Forgetfulnessness

Final

2009-01-05T12:04:00.001-08:00

My Little Rabbits

2008-11-23T22:40:00.000-08:00

I had them when I was in Grade 7.

Icon

2008-11-20T04:32:00.000-08:00

My Little "Pet"

2008-11-19T23:48:00.001-08:00

I caught it on monday. It ate my whole pack of melon seeds.

New Idea

2008-11-19T22:10:00.001-08:00

New idea came out of chaos. After some very rough sketching, I gave up my original idea which is to create geometric icon for each message. Instead, I will use more realistic picture as the icon. The icon is not directly representing the message, but relevant to it. That is more interesting, and has more fun.

Some Interesting Signs

2008-11-19T00:46:00.001-08:00

Position

2008-11-13T13:17:00.000-08:00

The bubble should be put in a position that, first of all, people can see and read it. When the person closely interacts with the bubble, I also want it to be as if the bubble comes out of the person's head, so the bubble should not be rising too high. Slightly above an average person's height will be perfect. Besides with the people, the bubble also has a relationship with its corresponding object. For example, if the message is "lock the door", the corresponding object is the door. The height of the bubble is relatively fixed. The bubble should be just above or next to its corresponding object so that it is easy for the audience to make connection (association). There are places where the bubble should not be put to: 1. other objects will cut the sight of the bubble; 2. more than one nearby object can be corresponding to the message; movement of the object (like a window open and close) will interfere its position.

I Am Stuck

2008-11-13T01:54:00.000-08:00

Not too much fresh idea for this week. In other words, I am stuck. Please forgive me for being stuck.

Some Inspiration

2008-11-13T01:36:00.000-08:00

Things from Last Week

2008-11-13T01:34:00.000-08:00

After Seeing Blogs from the Other Class

2008-11-06T03:27:00.000-08:00

After seeing blogs from the other class, I think it is time to "beautify" my project. I think I am half step behind. Just half, not too big.

Nothing to Post for This Week

2008-11-06T02:00:00.000-08:00

Hmm, i was preparing my presentation instead.

Hit the Cupboard

2008-11-05T19:47:00.000-08:00

After I got a glass of water, I turned and my head hit the cupboard, heavily. Ouch! What an inspiration!

Absent

2008-10-30T08:46:00.000-07:00

Sorry my dear classmates and instructor. I will be absent today because I feel really sick... I seriously need some rest.

I have posted up all I have for this week. Please take a look. Thanks.

Scenario

2008-10-30T06:11:00.000-07:00

Colour

2008-10-30T05:47:00.001-07:00

White colour is always not a wrong choice, but using some other colours might make it more interesting. I believe light blue will be the most appropriate because Mr. Forgetfulness is in blue.

The text is in light colour too so that the viewers have to spend some effort in order to read. It is just like, spending effort to recall a thing.

Type

2008-10-30T05:31:00.000-07:00

For typeface, I would like to use a round one which fits the roundness of the bubble or balloon.

Thanks for Cindy's idea about using dash line to express the ambiguity of forgetfulness.

I personally prefer all lower case because it looks more friendly and lively.

The Messages on the Bubbles

2008-10-30T05:02:00.000-07:00

The messages (things that people usually, commonly, and likely forget) on the bubbles can be categorized into 4 big locations (for my target audience, 16 - 25 age group):

1. School, what a lovely place!

2. Home, as long as you are not homeless.

3. Office, as entry level workers.

4. Public space, places that we share.

Each location has its corresponding messages.

School:
1. Pay tuition fees (Financial Service)
2. Review for midterm (lecture room)
3. Bring my calculator (math classroom, high school)
4. Take my USB back (computer room)
5. Bring my assignment (classroom)
6. My ECUAD email password (ECUAD)
7. A wonderful idea (ECUAD)

Home:
1. Bring my key (near the door, outside)
2. Lock the door (near the door, inside)
3. Feed my dog (dog dish)
4. Expired milk (fridge)
5. Water my flowers (garden)
6. Turn off light (switch)

Office:
1. Reply to a client (phone)
2. Attend a meeting (somewhere in office)
3. Say hi to the boss (somewhere in office)

Public space
1. Get off next stop (inside a bus)
2. Bring my bus pass (bus stop)
3. Wash hands (washroom, restaurant kitchen)

For Ginger's Project

2008-10-30T03:21:00.000-07:00

Ginger you might have seen this image. I really like the idea of using 2D to express 3D. In my opinion, it will be more interesting that the 2D objects suddenly transform into some 3D elements. In this image, the person's head and smoke are drawings (2D), but his cigarette and his mouth are 3D. That is where the wonderfulness is, perhaps. Hope my understanding of what you are doing is correct... (I am the kind of stupid person who will mistakenly email my resume to those who are looking for jobs, instead of hiring...)

For Cindy's Project

2008-10-30T02:48:00.000-07:00

Here is an idea for Cindy's project. Hope she can read at least some Chinese. The image is a menu. It lists several super luxurious plates in big text, but at the end, in small text, it says "All of above, we do not have." Since the target audience is 18 to 20 something, i guess they are the most "demanding" age group. A list of things that they want will definitely attract their attention first (like, borrow most update video games, etc.) , but then, all these require their feedback in order to be realized. Understand what I am saying?

Slow Down

2008-10-30T01:56:00.000-07:00

For this week, I am slowing down again. Not much sleep since last Sunday. X________X OMG... Energy drink does not work anymore...

I am reading and commenting everyone's blog. Everyone's project is so interesting that I want to participate in (but sometimes it is hard to write comment) and put my own project away for a while... My head is stuffed with too many balloons. Haha.

Please forgive me for not having much to show for this week... I forgot to rest...

Some Sketches

2008-10-23T06:12:00.000-07:00

Blurry Text

2008-10-23T06:01:00.001-07:00

It would be interesting that the text on the bubble is blurry because a forgotten thought should be ambiguous.

My Work

2008-10-23T05:58:00.000-07:00

Inspiration

2008-10-23T05:52:00.000-07:00

Not Much to Say for this Week

2008-10-23T05:47:00.000-07:00

For this week, I do not have much to say. I focus on working on the tangible part of my project, and realize my manufacture ability is a way far from what I want to achieve. I have a lot of images to share with everyone. Enjoy! (Do not forget to give comment! I will give each of you a comment by Sunday. Promise!)

Wonderful

2008-10-16T16:21:00.000-07:00

I like this project more and more. How wonderful! I have seen my sun is rising up from the horizon.

A Good Influence

2008-10-16T00:57:00.000-07:00

Bubble Project

2008-10-16T00:43:00.000-07:00

Wow! It is the famous bubble project! Fun? Err, no comment.

Stuck

2008-10-16T00:39:00.000-07:00

Stuck? Then browse Youtube. It is a huge useful idea pool, yet which is not boring at all. I kind of forgot what I was doing.

Thought Bubble

2008-10-16T00:38:00.000-07:00

Imagine those thought bubbles are real and floating around.

Flying Lantern

2008-10-14T23:22:00.000-07:00

This is a huge insporation. I was always thinking about hydrogen balloon, but there are different types of balloons out there. This flying lantern is more fun because it can be seen at night.

The Difference Between Art and Design: Explanation

2008-10-12T05:06:00.000-07:00

The following are the most elite quotes from the previous post and my corresponding explanations.
("Q" stands for "quote", and "A" stands for "argument".)

First of all, we assume there is a sharp boundary between art and design.

Q: The differences between art and design lie not so much in how they look as in what they do: They have different purposes, they are made differently, they are judged by different criteria, and they have different audiences.

A: Yes, I totally agree, especially for "different purposes". I think art can have many purposes and its purposes can change upon different factors because it all depends on the viewers' understanding and feeling. Nevertheless, design usually has only one purpose which is strictly controlled by the designer (or those who "control" the designer at the back).

Q: Milton Glaser noted that whereas a design must convey a given body of information, the "essential function" of art is to "intensify one's perception of reality."

A: Yes, that is true. The given body of information of my project is 1. the places where forgetfulness has happened (where); 2. the contents of forgetfulness (what); 3. the identification of the forgetful people (who).

Q: The artist usually has an end in mind. The designer typically begins with more than a blank canvas or lump of clay from which anything may emerge.

