Noisy Decent Graphics

T5 - the infographics airport

On Friday I flew into the brand spanking new Terminal 5.

Seeing as you've asked my flight landed 10 minutes early, my baggage wasn't lost and I didn't feel the need to swear loudly at BA staff. But this a graphic design blog and not Lonely Planet, so onwards and upwards with the infographics reviews.

I flew in from Romania and funnily enough when we were there we cited infographics as a huge trend in graphic design right now. The new T5 is full of them.

Already they look dated. They're not brilliantly designed and they just feel dated (all those silhouettes?). Surely the information will date super quick too? (Imagine if T1 said "we're the only building in Great Britain to have two escalators running side by side.) There's a lack of future proofing there. Plus - who cares how long the baggage conveyor belt is?

There's even a whole infographics pod!

I know this kind of information (how do I get to Central London etc) is very important. But it seems they got a little carried away with the screen and the use of English over symbols. It all looks very futuristic, but it isn't. Look at the amount of text on those screens. And as far as I could see the screens stay static.

The spaces are huge and the signage is small. Shortly after being told off for taking this photo I got told off for walking into the crew Passport Control area. If only they'd seen my bottle of Evian I could have been in real trouble.

Those yellow and black signs, are they official airport signage? I seem to recall reading that they were. Is that right?

They work and they look good, but it all feels a bit hospital. A bit too official. There's no wit there, which would be fine but then they're not functioning that well either. They're like new versions of the old signs. No one has taken the opportunity to rethink the signage they've just carried on as they were before.

That sums up my whole feeling about the airport really, it's a version 2 of what's been before. Nothing new, no big leaps ahead. It's a cleaner, bigger, shinier version of T4. Which seems like a huge opportunity missed.

A few more pictures over here.

Connected

More Connect. It occurred to me the other day that Flickr display pictures within a set as squares and they only show six pictures across. So if I could lay out a Connect game that was six squares wide and photograph all of them individually... Take a look at the set here. Not the individual pictures, but the whole set together.

Connect

This holiday we played Connect, Ken Garland's brilliant board game (card game?). If you're a graphic designer this is about as good as parlour games get.

I don't know about you but when I see a collection of shapes and lines like that I instantly think - could I make an alphabet out of that?

The Os are normally easy. And seeing as this one is based loosely on a digital style grid the U is pretty easy too. And the N.

The M isn't quite as elegant, but it looks cool.

The connect game doesn't only consist of three lined squares though. And to be honest all these letterforms remind me a bit too much of the Mexican Olympics and all those Helveticalovers. You know the type.

So this M is a little more fun. And more appropriate for the game.

But making a full alphabet is hard. And it's a bank holiday weekend. Easter weekend. So back in the box they go. Until another time.

Still, at least I got enough letters to make COMMUNE.

Filter Design Competition 2008

Next week Kingsley and I will be honoured to be going back to Romania again. We're helping judge the Filter design competition for the second year running, we'll be giving a little talk and we'll be running a workshop. Razvan has started calling us the 'Godfathers' of the competition, which is pretty cool.

I really should have written about this before but I haven't got round to it. Filter is organised by the guys at Oricum. You'll probably never meet a more energetic, committed bunch of people.

A few weeks ago they had Dick Powell out to present. Doesn't that hall look gorgeous? It's the same place we presented at last year, the National Theatre.

Anyway. If you want to know more about Filter get in touch with Razvan or anyone at Oricum.

Manchester

Are there any London designers who will be in Manchester on Tuesday?

A mate of Famous Rob's is organising a North vs South debate and needs some people from the London team. If you can help, leave a comment and Rob will get back to you.

Little ideas adapted by big companies

Here's a nice little idea. No big fanfare, it won't win any awards, but I just saw it and thought it was good.

If you're out and about. At a friends house for dinner or sommits. And you think think, ooh that was a nice bottle of wine I'll have to remember what that was called. Except you won't remember, because you're a bit tipsy and you've got better things to be remembering.

Now that problem is solved. You simply tear off this little reminder. I always thought those notices you see in Universities with the little tear off strips cut into the bottom were a brilliant idea. It looks like someone has adapted this for Oxford Landing. I could imagine innocent using this. I bet people would collect those little labels.

In fact, that's one of my favourite types of ideas. One that just builds over time and then gets adapted by a business or an organsiation. A bit like those paths people make when they take the direct route through a park, rather than the badly designed route the developers have made. But that's another post.

