Research Project Folder Feng/k1443283/DE7300/Group10
Xueyun Feng MA Communication Design: Illustration Kingston Univeristy K1443283
This folder contains : 1. 500-word critical review of my personal project contribution. 2. Positive critical commentary on a design example and negative critical commentary on a design example. 3. Manifesto. 4. Documentation of the exhibition piece/ what I contributed to the project. 5. Exhibition piece. 6. Group blog: http://www.thedesignschool.co.uk/group10/
A Critical Review of Group 10’s Manifesto and Exhibition Piece By Xueyun Feng Introduction At the beginning of this term, we have been divided into groups to think about what is design and our own role as a designer. As we are from different course and studied different major, we considered the definitions of the subject we were studying in. Through the discussion and conclusion of our final 8 pieces positive critical commentaries and negative critical commentaries, we produced our design manifesto. And as an outcome about design and a reflection on ‘design‘, we produced our exhibition piece - folding display board, which followed our manifesto, and it described design always change - by different ways, different times, different people and different point of view. As a member of group 10, this paper will review why we think design is changing, how we produced our exhibition piece, and will evaluate what was successful and what was less so in the process of our group work. Summary Design always change, from every little things of our daily life. 20 years ago we have never think about we could do our works and hand in it by internet. Technical and society develops incredible quickly, we did not even slow down and aware how different the world is comparing to before. We produced our final exhibition piece which takes look around the little things we used in our daily life - the things and tools people usually put on their study table. We produced illustration works about these difference through recently 20 years, put them onto folding display board, to encourage our audience to look at it from different point view. As this special format, people will see two comparative images about the same table from left and right, to see how different they are. Design always change, from every little things of our daily life. Design is innovative, we should slow down and aware it; Design is functional, it is a problem-solving activity, it feeds people’s need in different ways; Design is understandable and long-lasting, it exist a long time, as a tool, as environment, as a method of makes life better; Design is aesthetic, it is an conclusion of human’s art history and their life practice through time. Evaluate As working in a group, we considered everyone’s different major and different opinions, trying to work out a more appropriate way to follow our manifesto and let everyone show their special skills and ideas. We all from different countries, have different religions and culture, this is a perfect background to discuss why and how design is different and it always change by different ways, different times, different people and different point of view(even by different culture, different religions, different countries). Our ideas changed several times, so we can not get more deeper, this is our problem. We should always stick together, share ideas and develop it together by every way(VLE, blog, facebook, whatsapp, skype). I am thankful for this opportunity to working with these talented people, I learned a lot of how to work in a group and how to achieve our plan step by step. We should not leave anyone of us behind, and always encourage each other and help each other. If we could meet more and always let each other know where we are, we could been done better for this project.
Positive critical commentary on my chosen design product - iphone
Xueyun Feng MA Communication Design: Illustration Products name: Iphone series Design and produced by: Apple
In my opinion, a good design not only looks good, but also contains other elements and bides by more principles. A good design should be functional, innovative, and sometimes is as little design as possible. For example the well-known iPhone series, they are not only smart phones but also contains many high technology functions design. The apps store in the latest lox-8 systems has updated the software use of i-movie, keynote and pages, which allows and supports professionals present works and take notes easily and officially on their phone; The iphone series not only innovated in their technology of the software and systems, but also always considering about the materials and shapes. They care about every edge and gap effects to the feelings when customers hold it in their hands, they keep it smooth and thin, these details design helped apple got more and more customers and great public recognition. Even through all iphones are set up a much higher price than other smart phones, but these price made costumers think it is a guarantee of the products’ quality and value, I think this is how a good design affects the market and the brand effect; Sometimes a good design is as little design as possible, iphone series always been designed simple looks, few colours choice, smooth and thin, this kind of design becomes an icon of high-tech and fashion for the electronic products, this is a successful example of the design of ‘Less is more’.
