OUGD405 - Studio Brief 02 - Design Development: Image

These three images show my final developed images to be used in my final designs. Originally, after the group crit, I had intended to produce a large scale poster to promote the new mathematics exhibition which has been opened at the Science Museum. However, in the process of creating these images, it became apparent that blowing them up too large would cause the text to also increase in size so much that the images would no longer be clear as to what they represent. As a result of this, I decided to produce a set of three postcards instead.

The process to create these images as well as the images themselves were inspired by ASCII art. Using my existing knowledge and research into the graphic design technique, I produced these using the text-editing program, Microsoft Word. To keep the images clear and simple I chose a limited number of characters within the ASCII coding system, which I used to represent light, mid-tone and darker shades of colour. The characters I chose to work with were '!' for light colours, 'C' and 'E' for mid-tones, and 'M' and 'W' for the darker shades, which worked based on the form of the characters and how much pre-set white space is around each of them. The type I chose to work with was 10 point Courier New, as this was the standard type used in the production of ASCII art, whereby the properties of the typeface allow there to be a clear contrast between lighter and darker tones.

As part of the process I used an image for reference and worked within a fixed square which I set myself so that each image would be of a standardised shape and form. Using the limited set of characters I had chosen, I started to recreate the basic shapes from each planet (Moon, Earth and Uranus), as to not over-complicate the images. This means the eye does not have to over-work to be able to understand and produce an image from the set of text.

Each image symbolises a planet; Moon, Earth and Uranus, which each have links to the facts I have chosen to work with. The Slide Rule was used to aid with planning for the Apollo 11 moon mission, the Abacus was first developed in Ancient Greece (a country here on Earth) and the inventor of Napier's Bones gained a reputation as a Wizard, where this idea of magic and intelligence has links to the planet Uranus. Another reason I chose to create links to planets was to keep the postcard designs standardised in their layout to create a series. As part of the next design stage, these ASCII images will be used accompanying the facts they reference, along with an appropriate use of colour and a small passage of text explaining that facts on the reverse side of each postcard.