A: Before he even starts, an artist knows what he will get at the end by following his intuition. I believe a designer follows his intuition too, but he use his intuition to make design decisions based on research. In the first class, Nelson Ho pointed out if you have a topic that you know what you are going to make for it, then do not do it because it will likely be a failure. (That is how I understand his words.) That is why I came up with such a complicated topic which I have little idea how to start, but after doing a lot of research, I am confident of completing it in an interesting and innovative way.

Q: Art is judged in terms of beauty and truth, of insight and revelation, of almost prophetic clairvoyance-when it isn't being judged as text, subtexts, and social constructs. Design is judged another way. Does the design serve the product? Does it accomplish an end--does it sell, inform, persuade, direct, or entertain? Typically, lack of success in these ways (often described statistically or quantitatively) is considered a defect in the design.

A: Art exists for itself, while design exists for a mission. (This quote is too commonly accepted to argue about.)

Q: The audience for art wants to look at the artwork or listen to the composition--perhaps to contemplate and reflect, perhaps to be transported by the power of the aesthetic experience or the scene portrayed; whereas a design's audience wants to use the information to find their subway station or select a product.

A: My project is definitely not just for being looked at as art piece, although it is indeed aesthetically attractive. People use the way finding system to find their subway stations, while they use my project, which has similar property as a way finding system, to find their memory moments (events of forgetfulness). They function in a similar way, but in different scales.

Q: Design graces our lives with the aesthetic presentation of useful and beneficial things, and art graces us with representations of things to ponder and perceive.

A: Haha! The author is almost like saying design is pretty and useful and art is beautiful but useless. How is my project beneficial? After interacting with my project, the audience become less uncomfortable to accept forgetfulness. Thus, the troubles and embarrassment caused by forgetfulness will have less serious impact on the audience. Therefore, the audience will have less stress. Stress is a big factor to cause forgetfulness. In this sense, they will become less forgetful. Is not it beneficial enough?

Q: Art often exists to provoke a reaction. Grphic design, however, is a branch of visual communication in which it is important that the message being communicated is received in the way that was intended.

A: I want to add that design also provokes a reaction, otherwise, its visual communication would be just like pages of boring plain text.

Q: If a designer produces a sign to direct people to the right place in a building, it has to do the job. Its function is not open to interpretation. Either it works, or it doesn't, and if it doesn't it fails.

A: Right. If my project can not serve its purpose, it fails. However, this judgement is very subjective. The effectiveness of a design can only be seen after it is completed and tested.

Q: A designer is similar to an engineer in that respect and must not only have an eye for color and style but must adhere to very intricate functional details that will meet the objectives of the project.

A: Again, this quote emphasizes that design is for achieving its objectives.

Q: No artist ever has to explain why they did something a certain way other than that this is what they felt would best portray the feeling or emotion or message.

A: My project is full of explanations about why the way it is. Every element has a "why" behind it. Most (not all) of those "why's" are not based my own feeling or emotion, but are based on research, analysis of target audience, and its purpose. In this sense, unfortunately, my project is not qualified as an art project. It has to be a design project.

In reality, however, art and design share a gray area. We commonly believe that design came from art. Actually, not only design is evolving to become its own, but also art is getting different from its ancient form when design has not been separated. A metaphor can be, design as white people (not being racism), art as black people (not being racism), and ancient art as their common ancestor (Adam and Eva?). White people and black people are obviously two different ethnic groups, but they are the same species. The relationship between art and design is not parent and child, but is cousins (parallel).

Q: I feel that designers who are passionate about their work should try and dedicate time to create "art" for art sake and train themselves to express emotion and feeling through their designs.

Q: Following trends and applying imagery based on specific needs and goals is the easy part, allowing yourself to express a message or emotion free of any specifications is where true beauty is born.

Q: Designers who are looking for the next big trend or who want to be the one to create that trend must create chaotic and truly original pieces to display their artistic prowess and then apply those unique methods to their design at work and i think this will create a truly harmonious balance between art and design.

Q: The Designer must learn to draw upon the techniques and discoveries made by the Artist. The Artist, conversely, may use tools developed by a Designer. Therefore, you see, it is both a sensory process and a feedback loop upon which Art and design rely in order to function cooperatively.

A: Showing some art traits in my project does not mean it becomes an art project. It has a clear purpose which is to change people's negative feelings towards forgetfulness into being more relaxed (less stressed to yourself) and forgiving (more sympathetic to yourself and others). It has a given body of information: 1. the places where forgetfulness has happened (where); 2. the contents of forgetfulness (what); 3. the identification of the forgetful people (who). It has specific target audience which is 16 to 25 age group who have the best memory capacity. You may ask: why not the elderly audience? Aging is a natural and unavoidable factor in affecting forgetfulness. Targeting an elderly audience whose memories have been declining due to aging will be disrespectful. Also, people within the 16 to 25 age group should not have concern about forgetfulness, but it does happen to them in an over-frequent way, mainly because of stress from life. My project is to remove their unnecessary stress from being forgetful. Alzheimer's disease and stress both have negative impacts on our memories. The former is in physiological level and usually affecting elderly people, and the latter is in psychological level and usually affecting younger people. Both deserve equally amount of attention and care.

In conclusion, my project is obviously a design project.

The Difference Between Art and Design: Reading

2008-10-12T04:36:00.000-07:00

The following essays tell you the difference between art and design, which make my project a design project more obvious.

Art and Design: What is the Big Difference?
1998 Michael Brady. First published in Critique Magazine 1998.

From time to time, you hear people refer to art and to design interchangeably, as if they were synonyms. Or they use the term "art" to add a bit of glory to design work. Most of the time this happens in casual conversation, but it does tend to confuse the two terms unnecessarily because, basically, they aren't the same. What is the difference between art and design? Are they closely related just because they use a lot of the same techniques and appeal to the same aesthetic sense? Or are they essentially different?

Well, art and design are different. The differences between art and design lie not so much in how they look as in what they do: They have different purposes, they are made differently, they are judged by different criteria, and they have different audiences.

Purpose

In a 1974 interview, Milton Glaser noted that whereas a design must convey a given body of information, the "essential function" of art is to "intensify one's perception of reality." Sometimes, he said, these functions coincide, as in a medieval stained glass window, but in modern times they have diverged.

Design is utilitarian in a way that art is not. Design is the how of a thing: how to order the parts, how to serve the client's interests, how to convey the information. Art, on the other hand, is its own end. It isn't utilitarian. It subordinates ordinary usefulness to its own purposes. It doesn't concern itself with description the way illustration does, nor with the desires of the buyer as does fashion, nor the tastes of the public as does style

We have already accepted this model in both its parts--it's settled law. Since in the Renaissance, artists have aspired to the status of philosophers. And beginning the mid-1800s, many artists chose to stand apart from worldly life in order to critique it, to forsake the programs of patrons in order to set their own programs, to discard the public moral code to promote a different code. Although many artists claim to address their art to the world, their method has been to take from the world only on their terms and give back as they see fit. This is definitely not the way of design, which considers the world's purpose first and fits the work to that end.

How they are made

If the ends of art and design are different, so too are the means of getting there. Most of us think, correctly, of the artist standing before the blank canvas, pondering the beginning and the end of the painting all at once. The artist usually has an end in mind--something as mundane as a portrait or landscape, or as grand as the outrage of Picasso's Guernica or the vastness of Christo's Running Fence. But at the outset, all the options are available without precondition.

On the other hand, the designer typically begins with more than a blank canvas or lump of clay from which anything may emerge. Many of the components may already exist, such as the text, photographs, production formats, and even the basic colors. The designer consults the client on the end use, the audience, the size and scale, and other factors. The designer's role is to envision how these various aspects should come together in a tangible thing and to bring aesthetic sensibility, taste, and technical skills to bear on the production of the job. To put it bluntly, the designer arranges the ingredients.

Artists generally have assumed that the work is a product of their mind and spirit first, and only secondarily serves the intent of the commission (to edify, to stimulate, to delight, or simply to decorate). A notable example is the 1884 commission of a memorial sculpture, The Burghers of Calais, for which Rodin made a striking group of six austere figures. But when the city fathers saw it, they rejected it: to them it was ugly, indecorous, unceremonial, and insulting to their notion of a heroic civic monument. Rodin had conceived it with his artistic genius, but they refused it out of hand because it appalled their sense of honor.

