The Impact of David Carson
He was labeled a terrible graphic designer in the nineties. His agonized typography drove a clique of critics to indict him of not being serious and of destroying the origins and foundation of communication design. Now, the work and techniques of David Carson dominates design, advertising, the Web, and even motion pictures.
David Carson graduated from San Diego state university, where he received a BFA degree in sociology. A former professional surfer, he was ranked #9 in the world during his college days. David Carson is currently the principal and chief designer of David Carson Design, Inc. with offices in New York City and Charleston, SC.
Carson is a designer whose unorthodox graphic style played a major role in his success in the design world. His sense of typography is original and unique in a way that he does not follow the basis of communication design. For example, his arrangement of text is not what we would normally see which is in order but positioned in disarray creating chaos and confusion which is new and refreshing. His use of interesting visual simultaneously with typography creates an out of the ordinary design where sometimes the images are deliberately obscuring the text that goes with it and occasionally creating an unfinished sentence or word.
Simplicity runs through Carson’s veins where “less is more”. Minimalism functions in his design where there are no extreme effects that would overpower his intention. His aim i...
In the beginning, Brooks illustrates the shift in thought from the outdated ideals of the past to the modern paradigm of simplicity. The oxymoronic title, “The Evolution of Simplicity,” exemplifies the irony of a society that advances forward technologically, yet moves backwards toward simplicity. This demonstrates our “go for the gusto” mentality that causes us to forget to enjoy the little things in life. Too often, we restrict ourselves with tunnel vision, focusing only on the destination ahead and forgetting to enjoy the
Lawson, Bryan. How Designers Think: The Design Process Demystified. 4th ed. Oxford: Architectural Press, 2006.
Concordia University, in response to an assignment proposed by Nathalie Dumont’s Dart 280 class. I devoted a month of work to this project in February of 2014. The assignment was called Helvetica No More in which we were asked to create a poster for Rainer Erich Scheichelbauer’s typographic talk at the Design Lecture Series at Concordia University. The lecture was on the overuse of the typeface Helvetica and how design is meant to be created to explore new ideas. The poster that I produced illustrates breaking the norm of
Lawson, Bryan. How Designers Think: The Design Process Demystified. NY: Architectural Press, 1980, 2007. Massachusetts: NECSI Knowledge Press, 2004.
In the video produced on TED “Embrace the Remix” by Kirby Ferguson, he discusses the importance of understanding that “creativity comes from without not from within and that we are not self made but dependent on each other” (Ferguson, 2012). Ferguson discusses how everything is a remix and defines remixing as copying, transforming, and combining. He makes a logical sound argument through the use of logical fallacies to convince his viewers. Ferguson argues how remixing helps creativity through the use of logos by providing cases of Steve Jobs building off ideas, appealing to ethos with poisioning the wall fallacy, and emotionally appeal to the viewers through pathos with appeal to tradition.
A year and a half ago, Ray Rice was one of the top running backs in the National Football League. Rice had it all, money, fame, and a successful career in the pros, but who knew that Rice would be capable of such a terrible act of violence. Kids all over the country looked up to him for how he played the game and even how he acted. Rice made an impact in the lives of many young people due to his signature event, Ray Rice Day, where he gave hundreds of kids instruction and encouragement, and also fun by playing football.(Ray Rice Makes Impact in Youth Community,1). Adults looked up to Rice too, due to his multiple charities that he is very active in. Rice’s persona was great until February 15, 2014. On this date, Rice and his then fiancee, Janay Palmer, got into an altercation in an elevator in the early morning after a very long night of heavy drinking. Rice and Palmer got physical and Rice knocked her out, then continued to drag her out of the elevator. The police were called, and they were both arrested on the scene and taken to jail. Ray Rice tarnished his image after being such a respected person in the NFL community and all around the world. One camera
MAIN NAME SHEET David Carson was born in Texas in the United States. Many of his design influences have come from his early childhood while travelling around America, Puerto Rico and the West Indies. His first significant exposure to graphic design education came as part of a three-week workshop in Switzerland, where the Swiss graphic designer Hans-Rudolph Lutz influenced him. He then worked in a high school near San Diego from 1982 to 1987. During this time he also carried highly experimental graphic design as the art director of the magazine Transworld Skateboarding. Among his abilities of art directing, graphic designing and film directing, he was also a professional surfer. His immense interest in the surfing culture persuaded him to return to the West Coast where he helped launch the magazine Beach Culture. The magazine only lasted three years but Carson’s pioneering approach to design, particularly toward typography challenged the fundamental aspects of all design and graphic communication. SURFER SHEET Carson’s work was often arresting and powerfully communicative. From 1991 to 1992 he worked on Surfer magazine. The straightforward styling of the covers was a strong contrast to the later "How" magazine covers. Here you could associate with Carson as his unique use of typography filled each cover to give an interesting introduction to the contents. After this came his break into an international profile when he helped launch Raygun magazine, ...
