More Free Fonts

I love finding new sites filled with lots of lovely free fonts, so I thought I'd share this with you!

Check out Naldz Graphics for loads retro looking typefaces.

Something I was thinking...

I was back home in Edinburgh over the weekend and was chatting to my parents over breakfast. They were asking me what I was doing at uni so I started telling them what my last couple of lectures had been about.

Since the begining of the year the main message of the various lectures we've received is that the best possible thing we can learn is to be prepared and ready to adapt our skills for the future. We should not sit around thinking that at the end of our three years in education we will simply become a graphic designer. Some of us will, but the world is progressing at such a rapid rate we have to mold ourselves to fit it. Whatever new services, opportunities or problems come our way we must be ready to work with them. Solving the problems of tomorrow before we know what they are today.

My parents agreed with what I was telling them, however my mum who works as a class room assistant in a primary school and regularly helps with reading groups found what I was telling her a contradiction to what she witnesses every day in the school. She feels that in her primary school the children are simply being spoon fed education. There is no room for the children to solve problems and to show initiative? They are to dependent on adults telling them what to do and where to sit etc. everything is 'labeled' and put in boxes. If the children get used to everyone solving their every day problems for them now, how will they cope when they leave school and grow up?

In one 'incident' where my mum was taking a reading group of children aged 8 around a table where there wasn't enough chairs, the children looked at her blankly as if to say "do you expect me to do my reading standing up?" Not for a second thinking that they could solve the problem by going and collecting a chair from the table behind. She eventually had to tell the children to go and get extra chairs as they couldn't work it out for them selves.

It is slightly worrying that the education system is producing children with such limited problem solving skills, when we're being told over and over again in uni that it is our job to be the problem solvers of tomorrow. If feels that they are more concerned with getting the kids though the school like a conveyor belt, ticking the right boxes and making sure they leave with what looks good on paper.

Instead we should be educating our kids at the age of 8 all about the skills they will need to adapt for the jobs they'll be working in in 15 years time, most of which aren't even invented yet.

Or maybe we should just start with teaching them how to think for them selves a bit more?

Assignment 2a

We were asked to read the essay Rhetoric of the image, by Roland Barthes for our design studies class. I found this a difficult read, why to academics not think about the poor unacademic types who may one day be reading their work? However I battled on with it and found it helped when I met to discuss it with the rest of my seminar group.

We deduced that Barthe's is talking about the way we perceive images, he uses an example of an advert for Italian food (pasta, tomatoes etc). He talks about the three main ways we see an image.

The linguistic message, which is the text or copy included on the advert, this affects the viewer’s interpretation of image. In the example he gives us the linguistic message not only gives us the name of the product but also helps convey an overall feel for the advert. It focuses our attention, helping us identify the main message being conveyed in the advert.

The coded iconic message is the assumptions the viewer makes from the appearance of the image, in the advert he used as an example the produce looks fresh and appealing, which makes the viewer assume the company sell quality fresh produce. This does not need to be stated in the text as we can see that from the photo's composition. The colours used in the image are representative of the Italian colours, red, green and white, this heightens our perception that the produce is from Italy.

The non-coded iconic image is literally what the viewer sees in the image.

As a graphic designer I need to be aware of the different levels which people perceive an image. I need to think about cultural differences, and what factors such as age and gender play within the viewer’s interpretation.

We then started talking about the current diet Irn Bru advert which is on lots of bill boards around Dundee at the moment. In them there are two images which are identical apart from one has the phrase "sugar free" incorporated in it somewhere. The 'sugar free' is huge and very obvious. The caption reads "Spot the difference.... Diet Irn Bru, same great taste but sugar free". To me the advert doesn't make sense, they are wanting us to see that there is no taste difference in the diet drink compared to the regular one but in fact the images have a huge difference in them. Which to me states the exact opposite, that there is a taste difference and it’s a big one. However another person in the group perceived the ad to work well, he explained that because the only difference in the photos is the statement that it is sugar free this conveys that the drink is exactly the same as the regular version with only one difference (no sugar).

I think this in an example where the viewer really relies on the copy to make sense of the advert. For me if the advert did not state, "Same great taste" I would come away thinking that Irn Bru's sugar free drink tastes completely different to the regular version, which I know from the copy is not what they want me think. So this is an example of how the linguistic message has affected my understanding of an image and advert.

The story of 3 random photos

For our design studies assignment we were asked to pick three completely random pictures from a stock photography site and ask several people to connect the photos in a story. The story could be as nonsensical or literal as the person liked as long as they linked all three photos, there was no order they had to begin or end with, they had complete free reign.

