Who couldn’t love a design studio named after Homer Simpson’s workplace area at the Springfield Nuclear Plant? Sector7g is run by principal Nicholas Eldridge who is fortunately somewhat more adept at his work responsibilities than above mentioned cartoon icon. The work up on the Sector7g site is excellent and inspiring, makes me wonder why you don’t see his name mentioned in a few more design competitions. The website has an interesting interface as well, allowing you to detatch the portfolio pics and move them anywhere in the space. You’ll need to ’shuffle’ the folio a few times to view all of the work on offer, well worth it to see some more excellent Adelaide design pieces.

I graduated from the University of South Australia’s Bachelor of Visual Communication Degree course way back in those halcyon days of 1991, so I’ve been a ‘professional’ designer for going on 15 years now, in theory anyway. When you finish your study, you’re thrust out into the working world and justly expected by any prospective employer to be ready to undertake the duties of a professional designer.

That’s rarely the case though, and wasn’t in my particular experience. I left University at a difficult time. Australia was in the midst of a recession, the days when you would see a design firms logo emblazoned on their company BMW were over and work was hard to come by for even the most experienced of designers. The course I did was excellent in regards to the theory of good visual communication, but was very light when it came to the business of an everyday design practice. Times were changing and the course was failing to (or at the very least was lacking in funds to) keep up with the important role computers were obviously beginning to play in the graphic design field, we all know it was inevitable as we scrambled to learn as much as we could from the few Mac SE machines available, trying to wring design gold under the very rudimentary tools set of programs such as ‘Ready Set Go’.

I’m currently in the process of a big clean-out in preparation for moving house. I’ve tended to be a bit of a pack-rat over the years, and I’ve dragged out my graduate portfolio into the daylight for the first time in probably over 10 years or so. It’s an interesting ‘artifact’ to say the least – full of all those past influences of Design heroes, letraset, bromides and cut paper. University is a time for experimentation, to find your direction as a designer, free to create without the burden of client input or budget constraints.

So how does the 21 year old graduate designer scrub up to the 35 year old ‘professional designer’? Over the next couple of weeks or so I’m going to examine each of my graduate projects and review where my design sensibilities where then compared to now – the good, the bad and probably the very ugly of what I offered towards potential employers back those many years ago.

The Dirty Three: Whatever You Love, You Are

I look at this album cover and wonder, ‘Why can’t all album covers be this beautiful?’ The best answer of course, is that not all bands are The Dirty Three. If there is one thing that separates them from the herd, in a musical sense, is their strong sense of craftmanship. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about that term ‘craftmanship’ about how it applies to me in terms of expression and art (designers tend to dwell on such things, I think it’s a reaction against self-expression vs earning a wage).

When we’re young, everyone does art at school (and usually just for the fun of it). It’s the fundamental tool of learning how to express yourself, unlocking the mysteries of life through finger-paints and paddlepop sticks. It usually ends there with most people unless they have that spark or inner self determination to continue improving and experimenting with their ‘art-skills’ It’s unusual in that it’s one of the few things you partake in at an early educational level that is not carried through with. All kids play with balls, and through their years of learning, the ‘craft’ of physical education is encouraged, so at least you’re skilled enough to kick a football or hit a ball with a tennis racket. This is the same with reading, computer skills, spelling – it just seems really weird that most people stop at the finger-paints.

As a designer – I’m one of those kids that decided to carry that journey on beyond the finger-paints, to hone ‘my craft’ if you will. I was never really interested in the intellectual side of ‘art’ when I was growing up. It was more of a matter of seeing something and appreciating the skill that went into producing it, whether that was a cartoon, a comic book or magazine illustration I stumbled upon. I never thought of myself as producing ‘art’ growing up – if I even thought of putting a title on what I did, it was illustration, cartooning, or just drawing – my interest wasn’t in ‘art for art sake’ but in creating something with a purpose, my explorations were always aimed at the creation of comic books, picture books, posters. So before I even knew what I was, I was a ‘designer’ I guess. It’s amazing how much that has influenced how I look and feel upon the visual world around me. I don’t really differentiate between craft and art. I can appreciate the beauty of a well considered and thoughtfully designed annual report as much as I can appreciate the beauty of the strokes in Monet’s water lilies. What is the link that ties both things together for me then? The important criteria is that they make me feel something, before I delve into whether that annual report is actually clearly defining that year’s stats to the shareholders, or Monet’s tenants on Impressionism, I want to be moved by them before I wish to explore them more.

