The Beauty of the Sun

Nothing I could say can compare with the beauty of these shots from the NASA's Solar Dynamic Observatory.

Still from the NASA's Solar Dynamic Observatory

Modernism vs. Hyperbole

It isn’t a mystery to anyone who has had my History of Graphic Design class that my biggest design influence is the Modernists. One of the facets of modernism that I am really drawn to is the feeling of inevitability in the solutions. Part of the inevitability of those solutions is that the text and the images not only work together, but that the text itself is straight forward and descriptive. The work is presented, “...through objective and impersonal presentation, communicating to the audience without the interference of the designer’s subjective feelings or propagandistic techniques of persuasion.¹”

What made me think of this is that I ran across a page of really silly images called, “If you add drunk people to fitness quotes.” Depending on your sense of humor, the images are incredibly funny, or generally horrifying, but what I thought was that the fact that they could be made at all represents a huge design failure for the fitness companies who are being parodied. Hyperbole, emotional pleas, motivational phrases, and even mission statements are, at their core, manipulative and not tied to specific images or content. They are generic, unmemorable, and ripe for parody. And they are bad design.

Words that are objective, audience focused, and free of hyperbole are inseparable from their context and that is the lasting power of modernist design.

¹Meggs, Philip B., and Alston W. Purvis. “Chapter 18: The International Typographic Style.” In Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. 5th ed. Hoboken, N.J.: John Wiley & Sons, 2012.

Being Who You Really Are

This is all awfully uplifting for a Monday morning, but since I managed to run across the same theme in a couple different places, I thought I would go ahead and share.

First off, I read an essay on a biography of E.E. Cummings on Brain Pickings, with the wonderful pull quote:

“It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.”

If you don't read Brain Pickings, you really should. Maria Popova runs the site and she consistently finds work and words that make you think.

http://www.casselliot.com/index.htm 

Then, not fifteen minutes later, Slacker Radio rotates in Mama Cass singing Make Your Own Kind of Music.



Mama Cass Elliot - Make Your Own Kind Of Music by Far_q


So,  go out and be you this week. Even on Monday.

The Importance of Capturing Movement in Design

Tony Zhou from Every Frame a Painting has a great post on how Akira Kurosawa used movement as a tool for story telling.


I think the idea of using movement to tell a story is one of the hardest to convey to graphic design students. Part of the problem of course is that so much of what we do as designers doesn't really move, but knowing where the elements on the page were before they got there, and where they are going when you look away, is key to creating tension and movement on a page or interface screen.

Another great video essay by Zhou is on the use of the Quadrant System.


More of Zhou's work can be found at his youtube page, and you can support his work and get extra commentary on his Patreon page.