About Joel Katsuda

I attended Eastern Michigan University from August 2019 to December 2023. I graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in graphic design, and I learned several aspects of design such as visual hierarchy, typography, and color theory. I also became a graphic designer and photographer for the school’s communications department, so I got to apply these skills very early in a real world setting, while also learning about working with marketing and branding guidelines. During my time at EMU, I also joined Theta Chi Fraternity. It was here where I became the social media manager for the organization, and got first hand experience with social media marketing and networking. This period of time allowed me to try out several different styles of digital marketing to see what my strengths and growth opportunities as a designer were.

The two biggest questions that I ask when designing a piece of work is “who is the target audience that is trying to be reached?” as well as “what do I want viewers to get out of my work?”

I believe emotions are very important to add into design as it is easy to engage a call to action with an emotion. When these two ideas are determined, I then begin a mind map of several different key words and phrases that relate to the material. mind-mapping gives me a better idea of various routes that I can take with the design.

From here, I then begin to sketch ideas onto paper; I normally give myself 10-15 different sketches to work with. I then take the best ideas from each sketch and work to create the best design with these ideas. I believe a very important part of design is collaboration, which is why I often have other people look at my work to get fresh eyes as well as feedback. Finally, I take my sketches into the appropriate Adobe design app to fully bring the design forward.