Visual Language

Today we went back to basics to recap over language skills that we had not thought about in years. 

Dictionary Definitions

verb a word used to describe an action, state, or occurrence, and forming the main part of the predicate of a sentence, such as hear, become, happen.

adverb a word or phrase that modifies or qualifies an adjective, verb, or otheradverb or a word-group, expressing a relation of place, time,circumstance, manner, cause, degree, etc. (e.g., gently, quite, then, there).noun a word (other than a pronoun) used to identify any of a class of people, places, or things ( common noun), or to name a particular one of these ( proper noun).pronoun a word that can function by itself as a noun phrase and that refers either to the participants in the discourse (e.g., I, you) or to someone or something mentioned elsewhere in the discourse (e.g., she, it, this).adjective a word or phrase naming an attribute, added to or grammatically related to a noun to modify or describe it.
subjective pronoun a personal pronoun that is used as the subject of a sentence. (I, you, he, she, it, we, what, who and they).

After this, we thought about what was important in a paragraph. We did this by shortening newspaper articles down into 160 characters (for a text message) and 140 characters (for a 'tweet').

OMG is Rooney getting dropped by Fergie? Lol. Fergie refused 2 tlk about the players future after reports claimed Rooney didn’t want 2 sign a new contract. City should sign him. Rofl.

Layout, Frame and Format

The basic principles of graphic design are layout, frame and format, and they are what I looked at during visual thinking. The composition is a fundamental element for any piece, for example with a magazine layout. I have tried to convey different words through type using a five square sequence.

Catch

The Times New Roman A is falling, and is caught by a bed of A's.

Slip

The A's start off in a straight line, and gradually slip towards the bottom.

I showed my sequence to other members of the group to see if what I was trying to communicate was understandable to others.

Expand

For this task we worked in groups to produce twenty squares showing the opposite of our word.

Adobe Illustrator Induction

Experimentation using Adobe Illustrator

Brief: Create 26 variations of one letterform

Week One


Before this induction I had a very small knowledge of Illustrator, so have started with very basic steps. I have manipulated an existing letter, mainly by altering the counter.

Week Two

I learnt how to use the pen tool to trace a shape, how to create curves, how to apply pattern and colour, how to create my own letters with shapes.

Development

I chose the letter p instead of k which I had been using in my visual thinking brief, as I wanted to alter the counter as I had in my inductions. The letterforms I have created were made by experimenting and playing around with different tools and settings to help give me an understanding of how I can use Illustrator creatively. 

.1. Original  .2. With Pattern  .3. Edited Serifs & Counter Shape  .4. Without Counter  .5. Shrunk Counter Shape  .6. Rotated & Enlarged Counter  .7. Altered Anchor Points  .8. Remove Handles .9. Recreated Shapes With Rectangle Tool  .10. Recreated Shape With Eclipse & Rounded Rectangle Tool  .11. Altered Opacity Of Layers  .12. Altered Brush Stroke  .13. Altered Brush Stroke  .14. Altered Brush Stroke .15. With Pattern & Stroke  .16. Created From Different Fonts In Style Of Visual Thinking Letterforms  .17. Changed Opacity Of Layers  .18. Stretched Anchors  .19. Created From Different Fonts In Style Of Visual Thinking Letterforms  .20. Outline Only  .21. With Scatter Brush  .22. P In Front Of P Brush  .23. Changed Stroke Weight & Outline  .24. Used Perspective Selection Tool  .25. Used Perspective Selection Tool  .26. Added Symbols  .27. Different Layers Of Opacity  .28. Altered Scale  .29. Pucker Tool  .30. Twirl Tool .31. Twirl Tool .32. Crystallise Tool  .33. Wrinkle Tool  .34. Scallop Tool  .35. Bloat Tool  .36. With Shadow .37. Blob Brush Tool .38. Blob Brush Tool

Final Piece: A1 Poster

Personality Alphabet

Brief

To create an alphabet and 6 glyphs for a partner, as well as a name badge, based on five adjectives which describe the partner. The alphabet should be created by manipulating existing letterforms. 

Eddie's Adjectives

For Eddie, I decided he was laid back, informal, mysterious, fun and indecisive. I then defined these words to get a better understanding of what I would be to communicate.

