Spotlight Series: Professor Sam Park, Graphic Design and Digital Media

CBU Online offers over 40-degree programs that purposefully prepare students to enter in-demand fields. The Bachelor of Arts in Graphic Design and Digital Media degree is ideal for the creative and innovative mind and allows students to bring their vision to life.

Professor Sam Park, associate professor and program coordinator for the graphic design and digital media program, applies his experience working in corporate and freelance design to help his students achieve their academic goals.

After completing his degree at the ArtCenter College of Design in Pasadena, California, Park immediately went to work for Fox as a lead broadcast designer. His duties were to create graphics for the 10 o’clock news and would cover events from the Olympics to presidential campaigns and everything in between.

It was here that Park received three Emmy Awards for his designs on the network.

“I received one for a design package for Fox, where we totally recreated the branding system and the logo,” Park said. “Another was for the X Games graphics and third was a team award. I was just lucky enough to get recognized.”

There is more to design than just creating visuals, Park said. It takes strategy and the ability to piece together different elements to create one cohesive product.

“It is about organizing all of your content and conveying a message,” Park said. “You might have a good visual eye, but you want to catch attention right away. You really need to be able to think about the big picture and come up with creative ways to achieve it.”

Design is not about how good you are at creating art, Park discussed.

“When designing you don’t just make everything big and loud, you have all the elements interact together,” Park said. “The images, objects and shapes, you have them all play together with the fundamental principles of design.”

Color selection plays a large part in the designing process.

“You don’t just pick colors based on a feeling, but you have a theory behind the colors,” Park said. “Colors have emotions, and there is a lot of psychology that goes into design.”

The field of graphic design allows students to tap into their creativity, but sometimes finding inspiration can be challenging. CBU Online offers flexible options that work with student’s schedules, lending them the creative freedom to work on their projects whenever inspiration strikes.

“I think in this asynchronous environment it allows them to find success when they want to be creative,” Park said. “Whether that’s at night or in the morning, or whatever it is. So (CBU Online) is a great method to help people learn about graphic design. It allows designers to work at their own pace when their creative juices are flowing.”

To learn more about how you can earn your degree in graphic design and digital media, please visit this link.