Making judgments

In 1820, Keats wrote, " 'Beauty is truth,truth beauty'--that is all / Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know." Older still is the motto, "Ars longa, vita brevis." Art strives to achieve beauty, which is truth, which is a noble thing more enduring that life itself. At least, that's the party line. In this century art has emphasized moral purpose, visionary truthfulness, and inward-looking integrity. Art is judged in terms of beauty and truth, of insight and revelation, of almost prophetic clairvoyance-when it isn't being judged as text, subtexts, and social constructs. Utility doesn't fit this mindset. Practical success is not the hallmark of art, as the example of Van Gogh attests.

Design is judged another way: "Beauty is as beauty does." If it doesn't get the job done, the design is considered not good, or worse, not successful. Does the design serve the product? Does it accomplish an end--does it sell, inform, persuade, direct, or entertain? Typically, lack of success in these ways (often described statistically or quantitatively) is considered a defect in the design. Ultimately, a design must fulfill its primary job of packaging or illustration or instruction, and no amount of aesthetic glamour will substitute for its failure to do so.

The audience

The audiences for art and design expect different things. The audience for art wants to look at the artwork or listen to the composition--perhaps to contemplate and reflect, perhaps to be transported by the power of the aesthetic experience or the scene portrayed--whereas a design's audience wants to use the information to find their subway station or select a product.

Design may indeed arrest the attention and engage the emotions of a viewer, but at some point, as Beatrice Warde said, the goblet of design must become transparent, allowing viewers to gather the intended information, rather than to be absorbed by the designer's layout.

Art draws attention to itself deliberately. Its very form is the means to intensify our perception. If a visitor to the Sistine Chapel marvels at the economy of the scene of God separating the light from the dark, she is responding to the Michelangelo's conception, his artistic free creation. But if she is moved by the Last Judgment because of the profound theological truth it expresses, she is responding to the Pope's purpose. That is, she treats it as information design, as an illustration of doctrine.

Materials

Art and design differ significantly in their use materials. Typically, the ultimate work is not made from the same materials as those used during the design process (the paste-up or, these days, the on-screen stuff) but of its manufacturing materials. A book is not actually "made" until it is manufactured from paper, ink, and binding. Another kind of design product, the digital document, doesn't actually exist apart from its temporary manifestation on a computer, where its appearance varies from one browser or platform than on another, depending on the monitor, operating system, and color display tables. By contrast, a work of art makes a point of reveling in its materials. Certain physical qualities are seen as critically significant, such as de Kooning's "painterliness," Pollock's drips, the encaustic of Johns's Three Flags, Murray's metal ribbons, or Schnabel's broken plates. Size itself is important in an artwork, whether it's a large Frankenthaler or Kiefer or a tiny Klee or Cornell, but in a way that differs from design. Perhaps it is better to distinguish between scale, that is, the perception of sheer size (even smallness) in a work of art, and production dimensions in a printed piece, which are very often a function of the budget, the kind of product, the size of press, and other external factors. (And for video, web pages, compter graphics, etc., size is a user-defined parameter.)

The difference between art and design is in the way we look at them. Design is meant to be looked away from and art to be looked at and into. Design graces our lives with the aesthetic presentation of useful and beneficial things, and art graces us with representations of things to ponder and perceive. Art and design are closely related but nonetheless separate. It is a good thing to keep them straight.

Art Vs. Design
by Craig A ElimeliahJanuary 13, 2006

I have read so many books and articles on design and on art, what it is and how it should be executed. I must admit that since becoming a Producer my designing days have taken a backseat to management, i enjoyed being a designer and now I enjoy working with designers as well as every other aspect of production. I was at home contemplating what the difference between design and art is and I think I have come up with some pretty clear lines between the two and have also identified where those lines have become blurred.

Now it is my understanding that design in the commercial sense is a very calculated and defined process, it is discussed amongst a group and implemented taking careful steps to make sure the objectives of the project are met. A designer is similar to an engineer in that respect and must not only have an eye for color and style but must adhere to very intricate functional details that will meet the objectives of the project. The word "design" lends itself to a hint that someone or something has carefully created this "thing" and much planning and thought has been executed to produce the imagery or materials used for the project.

On the other hand Art is something completely separate, any good artist should convey a message or inspire an emotion it doesn't have to adhere to any specific rules, the artist is creating his own rules. Art is something that can elicit a single thought or feeling such as simplicity or strength, love or pain and the composition simply flows from the hand of the artist. The artist is free to express themselves in any medium and color scheme, using any number of methods to convey their message. No artist ever has to explain why they did something a certain way other than that this is what they felt would best portray the feeling or emotion or message.

Many designers are artists and many artists are designers, the line between the two is complex and intriguing. I was perusing some art books and something strange caught my eye, i had noticed that many of the artists were not creating a unique, almost chaotic portrait of their innermost selves or inspirations rather they were clearly using popular trends to capture the attention of the viewer. I noticed that many of the pieces being shown were "throwbacks" of past artists styles or color and simply refreshed for public consumption. The very fact that older artists inspire newer artists seems to contradict the whole definition of art. These artists are following a method, a pattern or a standard that has already been established by another artist and therefore they are not creating something completely new rather following instructions laid down by a previous artist rendering that piece to be more design than art.

I can completely appreciate the paths laid down by past artists who establish a style or method but at this point it seems that when that style or method is used the art then turns into design. I looked through some older books and saw a rather obvious occurrence in the art being displayed, many of the newer artists were simply copying things from the past. I admire a persons talent for picking up a brush and creating an image that has an impact on its viewer but when i see it over and over again by different people who are all claiming to be "of the school of...", and that this is legitimate, unique art, i find that a bit hard to swallow. If the artist said "I have designed something in the standard of Picasso" and this is simply a design based on his style but a new twist has been added then I would feel more comfortable accepting it for what it is, a design. But when an artists style and methods are completely the same as someone else's and even if the message is different I feel that this cannot be passed off as art because the newness and the chaotic nature of it simply flowing from the source seems to be absent and it becomes more like a paint by numbers project than a creation that has never been seen before.

I do not claim to be an expert on defining what art is and what it is not but i do know that if we look at the differences between art and design we will see a very clear line drawn between the two. An engineer, if given the exact coordinates to place different colored pixels in specific places could render a beautiful web site or ad simply by following instructions, most design projects have a detailed set of instructions and most design is based on current trends and influences. An artist on the other hand could never be given any specific instructions in creating a new chaotic and unique masterpiece because his emotions and soul is dictating the movement of his hands and the impulses for the usage of the medium. No art director is going to yell at an artist for producing something completely unique because that is what makes an artist an artist and not a designer.

I feel that designers who are passionate about their work should try and dedicate time to create "art" for art sake and train themselves to express emotion and feeling through their designs. Uniqueness comes from passion and not adhering to any rules that may force the artist to make even one stroke that was unintended. Commercialism has been dictating the course of design and has made a clear and thick line between the artist and the designer. Following trends and applying imagery based on specific needs and goals is the easy part, allowing yourself to express a message or emotion free of any specifications is where true beauty is born. Designers who are looking for the next big trend or who want to be the one to create that trend must create chaotic and truly original pieces to display their artistic prowess and then apply those unique methods to their design at work and i think this will create a truly harmonious balance between art and design.

Art and Design: A Comparison

Design is a deliberate planning process aimed toward specific or generalized results. Since Art is based upon the imaginative, fantastic or creative drives, it is a discovery process, fraught with adventures for the Artist’s mind. One solves problems with a product in mind, while the other has the encouragement of discovering novelty as its goal.

In order to create art, the Artist must be willing to experiment, search, explore and indeed, often risk failure. This takes a certain personal courage; it involves stepping off into unknown territories of the Artist’s mind. In the Art process, as contrasted with the design process, preplanned goals are counterproductive since the results should not be overly pre-visualized. The Artist must be willing to try novel techniques or to invent new tools and to use them in possibly accidental ways not previously experienced. This serendipitous approach brings about unexpected results.

