Just Simple

I recently found an interesting film about industrial design. It talks about how we have interacted with objects over the years and how it may change within the future as we draw away from archetypes. The documentry is interesting and worth a look if your interested in interaction.

Objectified does bring up some good points about bad design. I often wonder why we put up with bad design in programs such as mircosoft word and excel. Although both programs come from the same family neither follow a pattern I can easily understand. Everytime I have opened the software a new menu always seems to come up instead of the same menu I am use to.

This documentry made me think about the objects I use everyday in my life. Most seem seamless, such as my bag and wallet.

Here’s a small clip from the movie about Apple:

I’m always interested in other aspects and disciplines of design. Although design as a whole is vast I can see there are similarities between disciplines and process.

The other day I found an interesting review site called Red Letter Media. What sets this review site apart from other is the way the reviewer (with a little bit of humour attached) breaks down the movie stage by stage. He explains why a movie works, through character development, what emotion the movie evokes. What really impresses me is he doesn’t say bad or good things about the movie without reason. This reminds me of what we were taught while learning design.

An example is to do with “Disney Eyes”.  He explains characters with wide eyes are more identifible and gain the audience’s sympathy due to look that they have nothing to hide. Where are characters with beady looking eyes are less likely to gain the audience’s sympathy due to looking like they have something to hide. This is all true and can be backed up in People Watching by Desmond Morris

He explains in one review that sometimes movie makers forget that they should aim to envoke an emotion, an aspect that I have to remember when designing. As designers we sometimes forgot we are trying to get a reaction out of people not to make things look pretty.

I really appreciate the time and effort this person has put into these reviews. Not only are they humourous but go into great detail! I’ve embedded the first part of the review. For the 2nd part if you are still interested go to his website.

For a link to Red Letter Media’s Site:

http://www.redlettermedia.com/

I just recently found this site and thought it was too good not to share. It’s a resource for old and new Australian TV. It’s interesting to see how Australian TV has evolved over the years. From tacky commericals about the world of tomorrow to tackier commericals of the kid in the pie shop. Be warned though you could lose a lot of time exploring old television commericals and episodes you haven’t seen in years.

Here’s the link to the site: http://australianscreen.com.au/

I just thought this was interesting. Made in 1945 to teach about the importance of work safety.

I found this site the other day while browsing for movies titles. I found most movies these days are mediocre and the titles are the only thing that excites me. I was surprised to learn that there are some sites out there devoted to just the titles of the film. I’m also surprised at the thought that goes into typography and animation.

Here’s a link to the site

Forget the film, watch the titles