505: Module Evaluation

OUGD505 I found to be a mixed module.

Studio Brief 1 I thought was a very interesting concept from start to finish. I myself love and am passionate about music so being able to complete a brief based on music entirely was a great project for me, it gave me the opportunity to discover new genres and research into some I am already interested in as well as find some new music. I chose to do a project on a genre I am not particularly familiar with but am interested in and I think choosing compositional ambient was a good choice as I was able to come up with an interesting concept. Given my own struggles with anxiety, I was able to relate more to the project and create a final piece that reflects the genre and its use well. If I were to redo this project I would perhaps create more of a 3D object as I think this would be interesting for use in an exhibition.

Studio Brief 2 was more research heavy and I liked in this project that we had complete freedom within this project to create something we were very personally interested in. Given that I have a wide range of interests I was able to pick something I thought could make for an interesting concept, using second hand fashion as a basis and creating an outcome featuring this. Researching into this project was eye opening as I discovered shocking facts about the fashion industry that made me rethink my buying habits, and I think the publication I created will do the same to readers. In 504 I also created a publication but the outcome was not to the standard I wanted so being able to create another one I was more happy with was great as I am interested in editorial design.

In terms of the course structure within this module I thought that we could have more taught sessions on the subject inclucding more crits to get feedback from peers. Due to 503 being such a substantial brief the timings for studio time were messed up and irregular and I think this affected how the project ran 

Product Range Distribution: Final Design and Evaluation

Unconscious is a publication aimed at younger people with the purpose of persuading the reader to buy more second hand fashion. The book is split into sections, the first to ease the reader into the subject of second hand fashion by showing the ease of accessibility and range of styles that can be acheived using just second hand clothing. Photographing the models in their home environments creates a sense of relatability as opposed to high fashion settings which may alienate readers. The photography is primarily focused on the clothes rather than the models due to the need to show the variety of clothing and also close ups to show that the quality of the garments is high, to contradict misconceptions about second hand clothing. By collaborating with a fashion photographer the photographs are of high quality which makes the book appear professional overall. 

The layout and style of the book changed over development, keeping the same minimalistic appearance but adding in elements of colour which makes the publication seem more deliberate and adds consistency across the pages.

Perfect binding the book again adds to the professional appearance of the publication by eliminating any loose threads and keeping the aesthetic clean.

Overall the publication reaches its purpose, gently encouraging and informing the reader, I think this is best acheived by the varied sections in the book which ease the reader into the subject of fast fashion, backed up by the statistics which inform.

Micro Genre: Final Piece and evaluation

My final piece for the micro genre brief is a typographic poster reflecting the music genre compositional ambient. In research I found that ambient music is used in relaxation techniques by anxiety sufferers, as it grounds them during panic attacks and 'the space between each note allows you to experience your surroundings.' This quote by Ryan Bassil, the author of a vital article in my research reminded me of a Massimo Vignelli quote 'I often say that in typography the white space is more important than the black of the type.' Inspired by this quote I decided to create a typographic outcome. I thought that a poster would be the most accessible outcome and easily placed in a place of work or area where people are likely to be stressed, as its purpose is to remind sufferers to breathe to overcome an anxious episode. The content of the poster reflects Brian Eno's iconic ambient album Music For Airports, as the dimensions of the poster, 420mm x 380mm reflect the duration of the record. The word 'relax' is used to instill feelings of calm, has altered kerning between each letter in the format 1630, 820, 1130, 600 and this represents the length of each track on the album. This kerning within the type reflects the link between ambient music and space, particularly the spacing between letters. The typeface used is Helvetica due to its simplicity and also relates to a quote by graphic designer Max Parker, who states that 'Helvetica, what it's all about is the interrelationship of the negative shape, the figure-ground relationship, the shapes between characters and within characters'. The pale blue of the poster aids with a calming appearance and the white text has been lowered in opacity so that the poster will be 'as ignorable as it is interesting', to quote Brian Eno's description of what ambient music should be.

I think that my design of the poster reflects the genre of music well and its purpose suits my research into the use of the genre within anxiety therapy and relief. The use of typeface and colours are strategically planned and have a good context behind them. If I were to improve upon the piece I may have created a 3D sculpture or similar to further push the idea that the genre uses space within its characteristics, but I think creating a poster is a good outcome for the project as it is easily accessible to sufferers, and to have it there in the background reminds them to breathe and help them get through a panic attack. I particularly like how the poster reflects the 'ignorable as it is interesting' personality of the genre, by the colours and the uneven spacing between letters respectively.

