Wednesday 28 September 2011

Design Process 


- to understand graphic design problem solving model
- learn how to (why) contrast & bid are prepared
- understand importance of research in graphic design (why it is relevant) (justify it)
- learn the purpose of thumbnail sketches & how to make them
- various ways of creating & presenting your preliminary design
- see how presentation & client feedback affects project's outcomes
- learn what happens after the design is completed
- understand the final evaluation


Graphic Design Problem Solving Model 


* Define > develop > conduct research > ideation (thumbnail) > preliminary comps > 
   presentation & critique > refinement (analyse sketch)


~ Research design histories to see what similar ideas have come about before
~ Research the "future" to see what might be


Ideation 


- look for MANY different answers NOT THE PROBLEM..! 
- work quickly , don't spend long time on one sketch
- use whatever is at hand to explore all possible options


Unified Communication


~ Intellectual  
* Idea generated & word dominant


~ Visual
* Placement of design elements perceptible to the eye


- De Stijl 
- Kinesthetic projection ~ Sensory experience stimulated by bodily movement & tension


Visual Dynamics
* project emotional
* top to bottom/ vertical & horizontal/ left to right



top to bottom
Symmetry 
~ for balance
~ repeated shapes left to right




Asymmetry
~ evoke sense of movement




Balance through contrast
~ unexpected size contrast  





Black and White 




Blind Love

Monday 19 September 2011

Expressionism - Max Beckmann

Max Beckmann 


1884 -1950

- A German Expressionist born on February 12, 1884 in Leipzig 


- Painter,draftsman, printmaker, sculptor, and writer. 


- Even though he was an expressionist, he rejected both the term and movement as he did 
   not like to be labeled according to them. 


- In the 1920s, he was associated with the New Objectivity, an outgrowth of Expressionism  
   that opposed its introverted emotionalism.


-  Expressionist artists mostly sought to express meaning  or emotional experience rather 
    than physical reality.


- Beckmann probably painted more self-portraits than any other artist and struggled on how 
   to define himself. 


- His art were sober, beautiful and expressive oil paintings, strong in contour and colour.


- He painted subjects  from the entertainment world, many portraits of family and friends, 
   and countless allegorical compositions with characters symbolic of ancient myths.

Still life with three skulls (1945). 
Oil on canvas

This painting contains many elements of ‘vanitas’ and ‘memento mori’ paintings which were  
   fashionable throughout northern Europe in the 17th & 18th centuries. 


- Vanitas ~ mostly symbols of skulls, rotting food or fading flowers as a reminder of the 
   certainty of death. 


- Memento mori 
    ~ Latin phrase for " Remember your Mortality" 
    ~ Its a reminder about our death and the judgement that will follow once we are 
       dead.


- This was painted during the final months of World War 1. 


- Combination of modern style of flattened space, schematic forms & intense colour with 
   traditional still life - objects skulls 

- These paintings aimed to show us that life, with its pleasures of the company of friends,
  card games and drinking, also holds reminders of our own mortality and unavoidable death. 


- In this still-life by Beckmann, the skulls and extinguished candle are clearly intended to be
   read as symbols of the shortness of life.


- The colour black used captures grim mood and mostly the value used is dark. Colour black 
   usually is associated with "darkness"


-  It appears that the direction of light is from the right side and he uses contrast of light and 
   darkness in this painting.


- This painting is an abstract  that uses symbols as guidance to understand its true meaning. 

Saturday 17 September 2011

Art Movement !!

Art movement ~ style or way of doing art with specific common goal that spans over a period of time that is distinctly different from other art movement. 


Key points for this :- 
~ Movement of cultural ideas
~ Changes in visual styles
~ History provides inspiration! 

Birth of Graphic Design 
- 30, 000 years ago ~ cave paintings
- Gutenberg's printing press around 550 years ago 
  * Gutenberg was the first European to use movable type printing, in around 1439 and the   
    global inventor of the printing press.


Industrial revolution
- started in England around 1733 where there was the shift from agriculture to manufacturing. Industrial Revolution expanded more powerful each year as new inventions and manufacturing processes added to the efficiency of machines and increased productivity.


Advancement
~ Great strides in painting
~ Large scale posters
~ Advertising posters in France


Art Nouveau - explores the new style of visual art and architecture developed in Europe  
                     and South America towards the end of 19th century.  

                  - intensive attempt to create international style based on decoration.  

                  - in a way was a response to Industrial Revolution 


* Charles Rennie Mackintosh ~ was a designer, architect, sculptor & watercolourist from Scotland. The so-called "Glasgow"( largest city in Scotland)  style was exhibited in Europe and influenced the Viennese Art Nouveau movement known as Sezessionstil (The Secession). He was interested in the relationships between man-made and naturally occurring landscapes. He worked as interior and graphic designer and also with textiles, metalwork and furniture. 


