Bicycle Safety

For our final project in class, we have been given the task of creating a logo for bicycle safety. Of course, the first thing I did was to go online to Google search for images on “bicycle safety.” Surprisingly, there were a lot of hits. Also surprisingly, many of the images were very similar.

I think this project is going to be harder than it first seemed. Originality and creativity are key goals, but these are hard when signs have already become so iconographic. For instance, 99% of the time, bikes are shown from the side. They’re somewhat abstracted, but as long as we see the two wheels and handlebars, we know it’s a bike. There was one image result I found where the bike was seen from the front, but it only really made sense because of the presence of the car which helped orientate it for the viewer.

A safety sign created by a colorado organization. (Image found here)

So truthfully, as a whole society, people are more comfortable with a profile view of the bike. Its best and most quickly understood, comprehensible with only a glance. Now, a “bicycle safety” search also resulted in a lot of pictures of helmets. Helmets either by themselves or on people who were walking or riding their bicycle. Once again, as a society, we seemed to have decided that the helmet— not for instance, the break bike lights, both also important – is to be the sign for proper safety precautions.

Now, in an attempt for originality, it would make sense to try to avoid the bike in profile and an image of a helmet. After all, novelty is difficult when you’re using the same set of images that had been used before. However, functionality trumps any desires for originality in this project. If the logo is meant to be quickly understood, to be immediately identifiable, then it should integrate known signs. The logo would probably be going on pamphlets on safety or signs or websites where the information is the most important. Because of this, a flashy logo isn’t necessary, instead it should be nearly unnoticeable, something for the mind to note and then move on to the words that they really need to pay attention to. The logo should simply indicate that the information on the page is going to be about bicycle safety, but it shouldn’t have to narrate or entertain.

However, if the project had been say, to design a poster instead of a logo, then originality could have come more into play. Poster design and logo design are two entirely different things, because posters are meant to attract attention and to be visually interesting and thoughtful. Yes, if the project was for a poster then perhaps I could have come up with something like this:

Ad campaign poster for a organization in New York. (Image from their site)

But that isn’t the assignment. For better or for worse, we are making a logo instead (incidentally, the logo on the bottom corner of the poster is an excellent example). But while there are tighter constraints and not much room for novelty, creativity will still be very important; essential, in fact, for arranging known signs into an interesting combination.

Sustainable Innovations

This Wednesday Nathan Shedoff visited our class to lecture on sustainable innovation. Mr. Shedoff was a great speaker, and it was obvious that he had both great passion and great knowledge on the subject about sustainability. One thing he focused on was that design can no longer be isolated from the rest of the world, designers can no longer simply create works in their ivory towers. In this modern world, designers, as well as engineers, also benefit from knowing business and of course sustainability. They are expected to understand the costs and effects of the products they create, to make responsible items.

While that was all very interesting, the thing I found most profound was that he advocated cheap sustainability. Of course, he didn’t say that we should be cheap with our sustainability, but that the most creative answers, the best innovations, usually came when a project budget was small. Tighter pocketbooks led to smarter and more efficient thinking. This is a lesson that America should take note of. When we hear the word sustainability, most people immediately think of the great costs of installing solar panels or retrofitting entire systems just to make them greener. However places such as Brazil are creating sustainable public transportation systems on a shoestring budget. They use buses instead of digging a new subway system. It’s the simplified version of what we would come up with in America, and it works just as well.

A bus stop in Curitiba, Brazil. Picture courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

As a society, I think that Americans need to learn that sustainability doesn’t have to be flashy. It can be as simple as building more bus stops. On our march to a greener world, we can begin by taking these little steps instead wanting to immediately leap forward to that utopian world of completely self-sufficient houses all attached to their own wind turbine. If we take little steps, slowly acclimate ourselves to a new sustainable culture, it will be a much more long-lasting future.

Objectified

Yesterday in class we watched the movie “Objectified,” (2009) directed by Gary Hustwit. It was a great movie, and it was interesting to have the opinions of so many designers about how design affects society. The interview that stuck with me most however, because it was the only one which I fundamentally disagreed with, was one segment from Karim Rashid. In his interview, he was questioning why we contemporary people put up with outdated designs. Why we sit in dated furniture when technology has pushed us into the greater future. His complete detachment from history was surprising, especially to an art history student like myself.