Some people I asked found this a lot easier than others.

From a male Tools Developer age 25:

"These are flamingos, they are on holiday - you can tell it's an all inclusive one because they all have bands.

It is a very expensive holiday.

Their god looks down and approves of their holiday, despite the window above the god, as far as the flamingos are concerned, there is no higher entity than their stone god.

All is well on the flamingo holiday, and they are looking forward to getting some prawn crackers tomorrow, from the nice lady that ships their bedsheets from China."

From a male dental student age 20:

"Chinese woman is taking a leisurely boat ride when she hits two flamingos with the front end of her boat. A mermaid comes and saves the flamingos and takes them to a flamingo paradise. The ancient Peruvian people then made built a building with a sculpture of the mermaid in her honour as they worship the flamingo."

From a male medical student age 20:

The flamingos are to be transported from an inner city zoo (indescribable in place or time) on an ancient oriental boat to be slaughtered and cooked by the descendants of an ancient queen. The queen is remembered by her family in the form of a stone sculpture on their house.

From male software developer aged 45:

Mabel & Doris had got to talking about how they had never been to Hong Kong to visit their great aunt Flo.

“No time like the present” said Mabel and they made a MAD decision to leave right away on a cut price ‘bring your own bedding’ cruise.

Unfortunately when they arrived Great Aunt had passed on BUT they were VERY pleased to see she had been remembered in a by a loving sculptor friend the harbour wall….."

From female primary school class room assistant aged 43:

"Pete Neon and a band member from the Neon Needles were in down town Hong Kong when they got stoned."
(This story is a reference to a Mighty Boosh episode)#

From male high school student aged 17:

"Two fridge repair men, Roger and Steve, decide to go hunting for flamingos so they can keep them as pets on their farm. This farm is a noodle farm but is not very successful as it is located in Yorkshire. They are convinced that the noodles will grow there and are certain that it is ghosts which are stopping their farms success. To fix this problem they contact an evil wall goblin named Carl who wasn't so much evil as just not well liked. Mainly because he rarely bought people drinks and was no fun at parties. They asked the spiirt for help but he declined because he was in a mood, and Roger fell into such a deep spell of depression that he jumped from a cliff but miraculously survived and now runs a McDonalds franchise in Shetland. Steve got lost in Ikea and was never seen again."

(I'm not sure if this one actually fits the brief as it doesn't seem to connect all three photos? But it's quite funny.)

I also emailed the photos out to a few people who I wouldn't be able to see in time, and one of the few people who got back to me was my old college tutor who kindly stopped her class for a 5 min break to ask them all for their stories.

Unfortunately I don't know their gender or age, only that they study graphic design. Here is a selection of their stories:

"As I was flying on my flamingo across the world I made a stop at china to have my breakfast when I heard about a statue of a head that I must see. I searched high and low but could not find this statue. The only thing I never found."

"I looked up at the mermaid's head on the pub wall and decided to go on a flamingo quest. We will take a raft and go to Flamingo Island, using our white sheets we'll build a tent fit for a princess. Maybe I shouldn't of had that last pint..."

"This is a story about Miss Nootchie and Patch's adventures in Thailand on holiday. the first day they went to the zoo and saw everything pink, it was a short visit but Noochie now does a good impression of a flamingo. Patch demanded that he bought some cheap white fabric so they went on a snorkelling trip to catch one of the ladies on the boats to give us her material. The found the mermaids head above the hotel door very amusing as it looks like the building is giving birth to a fully grown mermaid."

"Once upon a time we lived in a hunted house. The house was very scary and had a woman's head made from stone sticking out the side of the wall. It turns out the woman was a farmer who bread superhuman flamingos to fight terrorists. But one day a boat arrived from Hong Kong and the people left the boat and killed all the flamingos. The woman was very sad and went into a deep depression, eventually turning into stone. A builder was so inspired by her story that he placed her stone head into his first house, this upset the dead woman and caused her to haunt the house forever."

"There was once a woman in Thailand rowing her boat, she was in a peaceful place and rowed past a garden that was beautiful and radiant. Within the garden she spotted flamingos fishing. Their heads bobbing in the pond that was positioned in the middle of the garden. The flamingo walked forward and presented a fish to the woman. She took the fish and row back to shore. At the fish market the woman sells this fish. The fish market is an old building with a stone carving of Possidons wife at the entrance."

"There was an old man who lived in a boat, he was cold and lonely and the boat was very emty with just him in it. One day he decided that he no longer wanted to be lonely so he went ashore to the town and went to the old 'Face-building', so named because of the large stone face above the door.

When he approached the door the face called out, "who goes there? What do you want?"