Laid Back: Relaxed, unhurried, free from stress, easygoing, carefree, horizontal, not strict, free from tension Fun: Amusement, enjoyment, playfulness, jokes, whimsical, flamboyant, animated, social, not serious, merry, foolery Mysterious: Obscure, full of mystery, puzzling, secretive, curious, not easily explained, confusing, inexplicable, unknown, strange, baffling, incomprehensive Informal: Casual, irregular, natural, easy, breezy, cool, light hearted Indecisive: Unsure, uncertain, unstable, doubtful, shaky, lacking assurance, inconclusive, mixed, wavering, insecure

Possible typography ideas

Existing typeface experimentation

I decided to experiment with existing fonts which I felt were relevant to what I was trying to communicate about Eddie by copying out his name in each style. It was important to make sure that each style worked with Eddie's name, as I would also be creating a name badge. 

Champollion Outline - Jigsaw - Wyvern Blocko - Glyphic Neue Wide - TX Gitter - TX Tiny Tim Gimpy - Trisec - Nurse Ratchet - Liquid Sex Italic - Crystopian - Twister

 - This is Eddie's favourite of the fonts

Development

There are different elements from the fonts which I like, so I continued my development by creating new ideas bringing together these elements.

Trisec (Uppercase with shadow) - Trisec (Uppercase with backwards italic and bits missing) - Mix of Twister and Trisec (with shadow) - Mix of Trisec and Champollion Outline (with shadow and backwards italic)

More experimentation with Mix of Trisec and Champollion Outline

Mix of Trisec, Wyvern Blocko and Jigsaw

The a has opened edges, the b has closed edges with shadow and the c just has closed edges.

I thought the style of the b worked the best, so decided to also mix in Champollion Outline, the font which Eddie preferred, and experiment with some letterforms in this mix. I also experimented with the idea of physically leaning back a letter, to show how I believe Eddie to be laid back.

I really liked the style I had created from the mix of existing fonts, so decided to continue this experimentation with the rest of the alphabet and the chosen glyphs. However, I was unsure whether I wanted the letterforms to be leaning back or not, so tried some letters with this idea and some without. After asking Eddie which style he preferred, and thinking about which style I personally thought was more attractive, I decided not to lean back the letters. 

I decided to use each glyph for a particular reason. The division sign shows how only a percentage of Eddie is revealed to me. The asterix is used to block out letters in offensive words, so I have used this to show how Eddie blocks some of himself out. I have used the email symbol to show that Eddie is confident with technology, and the pound sign to show he is interested in money. I decided not to use the and symbol as I didn't think it would work at a small size. I developed the symbols so they would fit in with the letterforms I had created.

Final Name Badge

Based on the design decisions I had previously made, this is Eddie's 4.5cm x 9cm name badge.

Final Pieces

A1 White Paper & A1 Tracing Paper

Hand Drawn Typefaces

On these A1 sheets feature my completed and neatened alphabets and 6 glyphs after development.

Testing Readability

I scanned in each letter, and re arranged these on to the computer to test the readability of the typeface when used for sentences, and at different sizes. I think it would look too much because of the quantity of lines to use this font for a large area of text, but I am pleased that the typeface does work at different sizes.

I also tried Eddie's full name for a different name badge.

Illustrator Experiment

To test whether handcrafting was the right idea, or if this style of letterforms would have been better suited to being created on illustrator, I experimented with creating the letter a with the pen tool. At this stage I have very little knowledge of Adobe Illustrator, so I have simply created this letter by tracing my hand drawing. The curves are cleaner and smoother, and there are no mistakes or smudges as with the hand drawn style. However, I don't think the imperfections in my hand drawn type face matter, as perfect and neat was not what I was attempting to portray. Instead of perfect curves, I prefer my slightly messy hand drawn style.

Further Development

After recieving feedback from my tutor, I decided to take a step back from my illustrator experiments and continue to develop my designs. The feedback can be seen on my PPD blog.

I have created this small design to show how the letters should look if they were in the correct proportion. I have also removed the block shadow and made each letter harder to read, and removed the closed lines, all of these being issues that arose after feedback.

The shape of the maze line in some letters gave away what the letter was about, which was not what I was trying to portray, so these design ideas are examples of what my alphabet could look like if it were truly portraying the characteristics I believe Eddie to be.

T was a problem letter as it did not look visually correct, so I have tried to fix this.