TO CLARITY Process Book Oct 9–Nov 1, 2018 Lily Greenwald
“We are all creating an archive of our own lives, whether we’re aware of it or not.” -Hasan Elahi
The research for this project was fairly simple. All of the critical information was handed to us in a box folder. I had to figure out the organization/presentation of all of this information. At the beginning of the project, I wanted to see if I could find a typeface that I have not used before and experiement. I tried out many typefaces in my type speciman sheets seeing what worked best. However, I also looked at typefaces that have been successful for me in the past so that if I get experiemental in other ways I knew the typeface would support me. Besides attempting creativity in my choice of typeface, I attempted the same in my choice of format. I wanted this calendar to be more than a series of textboxes. I tried not conform to the minimalistic nature that some of my peers find extrememly sucessful and add some life the project. Unfortunatley, I discovered that my more creative ideas would not work out for clarities sake.
“I am tired of new media art works that are just silly and lazy and privileged.� -Morehshin Allahyari
As mentioned before, discovery was the discovery of unsuccessful experiments. However, it forced me to rediscover some of my ideas and perhaps simplify them. For example, I was very excited by my puzzle piece iteration and my final had pieces that all fit together nicely, like a puzzle, but without the complex forms to distract from the text. I fell back on to the promise to go crazy with a typeface and used my favorite typeface: Sentinel. But, I also used Scala Sans, a new typeface for me, and it was nice seeing how the two interacted with each other; both have a lot of character but when scaled correctly and weighted differently they can balance each other out. Additionally, Sentinel handles numbers better than Scala Sans so it was helpful to have both of them in my arsenal. Another major issue was incorporating images. In the beginning I avoided even placing them in my iterations. Eventually, I found spots from them in a similar matter I found spots for all the body text.
“I don’t have that kind of clarity ahead of time and I don’t have that kind of agenda.”
-Diana Al Hadid
Once I started with color, I couldn’t stop. I knew I wanted to keep the fall theme as my color scheme. However, there were multiple moments of doubt when I looked around the room and saw lack of color in many of my peers posters. So, I decided to make a more minimalistic version that included the colors but only in the numerals. I liked the simplicity this version held, but in the long run it didn’t quite work. I probably could have worked more with it, but the color block version had more potential and more visual interest. In my iterations, placement of headings and images were the most difficult to figure out. I wanted to keep the structure of the grid because that was so integral to the overall design. Then, I had to figure out how to make sure the artwork was connected to the artist/event it belonged to. Eventually, a simple arrow sufficed. Then, I had to start thinking about the poster side. I did not want to start thinking about the poster side. When I did think about it I thought I came up with some good ideas, but in the long run they weren’t as successful as they could be and I had to look back to the images for inspiration.
“No longer minimal, light and thin, but full bodied, soft, glowing and sometimes trasnformative, these solids give us comfort, ground us, and wrap us in a soft embrace.” -Winka Dubbeldam
A major area of critique/concern was handling the images and text on the poster side of the calendar, also known as the entire poster side of the calendar. How do I relate the two sides together? First, I had to address color. I needed the same vibrant, saturated color that was introduced on the calendar side. But, I needed to convey that color through the images. The placement of the text had to reflect how the text was handled on the calendar side. But, I needed to scale it up. There were many challenges involved, thus many iterations needed to be made. The calendar side needed final adjustments when it came to space and clarity. I needed to connect the images with the events. Also, the large text needed to fit in well within the puzzle I created while managing to breathe within the confined space they were placed. Space was also an issue for the logo on both sides. I manipulated the color grid I created to place the logo and parking warning on the calendar side. On the poster side, it was a simple matter of treating the logo as somewhat of an equal by aligning it to the “Fall 2018” block.