted to talk to you and I want you to share with the audience about design and the direction that design is going. So my first question to you is what made you get into design?

Well, when I was younger I went to school actually for criminal justice. Because I wanted to be an FBI agent, but it just, it didn’t work out for me. I didn’t feel like I was, it was, what’s the word I’m looking for it just didn’t feel like it did anything for me in my brain. Like it just didn’t feel like I was challenged in the way I want it to be. I mean obviously it was challenging because it’s, police work and all that, but it really bored me. So it was like a bore it was mundane it was just not something that I knew I would enjoy. And so I sat with my mom and I talked about. I was like, mom, I got to change my major. This isn’t going to work out like I’m going to fail out of this major because I wasn’t well in it because I didn’t get it. I’ve always done art. I’ve loved art since I was a kid, my uncles an artists. So it’s just kind of been in my blood and I decided that I wanted to do an art major, but I knew that just trying to be a painter, it’s difficult. I’m not saying you can’t do it because, you should still do it on the side, but I wanted, I knew that I could use my art and make some money as well, and that’s when I found out about graphic design.

Okay. So, like many artists, you have this artistic brain artists. And so what fascinates me is the fact that I can sit with you and give you a concept of what I’m doing and you will create a graphic for that. Now whether that be a logo, the magazine design, any kind of design. You can take that to the next level by my just talking to you, and explaining to you. It’s like I’m speaking to you about what I do and suddenly if you actually develop something out of it. So with that said how innovative is that kind of work?

You have to be pretty innovative. So, it starts off with like you said, a small little concept and we produce sketches. I don’t have to produce sketches the way I used to since now that I’ve done certain things. I mean like logos, I still have to sketch, I still need to visualize and let those ideas flush out. But like layout and stuff, I don’t have to sketch. Sometimes I do if I’m like, if I want to do something really innovative, something really different that I’m like, I have to sketch it out and see it. So you get kind of like a visual. But like for the, like the magazine layout, I don’t have to sketch out the full magazine before I go into the designing process of it because now I’ve done it. So I know kind of where I want things to flow, how a magazine should flow, the look of it, the style of it, things like that. So it’s a bit of a process, but I mean in this job you have to be innovative, you have to try and be unique, you have to try and do things differently. But also this is a field kind of like music where, it’s all been done before, so it’s not necessarily being innovative and unique and completely something that’s never done something totally out of the box, but it’s using what you see inspiration and twisting it and making it your own. Okay. That’s how I. When I first started drawing, a lot of my oldest sketchbooks are filled with drawings that I saw from Google and I would just sketch them and redraw them. Now I didn’t claim that, this idea came from my head because that’s what I had to start from my hat to see. I had to visualize, I had to learn how to, how sketching worked, how shading worked, and now I can do more drawings and sketches from my own brain. Because now I know like now I’m learning how to paint on Photoshop, so I have to see other drawings. I have to see how other people do so that I can understand it so that when the time comes, when I’m able to do it myself, then I’ll know how to do it.

So one of the things that you do with the Foresight Strategies insider is that we give you the content, we’ll give you the articles, you take those articles and you basically bring them to life with pictures, with font, with sketches. It’s absolutely insane. It’s insane the way that you actually bring them to life. So my question to you is, when you bring them to life, what does that mean? What does that look like? How is your brain actually processing? How’s that? How is your brain processing when you are reading these articles?

Well, what I usually do is I, because the design process itself takes so long, so I can’t necessarily sit there and read every single word because there’s other clients, other things that I have to get done. So I look at the articles and I’ll skim and I’ll find the words for me that stand out that I think conceptually can make that I can turn into an image. Now that doesn’t necessarily mean like an image I create, but like an image that I can find. So if the article is about trying to think of one that we’ve done before, like the bitcoin, there we go, like, I saw where it’s like bit coin. And so I would take those words and then I would go into the Adobe Stock, Pixabay and I would look at them and then I would look at the different images and find images. To me that represents the article the best. And then the rest is history. The rest is really just been laying it out in creative ways. Unique ways, stunning ways.

But by the same token, I’ve also seen that you take a picture and you make it completely different. I’ve seen you add things to that picture, change that pictures, colors, style. I mean honestly, like I, because I see the picture that you start with and they see what you put up and it’s almost like a whole different picture.

Well that’s just adding in your own flair to it to make it something different to make it something so that it’s not the exact same thing. Sometimes the images are beautiful in their own, so I leave them. But like one time the image, the background was black, but the image was almost like a neon blue. So I guess you could call it like a neon sign looking thing, but it was like an image of the person. So all I did with that one was put a filter over it to tone down the blues so that I had more of a orange gold hue. Over the whole entire image. And then I added lines too, like the curves of the neck the back of the neck and stuff, just to give it a bit more of a dynamic look to give it something different.

Okay. So Kathryn, you’ve been doing this for quite a few years now. So my question to you is, where do you see the future of design?

