7 Dec 09 PGC presentation

I am here.
This is the present.
Here is the plan.
This is the story since September, in visuals.
















And here are some afterthoughts in words:

It seems like I have to start working on a manifesto for the next phase. I have to try laying out a comprehensive, linear narrative to be able to communicate my project. So. I have to develop manifesto skills, as well.

Why not?...:

We have finally established trusting each other. We have shared our great plans, our confusion and our fears. We are a little community of little designers that help each other to make their little dreams come true. These little dreams are the way forward and no-one else has them quite the same way we do. It's up to each one of us to make the most out of this community and the most out of our dreams. If anyone fails it will hurt us all. If anyone succeeds it will make us proud. If we all succeed we will have made a significant change towards a greater progress. Change starts from within. It has actually started already. We can do it.

PGC term reflective summary report

When applying for a MA programme in Art&Design at NTU, we make an initial project proposal. I take it this is to show our point of interest in research and the level of dedication to the subject that we are going to become masters of. In my case, MA Branding and Identity Design, my initial proposal was entitled "Defective Branding - An investigation into the negative effects of branding". It was fairly clear in my head at that early stage and I was looking forward to making a really evil brand and having fun with finding how to do it. The idea was to find a way of raising public awareness towards a socially responsible, ethical and non-consumerist lifestyle.

Three months and a lot of contextual reviewing and confusion later, I have decided that an evil brand would not be doing anyone any good, as the world is already packed with such brands. Let us be socially responsible for once, let us do something good for the greater benefit. Branding is a very dangerous kind of tool. The kind that needs to be handled by adults or with adult supervision. It has to be used responsibly. So, I've decided to find a way to use Branding and Brand Communication Design to promote a better lifestyle, one that is socially responsible, ethical and non-consumerist. Like an adult should. On reflection, it doesn't sound very different from the start, which is quite reassuring. But it was only a few days before handing in my Learning Agreement, that I have been able to phrase the correct question and justify my research in academic context.

This is the question:

HOW CAN BRANDING AND BRAND COMMUNICATION DESIGN BE USED TO PROMOTE A MORE SOCIALLY RESPONSIBLE / ETHICAL / NON-CONSUMERIST LIFESTYLE IN TODAY'S SOCIETY?

Excellent!

Thanks to Stuart for his patience and contribution in formulating this question. Like he says: 'Now we're in business!'

'Method and Methodology' exercise

Just as a peer to peer share of information, I would like to state here the fact that in the context of Design, my subject's first 'node' of relation to the academic code, as I see it now but couldn't see before, is what the tutors refer to as "broader context". We are asked to 'focus' and 'narrow' our 'broad' view into a 'broader' context.

How good is that?

How can we zoom in to a broader view?

By reflection: we focus on the mirror we place in our view of our subject at the very beginning (with the project proposal) and see through it what is the broader view wherein we are actually standing ourselves.

Any better?

Now reflect on reflection.

We take great care to review context so we don't fall into quite pointlessly reinventing the Wheel, but, hey! we can reinvent the Atom Bomb and Space Travel and the Internet! Unless the contextual review is not very broad at all since we can't even evade the 'mind-trap' of tautology.

