Film; Citizen Kane

The film traces the life of Charles foster kane, a man whos career in the publishing world is born of idealic social service but gradually evolves into a rtuhless pursuit of power. It foucuses on flashbacks through the film of different incidents and from different points of view. Basically Kane dies and uters a last breath saying "Rosebud" a reporter then goes delving into Kanes life and past before he died to try and dig up any mysterious findings and also to find the meaning of his last word.

The film has been voted number one many times in American poles and it does take some getting into when you first begin to watch it but as the plot thickens and puzzles get solved the overall feeling I got from the film was through Kanes rise into power taking over the newspapers and gaining a dominant stance in the world the only time he was truly happy was when he was poor and had very little and no desire to gain power. The rest of his life although being wealthy and powerful he wasnt truly happy, and it goes to show that power and money are not what can solve things or make you happy.

Design;Apple i phone

Using a laptop to work on the move is becoming almost as common as reading the paper on your daily commute. More than a quarter of us read email and get a head start on the working day, according to the future foundation. One in 10 commuters works on a laptop on the train and just as many email on their smartphone. Although they're first and foremost mobile phones and we'll always use them to make calls, the new breed of phones do much more. Once restricted to executives with a blackberry and an IT department, mobile email is easy to use on a wide range of phones. Mobile web browsers have been primative, but the iphone has improved the experience dramatically and other smart phone browsers are set to catch up quickly. Iphone users search with google 50 times more than other phone users but mobile browsing generally has increased 89 percent in the last year according to measurement service M:Metrics.

The Iphone has lead the way in innnovation it is changing the face of mobiles and putting pressure on its competitors, it looks good, is simple to use and aas i forementioned allows you to work and email any where. I think within the next few years all or most of all mobiles will follow down this path almost cancelling out the need for laptops.

Artist; Ant macari

Macari is an artist with a difference, quoted from the baltic "Macari’s direct physical response to the space has resulted in a new series of site-responsive drawings, traceable throughout the building. This presentation of Ant Macari’s work is expansive and involving, presenting new visual challenges to us in and around the gallery that reaches beyond the conventional art exhibition."

He uses as you can see from the photo all the space he has available to him in the room he is situated in to produce his art. He leaves codes and hints in his work and forms paths to illusions hidden secrets. He uses a diverse array of techniques from tonal to line shading and isometric drawings, he involves the viewers in a fantastic way when his art is displayed. I see it as marketing art in a different sense taking in and using everything he can around him. His art could be classed as grafitti if seen on streets etc but is grafitti classed as art? However becuase it is setup in exhibitions it is known as contemporary art . Viewers are often handed guides asking them if they can find the puzzles hidden within the art of lines and crazy drwaings. It reminds me of alice in wonderland sorts of themes or pans labrynth.

Website; www.walkit.com

Co-owner and founder of walkit.com launched the UK'S first online walking route planner and now turns over 250,000 pound and recives 55,000 hits on the site a month. This site to me is a simple product with good innovation and design. Walkit was started for people to be able to measure how long it would take for them to walk from a meeting to their office in central London rather than them driving, as walking is the quicker option but people didnt belive or seem to realize it. The essence of walkit is ' given the right information people can beat the grind of the daily commute using their feet. ' The wevsite doesnt spend anything on marketing and only uses word of mouth, which of course is the most powerful marketing a company can get. People having been giving up the car and bus ride to work because through the site they have realized that walking is quicker, this is leading the way to a more enviromentally friendly City and healthier people.

Design; Lexus GS450h

The Lexus S450 is the world's first luxury car to go into production employing a petrol-electric hybrid powertrain. This is a fantastic idea of innovation especially with the ever rising cost of fuel prices, it apparantly cuts the price of fuel for the user by a quater if not more, The GS450h also emits 30 grams less of climate changing carbon-dioxide per kilometre, which is a massive kay point as global warming is becoming such a major issue in our current time. The Lexus isnt cheap coming in at approximatly 100,00 american dollars, but I think its leading the way for all car manufacturers and industry. Imagine how much cheaper it would be to run your car on a quarter if not less of the price. Performance isnt an issue either the engine kicks in at certain rev points for those steep hills or important quick takeovers. However the engine only kicks in when needed and thus is fantastic for those long cruising journeys at a steady speed which will save you loads on fuel price and consumption.