Analogue Digital Clock

Wow.

By Alvin Aronson. More details here, found via Swiss Miss.

"You have fewer ideas, but you use them better"

I've always believed this. As you get older you don't get better ideas you just get better at getting them from your head on to that bit of paper in front of you.

That's why experience often leads to better execution and the youngsters often have more ideas.

Numbers and lights

At the weekend graphic designers do stuff like this. As we used to say at college, "you could hand that in".

Golden Anniversary Celebration McDonald's

Chicago is home to the Golden Anniversary Celebration McDonald's. Essentially a huge McDonald's built to celebrate their 50 year anniversary.

The angle of the photograph isn't quite right, but the building sits under two huge arches which, when viewed from the right angle, form one massive golden M.

I was told they had an exhibition upstairs of every toy they'd ever given out with a Happy Meal. This isn't correct, but they do a have an interesting display of memorabilia through the ages. I'm no McDonald's fan, but there's some fascinating stuff here.

There are some pretty funky arches on that cup.

I wonder how many they've sold now?

I bet that Rubik's Cube is worth a few coins now. More pictures, inevitably, on Flickr.

Things you should be reading

Morning.

Right, today you should read this by Iain. It's good and Iain knows what he's talking about. You should also read this (admittedly slightly fluffy) article on the Beeb about airport design. "Ten minutes in a horrible space can feel like half an hour but in a nice space can pass relatively fast."

You should then read this article tantalisingly called Secrets of UX Design Productivity from Google, it seems that "Google is in the process of getting great ideas produced quickly" which is no bad thing. Lastly read this article in the Harvard Business Review about a Japanese bank's new IT system which was developed using the path method. As you'd imagine it's a bit heavy going in parts, but it's interesting and there are the makings of some good lessons, "firms should not have to sell new systems to users; rather they should build systems that users willingly embrace".

"Centred type is bad enough, but centred images is taking the piss."

As said by Tom, the official hater of centred anything.

Your company's app

Or your products, your brand, your communications strategy... I love that. Via Etre.

Ten Again

Have you been working in design, advertising or planning for ten years? Exactly ten years?

Email me. I need you. You'll get to see your name in print.

Umbrellas. Rubbish. Fact.

Surely an umbrella is the worst designed thing there ever was?

Problem 1. They don't do what they are designed to do. If you've been out and about in the UK today and used an umbrella I bet you still got wet. And not just a little wet, quite a bit wet. Wear a hat and buy a waterproof coat. Much better.

Problem 2. They break, easily, all the time, Look at that picture above. Look at this Flickr set. How old is the oldest umbrella in your house? Over two years? Thought not.

Problem 3. They're aggressive little beggars. Nothing frightens me more than a narrow street packed with umbrella users. I raise my hands to protect my eyes and I quicken my pace...

Umbrellas. Dreadful things.

"CO2 neutrality is the biggest fucking scam ever"

Marcus Brown.

Typography of Heroes

More tales from Chicago.

We were lucky enough to have a visit to the Hillside Fire Dept. If this was a different blog I'd say how kind they were for showing us round and how brilliant the tour was. Hero is one of those tags that gets bandied about too easily, but people that run into burning building for a living qualify in my book.

Anyway. This is a graphic design blog so take a look at some of the gorgeous hand painted typography. A few more pictures over here.

"You can't move in London without someone giving you the news"

I was talking to someone the other day and they said, "The last thing the world needs is another news website. You can't move in London without someone giving you the news". I love that quote. It's really stuck with me because it's so true, isn't it?

So since he said that I've been taking pictures every time I see someone (or something) giving me the news. That picture above is your standard noughties office reception. The news on three big flat TV's.

Here's another one. But this huge big glass fronted building allows the news to spill out on the street.

As does this one. They've used four screens, so they can show four different news channels.

I know it's a bad photograph but this is just outside Waterloo station. More news.

This is inside Waterloo station, also taken on bad photograph day.

Continuing the station theme, this is Kings Cross. So, inside office receptions, visible through the window, outside stations, inside stations.

At the airport.

On the way back from the airport. I appreciate this is a promotional thing for Bloomberg, but it's still news being thrust at you.

Likewise this is some promotion for Reuters who are situated just across the street. But still. News. Everywhere. These are all razzy screen based things, but there's also the more traditional method of London news delivery.

