Graphic Design Bootcamp for High School Students

Topics Covered in Graphic Design Bootcamp for High School Students

Understanding Graphic Design

• Why design is important
• Understanding the International Typographic Style

The use of sketching for graphic design

• Low fidelity sketching
• Developing innovative concepts
• Creating flexibility in early stages of design

The use of space

• Understanding and using negative space
• Creating designs that utilize white and non-white space

Balance as a design element

• Understanding types of balance
• Experimenting with symmetrical and asymmetrical designs
• Experimenting with weight in order to create more dynamic designs

Using type as a design element: Typography

• Typeface scenarios.
• Understanding which typefaces are best to use in different situations
• Basic typography rules that help improve viewer’s experience
• Building an effective and successful information hierarchy with a type ramp

 Design proportions

• Building a beautifully proportioned layout for your design
• How positioning can affect aesthetics of your design
• Incorporating the golden mean into your designs

Color as a design element

• Understanding HSL (Hue, Saturation and Luminosity)
• Designing with color

Using Photoshop in Graphic Design

• Photoshop workspace, tools, and panels
• Editing specific areas using selections in Photoshop
• Creating selections to limit editing area
• Color Correcting Images with Photoshop
• Understanding Photoshop Color Modes
• Introduction to Content-Aware Tools in Photoshop
• Content–Aware retouching in Photoshop
• Using Photoshop layers
• Advanced use of Photoshop layers
• Combining images
• Retouching images
• Using Photoshop blending modes
• Advanced editing techniques

Using Illustrator in Graphic Design

• When to use Illustrator vs. Photoshop
• Understanding the Illustrator Workspace
• Illustrator Essential Skills
• Drawing using Illustrator's Tools
• Creating, applying and saving color
• Adding text to designs and applying formatting
• Using Layers to organize Illustrator artwork
• Exporting Illustrator artwork for use in digital, print, and video projects

Using InDesign for Graphic Design

• Understanding InDesign Tools
• Creating documents using InDesign
• Navigating within InDesign documents
• Adding, editing, and formatting Text using InDesign
• Adding graphics to a layout using InDesign
• Applying color to layouts using InDesign
• Transforming Objects in InDesign
• Adding, Deleting & Arranging Pages in InDesign
• Using Master Pages in InDesign
• Printing and Exporting from InDesign to share your documents

Portfolio Development

• Understanding the purpose of a portfolio
• Selecting existing artwork for portfolio
• Developing designs that showcase skills and capabilities

Differences between Graphic Design Bootcamp and Graphic Design Course for High School Students

The graphic design bootcamp is four weeks in length compared to the two-week graphic design course. As a four-week program it covers additional material, including more advanced concepts using the Adobe Creative Cloud tools: Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign. The graphic design bootcamp also allows for more time to be spent on project work and portfolio development, which is more limited in the two-week program.