Illustrator “Katie”

This project allowed me to think creatively and broadly.By experiencing various media, I was able to think in many aspects of idea development.
Not only that, I found my path to developing new ideas via going through different processes every week.
Above all, During this project,I have learnt how do we develop the idea from research and create something based on that as well.
It is true that I was thinking about only outcome in early weeks not development. I had troubles sometimes with my ideas and felt like lost the direction and point of my work but through manage the trouble,I found myself more progressive. Last semester, I also did group work and that was my first group work ever. At that time,I wasn’t really active but this year I did my work more actively and positively. Anyway it was good time even though I found myself kind of selfish too.^^(convince to group members with my ideas…)
Although I had a problem with some idea process, all work I have done with my group member is satisfying me.
And I did all my best on this project=)

From personal reading,it was good chance to find interesting articles by myself which are related to my work.
What I mostly enjoyed read was ‘understanding design’.
That was the book about today’s design school for tutor and students. As a student of design school, was good time to rethink of it.

During this week,we had many things to do.
Actually it was quite stressful because we needed to manege group work as well as personal work. Since we decided make new product for each with use of our mark,all my focus was make new product based on creative idea.

The new mark

Also we have made new mark for the product.
Until just two days ago,I got stuck again to think up ideas for product.

Although I had an idea, that couldn’t satisfy me because it wasn’t strong enough as I expected before.
So I decided to make other products as well.(by the way I couldn’t just give up first idea..)
It gave me new challenge to do that and finally I have got more ideas.

These are short descriptions of my ideas.

-knowledge saver
bookcover which looks like pillow and cushion ,save the knowledge from not only book but brain as well.

-bubble helmet: make a hat using bubble wrap for protect head from dangerous thing(from sky,have you ever expect thoes thing?)

-Breast feeding T-shirt: put the zip in the middle of T-shirt to make it easy to open for mother

As we developed our idea from research, the point of our product is useless and priceless and I’m worrying about they might be regarded as just funny products for people.
Now,I nearly done my product making work but there’s still one left ‘EXHIBITION’.
It will be good chance to show all ideas well.

Plan for Exhibition
In exhibition,to make better presentation,all product will be presented with our new mark and their own logo which is changed a bit like GrennX.
We will also show our early work we have done in last few weeks.
And I hope that the exhibition will be focused on our creative thinking
rather than humor.

In this week, I also finished my reading work.
I didn’t really read many books so far so it was good chance to read some of nice reading.
And I really enjoyed read the article called “understanding Design”.
As a student from design school,it was so interesting reading to make me think more.

Whether our work is successful or not,this whole project was good time to do different work in our way we arranged and made not from brief because we had to manage it as much as we have troubles.
Although we had many troubles during this project,it enabled us to develop ideas from research even troubles.

Understanding Design

This book is about aspect of design education.

LEARNING BY DOING
According to the book, it says that ‘most design curricula are based upon learning-by-doing’
Design school students learn by this doing method which is major part of program.
Student who don’t need a lot of tutoring still need a learning from others whether they are same level or lower.
In my case, the design tutoring helps me to get better skill.
Also it guides me to be more practical.
I still could do my work without design tutoring but it would be confusable.

Learning by doing provides a lot of motivations to me so that I can find the area, which I want to afford. My idea for these is within the limit of fact that the tutoring doesn’t ignore student’s creativity.
However because of Design tutoring, diverse opportunities of learning could be reduced.

REFLECTION
In order to make not same mistakes as present and past designers made, design students need a lot of chance to get design stories like designer’s reflection.

THE TUTORING DILEMMA
“…in the role of tutor, you should not say everything that comes into your ‘designer’s mind’. You must often let the students make the mistakes they are heading for, confront them with those mistakes and then help them reach a different solution.”(p82)
It is true we are facing a lot of mistakes and learning from them.
As my experiences that I studied in different countries and institutes, tutors are sorted by way of answering our question.

Some of them give me a answer directly what I ask and expect so that I am able to apply my work but others want to ask rather my opinion of the question and never give direct answer and any suggestions. Critic answers give me a challenge always.

And this gave me a new question that do we need to accept all answer from tutor? How about in real work place? Do they always accept their company’s answer?
Whether the answer is positive or negative, student’s creativity must be respected as a preliminary designer.
Although the point the tutor wants us to get from question is different, everything could be a guide.
Unskillfulness can be improved by tutoring but produce a good design from those of skill is our work.

