VISUAL
thinking KATARZYNA POPLAWSKA
Contents 1. The Brief 2. The Letter 3. The Postcard 4. The Letters in the landscape 5. The Letterbook 6. The Trip 7. The Exhibition 8. The Lectures 9. The Workshops 10. The Evaluation
Contentspage
Thebrief Description of the brief: ‘Visual Thinking’ focuses on extending your visual awareness, individual creative language and understanding of contemporary practice while examining the fertile and complex semiotic and aesthetic nature of word, image and object. You will examine these relationships while engaging with broad and experimental creative processes through a series of workshops, demonstrations, seminars and critiques provided across the courses in the School of Visual Arts: Fine Art, Graphic Design, Illustration and Visual Communication. This unit has been designed by the Course Leaders across the School to give you a unique opportunity to test and expand your range of skills and to combine materials and processes in different ways. You will undertake a short diagnostic exercise to evaluate the skills and knowledge that you have acquired; skills that you desire, skills that you feel would enhance and complement your practice and those that would challenge your thinking. Your evaluation will indicate which of the workshops and seminars onoffer you will undertake so that you are able on completion of the unit to be able to understand your practice through a trans disciplinary experience. You will present a body of work enhanced through an understanding of a broader visual context. Through studio practice this unit introduces you to the symbiotic and expansive relationship that exists between theory and practice in the visual arts. You will develop an awareness and understanding of the related key themes and issues, placed within relevant social, historical and cultural contexts. The unit will provide you with a strong foundation for your studies by enabling you to develop research and study skills within relevant critical and theoretical frameworks. In this unit you will become a proactive learner, working both independently and collaboratively.
Task One: The Distinctive Characters Working in groups of two choose an initial letter from the following set and based on the terminology and glossaries contained within the brief create a word that is related to the unit - you can produce it in caps or lowercase. After careful planning and research you are required to design and make a three dimensional initial character that communicates the meaning of the word. The model can be made of found objects but must finally be wall- mounted.
N A T L H U I S N I V I G K 300mm high M T R P E A S R A E I O I C T E S O U C E Y S 150mm high
K
TYPOGR
as a semiotic
Semiotics are sig and their use and
300mm
Due to the fact that many groups wanted the same letter, we decided it would only be fair to do a draw. The letter we drew out of the box was ‘K’
My Partner is: Nawal Gurung.
Theletter
Semiotics are u commercial secto of the world’s bigg fame and
Typogr as a semiotic re own right is transmitting
The theories that we apply to graphic design and visual communication are taken from a study of the general science of signs known in Europe as semiology and in the USA as semiotics. There are three main areas that form what we undesrand as semiotics: the signs themselves; the way they are organised into systems and the context in which they appear.The meaniang of any sign is affected by who is reading that sign. The book on the right, ‘Visible Signs’ by David Crow is my main saurce of research about semiotics.
RAPHY
c resource.
gns and symbols d interpretation.
used within the or to help some gest brands find fortune.
raphy esource in its capable of g meaning.
2
3D Typography
As part of my research, I have looked at ‘The 3D type book’. Andrew Byrom who is a 3D type specialist, explains in this book the context, motivation and inspiration behind these pieces of art work. The pictures below show some of the inspirations I have found in this book.
Oliver Vaughan Oliver Vaughan is a British graphic designer based in Epson, South of London. He was born in 1957 and he is well known for his work with graphic design studios 23 envelope and v23. Vaugham’s work is mainly album covers that are ‘sometimes gritty, sometimes dreamy’.He uses his passion and conviction to express moods to match the music inside. He does that through the use of colour, composition and typography.
Stefan Sagmeister Stefan Sagmeister is an Austria born typographer, graphic designer and artist, currently living and working in New York.He has been awarded for his work multiple times, mainly because of his desire for graphic design. Sagmeister owns a small studio, together with Jessica Walsh they mainly focus on 3D typography. He is well known for designing with controversy and using provocative ways to portray his views, opinions and beliefs. Stefan Sagmeister is one of my favourite graphic designers of all times.
Mathieu Lehanneur Mathieu Lehanneur is a French born industrial/ product designer. His work is very different to anything else I’ve looked at, as his designs are based on science and environment. He also uses passion and conviction to portrait his beliefs and that is why I believe he is an infulential and inspirational designer. The ‘Lab Gate’ project has particulary caught my eye because of the style of his typeface and general confidence and creativity of this design.