In order for any design to be expressed, reasonably clear goals need to be envisioned, the creative tools must be available and of course used to solve problems. “Creative tools” refers to basic techniques, supplies and materials previously discovered by the Artist. A design is a plan that exhibits the attributes of dimensions, notes specific materials and technical operations that will, if used properly, result in a finished product. The designer’s imagination can be honed and focused in ways enabling visualization of the parts and sub-processes involved so that they can be organized and interrelated or tuned, resulting in a plan, model, rendering or other crystallization of the solution that moves the designer closer to their final goal.

Between pure Art and pure Design is a wonderful spectrum of possibility and adventure allowing creation of novel and sometimes-useful products.

The Designer must learn to draw upon the techniques and discoveries made by the Artist. The Artist, conversely, may use tools developed by a Designer. Therefore, you see, it is both a sensory process and a feedback loop upon which Art and design rely in order to function cooperatively.

Art is experimental and breaks new “ground” while Design is deliberate. Art is aimed at novelty while Design is more product-oriented. Art is necessarily creative, but Design is more constructive and is a problem-solving process mainly with utility in minds.

Graphic Design Is Not Art

A brief post over at "Graphically Speaking" by Michael Kovalchick (who describes himself as a student - I think my earlier point is being made for me) made me dig out an old post I made a year ago on the subject of art v graphic design. I think I've been pondering this for quite some time, particularly since I taught on a graphics course where most of the staff were fine artists or illustrators, and seemed to be pushing students down the route of being "arty" and "conceptual", but never once considering the communication aspect. Although the work they produced was certainly arty and stylish, it wasn't, by any stretch of the imagination, graphic design. I remember the argument I had with them, but it was like trying to herd cats. They seemed to think I was saying design should be boring - far from it. But it certainly shouldn't be indecipherable (a quality they rewarded in students' work).

I think my argument's a little clumsy, but it was written "straight", i.e. without being edited. I might rephrase things now, or offer more explanation, as I think I open myself up to misinterpretation. But here it is in all its vain glory. (I also discovered that About Desktop Publishing had commented flatteringly on the original, which is no longer available, so this is an opportunity to correct a broken link. I think this is a subject I'd like to come back to as it's one that people have strong opinions on.

The way graphic design is often taught ignores the harsh commercial reality of the profession, and the context within which designers work. By dressing it up as "art" where the only people to be delighted are the artist and their peers, the trick is missed.

Let me get straight to the point. I don't think designers are artists.

Now I know that's a controversial view. It's not that I don't believe there is an art to being a designer, it's just that I think it's unhelpful to view art and design as the same thing. There are all sorts of reasons to attempt to see the two as being separate. Firstly, only designers protest that they are artists. Secondly, artists protest that designers are not. So there's a difference of opinion, and I really think designers shouldn't be self-possessed enough to insult the people who, let's face it, really should know about these things. Designers are the first to get upset when they see people encroaching on their space, and it's somewhat two faced to think they have the right to trespass on somebody else's patch.

That aside, I think there are some very obvious differences between art and design. The main one is that when an artist produces a piece of work, it doesn't matter if somebody doesn't like it. Sometimes, that's the point. Art often exists to provoke a reaction (particularly modern art - whatever that term means nowadays). The reaction is enough - it might be desirable for it to be positive, but it doesn't really matter either way. (I'm being over-general here, and I know it, but bear with me).

Graphic design, however, is a branch of visual communication in which it is important that the message being communicated is received in the way that was intended. Graphic design is objective, while art is subjective. If a designer produces a sign to direct people to the right place in a building, it has to do the job. Its function is not open to interpretation. Either it works, or it doesn't, and if it doesn't it fails. The rest is decoration. Maybe that's where the art comes in, but if it affects the objective of the sign - it fails.

This is a clear point of difference between art and design. If an artist designs a sign that doesn't work, it can still be art - indeed the more obtuse and 'conceptual' the better. But it isn't design. You see?

Okay, let's try something else. A student of mine told me she was looking for some work experience on a magazine because that's the line of business she was interested in. She told me she had got a few weeks working for a weekly gossip/TV listings magazine but her other tutors had told her to try, instead, to get experience on a magazine like 'Wallpaper' or 'Eye'. They were quite disparaging about her going to work for the more populist title, almost snobby. In fact, forget the 'almost'. The worst designed magazines in the world are the ones designed by designers for designers. They are awful , mostly unreadable with tiny illegible text painstakingly set in such a way that other designers coo over the artiness of it all. The best designed magazines are the ones that people can read and, as a consequence, do read. In their hundreds of thousands.

The best designed magazines are also the ones that follow the 'rules' such as use of grids etc.But get this: "Grids constrain their creativity," one fellow tutor told me - she'd never worked in publishing so didn't understand that a) a grid is a framework upon which you build, like an architect builds on a basic structure - so not a constraint to creativity but a support; and b) that any magazine that doesn't use a basic template will have to be re-designed from scratch every month which basically means it just won't come out on time.

The problem is, the way graphic design is taught establishes the myth of the designer-artist. Students are given briefs and then guided (or often just left) to produce something that the tutor 'likes'. The feedback the students get is very low level and tends to focus purely on the ego of the tutor. "I wouldn't have done that", "I think you should do this", "I want you to tear that up" (I have met several tutors who proudly tell me they make their students tear up their work every so often to learn not to be precious. I think that's criminal and there are better ways to make the same point without distressing and depressing people who will as a consequence be scared to put any effort into any work in future. It's all about the tutor and that is wrong.)

Where was I? Oh yes.

The real problem with this method of teaching is it is entirely subjective. The same piece of work will receive completely contradictory advice from each tutor, each piece of which will be based on that tutor's opinion. What's wrong with that? Well let's take another example.

Imagine a student is asked to design a piece of packaging aimed at twelve year old boys. The only opinion that counts as to whether the design is good or not is that of the target audience - the twelve year old boys. Yet students are forced to design for tutors who will, more often than not, judge it based on whether they like it or not, forgetting that they are not (and may never have been) twelve year old boys. And as a result we have generation after generation of designers trained to design for themselves, for their 'betters' and for each other. But not, bizarrely, for their target audience! What this means is that we are producing designers who do not know how to communicate with their audience .

When I said this once to some colleagues I got shouted down - they said that the course should be about "skills". But what skill could be more important? As the only actual graphic designer among them (believe it or not) I knew that the way designers tend to work is as part of a team. There'll be an art director to help make things look nice, and an account manager to keep things real. The account manager will bring in the brief, specify the objectives and any constraints, and leave the creatives to get on with it. The ideas they produce will then be tested out - not on the client, not on the art director and not on other designers, but on the audience with any problems then fed back to be sorted. This will go on until the team is happy to go to the client who, if they make any comments, will be shown the market research data.

Any design team that traded off ego, the way today's design students are trained to believe happens, would sink. Yet I've heard students get live jobs from real clients and then have a prima donna fit in the studio when the client has over-specified what they want or taken a creative hacksaw to what they've come up with. "I'm the designer", they will cry, "and if they won't let me design the way I want to design, I won't do the job". Fine - and nobody will ever ask you to work again. There's no room for artistic temperaments in this business.

But there's no suggestion of selling out in all this - a well prepared designer is armed with the evidence that their design will work. It has to look good, yes, but first and foremost it has to work . And that requires the sort of objectivity that sets graphic design apart from art.

My Project is a Design Project

2008-10-12T04:28:00.000-07:00

My dear instructor and classmates, I am sorry I have not told you that, my project is actually a design project, not an art project.

"Oh! Really? I did not know that." If that is your reaction, please read the newer post for detailed explanation. I am sure it will convince you.

Balloon Bowl

2008-10-12T00:14:00.000-07:00

This may be the scale of my project, if I get enough budget.

How to Make It

2008-10-09T08:25:00.001-07:00

How to make the bubble? I am thinking about using white cloth to make a pillow, and stuff the pillow with hydrogen balloons. Then add a tag to the bubble to increase its weight so it can float in the mid-air. I am not sure if this will work.

There are many easy ways to print on cloth such as T-shirt transfer.

How to make the tag? A square tag will look boring. I want it to have a more interesting shape. Because the bubble was once attached to a person's head, the tag functions like a joint. This relationship can be like a plug and an outlet. Any better idea?