* William Morris ~ started revolutionize the art of house decoration and furniture in England in 1860 after founding the firm of Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co. His "Daisy" wallpaper, designed in 1862, became famous and was never out of fashion. Morris's love for old books and illuminated manuscripts resulted in the founding of the Kelmscott Press. It produced from 1891 to 1898 53 titles in 66 volumes, among others The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer. 



Brer Rabbit Wallpaper 

German - produced artwork for almost 30 years ago
            - long and distinguished tradition in visual art, from the earliest known work of 
               figurative art to its current output of contemporary art. 
            - made advertising posters
In 1905, Friedrich Nietzche - contributed to Expressionism (style in which the intention is  
                                        not to reproduce a subject accurately, but instead to portray it  
                                        in such a way as to express the inner state of the artist.) 
                                       - mostly associated with Germany 
Leading Expressionist - Franz Marc, George Grosz & Amadeo Modigliani



Fundamental changes
- travelling, increased in communication, network and related technology 
- art & design both reflect society and help shape the community
- influenced many movements 
- Cubism ~ fore fathers of design..! 
              ~ emphasized flat surface
              ~ its the most radical, influential and innovative practice of the 20th century 
              ~ joint invention of Pablo Picasso & Georges Braque 


ArtLex on Cubism 

Fauvism - led by Henri Matisse 
             - favoured wildly expressive colours.
                 - the movement did not last a long period, only about 4 years 
             - The style was essentially expressionist, and generally featured landscapes in 
                which forms were distorted.



Plakatstil (poster style) - the term for flat colour and shapes
                                  - exist after Berlin became the centre of commerce
                                  - the stand out artist/ posterist in Berlin at the birth of this  
                                    movement was Lucian Bernhard.


Plakatstil
Modernism 
modern thought, character, or practice.
- describes specifically on modernist movement 
- revolt against the conservative values of realism.
rejected the lingering certainty of Enlightenment thinking and also rejected the existence 
  of a compassionate, all-powerful Creator God.


Dada ~ literary and artistic movement born in Europe at the time of horror during World  
           War 1.
        ~ has questioned meaning 
        ~ photo montage created with intentional disorder
        ~ Dada art is whimsical, colourful, wittily sarcastic, and at times downright silly. 
        ~ Abstraction & Expressionism were the main influences on DADA, followed by Cubism 
           and lesser extent of Futurism. 


By Marcel Duchamp  

Constructivism 
- artistic and architectural philosophy originated in Russia in the beginning of 1919
- Soviet Union youth movement 
which was a rejection of the idea of autonomous art in favour of art as a practice  for social 
  purposes
- influenced major trends such as Bauhaus & the De Stijl movement.
- El Marcovich Lissitzky was a designer, typographer, artist, photographer, 
  architect, and teacher. He had a great influence on the design work from the Bauhaus and  
  De Stijl movements, and on modern commercial art and design.
- he developed the rules of typography and grid system 



De Stijl - Began in Holland in the year 1917 
            - Known as " The Style" in Dutch which is also known as Neoplasticism 
            the term De Stijl is used to refer to a body of work from 1917 to 1931
            -  flourished in Europe during the 1920s 
              


The De Stijl Movement 

BauhausBauhaus movement is a school of art, architecture and design characterized by 
               geometric design, respect for practical material, and its severely economic 
               sensibilities. 
founded by Walter Gropius in 1919 in Germany and ended in the 1930’s
~ focus on graphic design, furniture and architecture
~ bridge gap between gap & applied arts
~ clean functional forms 
 Bauhaus creators have influenced architecture, furniture, typography, and weaving
~ Josef Albers - colour research
~ Annie Alber  - fiber artist


Art Deco - figurative movement
              - 1925 in Paris 
              - figurative images with decorative appeal 
              - Adolphe Mouron Cassandre was an influential Ukrainian-French painter, 
               commercial poster artist, and typeface designer.
              - his artwork were influenced by cubism as well as surrealism 

Surrealism ~ cultural movement & artistic style that was founded in 1924 by Andre Breton 
                 ~ Uses visual imagery from subconscious mind to create art without the  
                    intention of logical comprehensibility 
                 ~ Influenced advertising & illustration 
                 ~ famous artist - Salvador Dali


New generations
~  Paul Rand - LoGO DESIGN
    *combined drawings & form 
~ Cipe Pineles 
~ Harper's Bazaar - American fashion magazine, first published in 1867
                         - Ruth Ansel ~ made a dramatic debut as a designer in 1962
                                           ~ was the youngest art direction in Harper's Bazaar


Post modernism 
~ philosophical movement away from the viewpoint of modernism
~ applied to architecture
understood in art and architecture as the project of rejecting tradition in favour of going 
   "where no man has gone before" or better, to create forms for no other purpose than novelty.
Modernism's valorization of the new was rejected by architectural postmodernism in the 
  50's and 60's for conservative reasons. 






