No news is good news - Post design

This image really helped me within the last stages of my design, I decided the hand drawn font wasn't appropriate. I wanted it to be more simple and this gave me the final idea i had.

I particularly like the boxes and it colours and patterns, a similar look can be seen within my designs, although I have interpreted it to be my own.

What is Graphic Design?

Mark Howe Illustrator/Photographer

Mark decided to make a trip to our college to give a brief presentation telling us all about his work and what not. I decided to give his work a blast on google, and found a lot of his stuff I really liked:

A whole google maps thing is going on here. Love the colour pallette, very natural and befitting to the lovely detailed illustration of the map. I do like the technique of this, along with the abstract colour of the outline drawing, normally it's usually black or white, but Marks been a little different.

The limited colour tone on this stock is my favourite element of this piece. The variation of block colour and pattern makes the colour restriction compliment itself.

I've always liked the combination of photography and Graphic design, the montage, natural presentation of this image is great. It show's a really creative and aesthetically stunning workshop which all designers want!

Using animals to portray a series of emotions in a catalogue is quite a nice idea. The whole 'down as a dog' idea is hinted at which is quite clever really. The negative space of this design I like the most I feel. The text really does ruin the affect of it, but hey, can't have it all.

I'm really digging his 'au naturel' thing going on in his designs. I particularly like the weaving of the leaves through the type; an unusual font to be used for this, yet I like it.

I REALLY like this page layout. Tiny, simple, outline illustrations paired with small, delicate font and a limited colour pallette has just worked so well here.

I've always liked child like font, especially here as it is the main focus of the design.

Mailing list research

I decided that my address list would include those in area's of very low christianity, those in an area in which christianity is high, and those in a multi-cultural area to gain several opinions - as thats the purpose of my product, to gain a range of opinions about the topic 'Christianity is decline, but does it even matter?'. I found a website which gave many stats and percentages:

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/census2001/profiles/commentaries/ethnicity.asp

There are 37.3 million people in England and Wales who state their religion as Christian. The percentage of Christians is similar between the two countries but the proportion of people who follow other religions is 6.0 per cent in England compared with 1.5 per cent in Wales.

The English region with the highest proportion of Christians is the North East (80.1 per cent). 

Fifty-eight per cent of people in London gave their religion as Christian, with the highest proportion in the borough of Havering (76 per cent).

Sixteen per cent of the population of London say they have no religion, including 25 per cent in the City of London.

In Wales, the highest proportion of Christians is found on the Isle of Anglesey (79 per cent) and the fewest in Blaenau Gwent (64 per cent).

Outside London, the counties with the highest proportion of Christians are Durham, Merseyside and Cumbria, each with 82 per cent or more. The districts with the highest proportions of Christians are all in the North West: St Helens, Wigan and Copeland (Cumbria) each have 86 per cent or more.

The district with the highest proportion of Sikhs is Slough. One person in seven of the population of Leicester is Hindu.

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/census2001/profiles/commentaries/ethnicity.asp

My research found that:

The region of the highest proportion of Christians is the north-east.

The highest area of christians within london is in Havering, at 76%.

In wales the highest area of Christianity is on the isle of Anglesey at 79%, and the lowest in Blaenau at 64%

Outside of London, the highest area's of christianity is Durham, Merseyside and Cumbria each with 82% or more.

I found Leicester to be very multicultural with 1 in 7 people being Hindu.




Next, I'm going to find Christian related buildings (churches, related charities etc) and educational practices within each of the area's to mail my designs to, to gain various responses.


Sunday school attendants
Leicester Cathedral
21 Saint Martins,
Leicester
LE1 5DE


Customers of
Christian Aid
Derby Rd,
Loughborough,
Leicestershire
LE11 5AH


Customers of
Christian aid
391 West Rd, 
Newcastle Upon Tyne, 
Tyne And Wear 
NE15 7PY


Religious education students
St Marys College, 
Elvet Hill Rd, 
Durham, 
County Durham 
DH13LR


Bishop of
Anglesey Methodist ChruchBangor Road, Penmaenmawr, Gwynedd LL34 6LE01492 623641

Attendants of coffee mornings

Morpeth methodist church

MORPETH, 

Northumberland 

NE61 1HU

Members of the debating society

Cathedral Church of the Hold and Undivided Trinity

7 The Abbey, Carlisle, Cumbria CA3 8TZ

Politics Students

University of Leicester

University Rd, 

Leicester 

LE1 7RH

Religious Education Students

Bangor University

College Rd, 

Bangor, 

Gwynedd 

LL57 2DG

Ambleside Primary school - Teacher of Religious Education

Vicarage Rd, 

Ambleside, 

Cumbria 

LA22 9DH

Crit - No news is good news, delivery and response.