Which (long-windedly!) brings me back to the album ‘Whatever You Love, You Are’. The cover’s Van Gogh-like use of thick paintstrokes and gobs of colours instantly draws me into further examination of the albums contents. A listen to it makes it obvious this is a beautiful album that has been well served by a beautiful cover. The painting effectively highlights the emotional expressiveness of tracks like ‘I Offered It Up To The Stars And Night Skies’ but is still naive and rough enough around the edges to properly serve a track like ‘I Really Should’ve Gone Out Last Night’. The layered paint strokes are an indication of the added layers of orchestration that have been incorporated with Warren Ellis’ violin, but you’re still reminded that this is no grandiose symphony performance, by the subtle placement of the band’s name in the bottom right hand corner. The cover and the music are a perfect amalgamation of craftsmanship and art – both can be appreciated for the skill involved in producing them and the means in which they can move you, that rare accomplishment, an album cover that gives you the feel of the music before a note is played.

Does the design of Australian CD covers suck, or perhaps to put it a better way, does the design of Australian CD covers pale in comparison to work being produced overseas? The latest edition of Australian Creative, in one of their usual indepth critiques says ‘yes it does’. The statement arises in their examination of that old chestnut, ‘does the increase in consumers downloading music online mean the death of printed cover art?’ I’ll cover my opinions on that matter in another article – but is Australia really producing substandard CD covers? Well, the obvious answer to that is of course that 90% of everything that is designed is substandard or at the very least generic. That applies to what is being produced overseas as well, so is Australia really the poor cousin in comparison when it comes to album art?

The article makes it sound like great CD artwork flows like milk and honey in the US and Europe, a fantastic nirvana where designer’s call the shots, producing cutting edge work for the likes of The Rolling Stones, Madonna and Radiohead. Funny then, that’s not the impression that I get when I see the racks of blandness while walking into a Sanity record store.

The fact of the matter is that The USA & Europe are producing as much crap CD covers, if not more-so, as we are in Australia. Certainly, the likes of Stefan Sagmeister, Designers Republic & Kim Hiorthoy are producing brilliant cutting edge covers, none of it is finding it’s way onto the latest Britney or 50 Cent release you’ll notic though. While Sagmeister and The Designers Republic have designed covers for big acts like The Rolling Stones and Madonna, they are hardly the most creative examples of their work, could you name off the top of your head what album they did? Their best work has always been for independent record labels, even Peter Saville and Vaughan Oliver’s covers for New Order and The Pixies were done under the patronage of independent labels.

It all comes down to economy of scale. Europe and the USA obviously have larger populations, are closer to other countries and therefore have more access to diverse markets. It stands to reason then, that they have a higher number of independent records labels, putting out more product and vying for a slice of the market. Australia has a relatively small population – hence less record labels putting out less product. So it would appear that there are less well designed CD covers produced here, but in a percentage comparison, the opposite is probably the case. And what exactly does Australian creative consider as a well designed CD cover? One produced by a well known designer it seems, they don’t really set any base mark for their conclusions other that citing the obvious overseas big names, Sagmeister doesn’t produce work here so guess what, we’re crap!

If Australian Creative were seriously interested in examining whether Australian CD artwork really is inferior compared to that overseas, they probably should have looked into it with a bit more depth than just asking the nearest ‘bohemian’ behind the counter at the local record shop whether he can think of any really cool Australian CD covers.

Ben Lee: Awake Is The New Sleep

What can you say about Ben Lee? You either hate him or hate him even more. Many would like to smash Lee’s elongated face open, not just because he has previously claimed his albums to be among the greatest Australian rock recordings of all time, but also because of the amazing amount of crap that dribbles out of his month in every interview I have ever read with him. I don’t hate him for that, it only puts him in the 99 percentile of all celebrities as far as I’m concerned – it’s the frustrating dichotomy of his existence. The fact that he’s not a very good singer or musician, yet plays to his strengths and knows his limits, that he’s not a great writer, yet his songs are habitually catchy and well crafted, the fact that he is not an actor, yet did a pretty good job of starring in ‘The Rage In Placid Lake, hell, I can even forgive him for going out with Claire Danes and not being ‘me’. No, the reason for my hate is an extremely personal and petty one, the fact that he isn’t a designer, yet does a frickin’ fantastic job of designing the cover to ‘Awake Is The New Sleep’ himself.