Architecture; Durham Cathedral

As you driveup and over the A690 into Durham and glance at the welcometo County Durham sign you will then be amazed at the sight in front of you which is now a world re-nowned world heritage sight. Durham Cathedral is the greatest Norman building in England, perhaps even in Europe. It is cherished not only for its architecture but also for its incomparable setting. In a nationwide BBC poll held in 2001 it was voted the nation's best-loved building. Like Hadrian's Wall and the Angel of the North, it is an icon of north-east England, its image is instantly recognisable to people who love this part of Britain.

The cathedral sits on a hill of land surrounded by the river wear. The cathedral is built in Norman style and architecture and is also the tomb of saint Cuthbert. When I've visited the Cathedral its stain glass windows and pillar stone supports whcih reach up to 30 feet high are sculpurtured and crafted to perfection. You get a strong emotional feeling when you enter the cathedral from the huge vast halls and endless room between the floor and ceiling. The student housing and accomadation for Durham University is also built onto the church and all the first year students still live there as was the same in Norman times for settlers in Durham. The court yard was deigned to open up onto the main town centre and so is a beautiful spot for students and familys to rest, picnic and just chill out. For me the building itself is beautiful and is a grat landmark to have for Durham as it is the first and last thing you see whn entering/leaveing the city.

Museum; Sainsburys

Lets face it if your doing a brief based on or anything to do with food, where's the best place to visit? A food supermarket. Its full of branding, attracting colours, user guides and information layout ideas. If you ever get the chance to look around a supermarket simply for research purposes rather than with food on the mind you ll notice a lot more. You even notice what people are attracted to and how the supermarkets attract them by interior layout, whats in your face, whats not!! the height of the shelving the colours of the products? Look along a shampoo shelf ? hundreds upon hundreds of bottles all lined up next to each other, which one is screaming to you grab me as you look along because 90 percent of the time it will be screaming to people looking for what your looking for, ask a friend to do the same and see what screams to them. Its a great way and source of gathering fast information for marketing products. Even Product design itself, there are vast amounts of all asorted packing methods and ideas on the shelves. Think of it as a library but with physical objects rather than books and pictures. You can even touch !!!!

Books; Jim Krause Idea Books

I own these books and there a fantastic source of inspiration, ideas, research, valuable information and general interest. There a collection all by the same author Jim Krause, each book is full of examples of work related to the title not designed to be copied but designed as possibly a starting point a a spark of inspiration for when your stuck on that impossible brief. From experience they really do work as well, taking two minutes out just to skip through a relevant book provides you with hundread's of flowing ideas. I would strongly recommend them to any designer with lots of briefs on the go. The colour index provides a vast archive of rgb and cmyk colour codes all in order of 'nature', 'love', 'fresh' etc so if your looking for that perfect colour its basically a massive colour wheel in one book.

Artist; Yoshitomo Nara

I actually first noticed this artists work in the Baltic Flour mill As pre-mentioned in one of my earlier posts and his work immediately stuck with me and so I started looking into his work and collection and they are a vast funny, original, different and interesting collection of work.

Yoshitomo in my mind uses his talent to bring ordinary everyday people and there actions to life by simple and stimulating illustrations. He has produced thousands of pictures and he often goes to small villages and observes the community and begins to base and draw his illustrations on the people in the community depicting out things that they are doing which are unique. It shows a very simple way of how otherwise normal things that we overlook and don't notice can become intriguing and interesting. His style is very individual and he seems to always use pastel colours and light tones, he uses outlines rather than dark and light shading to depict shadows and depth, however some use of gradual gradient can be seen in the dominant black and whites. The picture below is a great example of how ordinary life can be brought alive and become fascinating through Yoshitomo's characteristic illustrations.

Film; Muhammad Ali The greatest

Not the film with Will Smith in, but actually the story and following of Muhammad Ali throughout his life and the amazing beliefs he stood for and trials and tribulations he went through to stand by them.

