Posts Tagged ‘typography’
eye-snacks from archive corner
Thursday, January 27th, 2011book review: Marian Bantjes’ ‘I Wonder’
Tuesday, October 26th, 2010
I wrote on this blog some while back that I feared we were losing the art of decoration, in passing referring to Marian Bantjes as bucking that trend. With the publication of I Wonder she has singlehandedly rescued ornament & craft from untimely demise at the hands of modernist graphic design.
For those unfamiliar, Marian Bantjes is a Canadian illustrator/typographer/designer (there is no appropriate single word) living near Vancouver who after a decade in book typography and production reinvented her career to a extraordinary degree. She is a kind of missing link between contemporary design and the rich decorative craft traditions of the religious world(s). Her work is entirely secular but there is a strong sense of devotion in it, and she has a gift for creating something something truly extraordinary—spiritual even—from the most unpromising materials or observations.
an accidental education: old news
Thursday, July 22nd, 2010
Randomly chosen newspaper spread with stories grouped under two page headings. The wide field of vision allows many other connections/reasons-to-read
The Death of Print is a phrase regularly bandied about since the invention of TV (and probably radio before that), appearing with renewed vigour with the arrival of every new communications platform. The actual death of some newspapers and print publications lends urgency to the drama, but the reality is less apocalyptic. Jobs are lost, companies fail, the media landscape changes, but old formats (with the notable exception of the unloved videocassette) assume new roles rather than become extinct. The life and death struggle of old vs. new media is the easy narrative but old media has unique value which should ensure at least a modest survival.
New media platforms have given us massive advances in accessibility and empowerment – but they also come with a predisposition for targeted communication, ‘narrowcasting’ and self-selection. Old media, print especially, has one underappreciated benefit that is absent from the new stuff. It doesn’t decide quite so forcefully in advance what information will be of value to me, limiting what I might learn about the world.
too much information?
Thursday, June 10th, 2010
This is my favourite road sign. I like it because it treats me as a sentient human being rather than a mindless drone incapable of independent thought. It encourages me to consider the possible hazards of my situation and trusts that having so reflected, I will make good decisions. Were I not barrelling along at 70mph it would also inspire me to muse further on the meaning of life, the universe and everything…
The rarity of such ‘thoughtful’ road signs makes me wonder why few communications assume an intelligent audience. Too much ‘telling’ surely eventually breeds disinterest. On the roads we all see plenty of poorly regulated over-signing: badly placed, ugly ‘street furniture’ laden with overly instructive signs, sometimes there (it would seem) as much to prevent the local council from being sued as to actually help the public. Credible research now shows that careful removal of oversignage increases road safety. De-signing can be good designing. As in most areas of communication design, consideration of the user and limiting the number of messages to be processed increases the likehood of effectiveness. More thoughtful communications crediting users with some intelligence would be no bad thing.
charm/offensive
Thursday, May 27th, 2010
The matchless charm of 1950s/60s comics, which comes not only from the artwork but also the basic (but cleverly exploited) printing technology and cheap uncoated paper (pic via Half-man Half-static).
Forty years back (in the Life on Mars era) the fashionable aesthetic is an informal, natural look. There is lingering hippy talk of ‘getting back to nature’. These are lean years for the high street hairdresser, ‘male grooming’ is a laughable concept and clothes are mostly cheap and nasty or homemade. Design is still a cottage industry but it is looking to the future: Michael English’s Hyper-real airbrush illustrations seem new and extraordinary. Robert Moog’s synthesizer is the future of music (although he hasn’t yet worked out how to keep it in tune)…
March 2010, Farringdon. I’m in a tube carriage near an extraordinary-looking young woman who appears in no way real. Her hair, nails, makeup seem somehow beyond human and her high brow and flawless surface reminds me of the actor/digital hybrid the Red Queen from Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland. Blankly shiny, expressionlessly ‘perfect’, she is the HD-ready paradigm of modern beauty. Music seeping from headphones is also soullessly bright, sampled, virtual, autotuned. All of this is in sharp contrast to the immediate noise and grubby texture of London, where illustrators, designers and musicians, bored with software slickness are increasingly going ‘wonky’ (surely the most irritating/overused phrase of 2009), working with the look and feel of handwork, crafts, ‘outsider art’ and forgotten technologies to rediscover ‘charm’….
ghost typography
Thursday, March 11th, 2010
Over the past year or two one side effect of the Global Banking Brouhaha has been a lot of high street retail refitting, briefly uncovering glimpses of signage and typography hidden for many years. If not quite as revelatory as Tutenkhamun’s tomb, these archaeological micro-events on the high street nonetheless show fascinating traces of old graphic design, rendered more intriguing by incompleteness.
Without nightvision cameras, bogus paranormal experts, or suggestible members of the public these glimpses reveal eerie traces of the past lives of type. In most cases the letters’ physical presence is long departed, their spirit inferred by shadows, fixing holes and accumulated detritus. Like some new kind of Kirlian photography the remaining traces hint at life and energy absent from the image.
Such marks are usually revealed fleetingly and soon cleaned up or built over. The above delicately shaded façade of a former Sketchleys branch is now sadly as pristine as its former customers’ shirts and suits. So keep your eyes peeled. The truth is out there, but not for long. Further evidence may be revealed from time to time here.
we want… information
Thursday, February 18th, 2010
I put up a shed last weekend (yes, the designer lifestyle is that glamorous): two days of stressful toil lengthened in no small part by the appalling quality of the ‘instructions’ provided: 14 pages of verbal and visual redundancy, irrelevance and confusion. Well what did I expect for £99?
Most products arrive with scant, inaccurate or misleading information for assembly and use. Many well-designed consumer products neglect information as part of the product experience, leading to returns, safety issues, customer dissatisfaction and erosion of brand loyalty. This seems overwhelmingly the norm and we are accustomed to sucking up all the wasted time, the frustration and stress, and moving on with our lives. Why are ‘instructions’ such a design-free zone? (more…)
simple
Thursday, February 18th, 2010
An explosion of communication and choice in recent decades has created the global climate of information overload that we are only now beginning to find ways to properly navigate. The rise of the iPhone app and the price comparison website shows the information economy at work and there is growing recognition of the value of designing access to information. But what took us so long?
In our personal areas of interest choice can seem miraculous: I can get my favourite version of my favourite song in less than 60 seconds; we can have customised trainers designed in-store; you can get your flat white-half-caff-soy-frappe-latte-cino just the way you like it in a coffee shop anywhere in the world (a distant time it was when coffee was purchased in only one of two states: black or white). But in general, relentless second-by-second decision-making is required to navigate a deep sea of visual noise. Negotiating our choices can lead to unprecedented fatigue, confusion, stress – and disinterest. As expectations rise, consumers are increasingly losing their patience. How do we solve this problem?
Comic Sans apocalypse
Monday, February 15th, 2010
Well that’s it then. The End of Days. Armageddon. Civilization? all over. I have seen a sign: Someone with sufficient cash for a brand new Bentley has seen fit to customize it not only with a personalised license plate (tacky, but unsurprising) – but one set in design’s least favourite typeface: Comic Sans.
Momentarily traumatised whilst driving I failed to whip out the phone camera to record this portent of doom or to note particulars for the design police, but trust me – its out there somewhere… (more…)
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