The First Year Of Graphic Product InnovationA portfolio of work by Kathryn Henderson ranging from alteregoed light switches to a collection of headlines of death.

Graphic Product Innovation

Grid StructureI took photos of grid structures in the surrounding environment. Showing that there are grid struc-tures everywhere. These pictures represent a column, hireachy and modular grid. It shows that grids work in any context of structure from buildings to page layouts.

Visual Grammar

We had a series of visual grammar workshops. Learning the prin-ciples of layout, abstraction, composition and type. I learnt how to make certain information hireachied so it caught your eye first in an interesting way, using the balance of lines and grid structure.

Exploring Abstraction and Com-potional elements. Using the blue as the main colour this commu-nicates how having the blue on the white square makes it clearer. Where as on the black it merges into the background.

Exploring the Abstraction of the different coloured squares over-laping. The grey square in the background looks darker than the lighter one in the foregrond. The elements create a dimen-sional space between foreground and background.

Similar to the composition of the blue colour this time using yel-low the abstraction is reversed, where the yellow square is upon the black it is clearer. This is why using yellow typography on a white background is unreadable.

Using lines of different lengths and weights exploring letter forms in compositions. This particular form shows balance between the positive and nega-tive space. And creates a nice layout.

Putting three different weights of lines together in a horizontal direction creates an interesting barcode like compostion. You can identify the differences of lines by there weights.

Grouping the three lines into the same lengths makes the eye identify the three different weights better than justifying them from the weights and again creates quite a nice composition.

Exploring the compotional qualities of just a line and a dot, The elements show positive and negative emotions of the relation-ship between the line and the dot. Creating tension where the dot is intraped by the line and a sense of innocence where the dot has almost not even discov-ered the line and is suspended in balance.

Bridge StructureThe task was to make a bridge that could suspend a full coke can across a 1 metre gap using just straws, string and pins. I used the structure like a suspen-sion bridge and I used triangles as they are the strongest shape. But it didnt manage to hold the can, I think it needed more triangles.

3D TypeI had to choose a song lyric to represent in 3D type. So the material and form had to convey the meaning of the song lyric. I decided to choose a lyric from a band called Taproot, ‘something more than nothing’. Which has a special meaning to me. I had to define for myself what something was and what nothing meant in the terms of a physical space. I did this little cut out of the lyric and it made alot of sense of how to maybe convey the meaning in 3D type.

Something More Than Nothing

Taking the concept that nothing in psysical space was nothing, air, a negative space and that something was what encased the nothing to make it something more than nothing. I decided to make my 3D type out of clear plastic to trap the nothing - space. So I made wooden letters first using edwardian script. And then vacuum formed the wooden shapes. I also decided to have the lyric fade into nothing, hense there being no nothing

These are my final photos for the 3D type. I wanted people to hold them as a possitive message that they are something more than nothing which is what the lyric conveys. I really like the way the concept of the something and nothing really communicates through the material I chose for the 3D type.

Drawing Exercises of interesting 3D household objects. Following certain rules for each drawing which made them more interesting. The rule for this object was to use a thick and thin pen together at the same time one in each hand or tied together using one hand.

We did a range of drawings using different techniques to achieve interesting sketches with texture and more thought. (From left to right) Draw the object normaly. Draw the object with the opposite hand to normal. Draw the object with a continuous line.

TaxonomyWe were given 26 words that we didnt know the meaning of, real scrabble winners. We had to classify them in interesting ways. One of my ways is shown hear I put them into order of scrabble score from highest at the top to the lowest at the bottom. Its really quite interesting as the high score letters like Q Z and X are moatly at the top along with the longest words. I also classified them in Alphabetical order and Hirearchy order of longest word at the top to the shotest at the bottom it is interesting to see the relation with the scrabble scores.

As part of our Taxonomy project. We were given a variety of sweets and had to classify them in different ways. This one is classified by colour from white to black. Just by looking at this you can see that the pinks and reds are the majority colours.

chrunchability

chewability

softability

suckability

Using a system of convergence I have classified this by eat-ability. It shows the sweets character and you get an idea of what textures they are. They are clas-sified by chewability, suckability, softability and chruchability

Another part of the taxonomy project we had to classify our own collections I chose to clas-sify buttons as they are different colours and different texture. I arranged most of my buttons in colour to see the variety within the collection. You can see that the neutral and dark coloured buttons are the majority.

