Color Transforms

Le Pegase de Hermes By Christian Renonciat

Color is what makes the world interesting and allows for individuality. As seen on these Hermes scarves, one has a wide array of color on it and the other is simply a sketch on a white background. The first scarf has lots of juxtaposing color, which draws the eye in and really makes it look at what is happening in the art. While the plain white one is really rather boring and doesn’t grab one’s attention at all. Color is key in making a good design, and without the correct use of it a design could go completely wrong. This scarf is perfect example of good color use because it really plays with juxtaposing color and quantity and yet it stays contained to Pegasus and doesn’t overcrowd the entire silk square. The brilliant colors used here really show what a beautiful piece of art the scarf is and the design is made into something incredible. While the white scarf is terribly bland and boring, the black sketch lines overcrowd the white and make the whole square look cluttered and uninteresting. This is a perfect example of how color really transforms a design. They are the exact same thing just one has an array of beautiful colors strategically placed that catch the buyers attention and the other completely makes the scarf look bland and standard. Color makes everything unique and the color scarf in this example becomes a totally different piece of art because of it’s brilliance.

Dangerous Design

Firearms

The invention and design of firearms has really made the world into a much more dangerous and unwelcoming. Guns are such fatal weapons, and yet they are available to the public to own and keep. Firearms fuel wars and hate amongst everyone with the dangerous affect it has on it's victims. A gun is designed to hold multiple bullets at once so when the handler pulls the trigger multiple times, all the bullets come out. To create an object that is able to hold and fire multiple fatal objects at once is a hazard to everyone who ever comes in contact with it. Handguns are designed specifically to be easily concealed and used at a moment’s notice, which makes them available to anyone really. Despite being small and concealable, handguns are still lethal weapons that can take another being’s life. The idea that guns are designed and made with the intent to kill something makes them such unethical objects. Firearms are such powerful weapons and yet are accessible to anyone. Without guns, there wouldn’t be cartel wars going on in Mexico right now, genocide happening all over the world, and really any source of violence happening in the world right now. Guns are what give bad people in society power to control and get what they want. Firearms create fear in the world because of the instant death they provide if used correctly. The fact that firearms are being updated in their design all the time to create more powerful machines is frightening. With the arrival of new and improved machine guns and more advanced artillery, society will become much more unstable and fearing, causing the world to degrade.

Utopian Design

Personal Computers

The availability of computers in our society has allowed for individuals to explore everything the world has to offer, share their creativity, and become connected with the global community. The first computers were limited to small numbers of people and not available to the world yet. With the dawn of personal computers, everyone can have access to the web and communicate half way across the globe with each other. The way this has been made possible was through the redesign of computers. Desktop and laptop computers are convenient for any person because of their design. The first computers took up whole rooms with all of their inter workings, but with time that has been compacted into such a way that is practical and accessible. Computers have evolved into staples in our society and we really could not live without them anymore. The access that they allow is unbelievable, and without them our class couldn’t all be writing blogs, or one couldn’t find rare music from Turkey at the click of a button. The world is at our fingertips because of the personal computer and that has made the world a more connected place, working towards a better society. Personal computers have allowed the individual to stand out in any aspect and that really goes to show its power. Without computers the world would be a much more narrow minded and selfish place that fostered no expression of individuality. The small personal computer has transformed everything we look at and how society functions.

Check it out

The music video for Will.I.Am and Niki Minaj’s new song Check It Out really uses words and images in conjunction. The whole video really plays with design concepts and abstraction. The video begins with an announcer who introduces the song in a very Japanese game show way to a military-esque audience. The audience is all in the same black outfit and have sunglasses on, they all move at the exact same time and express no emotion. Then Will.I.Am and Niki Minaj come on and they are in these bright futuristic outfits that really contrast the dark audience and while they are singing bright Korean words pop on to the screen. The two singers really embodied the whole robotic aesthetic with both their singing voices not sounding like real ones and the way their bodies moved on the stage. Despite the singers robotic ways, the audience too were very robotic, almost more so than the singers because there was no color or movement from them. The whole idea of the words popping out was interesting because as only and English speaker, I couldn’t read what they were saying, but I understood the lyrics being sung, but to a Korean speaking person they couldn’t understand the singing, just the popping words. This really made the video very global in the sense that it crossed cultures with both the words and images in the video. The mixed medium had a strong affect on the video because the words emphasized certain points in the song, even if some couldn’t understand either the lyrics or the popping words.

