Graphics...
Jan. 29th, 2006 01:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
Okay, so Miss
freddiefraggles was asking what I do in my graphics course, and about graphics in general. So I'm going to write a little about that.
But first, a rant
Often I've heard when people see logos they don't like/hear about how much logos cost, they trot out the traditional "I could've made that in 5 minutes". While there may be some utterly crap designs out there where that's true, as a general rule, you're wrong.
Take the monogram that is my icon for this post. It doesn't look like much, but along with this, it is the end result of 4-5 hours work. To get it required some time thinking about what I could do with the letters J, S and F, a drawing out a bunch of different possible ways to take it, choosing one general layout, then creating a large number of versions of it to see which looked best. This included getting other peoples opinions on it at various points. I filled two A3 sheets with possible designs to get those two.
This is not saying that bad design is okay because it might've taken a while. Crappy design is still crappy design, but it's probably not the result of five minutes work, and sometimes the simplest ideas (which generally work better than more complex ones) can take a long time to reach
Ahem. Okay, that's done. Onto the description of what the course is like. I will mention that it's rather different to the graphic design course run at Exeter by whatever they renamed the Pallas department to, though that one is very good, and I'll describe it and say why I give it a big recommendation after...
The course started with a few bits covering practical skills, where stuff is, and suchlike. Also, we spent one afternoon a week with one of the other portions of our department (Illustration and Photography) in the first term, which was quite interesting. But the general set up of graphics work has stayed the same, though the pace has changed.
First, we get briefed, then we work on the design in question, then we have a crit. Tutorials and/or halfway crits can happen during the middle phase too.
The briefing is when we get told what we need to design, what it's for, why it's needed, who's going to see it, and so forth. At this point, we'll discuss among ourselves and with our tutors about the nuances of the brief - what the target audience is, and what you can take from that information into your design. The brief will lay out exactly what things we need to end up with for that part of the module.
Working on the project runs fairly similarly to how I described doing the monograms in my rant above - try and come up with some ideas, look at those ideas to see which ones work the best, take the best bits and develop develop develop, and expand them so you can complete all the bits of the brief.
Tutorials can be with just you and the tutor, or with a group. You show what you've done so far, they give their thoughts on it - what could use adjusting/changing/abandoning. It's also good for going "Arrrgh arrrgh, I don't know what to do", cause they can give suggestions to get you started/get you out of ruts. Group tutorials can make the weaknesses of your work more embarrassing, but have the advantage that the other can make suggestions (which I tend to do a lot).
There are also various tutorials for teaching you specific skills - so far I've been to ones with the computer tech teaching us the basics of & useful tricks for Adobe Photoshop, ImageReady and Illustrator, and done a day learning how to use various different letterpress machines for making designs using old style movable type.
Part-way crits are usually the whole group, or at least a fair chunk of it (half, a third), bringing a definite image where people can see how it's going to work/where they're going with it, everyone looks at them all, compares, offers opinions, suggestions and criticism. There's a bit of blurring between group tutorials and part way crits, but the main difference is that you have to bring some definite piece of design to a half way crit, and that the crits tend to be more critical and less suggestive.
Then more work, taking into account stuff from the crits. Or ignoring it, if you disagree enough - one of the tutors was saying that I "didn't really have an idea" behind what I was doing for the current brief because I didn't describe it that well and had two ideas on the same theme, and suggested a completely different approach. I didn't particularly like his suggestion, so instead I've refined and made more definite my idea, and will be running with that. And if I come up with a decent design, then that's fine and I can 'get away' with doing that.
Then usually a final crit for a particular brief, when you should the design done, and everyone discusses them all. It is very much the case that we're saying what we think about peoples work, both good stuff and bad stuff.
Finally, at the end of each six week module, a hand in, where we lay out everything for that module (which would be a number of different briefs), both final design and rough work/research, and the tutors look at it, and decide upon the grades. In this year we have 5 six week long modules, and one that runs for the whole year (Design Research), which means a lot of deadlines.
In terms of the pace, there has been a lot of variation - the first module consisted of eight separate briefs, whereas the third one is three heavily linked ones. Several of the starting module briefs were one day only - half an hour's brief at 9.30, spend the day working on it, then have it done by 4 or 4.30 for a crit. Now all three briefs cover the entire six weeks, the starting briefing takes about 3-4 hours, and the crits and the end often take an entire day.
