EARTH ARTEFACT
Research Document
Alexander Nicholson
Response to the Brief
Earth Artefact
I feel that this brief allows us to dravel down many different pasths as an artefact from earth can be interpreted in many different ways, for example it could be an actual remake of there record or perhaps some other form of time capsule showing remembrance of human life.
some form of book or leaflet consisting of info-graphics may be the best option although I will have to experiment with various styles and techniques.
I will begin this brief here in this book by carrying out various forms of research. I will look into primary research by carrying our surveys. I will then move on to more general research such as the history of space flight, NASA and the voyager spacecraft itself before looking at different artists styles of work. To finish my research I will come up with three main Ideas which I will the experiment with in a second book titled ‘development’. With only my initial thought I feel that perhaps making 2
Space USA
Space Race
Space Shuttle
NASA
Apollo Missions
Apollo 18
The man who fell to earth
Films Koyaanisqatsi
Interstellar Gravity
Alien
Images of earth
Voyager
Hubble telescope
The Golden Record “We come in peace” “The sound of Earth” Last record of humanity
Earth Artifact
Danny Hass
Over Population War
Earth Artefact
Artists
Michael Murdock
Capitalism Valentin Viktorov
Nina Geometrieva
Pollution
Capitalism
Issues Economic systems
Earths Resources Waste
Religion
Elements - Human and Physical
Consumorism 3
Primary research: Issues and Problems For my primary research I decided to ask a range of questions to my class mates in order to build up an idea of what they thought of mankind. The result form this date suggest that most people agree that mankind is still a violent race and war is likely in the future.
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I could link this to the brief as I could possible show how the record was sent into outers-pace as a cry for help from more civilised worlds.
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War
Religion
Successful Explore space
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Consumerism
Destroyed by nuclear war
Killed by natural events on earth
Alien invasion
Waste
Pollution
Over population
What are your concerns for the future?
Killed by a Plauge
Natural disaster
Live untill our species die out
Capitalism
What will happen to mankind in the future?
Lack of natural resources
Kill ourselves with over population
NASA NASA’s Astronauts famously standing on the moon in 1969 after the famous Apollo 11 landings. NASA created voyager in 1977 to explore Jupiter and saturn although they continue traveling to this day.
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NASA is Americas’ space programme, responsible for some of mankind’s greatest achievements in space. NASA itself, standing for “National Aeronautics and Space Administration” was established in 1958 by president Dwight D. Eisenhower with the hope of one day taking civilians into space. Pictures are some of
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On the left is NASA’s curent logo which was derived from the origional logo pictured on the botom left. The simple colour scheme is also instantly recognisable by the genral public. It was designed by James Modarelli in 1959 and pictures what appears to be stars, an orbiting planet with the rev ‘V’ reprisenting aeronautics.
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On the left is NASA’s “Official” logo which is used in special events and presentations. THe more complex logo shows the name and contains similar aspects of NASA’s “Everyday” logo. Although this logo is radicaly different the colour scheme still makes it recognisable.
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Voyager Spacecraft In 1977 NASA built two brand new spacecrafts named voyager one and two. Their initial mission was to explore Jupiter and Saturn as the crafts passed by although they have continued way past the planets they were created to explore as voyager two went on to explore Neptune and Uranus, still holding the record as the only man made object explore them. Both crafts were fitted with a ‘Golden Record’ which contained incrypted images and sounds that give a brief overview of life on earth, in hope that one day an alien species may come across the crafts floating in deep space. On August the 20th 1977 Voyager two was launched on a Titan-Centaur rocket with it’s sister ship launched shortly after. On August 25, 2012 Voyager 1 became the first human-made
object to enter interstellar space, traveling further than anyone, or anything, in history. The crafts are still the only man made object to explore the outer planets such as pluto. The crafts are still transmiting infomation back to earth through deep space somunications giving us an idea of their speed and location. Voyager one was recently clocked at traveling 11 miles per second. Voyager 2 is expected to enter interstellar space within afew years of 2016.
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The Golden Record Two golden records were produced and were fitted to the voyager spacecraft back in 1977. Although records may seem an old fashioned way of storing information, it was at the cutting edge of technology at the time, devices such as floppy disks, CD’s and Hardrives simply didn’t exist. It was decided that the record was to be made of gold as it would not weather or smash along it’s journey. On the front of the record are four diagrams, the first show how the record should be played as an alien species would have no idea. The second shows a brief map to our planet with the rest of the images again showing how the record should be played. The Record titled “Sounds of Earth” contains many different images and audio clips that are to be decrypted. It is thought by many people that the golden records will be the last trace of
human life, due to our violent nature its possible that we will destroy ourselves by the time that alien life finds us.