NAIVE DESIGN
Whenever I start to my new project, I wanted to see design method from the tutor what it would be.
However the problem is that I can’t reach my answer once I see the design method but tutors answer.
This is very important fact to develop our own way of working.
“To students, those method are just complicated solution to problems they have never encountered.”(p83)

LEARNING INTEGRATION
“the trouble is that good tutors are hard to find.”(p84)
As the book said it is not easy to find the tutor who teach based on a lot of knowledge whether from book or others and experienced in practical area as well.
Whether they are experienced or not, they are all facing the problems.
In my opinion of that is that different tutors are required depending on character of program.

THE UNSURE
“And the outside world can be a mean place.”(p86)
The answer from tutors doesn’t make me satisfying always.
It does not only get me down but also makes me suspect of my ability.
However, once I solve a problem with answer, I find myself better than before.

LIMITS OF AN EDUCATION
According to the book, through the design practice we find out who we are and what kind of design area suits us.
Although my taste of design is inclined to a certain part (illustration), I always think I need to be ready for any random design work.
And I will be learning even I work as a designer after graduate.
“You never stop learning.”(p87)

LEVEL OF EXELLENCE
“When you manage to reach a new level, a new world literally opens up to you. It is a real break through.”(p89)
The more we enter the next level, the more we become a designer.
Because we are not professional yet, we have many possibilities to be a designer.

Reference
Dorst, K 2003, Understanding Design, BIS Publishers, Amsterdam

the medium is the MASSAGE(AN INVENTORY OF EFFECTS)

As a one of guiding book for media, it was the book I wanted to read in Korean rather than in English in that more I read more I found it difficult because of the language translating in my head.
That was not really helpful to understand when I started to read so it made me search the book in Korean website again to better understand.
I didn’t know about this book at all but after I got the book from library, I knew that it was a book recommended by Adam.
I was lucky to get this book from library because I could see all image and text inside the book to better view instead of PDF file.

A title of the book, ‘the medium is the MASSAGE’ was unclear for me at first because I was thinking it might be some problem with printing the title text. However it was a right title as it shown and even, more familiar for me to understand than original word.

By that reason it gave me a question of the title why medium regards as MASSAGE instead of MESSAGE.

This book is about media, which define as MASSAGE and what media is.
The answer I found after I red the book is,
Media are stimulus (Like Massage). They stimulate our five senses. Thus power of media, which work on people, is compared to MASSAGE.

All media are extensions of some human faculty-psychic or physical. (p26)

The wheel…is an extension of the foot.
the book is an extension of the eye…
Clothing,an extension of the skin…
electric circuitry,an extension of the central nervous system.(p31-40)

These are interesting and understandable phrases.
Everything can be an extension of media. Maybe, they are already.

In this book, the author, Marshall Mcluhan states that the media are not limited in just communication medium but all media such as languages and money.
He didn’t see media as a mean. Furthermore he believes that media change our thought and act type so that media change people.

There are some good phrases, which I really like.

“They [I Ching] told me to continue what I was doing, and to spread JOY and revolution,”(p119)

It is true whether I am aware of it’s exist or not.

“I-I hardly know, sir, just at present –at least I know who I was when I got up this morning, but I think I must have been changed several times since then.”(P154)

This is my favorite phrase.
Every time whenever I get up in the morning, myself defines as me but the end of day I used to be changed at least a bit by contacting many different things like different media.

We live with not only flowing information but also flowing media.
It is impossible to live without media’s interference.
Media satisfy our needs by different forms.
Also it gives more opportunities and choices to express us in an effective way.
In order to live successful life with media, we need a better understanding about media.

Reference
-the medium is the MASSAGE(AN INVENTORY OF EFFECTS)
McLuhan, M & Fiore,Q The medium is the massage, 1967, A Penguin Book, England.

A holiday at the end of the Earth: tourists paying to see global warming in action

After our group made a question about global waming, we were struggling to search something about global warming.
During that time I found interesting news about global warming on the Internet, which is about Global warming tourism.
Unfortunately, because of language problem, I was searching in Korean website instead of google to better understand. (This was what I used to do when I got stuck to find or don’t know about something)

It shows that one tour company really use global warming as their one of tour program.
This was really interesting research because what we discussed during past few week was ‘who is make money out of Global warming’ and it was a different kind of company we never expect from the question.
And this tour company is really making money.
US tour company,Betchart Expeditions Inc, is known as exploring not only safari expedition but also history expedition.
As their tour plan, whole program will be led by Dennis Schmitt who found out the new island in 2005 that was formed by the melting of the Greenland ice sheet.
This is called Warming Island now.
The program will set out from 25th Sep. to 6th Oct this year.

The tourists will be listening the lecture in terms of effect of global warming how it affects the environment while they travel around ‘warming island’ for one day.

The idea is very likely and not too bad but my question was what is it really for?
What is the purpose of the trip?
Are they really making people aware of seriousness of global warming?

