Equal Rights for All Australians

For an assignment I have to collate process and research/foundation. The assignment was to create an "AvantCard" or post-card-sized design which had a strong relativity to a social/political issue. I finally settled on the idea of equal rights in Australia; based around the very famous and now global statement of "All men are created equal".

Strangely a lot of people I have spoken to thought that the word "men" in that quote made the idea of equality irrelevant. I guess I should clear that up. The line is most commonly attributed to Thomas Jefferson and his involvement in the Declaration of Independence; however the phrase has been used many times beforehand. It is suggested he 'borrowed' it from his Italian friend Philip Mazzei. Regardless of the history, the idea of "all MEN are created equal" refers to men not as a gender, but as a race; mankind.

Before landing at this final concept I also thought about the following quite seriously:
- A variation of a shop window "We're Open/Closed" sign relating to Tony Abbott's stance on "Boat People".
- Faces of Tony Abbott and Clive Palmer crossed out to support the need for a Labour government in Australia.
- An infographic related design
- A message for the idea of government being a voice of the people, not a personal infliction.





Here are some resources I used (there aren't really many):
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_men_are_created_equal
- http://australia.gov.au/directories/contact-parliament
- www.avantcard.com.au

Finally, where I landed in the end... The idea of implementing photo montage seemed a bit hard/irrelevant to most of my other ideas. The other strong contender for the final result was the one about a need for Labour government in Australia, but when I thought of this I was already set to work on the current design so I decided to stick with it.

The idea of the card is something people can pick up and read. It gives them a chance to think. From there they can write their own message and send it to their local MP to show their support.

I thought about a lot of ways to show the diversity between every day people. The most accessible in a controlled environment was of course, my peers. I thought about doing the portraits with a polaroid camera, but that would have cost me about $40 in film and every shot used/taken would have cost around $2. It also bought up the issue of whitespace for the polaroid frames. Despite it being a cool idea I don't think it really added anything to the concept or design so out came my trusty 7D and I persuaded some people at RMIT to let me take their photo.




I consciously tried to keep my design minimal. I used one typeface and two weights (apart from the quotation marks). This was to support the idea of equality. I tried to make everything uniform but still slightly unique. All the photos were taken really quickly to make them look more authentic instead of some kind of generic set of people you couldn't tell apart.
The colour was something I just had as an idea in my head. I'm not really sure why and I can't fasely justify it too much, but it worked with the colour of the pin board in the classroom aka my DIY backdrop so that helped me out.

The back of the card is something relatively simple. There isn't too much room to work with and form certainly follows function. I kept in theme with the front of the card and allocated all the required spaces for the message, address and stamp. I included a website reference which lets you find the contact details of politicians and it can be filtered by postcode etc so you can find the contact for your local MP to send them the card.

Here is the final result:


A big thank-you to everyone who let me take their photo, I appreciate it a lot.

Milton Glaser Project

For a part of my current  course at RMIT I had an assignment to make a booklet about a "Design Giant". I chose Milton Glaser who has been a significant inspiration to me and was one of the first major designers who I discovered in High School. The following contains progress photos, notes and references which had to be "blogged" as a part of my assessment.




A basic mock up/layout for my booklet and some notes/ideas.




These photos show my attempt at making the booklet into a physical object, I didn't do an amazing job; but I tried. I guess that's why there are printing and production professionals.

References:
Most of the reference used was video/film, including his own documentary and his parts in the BigThink and TED series.

Film
 - Milton Glaser: To Inform & Delight (2008/9)
 - Milton Glaser: BigThink Interview
 - From the TED Archives: Milton Glaser

Web
 - Milton Glaser: www.miltonglaser.com/
 - Pushpin Studios: www.pushpininc.com/
 - Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milton_Glaser
 - MoMA: www.moma.org/collection/artist.php?artist_id=2188

TRACTOR x SEMIPERMANENT DESIGN COMPETITON

I had to make a poster for this brief for an assignment, so I decided to enter it into the competition. There are two competitions running, one with real judges and "people's choice" competition based on votes (read: popularity contest - something I am totally against) but it is something which I would still like to extend an ask for help in winning. I have some decent hopes for my chances in the professional competition. Regardless. Here is my entry:
VOTE VIA FACEBOOK Press the "Like" button under "VOTE FOR ME" at the top left of the page
http://tractordesignschool.com.au/compgallery/detail/67


Thank you. Please share the link if you can.

20/20 Vision

I've always had 20/20 vision, but over the past few months I had noticed myself having trouble reading small type and focusing on things like intersecting lines meeting when I was designing/drawing. All of this seemed to be multiplied if I was tired or if I was working for long periods of time. Anyway, it turns out I could benefit from some really low strength glasses for reading and working.