Issues raised:

• No apparent directed/targeted audience.
• Product to fussy, needs to be simple.
• Overcomplicated 
• Not clear what the purpose of my product is

Action to be taken:

• Find my directed / targeted audience - who? - Lowest area's of Christianity?
• What message - Asking people to express opinions about topic - designs need to promote a discussion, asking a number of questions, advertise a website in which people can post opinions (although it's for research), to gain reactions.
• My products purpose - To invite to give an opinion about topic.
• Simple design - No pull out boxes, don't over complicate, relate to Christianity (make it look more bible like?) Bible like fonts used?
• Produce mind maps - how, who, what message
• Think about mailing list - Mind map - Possibly educational practices?

Idea's for post design...

Personally I really like the colour palette and several objects within this design. I feel it would be befitting to my topic, I may try this template and see in which ways I can adapt it to be my own, and benefit my products purpose.

I like the simplicity of this. My design could be so simple, just an opening envelope, revealing a design. I'll keep this in mind, that in some situations, its best to keep designs simple in order to gain a strong response.

I wanted to make mine wither 3d, or in the form of a box. I like the simplicity and effectiveness of this design, and how it relates to the product its selling. I could do the same, relating to symbols of my topic.

I feel this is quite ethnic and religion-esk (forgive my making up of words), the colour palette in itself expresses this, along with the religious symbol cut out. I could take these elements into consideration when producing my designs and products.

I like the little hidden elements to this design, and the way in which it's done this, not being too complicated, its still simple in it's appearance.

I'm going to try this idea; a grid form revealing an image. I think i'll produce a more complex design, in which the movement of the image behind the grid reveals a range of images rather than just one. 

I like the cover in particular, and its envelope appearance. 

No news is good news - Relevant article

http://www.journal-online.co.uk/article/5475-student-christian-conversion-on-the-rise

I found a relevant article which might prove useful when it comes to gaining opinion. It's a contrast to what i'm looking at as it states more students are converting to Christianity than ever before.

It goes on about the 'alpha movement', which has been designed for non church goers, has been embraced by Edinburgh's students.

So, what is graphic design? Take 2

Graphic design...is the effective delivery of a message, idea or concept through the use of visual language.

It delivers the message well, to promote. I'm a real fan of vintage and classic graphic design - This I consider to be just that. I love the subdued tones, and the use of painting in comparison to print. The hand rendered element I feel I love best here, basically everything is produced, in one way, shape, or form by hand. In this case, painted. 

Theres something about the combination of alot of very small text, with very detailed illustrations I just love - It has the appearance of a personal sketchbook, a personal piece of work and doodling. Which just goes to show, some peoples doodles, are others considered graphic design. I have a love for the biro pen too, the breadth of detail created from such a restricted medium is brilliant.

Again, a handmade piece. In a vast range of gritty materials and mediums. The like this best due to the 'grunge' appeal. Its no a precise piece of work, its been created in a collage like style. This is one of my favourite pieces of graphic design i've ever seen. Its just unique.

The layering of hand drawn text on photos has been a technique and style i've used a lot myself. it's simple, yet, effective. This piece looks like a scrap book, of places visited, which an opinion or comment on the place, drawn on top of the photos taken.

This is appealing to me, particularly because of the colour palette and chosen materials. Monochrome is wonderful to work in, especially when working with newspaper, print and photos. Its a nice variety which works well together. The use of red, really highlights the textures, and monochrome colour pallette due to its vibrancy. I can't quite pinpoint why I like this so much...

This was the layout of a webpage, Images shown within a polaroid style border, suggesting a scrapbook like appearance, which, as said before, is a love of mine. I like when work feels personal and unworked, yet gives a professional finish.

Another piece screaming 'Personal scrapbook!' Again another piece using doodles, a lot of small writing and a variety of texts, colours and images to create an intricate interesting piece.

Simple yet effective. A quote possibly used too much by myself, but a design which can do so, I grow to love. The hand rendered tree and consistency through products works well due to the simplicity of the design and type. The brown, aged colour palette is a favourite of mine, and here its gives a 'earthy' quality to the products, referencing the illustration of the tree.