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Pictured above is the Golden record fitted onto the voyager space crafts. On the Left the front diagrams can be easily seen as they are etched into the surface of the record meaning they will not be worn away in space. On the rear (Right) the title of the record “The sounds of Earth� is centred with the rings of the record oscillating outwards.
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What’s on the Golden Record?
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Although records seem old and out-dated system of storing data at the time it was the most advanced format. The record itself is full encrypted images showing a brief insight into life on earth. The images show vehicles, animals, landscapes and us. Of course with the voyager space crafts being sent up back in 1977 the images are of low quality and appear to have a sepia filter over them, a common trail of vintage cameras. The sounds, due to their age appear to be slightly muffled and crackly as we are use to the crystal clear HD formats of the modern world.
ever to attack. The images show how grow and live our lives which again has being criticised by some. Of course the record is simply attached to the spacecraft voyager without anything to play it with. The only help is on the front of the record where a simple illustration shows the tool needed to listen to it. Viewing the images however would be another challenge.
Some people criticised NASA for including detailed images of our internal Organs and structure as it would give alien species the upper hand in-case they were 12
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Space - The final frontier exploring our solar system. The moon-landings and ISS are the biggest. Mankind is permanently set in space and our natural passion to explore will only fuel our discoveries.
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Space is deemed as the final frontier as it’s practically impossible to explore with the technology available, even in hundreds of years its thought we still wont have the capabilities to put man into deep space. Despite this within the last few decades we have made tremendous strides in
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Pictured above is an artists interpretation of our solar system with the sun at the centre. The planets are then aligned outwards with two asteroid belts circling. Our solar system only has two planet within the ‘Habitable zone’ (The part where liquid water is formed, not to hot or too cold.) Earth and Mars. Of course we know there is life on earth and scientists are now trying to prove that there was once life on Mars with the help of the curiosity rover although nothing has been proven. The planets are ordered with Mercury first followed by, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto.
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Films
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Films are practically the closes the public can get to seeing the the true beauty of space, huge blockbusters such as the recent “Gravity” take advantage of Hollywood’s incredible special effects. Although they show the beauty of space the dangers are usually conveyed, whether is killer alien spices or the general inhospitable conditions in space.
they may have the technology to invade our planet for resources. Alternatively an even more bleak outcome would resemble the alien movie where an alien predator which is equally intelligent and deadly hunts mankind.
Early Si-Fi films are often basted in a fantasy world where humans are have explored hundreds of planets and solar systems, where humans are living along side alien spices in harmony and flying around in high tech spaceships and other forms of advanced technology. In reality there would probably be a more bleak outcome as the human race is typically violent. It is also thought that the alien species would have superior technology to us meaning 16
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Games
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The games industry is growing every day with millions of people playing hundreds of games across all platforms such as the XBOX, Playstation and Nintendo. The games they play are hugely different although Si-Fi games have proven particularly popular with audiences around the world. Deadspace is the most realistic game when talking about what might actually happen in the future, in a way linking with the alien film. The game take place on an abandoned spaceship mining a planet fro its resources although the species that inhabit the planet turn out to be incredibly deadly. The player controllers a character through the dimly lit treacherous corridors and rooms of the empty ship, fighting for life.
the biggest and most well know Si-Fi franchise as you play as ‘Master Chief’, a genetically modified human soldier who fights different alien species. The game is so popular that almost everyone who has played a console knows of the game. The final game pictured again shows the story of the fantasy world of Starwars, although the game hasn’t being hugely popular the next edition is set to be, pushing Si- Fi games back up the charts.
Despite Deadspaces’ success the ‘Halo’ franchise is by far 18
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Past & Future with their experiment V2 rocket bomb. Pictured below is the first man to go into space, a Russian called ‘Yuri Gagarin’. The flight was on April 12th 1961 aboard a Vostok 3KA-3 rocket
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Flight has always being an obsession of man and was finally cracked after hundreds of years of experimentation in 1903 by the Wright brothers. Ever since then the aviation industry has exploded, pushed by needs for better technology during both world wars. The Nazis were one of the first to send a man made object to an altitude classed as space
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Although man has being almost permanently in space since the construction of the ISS we haven’t visited any other planets since the Apollo moon landings. Although recently various space organisations have planed a one way trip to the red planed within the next 20 years. Small cabins will be constructed by rovers which will allow a small team of scientists live on Mars carrying out vital research. Unfortunately once on the red planed there is no way of getting back to earth. 21
Where could the Voyagers’ find life?
