KelseyAllen

Friday, February 25, 2011

Journal entry 4

Who is Bruce Mau ? Bruce Mau is a designer who uses innovative unique was to create brands for many well known companies such as Coca-Cola, McDonald's, MTV. As well he is a author of books and uses words to help in his designing of life.

What has he done?Created brands for Coca-Cola, McDonald's, MTV, Arizona State University, Miami's American Airlines Arena, New Meadowlands Stadium, Frank Gehry, Herman Miller, Santa Monica's Big Blue Bus. Wrote books, Mau’s Incomplete Manifesto for Growth guides thousands with his articulation of design strategies and motivations for unleashing creativity.

Why is he interesting? He uses his words and creativity together to create innovative design that is both pleasing to the eye and creates an aesthetic feel to the viewer.

Mantra - 5. Go deep.

The deeper you go the more likely you will discover something of value.I chose this mantra because if you just stretch the surface you will never challenge yourself to create that amazing solution instead of just a solution you have to push yourself and think of the impossible and then think how you can make it possible.

Saturday, February 19, 2011

Journal entry 3

Stefan Sagmeister shares happy design – happy experiencing design – example the authors photos on the back of the design or covers photographs of their faces show the happiness of their design. Pieces about the visualization of happiness and not about happiness. 3 designs that have happiness signs about safety created to make someone happy or intriguing creating an interesting visual for viewers to look at. Another example is a square room that opens up and insides watching the changes in to color of the sky and the reaction that people see when they can see the beauty of the sky changing. Another is speech bubbles and people go and fill them in and get to express their feelings and create joy to others worrying without pressure trying to brake out of the studio and work in other areas and see different angles of life and enjoy the end results of your art. Everything I do always comes back to me and to allow the design of your work to reflect the work, and everything always works out for me. How do you think about the materials you use for the words?

Alwar balasubramniam: Art of substance and absence – open and aware of our surroundings. Explore the character of the past is what makes up what you are today. Creating art about how you feel and creating something that feels like oneself. How are there ways to capture an object and are there many ways to capture objects. Try to understand the trace of something then when we try to understand what it is we interpret them from our old interpretations. Are we trying to understand what it is or what we think it is, like a joke many interpretations for one thing. What we see is just what we think and most of the time we don’t think what it is but it is just our perception of something. Meaning doesn’t exist its just created by the mind by what we have been taught. Anyway to capture the thought into a visual art. We see the source of the light and when it is bouncing but we don’t see the light rays in between. We don’t see dark and light and gravity and electricity. What made you think of using your body as the mold?

Vik Muniz makes are with wire, sugar – entertainment design - created to make people enjoy design and art. Using materials around to make art a piece of joy and laughter. Cloud work – cloud can mean anything you want – lump of cotton. Make creatures out of cloud – working with sculptures. Simple line drawings into wire art. Line drawings and shaded drawings used with thread and other materials. Departing from lines he went to points to depict black children’s faces. Pictures of chocolate that are entertaining face goes into texture. Picture of blocks of color and create a pixilation and mosaic pictures of large photos. Using different materials to create art. What made you so interesting and how do you come up with the materials you use to work with? Not about impress but about giving someone a measure of their own belief

Sunday, February 13, 2011

personas

Audience personas (3)

Lindsay is a 16 year old girl who lives in a upscale two-story house. She drives a 2010 jeep wrangler and attends a private school. She hangs out with friends and boys and homework isn’t the most important factor on her mind. She is boy crazy and wants to be the most popular in her class. She has blonde hair and blue eyes and sometimes dies her hair to her mood of the month. She owns a toy dog and is the youngest of three siblings. She would choose top brand over off brand any time and her favorite hangout is the mall. She is athletic and can hold her own in sports activities and is very competitive in compositions. She would drink pop over water and would choose the beach over the mountains. Loves a chick flick over an action movie but would stand scary unhappy endings once in a while. Her room is a beach theme with blue walls and giant murals of the ocean on them. she usually will dress up for any occasion and loves the in fashion. Would chose high heels over tennis shoes.