The old man replied, "I'm just an old fisherman, I came ashore to find a friend"

"Oh really?" The head said surprised. "Fair enough."

Smiling the old man went inside, there in the building the old man decides to buy himself a flamingo.

Never at any point did he bother to ask himself why there was a talking stone head above the door of a shop that sold flamingos, but I'm sure you didn't either, did you?"

Although I cannot tell the age or gender from these stories they help give me an idea of some other view points, reoccurring themes and story lines

Some of the recurring themes in the stories are depression, mermaids, royalty/god and holidays. Most of the stories start with the picture of the flamingos or use the flamingos as the main focus of the story. I feel that the more "creative people" like the HNC graphics students did come up with longer and more detailed stories than the "non creative" people, such as the doctor and dentist who found the exercise difficult and struggled to link the photos even in the most literal way. This is probably because graphics students are used to problem solving and 'thinking outside the box'.

For the second part of this assignment I had to pick one story and find a fourth image that I felt summed up it's main message. So that whoever I showed it to would be able to come up with the same or similar story as the original.

I chose this story:
"Chinese woman is taking a leisurely boat ride when she hits two flamingos with the front end of her boat. A mermaid comes and saves the flamingos and takes them to a flamingo paradise. The ancient Peruvian people then built a building with a sculpture of the mermaid in her honour as they worship the flamingo."

I thought that a photo which represents the Peruvian people worshipping the flamingo would be good and with a small bit of research found that the Peruvian flag is red and white which is to represent the colours of the flamingo, it was chosen to represent the country's new found freedom in 1820. As flamingos represent so much to Peruvian people, I think it would be quite possible that they might build a sculpture in a mermaid's honour for saving them. So for that reason I chose a picture of the Peruvian flag as my fourth image.

Unfortunately I did not have enough time or know enough people to ask them the final parts of this assignment.

I have been finding the workload pretty heavy at uni the past couple of weeks, combined with a large amount of studio work and deadlines and it taking me longer to understand and read assignment 2a, plus reading our design cultures book, I have run out of time. Studio work is not really a problem but combined with the design studies side of things which is a completely new way of working for me, I feel it demands much more of my time than the module hand book suggests, especially combined with the amount of work we have in the studio. I'm upset that I could not finish this assignment.

(Sorry I don't know why the pictures have gone weird, I wont be able to fix this till next week)

Happy Valentines Day

Envelope map

Quite a cleaver idea of putting a google map location on the inside of an envelope, nice for corporate invites etc. However it's likely to rip when someone was opening it :/

Nice gimmick though, it adds an extra something...

(found on bestemiray)

In my opinion...

Tracey Emin's My Bed

This is my response after reading Understanding Bourdieu chapter 8.

One of the things I have always loved about 'art' is that it is so subjective, it draws people together and it divides others, it sparks debate and stimulates conversations. Of course people will come along and state their opinions as definitive, or condemn someone's passion as trash, but really the beauty of the subject is that it's a personal experience, different from one person to the next. There are on the whole no wrong or right answers. Of course factors such as upbringing, social status and education play large rolls in defining or swaying our tastes, what newspapers we read and radio stations we listen to all have a bearing on how we react to art. But I believe the basic instinct of liking or disliking art is something private that comes from deep inside ourselves.

I don't believe that someone who is well educated would necessarily get more enjoyment from a piece of art than someone who is poorly educated. The better educated person may be able to understand the piece better on a technical level, be able to put it into context or it's time period or social surroundings, but you do not need to be an expert to know your own tastes and preferences. On a basic level of enjoyment and personal understanding and interpretation I believe art is the one thing that everyone can have an valid and interesting opinion on.

A big question is what makes something art? What makes something worthy of being hung on a gallery wall? Being put in a case in a museum? Or selling for millions at auction? Do we hold more value to a painting if it has been validated by a renowned critic or done by an already established artist? I believe we do. But does that mean we necessarily like it any better? Personally I don't think I do. I do not like Tracey Emin's work just because it's received so much exposure, press coverage and prestige. In fact I left her exhibition last year feeling slightly disturbed and uneasy, I couldn't think of one of her pieces that I liked. But that got me thinking, was that the emotion she intended I felt after viewing her work? Did she want me not to like it? I think what is important is that it was an experience that evoked an emotion from me.

I think art is whatever you want it to be, there are no right or wrong answers, it is constantly changing, tastes change and fashions will come and go, cultural and social movements will evolve. All these factors influence art and what we think of it. I wouldn't want it any other way.

Semester 2 Assignment 1: The Photo Swap!