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Are we alone? That’s the question that’s being burning for thousands of years although recently we have gotten a huge step closer to finding out what’s really in the universe and weather we are in-fact alone. With the use of various powerful telescopes and other scientific equipment we have being able to identify other solar systems within our galaxy. Within these systems we have found all the right ingredients for sustaining life... A sun and various planets within the habitable zones which appear to have a similar composition.
Despite this with advancements in technology its possible that we will discover more about these planets. Pictured right are the planets discovered compared to Earth. On the next page a diagram of our solar system is compared with the Kepler 62 solar system showing many similarities between them. Perhaps one day the voyager space crafts could reach a planet similar to those pictured.
The possibility that these planets could hold life is extremely high although we will probably never know as the closest (Kepler 186f) is a huge 490 light years away from earth. 22
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What would aliens look like? Nobody really knows what aliens look like but there has being thousands of interpretations which fuel the imagination.
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One of the most recognisable aliens is the Xnomorph from the film ‘Alien’ due to the fear factor it imposed in the late 1970s. Despite this creature
being the most advanced predator known to man other interpretations show aliens which are friendly and what to share ideas and technology with each other. Shows such as Dr Who and Futurama display this.
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Where could the Voyagers find life?
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In response to NASA discovering these new planets a series of advertising posters were created in a vintage style that resembles the days of the space race between America and Russia. They contain bright bold vector images which capture the viewers attention. They typography used varies between serif and san-serif although, like the images they are bold and eyecatching while still retaining the vintage sixties look. The posters are based around the ideas of how these new discovered worlds are different from our own. For example the poster on the immediate left emphasises how the
difference in gravity would effect humans, shown by a skydiver. The middle poster shows how the different vegetation might look compared to Earth’s green grass planes whilst the third shows how Kepler 16b orbits two suns meaning everything has two shadows. These illustrations combined with tag-lines such as “Where your shadow always has company” makes them successful. Perhaps I could attempt to incorporate this style into the voyager spacecraft and the golden record.
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Religion Religion is the one of the main things that divides us as humans. Religions can be chosen biased on there beliefs etc although most people are the same faith that they were born into, following in there parents foot steps.
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Each religion has different places of worship such as mosques, churches and synagogues. The different building are visually different and of course can be seen in different places around the globe.
Again, whilst some people find happiness and content following a religion can cause rivalry as religions work differently to each other. Unfortunately this causes wars and extremist group to form. Religious wars have being ongoing for thousands of years and unfortunately wont end anytime soon.
Although many people are happy following a religion others are not, living an atheist life by not believing in god.
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Humanities good points
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Through out humanities short stay on this planet we have done some truly astounding thing that no other animal to walk the earth has ever come close to. First of all our ability to understand language sets us apart from all other animals on the planet, its what helped us become the top predator. Medical science has improved leaps and bounds as we now have thousands of cures and treatments for illnesses, with more breakthroughs being made every day. This also helps us look after our young which we do so through out our lives, something no other animal does, showing man kinds compassion and
affection. Our methods of transportation also help us with this as we can not only reach any corner of the globe on a plane, car or ship but through the internet with a few clicks of a button. This global network is helping Ideas be spread towards helping ourselves and each other. Finally the moon landings are deemed man-kinds biggest success as we walked and drove across our moon. Plans to Mars are next on the list as we are set to travel there as early as 2018.
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Humanities bad points Although we have achieved some amazing things unfortunately mankind is responsible for some terrible things that are still happening around the world today.
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Our planet is becoming more and more polluted by the day with power stations, cars and planes throwing out carbon dioxide and other gasses into the atmosphere, which in turn causes global warming. Other forms of pollution include oil spills, littering and nuclear waste with all these problems growing.
and pushed closer and closer to extinction as we ruthlessly destroy their habitat. Despite all this our grates failing is our inability to live peacefully alongside each other. Wars are ongoing around the world. The first and second world war changed our landscape with a huge loss of life on both sides only ending with the explosion of two nuclear bombs on Japan. Thankfully there are no sings of a third world war although smaller conflicts are still happening.
The animals we share our planet with are also suffering because of us, they are experimented on 32
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Danny Haas Danny Haas is an American artist/ Illustrator who describes himself as “a bit of a geek� due to the fact that his artwork is based on rockets, Starwars, the Avengers and other such films. He works on adobe illustrator, using strong bold vector shapes to make up his work.
all it was near the era when the voyager crafts were built. I would print on various different materials such as brown sugar paper, newspaper and aluminium.