Here I like the range of materials that have been used, creating a variety of textures, colours and an interesting aesthetic appeal. This person has used sewing - in an intricate detailed form, embossings, and printmaking within all the pieces. To then layer these I feel is ingenious.

Another design using hand rendered type over photo. A variety of line thicknesses, fonts and a quirky illustration works when in attracting an intended audience of young people.

This is different to other pieces i've looked at. Its colour palette is nice due to its pastel qualities paired with the contrasting use of black and white. I really like the different uses of type. The illustration itself has a foreign feeling about it which is very subtle but quite nice. Again all these points are relevant for the image below.

The simplicity is something I like here. Simple type, simple pattern, does what it needs to do. The range of line thickness is complimentary in highlighting the detailing.

Absolutly love this design in a book. In handmade, holds vintage qualities, has a personal touch and looks aged. Pretty much holds everything I like.

I'm liking the whole 'product in a box' going on here. Not sure I like the designs themselves, but I really like the presentation of them being in a cardboard box.

No news is good news - Poster research

This is a magazine cover for 'newsweek' which is communicating the same article I am of the decline of christianity. I like the simplicity of it, its quite strong. I like the idea of creating a symbolic image to the religion out of suitable typography and will experiment with this.

I like this, it could be relevant to produce the design with image and type. It's use of naturally lighting and quite a gritty scene i feel would suit my article headline; as its a topic which could be seen as controversial , not many people would want to talk about it; this design would give a dark, edgy element to it.

I really like the hand drawn qualities of this, I came up with the idea of drawing a cross, in relation to christianity, but found this image and thought it would be good to be drawn in a tree like form. I'l attempt to give it the print like quality this image holds.

No news is good news - Design principles

We were given these words and their definitions today:

• Visual Metaphor - Transfer the meaning from one image to another. The metaphor conveys an impression about something relatively unfamiliar by drawing a comparison between it and something else.
• Synecdoche - Applied when a part is sued to represent a whole. e.g statue of Liberty = NewYork
• Metonym - Symbolic image eg a cross = Church, when two images bear a close relationship, it doesn't translate characteristics.

Once we knew what they were, we had to make our own example up for each.

Visual metaphor - That girls hair looks like spaghetti

Synecdoche - Monaco casino = Monte-Carlo France

Metonym - image of smile = Dentist

No news is good news - What next?

Throughout my research I came across some information about how some Churches in England are being converted to Mosques. This is down to the low congregation sizes within particular churches, so much so, other religions are using building of worship, into relating to their own to hold services. I thought this would be a really interesting topic to research more in-depth. I began by finding key words relating to this. Heres are some, along with definitions:


Dictionary definition:
Deconsecrate - To remove the consecration from a church or a similar building.
Consecration - The act or ceremony of consecrating; the state of being consecrated; dedication.
Dedication - A ceremony marking an official completion or opening.   - The deliberate or negligent surrender of all rights to property.
Sacrament - A sacred act or ceremony in Christianity. In roman catholic theology, a sacrament is defined as "an outward sign instituted by christ to give grace.
Unction - A religious or ceremonial anointing 

No news is good news - Research found

Relating articles:

Within the Daily star, underneath my chosen article I found a phone in debate, which was labelled "IS BRITAIN BECOMING A MUSLIM STATE". It would be interesting to find out the results and possibly some comments on this.

Another article found was the top ten listing of boys names, ethnic asian influx has had a massive impact on these results, the top boys name within England and Wales is 'Mohammad' (all spellings) which is renowned as being an islamic name, showing how culture is changing, even within the names of people.

Bradford - 2nd most Muslim populated city outside of London

With such a significant Pakistani population, Islam has become prominent throughout Bradford. This is particularly the case in the inner city areas such as Manning-ham, where a majority of the population are Muslim. Accordingly, there are a substantial number of mosques - some where converted from churches or other buildings, others where purpose built. (Could find research for conversion of religious building) A mosque in the city even won the model mosque award. 

There is also a sizeable indian immigrant community, also significant Hindus in area. There was a Hindu temple built which is the largest in northern England. Many Sikh related festivals are celebrated within the city annually.

Over the years, most of the Jewish population have migrated to Leeds. The Jewish community in Bradford was strong in the 19th century.

Facts and Figures:

Parish numbers - 13,500 in 2000

 -    8,700 today

Muslims who attend mosque weekly - 20,000

No religion in UK - 31% to 43% between 1983 and 2008

Those who are Christian in UK- 66% to 50% between 1983 and 2008

37% British sceptical

25% Believe in god in UK

Member of Church of England - 40% to 23% between 1983 and 2008. 49% of this group never attend services, 8% attend weekly.

