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Hello! Please introduce yourself.
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Hello, my name is Edwin Carl Capalla, a graphic designer based in Iloilo City, in tiny Iloilo island in the Philippines.
How did you find yourself in the realm of graphic design and illustration?
I’ ve always had a thing for fashion when I was young; the act of dressing myself with colors, patterns and fabrics and choosing what to wear was a fun task, so maybe that played a part in developing an early interest. I only took on this fascination towards graphic design seriously in college, during a web design class. I noticed when we were tasked to do web pages that I was more interested in the layout rather than the coding aspect. Fast forward to the end of the semester, I got drained by all the coding and found web design rather tedious. After the class ended, I decided to stop pursuing it and thought of giving logo design a try. It was pretty easy to learn the tools of the trade with the help of YouTube and Google. Logo design also had a faster workflow which I liked. I also generated most of my portfolio with logo design which led me to good job opportunities but after a year of work, it started getting slow. I decided then to take that opportunity to invest time on Instagram and start a poster series. This is the time when I could truly say is my“ graphic design phase.”
Your poster series on Instagram is captivating. What made it even more special was you used this medium to help you better your skills in Photoshop. What insights did you gain after a year of creating poster designs? There are three things I learned from this series: First, Photoshop is pretty easy. You do not need an expensive tablet or an overwhelming depth of knowledge of Photoshop to create good artwork. Great artwork can be made as long you have a good imagination and the eagerness and curiosity to learn new tools and techniques. Most of the pieces I made for the series only used very basic tools and techniques which anyone can do, given that they know the basics of Photoshop. So don ' t be intimidated. Second, if it ' s ugly, still upload it. Let’ s face it: not all of our efforts will end with a perfect output. Rather than invest all that time into " making stuff perfect”, go to a bookstore, read, watch videos on YouTube or search different artists to be inspired. Inspiration won ' t come to you, you have to find it. Because by the time Designer A has finished making an artwork“ perfect”, Designer B has already improved miles ahead from Designer A.
Lastly, focus on growing as a designer and ignore the‘ gram. When I first started this series, I didn ' t think of followers or likes but used Instagram as a medium to monitor my progress. I have seen numerous Instagram pages where
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