OUGD501 IDENTITY AND CONSUMPTION

Identity:

• Identity is an individuals personality
• How you're perceived 
• The fact of being a person
• Description of a person with specific characteristics that makes them them

Consumption:

• The action of using up a resource
• Purchasing an item and using it
• The use of something that it is made for
• The process by which goods and services are, at last, put to final use by people (economics) 

• Snackrite
• Converse
• Weeto's
• Kingsmill
• Red stripe
• Fred Aldous
• Aldi
• Head and shoulders
• Right guard
• Primark socks
• Greggs

Multiple identities:

• Multiple identities is when someone changes the way they are depending on the situation they are in. For instance most people might have a role to fit into within the daytime like a job and at night they may go out to a club and their persona may change via the way they dress for example.

How are identities formed?

• When people reach adulthood they tend to grow feelings, political beliefs and find things that motivate them. Also more obvious things are effected like how they dress. These things are usually decided by the way we are bought up and our surroundings.

What is social categorisation? 

• We naturally categorise people within different categories due out upbringing and learning about different cultures. We can identify these different 'categories' naturally by the way people look and dress and also what they believe in. 

What is social comparison?

• A way where people compare themselves to others via their political beliefs or fashion sense etc, and find out where they belong. We conduct these comparisons based upon the social categories we have created within out modern culture. 

What is social identity theory?

• A persons sense of who they are based on a certain group they are apart of.

An example of strong brand identity:

• Adidas has a really strong brand identity. People can recognise the three stripes from a great distance and still identify what that is. Adidas have been apart of many sport related advertising campaigns originally labelling people who where the three stripes as being active or athletic. Now a lot of different social categories celebrate the three stripes for different reasons but it can still be recognised from a far in the mix with other brands.

What are the negative effects of a body image?

• The media has manipulated the way people think that physical appearance is important in belonging to a certain type of social category. This can effect peoples mental stability when attempting to match these 'picture perfect' people.

What is self discrepancy theory?

•  This theory preposes that there a three types of self-schema (schema - being organised sets of expectations and associations about an object) 
• Actual self - the way people are at the present point in time
• Ideal self - the self that we aspire to be
• Ought self - the way we think we should be

OUGD501 PARODY AND PASTICHE

Both the texts given are discussing the difference between parody and pastiche in post modernism in the opinions of two individuals, Linda Hutcheon and Frederic Jameson. Hutcheon's simple definition of parody is that it is something that takes and views art only in jest "citing a convention only to make fun of it" (Hutcheon, Linda. The Politics of Postmodernism. New York: Routledge, 1989.) On the other hand, Jameson's definition of parody states that it is more of a development of culture. "symptom of the age, one way in which we have lost our connection with the past and to effective political critique" (Hutcheon, Linda. The Politics of Postmodernism. New York: Routledge, 1989.) These two definitions of parody clash rather greatly, as stated on one side, parody is something that is ironic and perhaps something to be taken less seriously. Where as on the other hand it is known to be a development of our ways, forgetting about the past and moving forward to better things. 

An example of pastiche is simply taking the aesthetic of a design, and completely copying it for solely visual pleasure reasons. There would be no really contextual reason behind why it has been selected as the chosen aesthetic, only because it looks nice. In some cases this could possibly work quite well without challenging the ethics of the original design too much. As you can see at this example below, the classic Jaws poster has been replicated almost entirely with it's aesthetic. These two have nothing in common of concept however, only aesthetic value.

An example of parody is using the exact same design and making something new of it in homage. This means that the ethics and concept of the original design are still there and there are no intentions of claiming this work as the designers own. As you can see with this example here, the north face logo has been mimicked here and changed only slightly but not enough to a point where it is unrecognisable. This still gives full credit to the original design and can be taken less seriously then something more pastiche. 