Following the taxonomy project with our own collection I then decided to classify the buttons into there well known charac-teristic of how many holes they have. I classified them in no holes, four holes and two holes. I noticed that the buttons that fell into the no holes catergory were mostly material buttons. The four hole buttons were mostly regular round ones and plastic and the two hole buttons tended to be irregular in shape.

Typography Layout Workshop

Learning how to make certain

parts of text stand out and be

made hirearched

Typography LayoutsDuring the typography work-shop I constructed these layouts concentrating on ways to make pieces of information stand out more , just by their layout. By arranging the text in certain ways you lined them up with invisible lines to make them have a grid structure to complement the layout.

These examples of layouts we were given the same block of text with four different parts of information, we had to do layouts showing how each part took hirearchy over the rest through the four different layouts. I fol-lowed the ‘invisible line’ rule of lining up all the text along the line but putting what I am trying to stand out set a bit higher up so the viewer will see it first. As it seems isolated from the main block of text.

The same priniciple as the last page to make a piece of informa-tion stand out from a bulk of text. However this time the fiormat of the paper has changed to land-scape and the weight of the type is heavier. I followed the same priniciple of using an invisible line which seems to be quite effective in making a sucessful layout.

AlteregoFor this project I had to choose an everyday object and analysis what it is that makes it that ob-ject. Thinking about its character-istics and “personality” I then had to think how I could change this into some sort of alterego similar to comic book superheros. I decided to choose a light switch as my everyday object and here shows my thoughts of what the functions and character of a light switch is.

I prototyped with a range of materials including jelly, vacuum forming and plaster to think of different ways to transform the light switch. In the end I came across a concept when turn-ing the light on in a bathroom as it was a pully switch rather than a wall switch therefore I transformed the switch to have a multiple personality of having two switches on one panel.

WayfindingThese make up some of the research for wayfinding about the Elephant and Castle subways. For the project we had to come up with an idea to help people navigate around. We came up with a solution of coloured half spheres on the ceiling that move around and people follow the one that says where they want to go e.g LCC, so that people around don’t know that your lost as you can casualy look at the colour for guidance.

Our solutions for the wayfinding brief developed from a handle I made out of modrock with an indent of a hand on it. We felt this was unsafe as people around would know that you were lost and therefore vulnerable so we decided on these domes that would be on the tops of the subways colourcoded and they would have type on them also for the places you want to get to.

Maiden Lane off of Park St that leads to Borough Market, under the bridge. A walkthrough to Perkins Square

Boxing LondonWe were given a location in London to research, we were given Maiden Lane near Borough market. The first impressions of this place was that it was tucked away from the busy city it had a square that was quiet and peaceful eventhough around the corner from the busy Borough high street. It seemed to be a secret place where people would just walk through. Although a few business people sat in the square for lunch.

I observed the people going through the place and sketched a few observations. After research-ing we were then to create a con-tainer encapsulating the atmos-phere and elements of the place. The main things of this place was that it was quiet, secret, leaves everywhere from the square and the people that walked through were business people and almost always smoking.

We chose a box as our container. We wanted to communicate the atmosphere of Maiden Lane through the box. From our research we got lots of ideas but in the end we decided to have a transparent box to convey the secretcy of the place and also decided to have leaves around the edge which contrasts to the city and how its right next to the main busy city but its so quiet we also collected lots of fag butts from Maiden lane to add to our box to communicate how lots of people smoked as they pass through Maiden Lane.

We placed a lamp inside the box so that when the light is off inside the box it symbolises how secre-tive the place is. When the light is on the colours from the autum leaves can be seen through the transparent plastic, there were lots of leaves everywhere in the small square so we felt this was appropriate to include to get the atmosphere.

PictogramsI had to create a series of picto-grams to communicate 24hours of my daily life. I didnt want to create a 2D usual pictogram so I decided to do something a little different in 3D. I made a simple 3D character to illustrate me and then to use everyday objects to communicate the action. I showed the time by making all the frames circular with an hour and minute hand around the exterior.

The Way We EatStarting this project with set out as teams to produce role plays to make up some intial research to start the project. In our group we set up an interactive test for the class to place out their table setting that they would have for a dinner party, family meal and a TV dinner. The results were very interesting to see peoples dif-ferences mainly through cultural eating. As we had basic utensils I have drawn some other pos-sibilities if we were to test this again so people had more choice rather than the standard knife, fork, spoon, plate, napkin and glass.

