EN
Hi Steemit!
Previously, I posted about Singaporean hawker centres as an entry for the HK-JP-SG cultural challenge contest organised by 
Anyway, Orientalhub has recently organised another competition; a Cover Image Design Contest! I've taken an interest in graphic design in recent years so I thought I'd participate in this contest as well.
The main theme of the cover image is:
Incorporating the philosophy of
“ An oriental boat sail in five oceans to seven continents in hopes of bringing out talents and synergy amid cross-community collaborations, promoting community harmony, and connect people together without geographical borders.”
So this is the design I came up with:
Here's the breakdown of the design:
I wanted the background to be dark since the font on the Steemit cover photo is white regardless if Dark Mode is activated, and I saw previous designs cutting off the design with a different colour in the middle which I thought didn't flow very well.
I had a few elements in mind I wanted to incorporate into the design; the oriental boat (obviously), some buildings, a mountain, a pagoda, some flowers (maybe sakura, even though I know that's Japanese), and a Chinese dragon. Over time I realised I had too many elements so I had to cut them down.
The main thing was figuring out how to combine those elements with a dark background. I was thinking of doing a reverse-silhouette style (white on black), but I also wanted some colour in the design, and it would be a tad bland if it was just black and white. This also made me decide to use a dark blue gradient for the background instead. Coincidentally, it also represents the ocean at night.
So I went about googling images of Hong Kong to get some inspiration, and then it hit me; neon signs! HK has always been known for their neon signs along many of their streets. It's definitely a staple in their visual culture. Singapore has even emulated them in one of our malls (Jurong Point).
After that the rest of the design fell into place. I used a city skyline since the image is fairly wide, then I put the boat in front and the dragon in the back (so that it looks like he's flying upwards). I couldn't really incorporate all the elements I thought of, since it would end up very cluttered, but I think it turned out okay. I finished up by adding the name at the top, as a background to the actual text.
This is a previous iteration, before I got the idea to hide the dragon behind the buildings.
Here's my first draft that I drew by hand on my phone. I'm pretty sure only I will understand what I'm drawing 😆
I had to stick with something simple since I don't have my Wacom tablet with me, and I don't have Photoshop, so I had to use a mixture of online tools and MS Paint. I think it still came out okay though.
I'm not sure if participants are allowed to submit more than 1 design, because I'm still thinking of other ideas. Maybe
Anyway, hope you like it!
Thanks for reading!
To find out more about me, check out my intro post here!
中文
你好 Steemit!
此前，我發布了有關新加坡小販中心的消息，作為
無論如何，Orientalhub最近組織了另一場比賽;封面形象設計比賽！近年來我對平面設計感興趣，所以我想我也會參加這個比賽。
封面圖片的主題是：
結合
“一艘東方船駛向七大洲的五個大洋，希望在跨社區合作中發揮人才和協同作用，促進社區和諧，並將人們聯繫在一起，而不受地理邊界的影響。”
所以這是我想出的設計：
以下是設計的細節：
因為Steemit封面照片上的字體是白色的，所以我希望背景變暗，而不管暗色模式是否啟動，我看到以前的設計在中間使用不同顏色的設計來切斷設計，我認為這種顏色流動性不好。
我想到了一些我想要融入設計的元素;東方的船（顯然），一些建築物，一座山，一座寶塔，一些花（也許是櫻花，儘管我知道那是日本的），還有一條中國龍。隨著時間的推移，我意識到我有太多的元素，所以我不得不砍掉它們。
最主要的是弄清楚如何將這些元素與深色背景相結合。我正在考慮做一個反向輪廓風格（黑色白色），但我也想在設計中使用一些顏色，如果它只是黑色和白色。這也使我決定使用深藍色漸變作為背景。巧合的是，它也代表了晚上的海洋。
所以我開始搜索一下Google的圖片，以獲得一些啟發，然後它打擊了我;霓虹燈！香港一直以沿著他們許多街道的霓虹燈而聞名。這絕對是他們視覺文化的一個主要部分。新加坡甚至在我們的一個商場（裕廊角）效仿它們。
之後，其餘的設計落到了位置。因為形象相當寬闊，所以我使用了城市天際線，然後我把船放在前面，把龍放在後面（這樣看起來他就是向上飛）。我無法真正融入我想到的所有元素，因為它最終會變得非常混亂，但我認為它沒有問題。作為實際文本的背景，我通過在頂部添加名稱來完成。
這是以前的一次迭代，然後才想到隱藏在建築物後面的龍。
這是我在手機上手繪的第一份草稿。我很確定只有我會明白我在畫什麼。 😆
我必須堅持一些簡單的事情，因為我沒有我的Wacom平板電腦，而且我沒有Photoshop，所以我不得不使用在線工具和MS Paint的混合。儘管如此，我認為它仍然出來。
我不確定是否允許參與者提交超過1個設計，因為我仍在考慮其他想法。也許
無論如何，希望你喜歡這個設計！
謝謝閱讀！
To find out more about me, check out my intro post here!
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