COLOUR & SEMANTICS MINI PROJECT COLLECTION BY CARL WIGART
Colour Wheel This project was an eye-opener for the design of everyday objects. We hunted down products of a set colour to create a large colour wheel. The colour I had was purple. The result was a variety of “indulgent� branded items such as chocolate, cake and quilted toilet paper. I also found New Year related products being purple: a blinking pin and balloons.
field made you realise how much is branded by colour and how much colour affects how you understand an object.
All in all finding objects in the
Natural We had natural as our colour scheme. To create this pallet we chose earth tones. We eliminated shiny, plastic and processed colours. The reason is that we associate them with artificial, man made products. Our pallet includes blue, purple, orange, yellow and greens. The blue bag we added shows the pallet of the sky, water and clouds with greys, white, and both light and dark blue. There is a sea
green t-shirt and a dark blue book with patterns that can be seen as representing the sea and ocean. The green objects have different textures and tones of green similar to vegetation. One of the green objects is nearly earth like in tone and saturation. We have red, orange, ochre and purples that also are fairly matte and desaturated. They could represent many things in nature such as autumn leaves,
spring fruits and the sunset. There are also some de-saturated brown and ochre tones that are the same as sand and rock. The all around looks of the objects are soft, matte, earth and dull. By Carl Wigart and Chiara Heppner
Persona Mood Board This exercise was based around creating a persona for a person with a mood board. The persona I had was a 35 year old female driving instructor and car enthusiast who enjoyed weekend deals. She also had a fiancĂŠ. The process I used
to create the mood board was by thinking of how she lived, what her income might be and what her future might look like. I based my persona around the idea that she lives in a suburb, she
would value spending money on both her cars and on trips. She would prioritise her interests over some domestic expenses such as fancy cookware.
Product and Consumer For the persona on the pervious page I was to choose a saladwasher. The main focus for my choice was: price, semantics and familiarity. After visiting shops around Glasgow I found a washer that I believed suited her. I found the best
way of looking for the washer was by trying to imagine how she would shop and what she would relate to. In John Lewis there was an OXO salad washer I believed had the semantics that would satisfy my persona. It was fairly cheep washer that had a heavy, satisfying push
button that made the washer spin. It was transparent so you could see how it span. I believe my persona would have liked it because of the familiarity of a spinning wheel, being able to see it work and the sleek functional look.
Vector Pen (1986) Semantics exercise
To exercise our skill in analysing product’s semantics we were given an object each to research an present it’s semantics. The product Imogen Faulkes and I had was a vector parker pen. This was designed in the 80’s as a cheaper pen designed to fit with the ongoing changes towards a computer based office. We listed these as the key points of the pen’s semantics: • Very subtle branding , just an arrowhead on the clip. • Pen is light, cheap plastic, differentiating it from expensive range. • It lies balanced in hand and has a barrelled, geometric form. • Brushed stainless steel and black plastic reflecting the computer centered wokspace. • Even cheap range at Parker looks expensive. • Lid clicks in place. You then know it’s secure. • Stainless steel is cold to touch, and gives and elegant feel . It is used in kitchen and home appliances. It could be seen as minimalist, modernist and exclusive. • Black plastic makes it stylish and formal. It could be seen as hardware, gadget, fashion and masculine.