Following from the role play outcome I thought more about the physical placement of the utensils during a meal and where things get placed through the narrative of eating. I did this outcome to convey how objects of the table may be moved and placed. I choose three differ-ent characters, one who eats really fast and never rests during eating shown in the yellow, one who drinks alot during their meal shown in blue and the other who talks lots during the meal and therefore rests their knife and fork lots shown in the pink. The three different layers show how there could be similarities and changes between the way people place and interact with the ob-jects on the table.

After researching into how peo-ple with OCD’s eat I came across some interesting concepts. One was that if they use a tin of beans and there is a stray bean as not all of them come out at once they feel uneasy. Taking this concept I decided to convert a fork into a can of beans that is functional with the way you open the can that to realise the fork from the lid you just have to bend back and forth the ring pull and it will come away.

I had kept hold of these from a job as I really liked the graphic qualities on them and I wanted to make something from them in the future. After visiting an exhibition I saw Damien Hirsts installation ‘pharmacy’ and it drew upon the concept of trusting medication because of the simple packaging and how people trust it eve-enthough they can’t see whats inside it and they just follow some instructions from a doctour on how to take it. I really love this idea of just because its medicine you trust it, where it came from and what it is made from. Start-ing this project I thought what if food was like medicine in terms of the packaging.

Following the concept of trust-ing medicine vs. trusting food I researched some more and also found these graphic layouts by Damien Hirst who had changed the medical type for food names and information. I thought these were really great. So I simply got an apple and mocked up my own medical like label. It turned out really sucessful and simple, I developed this futher to thinking about a periodic table for food and how a combination of some would make for example an apple pie. I thought this would be quite a fun way but it turned out way to complicated as there are so many different types of food. So again I just mocked up a periodic table inspired label for an apple but it didnt turn out as sucessful as the first one did.

Developing from the apple label concept, this was my final outcome for the way we eat project. I decided to create a prop that can be used as part of an advertising campaign. The concept behind it was trust in food and how the character of the packaging can convey medical conotations of trust in medicine to make you better and so trusting in food being instructed to eat. I decided to link this with the proverb “an apple a day keeps the doctor awaykeeps the doctor away.”

you take Apple with any other medicines in the groups known as fruit or vegetables there will be no affect at all but it will enhance the affective-ness of Apple if five different medicines in the fruit and vegetable group is taken per day. To enhance a balanced healthy diet.How to take your medicine?It is important to follow your doctor’s instructions exactly, never change the dose yourself.The usual dosage for adults (including the elderly) and children is 2 capsules (145g) once daily to keep the doctor away. Remove the Apple capsules from the blister container by pushing the capsule up through the foil covering. The capsule itself you can cut into pieces to eat more simply. When you take this medicine just simply chew it and swallow like any other food product. You could also change the form of the Apple by liquifing (to create a smoothie) or add into a favour-ite recipe. When you take the medicine make sure you take it all at the same time, You can discard the pips and the middle core of the Apple if this is more to your favor and this will not affect the medicine. What if I take too many capsules?If you or anyone else acidentally takes too many Apple capsules it will not cause any effect. Although if you take five doses of the Apple medicine this will not count towards your five a day quota as it has to be different medicines as part of the fruit and vegetable groups. However if a mass ovedose is taken then this may lead to adverse side effects for example adominal discomfort and diarrhoea. What if I miss a dose?If you forget to take a dose take another as soon as you remember although if you miss the dose completely then it will not cause any harm. Although it might not keep the doctor away, as an Apple a day keeps the doctor away.What are the side effects?As with any other medicines Apple capsules cause side effects in some people the most common side effects include adominal discomfort, diar-rhoea and vommiting. Less frequently reported allergic reactions include teeth turning transparent and tongues turning a faint green colour.Inflamation of the pancreas, leading to abdominal pain, has been re-ported rarely. Itching and skin rashes have been reported rarely, and there have been rare reposts of more severe skin reactions, with soreness, blistering and ulceration.There have been very rare reports of headaches and migrans causing dissoritation and vertigo.If any of these side effects or any other side effect occurs and continues for longer than a few days report it to your doctor or phamacist. If allergic reactions occur stop tking this medicine immediatley and inform your doctor.Use by dateDo not use Apple capsules after the last day of the month of the expiry date shown on the carton.