KEN
K
‘K’ is the eleventh letter of the English alphabet. It comes from the Greek letter ‘K’ (kappa} which originally symbolised an open hand. In modern-day English slag, the word ‘k’ stands for ‘Okay’. Firsly, we have researched all of the letters beginning with ‘K’ as we wanted some inspiration for our project. The circled words are our favourite ones. On the next page, I have took the favourite ones and brainstormed words which relate to them.
KICK KNOT KILL KEBAB KEY KIT KID KEYBOARD KNEE KETCHUP KISS KIND KIDNAPPED KNOW KNIFE KEEP KITE KEEN KEYRING KIDNEY
Further research
From my research, I have leardned that 3D typography needs to be bold, clear and convey more than just a letter: it needs to portray a meaning. This brings me onto the research of my particular letter.
KISS
Lips
KNOT
Red
Brown
Girl
Rope
KITE
Colorful
Shoe lace
Couple
Hanging
Hang/Fly
Child Two parts
2
T-Shit
Shoes Football
Shorts
KIT
Serif
Golden Musical
House
KEY
Meat
Red Humours
Beans
KIDNEY
IDEA GENERATION
The idea of a KEY:
The idea of a KISS:
- Pick a quite old, golden key.
- Out of thick paper, make 3D lips in various sizes.
-Engrave the bottom part so that it makes the ltter ‘K’ -The meaning behind a key lays in the ‘key texts’ of graphic design. -A key can represent a start of something new, or something very precious which is locked away. -It could also portray the meaning of secrets.
- The lips would either be painted red afterward or made out of red paper. - All the ‘lips’ would be hanged on transparent string in order to shape a ‘K’ which would convey the meaning of a kiss. -’Kiss’ doesn’t really have any relevence to graphic design, apart from ‘love’ in general.
The idea of a KIT:
The idea of a KNOT:
- The idea is to make a 3D ‘K’ out of cardboard or thick paper.
- Made out of rope or shoe lace.
-Then, buy a small football kit and dress the letter in it. - The shoes could be made out of paper too or they could be socks. - The meaning of ‘kit’ is a set of equipment needed for a specific purpose which ties with graphic design as ‘kit’ could mean tools or equipment such as Mac, InDesign or any other programme.
-The rope would be divided to two parts, making a letter ‘K’ by making knots. - The meaning of a knot in graphic design could be anything, as in order to design you need plenty of resources which brings me onto KNOTS: you need to knot two things together to make one. - For example, you can knot rules and grids to make perfect layout.
KNOT After careful consideration, we have decided to create our ‘K’ as a KNOT. This is because we felt that it has the most meaning and relation with graphic design and typography. Below are some pictures that inspired us while making our own design of ‘Knot’.
Both myself and Nawal then thought of what type face are we going to make the ‘k” with, We researched the most common cursive typefaces such as Comic Sans MS Blackadder ITC Lucida Handwriting Brush Script Apple Chancery and as a result, we decided that a cursive type face will be the most appropriate to use for our design.
K Rope MF
KNOT: -a fastening made by looping a piece of string, rope, or something similar on itself and tightening it. CURSIVE TYPEFACE: -cursive means handwritten, therefore the type we are going to use will be quite personal. -it can also be called ‘script’ type.
k k k k Giddyup Std
Apple Chancery
Brush Script MT
Edwardian Script ITC
FINAL OUTCOME Together with Nawal, we have firsly gone out looking for a good rope. Starting from a pet shop, considering going to the shore and lastly, looking in a curtain shop - we have found a perfect rope for our project. Without hesitation, we started knotting. After several tries, we got our perfect ‘K’. Below are some pictures of the letter in progress.
Firsly, we created our ‘K’ with this typeface. Soon we realised we didn’t like it so we changed it, looking carefully at our research. We also started of photographing our letter on a white background which doesn’t work therefore we decided to stick to black background.
On the left is the final piece of our letter, the rope is glued to a black piece of cardboard. This can be found in a black portfolio, labeled with Nawal’s and my name. On the right is the digital version of our handmade letter.
