Type and Tape

We were set the task of designing a typeface made only of tape in groups. We had an array of different of tapes at our disposal in order to fulfil the brief and had to consort with the group on how we could best use these materials. It turned out our group had alot of good ideas and it proved difficult to chose one at the expense of the others so we ended up chosing a typeface consisting of a selection of our ideas, with a different type used for each letter. After considering how this would look, we decided to use white tape to create a joined up outline in order make the typeface look more unified, without it, it may have looked mismatched and chaotic. We named it 'Coalesce' meaning 'to bring together', befitting the concept behind it.


Final typeface

Without white joining line

Me sticking up my letter

Another one of our day tasks was to create an illustration solely out of coloured paper. I decided to work around the theme of creating a sense of place about Poole, so that the piece was relevant to our other task of creating editorial illustrations which visually describe Poole. I used a black background cut, meticulously, in the shape of cranes (which dominate poole quay's skyline) on which I stuck a paper image of the 'boat trips' booth along the seafront as these two images signify the two things which characterise Poole- Tourism and Industry. Given more time I could have easily improved the image, the fiddly cutting of the details of the crane took alot longer than I anticipated and left very little time for the other elements.

Crit for Visual Mapping

the feedback from this crit seemed to echo what I had thought about the work myself, there were good elements, but it was not composed very well. The image seems imbalanced I think, so I am going to create another illustration to go in the bottom right as this area is comparatively bare. Then I will probably go down the route of dividing it into a triptych which will make the image less busy and chaotic as well as helping to communicate the differences between each area of London, something which I intended to be one of the main features of the piece.

Hectic

After slogging away for the whole weekend on the visual mapping task (our brief was to visually describe a journey in a new environment) for our Monday morning critique I was optimistic that there might be some respite this week. Instead I was confronted with a reminder of the plethora of tasks which are imminently due. There is a definite air of urgency, even panic among our group over the amount we have going on. It's not solely a case of the workload that seems to be causing this, I think we've coped all with similar amounts before, I definitely have whilst taking my A-levels, it's the different tasks for different tutors which have different deadlines and are within different units requiring different skills and different students hearing (and telling you) different things about these. However, I've learned that spending time moaning, stressing and chatting about it is not conducive to getting any of it done, instead its better to step back, calm down, prioritise each task and simply work. Our upcoming tasks include:

-3 editorial illustrations to convey our experiences of the Poole trip
-A series of photos of typography in the public environment (vernacular typography)
-Letterpress workshops
-Refining and developing my 'drift' task
-Making a a book complete with photo montage centre-fold and a cover design featuring a piece of experimental typography
-Making another book detailing our journey through the course so far
-A 2000 word essay on an image
-An 800 word self evaluation of my progress in the theory unit
-A 500 word evaluation of progress through text and image
-And an 800 word critique of an object from the museum of design in plastics.
-Ongoing general research, reading (general as well as academic) and self-reflection

This week I am going to: refine my drift project, build up some more research for the editorial illustrations, get the vernacular typography task out of the way and begin reading/get some library books out to support my essay, I also need to try and procure the photos of my group's typeface made with tape.

Writing out all my tasks like this definitely has a kind of therapeutic effect, just by compiling the above list I instantly feel more relaxed, they all seem more tangible now, I don't feel like I'm in danger of forgetting any of them.

As I mentioned above, I have been working all weekend on the visual mapping or 'drift project where I had to document a journey through a new environment. I used a group trip to see a talk by influential film-credit designer Kyle Cooper London as my inspiration for the image. What I initially set out to convey was the distinct character of each area of London I walked through. One of the main devices which I intended to achieve this was the use of the black railings which are really prevalent in London- I noticed they changed from area to area, with affluent places like Holborn having very ornamental, decorative railings and areas like Tower Hamlets, which are generally less wealthy having basic, functional designs. The railings were meant to be a constant which signified London, with the slight differences in their appearances portraying the differences in the visual landscape of each area. After a draft copy of my image I realised that the railings idea wasn't very communicative due to the other elements of the montage image which attract more focus and the image of the railings alone was quite crude and didn't convey any of the other aspects of my journey (buildings, people etc) so I chose to make them smaller and overlay a jagged line in order to detract focus from them and amplify the idea of direction and also convey the pace of my journey (it was quite fast and chaotic). I don't think I've successfully conveyed what I wanted to as of yet so I will be refining the image but i'll post the draft up on here anyway.

Letterpress

When trawling google, researching for our upcoming letterpress workshop, I found some good examples of contemporary designers employing the centuries-old craft in their work. Letterpress has undergone a revival in recent years, with design practitioners increasingly turning to a medium which offers a very fine, rich aesthetic and allows the use of bold inks to create work that not only looks more distinctive than that churned out of a laserjet but also has a sense of history, and craft behind it, making it feel unique. Obviously these attributes don't translate completely onto screen, the letterpressed object can only be appreciated to its full extent as a physical object owing to its tactile nature.

The images that really stood out to me were created by Peter Kruty and Lovio George Inc and can be viewed by copying this link into the address bar: http://img530.imageshack.us/img530/2254/letterpressco0.jpg - Kruty's type design competition poster has utilised the way letterpress is an old medium to amplify the traditional feel to the poster created by the heavy, serif typeface and layout reminiscent of a bourbon whiskey bottle or even a wild west 'wanted' poster.

The Lovio George typographic illustration of the Eastern Market is part of a series of postcards depicting landmarks around the American city of Detroit. Letterpress works particularly well in this image as the crisp, sans serif type in black (with the white counters and spaces the two merge to create a steely shade of grey) creates a very constructed image- reflecting Detroit's reputation as a major centre of industry (it houses 3 of the world's biggest automotive companies General Motors, Ford and Chrysler).

http://ohpickles.wordpress.com/2008/02/18/lovio-george-typography-letterpress-wow/

http://www.peterkrutyeditions.com/