davidthedesigner

going dutch #2

Following on from going dutch #1 I've set myself the task of seeking out the most interesting graphic work coming out of the Netherlands at the moment.

This is the studio 2keerkijken (which, if my ham-fisted translation is correct, means 'two turn and look') - a partnership between Casper Glorius and Willem van de Ven. And that begs the question, I think, that if you were christened Casper Glorius would you have any choice but to grow up to be a designer?

But these two turn out some interesting work and their web site is a little bit of fun as well.

what will be the next 'industry standard' design program?

Courtesy of Mister SF (I hope he doesn't mind)

It's one of the pleasures of blogging (for me at least) that you sometimes get involved in off-blog discussion with fellow bloggers. I had an interesting little exchange yesterday with young Kevin from NYC, who had asked for some advice about kerning. This then led on to a discussion about the design programs that we use, since there are really only two contenders - one of which overtook the other to become the current 'industry standard'.

But the 'industry standard' usage of either of these programs running on Apple Macs is really no more than 15 years old - which is, in the history of type, a very small amount of time. And I'm willing to bet that in another 15 years we'll be handling type and design layouts in an entirely different way. You see, at the moment a full purchase of Creative Suite 3 would probably cost more than the computer that you're going to run it on, which is both nonsensical and unsustainable over the long term. Simply because the customer base will find a way of resisting that cost (the basic laws of supply and demand, really). It wouldn't be so bad if CS3 allowed you to do a great deal more than you can in CS2 (though, I have to admit, that is an assumption on my part) - the upgrade is addressed at the hardware changes (ie Intel chips), rather than any significant user benefit. You have to go back to versions 3, 4 and 5 of these programs to see any substantial step up in significant user features.

Compare that with what's going on in the Web 2.0 world, where all the movement is towards open source programs. So you can set up a fully designed and personalised blog, for instance, for no capital outlay on software (by using WordPress). And CMS programs are moving this way as well.

I personally think the future for us designers will move towards the Google Docs & Spreadsheets model, where all we'll need is the computer and we'll access our software (and maybe even documents) remotely. It'll be interesting to see if that happens.

After all, from a design perspective, all that matters is the quality of your creative input and the quality of your end product. The tools that you use along the way are pretty incidental, but will almost certainly be the 'industry standard'. And it's not so long ago that the 'industry standard' for headline setting was Letraset. And Letraset was a very powerful and successful company which was able to charge a premium for its products - until we all bought Macs, of course.

What do you think?

going dutch

I've mentioned before my admiration for, and fascination with, Dutch design. Simply because it's so much more adventurous than we're allowed to be here in the UK. And I say that because the process and outcome of design depends upon the interaction between designer and client, and adventurous work requires not just adventurous designers, but also adventurous clients. As Gert Dunbar once said "The genius of Dutch design is born from its geographic flatness".

All of which is an excuse to introduce you to...

...the wonderful work of René Knip.

And if you're also interested in Dutch design (if you're a designer yourself, there is no excuse not to be), you'll find lots of useful links over at the very useful The Serif.

it's another of those big pictures

Another big picture, another design studio:

Nice picture though.

is that your natural colour?

For me, one of the interesting by-products of blogging is that I use my camera much more. As a designer I am, by instinct and training, always taking notice of the visual world around me. But I've found that blogging has encouraged me to record what I see. And what I see at the moment is that the country has turned yellow (though I'm not the first person to notice that, I'm sure). Yes, it's that wonder crop oil seed rape. It's hardly any surprise when you consider that a 500ml bottle of the oil it produces can be sold, as though it were extra-virgin olive oil, for £6. That's nearly 67 times as much as a farmer gets for the equivalent amount of milk. And I bet, even as I type, there's someone out there trying to figure out a way of marketing it as organic so that they can charge twice as much.

But organic is the very last thing this stuff is. And the more chemicals you apply, the more oil it'll give you.

But what interests me is the colour. Because the colour is so unnatural. It's like blonde hair that's been achieved by the application of hydrogen peroxide. And it's interesting (to me at least) that photographing it makes it look even more unnatural. There's something almost acidic in the slight green hue that lingers behind the intensity of the yellow.

Compare and contrast with what nature itself can achieve. Venture into the woods that border those yellow fields and, at this time of year, you'll find carpets of bluebells.

And that shimmer of light and the intensity of the blue is something far more subtle than any chemical enhancement can achieve. And the wonder of it all is that a bluebell has no commercial value.

we're all being watched

Even when we take a walk in the woods:

But which tree do they hide the camera in?

the strange rules of retailing (#1)

This goes back a few years to the pre-PDF days when everything we did had to be proofed to the client on paper. And we had a big A3 laser printer to do the job, which naturally required A3 paper to feed it. But this was also pre-internet shopping, so we had to buy our paper from local suppliers. One day we're working towards proofing out several hundred pages and the courier's booked to come and collect at 5.30pm. Around 3pm we suddenly realise that we're almost out of A3 paper.

