Angus MacPhersonPresentation

8/9/2019 Angus MacPhersonPresentation

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A N G U S M A C P H E R S O N D E S I G N C O N T E X T

Typography:

Process and Product

Book + Inserts


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C O N T E N T S

Chapter 1: Leerpress and Pre-Graphic DesignChapter 2: Leerpress and early modernism

Chapter 3: Photoseng and High Modernism

Chapter 4: Apple Mac, Desktop Publishing and Post-Modernism

Chapter 5: Post Digital Design

Interview: Jack Featherstone

Interview: Jay Cover Nous Vous

Interview: Holger Jacobs Mind

Interview: Alex Bec Its Nice That

Interview: David Pearson

Feature: Team Impression


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L E T T E R P R E S S A N D P R E G R A P H I C D E S I G N


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L E T T E R P R E S S A N D E A R L Y M O D E R N I S M

De Slj Construcvism Bauhaus


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P H O T O S E T T I N G

High Modernism Swiss Style


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D E S K T O P P U B L I S H I N G

Breaking all the rules Postmodernism


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P O S T D I G I T A L D E S I G N

Where are we now?

Why are lo producon and design methods so important?

What can we learn from the past?

What can we borrow from the past?


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I N T E R V I E W : J A C K F E A T H E R S T O N E

1. When you embark on a new brief to

what extent does the producon method

inform the ideas you come up with?

This of course depends on what the brief

is. But in general the producon method

can have a massive impact on my work.

Somemes to the extent that the process

completely takes over and the work is

based solely upon ideas and experimentsthat come from it, as opposed to a

preconceived concept that id rigidly stuck

too. Usually it is a maer of starng out

with a basic idea, laying some guidelines

and then leng the project evolve naturally

through the producon method.

2. With the way graphic communicaon,

adversing and promoon is becoming

increasingly digised why do you think a

physical, printed products sll hold such a

fasinaon for designers?

Because designers are human beings

and human beings like to touch and hold

objects. We like products to have their

own personality and this can somemes

be dicult when the product is solely

expressed through a computer screen or

mobile device.

3. To what extent do you think

experemental, quirky and premiumnishing techniques are relevant to non

designers? Do you think the average man

in the street will noce or care about your

beauful die-cut, spot varnished book

cover for example?

This seems to allude to the queson

of whether or not design should be

democrac and keeping in line with the

ideas that came from the Bauhaus. Should

everything you design be accessible and

communicave to the average person? I

think not, design should be custom and

relevant to the audience it is meant for. But

designers are oen selsh and obsessive,

so given the chance (budget) will oen

employ methods that seem a bit over the

top, which I think is wonderful.

4. Where do you see the future of graphic

communicaon in 20 years, how much

printed collateral do you think we will

sll need?

Moon design for mobile devices will

become incredibly important, adversing

will bombard the consumer will

personalized holographic messages. Think

minority and youll get the idea. Printed

maer will be obsolete by then, but of

course dont forget about the obsessive,

selsh designers who I am sure will sll

produce limited addion publicaons.

5. Where you involved in design pre the

introducon of the apple mac?

nope

6. If you were what impact on your

personal pracce did the introducon of

desk top publishing have? If not how has

the role of the computer changed while

you have been a designer?

The computer is taking more control by the

day, it scares me.

7. In our current climate where,

typographically, it is possible to do prey

much anything with a laptop and a digital

printer, why do you think designers are

sll so interested in real physical graphics

like paper cuts, models and the use of

photography and manual producon

techniques like screen prinng and

leerpress?

see answer no. 2.


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I N T E R V I E W : J A Y C O V E R




Depends on the brief. My general working

process is to aempt to embody the

message in the method anyway, so I sort

of preempt the noon that the method

informs the idea, but that all depends on

the brief as I usually adapt processes I use

and research other processes to come out

with an appropriate response. I suppose

what youre geng at is the idea that some

designers have a certain working method

that they use, which mainly applies to

illustrators who develop a porolio of workto display a consistent visual language?

Id say it was 50/50 really, as I occasionally

use devices that I have developed in my

personal pracce, that I would like to see

applied commercially, so somemes the

outcome is mediated by a process, which

somemes in the right context, is far

more interesng in my opinion anyway.