Learning Agreement Build-Up

The bottom map from the picture above is the closest I could come to defining what I am looking at as a subject at this point of developing an academic argument. I realize that I went through a process of communicating my area of interest, from describing a singular entity of a vastly chaotic idea, to illustrating it in a collection of more comprehensible 'signs' that can relate to a decipherable 'code'. The key word I found in this fourth stage of ZOOMing in is 'Antithesis'.
This was the 'node' that allowed Stuart Hodges, my supervisor in the MA, to relate to and comprehend what I was talking about, as set in the context of this 'map', and therefore help me finally FOCUS. I am still a mind-map away from actually achieving it.
It has been a tough race with time and information-handling, through a 'jungle' of different theoretical approaches, but now I can see the path that leads to the finish-line. This is an enormous relief, as the fear of being 'lost' was immense despite the fact that I never allowed myself to lose the confidence that it can be done and I am the only one who can do it, because it is my 'original' concept. The more original a concept is, the hardest it is to communicate before it is somehow materialized - visualized.
I have more or less read more than ten books that inform my subject, within in the last month alone, and countless on-line articles and wikipedia definitions... and still my language is primal and insufficient. The practice part of my project (and therefore the finish-line to the race) is yet invisible but I'm positive that (I know) it exists as it is already illustrated in a not-yet deciphered part of the 'map'. The extreme difficulty is partly due to the multi-disciplinary nature of my subject or to put it in Photoshop language, it is like a multi-layered document of which only one layer is seen at the time when I try to communicate it in the tutorial time. It involves as I realized with the second map in the above image, Design, Sociology, Politics, Marketing and Business, Philosophy, Film-studies, Web Architecture and even Physics, Maths and Biology. And that isn't the full list.

Missing a few that I have read and having not yet read in full some of the ones in it, the photo below is like a mind-map on early stages. Not a good example of how to work faster, but a good one of how contextual information is built and appropriate language acquired.

Bottom left is my first mind-map, bottom right my 'reflecting journal' 'sketch'-book.

This post is in celebration of me finding a way out of a maze of non-communication.
I'm still in the maze.

Revision notice

The last document (Backwards Brief) has been revised since it's original posting and slight moderations have been made in light of its relationship with the Learning Agreement. It's still not perfect.

Backwards Brief

The brief is set in 'Research Methods' context for MA studies. We're asked to choose a specific example of completed work related to our research subject area and analyze it after a given formula. As circumstances have it, this analysis has to be rather short.

My subject area is that of 'negative branding' or 'branding the Resistance to Branding'. Or so I have it in my head at the present time.

For the argument's sake I choose Marilyn Manson's latest album art-work. I am sort of familiar with his work although by far not his greatest fan, so I think it's likely to be more insightful. The image for basic reference is taken from this address: http://www.nachtkabarett.com/babalon/topic/934--THEOL-Imagery - (my copy has the old b/w "Parental Advisory Explicit Content" logo where the blue-white "Warning..." one stands here, both logos play one particular role in the packaging). The credits on the inside of the package go: Art Direction and design: Marilyn Manson and Liam Ward, Cover Layout: Jeff Witters.


The album is called "The High End of Low" released on Interscope Records in 2009.

Branding and God

I'm busy trying to sort out my bibliography and reading little wikipedia sort of summaries and Amazon reviews all day is quite a job.

The more I read things relative to my subject the more I feel I'm digging up a sort of 'divinity' issue. Web 2.0 branding is like old religion-building, only at the early stage of us discovering the new world of possibilities and being so absorbed by it that we are actually unaware of falling into the same loop as the first Christians, building a new Christ/Antichrist imagination to replace the old tyranny. I was led to this trail of thought by Umberto Eco's writings (umbertoeco.com). He claims we, humans, are religious animals that need to justify Life and Death in their logic and therefore cannot live without a god, especially in the West after 2000 years of one god moral monopoly.

It seems to me that branding is exactly like building gods, and in 2ooo years from now, there will be more archaelogical findings with the Coke logo on than with the old cross. Further-more, it will look pretty horrific when Coke's Santa will be found next to crucified Christ. Was it like that with the ancient Egyptians and their monstrous 'gods' figures next to and inside Death-glorifying 'tombs'? What a mess of a civilisation!

I am currently interested in looking at the Greek Orthodox Church as a case study of the "perfect brand" with its 'omnipresent' and 'omnipotent' strategies of intangible temptation/salvation and charity/penalty issues, that still survive today by means of oligarchical tangible wealth and un-surpassed imagery (the cross logo et.c.) and fetishes and brand-plans, despite the rise of the New/Social media that have majorly de-contextualized the notions of preconception and superstition, yet rely on the same notions.

Is Mass/Ritual really a needed service or a brand-bubble taking advantage of our credulity?