Apple 145gGreen Coated CapsulesGranny Smith

PATIENT INFORMATION LEAFLETPlease read this leaflet carefully before you start to take Apple Capsules. This leaflet contains important information about your medicine. If you have any questions, or are unsure about anything ask your doctor or pharmacist. Kepp this leaflet until you have finished your treatment. You may want to refer to it again.What is in Apple?Apple is supplied in a range of different varities. This Granny Smith variety is supplied as bright green crisp capsules containing a white juicy centre. Each capsule contains 75g of the active ingredient, Granny Smith. Each green capsule also contains the following active ingredients: vitamin C, iron and calcium. Packs of 14 and 56 capsules are available.What type of medicine is Apple?Apple is one of a group of medicines known as fruit and is used as part of a balanced diet.Who is authorised to market Apple?Fiveaday Ltd, 1 Albany Place, Orchard Way, Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire, AL7 3BT, UK.Apple is manufactured by the Pharmaceutical Development and Fruit Services Ltd., Lane End Farm Block no.1, Sheffield Park, Chailey, East Sussex RH7 3TS, UK.What is Apple for?Apple is used to treat an unbalanced diet and to provide a source of vitamin C. Vitamin C helps maintain healthy skin, gums and nerves. It also helps to absorb iron which is needed to maintain healthy bllod. Also used to keep the doctor away.Before taking Apple you should check the following itemsHave you previously experienced a reaction to Apple, or to any other food product containing this, Granny Smith or any other vari-ety of Apple, that may cause allergic reaction in some people, more commonly in those who prove a strong dislike to Apple?Have you been told that you have an intolerance to some sugars, (note Apple contains natural sugars)?If the answer is YES to any of these questions, tell your doctor or phamacist before you take these capsules.What if I am taking other medicines?Tell your doctor about all the medicines you are taking including those you have bought without a prescription. Apple is likely to not be affected by other medicines being taken at the same time but still inform your doctor of any other medicines you are taking. If

you take Apple with any other medicines in the groups known as fruit or vegetables there will be no affect at all but it will enhance the affective-ness of Apple if five different medicines in the fruit and vegetable group is taken per day. To enhance a balanced healthy diet.How to take your medicine?It is important to follow your doctor’s instructions exactly, never change the dose yourself.The usual dosage for adults (including the elderly) and children is 2 capsules (145g) once daily to keep the doctor away. Remove the Apple capsules from the blister container by pushing the capsule up through the foil covering. The capsule itself you can cut into pieces to eat more simply. When you take this medicine just simply chew it and swallow like any other food product. You could also change the form of the Apple by liquifing (to create a smoothie) or add into a favour-ite recipe. When you take the medicine make sure you take it all at the same time, You can discard the pips and the middle core of the Apple if this is more to your favor and this will not affect the medicine. What if I take too many capsules?If you or anyone else acidentally takes too many Apple capsules it will not cause any effect. Although if you take five doses of the Apple medicine this will not count towards your five a day quota as it has to be different medicines as part of the fruit and vegetable groups. However if a mass ovedose is taken then this may lead to adverse side effects for example adominal discomfort and diarrhoea. What if I miss a dose?If you forget to take a dose take another as soon as you remember although if you miss the dose completely then it will not cause any harm. Although it might not keep the doctor away, as an Apple a day keeps the doctor away.What are the side effects?As with any other medicines Apple capsules cause side effects in some people the most common side effects include adominal discomfort, diar-rhoea and vommiting. Less frequently reported allergic reactions include teeth turning transparent and tongues turning a faint green colour.Inflamation of the pancreas, leading to abdominal pain, has been re-ported rarely. Itching and skin rashes have been reported rarely, and there have been rare reposts of more severe skin reactions, with soreness, blistering and ulceration.There have been very rare reports of headaches and migrans causing dissoritation and vertigo.If any of these side effects or any other side effect occurs and continues for longer than a few days report it to your doctor or phamacist. If allergic reactions occur stop tking this medicine immediatley and inform your doctor.Use by dateDo not use Apple capsules after the last day of the month of the expiry date shown on the carton.

How to store Apple CapsulesDo not store above 25 °C. Store in the original package, in order to protect from moisture and discolouration.