Product Range Distribution: Production

My publication was printed on 200gsm Olin Regular paper, I chose this paper as I wanted a sturdy and fairly heavy weight of paper to bulk out the publication and make it substantial and professional. The pages were printed on A5 size and I chose to perfect bind them together.

I chopped down the pages in a stack using the laser-assisted cutting machine in the traditional print room so that the edges would be smooth and clean. I then sandwiched these pages together and clamped them within a plate clamp. Then after applying a thin layer of PVA glue to the spine of the pages, I glued scrim to bind the pages together. Thin layers of glue would then be applied to the spine to cement the bind. The cover was printed on 300gsm digital iSilk paper as the paper is thick, perfect for a cover and finish is silky, which gives the publication a professional finish. I also chose to perfect bind the book as there would be no visible thread, again providing a clean appearance.

Micro Genre: Development

Upon further research into typography and space, I came across this quote from the documentary Helvetica which I found interesting.

Mike Parker: When you talk about the design of Haas Neue Grotesk or Helvetica, what it's all about is the interrelationship of the negative shape, the figure-ground relationship, the shapes between characters and within characters, with the black, if you like, with the inked surface. And the Swiss pay more attention to the background, so that the counters and the space between characters just hold the letters. I mean you can't imagine anything moving; it is so firm. It not a letter that bent to shape; it's a letter that lives in a powerful matrix of surrounding space. It's... oh, it's brilliant when it's done well.

The quote relates perfectly to the quote from the article and Vignelli's on spacing between type. Creating my piece in Helvetica reflects this quote, and adds to the understated design due to its simplicity and iconic letter forms. The sans serif type allows the word to be read clearly and makes it look modern and more relatable. In Ryan Bassil's article he explained how Brian Eno's album Music For Airports - a pivotal album within the genre - helped him to calm him when feeling anxious. 

One quote that stood out for me was 

'ambient music is different: it can quiet your thoughts and the space in between each note allows you to experience your surroundings.'

This related to a quote well by Massimo Vignelli

 'I often say that in typography the white space is more important than the black of the type. The white space on the printed page is the correspondent of space in architecture.

The link between the music and type here due to the spacing was evident and provided me with an idea. Using the idea of the spacing in typography to represent the spacing in the music.
When looking more into the Music For Airports album I found it was 48:32 in duration, the poster measures 480 x 320 mm to reflect this. The album contains 4 tracks with varying lengths. 

To reflect the track lengths I have adjusted the spacing between each letter of the word, so the kerning between each letter is adjusted - 1630, 820, 1130, 600.

In relation to the context of anxiety and breathing Erik Spiekerman has also been quoted as saying: 

It's air, you know. It's just there. There's no choice. You have to breathe, so you have to use Helvetica. 

To begin with I chose the word calm, as the 4 letters in the word represented the 4 letters in the album Music For Airports. Adding in the full stop gave 4 spaces between characters in which I could adjust kerning to reflect the duration of each track.

Experimenting with using 4 letter words associated with being relaxed, these would be used as reminders to the viewer to help with anxiety attacks. 

Replacing the previous 4 letter words with a 4 syllable word, and breaking up the syllables in the same way as the letters looks effective but the message behind the poster is wrong - instead of having a calming effect the poster looks chaotic due to the extra letters and odd, uneven grouping of letters. The viewer will not want to be reminded of their situation, so instead a calming word should be used.

Switching the word to 'relax' rectifies this problem. The word relax has 5 letters and as a result, 4 spaces. Relax I think perfectly encapsulates the mood the anxiety sufferer needs to reach. The above experimentation echoes that 2 of the tracks in Music For Airports features loops in the tracks, this is shown here by repetition of the word over and over. However, I don't think that this gives a very relaxing appearance to the poster due to the odd spacing and many letters.

Instead of the repetition I have decided to revert back to original format of the poster and use one word as a statement. The word takes up the space on the poster in the same way that ambient music fills space. The colour has been changed from white and black to a pale blue colour, to aid with the calming appearance, and the opacity of the white text has also been dropped. This echoes the fact that ambient music should be as ignorable (due to the pale subtle colours) as it is interesting (featured in the odd, irregular spacing of the letters).

Product Range Distribution: Development

After conferring with Orlando, the feedback was to make my lookbook more of a publication. The outcome will be a small publication on the theme of second - hand fashion, with more content than just photos. This will round out the publication as well as inform and educate which was my intended purpose for the book. 

Possible Sections
Profile of Depop Seller (featuring photos)
Editorial section (photos and clothes information)
Interview
Statistics
Illustrations?
Brands and sustainability

As I am adjusting the publication from a lookbook to more of a magazine, I will need to change the composition to suit this. As the publication will feature more text, the layout will matter. As within a magazine, the text will be running in columns, which also makes it easier to read.