I consider history to be the strongest identity a person can have, and I think that stylistic history is a large part of that. We don’t keep grandma’s couch because we think it is fashionable, or because we think it is the most comfortable thing available. We keep it for the memories that it holds, because those memories of grandma fulfill and satisfy us more than technologically-advanced design. Preference of style doesn’t even have to come from an heirloom. Some people prefer traditional chairs or traditional desks or whatnot because they say something about that person’s personality. Some of the other designers in “Objectified” mentioned this, and I think that it’s very important to understand that people chose designs for different reasons, because they want to project something about themselves. If someone chooses Victorian over contemporary design, it is because they have made a choice about how they want to represent their home and their life. They want to be perceived as a person who appreciates history, not as a person who looks to the future.

It seems close-minded that Rashid would suggest that contemporary design is the only right path. Modern lines and suprematist colors and minimalism are themselves all trends. The search for simplicity is a trend, not the final solution. Soon enough, I’m sure, designers will face a problem when they have simplified everything to it’s fullest. They will find that the design is lacking, and though it may be functional and completely ergonomic and of the highest efficiency, it might just lack personality. It would seem sterile, so bare-boned that it would turn into nothing more but a skeleton. And so design will turn back to decoration, back to historical references for inspiration.

In opposition to Rashid, I value design which recalls history, even if only in the planning stages. It shows respect and a willingness to learn from others, to take what has been done well: what is most utilitarian, what is the most psychologically comfortable, and to use that know knowledge to creating a better product. Though mankind lives in a technological age, we are still humans and not machines, and as such we require meaning in our lives, objects which have some value, not only in their function but also in what they represent.

Design and Color Theory: As Seen in my Bedroom

One of the most comprehensive books on color theory which I have read so far is Josef Albers’ “Interaction of Color.” One concept I found particularly interesting was the difference between hues and their values. And, since I am typing this in my bedroom, I found the perfect demonstration of his theories right behind me on my bed.

I bought my comforter at Target. It was many of the back-to-school collections, but I preferred this one the most. Now, in this color picture, the difference of the hues, the colors, stand out, particularly the yellow square:

It is interesting to note that in this juxtaposition of colors, the yellow is the one to best stand out, though the teal (second row, on the right), and the darker blue (top row, left square), are equally vibrant individually but practically disappear on the field of blue. They are so like in hue to the base color that their difference is nearly imperceptible, especially with the chocolate brown dividing the colors up. I’m sure that if the colors were placed side-by-side without such dark boarders, their differences could be immediately seen:

Placed side-by-side, the three blues clearly form a cool to warm spectrum. It is only because the yellow is so vividly different that the blues fade into a common color. On the other hand, though the yellow is so bright in color, a black and white version of the image reveals something rather interesting:

In black and white, we can see that the values of these yellows and blues are nearly the same. It is this similarity of value that allows the colors to harmonize so well, it explains why that spot of yellow is an interesting statement yet not completely overbearing. Relative to their values, they match and because of this, the focus of the overall pattern can return to the grid formed by their lighter shades to the chocolate brown.

My comforter has a simple style, but one designed with color theory in mind. To market to college students, Target created a look that was both bold yet harmonized, with varying colors but a common theme. It’s design for the masses, an example of the sort of design thinking which permeates unnoticed into society.

The Bauhaus and its Effects

The Bauhaus. Photo from Wikimedia Commons

One of the most famous influences on contemporary design was the Bauhaus. Opened in 1919 by Walter Gropius, it was a school dedicated to teaching both the fine and applied arts. The name Bauhaus itself comes from the word Bauhutte, a title for a medieval guild of stonemasons. Gropius wanted the school to break down the prejudice between the so called fine arts and the generally maligned applied arts, which were, and still are among many, considered inferior to painting and sculpting. The Bauhaus was also very much focused on a hands-on approach, and students were expected to produce well-crafted designs. Though the buildings separated into different fields of art, Gropius wanted to bring back that medieval guild atmosphere, and have everyone work on an equal level.

It’s interesting that though he took inspiration from such a premodern source, the products that came from the Bauhaus were revolutionary in their stream-lined, standardized, and mechanical forms. For instance, the International Style in architecture emerged from the Bauhaus, glass and steel brick towers which would dominate corporate architecture for decades. It’s a sort of paradox that such modern results would come from such an old system, but the Bauhaus and Gropius made it work.

Though the Bauhaus eventually was forced to close down, due to the pressures of an impending second world war, the designs it envisioned remained predominant. The unprejudiced mingling of fine and applied arts however, faded someone from the conscious mind. While modern artists had certainly become aware of the power of applied arts as a meaningful art form, Gropius had been unable to completely stop the supposed superiority of painters and sculptors.

