DSDN 171 - Blog Assignment 10

Nicely rounding off my blog assignments with the one piece of design work I started my blog posts for DSDN171 with, The Tripod from Weta.

The Weta ‘Tripod’ has many techniques and references hidden within its construction. One of the many cultural references in this piece of design is War of the Worlds. I think it was designed this way to keep it in line with the sort of things that Weta make. The War of the Worlds styling makes this piece so much more visually striking than if it were a plain, large tripod. It very much looks like it could have come straight out of War of the Worlds, and onto the streets of wellington. A technique that was used in this alien like construction was a manipulation of scale. Tripods, if they are made to be functionally used by a human, are never that large. The size of this has been exaggerated to make it a spectacle, something to walk under and around. Finally, there is also a very large amount of ornamentation on the Tripod. The ornamentation serves no helpful purpose to the structure, but definitely adds to the visual value, making it appear more striking, and alien like to the beholder.

References
[Figure 1] From flickr. Retrieved from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/deadpossum/469780589/

DSDN 171 - Blog Assignment 9

‘The need to have’ is a huge message that informs the branding of design today. I am focusing mainly on Apple and their ad campaigns and product cycles. Each year a refresh is brought out and a new campaign started to get you to ‘need’ a new mac or ipod etc. This video is from the Mac vs PC campaign and shows the benefits of a mac over a PC.

Video Below

The idea shown in this video is loosely tied to the political idea of newer is better. Consumerism is another name for this state of mind. These ads by Apple make the viewer’s believe that their macs are better than PCs though in reality the PC has a far larger reach and can do much more. Their Macs do possess a few benefits such as being largely virus free, as shown in another ad from the campaign but the ads play on the geeky nature of a PC and make the audience believe that if you buy a Mac, you will be cool, and have the latest and greatest technology has to offer. They also play on the Mac being easier to use, which is true of the older version of windows, but the latest windows is, in my opinion, better.

References:

(2007, 15, April) [video file] Retrieved from :http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJ1AWw8ktLQ

DSDN 171 - Blog Assignment 8

When Meyer argued that ‘design [is] synonymous with man made things and [is] a product of “function x economy” ’ in chapter 9 of ‘The “First Machine Age” in Europe’ I felt like I disagreed. I then thought about the statement more and realised that it has some truth to it. I now agree with Meyer when he says that because many things that are around today are there in the standard, and with the functions they have, to help us do things based on the current economy and needs of the targeted audience.

I think design today can be both an art and a science. There is no rule that design is there to make art and art only, or that design has to be scientific. Design can contribute to both art and science. Take for example the iPhone 4. I have mentioned it in another post previous to this but I think it a good example of something that is well designed and looks nice, but could not have been achieved without science.

References:

Figure 1, From Technorati website. Retireived from (http://scm-l3.technorati.com/11/06/01/44109/iphone4changeseverything1.jpg?t=20110601135413)

DSDN 171 - Blog Assignment 7

P. Berger, T. Luckmann says of the symbolic universe: “the symbolic universe links men with their successors in a meaningful totality, serving to transcend the finitude of individual existence and bestowing meaning upon the individual’s death. All members of society can now conceive of themselves as belonging to a meaningful universe, which was there before they were born and will be there after they die.”

The digital world can be seen in today’s time as an identifiable ‘symbolic universe’.  The digital world was born before I was and will continue after I die. It has helped link my generation with its parents and will help the transition to the next generation. Any imprint we make on the digital ‘symbolic universe’ now will remain till after we are gone, and will be added to, or changed by our successors in the future.

Media and design in my opinion won’t be impacted in the construction of the digital social universe, but helped to progress through and into this digital era. The fine arts, like painting and creation from solid materials by hand will still exist, but the majority of design will become digital. From 3d modelling and printing to motion picture productions, to even writing letters, all these will during my lifetime pass on almost entirely to the digital realm. These will continue in the digital world and last past out generation through the digital ‘symbolic universe’.

DSDN 171 - Blog Assignment 6

The task for this week:
In this week’s reading Benjamin argues, “To an ever greater degree the work of art reproduced becomes the work of art designed for reproducibility. From a photographic negative, for example, one can make any number of prints; to ask for the authentic print makes no sense.” Do you agree or disagree? Do you think there is a role for the ‘authentic’ in an age of digital design and manufacture?

My Response:

I partially agree with what Walter Benjamin is saying when he says photography and film take away the authenticity of prints. I agree that having the photographic negatives makes it incredibly easy to reproduce photographs and therefore the plain fact that there can be many, many copies of the same print may take away its authenticity. However in my mind, there will always be the first print, and there will always be the film that the first print is derived from. The film and the first print are authentic originals in their own right because they are the first, they are the originals.

I think there is and always will be a role for the ‘authentic’ in our digital world, and I also believe that role is present in our future too. There will always be a demand for the authentic first. With our modern digital cameras there may not be a negative to reproduce from, but there is the first copy of the image file captured. There is also the first print, should the artist choose to sign it. I think, continuing with the example of photography, that our digital realm of photo sharing only allows one way to create an authentic ‘copy’ of the artwork and that is to have it signed by the artist/photographer.

DSDN 171 - Week 5 Assignment

Isaac Newton. Philipp Otto Runge. Pablo Picasso. Vincent Van Gogh. Claude Monet. These people, as well as others, through their experiences and experimentation, helped develop our modern understanding of colour and our perception of ‘colour vision’.

Isaac Newton discovered that we see colour when the light reaches our eyes as opposed to previous theories of the time in which people believed that the human eye would send out ‘beams’ and when the beams bounced off and returned to the eyes, they would be interpreted and the image would be seen. Newton also discovered that every colour visible to our eyes are contained in white light by refracting the light in a glass prism. You all know of this experiment I am sure but at the time this was big news. Newton kept to the scientific side of things and did not explore how colours would look different when placed beside other colours, which invited artists such as Philipp Otto Runge, Pablo Picasso, Vincent Van Gogh, and Claude Monet to explore what newton did not, and move this into their paintings. Impressionism is born. 

As you can see in this painting (below) by Claude Monet the many colours in this painting look different when put beside other colours in this painting. 

Figure 1

The painter leaves it to the beholders eyes to fill in the blanks and get the impression of what is going on in the painting. 

References:

Gage, J. (1993). Colour and Culture: Practice and Meaning from Antiquity to Abstraction (pp.191-212). New York: Thames and Hudson.

Figure 1. Monet, C. (c. 1880). Sunset at Lavacourt [Painting]. Retrieved from http://gallery.sjsu.edu/paris/breaking_away/landscape_files/image001.jpg.

DSDN 171 - Week 4 Assignment

In 1908 Adolf Loos argued that "The evolution of culture is synonymous with the removal of ornament from objects of daily use."

Which in real english means: The development of culture is in effect the same as removing the frilly bits from the objects we use everyday.

I agree with this.

My reasoning for this is can be seen below in the comparison of two phones created along our cultures path of development.

An old telephone

A modern iPhone 4

As you can see, the old phone has many frills and ornaments that are not required for use. There is also a cord between the box and the ear trumpet piece but at the time this was required for operation. In stark contrast to the old phone, we see that the iPhone has almost literally shaved all these ornaments from its form and flattened itself down. This quite clearly shows, in my opinion anyway, that through cultural development ornaments are definitely removed.