Banner
Media Art Nexus / Panorama Banner
3840 x 480 pixels
LED 15m by 2m
North Spine Plaza Media Art Nexus
NTU Singapore
16 November 2017
Panorama Banner at the Media Wall
Application examples of the pattern swatches
Food Monster Wallpaper Design for a Korean Restaurant
Swatch Book Soft Copy
Earlier process documentation
On to the final deliverable, the swatch book! As with any pattern project I struggled to come up with the pattern swatches for the book as you always need that one starting point/spark of idea (well for me at least). True enough, when I started on one more and more patterns came and it became like a churning factory haha. Even just changing the hue was considered as a swatch, the possibilities were endless and it was pretty fun process!
I eventually did about 22 variation of swatches for the submission and superimposing it onto several items/products for possible application visuals: (click on the images to view the swatches and application as an enlarged slideshow)
Swatches
Application
Tried out application in space too but I think my designs were more suitable for potential merchandising of apparels, bags, badges etc.
I kind of have the urge to translate them into actual products in the future if the opportunity arises; the superimposing/mock-up process was pretty tedious but fun!
Swatch Book
Here’s the final documentation of the big project that contains the banner, the swatches, application, everything you need to know about Dokkae-blin!
Final post coming up as a gallery series for an overview of the project (or if you wish to call it, a visual summary)
Thanks for sticking around 🙂
The next thing on the list of deliverables once the banners went up for was to design a horizontal digital composition for the Media Art Nexus at North Spine!! For those who had abstract/paint-looking banner designs were abstract, it was easier for them to come up with their compositions for the media wall – Simply just by rotating their banner design to a horizontal layout.
On the other hand, it was quite a struggle for mine as I was working with a really vertical design composition initially. But I eventually figured my composition layout eventually so all’s good 🙂
Keeping the consistency of my vertical banner design with this horizontal digital composition, the central motif remains as the One-Eyed Goblin with the other Food Monsters motifs flanking its sides. The composition I went for took on an almost symmetrical look and it was a rather spontaneous decision. For the arrangement and placement of these motifs. With the most bit being just a reflected side of the other thus the symmetry. The organic wavy linework in the background that mimics the noodle strands of the Ramyeon (Korean instant noodles) similarly suggest and provide movement and flow in this composition while somewhat creating a cohesive, connected composition altogether. The composition for this turned out unexpectedly well and I was satisfied with it! 🙂 For the colours, I kept it exactly the same with the banner’s for consistency.
Version 1 (used for the preview)
The week after in-class viewing of these compositions for the Media Art Nexus, we head down to the actual place for the preview of it on the actual screens and below was how it looked like: BAM, another surprise!! I guess there’s always this wow factor when your work gets blown up and viewed across various types of medium. On the LED screen it was really another kind of beauty with all that illumination :’)
The only qualm that I had when the preview for my composition came up on the screen was that compared to others, mine came out slightly dull. The same problem I had for my banner composition initially during test prints. Hence I went with increasing its saturation and contrast just like what I did for my banner eventually! Hope it turns out better!!
Version 2 (with increased brightness and saturation)
After an insane but exciting four months working on this Dokkaebi design, the time has finally come for it to be printed into a banner and displayed for the annual end of semester showcase!! Here’s a breakdown of the process leading up to exhibition day starting with the printing process:
Time to print our banners and I couldn’t be more thankful to have paired up with Yi Ling as my printing partner! It was such a sight seeing the banner slowly coming to “life” bit by bit from the printer and it was HUGE. We were obviously really excited but unfortunately met with printing mishaps – The colour of our banner didn’t turn out like we wanted it to / as seen in our test prints a week earlier. Turned out the printer had colour calibration problems but luckily we could reprint our banners! Below, pictures of behind-the-scenes to getting the banner up. We had to trim the edges on our own and surprisingly Yi Ling and I complemented each other’s cutting styles well haha. One more reckless and one slightly way too OCD so eventually we balanced out our styles by trimming each other’s banner and eventually working together on trimming each side of one banner simultaneously.
