Week 11 - Origination

Class Format

Covered today was the the tenth law 'The One' from John Maeda's book 'The laws of Simplicity. Cherill, Katelyn and I also plan to begin work on the pin board of materials from our creative process which will accompany our work for the student exhibition.

 

Group Exercise

Reading Quiz

Answer the following questions as succinctly as possible in your own words
10 mins: Cut & paste into your blog and start answers / 10 mins: Open discussion

1. What does Maeda call the 3 keys?
   - Away, Open & Power.
2. Describe how you have used these in your work towards student exhibition? Give at least one example of each key.
   - By moving away from each of my designs I have been able to view their effectiveness more accurately. Maintaining an open line of communication with my co-conspirators has benefited the project. Simplification and the ideal of using less have been a focus of our group throughout our design process.
3. Describe an incident in the production of the student exhibition where technology has been an enabler.... and another where it has been a disabler!
   - Most certainly the production of designs which adhere to a defined template is an example where the technology has been an enabler. Using the machines in this lab where they are running an earlier version of the Adobe programs compared to the other labs and my machine at home is an example of the technology becoming a disabler.
4. At this stage in the exhibition process you are all working on some element or process for the big event. List 3 things (in your current project) that you could take away to simplify and one thing you could add for meaning.
   - We could reduce the number of designs. I could not exhibit my 'steampunk monitor' to give a more cohesive feel to my body of work as a whole. I could relent from building my own portfolio site and use a Wordpress template. We are actually adding something for extra meaning being the pin board of our creative process.

 

Research

Video

The reading this mentioned open source software and APIs in reference to openness encouraging simplicity. This video is a great example of the use of open source software being Blender used in combination with crowd sourced funding. Found this via an RSS from Gadgetose.

 

Images

This is a bit for fun, work done by a recently graduated design student from the University of Cumbria, Gary Nicholson. This came in via RSS from My Modern Met.

 

Reflection

Some of the class today was spent discussing the layout of the exhibition space, we also went down to the space for a look. With the planning that our group had put in previously it was simply a matter of choosing the spot for us. Having this discussion gave the project and in fact the whole course a firmer sense of reality. All is looking good at the moment as we spiral into the final four weeks. Cherill and I have a clear understanding of what is required and how we are going to get there.