62% in UK never attend a religious ceremony - 42% questioned are against any form of faith school.

52% agree that - "BRITAIN IS DEEPLY DIVIDED ALONG RELIGIOUS LINES"

No news is good news - Research methods

Research methods

Using the internet

Books

Taking surveys

General chit chat 

Secondary 

Primary

I want to find relating articles which could back the original opinion given in my chosen article, making comments on how it does so. 

I want to find stats and figures online in connection to religious numbers within Britain and how the ethnic Asian influx in influencing British culture.

No news is good news - The newspaper article

"Mosques take over our cities" is the headline of my article. This was extracted from the daily star on monday, october 25th, 2010.

Topic overview : Church bosses setting to axe a Christian district as there's more Muslim than Anglican worshippers. Mosques are crammed full while many churches are empty. Officials preparing to scrap diocese could merge Ripon and Leeds, due to large ethnic Asian influx, which made a noticeable impact on congregation sizes resulting in downturn of financial fortunes.

Facts and figures : Parish numbers have dropped from 13,500 in 2000 to 8,700 today. Compared to the 20,00 Muslims who attend Mosque every week.

No news is good news - the brief

The brief

To produce a body of research based upon a headline from a newspaper.


Tone of voice

It should be appropriate to your message, the context in which it is intended to be read and the audience to whom your work will be delivered.


Deliverables

A body of visually engaging research and information that has a clear line of enquiry and tone of voice.

An informed opinion on a subject matter derived from your chosen headline


Mandatory requirements

Consider the format that your research will take, your findings need to be clearly organised and logical in their presentation. You will need to have a focus within your research.

Labels

Regulations - Converting a church

http://hopeseguin.wordpress.com/2009/12/09/holy-conversion/

A deconsecrated church is a church which is no longer used for worship.

There are several reasons why a church may be deconsecrated, such as damage to the structure rendering it dangerous or impossible to use, changes in parish structures or the population in the area, or simply that it is no longer practical to use it for some reason. When converting, Various organisations needed to be involved, including English Heritage and the Church Commissioners.

When a church is no longer required, it becomes a ‘Redundant Church’ .  Planning permission is normally required for a change of use, and listed building consent may apply. You will also need to submit your plans to the Uses Committee Secretary. If there is a graveyard attached to your church, the human remains must be removed and interred elsewhere, although if your plans will not disturb any graves the Home Office can grant an exception.

http://www.homebuilding.co.uk/feature/converting-church

A church or chapel might not instantly hit you as being the most obvious of conversion opportunities, yet each year a good handful of redundant churches and chapels, which have fallen out of their intended ecclesiastical use, make for some of the most exciting and striking conversions. And the good news is they are zero rated for VAT.

A ‘Redundant Church’ is one that is no longer required by the Church, and has been formerly closed (so they aren’t all up for grabs), and there is a surprisingly large number of them around. This is thanks to the Victorians, who took it upon themselves to build so many surplus churches, that the pews weren’t even being filled in the 1800s. Visit www.cofe.anglican.orgfor a list of churches currently available.

DESIGN

Though they feature many of the same architectural details, all churches and chapels are unique. Each will present its own individual design problems and not all are suitable for conversion into a home. Contact the local planning authority as soon as possible to discuss your proposals.

In most cases, you will not be able to make major external alterations and even internally you will be restricted, especially if the church is listed, where you need consent to so much as remove existing fixtures and fittings such as crucifixes. You will also have to be a lover of open plan living and double-height spaces. First floors can sometimes be sensitively added. Bear in mind that whatever alterations are agreed, you need to be happy with, as a covenant will be placed on the property to protect it from any future unauthorised alterations and to ensure the Church still retains some say in the property.

ESSENTIAL INFORMATION

Planning Permission: is normally required for a change of use, and listed buildings consent if applicable. You also need to submit your plans to the Uses Committee Secretary. Bear in mind that the local authority may have already agreed on likely permitted uses.

Making an Offer: Contact the Uses Committee Secretary who will make a recommendation to the Church Commissioners. They will remain your main link throughout.

Graveyards: If there is an attached graveyard, the human remains must be removed and interred elsewhere. If your plans won’t disturb any graves, the Home Office can grant an exception. The Bishop will decide what happens to any tombstones and monuments.