Explanation by Stick Man

2008-10-09T08:24:00.001-07:00

This stick man cartoon will explain better.

In front of the Financial Service, there is a bubble which says "pay tuition". A student is attracted by it, "Wow! It is a bubble! Amazing!"

Then he reads the text and remembers he forgot to pay his tuition on time. He is now panic. However, he can not do much about it.

Then he comes closer and sees the tag.

Then he signs his name on the tag so that everyone knows he forgot to pay his tuition.

After interacting with this wonderful design, he is now more relaxed.

Interactivity

2008-10-09T08:23:00.001-07:00

A message (the icon and the text) has been printed on the bubble. The bubble has been put at a place which is corresponding to its environment. A tag is hanging under the bubble. The tag says "Forgotten by (an empty space)". It is waiting for you sign your name.

The tag allows the viewers to participate in completing the design. I believe an interactivity can make a design much more attractive.

This tag interactivity makes people admit what they have forgotten. By doing this, people are going to be more easy-going with forgetfulness.

Understand?

More Specific

2008-10-09T08:21:00.000-07:00

A person sees a bubble which says "lock the car". His reaction is "Wow! Someone forgot to lock the car! Haha!" Each bubble contains a message corresponding to its environment. This allows the viewers to imagine a scenario.

The bubble does not rise up to hit the ceiling like a balloon. I do not want to hang up the bubble or stick the bubble to an objective. Ideally, the bubble should float in the mid-air, and slighting move around. I think it is more interesting in this way and it can cause people's curiosity.

This signage system is not to remind people not to forget. It is to show what, where, and who "forgetfulness" has happened to.

Third Concept: Senarios of Forgetfulness

2008-10-01T22:55:00.000-07:00

This concept is not so abstract as the previous two. It shows realistic images to provoke an echo of people's own experience.

The expected deliverables are photos or short films.

Let us see one photo example.

The scenario is, a person puts too many sticker notes on his body. Some people do use this way to remind themselves. I exaggerate this idea.

Hopefully the audience will think this is funny, and be impressed.

However, I do not think photography is a good medium since it is too quiet.

I think short films will be more ideal.

Challenge:
1. I lack of filming skills.
2. I lack of film editing skills.
3. If not handled properly, the films will be very very very very very cheesy, instead of funny. My project has a high risk to screw up.

Second Concept: Devil of Forgetfulness

2008-10-01T22:54:00.001-07:00

I use balloons as a metaphor for ideas, thoughts, and memories.

I believe our memories are held outside instead of inside so that it is easier for them to come and go.

In this balloon metaphor theory, occasionally one or two balloons will escape.

The reasons (causes) of forgetfulness are very ambiguous and abstract. Nobody will understand the explanation by pure scientific tones of langage. People will just dismiss it.

Therefore, I bring into a vivid representation.

Let us blame on the Devil of Forgetfulness.

This devil is holding a pair of scissors. His job is to cut the balloon strings to make people forgetful.

What should the devil look like?

There is an cartoon character called Mr. Forgetful. Based on him, I created a few awkward sketches. Finally I concluded that a cute looking devil will be more popular. "Forgetfulness can be lovely." That is my thesis.

I will give this devil a personality. He is not that bad after all. He cuts the balloon strings without a bad intention, but this is just his job. he will also make people forget about sad things, so he deserves an innocent face.

The expected deliverable is an illustration book which tells lovely stories about forgetfulness.

Challenge:
1. I am not good at illustration.
2. I am not good at writing lovely stories.

First Concept: Signage System of Forgetfulness

2008-10-01T22:50:00.000-07:00

I use balloons as a metaphor for ideas, thoughts, and memories.

I believe our memories are held outside instead of inside so that it is easier for them to come and go.

In this balloon metaphor theory, occasionally one or two balloons will escape.

Where do those escaped balloons go to? They stay in the places where people forget.

Each balloon has an icon to represent the forgotten idea. For example, in washroom ceilings, we probably can find balloons with "washing-hands" icon.

Some icons might be obvious to articulate, but some can be ambiguous so that the audience have some imaginary space.

Those balloons form a signage system which indicates where (under what situations) and what people forget. With this signage system, people will realize forgetfulness is always around us.

The balloons themselves are not the complete design, but the combination of the balloons and their corresponding evironments. The design highly relies on context.

I do not want the icons to be too ordinary. People's response should be "Oh? Ah! Haha!"

I have a strong feeling that these balloons can be categorized based on a colour code, but I have not figured out how.

Challenges:
1. So far, it is definitely not interesting at all. How can I make it attractive?
2. How can I make the audience understand the balloons are about forgetfulness?
3. How can I print the icons on the balloons?

Contract

2008-10-01T21:46:00.000-07:00

Sigh. I have to write something again. It is a contract this time. I hate writing something formal. It will cost (waste) most of my time which should be used for visualization and so on (actualy work). Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh! Help!

Glad to Know

2008-09-30T21:02:00.000-07:00

The existing photos (art directed) about forgetfulness are so cheesy. I do not want mine to be one of those cheeses.

Mini Reminder Offers Help for the Forgetful

2008-09-30T20:54:00.001-07:00

If you're a forgetful person, you know that always misplacing your wallet, keys, PDA, or children turns from an endearing foible to an infuriating and expensive curse pretty quickly. Perhaps you could use some help, and your options are pretty limited. You could go to a hypnotist to fix your faults, or you could just get this Mini Reminder to do the remembering for you. The Mini Reminder is a two-part device, with a receiver that clips onto your belt and a transmitter that clips onto whatever valuable you're most worried about misplacing. If you happen to move 10 to 25 feet away (you can set the distance), the gadget will beep or vibrate at you until you go retrieve it. You can also hook up multiple transmitters to one receiver, so you won't be able to leave without your wallet, iPod, and umbrella. Just imagine all the trouble you'll save when it forces you to remember to take, say, your medication with you when you head out on vacation, or your baby with you when you leave the supermarket. The possibilities are endless. The Mini Reminder is $40 and available online now.

Londoners the Most Forgetful Taxi Passengers

2008-09-30T20:50:00.001-07:00

London is the greatest security risk as found in a global survey of 2000 taxi drivers from eleven major cities around the world which shows that thousands of valuable mobile phones, handhelds, laptops and USB Sticks are forgotten in taxis every day.

Mountains of mobiles are left every day by fretful and forgetful travellers at the back of city cabs as passengers rush to leave taxis for their next destination, a new survey reveals.

In the last six months alone, Londoners have forgotten a staggering 54,874 mobile phones (that’s over 2 per taxi), 4,718 handhelds or Pocket PCs, 3,179 laptops and 923 USB stick drives at the back of licensed taxi cabs and there just the ones that have been reported.

London is not alone when it comes to forgetful travellers. It would seem the story of lost and forgotten mobiles echoes around the world with the same fate afflicting Sydney, Bombay, Stockholm, San Francisco, Washington, Helsinki, Frankfurt, Berlin, Munich and Oslo.

However, of all the cities London still comes out on top as the capital with the most forgetful population losing more mobile phones than any other city, followed by Bombay travellers who have lost a total of 32,970 and Sydney citizens who come third with 6,440 mobile phones reported as lost. Interestingly the survey found that when it came to handheld devices such as Pocket PCs London once again came top with 4,718, Washington came out in second place with 2,260 and the Germans were also forgetful with their devices in Munich losing 1,902 and Berlin 1,125.

The numbers of lost laptops was also highest in London at 3,179 with Munich in second place with 355 and Bombay in third place with 349.

In light of these staggering figures Pointsec (mobile security experts) who conducted the survey is encouraging business and individual users to back-up, encrypt and password protect their device in the event of it falling into the wrong hands and the data then being stolen, compromised or abused.

Mobiles a potential Security Threat

A warning message to the business community and individuals to be vigilant when travelling with their mobile devices has never been more relevant as this survey comes at a time when the latest crop of mobile phones are now capable of storing 4Gb of memory. That’s equivalent to physically storing data on 400 boxes of paper in 9 filing cabinets with the capacity to retain 4 million emails and 4000 songs.