Although this tour program is quite expensive, it is already started to sell by some people.

According to Michael McCarthy,he states that ‘The author Mark Lynas, who has a strong claim to be the world’s first global-warming tourist – he wrote the first book about its effects around the world, High Tide – agrees that people are looking for such different trips that global-warming tourism will probably be an inevitable development’

“The way things are going, people want new experiences not had by 10,000 people the previous week,” he said. “But there’s no such thing as the lonely planet any more. You’re facing hundreds of other people seeking a lonely planet wherever you go, so we are getting all sorts of new tourism. It’s broadening out more thematically, becoming issue tourism.”

“The idea of global-warming tourism is full of ironies,” he said. “If enough people expend enough fossil fuels to visit one Warming Island, they will ensure that there will be many more.”

I might be interesting tour idea for people but ironically, the fact is that tourism also is a one of factor, which encourage environmental problem.
There was another reading of that fact.
That was a article about Global Warming and Travel.

In this article, Bill Maloney, executive vice president of the American Society of Travel Agents in Alexandria says
“Tourism is an industry harmed by any harm to the environment. Period,”

My opinion of this new idea,‘Global warming tourism’,is that it doesn’t regard as just new tour program.
It is more about how it understandable for people.

Reference

Michael McCarthy,A holiday at the end of the Earth: tourists paying to see global warming in action, Published in May 03 2007
from http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/climate_change/article2504641.ece


Betchartexpeditions,A VOYAGE OF DISCOVERY TO WARMING ISLAND, GREENLAND from http://www.betchartexpeditions.com/antarctica_warmIs.htm

Mike Tidwell,Global Warming and Travel from http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2001/09/09/AR2005041402506.html

Chindogu

Chindogu is a Japanese word, which means ‘priceless tools’.
It was invented by Japanese inventor Kenji Kawakami. A Chindogu generally does solve a problem, but it might result to social embarrassment or create new problems. Nevertheless, each Chindogu are designed to solve a particular problem so it cannot be called ‘useless’. So they can be regarded as noiseless inventions.
Although his inventions are unnecessary, they are well known to people also regarded as a new form of Japanese art today. His creative ideas interest people and make them passionate about the idea of Chindogu.

As far as I remember about chindogu, it was just funny invention, which doesn’t reflect any reality.
It was quite long times ago I saw that at first on Internet.
At that time, I was thinking it is made for just fun without any consideration. Although it was popular in my country through the Internet, it was forgotten soon like other information, (good thing of internet is we can share information at the same time but also it is easy to be forgotten because of its quickness)
And later, since I started my uni in Australia, I found chindogu again by this media class.
This was really good guide for our outcome.
That was totally new media I ever used as my concept of outcome and new way to approach the answer.

It is all about the idea of useless product.
Using that useless invention makes people not only looks like funny but also embarrass.
It can be used in our life as a tool but ironically nobody uses that.
It is true that this kind of invention which is illogical and funny
are likely to be considered as a failure.
However it is getting known as a new type of Japanese art instead of disappear.
By reading the chindogu,it made me free from that kind of stereotypical thoughts.

Many people think chindogu is just funny and they all agree with it’s uselessness.
This fact gave me many questions like- why chindogu regards as new concept of art? Why it is so popular? Why are the people passionate about this kind of odd tool?
In my opinion about answer for those question is that conversion of idea. That could be the idea Kawakami wanted to show.

“I hate the Japanese way of product… so this is my irony and protest,”(Kawakami)

Following is about ten tenets by Kawakami.

1.A Chindogu cannot be for real use.
2.A Chindogu must exist.
3.Inherent in every Chindogu is the spirit of anarchy.
4.Chindogu are tools for everyday life.
5.Chindogu are not for sale.
6.Humor must not be the sole reason for creating Chindogu.
7.Chindogu are not propaganda.
8.Chindogu are never taboo.
9.Chindogu cannot be patented.
10.Chindogu are without prejudice.

This ten tenets sound like serious as well as funny to me.
However one thing really clear to me was they are so creative that give me a lot of inspiration of my work.

Reference
Kawakami,K. Bumper book of unuseless Japanese inventions : the art of Chindog. HarperCollins. 2004. London.

Electronic Labyrinth THX 1138 4EB

It was really interesting film because it is the first film from George Lucas in 1967 who known as a director of Star wars.
The reason I used to watch these kinds of movie (called science fiction film) is that it enables me to get a lot of inspirations of my design work always.

Whole story describes the dystopia (dis+utopia).
This film focuses on only bad aspect of future while most SF films show a good aspect of future.
I think it is a really experimental film as well as critical film.