I jump in the car and drive into town to the largest stationery store. Remember, I'm just running in and out of the shop and I don't really want to have to pay for an hour's parking (not least because the ticket maching doesn't give change and I don't have the right change - am I the only person that ever happens to?). So I pull up on the pavement opposite, run into the shop (keeping one eye open for any hovering wardens outside), find an assistant (not always that easy in this store) - "have you got any A3 paper?" I ask. "I'll just go and have a look". The minutes tick by. Assistant returns: "sorry, we've only got about half a pack". "That's no good" I say "I'll have to try somewhere else".

So up to the top of the town. Same parking dilemma, but this time I have to use the car park opposite - problem is there's an 8ft-high wall, so I can't see the car from the shop. I'll just have to risk it - I'll only be two minutes. Over the road and into the shop. This one's smaller, so there's an assistant ready and waiting behind the counter. "Have you got any A3 paper?" I ask. Assistant looks at the shelves behind him: "Yes" he says, "there are two packs here". "Great" I say, "I'll take both". "Oh, I can't let you have both" he says "someone else might want one".

Needless to say, neither shop is there any more.

russell* told me to tell you...

...buy a ticket to this or the monkey gets it.

*here

More info here.

this made me smile (#13)

In fact it reminded of the notice once found on a hand dryer which said 'FOR AN IMPORTANT MESSAGE FROM YOUR MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT, PRESS HERE'.

The world tour of hand dryers (via I Like).

And I see that Ben:

has already visited number 15:

Not sure who his friend is though - maybe it's Amp Fiddler.

what's the true cost of information?

Warning: this may turn out to be a rather long and rambling post.

All designers, by instinct and by training, are constantly looking at their surroundings - and noticing and wondering about things that most other people simply accept (or so it seems). It's interesting, and perhaps instructive, that Ben's now-famous post 'the design disease' started with an illustration of a road sign:

In Ben's case he was upset by the shocking kerning, which is only natural for a graphic designer. But even designers trained in other disciplines, such as dgthekneelo, might look around them and wonder about road signs:

And the shocking thing is that this little collection is tolerated in one of the most picturesque towns in Cornwall. Because, it seems to me, the men (and I'm sticking my neck out here, but I'm willing to bet my shirt on the fact that they are men) who erect road signs are infected with some sort of disease that only they understand. I suppose it might just be the polar opposite of the design disease. You see, these men don't just think their work enhances the environment, they also think it presents us with essential, life-affirming information in the most economical and effective way possible. Like this:

Courtesy of the Minster-in-Thanet Website.

All of which brings me on to this little baby:

This one lives a few blocks from where I live. Now, if I look at this as a graphic designer I first of all wonder why the 'NO' is followed by a dot (I'll come back to that later), and why it's centred when 'REPORTED' and 'INCIDENTS' are ranged right. Surely it would be far more elegent to display it as:
NO REPORTED
INCIDENTS
Wouldn't it?

Or if I'm in a cynical frame of mind I might wonder quite exactly what might constitute an incident. 'Man seen jaywalking outside Marks & Spencer' perhaps?

But what first caught my eye were the three legs. Why's it got three legs? And why isn't the middle one in the middle? And what legs they are:

These things could support a deep-sea oil drilling platform. So I decided to take a closer look:

Oh, I see - the third leg protects that bit of cable that comes up from under the ground and feeds information to the display on the front. And so I begin to wonder what this thing's for, how much it's cost and whether it's either necessary or desirable, or an enhancement to its environment?

And then I notice that it even has its very own stretch of crash barrier. To protect it from all of those drivers distracted by no reported incidents, no doubt?

Now I drive (and occasionally cycle) past this thing quite often, and I've noticed that most of the time it's turned off (I'll come back to that later). And when it's turned on I've only ever seen it display 'no reported incidents'. Perhaps it does sometimes report incidents: I've seen a similar sign on the other side of the city which sometimes says 'time to centre of city = 4mins'. But is that information? Or information that you can really do anything about or with? Surely the only possible thing it can achieve is to encourage drivers to use their mobiles to call someone up and say "I'll be another 4 minutes".

But, as I say, most of the time it's turned off:

Except that it's not turned off at all. Because there - just to the right of where the 'NO' usually sits - is the dot. And that dot sits there all the time, consuming electricity 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

So my real question is: what's the carbon footprint? Not just for the electricity it consumes, but also the cost of it's manufacture and construction. And is the information that it might sometimes display worth the price?