OUGD401 - Study Task 8 - Practical Explorations Festival Research

'Festivals are big and getting even bigger – in terms of the number being held each year, the size of the festivals and the number of people attending them. In fact, recent research* carried out for us shows that 14 million UK adults plan on attending a festival this year. And nearly three in 10 of these say they’ll attend more than one. With the average ticket price being over £200 for the major music festivals in the UK, that’ll be a fair few pounds flowing into the festival organisers’ coffers – a rough estimate being £2.3bn! And, if all those who say they’re attending a festival this year actually do it, it’ll represent a doubling of festival attendance in just three years!

Unsurprisingly, the keenest to attend are the younger generations, with just under half of both 18-24 and 25-34 year-olds saying they intend to purchase tickets for festivals this year. This is probably because camping is less appealing for older music fans, as they may not want to spend a few days stuck in a muddy tent.

And why has festivalling become such a big thing? Adrian North, director of psychology at Herriott Watt University offers up an explanation, “For some, membership of a tribe gives them self-esteem. If you are with people you think are cool it reaffirms your own lifestyle choices – you're basically patting yourself on the back."'

Quote from ThinkMoney.co.uk

10,000 units spread across the UK at £100 = £1,000,000

0.0007% of people attending a festival would need to purchase the product to sell out

Predicted 10,000,000 are target audience meaning that 1 in every 100,000 would need to purchase the product nationwide in order to meet product figures set

These ideal products are not being marketed towards the right target audience. Festival advertisement and product placement within the right stores would increase the sales of this product massively. This gap in the market can surely be exploited by any company willing to fill it. Much like timberlands asking the question "why can't work boots be incorporated into fashion?", the industry is calling out for someone to step in with another bold statement on practical fashionable footwear. Hunter wellies for women are the only competitor brand however, this is heavily linked with the female market and is in no way advertised towards the festival audience.

OUGD401 - Colour Theory - Lecture

There is no way to be sure that an apple is red, this is because of the relationship that we perceive colour. Spectral colour is a colour that is evoked by a single wavelength of light within a visible spectrum. In order to perceive colour, light needs to be present. What happens when we see a blue sky, it is a reflection of short white light wave lengths. The diagram below shows the spectrum of white light in relation to their wave length. Because the blue wave lengths are so light, the sunlight bounces off and reflects off them.

Our eyes can interpret red, green and blue however, when our green and blue cones are simultaneously stimulated, we can perceive other colours. Additive colour light is referred to as RGB whereas subtractive colour CMY. When we deal with RGB we are dealing with screens, when we deal with CMY we are working with printing.

Chromatic value = Hue + tone + saturation

Rods convey shades of black white and grey

Cones allow the brain to perceive colour

The first thing we recognise when perceiving colour is rods acknowledging tone. We can then see the contrast of hue which is determined by the distance between colours on the colour wheel which in turn creates contrast. The third element which makes up the chromatic value of a colour is saturation.

The contrast of temperature is assigned to the idea that a colour can be perceived as temperature.

OUGD401 - Study Task 8 - Practical Explorations

I also recently came across this piece of design below which started to spark my ideas on a more contextual piece of design. Using influence from the part of my essay on branding cattle with a branding iron, I have came up with the concept of possibly using primary source photography of someones back or forehead. I would then manipulate the image to look as though someone has burned a clothing brand onto the skin with a branding iron.

OUGD401 - Study Task 8 - Practical Explorations

In Study Task 6, I explored the concept to re brand an existing product towards a new customer market to boost sales and expand their target audience. I then began exploring potential untouched abilities and target audiences within products to redirect the sales to a new type of customer and to find a new direction for an existing product.

After searching the internet for a while, I discovered that there are no advertisements for welly companies during festival season. I could use photography such as the image below and overlay colour text and brand to create an advertisement aimed towards 16 - 25 year olds for wellies. Lights, music, bright colour and atmosphere are a few of the many elements of a festival which need to be clearly represented in the advertisement in order to grab the attention of young viewers. The final outcomes could then be produced into posters or mocked up on billboards in order to showcase the concept.

I could then develop this idea by moving onto welly packaging or possibly collaborating with fashion designers to produce some unique branded festival wellies. To really push the concept I could approach shops with the target audience of 16 - 25 year olds such as Foot Asylum, Foot Locker, JD and Scotts and present my prototype for possible development.

