New New Visual Visual Language Language
New wen Visual lausiv Language egaugnal Form mrof Follows swollof Function noitcnuf
Contents | Street Graphics
Street Graphics Brief . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
The Form and Perception of an eye . . . . . .
6
Paper Architecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
7
Abstraction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
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Urban Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
9
| Cabinet of Curiosity
Cabinet of Curiosity Brief . . . . . . . . . . . . .
11
The box of Curiosity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
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Final Outcome . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13
| Earth Artifact
Earth Artifact Brief . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
15
The Elemental Focus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
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The 4 Elements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
17
Continental Cards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
18
Elemental Cards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
19
| Typography Typography Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
21
| Manifesto Manifesto Documentation . . . . . . . . . . . .
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Street Graphics Form Vision Perception
Street Graphics Brief Street Graphics and the initial theory crafting. My initial ideas where based on abstraction and how perception would play it’s part on how we visually understand objects and language on Earth. I was aware that most people were going to be looking at photography and graffiti as the gateway into the project, I wanted something different which is why I decided to have an experiment with Brusho ink. The idea was to be as open minded as possible, as I believed that was they best way to approach this task. Another element that we could consider is how we go about recording social and communal views in a form of art and design. I looked decided to look at Rauschenberg’s work as he was famous for recording social events using elements of collage and fine art work. I was looking to use a different mindset when it came to my version of recording the work, but gaining insight from artists such as Rauschenberg would really help drive my ideas forward. To the right you can see some of the development of the brusho work that I have conducted, the abstraction element could be clearly deciphered through the designs. Its always a good start to get some of the initial designs underway, because from that you can evaluate, create and plan the next step.
The buildings and eyes where an obvious representations of the visions that stem from our mind. You can start getting into dream-states, peripheral visions and ideas based around that aspect, but at this stage I just wanted to investigate a few possibilities through design and concept. The main thing to take out of this project was the fact that everything was going to be unique, stemming from the idea that everybody will see things from a different perspective and in a different light and that focus is what made this project interesting to me as it was very explorative.
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The form and perception of an eye. The pupil can be represented in many formats, this experiment was to show that each eye is unique, both in colour and in form, the textures that the brusho provides helped me clearly document this idea. You could also link what I have done here to the planets as there are 9 circles for the primary designs, I guess you could go as far as to name then, but it’s something that I opted against.
How technology inspired the design process. Technology is a powerful tool, something that the street doesn’t provide. Technology could be seen to enhance our vision, just like a lens, i.e.. A pair of glasses. Using a device to enhance a perception is the concept behind the inversion on Photoshop and it’s insightful to see how technology can manipulate our visions and perspectives.
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Paper Architecture The idea and purpose behind this design was to create something abstract and structured. To represent the abstract visions that I had through an architectural perspective. This would represent change and continue with the mindset that everyone visualises shapes and colour in a unique fashion. Giving them something they don’t recognise will stimulate their perception and the result will be endless ideas on what the subject matter was. The lighting setup was to amplify the buildings size, structure and stance on the topic. The composition also helps reflect on the three main attributes of this project, which are the perception, vision and form of the designs. This template was very much a work in progress, but I thought that the output would be different enough to the brusho work, to validate creating them paper pieces of architecture in the first place. Each one of the structures could also represent an element of the financial ladder, as you have the lower tier, the middle tier and the higher tier. You could then from there start organising and creating different compositions to reflect certain areas of the city, the country or it could even escalate to a more global scale.
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The vectorized version of the street Another route that I decided to take was that of a vectored nature, using a fragmented approach I came to a conclusion of a building within the street. This is a very abstract method of creating a building, which compliments the rest of the work that I had been doing for this project. The colour palette for this piece of artwork was deliberately chosen to promote a cool and subtle look. It also adds that element of limbo, as you aren’t quite sure where this structure came from, it doesn’t really associate with anything you have seen on a street before. This methodology has driven the project as it really does question what you have seen and also the unseen, what would the world look like in our dreams? Or in our nightmares? What forms would these structures take? This is the area that really interested me and I think the work clearly demonstrates my intentions and my questions. It’s almost like a puzzle that needs solving, which is a nice annotation of the work in this scenario, you could also use this method to create many variations in the form of a design.