But generally I take each brief as it comes

and deal with it in a way that would best

communicate the point.

2. For you what is the aracon of using

lo processes in design and producon

like screen prinng and model making?

I suppose the aracon is that there is

a denite personal visual language, with

character and personality of it s own / or

its makers. Also to my mind theres a great

deal you can learn from hand rendered

processes that you cant learn by working

on a computer. I personally, simply, like tomake things, I like what I learn f rom the

processes involved in producon and how I

can apply & improve those processes. Its a

good thing for expanding your mind as well

as your skill set, as co-ordinaon between

head & hand eects and informs ideas.





fascinaon for designers?

Theres always going to be an urge amongst

creave people to express themselves,

without the aid of a computer, to have a

voice of their own making. The computer

can be very restricve and less immediate,

when you can only see your creaons on

screen and not in your hand - somemes

this just doesnt sasfy. I guess?


experimental and premium nishing

techniques are relevant to non designers?

Do you think the average man in the street

will noce or care about your beauful

die-cut, spot varnished book cover for

example?

I think if you present these processes

appropriately and you are wary of their

applicaon, anyone will noce. You just

have to use necessary techniques and not

do superuous things just for the sake of it,

generally for your own self-sasfacon. On

the other hand introducing unusual things

into the public arena is never a bad idea,

unless its antagonisc.




sll need?

I dont know exactly what you mean

by printed collateral - excess printed

material presumably, collateral just means

addional, it doesnt mean too much?

Please advise? - sorry didnt want to sound

patronising there, just Graphic design is

about clear communicaon, this goes

beyond what you produce, you have to

look at what youre saying and queson it.

I think the term graphic design is far too

general in contemporary society, I dont

actually consider most design agencys

- designers, they just brand and market, re-

present exisng ideas and dont do it with

much clarity, so hopefully the denion of

design will adapt and become more clear.

For me graphic design is progressive and

making informaon accessible as well as

looking at what youre saying, quesoning

why youre doing it. Its more for social

benet than for prot, or at least for

both, design is for solving problems - not

expanding pockets. I hope design will

return to tradional values within the next

20 years, like the design of roadsigns etc,

but keep up to speed with methods of

communicaon being developed that will

be less wasteful.

6. Were you involved in design pre the


Well the Apple Mac was released in the

80s, and Im not quite that old. I didnt

actually consider myself a designer unlI nished Uni in 2007, when I got my rst

few commissions and I was geng more

interested in type and reading more about

graphic design. Before that I was just a

do-er of things, visual things mainly. I guess

I was involved in it, in that I was learning

about it un-wingly.






Well I guess I was just on the cusp of most

development, in terms of communicaon.

Although I didnt noce as I was just doing

my own thing. For me personally I use it

alot more since graduang, obviously most

jobs require being sent to printers so its

necessary and always has been since Ive

been praccing, I guess communicaon is

the biggest thing though. Blogs were just

taking o when I nished Uni Manystu

had just started and itsnicethat was alsojust starng, I think they both started just

before I nished Uni, which wasnt very

long ago, but theyve come a long way in no

me at all, comparavely, well the impact

of them anyway. So the only thing I can say

Ive noced is the use of communicaon,

especially things like, anyone being able to

set up a website and market themselves

internaonally for relavely low cost,

which is great and has helped my pracce

enormously.


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I N T E R V I E W : H O L G E R J A C O B S

1. The identy you designed for Circus is

employed across a mind blowing range

of media. When you embark on a project

like this in what ways does the producon

method inform the ideas you come up

with?

In this project there are many produconmethods. We worked with illuminated

acrylics, acid etched aluminum, steel,

prinng on mirrored stock, etc. Normally

we always think of the producon method

right away when we do the rst sketches.

However, in this case as it was so varied, so

the inial design of the logo is more based

on the interior. Circus features a table that

doubles up as a stage with steps leading

up to it. Beside those steps the logo was

inuenced by kaleidoscopes and mirrors.

Other inuences came from Surrealism and

Art Deco, a period I am very interested in

at the moment. The overall identy is quite

a complex puzzle of dierent elements

and somehow reects that dierent

people where working on it in the studio

at the same me. Many ideas develop in

teamwork.






