24.8.2021 - 23.11.2021 (Week 10 - Week 14)
Chung Yi Ki / 0345014 /
BDCM
Design Principles
Final compilation and reflection
Instructions and full detailed blog posts
Final submissions
Exercise 1: Gestalt theory and contrast
24.8.2021-14.9.2021 (Week 1 - Week 4)
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| Fig 1.1 Final gestalt theory outcome - JPEG |
Fig 1.2 Final gestalt theory outcome - PDF
On an upright position, the cat catches our attention first as it's head is on
our eye level. While on an upside down position, the dog becomes more apparent
as it has taken the place of the cat. Since the black dog borrow its ear from
the white cat, it would be harder to distinguish the two subjects separately
if the eyes were not given to them. Besides that, the shape of the eyes also
gives them somewhat of an expression.
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| Fig 1.3 Final contrast outcome - PDF |
Fig 1.4 Final contrast outcome - PDF
Yellow having a lighter hue and value, contrast heavily with black which has a
darker hue and value. The yellow background here doesn’t only act as the
background, but it is also used to form the “V” shape neck of the sun bear.
The white face of the sun bear, although it’s not contrasting with the yellow
background, contrasts with the black body, eye and nose instead which helps to
show its contour clearer.
Exercise 2: Emphasis / balance / repetition / movement
31.8.2021 - 14.9.2021 (Week 2 - Week 4)
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| Fig 2.1 Final emphasis outcome - JPEG |
Fig 2.2 Final emphasis outcome - PDF
In this design, there are two subjects in emphasis which are Saturn and the
camera. It is clear that Saturn is the main emphasis of the work. Its size is
the biggest and its colour contrast with all the other elements, making it the
first to grab our attention. The camera while being in the foreground, has a
much more smaller size and its colour is a lot more muted and darker. So, it
grabs the viewer’s attention later and shows that it is in secondary
importance compared to Saturn.
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| Fig 2.3 Final movement outcome - JPEG |
Fig 2.4 Final movement outcome - PDF
For me, the challenge in this was figuring out how to use rectangular or
“blocky” shapes to create a curve line movement. I intentionally left the
printed words and handwriting in a normal horizontal alignment so the
movement effect would be how I would arrange the words. The handwritten
words themselves have different weights of strokes which gave variation to
the design. But the printed words, although having different typefaces, the
letters are perfectly aligned in order which made them look stiff. But the
trick here is to arrange the words following a curve and using different
sizes (the white spaces) to not only add variation, but also to create a
sense of distance when the words are moving toward the hourglass. Different
position (upside down, slanted, straight) of each torn out pieces also adds
to the illusion of movement along with the curved shape.
Exercise 3: Harmony / unity / symbol / word and image
14.9.2021 - 28.9.2021 (Week 4 - Week 6)
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| Fig 3.1 Final symbol outcome - JPEG |
Fig 3.2 Final symbol outcome - PDF
In this symbol design, it is to show the message of the kind of person who
feels the need to be someone else in front of different people. Even if it's
a tiring task and it's likely to break them, they still continue to do it
with seemingly no end for the sake of pleasing anyone they interact
with.
Overall rationale of the symbol can be found
here
Some extra elaboration of the explanation:
5 main colours are used for the tiles of the mirrorball, yellow, green,
purple, red and blue. These colours are used to represent different emotions
where yellow can be viewed as joy, green as jealousy or disgust, purple as
fear or mysteriousness, red as anger, blue as sadness etc. Each tiles have
different hues of these 5 colours which represent different degrees of
emotions.
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| Fig 3.3 Final word and image outcome - JPEG |
Fig 3.4 Final word and image outcome - PDF
In this word an image layout, although the words are not perfectly aligned
with the pictures, but the closeness of their position with their respective
pictures creates a grouping for each of them. Since the words used are
lyrics from the song "Two Birds", the word "two birds" are in bold and
underlined to not only grab attention that it's the starting point of the
composition, but to also act as a title indicating the song name.
Two column of pictures showing one bird in each with a line drawn connecting
the wire they're standing on visualizes the lyric "two birds on a wire".
"one tries to fly away and the other..." is shown by the two birds being in
separate frames with the second frame positioned higher and the second bird
positioned a bit out of its frame.