The cover provides the perfect aesthetic for the upbeat and likeable aura of ‘Awake Is The New Sleep’. Those expecting the album to document the little bugger’s breakup with Claire Danes with morbid musical strains will be disappointed. The album was mostly put together before that sad journey to Dumpsville: population Lee, when Danes decided to grab herself a large hunking lump of actor Billy Crudup, the only signs of their parting is in the bluesy tribute of Ache For You. For most of the album a chin-up atmosphere prevails, even the initial sad strains of ‘Gamble Everything For Love’ upon a closer listen reveals a positive affirmation of the possibilities of love. And it’s all seems perfectly encapsulated with that ’so simple why didn’t I think of that’ cover that cuts through the pretentions that the albums title might suggest. If I was to say, it’s an album cover with the title spelt out in flowers, it would sound pretty naff, right? Yet Lee pulls it off with the restraint and elegance of a seasoned design professional, bastard.

It’s not a perfect album by any means, it’s cheeriness overstays it’s welcome by a song or two, as does that damn toy piano by about three songs in. I have to give him an “A’ for effort though. Awake Is The New Sleep is a humble album that finds Lee astutely checking his ego at the door for a change. That and a fantastic cover is enough to distract me from his ugly smug mugging, ridiculous media quotes and C grade gaggle of celebrity friends for the moment, at least until he hooks up with his next Hollywood babe.

Being a Graphic Designer, I always take an interest when I come across an updated identity for a well known local brand. Usually this change is an improvement, the mark may have been in use for over a decade or more and needs to keep up with the aesthetics of the time, the company might have grown or been bought by someone new who wants to update the image to meet with their business criteria – in any case, what the business would hope for is a new mark that is at least as effective as the old one if not a vast improvement. Then you come across something like the new logo for The Professionals Real Estate and you wonder what the hell they are trying to achieve. Their old logo (as such) was made up from a serviceable use of san serif type and those 1970s modernist parallel colour bars prevalent in the design of those times, so there was no doubt that an update was justified. What they have ended up with looks like they got the receptionist to knock it up in her lunch break (my apologies to any receptionists out there who have forsaken a career in graphic design to work front of office). I can excuse a small business knocking up their own logo out of Publisher on their home computer to stick on a sandwich board outside their shop (well I can’t really, in fact I usually think they’d be better off if they hadn’t of bothered), but The Professionals are a large national real estate firm, They even call themselves The Professionals with a mark that says they are ‘anything but’. First off, is that friggin’ Comic Sans that they’ve used for the typeface on the mark? I’m pretty sure it isn’t actually, they’ve only managed to discover a similar typeface that is even uglier. Lots of designers use a handwritten style in logos to denote a personable, approachable personality to the mark, I guess it’s like when you receive a handwritten letter, it’s saying ‘this is just for you’. So that approach is probably not so bad when you’re trying to sell someone something as personal as a home. A computer ‘handwritten style’ font isn’t going to do that, the whole idea is negated by the fact that it’s characters are exact duplicates, for example, in Professionals you have three ’s’ that look exactly the same – you don’t get the different nuances you would if they had actually bothered to pick up a writing implement and handwritten it.

Secondly, let’s make this logo really difficult and expensive to reproduce by making it work only in five colours for the hundred odd offices around the country who will need to be able to reproduce it in one colour newspaper real estate listings, making sure that when they do it will be even uglier.

I assume that smudge at the top is a star (signifying?) – either that or their colour printers ink cartridge has leaked.

I’d be very surprised (and embarrassed) if a dedicated design firm produced this – I’m assuming the Managing Director’s 8 year old son brought it home from art class and hung it on the fridge just when daddy was looking for a new identity for his firm. If this was produced by a designer, then they must have the biggest balls imaginable to get this through, either that or it’s meant as irony (I just can’t tell anymore).