Negative critical commentary about Juran Hoang’s chosen design product - the Bouroullec Clouds Xueyun Feng MA Communication Design: Illustration Products name: the Bouroullec Clouds Design and produced by: Ronan and Erwan In my opinion of Juran hwang’s chosen design product - the Bouroullec Clouds which designed by Ronan and Erwan. As a sophisticated and colourful new tile concept for the home, I think it does not contain the basic elements and did not bides by the principles of a good design which should functional, innovative, environmental protection and does not considered about materials and public recognition. When I looking into the functional of a good design item, this product does not considered when people arrange it, they can make spaces and place on or in it to display other daily use, it dose not save the space in home and not easy to pack it up into a small package, there is no more function except as a decoration; It is not innovative, as a set of pieces new decoration for home, it attache by rubber bands. These fragile rubber bands are easily get break by some sharp appliance. Only 3 aspects for each piece to arrange new forms, this is restrictive and not creative enough for some new challenge ideas; When considered about materials, this product made by foam and fabric. Most of the foam are not recycled and they are not environmental protected. The foam and fabric are inflammable and difficult to wash and clean, due to it is very big. It dose not considered about waterproof materials which could help the product displays at more places like outdoors. This product is under advertising, if a product going to on sale and face to the business and market, it should own great public recognition.
What I contributed to our Group:
1. Summed up my ideas bout our design manifesto 2. Useful information shared from Friday Lauguage Session 3. Prepared our group manifesto presentation PPT individually 4. Arrange our meeting times 5. My idea has been seleted for our final exhibition piece (a comparison way to show the difference and connection between them)
Manifesto working process: After disucssion and conclusion about all of our commentaries, and the useful resource I found in Friday lauguage session, I summed up a series of general ideas about our manifesto: 1. From my own positive commentaries, I think a good design should be functional(useful,match people’s needs), innovative(correct mistakes, technology, considering materials, shape,etc), effective(market, business, brand effect, public recognition), and sometimes is as little design as possible(this depends on different disciplines). 2. From the negative commentaries I summarised a good design except the above, it also should be environmental friendly. 3. From the Language support session with Janet today, I found some really useful definitions about design and people’s manifesto as follow: ‘Visual communication is a problem solving activity...a sound bite that can be understand by the commissioners of designers - the clients’ (Noble and Bestley, 2005:22) I think this is telling people design is visual solution. Graphic design constitutes ‘a language with an uncertain grammar and a continuously expanding vocabulary’ (Holli cited in Noble and Bestley, 2005:24)
‘No single definition of design, or branches of professionalized practice such as industrial or graphic design, adequately covers the diversity of ideas and methods gathered together under the label’ (Buchanan, 1992:5) I think these two is telling people there’s no certain definition of design, because it is so wide, it includes so many things. Put simply, [design thinking] is a discipline that uses the designer’s sensibility and methods to match people’s needs with what is technologically feasible and what a viable business strategy can convert into customer value and market opportunity. (Brown, 2008:2) I think this is telling people design should be functional, useful, match people’s needs, and it faces market and business as well. Critical Design uses speculative design proposals to challenge narrow assumptions, preconceptions and givens about the role products play in everyday life. It is more of an attitude than anything else, a position rather than a method. There are many people doing this who have never heard of the term critical design and who have their own way of describing what they do. Naming it Critical Design is simply a useful way of making this activity more visible and subject to discussion and debate. (Dunne and Raby, 2012:1) I think this is telling people designers should take risks and do challenge works, try new things. Maybe we could take some of the informations above which from my opinions about design and the useful definitions about design into the final manifesto. I need your guys summarise what is a good design and what good design means to you from your positive commentaries and your negative one, and do research as more as possible, then post them here and we can chose some from them use for the manifesto. At the beginning of this project I think probably we can do a video which follows the definition we summarised about the manifesto, we replaced the bad design objects from a table by a good design one, which follows the ideas of what is a good design and what good design means to you. But I don’t think we have enough time to do the video, because we need time to edit it. we did not start to find objects and did not have a plan how to do it. I can not join your guys on Monday because I need do my own project. So I think if we could get a summarise of the manifesto, then make a PPT probably? then each of us talk several pages of it that probably works. Or if you have any other ideas please share it ASAP.