The space provided by these recent 'must have' mobiles means business travellers can now use them as a mobile office and a convenient replacement to the home filing cabinet to store a host of personal and business data including customer and personal names and addresses, pictures, insurance details, bank account and credit card information, NI numbers, and other highly sensitive data, making it even more important to secure the data, in the event that the device is lost.

Peter Larsson, CEO for Pointsec said: “This survey shows that no-one is infallible and looking at this survey’s findings you look to stand a pretty good chance of losing a mobile device in a cab or indeed any public place. With the new breed of phones being able to store 4Gb, users need to be aware of the amount of power and data they are literally carrying around in their hands. If your device falls into the wrong hands take a moment to think about how it could affect your livelihood especially if it has not been probably secured. Our advice is that if you have something valuable stored on your mobile device, then make use of all the security that comes with it or encrypt it – that way when you do lose it, no-one will be able to read your data!”

Taxis a safe place to lose your mobiles

There is some good news for our absent minded travellers though in that, if you are going to lose your mobile device, you couldn’t do it a better place than a taxi!

That is according to the findings of the survey: globally an average of 75% of passengers were reunited with their mobile phones and 78% with their Pocket PCs and Laptops – with the cab drivers in almost all cases tracking down their owners. Once again London came out on top – this time for having the most honest drivers with 96% of all mobile phones reported as being re-united with their happy owners.

However, the case was very different in San Francisco with just 32% of passengers being reconciled with their mobile phones and just 32% getting back their laptops compared to 100% in Bombay, Berlin and 97% in London!

Not just mobiles, but pork chops, babies, drunken women, judges wigs and machine guns...

When asked what was the strangest items left in their taxis it was interesting to note that around the world a large number of people strangely leave their false teeth at the back of cabs and it was not uncommon to hear of artificial limbs being forgotten in almost every country surveyed!

UK taxi drivers admitted to finding a telescope, a drunken women left as a tip by her boyfriend, a machine gun and £100,000 worth of diamonds.

In Helsinki a taxi driver found secret papers from the military forces and in London a cabbie returned a laptop belonging to an employee from the United Nations which he managed to return after turning on the device and finding out who owned it – which nicely shows why it’s so important to encrypt and password protect every device to stop less scrupulous individuals from tampering with the information.

So if you don’t want to risk a virtual custard pie in the face from family, friends or your employer, heed the message and protect both your device and yourself.

Related Image

2008-09-30T20:38:00.000-07:00

Oops! This is an old idea. Haha! I thought it would be original. Maybe I can exaggerate it.

Forgetful Couple

2008-09-28T21:47:00.001-07:00

Some Ads

2008-09-28T20:04:00.000-07:00

The 2nd one is so funny and "forgetful".

Mr. Forgetful

2008-09-28T19:53:00.000-07:00

You might have been familiar with this cartoon, but it is new to me. The narrator speaks too fast! I can not follow!

Club Forgetful

2008-09-28T18:37:00.000-07:00

http://tw.myblog.yahoo.com/CaT-C/archive?l=f&id=41
Someone established Club Forgetful, but I believe this club has been forgotten since it has not been updated for a long long time. It contains a lot of interesting events about forgetfulness, but it is in Chinese.

The Forgetful Boss

2008-09-28T17:56:00.000-07:00

Boss:
The conference on August the 1st is very important. Please remind me.

Secretary:
It took place the day before yesterday.

Boss:
Oh my God! I forgot to attend it!

Secretary:
You have already been there.

Humour

2008-09-25T07:40:00.000-07:00

This is the kind of humour and creativity I am looking for: http://www.art-studios.de/home/index.php?play=pommes.

Information Share

2008-09-25T07:27:00.000-07:00

The "Voices of White City" project is a good and successful example of sharing information. First of all and the most important of all, it attracts people to participate in this sharing process because it is fun and simple. People peel off stickers and stick them everywhere, which helps get this project widely knownly. The left stickers on the wall reveal the messages.

Abnormal Psychology

2008-09-25T04:00:00.000-07:00

The series of designs for Hans Brinker Budget Hotel are good examples of "abnormal psychology" if it is what I intend to mean. Take a look at their website too: http://www.hans-brinker.com/.

Concepts

2008-09-25T02:38:00.000-07:00

The most difficult part of a design project is to explain. Oh god! I have my ideas deep in my mind, but I just can not translate them into a language (especially English). Forgive me.

When thinking about a concept, I always keep my objective in mind.

"Enhance people’s understanding of forgetfulness to change their negative feelings towards forgetfulness into being slightly more relaxed and forgiving."

The key words are "understanding" and "change", which I immediately relate to "informational" and "interactive", "awaken" and "action".

I am so afraid of the word "concept". No matter how many times I try, people still do not think my "concepts" are concepts. Let me try one more time.

As I rewrote and re-considered my proposal, I realized I have mentioned two "concepts".

1. Metaphor of forgetfulness. Basically, I will use metaphor to explain the mechanism of forgetfulness and its related things such as retrieval failure so that it is not boring, hopefully. This approch is more scientific.

2. Evoke an echo of people's experience. Simply, it is experience share, to discover the interesting, humorous, and "lovely" aspects of forgetfulness. This is quite similar to the thesis.

However, in my proposal I discuss these two together as if they are bonded. I believe that a design can achieve both of them. In this sense, maybe they are not even concepts? Are they too specific? Let me try again.

1. Forgetfulness and forgiveness. Troubles caused by forgetting things are not intentional, and we commonly have ever had. Should not we be more forgiving to forgetfulness?

2. Abnormal psychology. I am not sure if that is what I mean, but Kessels Kramer does a lot of such designs like Hans Brinker Budget Hotel. Since this project is about "negative" to "positive", when over emphasizing "negative", people will shift to "positive". Humour is the most important role in this concept.

3. Compare and contrast. What are the similaities between two forgetful people? What are the differences between a forgetful person and a remindful one? What are the similarities and differences between forgetting your best friend's birthday and forgetting your dog's? It can be something "stupid". It is mainly about experience share.

I hope at least one of my five "concepts" is a real concept. Thanks!

A Sketch About the Previous Ideas

2008-09-25T01:59:00.000-07:00

Are people absolutely forgetful? I think it is relative.

In an information overwhelming environment, because there are too many thought bubbles (metaphor), and you have a fixed numbers of wires and plugs, you can only "choose" to remember some things, at that particular moment. The wires plug to different thought bubbles as the environment changes. For example, (this is not necessarily true) at school you probably remember more assignments than at home. This situation is called locational context-dependant. Now you know it is quite reasonable for us to forget doing some homework. Do not blame us.

In a leisure environment, because there are only a few thought bubbles, our wires and plugs are likely excessive. Since thought bubbles are floating everywhere, the excessive wires tend to plug to them randomly. That explains why we indulge in wild flights of fancy in a leisure environment.

Some Ideas

2008-09-25T01:21:00.000-07:00

As usual, I am doing a cheesy mood board thing like this. This was from last week, but I did not get a chance to explain it. Nevertheless, I am better at writting my ideas down instead of speaking up.

There are basically two types of forgetfulness. One is that the memory is totally lost (deleted), and the other is that the memory is there but can not be retrieved at a particular moment (called retrieval failure). In this project, I focus on the latter since if you do not remember what you forget, you will not even realize you forget something.

As I find more information about retrieval failure, I have a metaphor for it. Memory functions as if wires and plugs coming out of our heads and connecting to the thoughts (bubbles, which is a quite cliche metaphor). The thoughts are not inside our brains, but floating all around, which is more convenient for the wires to plug in. When the wires are unplugged, the thought bubbles fly away, and that is the way you forget things.

Forgetful people, I believe, their plugs are easier to fall off, so it is easier for them to forget things. I am one of those people with loose plugs.

You know you can click an images and enlarge it, right? Thanks!

My Rewritten Proposal

2008-09-25T01:16:00.000-07:00

I have used all of my resources to get this proposal rewritten. I hope you understand what my point is. Thanks!

In every day life people experience many events where they forget things, whether they are minor or major. For example, they might forget to bring their keys so they can not get in the houses. Forgetfulness indeed brings us troubles. As a result, people usually have a bad feeling about it. We often associate forgetfulness with unintelligence, aging, and illness, such as Alzheimer’s disease. There are many causes of forgetfulness, and scientists are yet to discover even more. In fact, we all have moments when we forget things. None of us wants to forget things, but sometimes it is just inevitable. People should not be so hard on themselves when forgetfulness strikes.

