i've refined my culture further into something more specific, and, i think, more interesting.
yeah, i'm talkin' about djs. which is exciting, because that's an activity that i'm kind of infatuated with, but without much real knowledge about. yaiy for research!
so now here's my updated artifact list:
headphones
turntables
soundboard
mixers
speakers
vinyl
microphone
synths
macbook
metal equipment box
cords/cables
it still has a bit of wiggle room because soundboards and mixers and synths all kind of look like boxes full of switches and knobs, so i will be determining which i can get to look most distinct from one another. as it should, everything kind of relies on the availability of quality imagery! if i can't get good photos, then no matter how great the artifact is, i can't really play it up.
i'm working presently on layouts for the book of these artifacts. so far, the layout i'm most excited about is one based off equalizer bars... i think it has a lot of potential! once i get these sketches into digitized layouts, i'll upload.
Friday, January 28, 2011
icon, index, symbol pictures
we had a very non-threatening critique in class of these photos, and presumably as a class we gleaned a better understanding of what the hell we were talking about. i personally kind of oscillated between getting it more clearly and then being much more confused. in any event, here are my three pages of photos, and i'm pleased to say that the majority of each were, in fact, what i thought they were. i think.
those are icon. please don't steal my identity from that school id card. my room, my keys, my macbook, my graduation photo, and a pen sketch.
these are index. although, if you don't know me personally, they could bleed a little into symbolic territory. my room, my bags, my clothes and hats and scarves and phone and class ring and keys and car.
these are symbolic. mostly. some of them are kind of indexical, like the double apple. although i'm inclined to think that that means it's a successful symbol because it's already attached to me without any real indexical reason? i dunno. a quick rundown of my symbolic intentions: owls are supposed to be smart. i want to be smart. the trouble is my owls are also kind of twee and kitschy. the thing is, owls are actually really stupid. i love that contrast. i hope i am smart. this takes care of several photos. the unicorn is kind of about how i don't want to grow up and lose that little-kid-magic, and how i hope i can carry some of that with me, because it's not really my choice if i grow up or not. as for the cat, well... i kind of meow. i dunno why. most people who spend any amount of time around me would agree that i'm kind of a cat sometimes. the plastic beads are about how i'm cheap and self-referential even while how i look is important to me. the feather has a dual meaning: super obvious, i have a great love for birds. less obvious, it looks like a quill and represents writing. the apple is vintage and new at the same time, indicative of the divide in my tastes. keyboard is about how much i love typing and how deeply i am related to my macbook. and the wire text again refers to the act of writing.
we're to take one of each and create a french fold book, two small images and one large one. i am thinking of using the little silver owl, my fedora, and the picture of me in the owl-hat. owl+hat=owl-hat. honestly, i am so simple. hopefully it turns out looking very nice.
those are icon. please don't steal my identity from that school id card. my room, my keys, my macbook, my graduation photo, and a pen sketch.
these are index. although, if you don't know me personally, they could bleed a little into symbolic territory. my room, my bags, my clothes and hats and scarves and phone and class ring and keys and car.
these are symbolic. mostly. some of them are kind of indexical, like the double apple. although i'm inclined to think that that means it's a successful symbol because it's already attached to me without any real indexical reason? i dunno. a quick rundown of my symbolic intentions: owls are supposed to be smart. i want to be smart. the trouble is my owls are also kind of twee and kitschy. the thing is, owls are actually really stupid. i love that contrast. i hope i am smart. this takes care of several photos. the unicorn is kind of about how i don't want to grow up and lose that little-kid-magic, and how i hope i can carry some of that with me, because it's not really my choice if i grow up or not. as for the cat, well... i kind of meow. i dunno why. most people who spend any amount of time around me would agree that i'm kind of a cat sometimes. the plastic beads are about how i'm cheap and self-referential even while how i look is important to me. the feather has a dual meaning: super obvious, i have a great love for birds. less obvious, it looks like a quill and represents writing. the apple is vintage and new at the same time, indicative of the divide in my tastes. keyboard is about how much i love typing and how deeply i am related to my macbook. and the wire text again refers to the act of writing.
we're to take one of each and create a french fold book, two small images and one large one. i am thinking of using the little silver owl, my fedora, and the picture of me in the owl-hat. owl+hat=owl-hat. honestly, i am so simple. hopefully it turns out looking very nice.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
signifiers and signifieds and semiosis, oh my!
had that first photo/image class today! sounds pretty good. tyler led us in some endearing getting-to-know-you conversation, and then we jumped into semiotics. it felt like a good call to go ahead and blog some definitions while they're still fairly fresh, so here's what icons, indexes, and symbols are!
firstly, all of them are signs. they are all things that refer to things outside themselves.
