Week 12

Reference material

Communication design: Insights from the creative industries

I really liked the explanation of what it means to be a designer:

“In a world where an audience participates in shaping and redistributing of culture, design is much more dependant on the subtle orchestration of their involvement. This audience wants to feel hat they have retained ownership of their input and that this input has been shaped by their own free will. Engineering audience involvement is a complex task that requires skills that go beyond those we traditionally associate with a designer. As a result, design commentators such as Don Norman have called for design education to embrace the development of an understanding of areas such as psychology and applied social and behavioural science.” – page 98

I have personally noticed this especially in my way of working, but that’s not limited to just me, it’s designers in general. This ties well to the lecture where we talked about multidisciplinary designers – so much more is required than being able to arrange text and image on a page.

“Our manifestos are designed to tell you what you can do rather than tell you what you can’t do”. – page 102

I think this quote speaks volumes psychologically for how the subconscious mind works – people don’t like being told what to do and as a designer I have to consider articulating messages in the appropriate way. It’s very true in the sense that it’s all about playing on the words language used in design. To create a meaningful brand means to address each individual customer and get their attention in a personal way, making it feel like it’s talking to them. Anything that is generic isn’t going to get people thinking.

Kin Wallpaper* Custom Covers:

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I love the concept behind Wallpaper* – how to make something so collaborative and fun, when using a website with an interface to manipulate images and patterns etc. It fits so well with the title of Wallpaper* as that can be seen as mix and match in the home.

Ultimately what the outcome of these covers are is a collaborative piece of art. They’re unique and unpredictable because so many people can do their own take on them, and that’s really special.

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