Numerous intellectuals have debated on the effects that typography has on the mind. An example of two such intellectuals are Walter Ong and Neil Postman. In Walter Ong’s “Writing is a Technology that Restructures Thought” he describes the difference between oral and typographic cultures and the resulting effects each had on the mind while in Chapter 4 of Postman’s “Amusing Ourselves to Death” similarly focuses on how typography has molded the way that we think, which has become very structured and writing-like, and how that effects public discourse. Overall, both their pieces serve to demonstrate how typography arrogates itself into our lives and is forever embedded in our conscious and unconscious mind, which illuminates how technology is
After being ranked 8th in the world and having a known name in the sporting industry, he was easily contacted and hired for designing sports/surfing magazines and advertisements. In the interview conducted by Designboom, Carson stated that he had no real formal training in the design world, resulting in a lack of knowledge in basic design content (i.e. grids, formulas, schools of thought, etc.) (Designboom, 2014). But, with his early interest and education in sociology, and his Bachelor of Arts degree, he is easily able to work with real stories, real people, events, and music. When Carson is given the brief article that he must design around, or the client’s idea pitch, he just designs what he feels is right (Designboom, 2014). The more pieces he creates, the more experimental he gets. This act of fearlessness and adventuresome is what makes him such a desirable designer. Clients are confident that he will produce something unique, beautiful, and daring. Carson stated that his strongest skill is his “ability to speak visually and emotionally to a wide variety of audiences and topics” (Designboom, 2014). Carson has been in the design industry for many years and has worked with many varied clients, making his knowledge and level of creativity mastered. His curious, bold, and open-minded personality, plus his experimental, clever, and unique approach to design, has made the successful designer who he is
With his down-the-rabbit-hole approach to design and obsessive attention to detail, Wes Anderson, writer, director and auteur, is best known for his highly stylized movies. His extremely visual, nostalgic worlds give meaning to the stories in his films, contrary to popular critical beliefs that he values style over substance. Through an analysis of his work, I plan to show that design can instead, give substance to style.
Graphic designer and typographer Stefan Sagmeister has always had a unique way of viewing the world, therefore has created designs that are both inventive and controversial. He is an Austrian designer, who works in New York but draws his design inspiration while traveling all over the world. While a sense of humor consistently appears in his designs as a frequent motif, Sagmeister is nonetheless very serious about his work. He has created projects in the most diverse and extreme of ways as a form of expression. This report will analyse three of Stefan’s most influential designs, including the motives and messages behind each piece.
Wicked Problems in Design Thinking Author(s): Richard Buchanan Source: Design Issues, Vol. 8, No. 2 (Spring, 1992), pp. 5-21 Published by: The MIT Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/
Many do not consider where images they see daily come from. A person can see thousands of different designs in their daily lives; these designs vary on where they are placed. A design on a shirt, an image on a billboard, or even the cover of a magazine all share something in common with one another. These items all had once been on the computer screen or on a piece of paper, designed by an artist known as a graphic designer. Graphic design is a steadily growing occupation in this day as the media has a need for original and creative designs on things like packaging or the covers of magazines. This occupation has grown over the years but still shares the basic components it once started with. Despite these tremendous amounts of growth,
In the late nineteen- forties, Alex Osborn was a partner in the advertising agency B.B.D.O., which is where he decided to write a book where he shared all of his creative secrets. At the time the advertising agency was much known as the most innovative firm on Madison Avenue. Born in 1988, Osborn spent much of his career in Buffalo, where he started out working in newspapers, there he teamed up with and another man by the name of Adman who he met volunteering for the United War Work Campaign. By the forties, he was one of the industry’s grand old men, ready to pass on the lessons that he had learned over the years. His book “Your Creative Power” was published in 1948.
Hegeman, J. (2008). The Thinking Behind Design. Master Thesis submitted to the school of design, Carngie Mellon University. Retrieved from: http://jamin.org/portfolio/thesis-paper/thinking-behind-design.pdf.