Other important pointsThis medicine is for you. And has been designed for you to be able to gauge the amount of Apple you are taking. Only a doctor prescribe it for you. Never give this medicine to others. It may not be suitable for them even if symptoms are the same as yours.This Patient Information Leaflet provides a summary of the informa-tion available on this medicine. It only applies to Apple Capsules. If you have any questions or are not sure of anything, ask your doctor or pharmacist.

Date of approval of leaflet: January 2010

0111/10 PX309/5

ToolboxThe very first part of the toolbox project we did, was to produce, visually the basic process of working through a project. This helped to get us thinking about the process as a whole, that we work through to get from A to B of any project. We decided to show this using the london underground map as inspira-tion. The main point we wanted to communicate was that the process isn’t always as uniform of working from the brief to pres-entation sometimes you might want to work in different ways skipping from one section of the process to the next. This map illustrates how you might want to travel around the map in different routes.

Toolbox- BriefContinuing the Toolbox project we were given a location to go to. To research possible influ-ences of the place to create a brief. We had to think about the possible solutions to the brief in which to write it.

We had the location of The George Inn situated on Borough High street, to write our brief on. We talked to the staff in the pub to identify the type of custom they have. We identifyed that the outside space wasn’t fitting with the 16th century character of the pub. Such a large space that was open from towering buildings blocking light during the day. However at night light was an issue all they had in the space were rows of benches and ugly heaters. So we wrote a brief on designing the seating, heating and lighting to fit in with the origi-nal character of the pub.

Toolbox- ResearchOut of some RSA briefs we chose the one called the re-soursceful supermarket, which we based on Sainsburys. We had to research using different techniques. Which included user profiles, and a photo journal of the shopping expierence. We also looked at peoples shop-ping habits through duplicated reciepts which were really inter-esting to second guess why they were buying certain items.

Toolbox- Ideas GenerationUsing a brief that was given to us we had to come up with as many xoncepts from it using dif-ferent techniques. One of those techniques was the ‘six hats’ each hat was a different colour and had a different perspective to think from like your wearing that coloured hat. The white hat - information, data and fact. The red hat- emotions. The black hat- having a pessimistic perspec-tive. The yellow hat- having an optimistic perspective. The green hat- creativity. The blue hat- how to put everything together. Us-ing these six hats rule we mind maped the outcomes of the different hats. Then using some post its as a group we had to think of as many concepts even if they were unrealistic. Having the six hats technique defernitly helped to have a broader idea generation.

From the idea generation of the post its as a group we came up with ‘iBar’ a UV bar code that is inserted into your wrist for use everywhere with all your needs. No need for keys, no cards, no loose change just convenience and all you do is scan the bar-code and it has all the informa-tion within it. We made a short advert to convey the function of the concept.

Prototyping the idea for our own idea generation technique, which we had learnt from trying out other techniques like thinking hats. The idea is to have a small cube that has consetinered sides that fold into the box. On the faces of the extending sides are inspirational words that you can gain interesting ideas from and visuals. Any of these words could take your original idea differ-ent places. The box took on the name ‘the thinking box’. below is the final prototype for our own idea generation technique. We in the end made it with removable words so the user can customise it the way they want to and also add words or images that relate to their current projects. We used visual patterned material to try and be as thought provoking as possible with different colours and shapes.

This is the dental pack we de-signed. We were given the brief of oral health and the idea of a dental pack on which we had to develop upon. We decided to keep the same idea of a dental pack but we aimed it for the use of children. When their parents made an appointment they would get this pack in the shape of a toothpaste with posters, toothbrush tooth paste, stickers, disclosure tablets and a handy appointment card that slips onto the pack itself as a reminder. The point of the pack was to make oral health fun and therefore the going to the dentist and therefore making the expierece always pleasant.

Design ToolboxThe concept of our toolbox was to have layers of working through a brief and on each layer having tools to help you. We decided to make the toolbox an actual box and then have pull oyt trays as the layers. We made the trays by making a MDF template and then we vacuum formed it in different colours so the box could then be coded and easy to understand the function.

These are all of our trays with the process tools included. They are all colour coded and they can be put in a different order if the user wants to work in a different process. Each layer represents;Finding the problems, Research and Analy-sis, Idea Generation, Refine-ment and Design DevelopmentPresentation. Our toolbox took on an ironic name of ‘Design-ers Block’ to do with its func-tion and its physical form.

