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Excavating Graphic Design
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Kavi Sivyer BA Hons Graphic Design, Level 5 University of Hertfordshire Professional Development Journal Semester B 2013 Tutors: Matthias Hillner, Jonathan Miller
Excavating Graphic Design Designed, Written, and Published by Kavi Sivyer
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CONTENTS
6 Analyse the Area Before you start mining it’s vital to scope the area, and know what your dealing with. The best place to start? Staff Talks.
10 Surface Chiselling Now we have the right area, we have to make sure there is something of substance here. Best way to find out is through Design Talks.
12 Tunnel Digging Make sure your digging in the right direction. A good way to check this is to compare your work to others who have succeeded in the past. Review Agencies.
18 Assess the Stones So we’re where we want to be, but what’s next? We have to compare our thought to the thoughts of other great designers. London Exhibitions.
24 Position the Blast Start looking at where you would like to work. Place the bombs strategically. So when it goes off it has an impact. The Design Agency List.
26 Detonate & Hope for the Best Everything’s in it’s place, so all that’s left to do is to hit the button and hope for the best. But exactly are my hopes and ambitions for the future?
28 Collect the Gems The exciting part. Collecting the goods. But it’s vital to know what you want to do with your new found wealth. Personal Design Manifesto.
30 Keep the Canary Singing Finally, what’s the future looking like? How am I going to continue in my design practice? What aspects of it interest keeps me going? Third Year Ambitions.
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the Area.
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Staff Talks When it comes to mining, its important to know where a good place to start digging is. To do this you have to assess the area, and really it’s the same when it comes to graphic design. So what is it makes good graphic design? Many think that in order for graphic design to be good they have to like it. But this way of thinking leads us to a dead end, because what one-person likes another dislikes. So rather than judging a piece of work on taste, we have to judge it on how well the visual language conveys the message the design was intended for. Lets take the work of Martin Schooley as an example to illustrate this point.
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Martin graduated from the Royal College of Art. After graduating he began a small design agency with one of the designers he used to study with. Their first project of real significance was one they did for an optician’s named Melson Wingate. The concept for the logo design that they generated for this company was very interesting. They looked at the structure of the eye, and how behind the eye things are seen upside down, and this then reflects back through the eye allowing us to see the world the right way up. He applied this idea to the company name, Melson Wingate, noticing that the M and the W could be used in this way. This is designing.
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He has also designed many wedding invitations and menus to go with the wedding. One of the wittiest ones was one he did for his friend Katherine Ready, and her husband to be, Daniel Moore. Noticing the interesting surnames he decided to play on this creating phrases like “Katherine’s Ready”, “Ready… steady… go!”, “Ready for Moore”, “The Moore the merrier” and “Don’t bite of Moore than you can chew”. He applied this concept to the invitations, menu, order of service and the half-day invites, and the after party as well. The thing that makes this a good piece of graphic design is not only the nice layout and treatment of type, but also the clever concept behind it.
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Surface Chiseling.
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Design Talk When mining for precious gems, we can’t just dig anywhere. We have to be sure that where we are going to dig is the right place to dig. Similarly we have to know who to listen to when speaking about graphic design. We need to do some surface chiseling, to see if what’s underneath is good. A great way to do this is through hearing great designers speak. What better place to start than Alan Kitching, worldrenowned letterpress designer. He got into typography at a very young age. He said, “when I was younger I wanted to be a poster artist, but where I lived there wasn’t a great need for poster artists. So when I was 14 they put me in a printers shop, and I loved it!”
The thing that makes Alan, stand out from other designers is the fact that while all other designers embraces the use of technology, Alan prefers to stay aloof from it, and do all of his design by hand. Rather surprising when you see the large size of some of his pieces. He says, “The great thing about letterpress designing is that it feels very organic and pure. For example if you don’t have the letter ‘O’ then you can replace it with the number ‘0’, and rather than spoiling the piece it enhances its meaning.” And really he’s right. We can see now that more and more designers are slowly going back to using raw materials again in design, in order to capture the unique aesthetic.
Tunnel Digging. 12
Review Agencies Its important to be digging tunnels in the right direction when mining for gems. With graphic though an easy way of making sure that your work is going in the right direction is to check it against the work of designers who you aspire to be like. So here is a review of two top design agencies.
Turner Duckworth and Williams Murray Hamm. These two design companies have designed some of the most clever and innovative branding in the graphic design industry. Its interesting to see how, even though both agencies are involved with branding, their clients vary significantly. Williams Murray Hamm, seems to be generally favored, by smaller specialized companies, where as Turner Ducksworth generally has larger companies employing it.
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Lets take a closer look at Williams Murray Hamm. One project they worked on was called ‘FETCH’. The client was an entrepreneur with a dog walking company, where she would pick up, walk and then return your dog. She was also based in Wimbledon. So what better way to represent this small company than with a tennis ball business card, that you can also use out on walks with your dog. Another client that Willaims Murray Hamm has taken on is Syngenta Pergado. This business deals with s new technology in grapes pesticide. The branding of the company was all based on circular shapes. The circles represent grapes, rain as well as growth. Interestingly the application of the circles is not limited to the pesticide bottle, but is cleverly and uniquely applied to all of the other branding for the company including, cd covers, a baby mobile, wine coasters. These two projects are just an example of the great thinking that comes out of Williams Murray Hamm, but from there two we can also see that the clients tend to be smaller companies.