It's certainly a lot tougher that I was expecting from my understanding of Arts degrees at Exeter, where I'd heard of 2-4 contact hours a week. Here we're expected to be in 9.30 to 5 (though it must be admitted there's a fair bit of flexibility around that). Also, it's hard work to come up with these ideas, research them, develop them, and then get the design from your brain onto paper. It's also very interesting, I'm learning a lot and developing skills I didn't know I had.
Now, onto the Exeter course that led me to the degree I'm now doing.
Firstly, I just want to say; it's great, amazing, cool and really interesting. Mike Dobson is a great lecturer - interesting, funny, takes the piss out of himself happily, interacts with those he is teaching. The Graphic design module that he teaches is essentially two different components that could almost be separated and taught as a pair of related modules - the lectures, and the tutorials. The lectures are about 'What is design? Why do we need design? How does it work? What works and what doesn't? Why do we see/do things in that way?' - getting you grounded in the ideas behind design. The tutorials can be essentially described as "How to use Corel Draw", because that's the program they've got, and that's what you use to do the main project. It's split into two parts - one concentrating on Logo/Identity, and how you communicate an image to people, the other on Signage - how you communicate information and instructions to people. For each, you have to do a piece of coursework in that area (Logo for a charity and signing system for a building where what it was when I did it), and a 2,000 word essay based on a title chosen from an appropriate list.
I know I'm going a bit OTT here, but I really can't recommend this module enough, largely on the strength of Mike as a lecturer, but also because the grounding in Graphic Design it gives you is really useful, and gives you a new way of looking at the world, when you can look at every different logo, bit of type, or just any produced good and think about why it was designed to look like that.
My provisional idea for my next bit of writing is explaining why I don't think that hypothecation (assigning the money gained from taxes in a certain area to be spent in that area - e.g. cigarette tax in hospitals) is particularly necessary, except as a vote winner.
Final thought for the day - it's interesting how buying furniture makes me feel old, but I also get a fair bit of pride out of the fact that I have put several items together that I now use everyday.
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
But first, a rant
Often I've heard when people see logos they don't like/hear about how much logos cost, they trot out the traditional "I could've made that in 5 minutes". While there may be some utterly crap designs out there where that's true, as a general rule, you're wrong.
Take the monogram that is my icon for this post. It doesn't look like much, but along with this, it is the end result of 4-5 hours work. To get it required some time thinking about what I could do with the letters J, S and F, a drawing out a bunch of different possible ways to take it, choosing one general layout, then creating a large number of versions of it to see which looked best. This included getting other peoples opinions on it at various points. I filled two A3 sheets with possible designs to get those two.
This is not saying that bad design is okay because it might've taken a while. Crappy design is still crappy design, but it's probably not the result of five minutes work, and sometimes the simplest ideas (which generally work better than more complex ones) can take a long time to reach
Ahem. Okay, that's done. Onto the description of what the course is like. I will mention that it's rather different to the graphic design course run at Exeter by whatever they renamed the Pallas department to, though that one is very good, and I'll describe it and say why I give it a big recommendation after...
The course started with a few bits covering practical skills, where stuff is, and suchlike. Also, we spent one afternoon a week with one of the other portions of our department (Illustration and Photography) in the first term, which was quite interesting. But the general set up of graphics work has stayed the same, though the pace has changed.
First, we get briefed, then we work on the design in question, then we have a crit. Tutorials and/or halfway crits can happen during the middle phase too.
The briefing is when we get told what we need to design, what it's for, why it's needed, who's going to see it, and so forth. At this point, we'll discuss among ourselves and with our tutors about the nuances of the brief - what the target audience is, and what you can take from that information into your design. The brief will lay out exactly what things we need to end up with for that part of the module.
Working on the project runs fairly similarly to how I described doing the monograms in my rant above - try and come up with some ideas, look at those ideas to see which ones work the best, take the best bits and develop develop develop, and expand them so you can complete all the bits of the brief.