The film portrays Muhammad Ali and his amazing fights and life story, it has footage never seen before on television or ever aired and is kind of like an in depth documentary on him. Ali is a huge inspiration of mine from being the best boxing fighter in the world he didn't let the fame and fortune corrupt him. The film starts as a young boy and his dreams and ambitions and follows him through the stripping of his heavy weight title, his imprisonment, his fights and most of all his beliefs and what he stood for. I find it quite an emotional and inspiring film to watch and you find out alot more about Ali than just his fame, you begin to get a deeper understanding of the life he choose to live and how even the government is strong enough to weaken one man.

Museum; Baltic

The Baltic Flour Mill

This art/modern contempory museum sits on the river Tyne's keyside. The Baltic has no permanent collection it is an ever changing archive of exhibitions by talented artists from all over the world, it ranges from blockbuster shows to art and the community demonstrations. It is a great place to discover fresh ideas and inspirations with its ever changing pieces of work. The building itself was converted from an old flour mill into what is now the museum. The Baltic is the biggest gallery of its kind IN THE WORLD. It has seen over 2 million visitors in the 6 years it has been opened and has become a landmark of Newcastle. Inside it has vast shelves of books on art and the design world as a great archive for research, along with lecture theatres and workshops it is a fantastic learning and motor-vating place.

Architecture; Interior; Sports World International

The reason I ve decided to debate a post on this isn't because of the clothes they sell, the colours they use, there identity. Its because of the way the interior has been designed and laid out although for a lot of you who have shopped there in the past may think ' but its just a mess' it is actually designed to be layed out and planned like this..... and guess what it works!! hugely works. I worked for the company for 5 years in the one same shop and I know myself trying to just get to the next floor is a nightmare. People with prams cursing and screaming about the lack of space cues of single isles weaving down to the tills at the back huge metal ball bins slammed right in your way just as you think your at the till, which yes is at the very very very back of the store, not at the front like most stores so you can pay as you leave.
All this is done on purpose, stands are crammed onto the shop floor to make it harder for people to get past for the simple reson that it makes them stop and look at the stand!! As there fighting there way past I would see them all the time swearing and getting annoyed due to lack of space then suddenly stop and ' oooo that looks nice' pick it and continue on this would happen all the way to the tills at the back. Thus the tills are placed at the back so the customers have no other choice than to pass every single stand and have no choice but to view every single item before they can pay and in most cases ensures they leave with a lot more than what they came in for.

Sports World is now almost a Monopoly in the department store market with only JJB competing with them.
I think the statistics speak for themselves at how clever Architecturally interior designing of a shop even in the case of being annoying to the customer actually works. Super markets like Asda and Tesco are the same, its all about getting the customer to notice and be interested in as many items as possible.

Architecture; Penshaw Monument

No this is'nt Greece Its Newcastle!

Penshaw monument was built in 1844 on the hill of Penshaw in memory of the first earl of Durham. It was based on the Temple of Hephaestus in Athens the one seen on Jason and the Argonourts. It is 100 feet long and 73 feet wide, each column is 6 feet in diameter. The monument features on Sunderland afc s Football badge and is also said to be the place of the lambton worm. I find this piece interesting probably for the wrong reasons, I appreciate the structure and that it looks impressive but like I said this isn' t Greece!! Whats funny about this design is that if you ve ever travelled up the A1/M1 to Newcastle and turned up the A19 to head into Newcastle you ll probably see this and to put it simply it looks out of place, Architecturally its fantastic, it even has an engraved staircase all the way round the pillars that lead to the top for you to walk around, but looking at it, you have a symbolic Greek Structure on a hill surrounded by bright red brick housing, 3 Industrial estates one of which produces huge amounts of steam 24/7 and a huge fast pace constantly busy motorway?? Now to me just talking about this makes me smile, Architecturally this has no symbolic reference to the North at all I could understand if it was a Monument of stature based on our mining in the old days or our ship yards, but its based on a Greek gods temple. I guess for me in my opinion this is Architecturally designed well but Architecturally placed wrong.

Architecture; Sydney Opera Theatre Tiling

Now we all know the Sydney Opera house is a fantastic piece of Architecture, but what struck me most when i saw it was the tiling structure it made from. When seen on all the post cards it looks white and plain but when looked up close as you can see in the photos its far from this. It has a very symmetrical tiling system that runs over each part of the Theater consisting of white diamond tiles and a dark cream diamond tile that is separated down the middle. Even the separations are interesting they appear at exactly the same distance apart spread every where. When you get up close and forget the obvious fact that the structure is meant to be viewed from a distance you see a different side to the structure. You could say it looks dirty as the cream tiles are a close tone to soil and muck.