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Turner Duckworth on the other hand, deals with bigger clients. Coca-cola, amazon, waitrose, homebase and levis. All of these are just naming a few of the clients that Turner Ducksworth deal with. Their style of graphic design is very unique, and they tend to simplify things, trying not to over complicate the design, which leaves the piece looking very pure and attractive. One of the projects that shows this nicely is their design of the some of the Homebase merchandise. One of the most successful pieces is the set of designs done for the grass seeds. One each packet there is grass that is grown into a shape according to what those seeds are meant for. For example the lawn revival seeds shows a patch of grass shaped like a heart. This very simply, but uniquely clever solution just shows what Turner Duckworth are all about. Simple, functional design, that improves the sales for their clients, and gives the customer an enjoyable experience.
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Analyse the Design Exhibitions Once you are pleased with the location, then the next step would be to go and really look deeper at the stones, to see if its what your after. So for a graphic designer this means going to exhibitions. This is a great way to experience design in general, and it really allows you to go deeper into your design practice. The light show exhibition was very inspirational. Although it was not directly connected to graphic design the thing that made the connection was the use of colour through-out all the exhibitions, as well as the thinking that is put into the pieces themselves, and of course the thinking aspect is a key part to graphic design.
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A beautiful example of great thinking was the first exhibition. It consisted of 99,000 tiny lights, that were synced together to great different images inspired by nature, such as tornados or snowflakes. Just by looking at this piece, ideas start coming to my simply because of the innovative thinking put into this piece of art.
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Another very interesting piece, was a piece that used colour alone, to change the emotion of the person interacting with it. There was a series of three rooms that were coloured green, red and blue with nothing else in them. While you were walking between the rooms you could really feel a change in mood. This just helped me to really understand the power that colour can has, and how as graphic designer, we can use this to our advantage.
the Bomb.
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Design Agency List Now that we have found the kind of rock that we want to mine we have to strategically place explosives in order to get the best result. With graphic design the best way to start positioning those bombs is to know who you want to work for in the future. Who inspires you to keep going in your practice. Here is my list.
Taxi Studio
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Johnson Banks
Hat-Trick
Frost
Blast
Bibliotheque
Rose Design
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Turner Duckworth
Williams Murray Hamm
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Hopes & Ambitions When the blast goes off, there really is just one thing that you can do, and that is hope for the best. While designing there are so many challenges that we face, that feel like little explosions of their own. For me there’s always that deep desire for everyone to like my work, and the hope of getting that ground breaking idea, and always wanting to be the best. But these things all come with time.
No great man got to where he is without hard work and perseverance, and graphic design is no different. The best way to not get too affected by all of these things is to design for a higher purpose. Rather than design for anyone and everyone, (which can become quite mechanical) design for yourself and never finish a project until you are satisfied with it‌ even if the deadline has passed. This way there will be much more fulfilment when designing.
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Collect the Gems.
Design Manifesto Now the fun part. Collecting the Gems. The whole purpose of mining is to get the jewels at the end. This is what we value. What do graphic designer value? A good way to find out is reading design manifestos. So here are is my design manifesto.
- Always stick to your morals. If a company hires you to work on something that you are against, turn it down. Other jobs will come. - Break the grid when you need to. Don’t get me wrong the grid is great. But when it’s not working on a piece of design then trust your own instincts. - Keep it simple. There is always going to be over complicated design in the world. If your simple you will get noticed better. - Keep it clever, not just looking good. If there is no concept behind a piece then it leaves a smaller impact on the viewer. - At the same time, keep it looking good. If it doesn’t look good , no one will be bothered to appreciate your concept.
- Work on a piece until you satisfied, even if the deadlines passed. This way you will be more fulfilled within your practice, and will enjoy it more. - Learn through mistakes. Because a mistake is only a mistake if you don’t learn from it. - Design for yourself more than anyone, because everyone else’s opinions are flickering, so if you are happy and confident about your design then generally so are others. - Always be ready to take constructive criticism, because that is the only way you’ll grow.
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Keep the Singing. 30
Third Year Ambitions So now we have collected all the jewels, but what’s next? We have to keep the canary singing. Keep enthused in your design practice, and look ahead to the future. The area of graphic design that I’m really interested in is. In the past I thought that all branding consisted of was creating a logo and a colour scheme, and just applying that to everything. Through my research and experience, I have found it to actually be something much deeper. Having the opportunity to think cleverly about something, and apply those ideas differently to every product, while at the same time keeping everything looking as part of a set, is really enjoyable and fulfilling.
Another thing that I feel is important within graphic design is moral code. For example I find it interesting the way that one person will happily design for cigarette campaign, while another designer will be completely against it. So this is potentially an area that I want to investigate further through my third year dissertation. But I really think that the most important thing for me to do for the future is to continue to look at great work and keep my interests growing. That is the best way to keep the canary singing for great graphic design.
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Designed, Written, and Published by Kavi Sivyer