Where do I see the future of design? I definitely think artificial intelligence is gonna pick a big wave in graphic design. Companies like adobe are already kind of trying to make their own ai software, which I think will be great because I think that could help. I think that all graphic designers a lot artificial intelligence because it will be able to take away a lot of the moon Dane or nuance tasks. I I always think about like Ironman the movie and how Tony Stark was able to just like take his drawing or take his little idea and flick it into the air and the Ai, produced it, tons of different ways. And I think of that with my logos and how I could take my sketch and just plug it into something and it’ll become this huge, all my logos could be up in the. It would just take away a lot of, tedious tasks that we have to go through. Then there’s going to be, you’re going to see a lot more animation, a lot more movable design. You see a lot of billboards that are starting to have animations moving. You sit at a bus stop, they’re more interactive. The gifs, do you know the gifs, the movable you’ll see that a lot more. A lot of designers are starting to use things like that. And what it is, is it’s not necessarily that that’s going to be like the only thing, it’s just those are gonna be things that you can add into designs to make them more entertaining, more exciting to look at.

Okay. Okay. So you see yourself sketching and actually using ai as an enhancement to what you do. Okay any other predictions that you’ve seen that you think are going to be really I want to say a real effort or real additive, to a graphic design.

Well, I think we’re really heading into an age of, this is really been the contemporary age of art and also designed to me because I feel like there is no longer gonna be just a set style for this time period. Like in the history books, I don’t feel like there’s going to be a style for this time period in art and design because I feel like everyone’s just so unique. Everyone is so different. Everyone has their own style, their own flair. So this is just going to be the age of controlled chaos, you know? It’s just going to be like a lot of fun when you look like that’s why I love going on Pinterest and just looking at all the different designs, like all the movie posters, all book covers. It’s like everything’s so different yet the same. So that’s why I call it controlled chaos because I just feel like it’s going to be chaotic. Like everything’s just gonna be all over the place. Yet it’s going to work. Like there’s not just this type face we’re going to use or you know, like you see posters now with tons of different type faces all over, all of it on one poster. But it all works.

Okay. I love it. So controlled chaos is the way of the new design. I love that. So well, graphic artists because one of the things that makes people very nervous when ai is the fact that they believe that eventually they won’t have a job anymore. That there’s so many jobs that are going to be extinct. Do you believe that to be true for design?

No. No, not at all. Okay. A designer is able to tap into that emotion that the client has to their business or the we can convey that emotion. A robot or a software can’t convey emotion. Illustrator doesn’t know what I’m trying to portray. They just know the color I need when I type in the color, but they don’t that I’m like, okay, well when people look at this logo, I want them to feel safe. They’re not going to know that because it’s a software, it’s a robot. They don’t understand those human emotions. They just understand what I plug in and when I say I need this logo in all these colors, that’s all it understands. So Ai won’t replace designers because people still aren’t going to need that human touch to it.

Okay. I love that. I love that. That’s awesome. So the way of the future is there’s going to be designed, is always going to be here pretty much I think all of the arts, music, design, ideas, all of this will always be here, but ai will be support. There was support all of these, which I believe is going to take everything, all of all of the arts to the next level. Okay. So are there any other thoughts that you have for us here?

Treat your design as well and we will treat your brands well.

I love it. I love it. So here’s my takeaway, Kathryn. My takeaways are that design is here to stay. That the future, is going to be controlled chaos, InDesign, and possibly all of the arts, that there will probably be a merger of the different arts, like moving arts with graphics, even music all of this is going to be a combination of all of the arts coming together. So there’s going to be more collaborative effort. Yes. I love that. So treat your designers well and they will treat you well. I love it. So thank you so much for being here. I know you have a show. You have the Marketing Whisperer, and this is on podcast so people could go to marketingwhisperer.com.

It’s rachelcalderon.com. And then you’ll see like on a drop down menu, you’ll see something that says podcast, and when you click that, it’ll take you to the marketing whisper podcast.

Awesome. You’re a cohost of this show? And what do you talk about on the show?

Oh, lots of things. We have an interview coming up with an author. We talk about marketing tips. We talk about design, we’re going to be talking about fandoms, we talk about a lot of things, but all dealing with design and marketing.

Okay. Love it. Okay, so I look forward. I look forward to the future and I love working with you. I love, love, love, love working with you, love the fact that you have really taken my brand to the next level. You’re awesome. I love you and, I think this is great information for the audience too. Thank you so much. And guys, next week they’ll come back with another futurist or another innovator, another awesome person. So until then, I will see you guys next week. Okay, goodbye. Bye.

Our Guest

Kathryn is a seasoned graphic artist and visionary. She has worked in many projects including but not limited to global projects. Her proficiencies are in logo design, brand identity packaging, digital design, print design, app design, social media design, advertisement and mailers, brand identity collateral, newsletters, magazine layout and design. She earned her bachelors in Graphic and Web Design and graduated Magna Cum Laude from the Art Institute of Atlanta. She is currently a candidate in Media Design Master of Fine Arts from Full Sail University expected graduation date May 2019

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