A Collection of 100 Headlines of Death - As part of a PPD project we had to collect a ‘thing’ I decided to collect headlines of death as they are always in the newspaper and its quite depress-ing just reading about tradgic stories. We then had to make a poster conveying our collection.

To create my poster for my collection of 100 headlines of death. I asked my local, friendly, corner shop owner in my village if I could borrow his newspaper headline board for an afternoon- much to my delight he agreed. I took the sign to a near by field on a horrible overcast afternoon and set up a camera on a tripod and photographed the sign in different places around the field. My concept was to create almost like a graveyard of headlines, as it occured to me the headline boards outside newspaper sell-ers are of the ironic shape of a gravestone.

100 Headlines of Death 16th-19th March 2010

Private View 16th March 6-8pmLower Street Gallery London College of CommunicationI had never realised how depressing newspapers were and yet lots of people read them, as simple reading material to catch up on the current affairs. I noticed one day how full this certain newspaper was of death. I decided to collect all of the deaths recorded in the newspaper. Mostly I was interested in the amount of deaths that occur so often everyday. I noticed the headline was the most important part and without the entire article and picture you could build your own narrative that I found added depth. Also tone of voice was important as viewing them all together as an archive you tended to focus on one more than another from different viewpoints. There’s some sort of irony collecting the head-lines of death when that is what Im trying to get rid of in society. If I did the whole process of collecting again, I would remove all the traces of death from the newspaper and then leave it for someone to pick up, I quite like this concept.

© Kathryn Henderson 2010

100 Headlines of Death 16th-19th March 2010

Private View 16th March 6-8pmLower Street Gallery London College of CommunicationI had never realised how depressing newspapers were and yet lots of people read them, as simple reading material to catch up on the current affairs. I noticed one day how full this certain newspaper was of death. I decided to collect all of the deaths recorded in the newspaper. Mostly I was interested in the amount of deaths that occur so often everyday. I noticed the headline was the most important part and without the entire article and picture you could build your own narrative that I found added depth. Also tone of voice was important as viewing them all together as an archive you tended to focus on one more than another from different viewpoints. There’s some sort of irony collecting the head-lines of death when that is what Im trying to get rid of in society. If I did the whole process of collecting again, I would remove all the traces of death from the newspaper and then leave it for someone to pick up, I quite like this concept.

© Kathryn Henderson 2010

Parents ‘starved 7-yr-old to death’

I killed my wife in a bad dream

Twelve die in attack on army base

Teacher is killed by a nip from his pet dog

I had never realised how depressing newspa-pers were and yet lots of people read them, as simple reading material to catch up on the current affairs. I noticed one day how full this certain newspaper was of death. Page after page and yet I was still quite interested in reading about the awful things. Is it that humans are just curious and by reading about negative things puts their own problems in a different perspective. Or is it just because death is a part of life whether we like it or not and so it is included into newspapers which are all about life.

I decided to collect all of the deaths recorded in the newspaper. Mostly I was interested in the amount of deaths that occur so often and sadly they do everyday, and these are just some of the few that make it into the news-paper. I was also intrigued to see the varied unforeseen circumstances of why that person died, for example, one of my findings was a father that had died because of a fallen tree.

I started by collecting a Metro newspaper eve-ryday, that I got a train, and filtered through it cutting out the whole article including most importantly the headline. I also at first collected only the articles with pictures but this changed as there were very few. I limited myself to the Metro newspaper as its free and readily available.

My process changed halfway through by instead of collecting the whole article I just collected the headlines as these were the main pieces that would make up my collection. I noticed the headline was the most important part and without the entire article and picture you could build your own narrative that I found added depth. Also tone of voice was important as viewing them all together as an archive you tended to focus on one more than another from different viewpoints. I also realised that within the headlines that the age of the victims was only included when they were of children.

In collecting, I learnt that the number of ‘death’ headlines in each paper would vary. On a ‘good’ day I would get as many as ten

There’s a baby’s body at my feet

Parents ‘starved 7-yr-old to death’

I killed my wife in a bad dream

Brown unbowed by soldier deaths

Boy, 5, is latest to die from swine flu

124 die as hurricane sets off floods and landslides

yobs killed own grandfather

Mutilated the dumped to die in the street

father dies as branch falls from oak tree

‘Gloating’ teenage knife killer jailed for

headlines on others only one or two. If I col-lected these all again I would have made sure I had made note of the headline and the date. The relation of deaths and date across a whole year would have been interesting to see the statistics.