icons are the most readily legible: they are pictorial representations of their signifieds. thus, a photograph of my friend represents my friend. a drawing of my cat represents my cat. a model car represents a real car. they draw a direct line from one thing to another that is easily followed.
indexes might take some work to read. they indicate their signified indirectly. they might be text, or traces of some action or implication. a dirty plate and a fork might refer to a meal. the setting can imply a scene, cobbled together out of little clues, using foreshadowing or whatever the word is for backwards-shadowing. indexes point you where you need to look to find the signified.
symbols are kind of delicate, and they seem to require a certain level of conditioning or backstory. symbols don't look like their signified. they don't point to their signified, either. the connection is not clear, or even cloudy: it's magic, or perhaps telepathy, in that symbols are agreed upon by some manner of collective unconscious to the point that we don't need the why to know the what. logos are successful in this regard if they can come to mean their brand and everything their brand stands for without needing the pitstop of the name and the explanation.
here's the fun part: we get to apply this to ourselves in photography! at least ten icons of ourselves, at least ten indexes toward ourselves, and at least ten symbols for ourselves. the first two are simple enough. the last one is also simple enough, in a way that requires a certain non-euclidean concentration.
with my brandshinynew camera, all that is to come in the near future. and we can all thank derrida that at least none of our image class signifiers are are transcendental.
firstly, all of them are signs. they are all things that refer to things outside themselves.
icons are the most readily legible: they are pictorial representations of their signifieds. thus, a photograph of my friend represents my friend. a drawing of my cat represents my cat. a model car represents a real car. they draw a direct line from one thing to another that is easily followed.
indexes might take some work to read. they indicate their signified indirectly. they might be text, or traces of some action or implication. a dirty plate and a fork might refer to a meal. the setting can imply a scene, cobbled together out of little clues, using foreshadowing or whatever the word is for backwards-shadowing. indexes point you where you need to look to find the signified.
symbols are kind of delicate, and they seem to require a certain level of conditioning or backstory. symbols don't look like their signified. they don't point to their signified, either. the connection is not clear, or even cloudy: it's magic, or perhaps telepathy, in that symbols are agreed upon by some manner of collective unconscious to the point that we don't need the why to know the what. logos are successful in this regard if they can come to mean their brand and everything their brand stands for without needing the pitstop of the name and the explanation.
here's the fun part: we get to apply this to ourselves in photography! at least ten icons of ourselves, at least ten indexes toward ourselves, and at least ten symbols for ourselves. the first two are simple enough. the last one is also simple enough, in a way that requires a certain non-euclidean concentration.
with my brandshinynew camera, all that is to come in the near future. and we can all thank derrida that at least none of our image class signifiers are are transcendental.
the current state of my desk
(remember how i was going to do that daily desk thing? how clever and alliterative that was? yeah... we're back to the "when i happen to look down at my desk, find its collection of papers & process to be interesting and relevant, and take the initiative to document its condition" desk. doesn't sound anywhere as nice as "daily," but is infinitely more accurate.)
in any event, here's what my desk looks like right now, and to follow, why!
these are some 16 or so sketches of potential typographical hierarchy for my letterpressed postcards. you'll recognize the quote, i hope! in these sketches i explored three different hierarchies. some had their emphasis on design (i find it helps if you shout the emphasis in your head when you read it), some had their emphasis on the juxtaposition between science and art, and some focused on the idea of breaking even. ultimately my mini-critique-group and i decided that breaking even doesn't really mean anything on its own, and its being highlighted was not so much eyecatching as it was slightly confusing. marty agreed. we also discussed it being slightly more interesting to bring out design is than simply design. the emphasis on science & art worked pretty well on a first try, woohoo!
so these two sketches are contrasting hierarchies of the same text, from which we can derive slightly (or maybe rather) different meanings. the next step (which is already littering the margins) was to go into the littlebittyteenytiny press room and sift through drawers of metal and wood type. likea fool an ambitious person i have big letters and also small letters, so i will be using both wood and metal type, meaning i will run each card twice to get the entire design on there, because wood and metal do not get along very well. fortunately they're not interspersed, it's big letters and then small letters, so it should go pretty well. finding type that is pretty close in size and personality to our intentions, we labeled our sketches and now set about digitizing to "sketch" and layout with more precision.
now is perhaps an okay time to explain a bit better why it is that i personally chose this quote. aside from the fact that it is a snappy, interesting take on design, it speaks to me directly because of trying to balance the science brain and the art brain, and hoping that you come out with something stronger and more useful than either of them alone. i love science. in another life, i would've gone to regular-college and pursued neuroscience. in this life, i went to art school to pursue design. the success in combining the power of each, two forces that many people might consider opposing, is what brought me to this discipline, because i don't think either science or art interests me quite as much as where they intersect, the point at which they break even: design.