Or is it done on purpose to stop strong reflections from the sun blinding the ships on the river?????

The tiles reminded me of a space shuttle and the overall structure which is comprised of 10 segments reminded of individual orange pieces cut in half or shark fins sticking out from the water.I havent been able to find the answer to why the tilings were created like this but never the less I find them an interesting piece of architecture design.

Architecture; Tyne Bridge and Sydney Bridge

"An over looked piece of design" in my opinion.

The tyne bridge is a compression arch suspended-deck bridge over the river tyne in Newcastle where im from. It links Gateshead and Newcastle and was designed and engineered by Mott, Hay and Anderson. It was officially opened by George 5th.

The bridge although not that well known is actually quite a landmark in the North East it has become symbolic of our awsome nightlife and brand new key side which holds the Baltic and Opera house with new developments springing up all the time making it one of the most wanted living areas in the North. I guarantee if you've ever been on the train into Newcastle traveling over the water and seeing the bridge with Newcastle's key side back drop will excite you.

Besides that it is more famous, the well known Sydney Harbour Bridge was based on the Tyne bridge, its structure, colour, design and ergonomics were all based around the Tyne's.
Compare the two pictures you will notice the similarities. Now for me living in Newcastle to have our bridge be studied and copied and then built in the famous and beautiful Sydney Harbor makes me feel proud because it s a bridge that I ve crossed and millions of people cross every year but it doesn't get recognized to the extent that the Sydney Bridge does and for this reason I think the Tyne Bridge is a fantastic architectural design having influenced one of the most famous bridges in the world.

Design; Coke a Cola the can, bottle, slogan

The coke side of life!! I love illustration and I especially have always liked cokes, I've never yet seen a more interesting glass bottle, not only do you get coke out of it but just look at these adverts and see what else you can get from coke. The colours used are very specific and unique and proclaim mountains of emotions and feelings and also symbolisms.
The far left one reminds me of the 'beautiful game' quite a few years ago with the old full colour strips and real raw passion and emotion behind each player.
The middle one gives me strong vibes of real Spain, strong intense red with blues and violets a fast pace samba dance, with rhythm and feeling behind it.
The far right one again is similar although veering more on the Jamaican side of life all chilled like Bob Marley feelings strong nature and going back to your roots feelings away from city life and hustle and bustle.
What is also different about these adverts is that the colours and images used are generated from other cultures other than English but also ' the coke side of life' is printed in another language and says something different, i think about music, enhancing the 'samba' essence feel.

I love the way Coke introduces another side of life its always been ' always coca cola' or or the coke side of life both two very powerful statements to make but i think they live up to there slogan through there design, the coke bottle is such a symbolic icon now and to hold and touch and feel, its great, it feels solid in your hand through the thick glass they use slightly, coloured blue to give that chilled feeling and the deep dark black and browns fizzing inside, it feels like your holding more than just a bottle.The bottle hasn't really changed much over the years and of course they ve always kept that distinct embossed cocal cola on the side.

I always feel like coke is constantly the in thing and cool to drink it never seems to get old and fizzle out like how i feel Pepsi has. They always manage to keep it fresh and I think its strongly to do with the designing of the bottle and strong use of slogans that keep them in the now.



'The classic 6.5 ounce contour bottle was developed at the Root Glass Company in 1915 as part of a nationwide competition for a standard bottle for Coca-Cola.

Until the development of this unique package, bottlers had used straight-sided containers in a wide variety of shapes, sizes and colors.

The contour bottle received a rare distinction for packaging when, in 1977, it was granted registration as a trademark by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Experts estimate that the contour bottle is recognized by 90% of the world‘s population.'