Collecting all of the articles at the beginning almost seemed like fictional narratives some-how although viewing just the headlines you actually really read into the depth of a pos-sible narrative. I think the most harrowing and probably my favourite headline I found was ‘I killed my wife in a bad dream’ You can just imagine a really sad man that feels so guilty yet kind of innocent.

Artist Felix Gonzalez-Torres made a piece of art ‘ “untitled” ( Death by Gun)’ where by he collected the deaths of 460 individuals killed by gunshot during one week and then he printed lots of sheets to make into a stack of all the pictures of the 460 deaths on each and a brief description. This relates directly to my collection but instead mine creates an obitu-ary of headlines.

The process of a flaneur hasn’t informed my approach to finding this subject directly as I was collecting headlines that can only be found in newspapers. Maybe if I had collected the headlines found in newspapers that I came across unexpectedly this would have been more original. I think collecting informs upon my practice by giving deeper and more inter-esting concepts that don’t arise immediately.

Some of the ‘deliberate’ killings that are headlined in articles for example murder cases seem to taint the victims life even more. Almost like the lasting memory of them is the tragedy. There’s some sort of irony collecting the headlines of death when that is what Im trying to get rid of in society. If I did the whole process of collecting again, I would remove all the traces of death from the newspaper and then leave it for someone to pick up, I quite like this concept.

‘Gloating’ teenage knife killer jailed for

Soldier shot three times by one bullet

‘Mercy killer’ mother is jailed for son’s murder

Husband ‘battered ex and set her body alight’

As part of one of the tasks during Richards lessons we were to construct a well formed cube out of card and then deconstruct it into something interesting. I did this very simply by cutting out twists and curls out of all the faces of the cube and then inter-twined it with each other.

Olympic Handover GiftThese are some of my intial concepts that I created through using a collage of London I had already put together as part of my research. I wanted to concentrate on the geographi-cal features of London as that represents London as no other place is like that.

Using my initial collage as inspi-ration I choose the landmarks I wanted to incluse and made a stensil of a composition of landmarks. I really liked the bal-ance of it so I then applied it onto a lightbox and used coloured papers to convey the coloured tube lines of which that building is near and also it relates to the olympic colours of the rings.

Taking the 2D stensil I had made I decide to make my 3D model into a series of lightboxes of the same composition to create the olympic colours and for it to look theatrical and light up. I made the boxes by vacuum forming the shapes from wooden blocks. I added it to a podium with the 26 sporting catergories around the top so non took ascendancy as it was on a circular base with the model being viewable all the way around. This also made up the olympic black ring. To convey the geographical qualitiy I decided to add a simple map to balance out the black buildings and I also added four more rings to repre-sent the other olympic rings but I kept them white for the possibil-ity of having a projection on the model. Also inside the model is a small archive like a time capsule that has all the recordings of all the games upon it and sounds of London that can be acessed via people of Rio by USB.

AffordancesThese are some of my photos that made up my affordance photo essay. I took pictures of all the affordances I could around me looking for unusual exam-ples. By doing this I was able to define what an affordance was. Affordances in design are what give the design an understand-able meaning, they are necessary indicators of what its function is or how to use it.

Taking the objects from the photo essay we had to redesign an affordance. Either by modifying, adding or subtracting the func-tion. I thought about all of the affordances of the objects and their functions and what other things have the same function. This was quite a useful way to visualise the objects and their functions.

I took the affordance of a push plate on a door which has the function of push as it tells you when its a push door instead of a pull one. I applied it to a chair as you push a chair into a place, and so it follows the same function. I made the chair out of cardboard. The peice took on the name ‘push chair’.

End UsersWe had to find and improve an object which had a possibility for interatcion. As a group we decided our object to be a simple knife and fork as it was quite universal. To work out possible interactions we thought about its functions. We also choose to design for a blind user to limit our user range and to think of their needs. We tested what it was like using a knife and fork when you are blind. Eating is quite a challenge and we found out that using them was fine it was know-ing what the unknown was on your fork.