And now we have this new menace. They literally thrust the news at you.

Look there's one dressed in purple and one in yellow. Remember, "You can't move in London without someone giving you the news."

Look at this one. Watching. Waiting. Ready to pounce and give you the news.

And if you manage to make it home without being given the news, it's waiting for you at the Tube station. It's there all around you. Unavoidable.

The news even creeps into the most two hallowed places of British life. Tesco's.

And the pub. Why do you need the news in the pub? Why do you need the news in Tesco's?

Why do you need the news in a cheeky little Belgravia bistro? "You can't move in London without someone giving you the news"

No cameras, no phones and definatley no iPhones

Adi

The visual feast that is Ghost School pointed me in the direction of this lovely stop motion film for Adidas. By lovely, I really mean that it's lovely looking. It's not especially clever or anything.

It tells a little tale about Mr Dassler and the shoes he made.

There's a nice mix of stop motion and live footage.

And an odd, but intriguing mix of old and new.

Jollyball

I was in the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry last week. Beside the great Farm Tech exhibit there is is this wonderful thing in one of the halls called the Jollyball. The Chicago Reader describes it best as "a gigantic, self-starting pinball machine dedicated to promoting Swiss travel." How great is that?

"After the ritual ka-chunk, a silver ball emerges from a hotel and starts to roll energetically about the tour-bus-sized contraption, doing things a silver ball might do if it were a tourist in Switzerland; riding ski lifts, passing an outsize fondue bowl, being magnetically integrated into a loudly ticking clock. When the hustle and bustle gets to be too much, it slips into a bar, sets off some whistles, and eventually pops out again, wobbling noticeably."

All very exciting. I've got some more pictures on Flickr and I've borrowed a video to show you the glorious machine in action.

Applying Green

I went to the London College of Communication the other day. It's more famously known as the London College of Printing but they had a rebrand a few years ago. It's a great place and pretty famous amongst design colleges. Walking round there was that great feeling that 'stuff on the walls' gives you.

Anyway. If you're reading this and you're from the college here's a links to a few of things I talked about.

I basically regave (Tom, is that a word? I can't be bothered to look it up) my Applied Green talk. It was slightly different because things have moved on a bit and the audience was different, but here's a link to the talk pretty much word for word, videos and all.

Here's a link to a post called Green(ish) Printing which was written by Marcus Brown who is a printer. It's well worth a read. And remember I said you should get some printers in to talk to you. Do that. They know about this stuff and they like being asked.

Here's a link to Thomas Matthews website that I mentioned. Thomas Matthews are a design company that know a lot about sustainability issues. Sarah Thomas, one of the founders, also helped start Three Trees Don't Make A Forest which is a kind of resource for eco friendly designers. I must admit to having reservations about Three Trees. The picture of them all in the trees really makes me cringe. But it's a difficult and admirable thing they're doing and they deserve our support. (PS If you're reading this Sophie, Nat or Caroline I'd love you to come on here and talk about Three Trees.)

Here's a link to the Wikipedia entry about Ken Garland's First Things First Manifesto, which is a good thing.

Here's McDonald's Corporate Social Responsibilty blog and here's a blog post where Richard Reed from innocent Drinks says "I also sought the counsel of the MD of Greenpeace, who said that over the last five years mcdonalds have changed from being their number one enemy to their number one global partner in reducing deforstation in the amazonian rainforest".

And last and least here's a link to all my posts about being a design student and trying to get a job etc. Invaluable, obviously.

Car Park Usability / Graphics

I went to Tesco with a mate of mine the other day. He parked quite a way from the store. When I pointed out that there were many other spaces, closer to the shop, he said that he could never remember where he parked his car so he always parked in exactly the same space. That way it's easy to remember.

Don't park here unless you work for adidas.

People always struggle to remember where they parked their car. Remember all those stories of people tying flags to their aerials so could easily identify their car?

This is from the car park at the Camp Nou. I'd love to think that Barca's number 8 parks here, but that just isn't true.

My Dad always writes which level he's parked on on the back of his ticket and I went through a phase of photographing the sign which told you which level we were on.

This is from the San Diego Padre's car park.

Here's great idea from Tunbridge Wells. They've given each parking space a unique number and they've painted them all on the floor. This is Level 3, parking space 84.

Good eh? And isn't that the maddest 8 you've ever seen?