The reader's eyes would then move up to read "watches him close from that
wire" with a picture of a flying bird in the sky. This creates a feeling
that the reader is seeing the picture from the first bird's point of view,
where the first bird looks up to see the second bird fly away.
The reader would then look down to read "he says he wants to as well...but
he's a liar", creating a sudden saddened feeling/realization along with the
repeated picture of the first bird but now only one wire can be seen in the
picture, adding to the lonely visualization of the lyric.
Project 1: Self-portrait
28.9.2021 - 12.10.2021 (Week 6 - Week 8)
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| Fig 4.1 Final self-portrait outcome - JPEG |
Fig 4.2 Final self-portrait outcome - PDF
There are two subjects in my self-portrait, the real me and the dummy me. The
dummy me is basically to represent how I present myself to others, nothing
more than someone who uses this particular phone and always have it on her,
wears glasses and is always wearing casual clothes. But the dummy, along with
the mirror and background, is in black and white to symbolize that these are
just what you see in plain sight. The real me, however, is in colour and in
motion blur to show that whoever is viewing this self-portrait have to keep up
and “catch” me to learn about my true self, or in other words, my true
colours. My position being close to the mirror frame is to emphasize that I’m
moving out of frame. The mirror frame is left visible in the composition so
that it gives the self-portrait a feeling of intimacy that the viewers are
seeing my reflection through “my own eyes”.
Project 2: Sense of place
12.10.2021 - 26.10.2021 (Week 8 - Week 10)
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| Fig 5.1 Final sense of place outcome - JPEG |
Fig 5.2 Final sense of place outcome - PDF
Fig 5.3 Final sense of place outcome video animation
This sense of place design portrays a place where everyone is familiar with,
but done in a way that shows a feeling of calmness in the midst of
frustrations. The way the music sheets are scattered carelessly on the floor
with crosses and unfinished staves (the set of five lines in a music sheet) in
some indicates that there was a moment of frustration going on. But the
sunlight shining into the apartment which leads from the papers on the floor,
to the cat and then finally to the person calmly looking out from the balcony
gives a sense of calmness to the scene. The electric piano, the metronome and
the music sheets on the floor, which are all elements of music, shows
relevancy to each other and further describes the identity of the person and
why the papers on the floor are music sheets. Other than that, by making the
objects in the background to only having only their shadows coloured (except
for the plant) puts more emphasis to the elements under the sunlight. And by
making the balcony outside to look almost fully plain creates contrast between
the interior and the exterior spaces and puts focus on the person. The use of
warm monochromatic colours in the design brings out an overall welcoming and
warm feeling to the space.
Do watch in either full screen or theater mode, and put volume up!
Project 3: Visual analysis
26.10.2021 - 23.11.2021 (Week 10 - Week 14)
Fig 6.1 Final visual analysis part 1 outcome
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| Fig 6.2 Final visual analysis part 2 outcome - JPEG |
Fig 6.3 Final visual analysis part 2 outcome - PDF
This design is inspired by “Crypto Cats” by Daniel Haier and the concept is
based on the research done on it. It uses the concept of chess as a way to
represent what is it like in the cryptocurrency trading market. In chess,
players have to be strategic in manipulating their opponents. The same goes
for cryptocurrency trading. Anyone rich or influential enough can control
the high and lows of cryptocurrency to their will by manipulating other
people in falling to their schemes. The use of neon style in this design is
to create the feeling of a futuristic and digital environment as well as to
relate to the lawless nature of cyberpunk to the ungoverned operation of
cryptocurrency trading.
The logos of different cryptocurrency are paired up with their respective
chess pieces according to the current cryptocurrency ranking and the value
of chess pieces. Hence, the position ranking of the “crypto chess” pieces is
as below (from the most powerful to the weakest):
- King (Bitcoin)
- Queen (Ethereum)
- Rook (Binance)
- Bishop (Tether)
- Knight (Cardano)
- Pawn (Solana)
The laser grid acts as a chess board, the blue chess pieces represent the
opponent’s pieces while the yellow ones are the viewer’s pieces, and the
position shows that the viewer is loosing. Click here to read in detail
about the positioning of the chess pieces in the design.
Perspective is used to create more visual interest in the design and the
proportion of the elements are sized accordingly. The blue king and queen,
which are further away from the yellow king are blurred to create a sense of
depth. The bottom part of the hands being fainter gives a feeling that
they're emerging from the background. Since magenta has a more striking hue,
it’s used for the title and the hands to create emphasis, the hierarchy is
then followed by the chess pieces on the chess board. Yellow is used to pair
up with cyan since they're equally bright and contrast with each other.
