Completing my three workbooks of X-Factor, Y-Factor and Z-Factor has caused me to notice a recurring theme of creativity, specifically in graphic design and writing. I believe that I may have focused on these themes as a result of them being activities that are relevant in the creative field of advertising, as well as things that I was good at.

Growing up in the Bay Area and attending a highly competitive, STEM-oriented school as a student who wasn't very good at math or science, I had very low self-esteem in regards to my capabilities and whether I'd be able to accomplish anything at all. The one thing I had going for me was fictional writing, which was just a hobby I indulged in for fun, and drawing, which some of my peers complimented me for despite them being relatively mediocre and far worse than what I am capable of today.

I believe this may have caused me to warp my identity around being a creative person, which is why it comes up almost constantly. Attending college and receiving hands-on experience related to advertising has helped me broaden my skills so that I could consider myself to be good at other things outside of fictional writing, from forms of writing outside of fiction to graphic design, formatting and photo editing in the various programs of Adobe Suite.

Everything that happened to me up to this moment has turned me into the person that I am today, and it is important to me that this is reflected in my personal brand.

I started off my brainstorming by doodling things in my sketchbook to see what would pop out to me most. I chose to go with simpler, lighthearted doodles as I've never really considered myself to be a serious person.

There is a reason why I chose to draw certain symbols:

- The flowers: When I get bored, I would generally doodle these as they were easy to draw and looked nice. 

- The snowflake: My name is Chinese for "ice." People have also described me as a sensitive person, which makes me similar to a snowflake in that way.

- The cat: I have an account on Instagram that I use to post drawings and other things related to the characters I made for one of my stories. One of the options I considered for a logo was a cat, as the word "cat" appears in the username deliberately. I had also used this idea for a past assignment.

Everything else were pieces that simply appeared in my head as time went on.

My family recommended the "sunglasses with headphones" logo as both of them were things that I would wear whenever we would go outside on walks together. My sister had also suggested a plethora of ideas that were not super appealing to me and seemed more like jokes, such as a "turtle riding on a bicycle," which included the turtle wearing headphones and sunglasses, and the symbol for money in Chinese as a result of me winning a family game of Mahjong too many times in a row despite having limited knowledge about the point system and the rules of the game. To help you visualize what these two look like, I've supplied some photos here:

On the left is a visual of what I imagine the turtle riding a bike would look like, along with my failed attempt to write that specific Chinese character from memory. On the right is a Mahjong tile featuring the actual Chinese character I was trying to replicate.

It was also at this point in time where I realized that it may also be a good idea to include my name and initials in this logo, as it was something that everyone else in the class appeared to be doing. Rita's inclusion of her Chinese name in her logo inspired me to try making a few drafts featuring my own Chinese name. 

My sister has a very similar name to me in English, with the only difference being a single letter, so our initials are the same. As you could guess, my special letter was "B." It felt more distinct to do "YB" than "YT," which was why I made sure to include a B in all of the English-based designs.

People preferred the simpler logo designs, with one person specifically pointing out the bolded one in the middle as their favorite.

To keep things simple, I chose to go with the logo in the middle. I liked the shape of it compared to the other logos, and it felt slightly more distinct. However, I do plan on adding tiny snowflakes inside of the B, just to give the logo some extra character.

To strengthen the presence of my identity within this brand, I selected a color palette. I chose to lean towards cooler colors, as I have a preference towards them and I perceive myself to be a relaxed and easygoing person. The colors also lean more towards winter, which matched the theme perfectly.

I redrew the logo digitally on Medibang Paint Pro, and then changed the colors and added in the snowflakes through Canva. Looking at it, the snowflakes felt out of place, so I decided it would be best to not include them and maybe just add them as a seperate pattern within the brand or not include them at all.

Out of curiosity, I decided to use Adobe Illustrator to create the mock-ups, with a focus on black, white, and one out of the three other colors. One of the most notable aspects was that the colors seemed to appear different in Illustrator than they did in Adobe Color, but I was fine with the results regardless.

I also noticed that the black had stood out too strongly in all three photos. Since the three non-white and non black colors are all on the lighter side, the black provides too strong of a contrast. As a result of these, I feel like it would be best to have black only appear over the color white.

A quick modification to make the business card readable:

Link to Portfolio: https://yeebingtse.myportfolio.com/