A friend of mine had told me about Holloway Eyewear and told me he knew the guy who ran it. Anyway, I ended up getting a pair. They make their frames from a lot of things, including old guitars, skateboards, driftwood and sometimes really nice, limited Australian timbers. They primarily make sunglasses, but they can fit lenses. Everything is made by hand, in a Brisbane warehouse by a handfull of great people. Do yourself a favour and get something a little more unique than frames from SpecSavers or the RayBans every other person is wearing. Hopefully I'll be doing some work with these guys soon, too. So watch out!




These are the Owl frames, with fitted prescription lenses. Natural front with black arms. The glasses come in a custom made soft case, which is crafted from Italian Suede with a hand fitted leather strap. All glasses are machine cut, then shaped and refined by hand. For more info and to get your own pair check out: www.hollowayeyewear.com.au

Condition Oakland

I grabbed this copy of the almighty Jawbreaker release, '24 Hour Revenge Therapy' on eBay the other week. This is my all time favourite record, by my favourite band. I love this record more than I love most things. They started recording this with Steve Albini the day I was born. Anyway, as far as I know there was only ever one pressing, and after this release they signed to Geffen records and released 'Dear You' which has a few variations. I think there might be a bootleg, but this is the first pressing. On black, not sure of the limitations.

I don't think much really needs to be said. It's an 11/10 release easily. This is in amazing condition, it was sealed when I got it.

You're Out Of My Top Eight

A little blast from the past here. This is Pro Team's EP entitled 'Our Wasteland'. This came out in 2007 as a CD on Washed Up! records, following their demo. This was one of my favourite Australian Hardcore releases of that era, and something I never really stopped listening to. The band never really broke up, either, but after playing a tour and some shows on the back of the CD version of this release they stopped playing shows and stopped being a band, essentially. A little while ago they announced they were writing more songs, playing more shows, and Midnight Funeral announced the release of this beauty on vinyl for the first time.

This came out last month. 300 copies and each is randomly coloured, so there are essentially 300 different variations. I ended up buying two because of this very reason. One is a bunch of browns/dark oranges, and one is a pink/purple swirl with black. Both are really cool, and I think there are more pictures of other ones up on the Midnight Funeral site.

A Turn For The Worst

I got this record when it came out a few years ago (maybe late 2010/early 2011?). I missed the preorders and then I saw Craig from Midnight Funeral post about having a few left when my friend Sean posted about the release on his blog. When Craig sent this to me a few days later he had forgot to send the insert, anyway, after a little chasing and Craig being overseas and a bunch of other stuff, he finally sent me the insert.

This is another record where the art is a major focus for me. The illustration work is something else, the front and back covers are exceptional, and the insert features zombie-like illustrations of the members. This band has put out another full length or two since this, and they've kind of blown up. Aside from the 'Three Nails and a Book of Flaws' 7inch this is my favourite release, and one of the only ones which has really grabbed my interest. I think the release was 300 on black.

Paranoia

So, after about a million years this finally showed up in my mailbox... Warbrain released this some time ago, I think it was early 2011 with immediate plans for a physical release as a 7inch. However there were a massive amount of delays and problems with the pressing. I kind of thought it was never going to happen and the only paranoia I had was if I was going to get my preorder money back from Trial And Error. But no, almost a year later it's showed up. It's also the first record Trial and Error have put out in quite some time. Anyway, here it is... It came in a nice screened mailer which features a 1 colour version of the cover artwork. The layout and artwork is by Callum Preston, who is an absolute champion and insanely good, he's really nailed this one. The packaging is nice and simple, front art, a back with a simple track listing and photo. Insert for the lyrics and then the vinyl... Which comes in 2 variants. Green on Green splatter (limited to 100) and Black splatter on Gold (limited to 200).

SHACKLES

So if you haven't heard Byron Bay's SHACKLES you've probably been sleeping under a rock instead of being hit with one. For a while they have been rockin' it out and absolutely killing it. They've put out two tapes on Sean's label; a demo and 'Preliminary Harm'. Now they have this, a seven inch by the name of 'Maunder'. There are 300 copies, 96 on the Green pictured (translucent) and 200 on Black (not pictured) and 4 test presses (not pictured). This band is beyond worth checking out.

Screaming Gets You Nothing

So as I posted about before, Give Up The Ghost/American Nightmare (whatever name you want to call them) did some shows at the end of last year, including what would have been the greatest New Years Eve in LA. To accompany these shows and the band (maybe) doing some things again, Deathwish reissued the 'Background Music' and 'We're Down Til We're Underground' LPs on both standard and 180gram versions. They came with re-vamped packaging and in gatefold. I'm not 100% sure but I think the tracks were also remastered/tweeked for this. 'Background Music' is one of my favourite records, and what I think is pretty well close to a perfect record, I'd quite like to own the first pressing (just because the name change annoys me) but until then this will grace my turntable.