Final Sections and layout
Contents
Editorial
Statistics 
How to get involved 
- Places to shop (Charity Shops, Depop ((includes interview with Depop seller)))

Initial layouts

In initial layouts I experimented with photo and text placement. Changing the page from a square to an A5 page made the publication seem more professional, as the square seemed childish and too simplistic. The A5 page is sleeker and seems more like a publication. In this stage I also realised that the majority of my photos are in landscape format, so carrying this format on throughout the book will ensure consistency throughout.

As the intended audience for the publication is younger people (students) I began to look at second hand fashion within popular culture. Coming across these slow fashion memes was entertaining and informative as it shows how the internet generation are becoming more involved with second hand fashion. I initially wanted to include these as it would make the content more entertaining as well as relatable, however the memes work better in digital format on a screen as opposed to a publication, so decided to omit them from the book.

Contents

Taking inspiration from minimalistic design, I wanted to keep some pages white, to ensure the publication looked clean and professional. I felt a quote about clothing would lend some context to the publication as at first glance, there is no context on the cover. This quote by Isaac Bashevis Singer was perfect for the publication as it mentions the power clothing has. This sets the scene for the entire book and ingrains in the reader that the decisions they make have an impact. This is a good starting point as it enforces this from an early stage. I have chosen to use the typeface Europa for the titles in the book due to its modern and young appearance. The boldness of the type perfectly echoes the bold quote and contrasts against the white pages.

Editorial

The opening page of the editorial section again features a bold statement - I wanted a title for this section that would accurately represent the purpose of the book and encapsulate the message I am trying to get across in the photography. By using this particular photo of Hannah I am subtly trying to say that people are blind or ignorant to the damage they are causing to the planet by buying into fast fashion and opposed to second hand fashion. 

Keeping the photos consistent across the publication was important so that it would flow well. As I had a lot of close up shots, these could be used as both full bleed and landscape. The close up detail shots work well full bleed as they highlight the quality of the garments, showing that the clothes aren't battered and damaged as is an all too common misconception of second hand clothes.

In this section of the editorial I thought that the pages seemed too white and plain, so decided to add a coloured box to the page, colour picked from the photographs on the page and the opacity dropped so as to not distract from the photographs. 

In this section a style was established using this coloured box, which I could then apply to the rest of my publication. The box pulls the pages together and creates a more consistent overall design. The addition of colour also makes the publication more fun and easier to read as the pages appear far less clinical.

As this page spread has no text aside from captions I have made the coloured box full bleed. The neutral brown colour contrasts against the orange and blue jumper in the pictures. 

Statistics

An unsuccessful visual representation of a statistic.

In this section on statistics I wanted to represent the sometimes shocking data in visual format so that readers would not just skim over the facts and instead be interested in what the infographics represent. The facts themselves are smaller and used as context for the designs, so that the reader will have to read them to understand the representations.

I wanted to keep the graphics consistent, so have colour picked the red colour from an earlier photograph in the editorial section, and as red represents something bad I felt the dangerous impact of the industry would be best represented in this colour.

 Get involved

This spread of the book introduces the section of the book where readers can begin to get involved in second hand fashion more. After the editorial section which is used to gently instill in the reader that second hand clothing can be fashionable, and the statistics to inform them about the impact second hand fashion has, the reader should now be more interested in buying second hand and want to know how to get involved.

The photograph of the mirror links to the beginning of the editorial section with the photo of Hannah with her arm covering her eyes. At the start of the book the reader may have been ignorant, but after the statistics, they should be reflecting on their personal buying habits and wanting to buy more consciously.

This section of the book features articles written on Depop and charity shops. Taken from the survey these places are the primary method of obtaining second hand clothes. The articles aims to inform and persuade the reader about each method. This is the most text heavy section of the book, and to make the content easier to read and follow, the text is broken up into columns. This echoes the magazine design I researched earlier in the project and also makes the page appear cleaner and neater. The titles are large and bold, to take up the white space but do not detract from the text or photographic content. Adding in the coloured boxes again make the publication consistent and fill up the white space which wasn't working next to the colourful photographs. This addition brings the design of this section together.

Linking to the section on Depop was the interview with the Depop seller. As this is in a slightly different format to the rest of the publication, the layout for the introduction page varies. The picture of Natalie the seller is the only photograph in the book in a circular shape, this reflects icons across social media such as twitter, where a persons profile picture is also in a circle format. 

The layout for the rest of the section follows the design across the rest of the publication. The page featuring the outfit with the shorts also has a full bleed colour page to tie in the same feature earlier on in the book. The adidas outift page does not use the same full bleed box.