Task Two: The Postcard
Brief: To produce an A6 postcard with the image on one side and a brief description of th word on the other. Partner: Nawal Gurung Technical specifications: 105mm x 148mm 300dpi 3mm blend
Thepostcard
Layout Firstly, in order to producte a postcard, Nawal and I decided to research different layouts of existant postcards and designs in general to gain inspiration and help with our project. From the following book I have learned that with layout, it’’s all about spacing things out. Graphic desigrners tend to leave a lot of space when working with plain pages as it shows that not only they’re not cheap but also it makes it easier to read and overall it’s more pleaseant to look at.
Description Part of the postcard needs to include a quote of a brief description about our letter and the object it is made of. Due to the fact that a ‘knot’ hasn’t got a straight forward meaning to graphic design or typography, Nawal and I thought it would be a good idea to write the desription of our letter ourselves. We will use colour, layout and typography to provide our postcard with emphasis and meaning to our letter.
‘The importance of typography in design can not be overestimated. Knotting the accuracy, precision and balance of geometrics formed together can give letters the elegance and sharpness they deserve,’ This is the brief description we came out with after a long research session through: books, internet and conversation.
Experimentation From the layout book, we’ve noticed that sometimes it’s not always best to keep things as they are - there are times where you should experiment with shape, transformation and corners.
H
elvetica
HELVETICA For the brief description on our postcard, we needed to chose a type face first. This was probably the easiest decision for both of us, as our favourite is Helvetica. Although we knew it would go well with our design, we still decided to research it first.
Helvetica designed by Max Miedinger and Edouard Hoffman and issued by the Swiss type foundry Hass in 1957. based on Akzidenz Grotesque, an alphabet popular at the turn of the century, it was originally called Haas Grotesque/New Haas Grotesque, but was retitled Helvetica after release in Germany in the early 1960s.
Helvetica is one of the most well known type faces, especially in the world of design. It’s legible, clear-cut characters contribute to it’s continuing international popularity. This typeface is iconinc and it had a great impact on typography, graphic design and popular culture. Below are some famous designs which use Helvetica as their main typeface for their logo.
A film known simply as “Helvetica,” covered the world of graphic design, typography, and Helvetica’s role in it all. Directed by Gary Hustwit, the documentary was released in the same year of Helvetica’s 50th anniversary. The documentary was nominated for the “Truer Than Fiction Award” at the Independent Spirit Awards.
FINAL OUTCOME
In the end, we couldn’t decide on just one design therefore we thought we’d keep the two. The postcard on the right is what we originally came up with. Seeing as we worked in a pair, we both designed differently then compared the two. The two final postcards are in a black portfolio, labeled with Nawal’s and my name on it.
The importance of typography in design can not be overestimated. Knotting the accuracy, precision and balance of geometrics formed together can give letters the elegance and sharpness they deserve.
The importance of typography in design can not be overestimated. Knotting the accuracy,
precision
and
balance
of
geometrics formed together can give letters the elegance and sharpness they deserve.
The Letters in the landscape Task Three: Mapping the landscape The brief:
This project begins with a visit to Poole where you will identify, collect and photograph, examples of vernacular letterforms in the town. Your images could be literal interpretations of details of road signs, hand painted signs, neon signs, fragments of words, individual characters, manhole covers, gravestones or shop-front signs. Documenting these typographic havens is crucial to rebuff the constant threat from planners and councils that choose to subvert local history and ignore the rich traditions of vernacular heritage. Alternatively, you could choose to record a slightly more challenging abstract collection of ‘hidden signs’ drawn from architectural forms, found objects, and unintentional typographic strutures. You will be working teams of four and planning which letterforms you each photograph in order to create a lexicon of vernacular letterforms. Remember, you will need a full alphabet It is important that you keep accurate notes for each of the pictures: ie Photographer, Location, Date, Description before returning to AUB and uploading your pictures to hard drive. You will then go through a process of picture editing and retouching in readiness to prepare layouts for the book they will be published in.
Technical specifications: Trimmed size: 300mm x 300mm 300dpi CMYK TIFF
My group: Katarzyna Poplawska Rosaline Thomas Samuel Jones Ryan Young
Trip to Poole On 23rd January as a whole group, we have gone to Poole to undertake the first task in this prject. We were told to follow the brief: take photographs in order to make the whole alphabet. Apart from spending the whole day exploring Poole and taking interesting photos, we also went to a museum for further research and knowledge. Below are some of the picture from that day, not including the ones we will later use to make our book.