in any event, here's what my desk looks like right now, and to follow, why!
these are some 16 or so sketches of potential typographical hierarchy for my letterpressed postcards. you'll recognize the quote, i hope! in these sketches i explored three different hierarchies. some had their emphasis on design (i find it helps if you shout the emphasis in your head when you read it), some had their emphasis on the juxtaposition between science and art, and some focused on the idea of breaking even. ultimately my mini-critique-group and i decided that breaking even doesn't really mean anything on its own, and its being highlighted was not so much eyecatching as it was slightly confusing. marty agreed. we also discussed it being slightly more interesting to bring out design is than simply design. the emphasis on science & art worked pretty well on a first try, woohoo!
so these two sketches are contrasting hierarchies of the same text, from which we can derive slightly (or maybe rather) different meanings. the next step (which is already littering the margins) was to go into the littlebittyteenytiny press room and sift through drawers of metal and wood type. like
now is perhaps an okay time to explain a bit better why it is that i personally chose this quote. aside from the fact that it is a snappy, interesting take on design, it speaks to me directly because of trying to balance the science brain and the art brain, and hoping that you come out with something stronger and more useful than either of them alone. i love science. in another life, i would've gone to regular-college and pursued neuroscience. in this life, i went to art school to pursue design. the success in combining the power of each, two forces that many people might consider opposing, is what brought me to this discipline, because i don't think either science or art interests me quite as much as where they intersect, the point at which they break even: design.
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
let the archeology commence
in viscom, we are working with a method called "design archeology." we are using the principles of archeology to work backwards from present day cultures to understand their material artifacts and how those objects alone can be used to build an image of their culture of origin, resulting in something of a snapshot of that culture, generated through artifacts.
we mindmapped and brainstormed until we had 15 cultures as a class, and each of us chose two to look at, moving forward. shortly, it will be one, and then, as i understand it, we will work with this culture continuously from here on out.
theatre
artifacts:
scripts
highlighters
costumes
makeup
props
stage
microphones
curtains
pulleys
lightboard
gaff tape
follow spot
values: authenticity, expression, believability, misdirection, teamwork, performance
audiophile/music fan
artifacts:
headphones
earbuds
mp3 player
soundboard
amps
turntables
vinyl records
CDs
cassettes
ticket stubs
buttons
band tshirts
autographs
values:
audio quality, preservation, purity, love of music, loyalty, community
Monday, January 24, 2011
we're baaa-aaack... type 2, project 1, part 1.
and they're off!
our first type project of the semester is a typographic campaign centered around a design-related quote. we are creating two contrasting compositions for a 7x5 in postcard, the theoretical audience for which being those in the kansas city community who attend the crossroads's "first fridays" gallery crawl. the trick of this project is that our postcards are to be produced using the letterpress. [this is one reason why our audience is more hypothetical than practical, although marty did say that if we wanted to produce enough postcards to actually hand out, then more power to us.]
i have chosen the following quote:
"design is where science and art break even."
the speaker is robin mathew, the strategic and creative head for ét interactive design. the word et, coming from latin, is a conjunction, is a connector. it means "and" or even "plus" in the mathematical sense. this is critical to their design philosophy. their work is all about connections, and they strive to eliminate distinctions and obstructions from design thinking. in this view, it's not about what design isn't, or what it can't do. [design, then, is everything, and it can do anything!] it is this combination, the addition of this and that, the balance of multiple, even opposing, forces, that give design its strength.
design is the solution to the equation of science and art, after cross-multiplying and reducing and balancing. it is where science and art break even.
our first type project of the semester is a typographic campaign centered around a design-related quote. we are creating two contrasting compositions for a 7x5 in postcard, the theoretical audience for which being those in the kansas city community who attend the crossroads's "first fridays" gallery crawl. the trick of this project is that our postcards are to be produced using the letterpress. [this is one reason why our audience is more hypothetical than practical, although marty did say that if we wanted to produce enough postcards to actually hand out, then more power to us.]
i have chosen the following quote:
"design is where science and art break even."
the speaker is robin mathew, the strategic and creative head for ét interactive design. the word et, coming from latin, is a conjunction, is a connector. it means "and" or even "plus" in the mathematical sense. this is critical to their design philosophy. their work is all about connections, and they strive to eliminate distinctions and obstructions from design thinking. in this view, it's not about what design isn't, or what it can't do. [design, then, is everything, and it can do anything!] it is this combination, the addition of this and that, the balance of multiple, even opposing, forces, that give design its strength.
design is the solution to the equation of science and art, after cross-multiplying and reducing and balancing. it is where science and art break even.
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