Noisy Decent Graphics

Newspaper Club logo

I don't normally do this, but I've just written about the Newspaper Club logo on the Newspaper Club blog and I thought you guys would like to read it as well.

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You may have noticed we've slightly changed the Newspaper Club logo. The previous one used a temporary paperboy graphic whilst we worked behind the scenes to create a bespoke one. 

I'd like to tell you about the thinking behind the logo and show you some of the versions that didn't make the cut. Other start ups don't give you that level of transparency, do they? When you think of newspapers you probably think of that 'funny marmalade' font. And you'd be right. That font you're thinking of visually equals newspaper, so I elected to use that. Simple. I'm a huge fan of not over complicating design, as my old boss used to say, "you might say cliché, I might say crystal clear communication". 

Most of the typography that would pass as crystal clear communication for a newspaper masthead is based on the font Blackletter. Blackletter has it's uses, but on screen is not one of them. In fact, it's more Duchy Originals than Daily Oregonian as over an incredible 1,000 years Blackletter has undergone many cuts and derivatives and most broadsheet newspapers today use stylised versions. Or typefaces based on a gothic Blackletteresque font, more accurately.

I needed a version that said 'newspaper' as instantly as Blackletter but worked well on screen.

Back in June (on day one in fact) I looked at several versions and settled on Brauhaus . It has been simplified and is therefore better for online use yet it still retains the newspaper feel I was after. To make the letters more distinctive I opted to change the N and the C for slightly tweaked versions of the Blackletter N and C.

That's the word marque sorted but for a modern start up you need an icon for all those pesky 32x32 square icons you have to create. And that's where the paperboy came in. The original inspiration was the Paperboy Atari game from the 1984. That's a sort of digital newspaper joke for people of a certain age. 

A little character would be handy for all those icons and also for guiding you through the newspaper making process. It feels right for Newspaper Club as we're a friendly tool for people and communities not a secretive, hard edged, spiky tech dot com.

We used this chap for a while, but it was just a place holder. We wanted our own, so we tasked the amazing Rexbox with creating one for us. Rex has worked on all sorts of cool stuff including co-creating LittleBigPlanet and stuff for Disney and MTV. Here he is. The paperboy, not Rex.

The result is a modern, friendly logo whilst hinting at the visual history of the newspaper masthead. We hope you like it.

Upcycling

 

How about this for a fab recession busting unproduct digital idea?

Folksy are doing a thing called Upcycling. You take second hand / charity stuff and make it into something ‘new’ and desirable to be sold at an online auction starting on the 7th December. All proceeds from the auction will go to Sue Ryder Care.

That's good isn't it?

There will also be a winner - the person that makes the best thing in various categories. The winners get to display their work in the Sue Ryder Care Camden store for one month from the middle of Jan to the middle of Feb in a specially constructed Folksy set. That's a fantastic opportunity.

Find out more here.

A few things

Because I have a few blog posts in my draft folder that don't seem to get finished and because I saw someone else do this the other day, here are a few things in no particular order.

* There is a recession going on. A big horrible one. Friends of mine have lost their jobs. But generally speaking everyone I know who is very good is very busy, everyone who is average or worse is quiet. Possibly there are two reasons for this; firstly in difficult times clients go for safe bets, secondly talented people are better are making themselves busy.

* I keep hearing people say the internet is going to change, nay revolutionise, politics. A new dawn is coming. Fine, except I see an Eton educated Tory Prime Minister coming over the horizon. That doesn't feel very new does it?

* People keep telling me that no-one is interested in politics any more. Wrong. Go and speak to some constituents of a Duck House MP. Go and speak to some Tories. They are all very engaged with the forthcoming election. The world is not full of Labour voting social media consultants.

NB I imply nothing about Eton, Tories, Labour, social media consultants or ducks. This is not a political blog.

* More and more it appears to me that small companies are good at innovation and big companies are good at Getting Things Done. Both of these are attractive at different times. Very few companies (Google being a clichéd example) are good at both. £££££.