Thanks for a fun printing experience, partner-in-crime 😉
Below was the disparity in the banner colours from the first print vs the second. The very first print that we did when my colours came out wrong, the background became more dark navy rather than a teal colour and the motifs came out very neon. As quoted by some of my peers “the food looks uncooked” haha (as I was working with motifs that were created based on Korean food)
Showed Ina the banner of the first round of printing and surprisingly she was okay with it! However I would’ve liked the colour saturation of several motifs to come out more saturated as intended especially for the One-Eyed Goblin as the intention was to have it be like the ‘central figure/motif’ of the banner thus we concluded that a reprint should be done and YES!!! IT WAS SO MUCH BETTER THE SECOND TIME ROUND. Both of our banners (Yi Ling’s and mine) turned out GREAT 😀
More cutting again, but this time round with the better final banners!
Set-up Day
The following week was set-up day; super exciting times. We laid out our test prints in class first to get a sense of which banner should go where for the exhibition set-up. But at the end of the day I really think that no matter how the banners were arranged, all turned out really pretty and complemented each other’s so well!!
More documentation to come in the next post!
Time really flies, the end of the semester is here and so are all the final submission deadlines! For this final project, we were really “free” in the sense that we got to explore any area of our interest, a physical product/publication etc. produced as an expansion of one of our past few projects – 2A: Vernacular Type / 2B: Organic Type/ 3A: Type As Image / 3B: Type As Pattern / 3C: Type As Emotion
I eventually went ahead with an expansion of Project 3A out of subject interest – A zine titled: Playground of Our Yesteryears and here’s my journey at arriving at my final idea:
Ideation
This final project being an expansion of Project 3A, the subject matter I based my compositions on were the iconic mosaic playgrounds in Singapore – the Dragon Playground and Dove Playground respectively. For reference:
As mentioned in that process documentation, I was naturally drawn to these playgrounds and always had this “something” for nostalgic stuff. I wanted to explore this theme of nostalgia again for this final project. Thus I was considering to create a zine that’s a collection of typographic compositions of several popular childhood snacks or stick with the same mosaic playgrounds.
After much thinking, the playgrounds it was! I initially wanted to have the zine include a little of Project 2A (Vernacular Type) as well, coming up with quotes related or said about the playgrounds and formed with Vernacular Type as observed from the form of the playground structures to strengthen/solidify the concept further. Even with the title of the zine as well on the cover page, I wanted to incorporate the techniques of Project 2A. However after much consideration, it was not practical at all given the tight deadline that we were given for this final project – 3 weeks.
How unfortunate! But I’ll definitely keep this idea in mind if I were to ever expand further on this project 🙂
Choice of Typeface
I stuck through with the previous typeface used for Project 3A, Cochin reason being that it evoked a nostalgic vibe and I liked how it had various weights and its Italic font had a unique anatomy to it. Unlike Project 3A where our reasoning for choosing the typeface could be just as simple as this, for this final project the rationale had to be deeper. It must be related/be of significance to the subject matter that the compositions are based on. In this case, the typeface Cochin had to be related to these mosaic playgrounds – The feedback I received during the first consultation for the project.
Thus I had to do further research to see if I could find similarities. If not, I have to change my typeface. Thankfully there were some connections! This was what I found:
In 1977, Cochin was later adapted an expanded for Linotype that is used as a system font that can be found in our MacBooks. This 70’s period that it was adapted is the same period when these mosaic playgrounds were created around the various HDB estates in Singapore
Therefore that similarity, and additionally the typeface has an old text feel that evokes a feel of nostalgia to which I feel is an apt tone to convey with these iconic mosaic playgrounds of the past as they were part of most people’s childhood.
Reference: https://www.fonts.com/font/linotype/cochin/story
The Zine Format
I wanted to opt for the normal staple bind zine, working with page spreads and all but I was thinking further on how I could make it less “dull”. After much digging around online I found out that there’s really a wide variety of zine formats and actually it’s really up to one’s preference, how they want their zine to look like.