OUGD401 - Post Modernism Lecture

Post Modernism asks questions of modernisms robotic structured rules; it develops from the idea that modernism creates an un creative aesthetic. Modernism is almost the opposite of modernism. It drives art and culture backwards; it progresses backwards through all of the eras of design. The post modern condition allows multiple ideals to co exist at the same time instead of the modernist approach which expects all of the world to hold their new futuristic way.

The origins of Postmodernism stem from multiple statements in all forms of art exploring this ‘post’ modern idea. The idea started in the 1960s and reached its peak in around t he 1980s-1990s, today post modernism has slowly faded away from the start of the century. The modernist approach is often associated with capitalism and today we are describes as being in late modernism or late capitalism.

After the war, modernist developments started to appear which were large concrete housing blocks. This was a project which wanted to create a utopian civilization where everyone was equal. This can be seen in council blocks in cities all over the world, which have now become the slums of the under privileged and lower class. Charles Jencks described this as is the death of technological determinism which relies on technology and modernism to drive our civilization forward.

1960s

2000s

2010s

Park Hill Flats which were built in the 60s as a piece of modernist architecture which evolved into a slum with residents requesting to move out. Because of the importance of the architecture, the building was a listed building and could not be knocked down. Urban Splash were then hired to re invent the block.

AT & T Building Post Modern Is built with modernism in mind but however, the grid systems and diversity of the shape and style of the building give it a post modern aesthetic.

Some recent post modern buildings have merged different eras together and have created almost a remix of different styles. Places such as Las Vegas is defined as the Post Modern city, this merges styles spanning from thousands of years. It is allowed to flourish from chaos and build upon wild hybrid ideals.

Andy Warhol rejects the idea of whatever art is, he describes it as meaningless and strived to become an anti artist. His pop art approach was a beacon of what post modernism stems from. It laughs at the pretentiousness and seriousness of modernist painting. The Oxidation Painting is famous for pissing on the canvas literally taking the piss out of Jackson Pollock. Piero Manzoni did a similar piece called Artists Shit to mock the pretentiousness of art lovers which sold for tens of thousands of pounds.

OUGD401 - Lecture - Modernity & Modernism

Starting at the start of the century in 1900, the modern world starts to become established in an industrial urbanisation. Work shifts from land to the city and the factory, street lighting, the telephone and the cinema are invented. Important philosophical and scientific work was developed which influenced how people started to think about their own existence. Paris was at the height of this modernist movement with advancements of architecture and technology, in turn the Eiffel tower was built as a symbol to this modernist culture. Because of all these simultaneous changes, artists started to become interested in the events around them. They started to paint this modern environment instead of kings and queens. Fashion becomes very important as in this vast array of population, individuals become lost in the crowd and therefore want some acknowledgement from their peers. For the first time, common people start to dress like royalty to feel important when being enveloped in the city environment. This drives more interest towards artists which bring more new unusual artwork and techniques.

When photography gets invented in the early 19^th century, painting almost becomes redundant as the reality can be documented perfectly. This drives new strange depictions compositions and techniques in painting as these classical realistic techniques become irrelevant. Picasso starts to create surreal cubistic portraiture which develops into cubism. This movement drives throughout all forms of art, even poems and literature become expressive and enthusiastic towards the modern way of life.

Graphic design in the 1960’s become responsive to the modern world and become ordered and structured. The order and grid systems relate directly to the gridded architecture at the time. The design looks clean, minimal and composed which applies information and success over decoration. They remove excessive decoration to make the function of the product the pinnacle of their design. The idea of removing all decoration and style in theory makes the design immortal, it should never go out of fashion as it does not follow any fashion. This Bauhaus cutlery,  Topos by Robbe and Berking

is a perfect example of this delivery as it is minimal and true to its materials.

Architecture is built which delivers the materials as they are and try to hide them, raw concreate or glass is left how they are which conforms to the form follows function rule. This can be seen on the Mies Van der Rohe Seagrams Building below

This vast spread of Modernist life between 1750 - 1960 covers almost 200 years however, not everything created in this time period is considered as modernist. For example, even though Times New Roman was created in the modernist timeline, it is not a modernist font as it is based on historic columns in Rome.