After user testing with the knife and fork as a group we de-cided to keep the same user but change the object we decided to choose a mug as after some research we found out that when blind people fill up there mugs they have to put one finger down the side of the mug to stop it overflowing. Therefore we decide to design a way that a little device can do this for blind people and a sensor could sense when the level of liquid gets to a certain point. For this project we learnt about the arduino programming board where linked to a computer you could put in a programme with the sensor to react to certain variables and then have an output to tell you when its at the certain variable you programmed it for.

Above are photos of us testing the proximity sensor that we had set to a variable of when the liquid reaches near the top of the mug. We also aded an output of a speaker to tell the blind person when to stop filling the mug up. We had to also programme in a tune for the speaker to sound at the moment of the proximity vari-able being reached. It seemed to work really well and I was happy to have created a programmed interactive product.

Viral ProjectionI decided to recreate the Gher-kin as with my growing green initiative I wanted it to be visable froma wide range of places.The initiative is to grow more green everywhere even on buildings creating a better air quality, saves energy on insulating buildings. And on a larger scale creating vertical urban farming to make places more sustainable.I made the building from foam board and card. I first made the main struc-ture of the gherkin and then I built up the strips around it which took a long time, but turned out quite effective in the end.

After three attemps at projecting I finally got the outcome I wanted. I changed the text several times to try and make it stand out from the grass image but in the end I had to add larger strips for the text to be seen. I like the ‘Growing Green’ text as it mimics going green which is the point of the initiative physically and metaphorically. The textures and structure of the building has re-ally shown up well too.

BrandingOne of our final prototyping projects came to an oppurtunity to work with a live client. Broad Oak farm who are a sausage company in Essex. Our brief was to re-brand certain aspects of their company. We traveled up to their factory to see the process of making the sausages and get a general at-mosphere of the company and of the business. There are lots of aspects we could work on from point of sale, packaging and product.

One of the prototypes I worked on was a concept for a way the packaging can open up to create a surface to have the raw meat on so it doesnt contami-nate other surfaces. I took the idea of the Marks and Spencers sandwich packaging and modi-fied it to my own pattern for the sausages to fit in. The concept also reduced the need for plastic as the final prototype I made was out of recycld cardboard and parcement paper. Also to give an organic feel to the packaging.

Our finished prototype was a box for the point of sale which enclosed a line of sausages individually wrapped for the need of a choice of getting a smaller amount of sausages, as a pack of eight is quite alot for just two people. The idea is that customers tear off what they want and they can be freezable. Eventhough they are individually wrapped we have actually re-duced the amount of packaging as the box can be easily recycled once it is empty and it can fit up to sixty sausages in it which is a ten, six pack sausages. There is also the oppurtunity to purchase a hole box for a BBQ for example and the packaging in this way means that you dont need to touch the raw meat as you can simply just squeeze the sausage out.

Systematic FailureWe chose personal space as our research area. I researched into as much areas of personal space from walking to being on public transport to get a broad idea of how to come up with a solution for a constant situation for example having your personal space invaded on public trans-port. I made this model below to show peoples desire lines from different locations to see the possible conflict areas where the lines cross.

Through research myself and the group came up with several concepts for ways of solving the system failure of personal space. These are a few of our concepts which mostly follow an attract and repulse concept. A scratch and sniff t-shirt where by you can attract or repulse someone by the t shirt you wear with special scents, A magnetic T-shirt that actually attracts other people wearing magnetic t shirts either attracting or repulsing the forces of the magnets and a fat suit that blows up, when a person comes into contact with a certain part of you so other people who may do the same will be more aware of your space. (The image just illus-trates the concept which I found in a book called Tangible)

For our final solution we decided to develop the scratch and sniff t shirt concept. We decided to use text, placement and tone of voice on the t shirts to achieve the visual communication to convey the attract and repulse concept aswell with the smell aspect. Below we tested out the effectivness of the t shirts on public transport.

I have really enjoyed studying Graphic Product Innovation in my first year at LCC. It has taught me so much already about the design process and visual grammar. I look at things a bit differently now after projects to do with systems and taxonomy. There has been lots of group projects and indi-vidual projects, of which I have enjoyed working in both situations, as I really like working as a team to complete a brief and three brains are usually better than one, to reach innova-tive original ideas. I didnt really have any firm expec-tations of the course when I started but I am proud of what I have achieved this year and I feel I defernitly have an inner buzz for product design.