I propose to create design to break the negative associations of forgetfulness. I am going to show that forgetfulness can be a vivid and humorous natural phenomenon in humans, by visualizing and personalizing its characteristics, instead of a potential negative medical symptom.

The objective of this project is to enhance people’s understanding of forgetfulness to change their negative feelings towards forgetfulness into being slightly more relaxed and forgiving.

Aging is a natural and unavoidable factor in affecting forgetfulness. Targeting an elderly audience whose memories have been declining due to aging will be disrespectful. Thus, this project is aimed towards a demographic that is relatively young and within the age group of sixteen to twenty-five-year olds who have an optimum memory capacity. I am confident in targeting this audience because of my similarity in age. This audience is the most active, and they will come across many situations where they will forget things. Not only once, but several times I found unplugged USB sticks in our computer rooms. People with experiences such as those who left their USB sticks are some typical examples of my target audience. Stress from studies might be the cause of their forgetfulness; after missing their important belongings, more stress and unpleasantness is added to them. This forms a vicious circle. As well, those lost objects usually can be found at the same spots or in the lost-and-found. In this sense, the extra stress caused by forgetfulness is a huge hassle and causes a lot of frustration. They should have a less anxiety filled attitude towards forgetfulness because if you give it some time you will realize the situation can be resolved.

After researching some scientific studies, I believe forgetfulness has an interesting mechanism called retrieval failure, which is where forgetting occurs when the correct retrieval cues are not produced to get at the contents from a person’s memory. A metaphor is an ideal tool to visualize this mechanism. Moreover, I will be communicating situations of forgetfulness that we have commonly encountered to evoke a strong echo of the target audience’s own experience.

There are many scientific writings about forgetfulness including a lot of surprising and innovative findings. For example, a study says forgetfulness is a tool of the brain to prevent us from being confused by overwhelming information. This type of research is going to be the reference of the metaphor for forgetfulness. In order to develop the project’s personality, a primary research aid such as a survey is necessary. I am going to ask the following questions: What do people usually forget? Why do you forget those things? What trouble does forgetfulness bring to you? What are some personal experiences on forgetfulness? The research found is going to be the reference and inspiration for the humorous elements of forgetfulness. Critiques and feedbacks from the target audience, of course, are the most important tools in perfecting my design. There is a limited amount of existing designs about forgetfulness. Nevertheless, this also indicates that there is a wide space for me to explore new and untouched concepts. With all this research, I am going to determine the most resonant content, the most interactive media, and the most imaginative graphic elements to carry my idea.

Overall, forgetfulness should not be conceived as an unsympathetic illness, but it can be a vivid and humorous common trait in humans. By interacting with my design, people are going to have a creative meditation, a new understanding, and a more positive attitude towards forgetfulness.

Forgetfulness Potion

2008-09-18T01:29:00.000-07:00

Forgetfulness is not necessarily explained by science. Perhaps there is a "magical" force to cause it.

CPU Brain

2008-09-18T01:26:00.000-07:00

That looks like a CPU only. Where is the hard-drive?

Visit at Grandma

2008-09-18T01:22:00.000-07:00

That is definitely an efficient way to prevent forgetting. Not stupid at all.

Pool of Forgetfulness

2008-09-18T01:13:00.000-07:00

This is a fractal art by Vicky Brago-Mitchell. I do not really get it, but it might help. I do not know.

Context-Dependent Cues

2008-09-18T01:09:00.000-07:00

Context-dependent cues are dependent on the environment and situation. Memory retrieval can be facilitated or triggered by replication of the context in which the memory was encoded. Such conditions include weather, company, location, smelling of a particular odour, hearing a certain song, even taste can sometimes act as a cue. For example, students sometimes fail to recall diligently studied material when an examination room's environmental conditions differ significantly from the room or place where learning occurred. To improve learning and recall, it is recommended that students should study under conditions that closely resemble an examination.

That is why we had better study at school (instead of anywhere else) before an exam. Location does matter; another wonderful excuse for getting a bad mark.

Forgetfulness Is A Tool of the Brain

2008-09-17T23:43:00.000-07:00

A note to the forgetful: be thankful you don’t remember everything. It means your brain is working properly.

According to a new study, the brain only chooses to remember memories it thinks are most relevant, and actively suppresses those that are similar but less used, helping to lessen the cognitive load and prevent confusion.

Brice Kuhl at Stanford University in California, US, and colleagues used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to measure the brain activity of 20 healthy adults while they performed a simple memory test. Participants were given three words pairs to memorise, including two pairs that were closely associated, as follows:

ATTIC dust
ATTIC junk
MOVIE reel

After studying "ATTIC dust" a second time, subjects were asked to recall all three pairs using the first words as cues. On average, people were 15% worse at recalling "ATTIC junk" than they were at recalling the unrelated pair, "MOVIE reel".
Initial suppression

Comparing these findings to the fMRI data taken during the test, the team found participants’ brains were highly active in a region known for handling competing memories, and also in an area believed to induce memory suppression.

The researchers believe that the first region identified "ATTIC dust" and "ATTIC junk" as conflicting memories. The second region then suppressed "ATTIC junk" because it had only been seen once.

As the test was readministered a second and third time, suppression activity lessened, indicating the memory adjustment had been made.
Prioritising memories

"Whenever you’re engaging in remembering, the brain adapts. It’s constantly re-weighting memories," says Kuhl. "In this simple test, we see it reverse memory to weaken competing memories. This is something that probably happens a lot in the real world."

A good example is the confusion that arises when we change passwords on our computers or email accounts. We often mix up old and new passwords at first, but through repetition we develop a strong memory of the new password and forget the old one.

"The process of forgetting serves a good functional purpose," says Michael Anderson of the University of Oregon, US, who was not involved in the study. "What these guys have done is clearly establish the neurobiological basis for this process."

Man Without A Memory

2008-09-17T01:39:00.000-07:00

Although it relates to my project just a little, but it is an interesting video.

How Much Forgetfulness Is Too Much

2008-09-17T00:28:00.000-07:00

Occasional memory lapses like forgetting where the car is parked are not signs of early Alzheimer's, but doctors still aren't entirely sure how much forgetfulness indicates a greater risk of developing the full-blown disease.

The problem isn't that you can't remember where you put your keys from time to time, it's that once you find the keys, you still can't recall that you put them in that spot. The problem isn't forgetting a single appointment, but a pattern of blanking on important events or responsibilities.

Or, as Dr. Barry Gordon of the Johns Hopkins Memory Clinic puts it: "Miss an exit on the highway once, that happens. Miss it five times and that’s another story."

As part of the explosion of research into Alzheimer's disease over the last decade, scientists have become more aware of the differences between typical age-related memory lapses and a more serious condition called mild cognitive impairment.

People with mild cognitive impairment may be more forgetful than usual, but can still pay the bills and handle most daily tasks. Signs include losing track of a conversation, difficulty remembering details from a TV show they've just watched or consistently forgetting appointments.

"These people are starting to forget important information that they used to remember regularly, like doctor appointments or meeting friends," says Dr. Ron Petersen, a member of the Alzheimer's Association's medical and scientific advisory council.

Alzheimer's is thought to be the underlying cause of most mild cognitive impairment, but not everyone who experiences it develops dementia or worsening symptoms, research indicates.

Dementia is estimated to affect about 10 percent of people over 65. Of those patients, about 65 percent have Alzheimer's and 15 percent have cardiovascular problems like hardening of the arteries or stroke that can impair the mind. The rest have various uncommon conditions.

Because it can be difficult to recognize the boundaries between typical absentmindedness, mild cognitive impairment and the early stages of Alzheimer's, people who are worried about recurring forgetfulness should consult a physician. There are tests to check a person's mental abilities, and neurologists can determine if something is seriously wrong.

Being aware of your memory lapses is probably a sign that the problems isn't serious, says Gordon. The time to worry about Alzheimer's is not just when you think your memory is getting spotty, but when your friends or family start to notice your forgetfulness.

