Case Studies Exploring Trends and Outputs
Lecture material
Craig Oldham
“The things you need to be asking is, what are you when you’re doing these
projects or when you’re approaching these kinds of projects? Really, really interrogate your interest in them. Are you more interested in photography than designing for example, or writing, or illustration, or whatever, than you are in the actual design elements? Because that could be an untapped potential in you. That could be something that rewarding in your career, to devote a little bit of time to massage it, to build it and to develop that creative muscle.”
What am I interested in the most?
• Sustainability – protecting our future
• Bio design and creating things that enhance the way we live/benefit our planet
• Natural processes – utilising the resources we have already through up-cycling/recycling/reusing/reducing waste
• Science and how it relates to design – facts, research, experimentation, labs
I have known for some time I have always been interested (heavily) in the scientific side of design but not been entirely sure how – I considered maybe it would be pharmaceutical and potentially designing for medical purposes. But, sustainability is a huge door I went through to enable me to connect that with science and design. I now know from this lecture that it’s ok to have a more ‘evolved’ approach to design where it’s another specialism of interest, and occasionally design. The format of design could be different – it doesn’t have to be graphic. It could be product design, lab design, image etc. and I think that relates to what Craig is trying to explain.
When considering a new project ask myself the following questions:
• why do I want to do this project?
• who are you doing this for, are you doing it for yourself, is this vanity? if it’s to be famous or get recognition – it’s not the right reasons. I need to ensure I’m doing this for someone else’s benefit other than my own
• is there an audience for this, or a client that you could push this towards when you’re thinking about problem solving?
• or is there a client, is this about your professional practice? Do you think that by doing this piece of work one major contributing factor, not the sole one, would be that you could see you getting a lot more work from it?
• and finally, is it worthwhile? What are the opportunities I could get from this i.e. what’s the best that could happen and what’s the worst? I feel like this would work in a little diagram before I start a project to let me see if it expands my skills or interests in any particular way.
Guerilla girls
I personally haven’t heard of the Guerilla Girls when they were mentioned by Craig so I did some research:
jesswhatley.design.blog 