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Although his pieces are contemporary they have a vintage look to them, as-if they have being printed on old newspaper sheets or tin as the colours appear slightly faded and textured although this could all be effects on adobe illustrator. Going with the vintage style I feel that they resemble the 1960 posters of the great space race but without the typography. If I was to use this style I would probably link it to the infographic or poster campaign idea as I feel this style would best relate to the brief as after34
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Nina Geometrieva Geometrieva is a contemorey graphic designer and illustrator working in Singapore. She uses bright strong even neon like colours to create strong eye-catching pieces.
have travelled. This style would also work well with typography, both serif and sanserif which could link to the idea of creating a propaganda poster campaign.
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Although her work is full of different shapes and tones it still appears clean and fresh. The pieces on the left were created as some kind of calender for the magazine “Smashing”. I felt that these pieces linked well to the brief “Earth Artifact” as it conveys the bright fantastic colours of space through a clean graphical outcome. The use of thin angled off lines build up the tone on her work whilst giving the impression of motion. This technique could possibly be used within an info graphic piece as the illusion of motion could be used to help show how far the voyager crafts 36
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WWF The World Wide Fund for Nature commonly known as the WWF is one of the largest nature foundations in the world who help save endangered animals around the world. The also help fight climate change, staging different protests and rally’s. Due to the nature of mankind only strong visual messages seem to get through to the public making an impression. They recruit various designers and illustrators from around the world in order to create these strong graphic messages.
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This style of work references to my idea of having a propaganda poster, using a similar style of shocking images to persuade the minds of the viewers.
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Megan Lee Megan Lee is and American artist/ scientist which conveys her love of both subject by creating a whole manner of different space themed prints which she sell online. These pieces have a retro feel to them whilst still looking modern and contemporary. She shows all the planet in the solar system, arranging them in order of closest to the sun
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This style of work could be influention on my final piece as...
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Kerby Rosanes Kerby Rosanes is a contemporary illustrator who uses a strict media of pencil and fine-liner on white paper. The style caught my attention by the shear detail and complexity. The viewer really has to look into the image to see all the different aspects.
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This style could influence my work as it would be a different media to work in as I typically work on computer based artwork. I could adapt this style working both on screen and paper, adding colour and backgrounds to create a more powerful piece.
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Hubble Telescope I feel that I could incorporate some of the colour schemes and patterns within these photos into my final pieces. All these images cab be found on the Hubble site.
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The Hubble Space Telescope was launched in April 1990 to orbit the Earth looking out into deep space. The telescopes mission was to observe deeps space to potentially look for planets resembling Earth. Since it’s launch it has take some of the most breathtaking images of deep space known to man which is why I have shown it in my artist research.
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Peter Thorpe Peter Thorpe is an American artist who creates space themed pieces using paint and other various media. When first looking at his work it strikes the viewer as it is created using bright bold contrasting colours which gives his work a “trippy” look.
this style I would possibly link it to the idea of creating propaganda posters as I feel that the bold eye catching colours would work well.
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Peter uses various different media although he usually uses thick paints on canvas using various brushes and techniques. The backgrounds are typically black with bright reds and oranges shooting across the canvas to give the impression of motion. I feel that this style of work could be influential ton the brief ‘Earth Artifact’ as it woul ofer a different look and feel as most other artists create there work using software such as Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop. If i was to look further into 46
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Michael Paukner Michael Paukner is a Vienna based graphic designer who own is own company called “Substudio� which was founded in 2002. He creates many different kinds of artwork although I am particularly interested in his info-graphics on the theme of space.
and tidy vector sketches keep his work looking clean, without being cluttered. Again helping clearly convey the information.
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For example his work shows how an info graphic can show the order of the planets in our solar system. This style is present across all his pieces are he uses more natural colours an tones to create a less striking piece which clearly conveys information through the use of various semiotics and typography. I was to go through with my idea of creating an info-graphic showing how far the voyager spacecraft had travelled I would imply these subtle techniques. His use of geometric shapes 48
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Michael Murdock Michael Murdock is an American based artist/ illustrator who creates fun cartoon style outcomes. These outcomes caught my I as i felt the vintage look could relate to back to the other artists work. They picture new spaceships and rockets, advertising them towards the general public asif its a new car or bike. This casual manor makes the pieces look friendly as the colours and tones are subtle.
the vintage look of the old tea stained paper its printed on.
The title typography used is again friendly using a matching colour schemes whilst the smaller print describes the product in more detail.