Is Branding and God one and the same?

(My photos:)

Happy Halloween!

Enough with preliminary matters, I think. If you are being entertained by my writings you can find more if you look around in the Internet. This blog is the place where I deal with my MA and from now on it is going to be about my project, exclusively.

I started it off with the title "Defective Branding" last summer, but since then the project has developed its own will and opinion and it is now calling itself "NO BRAND" in reference to Naomi Klein's work entitled "NO LOGO".

When it was at the stage of being presented as a proposal to the rest of NTU MA GD 2009-10, it was called "Resistance is futile", quoting STAR TREK's Generations' "Borg" episodes and movie.

However, there is a documentary on Google movies entitled "No Logo - Brands, Globalization & Resistance" where Naomi Klein herself introduces her book and I recommend that you ought to watch it before attempting to comprehend myself any further, at this early stage of the project, unless you are already familiar with "No Logo". Hopefully I will eventually be a lot more comprehensible too, in a few weeks from now.

Following are the visuals of that presentation for the journal. It's a project proposal so please forgive the lack of references for some of the individual pictures. I used Google images search to find them in a sort of rush for mood-board purposes and I lost track of their home sites. I'm not forgiving myself for it so it won't be happening again. If there is any offense issue relating to this, please contact me and I will delete these visuals asap.


A further introductory presentation on the subject is currently being prepared.

Study-trip to Manchester, 29/10

It didn't rain and I felt rejuvenated by getting out of town after four months of routine routes around NTU central.
The Imperial War Museum North was a fantastic experience. The building and entire concept of the institution is a work of Art bearing a great anti-war statement through-out. I was completely overwhelmed by the inclined tower and the view through the inclined iron grid. The world looks very un-balanced from that point on. Even the ManU football club looks like a relative issue from up there. I sort of realize now how come the Japanese have so developed architectural shapes in their cities... They are now in the grandest aftermath of war, are they not?
In a sense, this museum is Art's war with War and I can't but feel awe and respect towards it.
Urbis made me realize that I am older than a thing that already belongs to history, British Hip Hop culture. That is as terrifying as the inclined iron grid.
Magma is a design bookshop, something that Nottingham lacks so far and I payed homage there before ending in Hard Rock Cafe for dinner with Stuart and my class-mates.
Manchester itself as a city is unexpectedly gorgeous. It is astonishing, with shapes and forms and colors and people who are livelier than people in smaller towns but not in constant battle with stress like in the capitol. I guess they have their own private issues to resolve and businesses-sponsored free-press is thriving, but in general I felt quite welcome and comfortable. For a day.

Just as an after-thought, Graphic Design has different essenses, depending on geography and population numbers. I think that the more the people around, the more it turns to Advertisement and the less the people, the more it turns to Scholarship. But the more the Advertisement, the greater the issues due to competition...

Entente = Understanding ?

I don't know what language it is in but I was left with the impression that 'entente' means 'understanding' and for its similarity to some English words it leads me to sinister relationships. I like the idea of positive input to a brand by use of foreign elements like language in its name. Anthony and Ed presented to us their design-studio work achievements, this morning and it was very educative to listen about their processes and how they set up and got lucky and running. There were a few things about the 'lecture' that weren't to my satisfactory but this isn't the place to mention them. I write this post because I realize after a little thought that too many things in their story were subject to 'luck' as opposed to genuine research and in effect, understanding. The artistic happy accident gone out of context sort of thing or me in the wrong mind-frame again. I don't mean to criticize them hereby, I merely want to ask a question in a broader context for mutual benefit and if anyone wants to share thoughts about it, please feel completely welcome to do so, even if it is just of the old "you make your own luck" sort.
What if... there is no such thing as LUCK?

Black Background ?

This is an apology again, this time for using white text on black background. It has been brought to my attention that people might be getting headaches reading this and a lighter or white background would be more appropriate. Some may also think it a 'political' statement, which is quite out of place in the present context.

