Point, Line and Plane
Within out first class Paul introduced us to the fundamentals of Design, which is the stepping stones of every design and these were known as point, line and plane. He then explained that in order to design anything you must begin with research and this lead into examples of both online and offline research, and as a class we were able to gather multiple different examples of both and this gave us a clear visual example of the research that we can collect from everyday life. Paul then carried through explain that in order to create a great design we need to follow the order of; Understand – Research – Sketch – Design – Implement. Each these steps are as important as each other and will ensure that your work will be of high quality if this process is followed. Paul lastly explained that unconscious processing is needed for excellent work. This means that it can be just as important to take a step away from your work to allow for yourself to just process it and this can be the key in changing your work from okay to great.
Point
We spent the majority of our work on point, line and plane and these were known as our visual vocabulary and our starting blocks for design. We began by looking at Point and we learnt that it is the simplest and first element when it comes to visual design and it gives the mind something visual to focus on and because of this draws in the users attention. No matter if there is only one or a collection of points are brain will try to make it mean something. This is done by the mind trying to create groups out of the points that have similar characteristics such as proximity, size, colour and more. Seed Media Group and Norwegian University of Life Science use points in order to create their logos and in my opinion or extremely eye catching and a great use of points.
Seed Media Group use points to create flowers using colour and variations of this design is used throughout the website by making each flower unique by using different colours. I particularly like how they use this design on their staff page to showcase pictures of the staff. It is a simple yet eye-catching use of points and is very effective for the audience.
I then looked at the designer Nigel Peake who is known for his creative drawing style which has led him to work for extremely well known brands such as Hermès, The New York Times and Flos. His work has also been showcases in London, New York, Tokyo and Paris. Due to Peake being constantly being brought into big, cosmopolitan cities, his work reflects the buildings and designs that he sees in these cities and to create these he uses line and this is a great example of working with basic elements of design to create outstanding pieces of work.
To finish off our work with Line Paul, gave us the same task line as he did with point, with a 3 x 3 grid filled up with different amounts of line’s in each. I was also pleased with how this work turned out and it confirmed my knowledge with the design element of line.
Lastly, we moved onto planes. Planes are seen as a line in motion and to put it simply it is a line with breadth. They make a strong visual impression as they can textured or smooth as well as opaque or transparent. They can be seen in the world around us such as window, walls, floors and even ceilings, we are surrounded my physical planes. Similarly to line, planes are used in typography and the lines that are created which create paragraphs as well as areas of text is considered a plane. Typographic planes are determined on letter sizing, typefaces, words as well as line spacing. They can be soft, open, dense or hard and designers try out test with typeface, letter and line sizing and more to see the different planes they can make and to figure out the one that will work best for them.
When researching different designers who used planes within their work, one of the most popular designer who kept coming up was Josef Müller Brockmann, he was a Swiss graphic designer and he was a pioneer of the International Typographic style. Due to his use of colour, typography and shapes and the sharp yet elegant designs he created continue to inspire designers nowadays. I personally enjoy his Beethoven poster the most as it gives the illusion of a record like it is playing which makes it looks like one of Beethoven’s records is playing. Each arch in the poster doubles in size after one another and his precise and geometrical shaping is an element within the Swiss style. I also like the symmetry of the type with the ending of the title, being the start of the paragraph of text below. The harmony throughout the poster from the use of shapes and text and using a mathematical process to layout the whole poster symbolises the harmonies within Beethoven’s work.
Lastly, we were introduced to Hamish Muir and Paul McNeil, who collaborated together in 2017 to create special edition covers of the Eye magazine and came up with the idea of the 8000 variable data covers. This was a cover that was made up of planes and had 8000 unique covers for Eye magazine so therefore any person who was able to get had had their own one of a kind issue cover. Muir and McNeil’s cover gain popularity immediately and was the most discussed about Eye cover in history, it went on to win many awards and everyone from broadcasters to bloggers was interested in it. Paul then showed us his unique copy of Eye 94 and his design of the cover.
