Graphic Design Digital Art Studio Art
Design Center Project Specs Design Process Upload Files
Course Planning Graphic Design Courses Studio & Digital Art Courses Art History Courses Professional Development Courses

Senior Art & Graphic Design majors

Students create a capstone project that exhibits the skills that they have learned at Marietta College.
The objective of a capstone project is to...

  • Embody your personal interests

  • Highlight your skills

  • Present your unique perspective or contribution

Angelo Leitner-Wise: Graphic Design Major

“My biggest hurdle to overcome during the capstone process was to not over think when it came to the creative process. I had a problem wasting a lot of my time due to overthinking the process, making myself become overwhelmed and would simply become lazy. I feel that capstone helped me tremendously overcome this hurdle to become a better thinker and a better artist.”
“I felt that I had a pretty strong beginning to my capstone, I just wish I would have felt more confident in my concept so that I would have started creating more work so that in the end I would have had more work to choose from to display my best possible work.”

 

blue_bkd.png
 

A good capstone project...

  • Requires about 10 hours of work a week for the academic semester to provide many examples for faculty to curate/choose from for the final exhibition.

  • Showcases the student’s strengths and studio/design concentration.

  • Must be realistic within the student’s budget and resources.

Graphic Designers

A good capstone showcases the student’s strengths while contributing something unique to the design landscape.

  • Since this is the first time you have complete creative freedom (scary isn’t it?) to guide the process of concept development, we encourage you to consider what you want to “contribute” to your community.

    • For example, what is going to be the value of the addition of your project to the design ‘scape? Do you have a unique perspective on a subject? A unique idea?

    • Does your project exist already? If so why is your creation unique? As designers, you learn to solve problems—so figure out what “problem” you want to solve and develop concepts around that.

    • Note: Branding alone is not an adequate capstone project. A project can include branding, but not be the core. For example, a capstone project can be an Application design that includes a logo and advertising or branding for a business that accompanies an informative website or book that is the core of the project.

Silkie Coffee • Megan Horsley • Graphic Design, 2019

Silkie Coffee is a coffee brand that helps donate toward saving animals that are mistreated on farms as well as promoting local farming and humanely treated animals. The concept and logo of Silkie Coffee came from Bantam Silkie chickens that she used to raise when she was younger. The colors and design are inspired by Andy Warhol.

Studio Artists

A good capstone showcases the student’s strengths in their concentration.

  • You may choose a theme possibly related to a past assignment (ex. Body as Subject, Retro Still Life, etc.), but you must create many preliminary studies and provide research for all proposals. 

  • You need to contextualize your work within art history and contemporary art by identifying other artists working in the same subject or genre—What other artists are working in a similar style and/or subject?

    • What masters, learned in ARTH, are related to his/her work/project?  You must use relevant artists, learned in class, or from reputable museums as references, (not just random people from the web).

  • Be prepared to do much more work than you show as the final—If you are working in a quick medium like monotype then you need to create 100 prints for every 10 images selected to exhibit. If a student wants to exhibit five (5) large-scale 4' x 5' paintings then, they create 10 for use to choose the best five (5).

Leah Seaman • Studio Art & Communication Major, 2021

Leah uses her realistic oil paintings to communicate the relationship between her Christian faith and race. Listen to her discuss the motivations behind her senior capstone project.

Capstone Proposal

STEP 1: Brainstorm

  • What type of project formats/mediums do you enjoy? Examples: portrait paintings, digital illustration, branding & logo design, packaging design, etc.

  • What type of themes/topics are you interested in? Examples: mental health, literature, music, gardening, etc.

  • How will your projects be different than what currently exists? It is important for you to consider how your perspective, style, or experience can influence your final projects so they are different than what we already see—you want to add something new to our world, not recreate something that already exists.

STEP 2: Write Project Proposals

  • Download Template provided.

  • Need five (5) project ideas total.

    • Three (3) projects need to be different from each other and have a detailed and complete proposal.

    • Two (2) projects can be slight variations of the original three (3) ideas and be less detailed.

Each proposal should include:

  • Capstone Project description: What are you thinking? What type of resources will you be using? Why do you want others to see it? How does it personally represent you, or your work?

  • Form: What form will your capstone evolve into? Will it be a painting series, sculptures, a book, a campaign, a product-line etc?

  • Materials: What type of materials will you need to create your project? What type of resources will you need to use, such as vendors, etc?

STEP 3: Submit Proposals

The Capstone proposals are DUE ON THE FIRST DAY OF CLASS!

Each student is required to submit the digital files to their instructor and be prepared to discuss their ideas with their class.

Capstone Example

Strong Women Poster Series

Ashton Helmke • Graphic Design, 2021

Ashton digitally illustrated a poster series that depicted the fictional female characters that were significant to her. To honor their characteristics, like Ahsoka’s strength and Scarlet Witch’s love, she incorporated a defining word on each poster. She was heavily influenced by Alphonse Mucha’s posters of female figures, especially the ornamentation and typography he incorporates.

The final pieces were printed on coated canvas and gold foil was added to create a visual opulence.

Learn about Ashton’s Process and review her materials.