"Those that worry about it most are the least likely to have it," he says. "In general the disease robs people of their ability to appreciate that they have a memory problem."

"Losing track of a conversation," that happens to me many times. Nice!

Memory Pill for the Forgetful

2008-09-17T00:08:00.000-07:00

US scientists have invented a pill that can boost memory.

The drug CX717 belongs to a family of compounds called ampakines and works by boosting the brain chemical glutamate that makes learning and recall easy.

UK trials on 16 sleep-deprived volunteers showed it improved wakefulness and mental ability.

Its creator, Dr Gary Lynch from the University of California, told New Scientist it could be used to treat jet lag and diseases like Alzheimer's.

Manufacturer Cortex is considering CX717 as a possible treatment for narcolepsy - excessive daytime sleepiness; and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) - a condition which impairs a child's ability to concentrate.

It could also be taken by healthy people as a pick-me-up. But it will have to undergo further clinical trials before going on sale.

Dr Lynch explained how the drug works. "What it's doing is causing the neurons to communicate with each other a little better.

"As you get tired, communication between brain cells begins to fail. When you take the pill, the communication is better."

He said the drug appeared to have no side effects and because it was not a physical stimulant, like amphetamines, users would still be able to sleep.

In the UK trial, led by Julia Boyle and colleagues from the University of Surrey, healthy male volunteers aged 18 to 45 agreed to test the drug.

The volunteers started with a full night's sleep and the following morning and evening were asked to complete a battery of tests assessing memory, attention, alertness, reaction time and problem solving.

At 11pm they took either the real or dummy pills and stayed up through the night, being retested at midnight, 1am, 3am, 5am and 9am.

The volunteers who took the ampakine performed much better than those who took the fake drug.

Barbara Sahakian, Professor of Clinical Neuropsychiatry at Cambridge University in the UK, said: "There has been a lot of promise with the ampakines and people are very excited about them."

She said it could be useful for medical conditions that impaired memory and concentration, but warned against recreational use as has occurred with other stimulant drugs such as the ADHD medication Ritalin.

"I think it's something we have to be concerned about because some of those people taking these drugs, their brains are still developing and we do not know the long-term consequences."

I definitely need a huge amount of those pills, especially before exams.

Stress Makes You Forgetful

2008-09-17T00:02:00.000-07:00

According to a new study, stress makes you activate an enzyme in the brain called Kinase C, it is a protein which undermines your short term memory, plus some other brain functions in the prefrontal cortex. The prefrontal cortex is the executive decision making section of your brain.

Ask any actor who is stressed with stage fright, or a student just before an important exam and they will tell you this (losing memory) is old news.

This new study, led by Dr Amy Arnsten, Yale Medical School, USA, has managed to pinpoint why your short term memory is affected when you are experiencing stress.

You can read about this study in the journal Science.

Experts say this study could help scientists and doctors acquire a better insight in how to treat people with bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.

Kinase C (PKC) is an enzyme which is active in patients with bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. Dr. Arnsten found that a psychotic episode often comes after some stressful encounter. Arnsten gave, as examples of stressful situations, leaving home to go to college or joining the armed forces.

Perhaps PKC plays a part in making patients more distracted, impulsive and have bad judgment (common during psychotic episodes).

Perhaps new drugs could target PKC production, said Arnsten.

Dr. Arnsten said 'These new findings may also help us understand the impulsivity and distractibility observed in children with lead poisoning. Very low levels of lead can activate PKC, and this may lead to impaired regulation of behavior.'

In this study Arnsten and team induced stress in rats and monkeys (by administering chemicals). The stress would be similar to what we would feel when exposed to a loud noise, or the jitters we may feel before an exam.

Arnsten said 'It doesn't have to be traumatic, as long as you feel out of control. Control is the essential factor. If you are confident, you don't have these problems." She went on to say that memory and the ability to use abstract thoughts are impaired. 'This kind of memory (using working memory that is constantly being updated), the ability to concentrate, seems to be impaired when exposed to mild stresses.'

This information is a little outdated, but it is an acceptable resource for my research since being forgetful during stress can be interestingly expressed in a visual way. Now, do you know what I am looking for?

Forgetfulness Because of Virus Eating Your Brain

2008-09-16T23:50:00.000-07:00

Forget where you left your glasses? Did those keys go missing again? A virus may be to blame.

Viruses that cause a range of ills from the common cold to polio may be able to infect the brain and cause steady damage, a team at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota reports.

"Our study suggests that virus-induced memory loss could accumulate over the lifetime of an individual and eventually lead to clinical cognitive memory deficits," says Dr Charles Howe, who reports the findings in the latest issue of the journal Neurobiology of Disease.

The viruses are called picornaviruses and infect more than 1 billion people worldwide each year.

They include the virus that causes polio, as well as colds and diarrhoea. People contract an average of two or three such infections a year.

"We think picornavirus family members cross into the brain and cause a variety of brain injuries. For example, the polio virus can cause paralysis," Howe says.

"It can injure the spinal cord and different parts of the brain responsible for motor function. In the [mouse] virus we studied, it did the same thing and also injured parts of the brain responsible for memory."

The researchers infected mice with a virus called Theiler's murine encephalomyelitis virus, which is similar to human poliovirus.

Infected mice later had difficulty learning to navigate a maze. Some were barely affected, while others were completely unable to manage.

When the mice were killed and their brains examined, a correlating amount of damage was seen in the hippocampus region, related to learning and memory.

One virus particularly likely to cause brain damage is enterovirus 71, which is common in Asia, the researchers say.

It can cross over into the brain and cause encephalitis, a brain inflammation that can lead to coma and death.

"Our findings suggest that picornavirus infections throughout the lifetime of an individual may chip away at the cognitive reserve, increasing the likelihood of detectable cognitive impairment as the individual ages," the researchers write.

"We hypothesise that mild memory and cognitive impairments of unknown aetiology may, in fact, be due to accumulative loss of hippocampus function caused by repeated infection with common and widespread neurovirulent picornaviruses."

Other viruses kill brain cells, including the herpes virus and HIV.

Finish reading? Ok. Now I tell you, that is the kind of information I do not want to research for because it is too negative.

Forgetfulness of Mom (Anime)

2008-09-16T21:56:00.001-07:00

Forgetfulness (Animated Poetry) by Billy Collins

2008-09-16T21:54:00.001-07:00

Design Proposal First Draft

2008-09-16T21:47:00.000-07:00

Will you forget where you park your car? Will you forget to do your assignments? Will you forget your password? I believe most people are kind of forgetful. Forgetfulness is an inevitable human trait. Especially in today’s society, tire, lacking of sleep, stress, and all types of negative factors enhance our forgetfulness. However, a study says it is also a tool of the brain to prevent us from being confused, by ignoring the most irrelevant and unimportant information. Really? It is interesting that we “forget” because we also “remember”. If we do not remember what we forget, we will never realize we forget something. What do people usually forget? How do they forget those things? What troubles does forgetfulness bring to them? As a very forgetful person, I am so curious about others’ experience. Yet, forgetfulness is a mental activity that is invisible. I am going to design an interesting visual expression to communicate forgetfulness.

At the beginning, I was going to design a device to prevent people from forgetting, or to increase short-term memory. However, there have been a lot of existing products on the same topic. People always try to find ways to cope with forgetfulness that is considered as absolutely bad. Nevertheless, I see it in a natural point of view; forgetfulness is just like a natural phenomenon in human. Instead of making it an enemy or a problem, I am going to show its interesting and humorous aspects.

Since aging is an unavoidable natural factor to cause forgetfulness, the target audience of this project must be age-dependent. I want a group that is relatively young and I am fairly familiar with, so I am going to target at the age group of sixteen to thirty who are the most active and have many things for them to forget.

There are a lot of scientific writings about forgetfulness including many surprising and innovative findings. In order to make the project have more personality, primary research such as survey is necessary. There are also some artworks and designs that I can study as reference. Critiques and feedbacks from the target audience, of course, are the most important tools to perfect the design. Through these researches, I am going to determine the most resonant content, the most interactive media, and the most imaginative graphic elements to carry my idea.

By interacting with the design, people are going to have a creative meditation, a new understanding, and a different attitude about forgetfulness.