Friday 30th September: Introduction to Sense of Place brief

Today we were introduced to the Sense of place brief during a workshop. We got together in groups and took part in a task using post it notes to help congregate possible ideas and brain storm thoughts of where we could go with our projects. I found this really inspiring , hearing about other peoples creative mind sets.

Following this activity , i collected together my ideas in a mind map , which helped me to think more broadly as to where my project could go. I really like the idea of exploring people and cultures , or thinking about the origins of local foods and the people and places they come from, really thinking outside of the box to try and bring my personality into the project. I am going to start to research locations and their personalities i.e the people that live there, the character , is it a sense of poverty, affluence , community? I want to interview people and ask questions, collect experiences and materials that will make my project bold and different. I want to be adventurous with my ideas and am ready to explore my possibilities and experiment with new and exciting ideas and ways of working , as influenced by my manifesto where i believe imagination is key . Thinking out of the comfort of my sense of place - Home, in hope that this will make my work different to anything i have done before.

Thursday 29th September: Adobe CC Workshop , Bitmap experiments.

Thursday 29th September: Introduction to Adobe CC workshop

In this first workshop we learnt about the basic layout principles of Adobe InDesign. We explored the Gutenberg bible and used the principles of the 'Van de Graaf Canon' grid to create our own version of the book layout. We did this to help us understand the ways page proportions, margins and type areas of pages are constructed. This is a screenshot whilst i was working towards my final outcome in adobe illustrator.

As the 'Van de Graaf Canon' grid is a fundamental basic of graphic design we used what we had learnt to imitate a poster by Josef Müller-Brockmann to introduce us to the visual aesthetic of Swiss Design. His posters "created a mathematical harmony which reflected the harmony of mu he was trying to promote.We had to be very specific in where we placed the text and blocks to get it just like Müller-Brockmanns. We did this using a grid inspired by the'Van de Graaf Canon' grid, I think mine is a very accurate imitation. On the right is my imitation of the Josef Müller-Brockmann band poster.

Monday 26th September : Design Manifesto

The first lecture and seminar on Theory and Practice was all about imagining ourselves as practitioners, and thinking about how we work , and about having design authorship on your own work, giving it a sense of strong identity carving out your style in the industry. Thinking about what type of designers we want to become and the idea of having concepts behind our work. To do this we began to think of our own design philosophy , revolving around what is important to us and how we could build this into our own style of work.

To do this we began looking at some famous manifestos to show us a good way of how our ideas can become practise. This seminar helped me to realise that Manifestos are a great way of creating your own framework for generating ideas that are specific to yourself and your own style. Especially Daniel Eatocks manifesto, a lot of his ideas are not specifically about design but also about his life philosophies. Design is a reaction to what is going on in the moment, Daniel Eatocks manifesto helps him to do this.

We looked at the 'First things first' manifesto which is quite a narrative and sceptical way of presenting a manifesto unlike Daniel Eatocks . In redacting the text i began to find what words stood out to me and what i believe a design philosophy is about. The word i was left with that really stood out to me was 'imagination'. I believe this is the way that you make an impact on the industry in being creative and showing your individual personality through imagination. You have got to believe and be confident in your ideas and concepts. As i begin to develop my manifesto these will be the ideas that will be the for front of my design philosophy, bridging the gap between theory and practice.

Test post

Into The Great Wide Open Festival - Full Line-Up Announcement from From Form on Vimeo.

I chose this video as my test post because i found something intriguing about the use of textures and mediums in the animation and how each window looks like its been cut out of the background. I love how you can still see every brush stroke where the backgrounds have originally been painted , this technique of combing 2D mediums like paint, papers and different textures with animation really interests me.