* That fucking Philippe Starck programme is awful. Lots of people say it's good that design is on the telly. Not when it's design like this. Mind you, designing does not lend itself to exciting TV.

* They should bring the two Dicks back. Do not Google that, the reference is here.

* Advertising agencies are much better at account management than design companies. This matters and is one reason why ad agencies have the relationship many design agencies grave.

* If you say, out loud "the internet is going to change my business" you are fucked. It already has changed your business. All that is over. But there's some good news, it probably hasn't changed that much. All you need to do is work out which bits of your business are good and then concentrate on those.

* You work too late. Really. It's no good for you. Stop it.

* Sir Harold Evans, famous editor said last week, “I’m in love with the craftsmanship of print. But I have to say I’m intoxicated by the speed of the web”. He's right and that gives me a cute link to remind you Newspaper Club launches in January.

* Anish Kapoor is worth a visit.

That is all.

Lego Book

 

You all know about the new Lego book, right?

D&AD Annual 2009

And now it's time for annual review of the D&AD Annual.

This year's book has been design by Peter Saville. Or rather, art directed by Peter Saville and designed by Luke Sanders (who I think works for WMH).

That really is all you need to know about the design of the book; Peter Saville.

Looks great - difficult to use.

These little info graphics are particularly gorgeous.

 

 

 

Each section is covered by an extended page that's on slightly thicker stock and folds in to wrap around a section.

 

 
 

Neat idea you might think? Certainly looks cool from the outside. But when you're reading the book and you move on to another section it does this.

 

Which is annoying. I'm sure the pages will soften over time and it's not so annoying it would stop you reading the book. But still, it's a book in a book format that didn't really need messing around with. Seeing that those section dividers add very little I don't see the point of them. Like I said, annoying and classic Saville.

The rest of the book follows the standard design we've grown used to.

There's some great work inside, but there's very little stuff that stands out. Actually I remember very little of the work when flicking through the book. That has nothing to do with Saville, or D&AD or the judges, that's a quiet year.

The book is well worth having though. It's a fascinating record of the year's work. And the standard is very high, as always. At the moment the only way to get the Peter Saville designed version is to sign up as a member. You should do that. You can do that here.

If you don't fancy membership you will soon be able to buy the same book, designed by Jeremy Leslie and printed by Taschen for about £30. That's a very good idea and a very good deal and I'm sure it won't have silly section dividers either. We'll announce that when it gets released.

I've picked out some stuff that caught my eye below. It's very hard to credit everyone involved, so I haven't. Apologies for that. Seriously, it's hard to credit everyone on a blog and yet I ought to really. Sorry.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

See also: 2006 Annual, 2007 Annual, 2008 Annual (n/a).

The LOGO BOARD GAME

What have we done?

Workshop Rules

Found via The Design Disease Flickr Pool

The Wolff Olins Guide to Corporate Identity

I acquired this book the other day.

It's very Eighties. Very November 1983 to be precise. 26 years old. That's older than some of you reading this.

There are no designs in the book, just words. Very good words too. Most of them still relevant today.

Unlike these organisations.

Neil Roberts

Neil Roberts is a mate of mine from college. He drifts in and out of my life every 3 or 4 years spouting more sci-fi rubbish and jokes I don't understand.

He's an illustrator, and a great one at that. He draws all that sci-fi stuff that I don't like but I know you lot love. In fact he's just realised a lifelong ambition by illustrating the cover of 2000 AD.

Image Courtesy 2000AD Online

He also did this very nice picture of Judge Dredd for Judge Dredd magazine.

And more importantly than all that, he appeared in the Louth Leader.

He has a blog. You should pop on over there.

Nice sign up page

That offensive Stephen Bayley book

As previously discussed I can't stand Stephen Bayley.

I don't like Germaine Greer much either. But her review of the offensive book is worth a read. If only for this quote;

"The book seeks to answer the question: if woman was designed then what exactly was the brief?... When the verbiage is shaken down, we discover that for Bayley the imaginary brief is to design a fuckable thing.".

As previously discussed I can't stand Stephen Bayley.

