DESIGN THAT COMMUNICATES

Wowza! Self reflection time I think!

In doing research for my dissertation I stumbled across this video. I'm looking into how video can be used to document but in this circumstance I'm looking at portraying information across to an audience and how to stylise it so that the video doesn't seem dull. So naturally I've been looking at the likes of TedTalks and RSA videos. Both have a similar drive behind them and both are forms of video documentation. But whereas TedTalks use a shot video format usually in a lecture theatre style setting, RSA Animate their videos.

I was looking at the technique of this video primarily but as I got stuck into the narration I realised that there are some aspects that are quite relevant to my research into Video Documentation. 

I've been banging on about this campaign and branding idea for a little while. When my friend and coursemate Amelia Lang was looking into creating the Branding for New Collective She was having serious dilemmas about colour ways and what looked right for the logo. I told her that she was stressing too much about colour. Colour is important in design. It's very very important in design to think about colour, but logos of old were usually assigned their own colour way and always kept to those colours. But this campaign by Tesco uses the old familiar Tesco logo that is usually red with the blue lines underneath as pictured at the top here, and changes the colour so suit the product depicted in the picture. It's a very simple idea. But it works. 

One logo that alway sticks out in my mind as seeming almost perfect in it's design and structure is Apple Inc. The apple with a bite out of it looks so simple. structured on a few circles that follow the rules of the 'golden ratio'.

Whenever Apple design anything it is immensely complicated and thought out but it is portrayed as though it was the simplest idea in the world.

However after doing a little bit of research into Apple's logo it turns out that their logo is inconsistent! I couldn't believe it. Apple seem to have this flawless uniformity that seems to flow through out everything they create but it's all fabricated. Apple actually has a number of ever so slightly different logos that they use in different scenarios. For the most part they look the same, but dependent on where the logo is used and the scale of it it does differ slightly. The Unicode symbol is slightly longer than the press kit logo. Theres no explanation to why this is. It may be due to when the logo is scaled down too much it doesn't 'look right'.

So underneath it all it's all aesthetics. Designing a logo is about creating something that 'looks right'.

During my undergraduate studies I was always told that a good logo design still needs to work when it is only thumbnail size. It would make sense then that Apple have produced a version of their logo that, when scaled down, looks more in keeping with larger versions of the logo, just so that it 'looks right'.

This is the video that was launched alongside Yahoo!'s new logo. It leads the observer to believe that the logo was produced by following a very structured plan, but I feel that this is a bit of fabrication for the sake of looking like it was designed with ease.

I've been looking a lot at video documentation, but one thing that has stuck out in my mind is that a large number of designers don't really show their processes of how they create their designs. I wonder why this is. But the other day I stumbled across a video for the recent 'redesign' of the Yahoo! logo. 

Firstly when I watched the video I found myself asking the question "Is that really how they went about designing the new logo?" But after reading some comments on it I have come to seriously doubt it. The video shows that the new logo centres around a circle in its design. everything has a slightly rounded edge. (That's not really anything new) 

When you take a look at the old logo (I was surprised at how forgettable the old logo is I had to google it as I had no recollection) It was clearly trying to create a 'playful' look with its wonky lettering and angled exclamation point.

It reminds me more of a logo for a children's tv channel but there it is.

The new logo has obviously tried to keep an element of the original logo. It has a Large Y at and the last O is larger than the rest of the letters. Even the exclamation point is still on an angle.

When they launched the new logo Yahoo! 'explained' the design of the new logo by producing the video and this image that maps the 'design process' but I seriously doubt that this is how they went about creating the logo. If this is how everyone designed then creating logos would be so very easy as there would be a formula for it. But after reading a number of comments on the logo the consensus is that this illustration of process is all for show. Most designers just tweak and tweak and change one bit, then another and after producing a plethora of slightly different logos they will finally reach an outcome that 'looks right' this idea that by creating a 'formula' for design is a bit insulting to designers. 

Ok so many designers will work from a grid, or design around a shape or with a shape in mind but the video for Yahoo! makes it seem obvious. But the but the bit that pleases me most is that I feel whoever designed the new Yahoo! logo stopped a little sooner than they should.

It's not awful, but once again it is very forgettable and it's surprising that they chose to use a bevel? What's all that about? Someone critiquing the logo said if they chucked in a bit of comic sans and a drop shadow it would be a perfect example of awful design. Slightly harsh but Yahoo! is a huge name, competing head to head with the likes of Google, I would have thought they would have come up with something a bit more exciting, or at least memorable rather than a 'redesign' that misses the mark by a long way. 

I can remember going to a talk on the redesign of the Salomon logo. The two guys who worked on the logo created literally hundreds of logo designs before they reached their decision.

I have now begun the 3rd and final section of the Masters. Over the next few months I will be developing my skills further, but after a chat with my personal tutor I have come to a decision that I am going to split this final section in half.

Throughout the last 4 modules I have been looking into the validity of video documentation. I feel that I have amassed a substantial amount of information on the topic and in my essays and I have covered the topic in some depth. However in fear of exhausting the topic I have chosen to focus half of this final module on video documentation and the other half on working to improve my spectrum of design skills.

Designers today are expected to be multi talented and display a number of specialisms. During my undergraduate studies I elected to follow the motion and interactivity pathway and teamed it with web design. Throughout this module I want to fucus more on expanding my capabilities for print design and branding. 

Yesterday I had an unashamedly geeky few hours whilst I watched Apple's anual WWDC from San Francisco California.

At which they unveiled the completely redesigned appearance of the iOS 7 interface. 

Apple let their design chief and expert Jony Ive loose on the operating system for their mobile devices for the first time this year. So it was no great surprise that the whole of iOS 7 has been given a fresh new look. Ive's first design achievement at apple came with the iMac which then made it posible for hom to work on other ventures such as the iPod, iPhone and the iPad.

Ive's designs have been continuously praised for their fresh and modern appearance and his first attempt at heading the designs for iOS software has been no different. 

Of course there have been reports where people have slated the new designs claiming that they are a backwards step for design by over simplifying the appearance of icons and flattening them. However, as technology has developed since the unveiling of the first iPhone in 2006, so has the capabilities of iOS software. Generation after generation of iPhone has been able to achieve more and more yet the appearance of the software managed to maintain it's old and familiar appearance, until now that is.

Ive strived to create a "cleaner" look to help "elevate" users' content which I feel the new look of iOS 7 achieves in true Apple style. 

The hardware that Apple produces is ever more sleek and minimal in it's appearance yet the software on their mobile devices was becoming to feel dated. Within the last year I heard a friend of mine say that he loved iPhone and had had one since 2006, but he was tired of looking at the same home screen on each and every new iPhone that he purchased, but now iOS 7 breathes new life back into the iPhone.

PLACED i-dent