Magenta also contrasts with them both so it's also used for the laser grid
chess board in the design.
Reflection
1. What have I learnt in this module?
Though I had Design Basics module back in Foundation in Design, this module
definitely helped me to understand more about each of the design principles
and learning how to identify them in works of design as well as using them
in my own works. Visual composition is also something that I’ve learnt
during my time in this module. Visual hierarchy always seems like a very
subjective decision to me before, and I would always take a lot of time
trying to figure out which arrangement of elements work best. But after
going through the project of this module, I found myself to be able to
compose elements in a design quicker and with more intention in my
decisions. Other than that, after looking at my classmates’ work and also
other artists’ works, I realized that there are endless possibilities in
design and knowing how to use each of the design principles can help to
create a variety of interesting and different designs. And for me at least,
I find that having a narrative is important when coming up with a design as
it is able to help guide me clearly on what I want to achieve in my work and
not get side tracked easily.
2. What did I enjoy the most?
Definitely the freedom of being able to use any medium we want in every
project. It allows me to explore more about the possible outcomes I can get
with my ideas and go for the ones that is the most suitable for the design
I’m going for. Because of this, I don’t feel limited when I’m thinking about
ideas and it’s always fun to be able to carry out a project with the best
vison I have in mind. There’s also comes a time when deadlines are tight and
being able to use a medium that I’m already familiar with makes the project
to feel more manageable and allows me to create an outcome that I’m
satisfied with. Besides, being able to choose any medium I want also means
that I can challenge myself in using different mediums, or even combine two
mediums together when doing my projects. This in turns is able to expand my
knowledge on them through my experience of using them.
3. What did I not enjoy the most?
I didn't face any big problems that made me to not enjoy the module, but if
I really need to mention something then it would probably be the short
deadlines and the amount of work that needs to be done for the exercises.
For someone who already had previous knowledge about the design principles
taught might find this more manageable but to those who are new to all of
this, they might find it hard to catch up when they had to come up with 2
designs after listening to the lecture on that particular week. And while I
already learnt about the design principles in foundation, sometimes I do
feel like I need to rush my work. And though I was able to manage it at the
end, I do wish we had a little bit more time in completing our final
outcome.
4. What have I learnt about myself through this module?
One thing I learn about myself is that I’m still the person who likes to
explore and try to create something that has much originality as possible,
but the downfall of this is that I tend to put myself in unknown territory
which leads me to spend more time in figuring how to get the idea to work
and also in executing it. And I tend to overthink about my work so I often
had to reel myself back in and focus on my current progress. Getting
feedbacks during class is one way to affirm the validity of my overthinking,
though ironically, I do get stubborn at times when receiving feedbacks haha.
But I always remind myself to keep an open-mind and try out any suggestions
that are given to me.
5. What has changed and what has not in my learning journey?
What has changed would be the way I process information from lectures and
also paying more attention in my process of carrying out the projects. I
didn’t have to write detailed documentation in blog posts before this, so I
always remembered information from lectures in a more general sense. So,
having to take down notes for each lecture to write it on my blog actually
helped me to gain a more well-rounded understanding of what I’ve just
listened to. For the documentation of my process, I found that by keeping an
update of my process in every class, I was able to notice how I have
improved and what I’ve learnt from doing each of the exercises and projects
given to us.
Other than the things I've mentioned in question 4, what hasn't changed would
be my interest in doing design. Although there are bumps in the road
throughout the 14 weeks I've spent in this module, they didn't waver my
passion in pursuing design but rather, my curiosity grew with each thing that
I've learnt.
6. What could be improved in this module?
For me, the workload in this module is still manageable and Dr. Jinchi's
lectures had been very helpful to me, same goes to Dr. Charles for further
explaining them and giving us great feedbacks. But if I need to mention
something that could be improved, it would be to set the deadline for each
project on the weekend rather than on Friday. It gives us more time to
compile everything and refine our works before submission considering that
we have other module progression to meet each day every week. Although
extensions were given at some circumstances, making it a “default” choice
would make everything more clear-cut.
Amazing compilation and well done for your hardwork! What is special is that you found a way to communicate very well using storytelling!
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