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The Urban Environment
The Urban Environment
Compositions of shopping content For this design idea I decided to produce a documentation of the content within the shops on the street, implementing an info-graphical style and a vector platform. To create the blueprints for this design I had to first note down the type of retailers in the area and then summarise the type of products that the shop would store and dispatch. From this step I could understand the type of images that I would want to include in my summary of the “Urban Environment�. To represent the fast food environment and outlets such as Greggs and Subway I introduced designs such as hot-dogs, pizza’s, noodles and chips. I also included designs for the jewellers, train station, medical and cosmetic facilities and
technology shops. The colour decisions where quite an interesting one, as I wanted to incorporate a warm colour palette and also a cooler one, which would provide a nice contrast and a different perspective. I was quite happy with the outcomes for this project, I tried to produce a variety of designs and compositions to reflect the ideas and concepts that I ran with for the project. There are some effective images with the brusho pieces probably being the highlight into terms of approach and potential outcome and I think that the abstract building was a nice concept, which could have been explored further, through composition and through colour.
The urban environment pieces where pretty straight forward, which was a nice change to the other two ideas that I ran with as it gave me something else to work with if I needed something a little lighter to work with.
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Cabinet of Curiosity Intrigue Memory Story
Cabinet of Curiosity Brief Cabinet of Curiosity and the initial theory crafting. The Cabinet of curiosity was a very conceptually driven brief in my opinion, as it was an evaluation and documentation of our personal lives. Memories, stories and history where the name of the game in this project, it was a very reflective process and one that was certainly different to a more traditional graphic design brief. To engage with the brief I initially decided to create two mind maps, the first represented moments in my life and experiences, which I thought may be worth incorporating into a cabinet. The cabinet itself was a term for storage, we weren’t being asked to build a wardrobe, it was just a way of storing information that symbolized who we are. The format to look at could be a virtual representation or include a physical dimension. The idea of the cabinet itself was the focus for the second of the mind maps, which questioned elements such as fate, reflection, significance and interaction. Which is where I started to generate a few interesting concepts, focusing on topics such as identity, the idea of camouflage as we all have something to hide, something that we want to exist in an invisible universe. I started to consider how I could incorporate the concept of identity into a physical or virtual environment,
looking into ideas that work with elements such as like fingerprints, textures and paint. I had decided at an early stage that this process was going to be a more physical project than I am used to, a good challenge in my eyes as I was hoping to open up new dimensions and qualities that I may have overlooked had I rushed straight into a digital format. In terms of design influences I decided to look at a creator called Joe Pollitt, who designed some experimental work based around fingerprints using both traditional and futuristic methods. Alongside Joseph Cornell who specialised in boxes of curiosity, this informed and gave me an appreciation in regards to the thought process, the intricacy and selection of objects that go into a box of curiosity. I conducted a few quick experiments, to try and utilise my initial research and ideas around the topic of identity.
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The Box of Curiosity The device that I decided to use for this task was this innocent little jewellery box. The journey started in the market of Huddersfield, the box made an appearance and I decided to grab it as it represented the visions that I had going forward. I was still searching for the right way to represent identity and camouflage, I was thinking about doing something subtle to the outer shell of the box. Thinking about this in an abstract manor we can look at the box as a head, with the brain, or mind located inside. The box would act as a shield for the information stored within. This was the approach I had and I think it’s something that not many people would have thought about in too much detail. The paintwork was simply to show a bit or erosion and history that the content within had endured, implementing the idea that this is a shield, or a bulwark, we can envisage that it would take the brunt of the damage to project the bearer.
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The Final Outcome The final design was a true reflection on the idea I was running with from the start, it’s the idea of identity, containing a little documentation of my fingerprints, a bottle of my blood and my soul. The last and most important piece of the box is the mirror, as it represents the idea of reflection. When you open the box, it will prompt you to reflect on your own story, your own identity. At least that’s what it was supposed to reflect, I had debated adding some typography or numbers into the interior, but I kept it simple and slightly mystifying. The documentation of the fingerprints was also quite important, as you could interpret it an my own stamp, my trademark, the contents of the box is really what I am in a more ethereal and conceptual form. Overall I enjoyed the thought process behind the brief, it was something that I didn’t really think about until we were looking into mentalities and reflecting upon our own stories in more detail.