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If I was to use this style of work I would probably link it to my Idea of craeting propaganda posters although it could also work for my other ideas. I would also probably keep to a similar colour palate as I feel the flat tones work better with 50
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Valentin Viktorov
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Valentin Viktorov was a Russian artist who was hired by the Russian Federal Space Agency to create a chain of propaganda posters to reassure the Russian public that their country would be the first into space and onto the moon, with one of these goals being achieved. The posters had to somehow convay the power of the Soviet union whilst being friendly. He did this by using strong bold colours to create detailed illustrations showing ‘modern, high tech’ rockets shooting up into space. the classic hammer and sickle was also incorporated whilst still sticking to the classic red and yellow russian tones which can be seen across all three images. The first man into space ‘Yuri Gagarin’ is also pictured, showing him as a national icon and inspiration.
relevant as the propaganda side of the posters could be used within my own design, perhaps some stating that sending the golden record into space was a bad idea as it could endanger human life. Whilst other posters would claim its a positive thing that man is exploring into the unknown.
I felt that this style of work was 52
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Troy Williams
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Troy Williams is a renowned poet who writes about various subjects in different styles of poetry. This poem stood out to me as is shows both sides of the universe. One person my see a dark vast empty nothingness whilst another will see it bursting with life and activity. After all its hard to believe we are the only life forms in the universe.
“Poetry is the rhythmical creation of beauty in words.� Edgar Allan Poe 54
Emptiness, but not without hope. Darkness, but not without light. Distant, but just next door. Dead, but bursting with life. Strange, but oh so beautiful. Not right, but not wrong. The unknown space. The human soul.
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“
Unknown Space
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Faridz Design Suite Whilst all different they are all similar in the respect that they are simple and clear whilst sticking to the same colour code of black and white.
One of their more recent jobs was to create a logo for a brand/ company called ‘Decode Earth’. I have shown the diferent logos that were created across these pages.
This style could be linked into recreating the golden record, being clear to read.
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This design suite is a Malaysian based company who create various logos and other designs for different clients.
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Ideas
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First idea: Remaking the record
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For this idea I would simply recreate the golden record itself but with a modern twist. The ‘Record’ could even be a different more modern interface such as a DVD disk or some kind of USB pen drive or external hard drive. The data included on the device would also be radically different to the ones sent on the original record. This would give me the example to show the good and the bad sides to plant Earth and the human race.
The images on the right show how the artist has removed some of the record to create the outline of a head resembling the artists who’s record it is. This idea could somehow be incorporated.
Two devices could be created, one asking for help from extra terrestrial life for help due to our violent nature whilst the other could show our achievements and the good natured side to humans. To research into this I have come across some different artist responses whilst looking into different materials that could be used to recreate a golden record. 60
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Second idea: Info-graphics Info-graphics are potentially a strong way to interoperate the ‘Earth Artifact’ brief as there are many different route’s I could follow. For example some are vector based whilst others are photography based, meaning I could use practically any media.
environment. Each poster although similar is composed differently which again backs up my idea of almost being able to use any media.
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I could use them to display various information about both voyager crafts such as how far they have travelled, their speed, location, etc. Info graphics are extremely popular as they quickly and easily convey information to all audiences. The viewer can almost immediately understand the subject at first glance going onto gather the information provided. I have collected a group of info graphics across the next two pages in order to display how easily information is conveyed, from coffee to films and the 64
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Second idea: Info-graphic, Book layout I would use a theme that incorporates various colours so I could match them to the colours of each planet. Blocks of colour would also break up the pages and allow for text to be placed in more unusual areas.
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If I was to go take this idea up to an end product I would need to look at various layouts which would make the book fun and exciting to read. On these pages I have gathered images of various books which I felt were extremely nicely laid out and would fit in with my own work.
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Third idea: Propaganda
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My idea of creating a propaganda poster first came up when looking into artwork from around the time of when the voyager crafts were launched, and the great space race between American and Russia. To build on this idea I have gathered a range of well known propaganda posters, starting with possibly the most famous of all. The ‘Your country needs YOU’ world war one poster which as become one of the most well known British icons. The posters on the next page are taken from a later time, the middle of the second world war. Propaganda was a huge factor on both sides of the war. As there are no current large scale wars the need for propaganda posters has shrunk although this hasn’t stopped designers and illustrators fro making posters for fictional wars such as
‘Starwars’. One modern day cause for propaganda posters are events such as natural disasters where aid needs funding, calling for the public to donate. I feel that a propaganda poster would work well with the Earth Artifact brief as I could display the good and bad sides of sending the golden record into space.
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Earth Artifact Research Book
University of Huddersfield 2015
Alexander Nicholson 74