Tutorials can be with just you and the tutor, or with a group. You show what you've done so far, they give their thoughts on it - what could use adjusting/changing/abandoning. It's also good for going "Arrrgh arrrgh, I don't know what to do", cause they can give suggestions to get you started/get you out of ruts. Group tutorials can make the weaknesses of your work more embarrassing, but have the advantage that the other can make suggestions (which I tend to do a lot).
There are also various tutorials for teaching you specific skills - so far I've been to ones with the computer tech teaching us the basics of & useful tricks for Adobe Photoshop, ImageReady and Illustrator, and done a day learning how to use various different letterpress machines for making designs using old style movable type.
Part-way crits are usually the whole group, or at least a fair chunk of it (half, a third), bringing a definite image where people can see how it's going to work/where they're going with it, everyone looks at them all, compares, offers opinions, suggestions and criticism. There's a bit of blurring between group tutorials and part way crits, but the main difference is that you have to bring some definite piece of design to a half way crit, and that the crits tend to be more critical and less suggestive.
Then more work, taking into account stuff from the crits. Or ignoring it, if you disagree enough - one of the tutors was saying that I "didn't really have an idea" behind what I was doing for the current brief because I didn't describe it that well and had two ideas on the same theme, and suggested a completely different approach. I didn't particularly like his suggestion, so instead I've refined and made more definite my idea, and will be running with that. And if I come up with a decent design, then that's fine and I can 'get away' with doing that.
Then usually a final crit for a particular brief, when you should the design done, and everyone discusses them all. It is very much the case that we're saying what we think about peoples work, both good stuff and bad stuff.
Finally, at the end of each six week module, a hand in, where we lay out everything for that module (which would be a number of different briefs), both final design and rough work/research, and the tutors look at it, and decide upon the grades. In this year we have 5 six week long modules, and one that runs for the whole year (Design Research), which means a lot of deadlines.
In terms of the pace, there has been a lot of variation - the first module consisted of eight separate briefs, whereas the third one is three heavily linked ones. Several of the starting module briefs were one day only - half an hour's brief at 9.30, spend the day working on it, then have it done by 4 or 4.30 for a crit. Now all three briefs cover the entire six weeks, the starting briefing takes about 3-4 hours, and the crits and the end often take an entire day.
It's certainly a lot tougher that I was expecting from my understanding of Arts degrees at Exeter, where I'd heard of 2-4 contact hours a week. Here we're expected to be in 9.30 to 5 (though it must be admitted there's a fair bit of flexibility around that). Also, it's hard work to come up with these ideas, research them, develop them, and then get the design from your brain onto paper. It's also very interesting, I'm learning a lot and developing skills I didn't know I had.
Now, onto the Exeter course that led me to the degree I'm now doing.
Firstly, I just want to say; it's great, amazing, cool and really interesting. Mike Dobson is a great lecturer - interesting, funny, takes the piss out of himself happily, interacts with those he is teaching. The Graphic design module that he teaches is essentially two different components that could almost be separated and taught as a pair of related modules - the lectures, and the tutorials. The lectures are about 'What is design? Why do we need design? How does it work? What works and what doesn't? Why do we see/do things in that way?' - getting you grounded in the ideas behind design. The tutorials can be essentially described as "How to use Corel Draw", because that's the program they've got, and that's what you use to do the main project. It's split into two parts - one concentrating on Logo/Identity, and how you communicate an image to people, the other on Signage - how you communicate information and instructions to people. For each, you have to do a piece of coursework in that area (Logo for a charity and signing system for a building where what it was when I did it), and a 2,000 word essay based on a title chosen from an appropriate list.
I know I'm going a bit OTT here, but I really can't recommend this module enough, largely on the strength of Mike as a lecturer, but also because the grounding in Graphic Design it gives you is really useful, and gives you a new way of looking at the world, when you can look at every different logo, bit of type, or just any produced good and think about why it was designed to look like that.
My provisional idea for my next bit of writing is explaining why I don't think that hypothecation (assigning the money gained from taxes in a certain area to be spent in that area - e.g. cigarette tax in hospitals) is particularly necessary, except as a vote winner.
Final thought for the day - it's interesting how buying furniture makes me feel old, but I also get a fair bit of pride out of the fact that I have put several items together that I now use everyday.