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Earth Artifact Extraterrestrial Alliance
Earth Artifact Brief Earth Artifact and the initial theory crafting. The initial ideas where very much focused on the idea of elements, how they could be portrayed, read and documented. What elements mean to Earth and how each one relies on the other really optimized my approach for most of this project. I also looked at continents as a more literal idea, as I usually like to work with an abstract idea, in this case the elements, with the literal idea for this project revolving around our geographical background. There are also certain crossover points where I can integrate both ideas into a more solidified design. It was important to note how we were trying to rebroadcast, or recreate the NASA Golden Record, creating a signal to extraterrestrial life. This could be through animation, book form, physical boxes ect. The unknown races will have no idea what Earth is, what exists on Earth, what things look like on Earth and so on. The main thing to consider is how we choose to perceive the Earth, using language and image to showcase what goes on here on Earth. An artist that I used as influence for the initial design process and throughout was Arian Noveir, who worked with these suggestive vector and water based images of characters featuring in games, movies and TV.
The reason I decided to look at Noveir was because I was looking at using the brusho ink technique again, to “suggest” what the elements on Earth may look like. I can only give an indication or an idea of what the appearance of an element would look like, this is why I looked at incorporating Noviers technique to my own ideas and designs. I think it’s important to look at the attributes of an element, so I can go about designing them in the right fashion. This was a project that I was looking forward to as it was going to allow me to be creative and innovative, I was aware that people where designing books and the like as a reflection on history and that was something I wanted to avoid as this was still a creative task, where I was looking to apply an abstract twist.
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Elemental Focus Looking further into the idea of elements, I went on to explore different variables and characteristics that could have an impact on how I go about designing my visualisation of the elements. I had to make a choice on what I was going to represent, as there are a few different aspects to the elements that I was interested in. The first elemental aspect I had to consider was the periodic table, how each element existed for a purpose and was categorised by number and also by abbreviation. The second aspect was culture, as elements of the earth are represented differently dependant on the region you are focusing in, the Asian continent has contrasting representations and ideas to what a European or an American may use to describe the same topic. The third aspect was shape, which starts to consider both the other aspects that I had started to theorize. What did an element look like? How would you describe the properties of each element through a visual language? These where the questions I started to ask myself, through discussion with tutors I was able to identify and area which would help construct my theory and representation of an element on Earth.
Elemental Focus Shift A slight deviation that occurred was the style that I was looking at implementing, as the watercolour effect that I was initially considering was probably going to detract from the symbolist approach that I seemed to be looking at. So the brusho’s were once again in action and I started to discover compositions and effects that I thought could shape and inspire the rest of the project. The results of the experiments were pleasing and it was now getting to the stage where I was just trying to figure out the compositions. Clipping masks and Illustrator where next on the agenda, I was looking at the possibility of merging the experiments into shapes to represent the elements. Influenced by the “Bauhaus Shape Theory� I was able to generate and validate my own work, you can see the results across the page.
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The 4 elements of Earth
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Asia
Africa
The CN Tower
The Great Wall of China
The Eiffel Tower
America
Oceania
Uluru
The Taj Mahal
Europe
Mount Fuji
Asia
Sydney Opera House
Asia
Europe
Roman Colosseum
Africa
Acropolis of Athens
Victoria Falls
Oceania
Europe
Africa
The Great Pyramid of Giza
America
America
Oceania
Christ The Redeemer
The Statue of Liberty
The Great Barrier Reef
Mount Kilimanjaro
Continental Cards The idea revolving around the continents was also something that I decided to explore during the project, this would compliment the abstract idea of the elements. Having a more literal observation of the Earth artifact would be a nice transition from the more complex design of the elemental work. The purpose of the graphic would be to document some of the historic landmarks here on Earth, a good method to present information in my opinion is by card, so that’s the process that I started to explore. The next stage was to adventure and research through the continents to find the most appropriate landmark to represent the continents.
Some of the continents were harder to explore than others, the European and American continents were the easiest to research, most likely due to the media coverage and the exposure though the internet in our country (the UK) . Africa and Asia took a little bit of digging to uncover the landmarks I wanted to highlight through the cards. The most challenging region to find information about was the region of Oceania, as most of the landmarks where based in a natural or water habitat, which you could have probably guess by the name of the region.
Uncovering some of the historic landmarks on Earth was a worthwhile process, as it gave me some important information regarding the topic and also for everyday life as I find it quite interesting to compare and contrast the cultures and styles that we are surrounding by. The colours where very subtle and cool, this was a conscious decision as I wanted the imagery to be easily understood, especially due to the fact we are trying to communicate to a race that we can’t converse with.