Over the Christmas holidays we had to collect several photos of ourselves growing up, the photos were to be candid snapshots of family days out, birthday parties and every day activities. The aim of the exercise was to swap the photos with another student who you didn't know to see if you could analyse the photos to discover what kind of person they were.

A few of the pictures I gave to Scarlett.

I exchanged mine with, Scarlett, a jewellery student who I had never met or talked to before. Looking at her photos my first impressions was that she grew up in the countryside, I felt she spent a lot of time outside in the garden playing when she was growing up. She is always surrounded by her friends and family in the photos suggesting that she is a people person, who enjoys others company. I think she enjoyed regular days out with her family when she was growing up.

The photos suggested that Scarlett loves to dance. There is a photo of her, her sister and a friend dressed up in costumes performing to her parents in her living room. it looks like they are practising for a show. They are enjoying it as they are smiling and giggling. I could see from a photo on the mantelpiece that Scarlett also did highland dancing. I think she also did some other sport, maybe running and enjoyed participating in school sport events.

Other objects in the room, such as a gold chest and an old clock look as if they could have been handed down through generation, which suggests that her family have strong family values.

There is a couple of photos where Scarlett is with animals, in one she is holding a pet hamster and in another she is petting a small deer. This suggests that She likes animals and is not afraid of them as in her pictures she is smiling and looks proud she is touching the deer. There is no evidence of any larger pets in the household such as a dog so perhaps annimals didn't play a big part in her childhood.

I feel Scarlett likes trying new experiences as long as they are within her comfort zone. In one of her pictures she is on holiday and is sitting on a camel. She is with her friend or sister and in a holiday resort which looks very nice and quiet (which suggests it is a family holiday rather than one with her friends) she is sitting behind the other girl in the photo, rather than at the front. Was it her friend’s idea to go on the camel and not Scarlett’s?

From the pictures I feel that Scarlett is a confident and a very likeable person, she is surrounded by friends and family in all her pictures, I think she is very well loved and adored by her friends and family. i think she has a wide friend base but has a few very close friends. She is always smiling and laughing in her photos. In one of the photos of her at a birthday party all her friends are not looking at the camera, but Scarlett is looking straight into the lens, pulling a pose. This suggests that she is full of energy, outgoing and enjoys being centre of attention.

I think Scarlett's fashion is influenced by the people around her, she dresses similarly to her friends, she follows trends but her style is not "out there".

I met up with Scarlett to discus my findings and to hear what she thought about my photos.

I was interested to hear that I had almost completely sussed her! There was a few things I misinterpreted like that she does actually have a dog, and that the room where she was dancing with her friends wasn't actually her house, so the chest and clock being passed down the family doesn't apply. She agreed with the statement that she likes trying new experiences as long as they are in her comfort zone too.

She then went on to tell me her feedback on my photos.

She thought I grew up in the countryside, but in fact I grew up in a tenement flat on a main road in the centre of Edinburgh.

"She seems a happy and very smiley child. She had a close family upbringing. It looks as though she has a brother and sister that are younger."

I was a very happy child, and had a very close family upbringing however I only have one younger brother, the other girl in the picture was my cousin.

Scarlett worked out that I enjoy family meals, and that we often eat outside in the summer (that's true, we have been know to sit with blankets and our coats on in the past).

She thought that there was lots of plants and flowers which created a happy atmosphere, that I love chocolate and that my family enjoy celebrating occasions like birthdays. This is true, we normally have a family meal either at home or at my Grandpa's restaurant when it's someone's birthday. My dad loves plants in the house, and what girl doesn't love chocolate!!

Scarlett guessed correctly that I'm confident and enjoy socializing with my friends. She also worked out I have studied graphic design for a while and that I'm very proud of my work.

She states that I have a unique style, that I follow trends slightly not not religiously. Which I would have to agree with, I never try to be "unique" in my clothing but am definitely not a slave to fashion or trends. She could tell that I like to change my hair style regularly, she said this shows that I like to experiment, and that I don't feel I have to be the same as everyone else. I like bright colours, which show my bright and bubbly personality. 

Although nothing earth shattering was uncovered by either of us I found this a fascinating exercise, I am currently reading Snoop by Sam Gosling which is all about the "science of snooping" so was fantastic to be able to carry out my own investigations. It is amazing how much information you can gleam from a handful of snapshots of a complete stranger. I did feel quite uncomfortable and awkward to begin with it felt daunting having to assess and judge a someone's personal memories of childhood. And it felt weird thinking she would be doing the same to my photos as I was to hers. I began thinking about what she might be thinking about me as I was thinking about her.

(Scarlett's photos to come soon)