Fonda 500: The Autumn: Winter collection

Fonda 500’s ‘The Autumn: Winter Collection’ was really the inspiration for my ‘Judging albums by their cover’ articles. It has been a habit of mine for some time to discover new music by picking out albums that had covers that I liked, almost 90% of the time it turned out that I loved the music on the album as well. The Autumn: Winter Collection was discovered during one of my frequent rummages through the secondhand stacks at Bigstar Records. I have to admit, I’m a big fan of the ‘looks like a five year old drew the cover’ aesthetic – a style which is harder to pull off than you would probably imagine. I think I may have had in the back of my mind that this album was something that I had read a review for a couple of months earlier – originally thought the band’s name was ‘Autumn’ and the album was called ‘Winter Collection. It was only months later that I discovered ‘Fonda 500 tucked on the CD edge (what I had originally thought was the record label’s name!) I was really drawn to the simplicity of the graphics, basic black and white, handwritten text, naive imagery – it felt Autumn/Winterish, like a memory back to childhood when the seasons seemed all the more defined and more simply separated.

So how does the music relate to the cover graphics? The way I would describe the music is if a 1970’s primary school teacher, taking her classes music lesson, decides to lock her charges in the music room and tells them they have an hour to produce 12 compositions on the theme of Autumn & Winter with the instruments provided – and I mean that in a good way!

This probably falls under the genre of ‘Bedroom Pop’ usually a pejorative, Fonda 500 carry it off with a mischievous imagination. Beach Boy like harmonies, cartoon imagery, weird instruments, out-of-tune guitars, nursery rhyme like lyrics, songs about snowball fights, eating biscuits and duffel coats. The Autumn: Winter Collection validates the fact that minimal budget is no barrier to creating intriguing , lovable, melodic, confusing and frankly wonderful pop music – likewise when it comes to cover graphics.

Maybe I’m looking into this too much, but I can’t help but be bemused by The National Australia Bank’s decision to abbreviate to ‘nab’. The bank has seen it’s share of troubles over the last few years, too boring to go into here, the name change seems ironically appropriate. My dictionary defines ‘nab’ as to snatch or seize suddenly or without knowledge. I don’t know if I’d have a lot of confidence putting my money into an institution so named. Perhaps it’s meant to be social commentary on those sudden bank fees that seem to hit my account if I go anywhere near an ATM machine? Or the sudden massive layoffs of bank employees that are becoming an all too common occurrence? If that’s the case I’ve got to praise them on their honesty at least.

The logo with it’s all lowercase letters is an odd looking mark as well, inelegant to look at and to say – ‘nab’? Roll that over your tongue a few times, this is an improvement over ‘The National’? At least that carried some authority. I’m sure a lot of money was thrown at it to come up with this, so obviously I’m crazy and the nab’s coffers will overflow with the milk and honey of the re-branding success. Now I’m going to go ‘nab’ me some lunch.

Architecture In Helsinki: In Case We Die

Design & Music would seem to be a perfect match. Art and design school seem to be filled with would-be-musicians, and many a well known band has found it’s genesis in one of these institutions over the years. It comes as some what of a mystery then, why there remains so many really badly designed album covers. A lot of output from the major labels can be put down to the machinations of their marketing departments. Primarily they are releasing albums to move product, therefore they are trying to create an ‘image’ of the artist, an ‘ideal’ that their intended market (whether this be teenage girls are whatever) want to aspire to, rather than an interpretation of the specifics of the music (in a lot of cases there wouldn’t be that much to work from anyway). The independent release has a lot more freedom and hence, the results of the cover artwork should be better, unfortunately there are still a lot of roadblocks in the way to stymie this. Bands just starting out and releasing their first album are often still finding their feet as far as style and image. They are invariably short of cash and any money they do have is usually put into producing the best recording they can, using a designer for cover artwork is probably last on their list of priorities. This leaves the design of the cover up to the most ‘capable’ band member or a friend who has some artistic ability (or at least knows how to use Publisher! )

The fall-back and easiest position is to usually copy the aesthetic style of their musical idols and inspiration (as best they can) rather than establishing their own visual identity. This can work ok as long as all the members agree on this aesthetic – the worse case scenario is the ‘design by committee’. This happens when everyone from friends, family, partners, their hairdresser (she’s really artistic!) put their two cents in over the design. What results is a cover that tries to incorporate everything and please everyone, but ultimately portrays nothing other than a confusing, unappealing morass.