Manifesto Principles Decided: 1 Innovative[Xueyun] 2 Functional[Bee] 3 Aesthetic[Juran] 4 Understandable[Bee] 5 Unobtrusive[Juran] 6 Honest[Bee] 7 Long-Lasting[Amr] 8 Through Down to the Last Detail[Amr] 9 Environmental Friendly[Amr] 10 As Little Design as Possible[Xueyun] Each of us will explain part of it, and we are going to make a poster. This is my part of the manigesto, the first and last principles we summarised: Innovative As the lecture given by Fashion Course Director Andrea which we joined last week Tuesday, we have learned that all artists and designers need business and face to the market. Nowadays, artists and designers produced commercial works in different democratic forms of communication, as a problem-solving activity, innovation becomes an extraordinary important element for the principles of a good design. As the development of technology, there are more and more chances for designers and artists produce innovative products to service people better. As what Dieter Rams said: ‘The possibilities for innovation are not, by any means, exhausted. Technological development is always offering new opportunities for innovative design. But innovative design always develops in tandem with innovative technology, and can never be an end in itself.’ As Little Design as Possible People always think a good design is as little design as possible, but through our research, We found that it completely depends on different disciplines and the request of people’s needs. For example, a good design for electronic products is always as simple as possible, because more simple look the product is, more easy and quick people could use it and accept it; But if we talking about a map, its not as simple design as possible, because it against the function of a map. People need a map to help them find the right way, a good map always contains as more details as possible, designers can never just give arrow up and arrow down on a map.
Exhibition Piece working process
The ideas about our exhibition piece changed several times, our first idea about the exhibition piece is ‘WE ARE DESIGN’ and ‘DESIGN IS A PROCESS’. WHY WE ARE DESIGN? To support this, we have discussed that we are design, each person is a design product. we were born from two different person, and we have been designed through our education, the growing up environment, different culture and religion, we have different interests and different dreams, we meet others and learn from others. and when we leave the school, we have different job, we chose our living environment, we chose our partner, we chose our life. Questions: 1. Is the surrounding environment effected people ( to design) or the people(‘s design) effected their surrounding environment? 2. If they effected each other, how they improved together as the same time? 3. How we going to express these ideas as DESIGN IS A PROCESS by our chosen format - animation. About the exhibition piece: We decided to make an 1min animation, we describe the design process is like our life, and all of us are the design products. The process: We have been brought up by different family, we growing up in different culture and countries and we have different religion, we went to the school been educated, some school trying to design us the same(learning the same project, school rules especially in asia counties), we meet others and learn from others, we have different interests and different dream. when we leave the school, we meet more people from different cultures with different skin colour, we chose our job and partner People like design products and they produced by the society factory. this is all how people’s life effected by the surrounding environment and how the surrounding environment effected the people at the same time. Like Pink Floyd’s MV - Another Brick in The Wall. Students are against to the education which trying to make them the same, the school is like a factory, bad education system produced the students all the same.
I have made a PPT for this exhibition piece presentation. From the very beginning how we developed our manifesto, as a journey, described our process step by step, to the decision of our exhibition piece made.
Exhibition piece changed/Still keep the same concept/evaluate My idea been seleted finally for the exhibition piece As working in a group, we considered everyone’s different major and different opinions, trying to work out a more appropriate way to follow our manifesto and let everyone show their special skills and ideas. we have two illustrators and two products designers, we should considered about everyone of us, soon we decided changed our exhibition piece into a project which everyone could work with, and still using the same concept we took from our manifesto. As we all agree with working on the folding-paper format and the concept we chose from our manifesto – design changes (through time, through different people’s point of view, through the improvement of skills and technique, and the development of the world), we decided to chose the simple element from people’s daily life, to investigative our concept – design changes. We are going to investigative the objects we ususally put on our study desk, how the design changes through recently 20years, from the innovation of technique, the changes of people’s aesthetic ideas, and the changes of people’s working habit. As we working in a group, everyone do different job for this final piece. Amr and me as illustrators produced drawings and software support, we work together and print the image out. we four made the wood borad in the 3d workshop together to make sure the folding style format stable, Queen Bee and Juran as products designers trying to stick the images to the wood board pieces, and combine them together as a folding style format. EVALUATE/WHY WE CHANGE 1, Illustrators can produce animation, but not for our other two products designers, as working in a group, we should thinking about all of us, so we changed a way of everyone could work for it and agree with it. 2, Considered about the feedback we received for the previous tutorials, we should find a way to show our ideas clearly and straight away, and out audience could easily understand what we are doing for. 3. We all like this idea.