Although all of scenes looked quite old compare with others, it was rather simpler and easier to understand the whole concept of film than others.
This film is about a dark prospect.
There are many science fiction films today but this is different in that it criticizes a high level of civilization earlier.
A delivering message of film was simple but have many different meanings. It actually makes people think about not just future but today society as well.
It describes the future as one society which People’s action is controlled strictly by rule. In this society, their identity and personality are ignored even love and emotion restrained by drug.
Also people define as 4 digit numbers instead of names. The film title ‘THX1138’ means a main actor’s own number which regard as his existence.

Most background of scene is kept endless white colours, it seems like try to tell something.
All people keep their routine as a part of society. This routine continues constantly. They are all uniform looking- no hair, wear a white cloths and a straight face in simple background. If they get a problem they talk with machine priest called ‘om’.
Although it is always same system, people rely on it.

The main actor tries to escape that society but he failed to do that. I think it is similar with today’s people who always want to find their identity but can’t.
If the society detects something wrong with someone they try to solve all problem and make people keep their routine again.
Whenever something detectives, the word ‘what’s wrong?’ is repeated.
It wasn’t special word but was very impressive as a meaningful word.
It made me think which is really wrong and right.
What I was thinking is that something seems like wrong so it needs to be solved but maybe that kind of view is really wrong.
And problem is maybe people don’t recognize that.

Another reason why this movie was clear to me was because of the visual things. It was really different with other films. When I saw DVD cover at first, it gave me a strong impression immediately. The person’s profile without hair on the cover was very impressive in that he (she) has got a tag, which has a specific number in ear. It seems like to show a message of this movie rather show that specific number.
Another factor made me interested with this movie was use of limited colours in the movie scenes. It didn’t show many colours but monotonous colour like white mostly.

‘What’s wrong?’

Reference
DVD
Directed by George Lucas,Electronic Labyrinth THX 1138 4EB,1967,USA.

As we found our direction to making product, we had to make a mark for them first.
Most of marks we found during few weeks were useless.
However the ironic thing is they still works well as apart of design (called information design). So we decided to follow that process. (useless mark with useless product)

Here’s our new mark.

After class, we went library with Adam to find the book we want but it wasn’t there so we searched on website.
He helped us to get an inspiration of making product.
Until that, my idea for making product wasn’t clear enough so I needed to get some motivation of the work.

What I was thinking to make my product was just redesign the existing product in different way like parody.

This was my first idea to make product.
My first idea was that make a box of tissue like Kleenex.
I wanted to change the name of the existing product “Kleenex” to Greenx and put really bad quality of tissue in the transparent box so make people think of bad quality product.
However I changed my idea again because it doesn’t agree with the point of our product that is uselessness.
I’m trying to make something not really necessary for people but moves people to sympathize.
Thankfully,Adam helped us to find a good and funny example of product, which shows uselessness called ‘chindogu’.

Chindogu came from Japan and means the art of uselessness like something we can use but isn’t necessary to live.
Here’s some example of chindogu.

Hay fever mask

Umbrella headband
http://www.chindogu.com

I think it is really creative idea we should look at because it’s not an idea from nothing but from familiar things in our life.
Although the works of chindogu look funny so it seems like nobody wants to use that in daily life, they might be something we need and used to think of.

There’s only two weeks left to submission.
Now I got an idea of my product, which I used to want.

Since we made a question, we have kept on developing our ideas. And we realized that there’s no answer for that question but continuous development.

A week ago, we went safeway and coals to do research of tick marks. To collect different kind of mark, we were looking all over the stores.
It is true that people tend to ignore that kind of mark when they purchase the products.
However it still works on people’s perception.
Although there was some mark which certificate the quality or information of products, many of them didn’t have that certification.It means that many companies use those of tick marks to just advertise them.

We had a talk with Adam last Friday after class.
We actually were stuck to develop our ideas at that time.
We got not only inspirations but also good advise through the talk.What he said to us was design perspective.
Here’s some his ideas.
Many of tick mark don’t reflect reality.
Although it means nothing, still people like it and buy it.
There are many examples from that we found like ‘environmental report’ and ‘hospital grade’. They are uselessness but still design.

Another interesting idea was that,
most people know the “fat free” mark and what it means but the funny thing is whether it says 97% or 98% it still has a fat in product. And the companies never say ‘3% fat’ or ‘2% fat’.
This is kind of branding that make people buy the products.
Also this is our work to make information design.

What we will do is making product in different way.
Before make the product, we will research more marks and create one which we will use our products.
Make something like real that means nothing.
To work in different areas, we will make a product for each.

I hope that our ideas will present well in final exhibition.