Graphic Design II: Kids Against Hunger

http://www.vimeo.com/7417632

North Cascades link

www.north-cascades.com

Two Birds with One Stone

First project of my summer internship, as well as my motion graphics final for the semester.

This is still pretty rough... I made it in two days so things were rough, and I didn’t have time to embellish it with much detail. YouTube also forced me to render at pretty low quality to get it online. Oh well, its crisp in real life.

What ‘made’ this semester (a limited overview)

Absolutely at the top of my list for inspiration for this semester is the work of Jakob Trollback. Simply amazing. An entire world of motion was unveiled to me through his work and has obsessed the vast majority of my extracurricular study this semester. Motion has interested me since last semester (fall 2008), but Jakob Trollback is operating on a completely different level. The intricacy that goes into every element of his work, both in how they are generated and also how they interact and are put together, have warranted hours and hours of careful examination this semester.

(also a big inspiration from videocopilot.com—moreso on the mechanics of the program)

JJ Abrams talk on TED about the creative process behind LOST and his mystery box. Aside from my obsession with his creation, LOST, his notion of the mystery box really has effected my philosophy on design. Not knowing all the answers, essentially by leaving the mystery box closed, the imagination of what might be inside takes you so much further than what may actually exist. This is huge in design as we have the ability to reveal and hide items within our designs to take those viewing said designs to a completely different level than a simple explanation ever could.

Lastly, the Hallmark tour was a great picture of a large creative community at work, which I had never seen before. It was a truly exciting day for me: to see design in action on a massive scale. Everyone in that company has a singular purpose. Sure they work on cards, gift wrap, even web interaction, but they all seek after and create a highly creative environment. The whole day was one inspiring experience after another, but the best part of the day was sitting down to lunch and getting some time to speak with designers within the company. It was great to discuss our feelings on designs going on throughout America, what my interests were in design (print or digital) and how creativity is structured within Hallmark.

I know I’m being transformed in my thinking (or maybe just spending to much time working on projects—or both) when I dream about design almost every night (when I remember my dreams that is).

The Law Strangling Creativity

Larry Lessig's talk on TED about how the law is choking creativity brought up some interesting perspective historically to the current infringement battles. The greatest of which, a struggle between broadcasters, can give us hope that history will repeat itself and competition will trump those who currently seek to suppress recreation of copyrighted material in new, not pirated forms.

In reality though, in this digital world where creativity is becoming more democratized by the second, there are simply to many leaks in the dam to hold back the waters. This is the way the world is moving, or as Lessig puts it, this is the way the newest generations speak, and no amount of effort, legislation or otherwise, will challenge that. Ultimately this is why I think that what is defined in the lecture as common sense and a generation with a lack of regard for the laws are inherently tied together in this instance. Essentially those in younger generations, who have grown with technology and have a general sickness with the greed of corporate America see the issue of fair use as common sense, and thus are not sitting by for laws to catch up with what they already understand and practice.

I do wonder though if those wanting to continue to hold all the cards of creative content are not suppressing a future artist in the making, and consequently a future source of revenue.

Blast from the Past =)

Design Matters.

Dan Formosa worked with the packaging design of the first IBM home computer

He also helped redesign how the interface to the XM radio works.

Recently he helped in the designing of the digital interface of Ford's SmartGauge that will be equipped on the hybrids arriving in 2010, designed to reduce fuel consumption by providing feedback to the driver on their driving performance.

Debbie Millman is the host of Design Matters, as well as a board member of the national AIGA. She is a teacher at the School of Fine Art in New York and is the president of the design division of Sterling Brands. Design Observer is a website centered around all kinds of creative design (graphic, print, typographic, packaging design, etc...).

I listened to the podcast of Dan Formosa being interviewed by Debbie Milman. I thought that it would be an especially useful interview as Dan Formosa works with packaging design, and we are working on packaging design in GD1. The greatest thing that I think Dr. Formosa talked about was the psychological research that goes into their designs and how that shapes the final product. Sometimes he would make packaging that he knew would just shock the audience, but in most cases, group studies and interviews were used to determine what would be most widely accepted by a target audience. He was also very clear that his target audience could not be pinpointed down to a very narrow average, because as he put it, “If we make a door for the average sized person, then half the people who go through the door are going to hit their heads.” I think this is very insightful and an important thing to keep in mind when thinking about those that are receiving our designs. Not everyone who consumes the design is going to fit into a narrow and neat audience persona. The design can be targeted in a certain direction, but must be considered for and work on several levels for a range of people. The tighter a design is focused for a narrow band of people, the more often if will fail to reach many people and most of the time this is counter productive to a main goal of any given project.