I use black background because I get less headache reading this way. Screens emit a lot of light directly to my eyes and I go blind from the effort to make out the tiny shapes of letter types against bright backgrounds, unless the screen is real top quality make, which usually means too expensive to afford. This editor is already void of the option to compose in darker background and I kind of miss the times when everything was happening in MS Dos black environment with crude green letters. When I will be able to afford a better monitor, I will be getting one and then I will be considering different layout colors.

If there is a statement to be understood out of this, let it be a manufacturing-critique one for hardware and software engineering. On-screen work is not writing poems with pen on paper in the cozy candlelight, it is like training for the Olympics in kickboxing. So far some CAD and photo/video editing software people seem to be aware of this and show respect to their products users. The rest believe in lighting up our faces.

Design Process Project, 21/10/09

End of project, design process evaluation.

The "theme" of the day as it concluded was the process as opposed to the final product. There have been some good products, illustrations, logos, storyboards and even videos there, but they were only part of the bigger issue that was: how we got there.

Great lesson for postgraduate study approach to things. In the course of three Fridays, I managed to value the evidence of process at a higher level than the end-product's one, in effect realizing that when the end product is well informed by not only contextual research but also manufacturing procedures, it shows and it works because it communicates correctly.

This is very practical for some of us who tend to look at our initial response and ideas like they were our offspring. When we come to being real professionals, our attachment to our first or our favourite solutions can lead to conflict with the customer at best and disfunctionality of the work- waste of time and effort and money - at worst. For the process to be right and evident and functional we have to be detached and clear and thorough with exposing the marks we make in the beginning and all the way to the final piece and we also need to be constantly alert and checking our co-ordinate points in relation to the brief, the research and both our intuitive and intelectual responses. I wonder if this is a pattern that works with bringing up children and playing the role of the educator, too.

I keep realising with this MA that words like in the above paragraph don't make much sense if one is not in the same or similar exercise and it is so with the briefs too. We have to get involved with the briefed project to understand what is going on.

I've learnt so far that involuntarily, a great number of us block the process from the start by refusing to admit that we don't quite comprehend it. We pretend we know exactly what is going on and then get frustrated and upset when it isn't working. When this falls into place with the previous issue of us being emotional with our offspring, the whole course is blown to pieces.

It's very accurately titled Design Process and I'm glad to have taken this project. I'm going to be a lot more conscious about many things in the future.

In fact, I'm now realising how important it is to share the process with peers and I'll be posting more things related to it so that others can make sense of it too.

Visualising Research lecture by C. Gray

Wow! If there was just one lecture to encompass the entire academic concept of Art&Design research, this would be it. I just had that "Bounty" experience... I also made a deduction about my studies today and I'm putting it down here for debate and critique.
We can be as mental as academically justified
- by means of reflective journals and within the context of Art and Design studies, at least. What a relief! Visualizing research is probably the most educative process available and I'm ordering that book straight away.
Anybody else finding it difficult to hear the lecturer in that lecture theater, by any chance?

Link to MA student blogs?

OK, imbecile here. How do I find the other students' blogs? The link at the NOW content map leads to blank, or is my computer upset?

Design Process Project, 16/10/09

• What have you learnt from this session - to improve your idea development for this brief?

The feedback on this day was very important to my idea development in multiple ways. I was operating in a wrong frame again, thinking that I should go for a "safe" suggestion although I had much better ideas put into sketch and I lost some precious time trying to give "safe" a little edge. Never do that again. It takes all the joy away and it doesn't bring any valuable results. Compromisation belongs to another context, not here. "Danger" is good. Design-wise. Be brave! Once the necessary research is evident there is no fear.

• What have you learnt from this session – to apply to your MA research project?

The same applies to this question. We are here to explore our limits and go beyond them. No point in restraining our creativity. Research is just fuel.

Design Process Project, 09/10/09 revised

First of all, I have to apologize for my tone of voice in the previous post.

Secondly, I have to share with everyone an absolutely positive experience in terms of personal development that I had today.