However, with that said, in the last few years a new sort of Bauhaus spirit is emerging once again. I blogged in an earlier post about the design firm JMP Creative. While they do not focus so much on the study of art, they do reflect Gropius’ desire to have an even playing fields, a workspace where no one position is considered superior to another. Perhaps art school may remain divided, but young businesses, the new design thinkers, are following in Gropius’ footsteps.

Color Theory in Action

Color theory is an extensive and complicated subject. One set of ideas which has always interested me though is Wassily Kandinsky’s theories of the spatial and optical qualities of different colors. In on treatise titled The Language of Form and Colour, Kandinsky specifically covers the qualities of warm versus cool colors. In this essay, he wrote that the movement of both colors “is an horizontal one, the warm colours approaching the spectator, the cold ones retreating from him.” This concept, that warm colors is perceived as closer to the eye, has effected many artworks since, including one of my own. For an art history class, we were instructed to create a work of art which emulated a particular artist or period. My chosen artist was Giorgio de Chirico, known for paintings such as Montparnasse Station and The Seer:

Montparnasse Station (above) and The Seer (below) (both images taken from Wikimedia Commons)

I also, however, combined elements of his style with Kandinsky’s theories, pulling them together into this painting:

As you can see, I utilized the concept of warm colors approaching the subject and cool colors receding to emphasize the layering of my painting. I wanted the figures as close to the viewer as possible. I also wanted the background to recede as much as possible. Furthermore, I chose yellow in particular because in that same treatise, Kandinsky described the color as having “a disturbing influence, and reveals in the colour an insistent, aggressive character.” Giorgio de Chirico was known for his unsettling images, so I thought that I might as well try to use yellow to my advantage to try and incite a similar feeling.

Despite whether or not my painting was a successful one, it proves that color theory is still very much prevalent. It is good to work with different color theories, because once an artist, or a designer, has a good grasp over their use of color, they can influence the viewer as they see fit. It is another tool for getting your message across, whether you want to soothe or to unsettle.

Design in my own Backyard

I’ve realized that while I’ve written of examples of design in our society, I’m looking so far out into the world that I’ve neglected what I know best. I was so occupied with learning that I forgot that I already knew a thing of two about design, because I’ve actually had a design job; all thanks to personal connections of course.

My dad, Brian Fies, is a science writer who moonlights as a graphic novelist. He has written two books so far but the one that I, my sister and our friends were a part of is his latest one, called Whatever Happened to the World of Tomorrow? My dad was on a deadline and had 200 pages to color. The four of us of the younger generation had little design education but knew how to use Photoshop. I’m still not sure of the strength of our qualifications, but my dad took us on and paid us by the page.

One of the things I was most surprised by was the freedom my dad gave us with the project. When he gave us pages to color, we exchanged them through Photoshop files on flash drives, we received black and white comic pages and a palette much like this:

(This is actually an example of one that we were able to work with, but the colors on the far right changed depending on what part of the book we were working on…)

It was like we had been thrown into a crash course of color theory. The freedom was overwhelming in the beginning, but on the plus side we knew that my dad would change the colors to suit what he wanted if he really didn’t like what we had done. He also gave us a handful of notes for every grouping of pages he gave us if he wanted anything colored in a specific way. That was a security net of sorts that slowly allowed us to feel comfortable being colorists, and in the end, that was what allowed us to have fun with color palettes that he gave us. We composed the color on the pages as we went, mostly coloring only by gut instincts but slowly becoming bolder. We began to place colors not where they would be most natural but where we thought they would look good amongst all the other colors. And apparently we were teaching ourselves rather well. By the end of the project, my dad was writing fewer notes when he handed out our pages.

All in all, it was a very good experience for me at least. It showed me that design can be something learned on site as well as in the classroom. It also reminded me just how much thought goes into coloring even a single panel of a graphic novel, and that everything we use in daily life undoubtedly went through the same level of design planning. Ours is truly a well-thought-out world.

I would say more about making a comic book, but I try not to repeat things which have been said better than I could manage. If you want to learn more about the sort of design thinking that goes into making a graphic novel, go to my dad’s blog. On the right, after you scroll down, there are a series of tabs that list the labels of his post. I would suggest looking at both “How I Approach Cartooning” and “Making a Book.”