OUR PHOTOS This is a set of images we have gathered together, before digital manipulation. We have all contributed to this set.
After we selected the photo’s we will later on put in our book, we have decided to start the digital maunipulation using Photoshop Cs6. Each person had roughly 4 folders of letters to edit. Below are some examples of my edits.
The next task in this project was to make a ‘Letters in the landscape’ A-Z typography book.
We decided that our book will have a lot of space, rather than trying to fit too many photos on one page as that looks tacky and unprofessional. We also agreed that I will be the one who
The first thing we did towards that, was sketched out the potential layout of our book. We had great help from our tutors with grids in Indesign.
will design the book.
Although we have decided on a potential layout, we understand that during the process of desining it, that could change due to many factors. One of them being the amount of images we want to include and another being the
As I will be the one who designs the book, we’ve decided that we all begin to bind it together, however the boys agreed to finish book binding themseleves.This way each member of the group had an important task to do (Rosie took the majority of the pictures we DECIDED to keep.
size of them.
TheLetter book
Book layout Below are some screenshots of the book layout I was designing using InDesign. I have been using grids in order to help me structure the layout. We will be binding out book using French folding, therefore the layout isn’t like a spread .
Book binding
Perfect binding: Method of bookbinding where a flexible adhesive attaches a paper cover to the spine of the assembled signatures is called perfect binding. Perfect binding puts all the pages or signatures together, roughens and flattens the edge, then a flexible adhesive attaches the paper cover to the spine. Paperback novels are one example of perfect binding.
The next task was to print, trim and book bind our work. Firstly, we all looked at the recommended key texts and books on book binding, so we knew what we’d have to do. After, our tutor has showed us how to do it ourselves. This page contains all the research I have done for book binding.
This book fully explains what book binding is. I have found it quite useful, as I could not remember everything that my tutor said. Instead, I just looked inside the book for further explanation of perfect binding.
Binding our book This page shows our process of book binding.
Using the Lumbeck Press (shown in all the images below) we binded our book with the process of Perfect Binding the most effective binding when using French fold pages.The whole process took around 30 mins + time for the glue to dry out. We placed our pages upside down so that the spine was on top, as it needed glue. Once we’ve done that, we left it for 24 hours then came back to trip it and add a cover to it. It was pretty easy to do, however we would struggle without the help of our tutors.
Finished book This page shows our book completely finished.
Here are pictures of our book finished and ready for marking. This book is in Sam Jones’ box labelled with all our names. Personally, I am quite happy with this outcome as this is the first time I’ve ever had to design and print + bind the book myself therefore it was a new experience. I can see how much I’ve learnt because of it, such as keyboard shortcuts on InDesign, layout and composition. Overall, I think this project was one of my favourites so farand I hope to do more book work.
Thetrip to London Whilst half of our class was on an educational trip to Berlin, others including myself took a trip to London for inspiration and to expand our cultural knowledge.
When we got to London, our main stop was the Science Museum. There was a lot of interesting objects there but one of the most important thing for us was the 3D typography exhibition. Some of the work up there was very impressive and we all fell in love with the finishing touches of the work. Pictures below show the Science Musuem and the work that I was most influenced and inspired by for this unit.
Vintage objects such as typing machine which I thought was quite interesting.
This is the poster that has been chosen by the majority of the votes of our class. A couole of students designed their own poster, then we all decided on which one should represent the exhibition. This is the design of Will Curtiss.
TheExhibition On Monday 17th February, we held an exhibition titled ‘For The Love of Graphics’. It was a one day exhibition that aimed to explore our love of Graphics through a spectacular display of all the things we thought were interesting, inspiring and impressive.
These are some other posters that I thought were extraordinary and deserved some recognition. I particulary like that one on the left because of the simplicity and bold colours however I thought it was too close to Valenties Day and it could confuse the potential targer audience.
The piece that I’ve decided to exhibit was an ‘I <3 NY’ photo album as I believe that Milton Glaser’s classic design is amazing. In addition to that, I also have a T-shirt which says ‘I [picture of a camera] NY’ which suggests how that well known symbol/logo can be changed and still have the same or similar meaning. Pictures below show the objects that I’ve put into this exhibition. We also had to include a small note about our objects, this is what I said: ‘‘I NY’ is a classic design from Milton Glaser. I love it because it’s simple, recognisable around the whole around and adjustable just like on the T-shirt. Both items had been bought in the International Center of Photography, New York’.