(www.signature-line.com/.../02_ContourBottle.html)

Website; http://www.lynxeffect.com.au

http://www.lynxeffect.com.au

Despite the OBVIOUS fact of why a lad my age would this site, thats not actually why I've decided to make a post on it.
This site is unbelievable, its more like a games console than a website, to date I haven't found a website that is as interesting and as stimulating as this, and its not just because of the pretty girls. The site use flash and some PHP coding and if you've ever used flash you ll know its not to bad certain things are tricky etc depending on your knowledge and then obviously getting the correct coding is even harder.
However this site makes it look easy its very very fast loading times are impressive and the fluidity of the changes and response times are even more. Most sited with flash I ve found although look great often take time to load and respond THIS SITE DOES NT!!!! Whats even more so is the content and interactive side it can entertain you for hours. To some Flash expert once viewed it may seem an easy task but to a 21 year old student who's just experiencing the endless limitations of Flash and coding its certainly an inspiration.
The only flaw I found with it was the accessibility obviously it does nt gain w3 schools certificate due to the flash encoding etc but the navigation is a bit complicated and tricky for the site, I found myself going through endless pages of girls and girls (not that i was to bothered) before i found information I was looking for.

Website; http://www.dna11.com/

http://www.dna11.com/
produce art based on you SERIOUSLY BASED ON YOU. They use your DNA to create DNA portraits or your fingerprints or kiss prints to do the same, opening up a new market in art that really is based on you. This blog post goes in hand with my ' can a fingerprint be classed as design debate'. They have used great innovation to think of a simple method that will people to won art specifically for them great for couples or newly weds. I suppose the down side is that you wouldn't really know if it was your DNA match or finger print match unless you were a biologist and could splice your own DNA but regardless i think the concept and idea behind it is great.









I would personally rather have this that all the new contemporary art that is pouring into our society, I still appreciate the modern artist that has new and invigorating ways of expressing themselves but i think this type of art would be a lot more specific to the client for obvious reasons and would express the client in art rather than the artists expression of the client in art.

Design; Finger Print

We look at art as design, buildings, sculptures, books, films, adverts! but why not ourselves?

Take our finger print for example, it is unique to us, it is our own personal identification system, it is perfectly formed and shaped and is renewable, free and available for us to view 24/7 at our own pleasure. I cant think of any other design that matches that criteria.

SO CAN OUR FINGERPRINTS BE CALLED DESIGN???

In my opinion yes, nature is classed as deign and also as a work of art in some cases and we are nature. Our finger prints are unique to us but other nature has there own fingerprints with there own unique 'design'. Trees have there circles of life once cut, dogs have there paw prints even each specific coral in the ocean has its own unique pattern design like our fingerprints.
Although we cannot change or colour our fingerprint like we would a painting I still think it is classed s a form of design.

Design; Persil Tablet (Unileaver)

When it comes to design innovation in detergents it is mainly scientific based good performance and practicality is generally still the most important thing to consumers when buying a washing detergent, thus companies need to design better detergents that produce cleaner results. So it is up to detergent companies to use design innovation to produce detergents that are practical, environmentally friendly and that will produce good results on lower temperatures thus being more eco friendly.
Persil were the first company to produce a detergent that was in the form of a tablet, however there was much more to this new innovating design than the fact that it was more easy and practical to use. Persil manufactured by Unilever has a dominant 27% share of the fiercely competitive £1 billion UK household detergent market, where design and innovation is crucial. Unilever considers design to be crucial in pulling together the research, development and manufacturing operations to develop the product, which will secure the most market share (Competitive advantage through design MARCH 2002). Yet just as important to the company are its environmental issues which are a huge concern in the 21st century. Its policies include using environmental management tools to evaluate the potential whole life cycle effects of the Persil product, from the extraction and processing of raw materials through to manufacturing, packaging, distribution, use and eventual disposal (Competitive advantage through design MARCH 2002).
Many detergents have been produced over the past few years that are eco friendly but have failed because they do not do their job as well, but Persil created the tablets that were not only eco friendly but also produced excellent results and were extremely practical; all you needed to do was place a tablet in the washer, which eradicated the need of measuring out certain powders and mixing them. The tablet was also kind to skin and was backed by the British skin foundation, which put again Persil further ahead in there sector because parents of young children now new the detergent would not harm there Childs skin thus that is why Persils campaign comprises of the phrase “dirt is good” encouraging children to play and get dirty. Another advantage of the tablets was the fact they were pre measured. Research showed that most people used more than was needed when it came to pouring the powder and so having the tablet at the right amount was again more friendly to the environment, less powder was being wasted so less needed to be produced.