Third and last I have to re-phrase some things that are in my original "Design Process Project, 09/10/09" post.

I was not aware that people might be taking my use of English as insulting, when I was writing it. It is absolutely essential to me that if anyone feels that way, please accept my sincere apologies and write me a comment straight away, including, if possible, suggestions for re-phrasing or requests for explaining, so I can improve my communication skills. English is my second language, which means I tend to think in terms of my first one even when I am using English vocabulary. I don't mean to criticize in bad ways and I definitely don't mean to offend the same people from and with whom I am here to learn and achieve the Master's degree.

Today I was called in to the office with Stuart and Peter and all the things that were not clear to me got perfectly clarified. If anyone has vague points about anything, remember that it's good to talk, and preferably with the appropriate authority, before posting something in a public blog, otherwise we all get involved in situations that may hold us back. I don't want to be held back and I don't want to be holding anyone else back. I want to learn as much as possible about everything that is available to me and I want others to be positively influenced and avoid the same mistakes. I am leaving the original post un-edited in hope of allowing everyone else to know what can result in negative effects for the course of their studies.

So to re-vise a couple of things briefly, I have to say that last Friday was a good exercise on dealing with basic problems of comprehending and responding swiftly to a design brief. I wish there was more evidence in the work exposition at the end of the day, of elements of research that led to the work in view, so I could be influenced for my own benefit by comparing other people's findings. Some of the designs were brilliant for the shortage of time given and I have comparatively failed in boldly making marks that could result in end-product propositions. The session was about induction to the means of responding to the brief and not actually producing an end-result as I had wrongly understood. This is to come in it's own time on the third scheduled Friday, after we have taken it home and given it a more thorough, self-directed study and have had a mid-point evaluation of the process on the second scheduled Friday.

There is a distinctive difference between studying in the University and working in a commercial environment and I have been caught up in a mental mesh of mixing the two. I am working on getting over it. I'm coming back to this when I have made some more progress.

Design Process Project, 09/10/09

What have you learnt from this session - to improve your idea development for this brief?

Not much, unfortunately. I was expecting a hand out of elaborate briefing on each of the three divisions we had to choose from and I was hoping for a clearer layout of the time-scale of the project. None of the above happened. On the contrary it seems to me like this is an experiment and it's being structured as we go along, depending on the average needs of the entire graphics group. These average needs may have been satisfied by the last minute introduction to mood-boards and partially by the extensive re-introduction to research-methods that I saw no evidence of in the work exposed around the room at the end of the day. Nevertheless, I've learnt that an hour and a half of post-research development in a room with 24 students and one b&w printer is nowhere near enough to achieve a brand identity presented as finished artwork along with samples of suitable business stationary, but I am still able to produce enough constructive work which can be used from here on to reach the desired results in another hour and a half under the same conditions. I have also learnt that the audience as described by the brief is not the abstract wealthy etc. that I thought I should be investigating into but the people in the room. What I am still puzzled about is the time-scale / budget of this project and what results are expected at which stage, as based on experience of studio and time management. Are we expected to spend three weeks on this or three Friday's only? Are we expected to fund the production of the end product on our own or do the poor also stand a chance? Is this workshop or homework?

What have you learnt from this session – to apply to your MA research project?

I have learnt about Scandinavian interior design values and that they belong to the past so I can rule them out of my MA project, if this is what the question is about. I've also now got a map of Research topics that need to be manifest in my reflective journal.

Is the design process discussed this morning different / similar to your previous experience, and if so, how?

The sense of deja vu was overwhelming throughout the day, especially when, exactly like with the worst clients in the industry, we were made to run for meeting a deadline in a total of four hours including the lunch-break and then we were told that we can have a whole week to think it over and discard the four hours of hype and intense like a killing joke. So I felt quite cheated there. But I love this job. What can I do? I am already trying to improve it by writing this down.

First Blog Entry

This is it.

My on-line learning journal.

Good Luck!