TheLectures Ooh, Ahh, Mmm - Notions of Taste, Aesthetic judgement and customer culture. This is the first lecture Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve booked and it was by far my favourite. The session explored our relationship with objects and how we respont to and give value to things. It also considered how our aesthetic judgment and purchase decisions relate to consumer culture. The lecture was given by Kirsten Hardie who has recommended www.coolhunting.com to us as a website with daily updates on ideas and products in the intersection of art, design culture and technology. How do we judge? Thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s simple: -subjectively -objectively -by experience of objects -through influence of media/culture -educationaly TASTE: -derives from old French term -to touch or to feel and judge
As part of this unit, we had the opportunity to sign up for lectures from Visual Communication, Illustration, Fine Art and of course Graphic Design. This has enabled me to broad and experiment the creative process of the artistic pathway. Overall, I really enjoyed all of the lectures I attended.
The Power of Persuation: Propaganda - Meanings, Methods & Messages. This is another lecture from Kirsten that I have attended. This session explored propaganda - what it is, why it exists and how it operates. From this lecture I have learned that propaganda has been used a lot in the history of design. The key issues of propaganda are notions of mass manipulation and persuasion and control. Moreover: animal rights, political campaigns, war reportage and news stories. This lecture was quite interesting, although at times I thought it wasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t relevant to my essay topic which was about ethics. I have still found it useful and I enjoyed learning about it.
PROPAGANDA: -an organised promotion of information to assist or damage the cause of government or movement.
Ethics, Manifestos and Doing Good + Postmodernism seminar: Seeing as my essay was about ethics I thought it would be appropriate to attend another one of Kirstenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s lectures. In this lecture, she has introduced us to the key ethical issues in our society as well as ethics in graphic design. That same afternoon, I have attended a seminar of hers which was about postmodernism. There I have learned the key concepts, theories, characteristics and examples of postmodernism. I have also attended all of her seminars and morning sessions about the essay which helped me with the structure and development of my essay.
ETHICS: - moral principles that govern a personâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s behaviour or the conducting of an activity.
TheWorkshops As part of this unit, just like the lectures, we were able to attend 3 different workshops from all of the Visual Art’s courses. This opportunity has enabled me to expand my knowledge of other subjects as well as let my creativty take it’s turn. From these workshops, I have learned a very important lesson: I am glad I’ve chosen graphic design. On a serious note, it was a veru useful and productive way to challenge my practical skills as well as evaluate my thinking process.
Digital Letterpress The first workshop I have gone to was the Digital Letterpress with Roger Gould. The whole session was based on working on a computer, using ‘LetterMPress’ program/app which enabled us to create type just like on a classic letterpress. After a demonstration of how to use the program, we were able to create our own designs and experiment with different backgrounds, colours and compositions.Overall, I quite enjoyed this workshop because it was useful and we could do it anytime we want in the computer room - easy access and it’s free! Below are some examples of what I did in the workshop:
Explosive drawing The next workshop I attended was the Explosive drawing from Illustration. I had mixed feelings about this one, because the aim was to cover with paint a whole wall and floor with the theme of a story that was playing in the background. This meant that on the spot I had to use my creativity and painting skills which I didn’t feel comfortable with at the begining, although slowly managed to get going. The end result was stunning, it was great to see so many talented people get together to work on one project and that’s why I can say that I’ve enjoyed this workshop.
Theadditional photos Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d like to include pictures of other books that I have used as part of my research. Some of them have only been read while others Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve used as reference and basic of my knowledge.
The image above is from one of our seminars. During it we all wrote down what we thought was good and bad designs. Overall it was a great session and we a lovely group photo.
Theevaluation To conclude this whole unit, I must admit it was much more enjoyable than the first one. I really liked the fact that we were able to work in groups and improve those skills. I also really enjoyed the different lectures and workshops as I really felt like I was learning new things this includes the research for the essay which was challenging but it enabled me to become a proactive learner. If I could do the whole project again, I would definitely attend to more lectures and workshops as I felt like I didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t use the time as wisely as I shouldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve done. In my next unit, I need to make sure I am more organised and keep an eye on time and deadlines.Moreover, I should read the key texts at the start of the project.
The End