Artist; Ewan Uglow

When comparing Morandi to the artist Ewan Uglow whose style of tone is different it is interesting to see how Uglow depicts out the light and dark of the forms and the huge colour differences he uses to display this, more like Cezanne. Uglow is a British artist who often painted the human figure and still life, his work uses block tone to differentiate the differences between the light and dark areas. Notice below how compared to Morandi the way Uglow uses block s of colour to create the shading on the pear rather than a smooth gradient like Morandi. In my opinion it is not as effective as to me it creates a block like structure because the eye cannot gradually move round a gradient it has to see one bock of colour then skip to the next to perceive the form.






I still think the way Uglow achieves the tonal value of the green colour is very effective however I feel Morandi s way of smoothly allowing the eye to see his forms is more effective. I can see that Uglows way could be more perceived as abstract although he does keep a certain distinction of reality in his work the way it is blocked on to me just isn’t realism in still life, although I am open to other forms of realism and admire there technique as an inspiration in other ways. My favourite is the approaches of Morandi and other Italian Artists such as Michelangelo. Another example of Uglows block tonal work can be seen in this still life painting of a figure where the body seems to be made up of segments of tone, this can be a lot like line tonal art as that is a collective of lines in places to create the form where as this is a collective of certain tonal colour values grouped together to create the form.













In conclusion there are many types of tonal art on all kinds media and the way each distinctive artist uses tone to create there work gives the viewer a different experience, to me when I look at smooth deep tonal work with slight values of colour to create form such as Morandi, I see depth and a certain link to real life viewing compared to when I see work such as Uglows I see blocks of different colour that relate flat shapes but each viewer is to there own and there is no right or wrong way it is just an expression of the Artists perception.

pictures:
(http://bavaroclasswork.homestead.com/files/Uglow-Seated-Fig.jpg)
(http://bavaroclasswork.homestead.com/planarartists.html)

Artist; Georgio Morandi

No artist in my mind in the twentieth century captured as much drama in their work as Georgio Morandi did in his small paintings of still life, flowers and landscapes. Again he was an Italian artist who grew up in small town named Bologna, his work shows relation to ‘Cezanne’ and cubism.
‘One of the few Italian artists of his generation to have escaped the taint of Fascism, and to have evolved a style of pure pictorial values congenial to modernist abstraction. Through his simple and repetitive motifs and economical use of colour, value and surface’ (Ambramowicz Giorgio Morandi: The art of silence. Janet Abramowicz 2004.)
I find the way ‘Morandi’ uses the value of tones to create his work fascinating if you look closely you can see how the deep black tone gradually lightens or darkens as forms are being created and this slight on value gives the work its edge and realism, notice the picture how the swirled vase seems to go from light to dark but still maintain its form of swirls.
A shadow can also be seen but it is very gentle and does not over power the painting, Morandi somehow still manages to keep the texture of the surface but also adds a lower tonal value to create the shadow this again in my opinion is a great example of how the human eye would also observe it. The same can be seen in the examples below.















You can see where cubism and Cezanne have played and influence on Morandi in these pieces or art, however Cezanne to me tended to stray away from the subtle shading and go for a more enhanced way of depicting light and darks even by completely using a different colour such as a secondary or tertiary colour.

pictures:
(http://www.askart.com/AskART/photos/COL20070618_4699/27.jpg) (http://www.artsjournal.com/man/images/MorandiLucas.jpg)
Giorgio Morandi Ntura Morta still life. (Arts right society New York)

Artist: Italian Art ; Michelangelo and Battista Franco

I find Italian art to be the most powerful tonal art, the way the Italian artists use tone to create shapes and forms and depict out the light and dark to deceive the eye and create such a realism almost like a photo.
Such work as by Michelangelo and Battista Franco of still life using shading to create the forms of the body, to create an illusion and also a perspective to the viewer. The simplicity of the tone shows by how minimal the use of it is, the pieces are not heavily shaded and there is plenty of space on the canvas. Michelangelo and Franco are not scared to show this space and allow the eye to wander, depict and seek out the forms of the body.
This is similar to modern day advertising and modern art, people are often scared of space and feel they must fill but I personally believe when used in the correct way allowing space can be more powerful than filling it up.

Picture 1. Batisa Franco. Seated Nude Youth.
Picture 2. Michelangelo. Christ at the column
(The contribution of Philip Pouncey. The study of Italian Drawings. 1994)