Ergonomics of a Cheese Knife

Culinar Soft Cheese Knife

Cutlery has always needed to be ergonomically designed so that the user may successfully cut items without harming themselves. Knifes are very sharp, dangerous pieces of kitchenware that are used daily to prepare food all over the world. If they were not designed properly there would be injuries constantly happening, and most people would probably loose a few fingers. Knifes are so important to everyday life, and the way we eat food today that they must be safe, comfortable, easy to use, have high performance and look aesthetically pleasing. This soft cheese knife by Wüsthof really embodies all of those ergonomic qualities and more.

Safety is key in cutlery design because of the danger they inherently possess. A sharp blade being thrust down into something is quite hazardous especially when the user’s fingers are centimeters away from it. This soft cheese knife’s handle is designed to fit perfectly into one’s hand with a natural grip. This allows for less slippage on the handle and a more secure grip.

The comfort of the knife goes hand in hand with the safety of the device. The handle once again is key to the comfort of the knife because of its natural shape and grip. The smooth steel that the knife is made out of makes for very cool and comfortable handling.

This soft cheese knife is specifically made to only cut through cheeses like Brie, Camembert, or Roquefort. Since it has a specific use, the ease of use is quite good. The holes that are placed throughout the blade help achieve that ease of use by preventing the cheese from sticking to the knife. The holes provide a smoother cut and a clean slice making the item much easier to use than others.

The performance of this knife is very high because it’s quality. It is made from the German company Wüsthof who is known for their exceptional quality and strength. The knife itself is made from a solid piece of stainless steel, which makes it very strong, and the blade stays sharp for a very long time.

Lastly the aesthetics of this knife are very beautiful for a piece of kitchenware. It is made of solid stainless steel, so the whole knife is a solid silver color, and since it is all one piece it really looks like it flows. The handle and blade are not stuck together, but rather flow into each other and it looks like an art piece. The holes in the blade that make the cheese not stick, really add a rather whimsical feature to the knife and separate it from the rest of a knife set. It has a swooping blade that swings up at the end and really adds to the curve of the whole knife.

The Wüsthof soft cheese knife really embodies the concept of ergonomic designs because it fulfills all of the components that make an item user friendly. Not only does this knife look much more beautiful than most others, but it provides much more for it’s user and the world that uses it.

Klaus Nomi

Klaus Nomi, the musician-artist who was spawned from the 80's counterculture in New York City. He was a German countertenor who had a passion for opera and new wave music. He was like an alien, and maintained that persona throughout his career as a performer. He inspired the likes of David Bowie and Jean-Michel Basquiat to work with him because of his amazing blend of opera and pop. He really is an artist who held design as a conversation in his work. He created a signature tuxedo costume that was a larger than life that he wore to all of his performances. He created music that was more than just music, but a vaudeville performance and really made others around him question it. He caused there to be a stir in the music and art world with his strange ingenuity and thus created a conversation surrounding it. His performances were pieces of design within themselves, with replicas of planets and creating an image of Nomi actually being an alien from outer space. To really push the boundaries of that scene in the 80’s allowed his work to be recognized and make his audience question what his art was about. He challenged his fans to really think about what he as a person was and what his strange hybrid music was too. He is a perfect example of having design as a conversation because of his interaction with his audience as more of a challenge to them to understand what was going on, rather than telling them directly.

Brian Fies use of Words & Images

Brian Fies came as a guest lecturer to our Design 001 class this past week and really discussed his creative process and all that went into creating his graphic novels. He really focuses in on the relation between words and images, and how that really defines what comics are. “The combo of words + pictures that add up to something.” As a comic artist he has to understand the way words and pictures add up to something, and he must know what that something is. Fies states that “comics transcend words and drawing” but they are something that works with space and time while uses symbolism and metaphors within both the words and images both. He enjoys using both words and images together because it allows for multiple ways of speaking to the reader. He can incorporate metaphors and symbolism into the words that his characters speak, or that the narrator speaks. With his work on Mom’s Cancer he was able to tell the story of his mother’s struggle with cancer as both an abstraction and as a clear description of all the emotions that were being felt at that time. Without incorporating both words and images in this novel, he couldn’t have gotten his point across as he had wanted to. Fies is able to communicate many emotions and situations with the combination of words and images which he wouldn’t have been able to do without if he was only working with one of those components.