Jonathon is a 21 year old in his senior year of college majoring in finances. Is very cautious with his money and makes smart decisions in money making most of the time. He would shop at Wal-Mart for everything and if need be look online to try to find the best price for things. He would never do anything that was unnecessary and off his schedule her is a very type A personality but is very social. He would choose a healthy quick restaurant over a sit down expensive meal. He is from a family of 6 kids and is the oldest from his family. He drives a Toyota Camery and lives in a apartment by himself. He enjoys adventure and action movies as well as once in a while comedy. He chooses not to have a girlfriend at this moment and he hopes to land a job in a big corporation after graduation. He style is sophisticated yet classy. He would wear jeans and a nice button down or polo out with some sperrys not too fashionistic but still is classy in what he wears. His apartment is the minimal style with less things in it and more expensive of the things he has. He has a dog that is trained well and lives in the upper floor of an apartment complex.

Heather is a mother of two and a wife to a lawyer. They live in a middle class to upper class neighborhood and are young for that area. She is 30 years old and plans events for people. She would shop at the Merk for everything and is very into organic and natural based food not into the processing plants of many companies. She is very talkative and can easily hold a conversation. She owns a suburban car and her husband has a convertible. They attend church every Sunday and their children are both in a private school. She doesn’t need to work but wants to because of her interest in her job. She would stop by Starbucks every morning to grab a coffee. She watches her weight and cooks very healthy meals for her family. She colors her hair blonde and keeps up on her nail appointments every 2 weeks. she is a traditional style mom but would wear sweats over nice clothes out and about. her house is some what organized yet there are things here and there. zebra print is her theme and color is her dream any chance to add color she will do it.

Saturday, February 12, 2011

20 design rules

have a concept – have a reason to design something and a purpose for your design solutions to a plan. Have a path to go with and be able to stay on track. No message story idea then it will become flat nor purpose to designing.
communicate don’t decorate - limit to flourishes and over excessiveness of materials and mood and feelings and layers of design to present your concept
speak with one visual voice – one idea that gets placed on everything and keep in same color and feel throughout to make the project cohesive
use two typeface families maximum. Ok, maybe three – staple rule one san serif and one serif have rule with two fonts and possibly a display font for small text that is easy to read – just a guide
use the one two punch – hierarchy given the point quickly see and understand it
pick colors on purpose – make a point to your color have a reason behind your work
if you can do it with less than do it – simplify design and clear and easy to read without to many generic symbols or flourished symbols
negative space is magical – create it don’t just fill it up – break for the eyes and clear hierarchy
treat the type as image as though it’s just as important – dominate type as image and use symbol and color
type is only type when it is friendly – does it compete or work together
be universal remember its not about you – design for universal demographic and create to everyone’s best interest
squish and separate – group together and pull the white spaces out
distribute light and dark like firecrackers and the rising sun – contrast of colors
be decisive and on purpose or don’t do it at all – have a reason for everything and create to a specific purpose
measure with your eyes – grid and look at how it looks visually see where things need to be to rest the eye and relax it and make it cohesive in a way
create images don’t scavenge – from images and manipulate them on photoshop and create the mood and town of your book with color and tone
ignore fashion seriously – fit within the trends but still design to your liking
move it static equals dull – make it moving and wanted to be looked at
look at history but don’t repeat it – aware of what is happening get a reference but then create your own work and design from your own mind
symmetry is the ultimate evil – off balance is good more interesting

Most important – have a concept, a reason, distribute light and dark – make it cohesive, symmetry is the ultimate evil, make it unbalanced and visual appealing

Need to work on – use two typefaces, measure with your eyes, speak with one visual voice

Want to ignore – squish and separate, ignore fashion seriously, type is only type when it is friendly

journal entry 2

10 design rules : Good design is innovative – changing creating making something new and different there are so many categories still to be explored. Good design make a product useful - meaning that your design has a purpose and a function that is the best that the function can be and the most efficient for what that design is doing. Good design is aesthetic – we are going to see these objects all the t time and they will be encountered by others in our lives as well. We want them to go with our system and flow of the look we are going for in a certain setting. Good design makes a product understandable – easy to use and readily available for everyone is a very much need aspect to design. Good design is unobtrusive – in a way that it is accessible for all and it is useful and easy for all. Good design is honest – does what it is supposed to-do and the necessary requirements it is supposed to have. Good design is long lasting – it has a purpose and will last and keep its purpose and now wear away. Good design is thorough, down to the last detail – Everything put into your design is for your purpose and meaning and nothing is just because it looks good. Good design is as little design as possible – keep it simple and as mush as you need but nothing else.