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Triangle
Element of Fire
Element of Air
Rectangle
Element of Water
Element of Air
Circle
Element of Earth
Element of Fire
Circle
Rectangle
Element of Fire
Square
Circle
Rectangle
Rectangle
Element of Water
Element of Fire
Element of Earth
Square
Square
Triangle
Triangle
Element of Air
Element of Earth
Element of Water
Element of Earth
Square
Triangle
Element of Air
Circle
Element of Water
Elemental Cards I decided that it would be nice to also create a set of elemental cards, this could potentially serve as a second set of cards for the “getting to know Earth� instalment. The designs used a similar template the landmark cards, enabling me to transfer some of the skills and techniques that I used to design the landmark cards. The Bauhaus colour theory was also something that inspired this set of designs, as the four colours and four shapes used to categorize each card where attuned to that idea. Implementing a set rule and structure really helped me with the outcome of both card series.
You will notice that I have tried to fill a little more of the white space in comparison to the elemental cards. I felt like the columns down the sides needed a little bit of attention, not too much as that would contrast with the minimalist style that I had embraced for this card series. The background colour was supposed to reflect on the actual colour of Earth, I was looking at a deviation of a more navy blue, instead of the lighter version that the Earth itself would contain. I found the darker colour was a more complimentary shade which helped emphasise the colour of the elements on the page.
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Typography
Language Education
Typography We were briefed to create a new style of typography, using existing designs and content to influence our ideas. I decided to look at designers such as El Lissitzky, Wyndham Lewis and Lauri Rosenwald to inspire and inform my initial response. I found that during the experimentation process I couldn’t transfer some of the content such as shapes and textures into a design I felt that they would have had a negative impact on the legibility of the type, which we know is the most important aspect of creating type, if you can’t read it then there is no point in creating it in the first place. After the research I had to start looking at transferring rough sketches onto graph paper, as that’s where the attention to detail came into it’s own.
From this stage you can start to see how a series of letters start to form, how they work as a unit and the amount of space each shape each letter would facilitate. After a reasonable amount of time, the type started to merge into a legible design, driven by the research and sketches that I had constructed. The graph paper ironed out some of the deficiencies that my type contained, but seeing as it was my first time analysing type in such detail I was remaining optimistic something positive would emerge as an outcome. Illustrator was then loaded with the intention to scrutinize the design on a digital platform, this is where all my fears came to fruition. I found it difficult to generate a consistent stroke weight between some of the
letters and the kerning was going to be a problem when it came to pairing letters together. Some of the letters needed more space to work in than others, and it just ended up being quite difficult to work with some of the design decisions that I had made on a physical platform. So a reasonable amount of improvisation had to be made and as you may be aware I decided to make two versions of the type as I was unhappy with the first set loaded into Illustrator. I was aware of the magnitude this task and how challenging it was going to be and I tried to make a fist of it. Considering I have no experience creating type, I am reasonably happy with the outcome.
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Manifesto Statement Reason
Manifesto Images Another task that I have set about doing revolved around my mindset and opinions on graphic design. Researching into existing statements and opinions on creative subjects inspired me to create my own version of a manifesto. I ventured towards musical lyrics and creative writing to see how I could approach the task in various manors. The manifesto didn’t need to be in the standard text format, we could manipulate the design if the potential was there to do something more creative and adventurous. I decided to initially record my thoughts on a word document, trying to unlock key terms that would indicate and refer to my mindset. From here I could choose to expand on the generated words through extended writing, paragraphs, sentences ect. Or I could go with something more designer orientated, creating some vector graphics to reflect on the words that I had highlighted as a key component in this manifesto. After I had created the images, I decided to try and create a format for both the text and image, this became a statement of my mind. I thought about making a poster, but I thought a little bit more about it and compositionally I don’t think a poster is the best method to document a thought process. I then thought about a creating little book/journal, which is more about a journey or encounter, which makes a lot more sense regarding mindsets and reflections. Incorporating both image and text I created this little book, you can see a few taster images, which clearly document my ideas and hopefully provide something interesting to look at during the journey.
Re
search
Research is a significant part of the design process, finding the influences and
motivation usually comes down to quality research and resource. Quality content is never going to appear without quality research, design is not a magic trick, or a miracle, design is a form of progress.
Paradise is something that we all think about, will we fight to shape our own paradise or will we let those who oppose us shape our own heaven, or hell?
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Issue 1 May 2014