The Hidden Park - iPhone game

Yesterday we went to the South Bank to try out The Hidden Park, an iPhone game.
[website] [iTunes]

It's an ambitious game that uses the iPhone's GPS, the camera and the speaker  to create a sort of ARGish geo-cachingish mash up for families. You pick a park, head down there with the kids and run around solving clues and puzzles and trying to find the magical creatures.

I am not a gamer at all. (Apart from the iPhone) I have never owned any games console. The last time I played a computer game was Guitar Hero at Christmas and before that I have absolutely no idea.

But I have an iPhone and I have kids so I'm probably a good test case.

It's very hard to review this game for two reasons; firstly it's not as good as you're imagining it is and secondly that's because the technology is a weeny bit clunky for the full experience. I'll try a review and hopefully you'll see what I mean.

OK, first up, you choose a park. In London you can pick Kensington Gardens or the South Bank. That's a disappointment right there, in your head you imagined you could play it in any park didn't you? When you think about it, it's obvious that you have to play in a pre-determined place as the game play uses the features of the park, but that's a good example of the perception and the reality not matching up.

Anyway. You start the game. Trutton rings you up. This is brilliant, it looks and feels just like a real phone call and the kids identified with that straight away. Trutton gives you some instructions and off you go.

Most of the time the maps were pretty accurate, but a few times they weren't.

We weren't in the middle of the Thames. It says waiting for GPS Accuracy, but I waited a long time and it still didn't get the location. This is a technology/reality problem that's only occurs because kids are involved. They want the map to be right straight away and they don't understand waiting.

When the map works, it's ace. It picks up where you are and triggers the next chapter. There are little puzzles to solve along the way, simple ones that give you a great big rewarding 'well done'.

But best of all is the camera link up. The game tells you to point your camera at specific things in the park and then brings the screen to life with little characters.

It does this really well, the graphics are fab and animated nicely. The kids loved this bit.

The story is a bit weak and (obviously) it sometimes over relies on the iPhone's attributes. But my main complaint is that there's too much walking. We started off by the London Eye, then we headed over to the BFI, then back to the Eye and then across to the National Theatre, back to the BFI and then finishing at Gabriel's Wharf. That's a lot of walking with small children. Especially in a busy tourist location.

The best bit as far as the kids were concerned were these brilliant little photos created by standing in exactly the right spot.

They are pretty awesome. Especially as you (or the child not in the picture) can watch the creatures walk on to the screen.

In summary, it's not perfect but I think it's unreasonable to expect it to be. It appears (to me) to be at the forefront of a potentially massive market. It has the basics right, it looks great, it's fun, it's simple and it makes good use of the iPhone. It's sufficiently parent and sufficiently child.

It seems to make sense in an emerging post-digital world. It takes something you can't do on a screen (going outside and run round a park) and merges it with something you can't do with twigs or paper (animate creatures over pictures etc). But also it takes the best bits of those worlds, going to the park is a good fun thing and gps and camera etc uses the best of the iPhone. That's smart and importantly it doesn't feel forced or false. Throw in gaming on the top and you've got a very interesting mix.

We had a great time playing and I would play it again. For £3.99 you can't really complain.

I'm not interested in games, but this sort of thing could easily get me hooked.

Next, Katie did India

Do you remember Katie? She was one my students at LCC last year.

The middle one.

She's currently in India as part of her year in industry. She's going to Nek Chand’s Rock Garden in Chandigarh to fill an arts & culture position. Anyway she's blogging about her time there. And what's interesting is that she's blogging through the eyes of a graphic designer.

"India is an amazing place. I have never seen colours like these"

And you'll find out about stuff like Chandigarh, Le Courbusier’s modernist town. I didn't know that.

Plus if we all click on this link she'll feel pressured to blog even more. Hopefully she'll see this and hopefully she (has followed my advice and) has a Flickr account which she'll link to in the comments.

Modernism is dead, good.

I can't stand Stephen Bayley. There are loads of reasons why, but here's the most recent one.