HOW TO ACHIEVE We discussed our problems of our exhibition piece ideas, we should know the reason why we wanna put two pictures together as one side of the folding paper. I thought if we could put two pictures together, they closely connected with each other but they are different, that would be clear to our audience, and people would know the relationship between the two pictures. I took the photo of New York 7 years ago compares to today of Bedford and 8th, Williamsburg, Brooklyn for example, we can show two different period pictures together to show the design changes during the time, they look different but they have same functions, they are long lasted. The buildings, the trees, the shops exists there and serves people for a long time. Design changes because of development of economic and technology, they developed for feeding people’s needs. And all these characters explains why we chose two different periods pictures put together and this fits our design manifesto.
Working Process 1 /my illustration drawings I produced simple illustration line drawings to show how design changes from the selected objects from people’s daily life which we displayed on our table, through a recently 20 years time.
Pictures scaned/Working Process 2 We draw the objects separatly on different papers, scaned them into computers, we use photoshop to fixed the images, and combine them into one A2 size image. We chose a scene of someone’s study table, put these objects onto the table, through 20 years change, the design of each objects changed in different ways, but still feed people’s need in the same way, they still have the same funtion. Some objects design changed because of the development of technical and sociaty, some objects design changed because people’s aesthetic ideas changed;
Working Process 3 Picrures printed out in library, wood board cut in pieces done in 3d workshop, we did different combine tests, and finally decided the way to combine these pieces as single object forour exhibition piece. We took a long time to figure out the right size hinge and the right colour for the wood board, we combined them together in the products studio. WHAT I LEARN I enjoyed working with these talented people, we learned from each other and helped each other, working with products designers helped me understand if we think things logically and always draw a draft, mark position and write down the size number, we can save materials and save time.
END Design always change, from every little things of our daily life. 20 years ago we have never think about we could do our works and hand in it by internet. Technical and society develops incredible quickly, we did not even slow down and aware how different the world is comparing to before. We produced our final exhibition piece which takes look around the little things we used in our daily life - the things and tools people usually put on their study table. We produced illustration works about these difference through recently 20 years, put them onto folding display board, to encourage our audience to look at it from different point view. As this special format, people will see two comparative images about the same table from left and right, to see how different they are. Design always change, from every little things of our daily life. Design is innovative, we should slow down and aware it; Design is functional, it is a problem-solving activity, it feeds people’s need in different ways; Design is understandable and long-lasting, it exist a long time, as a tool, as environment, as a method of makes life better; Design is aesthetic, it is an conclusion of human’s art history and their life practice through time. As working in a group, we considered everyone’s different major and different opinions, trying to work out a more appropriate way to follow our manifesto and let everyone show their special skills and ideas. We all from different countries, have different religions and culture, this is a perfect background to discuss why and how design is different and it always change by different ways, different times, different people and different point of view(even by different culture, different religions, different countries). Our ideas changed several times, so we can not get more deeper, this is our problem. We should always stick together, share ideas and develop it together by every way(VLE, blog, facebook, whatsapp, skype). I am thankful for this opportunity to working with these talented people, I learned a lot of how to work in a group and how to achieve our plan step by step. We should not leave anyone of us behind, and always encourage each other and help each other. If we could meet more and always let each other know where we are, we could been done better for this project. The original idea of this project is door high size, both sides, so audience could walk arroud it, when people’s position changes, the pictures on the board changed as well. We encourage our audience slow down and look at the picture, think about why and how design changes in our daily life, it changed a lot and we should aware it. Xueyun Feng MA Communication Design: Illustration Kingston University 16. 12. 2014