Then I chanced upon the one-page mini zine template! Pretty decent and quite an interesting layout to work with. There’s a slit in the middle though.
Looking further, I came across this typography publication that was one-paged as well just not 8-page and mini. It had a poster on the flip-side (back-side) of it’s front which sparked the idea of packaging it to come with a freebie of sorts in poster form (folded). The contents of the zine and the poster would be further elaborated later on.
Cr: https://www.behance.net/gallery/33539703/Typographic-Zine
The Compositions
THE BIGGEST STRUGGLE OF THIS PROJECT. Going ahead with the project as an expansion of Project 3A, I could foresee it was going to be quite a struggle as I already was that time during the project. This was the first version of compositions I came up with:
Went in to consultations and sure enough, I struggled. Sure the compositions came out, the respective playgrounds can be identified. However, feedback was that similar to the two that were created in Project 3A, the compositions looked quite flat and way too simplified. The reader would not be able to identify the letters used/see the typeface and the compositions could easily pass off as being drawn using the pen tool.
Shirley suggested to search online for examples of Type as Image to get a better sense of how the compositions when formed should look like – Definitely the anatomy of the letters could still more or less be identified and that should be the way to go!
^ Reference Works
Thus I changed up the compositions a little by cutting up the anatomy less, some retaining it’s full form and the use of the letter’s descenders and ascenders rather than it’s stems. The list of mosaic playgrounds around Singapore is pretty long and people might ask, why feature just these mosaic playgrounds and not all of them? My reason for choosing these playgrounds to be featured is because these seven I personally believe are the more iconic ones around, I see them popping up/being mentioned in most if not all the articles/materials I’ve read about these playgrounds. Furthermore, several of these playgrounds were popular designs till they had replicas of it built about Singapore but these selected ones are the original ones that were created, the first version to exist.
Below, each revised composition labelled as follows in a gallery of its own and the process of getting to the final composition used in the zine with the colouring for some: (click on the images to enlarge as slideshow)
DRAGON PLAYGROUND
DOVE PLAYGROUND
SAMPAN PLAYGROUND
ELEPHANT PLAYGROUND
CLOCK PLAYGROUND
WATERMELON PLAYGROUND
PELICAN PLAYGROUND
Content
As I felt that it would be rather boring to just have the typographic image compositions make up the content of the zine, I eventually decided to include several fun facts/information that readers will not likely be aware of about these playgrounds complement the compositions.
I have to say, bulk of my inspiration on what should be included in the zine came from this digital pdf that I chanced upon while researching on the playgrounds (link): Mosaic Memories – Singapore Memory Project
From there I got the inspiration for the main content to complement the compositions:
And the poster: Somewhat like the map as seen in the Mosaic Memories project referenced, but in my own take and style. The map that the designer came up with for that project featured way more playgrounds and it was even more detailed with a descriptive paragraph beside each playground. As for mine, I decided to have it just feature the playgrounds that I’ve created compositions for on a map silhouette of Singapore. The playgrounds placed roughly at where it’s located across the island (North, South, East, West side) with simple header text above it made up of their addresses’. The poster works as a tiny prompt/suggestion for readers to visit/re-visit their childhood while they still can (the design can be seen later on below)
And after much revising and printing…. here’s the final look of the zine 🙂
To make the background of the zine look less flat, I added texture to create a vintage rustic look that somewhat gives a nostalgic feel and also something spontaneous; a pattern like wallpaper design overlay on the already textured background with lowered opacity 🙂
HERE IT IS!!
(click on images to enlarge as slideshow)
References:
Overall, I’ve learnt A LOT from this project and module. Not just applying the usual typography concepts that we’ve learnt so far, but in this case to even analyse how the choice of typeface can affect the readers’ interpretation of the work. Also, layout and almost every design aspect needs to be taken into consideration. In fact, all the projects we had throughout this module had its own learning points. But if there’s one biggest learning point/takeaway at the end of the day, I would say is that my observation skills and appreciation for typefaces/fonts have really grown 😀
Looking forward to what Typography II has to offer!!