3 ways good design makes you happy

beautiful, functional and reflective, happy things work better because you are more creative biology – like bright colors (fruit plants) dislike bitter taste loud sounds un symmetrical face

-- choice of type fonts or red for hot or an old car – water bottle buy because of the bottle visual and behavioral is subconscious - automatic, skilled behavior – design feeling and control. Communicates – motion about acting understanding the world

Sunday, January 30, 2011

Journal 1

Journal Entry 1 - Writer’s toolbox

Writing can help you engage in your project and think out how your project looks in visually descriptive words. Leonardo da Vinci had diagrams and maps that later created more visual forms on the computer later. Art and science are infused together to create compositions.

Mind maps - give visual forms and structure to ideas and concepts in an organized manor. It allows for you to understand the concepts and see the connections between the designs. Can be used with words, color, and images, any like forms of design. Start basic and get more specific as lines grow out from objects and items.

A concept map is similar to mind maps however concept maps have more thorough analysis of what goes with what and makes sure there is a relationship between items. The information is arranged in hierarchy order from least to most specific. The data is analyzed to see how the specific things can be used to create the broader topic.

Free writing - To collect your thoughts on paper and be able to look back to reference the ideas later on. Free writing is a casual sit down process that allows for the ideas to flow without organization and the after the free writing process you can take away the needed in formation to organize and create your final design.

Brain writing - Is equivalent to brain storming by allowing yourself to look at the problem and to create the best solution for the problem in design terms. Allowing for one self to create multiple solutions will broaden the solution and form later for the best possible solution to be created.

Word lists - is basically stretching but in language putting all words and adjectives that come to mind about our topic. This allows for the designer to envision the different possibilities the design could go and relates language to designing yet again.

Outlines - outlines allow for problem and solutions to be created in an orderly fashion to make sure all is being incorporated into the solution. It allows for more structure to be put into your brainstorming and your ideas to start coming together, and be framework for the design.

Writing and critiques - Allow for other peoples input to be taken in to consideration on your design and by displaying your work next to others you can see where you fall on the lines of the project as well as get some feedback to better enhance your composition. Methods are critiques are all useful in trying to get information to the designer about their work from silent notes to out loud discussion allowing more opinions can best result in a job well done.

Reflective writing- can help you gather your thoughts about the project as a whole. It will help your from later projects to see how your work and what helped you best and allows for you to relax from the design mind and go to the summarizing mind set.

Journals and sketches - allow you to be more visual in you’re brainstorming process and allow for creative ideas to be put on paper and document what is happening throughout the project. These pieces allow for you to always be able to document ideas and then have a strong process book in the end.

Free write -- Great Gatsby

G.G. is full of adventure and mystery in how the characters interact with each other the way the book was written it almost seemed like what was happening is in the love of the characters also told what was happening with the scenery around them. The book is told from nick’s point of view after he moves to New York and lives on the west egg island across form the east egg island where his cousin daisy lives and her husband tom. Nick is a young man who just landed a wealthy job in the stock market. This was written around the time that the young were landing jobs and accessing a lot of money. The book gives a feel of snobbishness fro the young men and women at the beginning and over confidence in money, which eventually leads to total destruction of the characters. The feel of this book to me is murky and evolved into a type of evil that rest insides the bodies of the young and wealthy. Love tries to peek through in many ways however also breaking up many relationships and in the end the evil wins out many die and nothing has become of the world today. This book also gives a feeling on clueless ness involved with the characters and their actions of money and relationships with one another and spouses. Almost as if they wanted everything of theirs to be invisible to the eye and be able to be inspected by all who can look. Many times the book takes a rollercoaster feel with one day doing great in relationships and the other someone comes along and it is broken up. Their seemed like their could have been resentment in the way that F Scot Fitzgerald wrote his book in how he though money of the young generations is getting exploited and taken for granted and when money devours your life there is nothing else to look forward too. In the end life goes on and the feel of starting over is released from the book. If I were to create a novel cover for this book my colors would be green and black and brown and gray and I would want to make it seem like romance but something is off about it. I would want their to be a since of feeling that there is good in the hearts of the young and wealthy but the evil extol their little bit of good. The cover would have a feeling of awkwardness and out of place and nothing can be too perfect on the outside everything looks great but deep down there is a whole lot of hurt going on.

Word List - Great Gatsby

Awkward

Bright Bold

Out there

Advertise

Brand

Display

Flash

Unmask

Leak

Feature

Abundance