Sometimes bands get lucky though, and actually have a member with design talent and an individual vision – such is the case with Architecture In Helsinki’s ‘In Case We Die’. The advantages of being an independent band with their own label are self -evident on the cover. It’s doubtful that a major label would find the artwork of front-man Cameron Bird particularly marketable, even though it perfectly parallels the bands style – a handmade aesthetic. It combines childlike scribbles and free-hand fonts with a clear, colourful, hand-drawn style. The band photos on the inside cover are playfully coloured, scribbled upon and drawn around in a spontaneous, random manner, much like the band introduces unusual instrumentation and lyric structure to the songs. Architecture In Helsinki quite literally wear their independence on their sleeve.

The Adelaide Fringe began in 1960 as an alternative to the Adelaide Festival of Arts, an ‘open access event’ that allows anyone with ideas, enthusiasm (and admittedly, the registration fees!) to be part of the program. It has grown over the years to become perhaps the second biggest arts festival of it’s kind, only eclipsed by the Edinburgh Fringe.

In the spirit of an ‘open access event’ the promotional poster is chosen each year by a contest that is open to the public, a method that you can probably imagine has produced mixed results over the years. It’s probably the most ‘well entered’ contest of it’s kind in Adelaide, a favourite among students and professional designers alike that have dominated the submissions in recent years (it seems every third or fourth Fringe that they try to regain their open access policy by awarding the winning entry to someone who isn’t studying or employed as a designer).

The past few years, the Fringe has also been big on giving the event a specific ‘theme’ to help direct the would-be designers in their interpretation (I guess this theme encompasses the Fringe as a whole as well).The theme for 2006 is ‘Re-generation’ and the idea of re-inventing itself. Winner of this years poster contest was Roger Tiley, a designer at uber-great local design firm Do-Da. He chose to interpret the theme of re-generation by recycling previous years posters into origami cranes.

As far as conveying said theme – it’s not bad as concepts go – it of course depends largely on the viewer being familiar with past posters to get it’s point across, easy if you have a mind for remembering past designs, but as designers we often forget that a poster such as this is an immediate thing and probably forgotten by the general public a week after the event finishes. Anyway, ok as a concept, but if you’re really going to dip into the history of an event approaching it’s 50th anniversary – re-inventing itself – it would suggest to me that you might want to dip a bit further into that history and use some posters that cover a greater timeline than the last 8 years. Does the Fringe really need to re-invent itself from the last 8 years? To be fair, I would hazard a guess that it has more to do with the availability of past posters to fold, than deliberately snubbing earlier posters.

The Adelaide Fringe Website goes into great lengths in justifying the use of the paper crane on the poster. They seem to be drawing a pretty long bow in my opinion, tying it into Hiroshima victims, Japanese legends and the perfect symbol of peace – pretty heady stuff! My first reaction when I saw the poster was, ‘Well if you’re going to use origami, a crane is the obvious piece of folding to use so people know that it is origami. The explanation smacks a little bit of the ‘bullshit’ that we designers use to justify our amazing design creations to a client. You know how it goes – you design it, you love it, you need to find a way to re-assure the client that their trust and money spent is warranted. My apologies to Roger if the design did stem from his deep thoughts into the matter, it sounds pretty heavy going for an event that has previously been represented by a pink reindeer and a close up of someone’s tonsils.

As nicely folded as the paper crane is, it’s not the most dynamic visual you can imagine, it’s a little sedate, which is ok, but to me the Fringe is all about life and movement – it’s a two week blast of comedy, music & theatre, a chance to try new things and to laugh and take in the vibe surrounding you. The poster needs to draw you into the event – a paper crane just isn’t doing that for me.

The finished poster was done in conjunction with designers for this years Fringe ‘Nicknack’. An organic, handrawn headline works well against the precisely folded crane to the extent that it’s actually a lot more exciting than it. With some more work I feel that the type treatment could have been the basis for the whole poster and still have fitted in with the Fringe’s much touted re-generation theme. I like the teal background as well – you can never have enough teal – I think I might paint my bedroom in it!

All that said, the poster is out there, tickets are selling, the Fringe people are happy with it, Roger Tiley is going to Malaysia (or where ever his prize was to!) and I’m not – maybe I should enter next time and put my money where my mouth is!

A quick note to the Fringe regarding the poster’s size. Normally the poster is printed up A1-A0 sizes, the largest I’ve seen is A2 and mostly I’ve seen it at a puny A4. It looks like a flyer for a Primary School fete at this size. I know they had the extra costs of printing four different posters (in full colour no-less) but the Fringe poster needs to be seen around town AS BIG AS POSSIBLE! Especially with the delicate nature of this years imagery.