Form and substance
~ women impact in design 
Not only are women making strides, but serious challengers are emerging from Asia, 
   Africa and Latin America. 
~ Barbara Kruger - created advertising that was anti-advertising 
                         - Much of her work consists of black-and-white photographs overlaid with 
                           declarative captions (white on red) 
                         - imagery and text containing criticism of sexism and the circulation of 
                           power within cultures is a recurring motif in Kruger's work.


Digital Focus 
- post modern medium
- technology always influences graphic design
- in 1953, computer graphics was originally developed for US Defence Department 
- its interactive, non-linear flow.  complex web sites & virtual reality


Progress
~ Photography -> Film -> Videos -> Computer -> Internet 
~ Virtual reality extends to all the senses
~ Exciting & challenging developments
~ Internet used to market products & disseminate information.


A picture is worth a thousand words. ~ Napoleon Bonaparte 

Sunday 11 September 2011

Futurism




Futurists (futurists) ~ artistic movement that originated in Italy in the early 20th century. It emphasized  themes are associated with contemporary concepts of the future, including speed, technology, youth and violence, car and the industrial city


Constructivism


Constructivism (constructivists) ~ was an artistic philosophy that originated in Russia beginning in 1919, which was a rejection of the idea of autonomous art in favour of art as a 
practice for social purposes.

Dada-ism


Dadaism (dadaist) ~ is a post-World War 1 cultural movement in visual art as well as literature (poetry), theatre and graphic design. At the same time it was to protest against the barbarism of the war.  

Surrealism 




Surrealism (surrealist) ~ cultural movement and artistic style found in 1924 by Andre Breton. It uses visual imagery from the subconscious mind to create art without the intention of logical comprehensibility. 
The class on 8th of September was more to the introduction to what is graphic design and what are the challenges to be a good designer. 

~Graphic design is the "art and profession of visual communication that combines images, words and ideas to convey information to audience" (Miller, 2011). Graphic design is a strategic art ~ meaning that the art is planned to serve a specific purpose.


A designer is responsible to use different types of media elements and arrange to create a visual. 

In today's world, graphic designs which are available are such as on 2-D surfaces, web packages, package design, multimedia 3-D and to the most advance is 4-D applications. 

Principles and practices to be applied to designers perceptions..
~ Always applying principles of theory perception(a person's own visual understanding and awareness) to practice visual communication, solving problems, finding several solutions to one issue rather than one particular solution and making intuitive personal approach with their own formal study to visual approach. 

Graphic designs always contribute back to the society and designers always find ways to give back to society such as to ergonomic, architectural, fashion, interior, furniture, product, even the medical industry.

Visual communication is a VITAL role for designer. 

Process to go about graphic designing:
1) Identify the style, understand the objective of the piece and the client's interest.
2) Do research on the piece and collect as much visual information and materials.
3) ~ For students, Thumbnails (initial sketches/ideas)  are more important than the final product as it is the blueprint of an individual's work. Thumbnails should always be kept in a file for future projects. 
    ~ Sketches are done to refine the thumbnails usually using colour pencils or pastels. 
    ~ The last step is to present it to the client for approval once the project is done into a  
       finished size. 

For presentation, it is very important to always take down suggestions to improve graphic presentation and accepting class critiques to build skills.

Applied design fields:-
~ Industrial design - 3-D functional objects
~ environmental design - buildings, landscapes, etc
~ graphic design - text & images
~ web design & multimedia - interactive, motion-based graphics. 

Graphic design has evolved a lot since 15,000 B.C where the first known visual communication (Pictographs & symbols in Lascaux caves) was found in South of France and now we have advance visual communication to create amazing  arts.

Design is everything that is around us and everything that is happening. 

Graphic design is design.

Tuesday 6 September 2011

Time for some Design !

First day of the semester and a new subject added in, Introduction to Design. I actually thought it was going to be boring but it turned out to be fun with a really fun lecturer. Throughout the lecture , Mr. Deepak emphasised more on principals and elements of design and the differences between art and design. 
We have been told about the assignment and the first one is due next week..! However the assignments are all quiet interesting and I am sure it would not be so hard to complete to get an A =D

It was a good day overall...!