That, in case it's not clear, is a whole book, a design book no less, called Woman As Design - before, behind, between, above and below.

The blurb says, "Stephen Bayley discusses how the female body works as a sign, a symbol...as a designed object." Does everyone else find that offensive? Abhorrent, even? It's not ironic or provocative, it's stupid.

It's precisely because I dislike him so much and because I am a well rounded human being that I read his piece first in a magazine article called 'Designs Of The Decade'. It's very good. Here's what he had to say.

Ignore the iPod bit and read the second paragraph.

"I do think we're coming to the end of a sort of sinusoidal wave, which began just after the second world war, in which life was all about making more, consuming more and so on. In architecture this is quite clear. The Chelsea Barracks is the last gasp of Richard Rogers, he is now as much an historical anachronism as Quinlan Terry."

Leaving aside that fact I hate people who say "I do think" and "I do believe" and so on; thank fuck Modernism is over.

I have always felt guilty that as a designer I don't like modernism enough. I mean, I like white spaces and hard edges and everything, but I don't feel the need to align my whole life to modernism. I would love a Huf Haus, but I'd be just as happy in a Victorian terrace. Sorry.

A Huf Haus by Lewis Broughton usual stuff applies.

I like things to be nice and stylish, but I'm just as happy for things to be a great big mess sometimes. I'm happy for the kids to have cheap plastic toys sometimes. Sorry.

Christmas is a good example of modernism facism. Designers always try and fuck Christmas up by making it stylish and modernistic. Christmas should look like this if you ask me.

And he's right about the Chelsea Barracks thing too. People are looking beyond steel and glass in big cities. I'm not a steel and glass hater and I'm not a big fan of Chelsea red brick - it's nice to see a mix of both.

And there's another very interesting point in that second paragraph.

"I do think we're coming to the end of a sort of sinusoidal wave, which began just after the second world war, in which life was all about making more, consuming more and so on."

Which reminds me of this brilliant quote from Lewis Mumford which I used in my I'm A Designer. Use Me Better talk.

“Why should we so gratuitously assume, as we constantly do, that the mere existence of a mechanism for manifolding or of mass production carries with it an obligation to use it to the fullest capacity?”

I do hope Stephen is right and we're moving towards the end of that era.

I realise this is an incredibly simplified version of Modernism. But I'm glad it's dead. And thank you Stephen Bayley for letting me know.

Still hate that book though.

"Always design a thing by considering it in its next larger context - a chair in a room, a room in a house, a house in an environment, an environment in a city plan."

Eliel Saarinen

Taxi for Kitching

Although I'm starting to really fucking hate these collaborative, let's get 50 designers to make a fucking poster things... you got to admit this is awesome from Alan Kitching.

From some collaborative, let's get 50 designers to make a fucking poster thing.

Designer Clothes

The nice people at Veer are offering one of these amazing KERN zip up tops (worth £69) for FREE when you buy any image or typeface from veer.com. That's a fab offer. I've had mine for a few days now and have enjoyed explaining it to everyone I meet.

Brilliant. And you could probably do with some new fonts.

The Best Sign Ever

GPS Tube Map Cards

There is an iPhone app called GPS Map Cards [web link] [app store link] which a few of us have been obsessed with over the last few months. Essentially it does this.

Which is great and everything, but I thought it might be fun to take pictures of Tube stations and map them accordingly. Like this.

The internet being the internet, other people started doing it too. Like Blech.

And so we started a Flickr Group. You can see the group here. Let's see if we can collect all 270 tube stations. That would be skill.

The group has some rules, like this.

1. Only take a picture of the front of the station with the name clearly displayed.

2. Match this up with the location on the GPS Map Card map.

3. Only use pictures taken with the GPS Map Card iPhone app.

4. Check if your station has already been included. Duplicates will be deleted. The rules are unashamedly strict and I will delete pictures that don't meet the criteria.

Here's a map of all the ones we've got so far.

Would you like to join in? Sign up to the group here.

Learn Something Every Day

From the excellent Learn Something Every Day blog.

Funny, interesting, simple and well art directed.