OUGD501 HOW ETHICS IMPACT GRAPHIC DESIGN

Today, ethnics in graphic design and branding in general has changed severely in comparison to a time before the naughties. Many precautions must be taken into mind when advertising, branding or creating something new entirely for there are so many things to be wary of that could offend or harm some form of community. Every one has ethics and rules. What they believe in and what they think think is right and wrong. Today, this has been applied to design in so many ways as the world is growing and becoming more diverse, brands have to be careful about who they target when selling a product or in fact if they aim at a specific group completely. Designers are clearly more self-conscious about their social role today than they have been at any time in the last twenty years, yet the lack of substance of the critics who have come to the fore, and take issues on which they have chosen to take a stance, reflect a political agenda that is set elsewhere. (MacDonald, N. (2001). Can designers save the world? (And should they try?). New Design, p.17.)  This is a major shame is some cases as it restrains some designers from expressing themselves in their work to their full potential. Designers are being made to silence their personal beliefs in pursue of professional success. This can completely ruins design for a lot of people as it defeats the purpose in some ways of the design work they grew up to enjoy. It's almost like they're being bought and customised by the change in ethics in society and politics to suit the needs of the rotten world of branding. Some designers have chosen to revolt against this silencing of creativity and opted to stick with their own personal morals to achieve their own personal creative goals. In a lot of cases this can be a sign of a more positive and happy designer, whom creates mainly for there self expression and individual morals. In Unit Editions’ monograph on him the publisher Adrian Shaughnessy describes why Lubalin quit as a partner in a successful agency to set up a design studio: “He didn’t like the idea of selling things to people they didn’t need. But he also did it for creative reasons because he couldn’t do what he wanted to.” (Abrahams, T. Its Nice That.(2016) Available at: https://www.itsnicethat.com/features/ethics-graphic-design-essay-131016) This is a really tragic thing to see in design today as an ever growing society develops with more challenging politics, the ethics of visual communication becomes ever more greater diminishing creative boundaries.

OUGD501 STUDY TASK 1

10 words that relate to my graphic design practice

• Bold
• Messy
• Fast
• Texture
• Busy
• Print
• Collaged
• Contextual
• Scanner lads
• Mixed media
• Collaborative

10 design issues/themes i'm interested in

• Music - Documented music events
• Magazines - Editorial - Layout 
• Cool socks
• Poster design - Animated posters
• Big mosh pits
• Design with well thought concept
• Tattoos
• Textures - Effect of print on different paper
• Other cultures
• Collaborative studies

10 things I learnt last year

• Layout design
• Sense of play
• Typography terminology
• Colour theory
• Not trying too hard
• Not overthinking things
• Physical print
• How important concept is
• Communication through design
• Book binding

How can graphic design...

• Collaborative - Editorial - Layout design
• Collage - Cool socks - Book binding
• Contextual - Mosh pits - Physical print
• Print - Music - Concept
• Messy - Magazines - Overthinking
• Bold - Magazine layouts - Communicate through design
• Sense of play - Editorial - Physical print

Sense of play

• Colourful
• Outgoing 
• Mixed media
• New
• Adventurous 
• Dangerous
• Pushes Boundaries
• Is there a limit?
• How far could it go?
• Can generate new forms and concepts

Editorial

• Communication design
• Having an idea and explaining it visually
• Concept book
• Translate a message through a publication of sorts
• Translation using visual aesthetic
• Books, publication, magazine, zine, website, newspaper, regular article, etc...
• How far can it go before it is no longer an editorial piece

Physical Print

• Traditional print methods
• Screen printing
• Etching
• Embossing
• Letterpress
• Book making
• Lithography
• Mono printing
• Lino printing 
• Dark room
• Can these be combined?
• How far could they go?

How far can I play with traditional design methods on an editorial format before it becomes too much?

OUGD501 BRIEFING NOTES

• Will be producing something related to graphic design
• Explore a subject through the means of graphic design
• Apply several types of research, theoretical, contextual and practical 
• Answer to a problem/issue defined by you/me!
• Think about issues that could exist within an area of practice
• This is an opportunity to challenge a practice or culture within design

10 words that relate to my graphic design practice

• Bold
• Messy
• Fast
• Texture
• Busy
• Print
• Collaged
• Contextual
• Scanner lads
• Mixed media
• Collaborative

Develop a considered research question focussing on a specific graphic design discipline 

• Research
• Understand
• Apply - complex theories and concepts to develop graphic design work

Part 1

• CoP blog
• 25000000000 word essay including reflective evaluation
• Intro to my argument - what are you investigating
• Critical argument developed through discussion (Harvard referencing) 
• Case studies
• Evaluation
• Conclusion
• Use third person, academic style writing, quotes/paraphrase, specialist language

Part 2

• 6 design boards documenting your practical work including project brief/and practical work
• Build knowledge through research and writing
• Explore issues surrounding your topic
• Endeavour to "answer" your question through practical means
• Have a clear brief
• Cross reference and justify your decisions between practical work and critical writing

Deadline 4th April 2019

10 design issues/themes i'm interested in

• Music - Documented music events
• Magazines - Editorial - Layout 
• Cool socks
• Poster design - Animated posters
• Big mosh pits
• Design with well thought concept
• Tattoos
• Textures - Effect of print on different paper
• Other cultures
• Collaborative studies

10 things I learnt last year

• Layout design
• Sense of play
• Typography terminology
• Colour theory
• Not trying too hard
• Not overthinking things
• Physical print
• How important concept is
• Communication through design
• Book binding

How can graphic design...

• Collaborative - Editorial - Layout design
• Collage - Cool socks - Book binding
• Contextual - Mosh pits - Physical print
• Print - Music - Concept
• Messy - Magazines - Overthinking