Shepard Fairey's use of words & images

Shepard Fairey, has exploded into pop culture in these past couple of years due to art prints of President Obama being popularized in the 2008 presidential elections. Fairey had been around for many years before this creating many iconic pieces like his Andre the Giant “Obey” but he really was thrown into the public eye with the Obama posters. He incorporated a powerful word under a very patriotic image of Obama, and this became the poster of the whole campaign. Without the powerful “Hope” or “Change” underneath this image it wouldn’t have made such an impact on the imagery of the election. The single word really makes the viewer see nothing other than what is stated in bold beneath the image. This use of word and image is very powerful and sort of hypnotizes the viewer into only thinking this word when you look at the image of this patriotic and powerful man. The blue hues in the image are very cool and force the viewer to feel confident and calm while staring at Obama, it seems to really embody the word that is stated in it. I thought this was such an interesting use of word and image because of the power of it and how extremely popular it became a couple years ago, and because of it’s power people are still trying to use this word and image compilation today to motivate and move their viewers.

OBJECTIFIED

The film Objectified really focuses in on the interaction between content and form, and how they are really united. It honed in on many talented industrial designers and how they approach the art that they are creating. Being a contemporary industrial designer you must keep form and content in mind, rather than just the content of an object. The designers featured in this film really embodied this theory that the every day objects we use must also be visually pleasing rather than as rough as possible. Designers must focus in on how they can make something that functional, beautiful. One of the designers featured in this film was the head designer of Apple, and they are truly one of the most stylized mainstream items we have in our culture today. Apple products are so smooth and simple, that one automatically knows that it’s a Mac when you see it. The designer said that it is Apple’s goal to make the item look completely different than what it really is and disguise it in a beautiful piece of design. He said that if we didn’t know that the iPhone was meant to be a cellular phone, we wouldn’t know what to do with that smooth rectangular piece of aluminum and glass. This really embodies the concepts used in industrial design today and it allows form to be much more connected with the content of an item.

Izze Bottle

I came across this Izze bottle while searching for an inspiringly well-designed object, and I think it really falls under that heading. The bottom of this bottle serves as a bottle opener for another bottle of Izze! The designer really created something that was unexpectedly useful, out of something that normally is left alone: the bottom of a bottle. This bottle’s concept is very interactive with both form and content by having it look and function like a normal bottle, but also have this additional add on of a bottle opener. The designer had to incorporate an opener into the bottle and that really allowed for it to stand out. Not only does the bottom of the bottle look similar to other bottle bottoms, but also it actually looks quite a bit more stylized with the opener. The designer really worked with their audience and added something that would really benefit them and possibly change the shape of bottles forever. By working with the idea of gestalt, the designer unified something very classic, the bottle, with something new and creative, the opener at the bottom of it. This is such a small piece of design, but I think it really symbolizes the progress of design and how designers are constantly modifying old designs.

Image taken from: http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/81Dkjt/dandelion.idasia.org/2007/11/20/redchiew-do-the-twist/

The Nudie Suit

The Nudie suit was an item of clothing most desirable to the country stars of the past. Nudie Cohn was a tailor who started detailing rodeo suits and selling them to country stars like Porter Waggoner and Tex Williams, and they became the symbol of the country culture. The detail that was put into these suits is unbelievable, from rhinestone covered wagons on them to music notes down the sleeve. Nudie really made the Nashville style with those suits as they became more and more popular. Despite Nudie being a tailor by trade, he really was a designer who created an iconic style. The concept of putting embroidery on a nice suit must have been unheard of, but he wanted to focus in on the form of a suit, more than just its content. He changed the way people in the Grand Ole Opry dressed forever and revolutionized the style of Nashville. He made Gram Parson’s suit (pictured above) and it had marijuana leaves and poppies embroidered all over it and Elvis Presley’s famous gold lame suit (pictured below). Nudie really was an amazing designer and his attention to detail was phenomenal. There still has been nothing quite like a Nudie suit that has influenced a culture such as he has.