EGRD1008: Production and Consumption
Utopia. An imagnary place considered to be perfect or ideal. A place that cannot be seen by people because we have no concept of perfection. Everyones ideas about their ideal world are completely different and therefore not one perfect place exists. The tin foil was representative of the idea that utopia is hidden and we can’t see it, so the foil reflects it surroundings to fit in because if we were ever to find it, we would destroy it and it would no longer exist.
Manifesto
After working with the idea that utopia cannot exist as a place I began to see it as a moment in time. Everyone has those moments which to them are perfect or those things which they love doing. Often these moments get overtaken by other tasks and people don’t stop and take time for themselves. The manifesto is written using a sewing machine because although challenging it was something that I enjoyed doing and taking the time to really show what the writing is about. The time taken to make the manifesto is representing the time others should take to do what they want instead of what they have to do.
Packaging
When approaching this brief we all worked together to begin with to produce ideas about the design and then went off separatly to produce a variety of designs which could have been shown to the client. Starting by producing a range of different illustrations to give it that hand done feel. Printing onto brown paper gave the packaging a rustic feel which went with the product. Working in a group proved difficult at times however it was good to be able to have people to bounce ideas off and because we all have different skills we could help each other out on different parts.
Eb D C# C B Bb A G# G F# F E Eb D C# C B Bb A G# G Ă?# F E Eb D C# C B Bb A Infographics
Creating an infographic about a piece of music. Taking the first 9 bars and comparing the notes and their length to that of the last 9 bars. After drawing it by hand I vectorised it on illustrator. It looks visually interesting and it is obvious tot see the differences between the beggining and the end of the piece.
G# G F# F E Eb D C# C B Bb A G# G F# F E Eb D C# C B Bb A G# G F# F E Eb D C# C B Bb A G#
Major Burnaby drew on his gum boots, buttoned his overcoat collar round his neck, took from a shelf near the door a hurricane lantern, and cautiously opened the front door of his little bungalow and peered out.
Infographics
Taking the idea further by using the first line from a book to create an infographic about the number of times each letter is used. This lead on to planning out the first sentence using coloured squares because the book it was taken from was an Agathy Christy novel and so it represted the mystery nature of the book.
a b c d e f g h i
j k l m n o p
r s t u v w
y
. ,
Book about a Book
Creating a book about how the Penguin on the cover of the Penguin Books has changed since it was first made. After visting the bookbinding workshop I decided to make a concertina book containing just the images of the Penguins. After making a few mock ups of ideas before I settled on the final one. Making up a fake cover of a Penguin book and replacing the book title and author. The simplicity of the concertina design reflects the content of the book and just using full size images of the Penguins to simplify it. Having the bookfair gave us an opportunity to show other people at the uni what we have been doing and to sell our work to people which was really satisfying. It was a really successful event and gave us an opportunity to talk to a wider audeince about our work.
Intervention
After recieving our instructions we decided to go around London Intervening taking photos from above and below. We also used photoshop to create the image of Abi climbing up a pole as it represented everything we had been told to do. To begin with we were a bit hesitant with what we were doing but then began to embrace the idea that people stopping and looking at what we were doing was another form of intervention in itself because we were making them stop.
The LAB
The 24 hour sit in. As we were situated in the canteen we began to try and make it look more appealing in there. After someone had been using coloured acetate earlier we got the idea to cover up a lit advert by hiding it underneath coloured triangles. It was nice to be in an environment where everyone was getting on with work, chatting and having a chilled time together. It made it feel like more of a studio community and there were lots of converstions about the work and ideas flowing.
The LAB
During the LAB Me, Rhea and Abi decided to start up a zine which we could then continue throughout next year. It lead on from a talk by ditto press and the experimental nature of the whole two weeks. The idea came out naturally towards the end of the two weeks, and we had just a laugh creating the images to go inside. The quick deadline meant some great images have been produced to put into it. Each zine will have a one word theme to keep it quite simple. The theme of the first one is Triangles and so we created some quick collages and images which we can photocopy to mass produce the zine. These are some of the images we have produced so far which will be going into the Zine.
Evaluation Overall I have really enjoyed this semester of work. There has been a lot of good opportunities and the projects we have been given have been mostly enjoyable. Starting with the Utopia brief, it was a great start to the term because we were working together and the discussions and debates we began to have whilst presenting our Utopias and Dystopias were really interesting. I found it helpful to have to think about why we really did what we did and getting your point across when people question it and also hearing other peoples view on the same issue. This lead into the manifesto which I got really into because I was able to express how I felt and although we had to present it to the group I didn’t find it as difficult because I was talking about something which I really cared about and so my confidence in presenting has grown a bit from that. The project I liked the least this term was probably the packaging brief. I’m not really that interested in packaging design so wasn’t very engaged from the beginning and although working in a group was a good opportunity there were a few times when there were disagreements which were hard to get over because we are good friends normally, so no one really took control and we ended up doing separate things. As much as I didn’t enjoy it the crits were helpful and a bit of a insight as to the sort of conversations you would be having with a client. Being able to go to London for the intervention brief was really exciting. It was quite annoying that we didn’t know what we were going to be doing till we swapped ideas there because we couldn’t plan anything or bring any equipment to maybe have done something a bit more interesting, but being able to work together outside of the studio was really good. I was really excited when we got the opportunity to have the book fair, not only at the possibility of selling work but seeing peoples reaction and interaction with what we had been doing. It was all a bit last minute and I had doubts as to if people would come but the turnout was amazing and as well as Graphics students there were students and tutors from other courses who were genuinely amazed at the work and the whole event which was really satisfying. Also having the event meant the work had to be perfect and had to be finished by the deadline, which was good practice.
I think the LAB was a really good idea and a great opportunity for both years the only downside was that we hadn’t done it sooner. I had envisaged all the students coming in and working in the big studio together, chatting about ideas and collaborating together and that didn’t happen as much as I expected. I didn’t know what I was going to do to begin with and I had hoped that just by having everyone in the space I would get inspired or see something which I liked which didn’t really happen so it did take a while for anything to happen. Being able to have the 24 sit in was really successful because it had more of that studio vibe and things were just happening collectively. Throughout the LAB because we were all sharing the same space it allowed more for discussion through first and second years and now I wouldn’t be afraid to approach them for possible collaborations or opinions on work which is really nice, and even within our first year group I have talked to a lot more people than I had done before, and I see it as something which could be done at the beginning of the year so there is that dialogue and friendship between years from the beginning. The people that came in to talk were really interesting and I gained a lot from hearing and discussing with them about their work and practice and about how they got to where they are now. I knew about and was already interested in some of the people before they came in and so it was exciting to hear from them unlike some of the other talks that are arranged which can be interesting but I probably hadn’t heard of them before and don’t really look into it more after, it was nice to have student led talks. I thought the show at the rag factory was a big success. I was slightly disappointed that my work didn’t get into the show considering the amount of space there was available but to be able to be part of it was really good and to have visitors like Ken Garland was amazing. Looking through my work as I was putting together my portfolio I don’t think I have as much physical work as I maybe had last semester but I feel I have gained a lot more especially from the LAB but also just the nature of the briefs has allowed us to learn a lot about industry, working as a group and explaining your ideas as well as creating the work.