Absolutely. There is unwrien rule in

typography: if you cant do it in leerpress

then dont do it on the computer. This

might not always be true but its good to

keep tradional producon methods in

mind when designing anything. I am not

very interested in digital technology I must

admit. Obviously I use the computer butthe development of new programs could

have stopped for me about 5 years ago. I

rather have less funcons, it helps me to

focus.

3. To what extent do you think bespoke

and premium nishing techniques are

relevant to non designers? Do you think

the average man in the street will noce

or care about your beauful foil blocked

menu for example?

If they dont noce they have to be

educated. Print quality and aenon to

detail is important. I rather produce less in

quanty. In a way it should reect how we

consume today. I prefer to buy one good

product and keep it for 10 years from a

company with a good identy, good design,

good packaging, etc. rather than something

from the Argos catalogue that I replace a

year later by the next model.




sll need?

I hope that print will improve in quality and

reduce in quanty. Everything that is high

volume mass market communicaon can

be moved to the internet.



Yes, for a short period of me just when I

started studying. It was brilliant. Of course

it was all a lot more hassle but somehow

design was slower and more considerate

because of that. You only had one shot so

it was important to think it through rst.

Today clients are already asking for the

third pdf version before you even had me

to think about the project properly. Its a

much more fragmented way of working

and especially since the intenon of pdf s

clients are much more in control.






Its not so much the computer, its more the

way we communicate now. Communicaon

has been much more demanding and

distracng and there is just too much of

it. Somemes I spent more me wring

e-mails explaining when and how I will

do a project than actually working on it.

I dont do social networking and those

websites are banned in the studio. The

rare occasions when the internet is down

for a day due to technical problems, thatsusually a very producve day.









leerpress?

Those techniques are much closer to

producon and make you work dierently

on the computer. For example when you

have done a bit of screen prinng it is easy

to understand how oset prinng with

2 or 3 Pantone colours works and what

overprint or knock out on the computer

means. Once you understand prinng

and producon methods it becomes

interesng to challenge those and push

their boundaries.


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I N T E R V I E W : A L E X B E C




The idea is always put rst, and then

the relevant tools are chosen to make it

happen.






Because we are sll human beings with

real senses.


experemental and premium nishing

techniques are relevant to non designers?

Do you think the average man in the street

will noce or care about your beauful

die-cut, spot varnished book cover for

example?

Perhaps, if used well. The key is that

the audiences needs are kept in mind,

regardless of process.




sll need?

I think well always need some printed

collateral, but theres no way there will be

as much as there is today. The things that

sll need to be printed, will most certainly

be printed.



Nope














leerpress?

Because I absolutely disagree that you

can do anything with a laptop and digitla

printer in typography. As I said before, we

will always remain human beings.


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I N T E R V I E W : D A V I D P E A R S O N

A lot of your work, a lot of your book

covers, could be described to be inspired

by vintage design and drawing from classic

penguin books and stu. Whats yourmovaon to take inspiraon from those

kind of things?

Well theres probably all sorts of reasons,

the main one is just I obviously dont

ever feel inspired unless Im looking at

something else or researching something.

I guess that probably says that Im not a

parcularly intuive designer! Haha! But

also Im just really a bit of a hobbiest and in

parcular I do collect books and Ive always

loved books. In fact I was always a bitsurprised Penguin gave me a job because I

felt like a bit of a groupie and I didnt really

think that people like that were supposed

to get a job at Penguin. Yeah, you know all

my heroes are generally dead, so in trying

to emulate their work I think in turn my

works tends to look a bit more tradional.

And also typography, if you use type as the

main driver behind your design especially

if your not applying lots of eects to it,

like modern day eects, three dimensional

things silver and all that lot, your work can

very easily look more tradional. Theres

all sorts of reason really, but yeah generally

speaking I love history, I love old books, I

love old prinng methods. These are the

things that really inspire me.

My books looking, not enrely, but quite

a lot of it is going to be about producon

methods, nishing techniques like die-

cung and foil blocking, looking at those

kind of things in design. But obviously

looking through your website I noced,

there isnt really any of that, how come

you dont indulge in that kind of thing?

Your work is very concept driven or really

visual rather than looking at the nish,

how come you dont go into those kindof things?

Oh I mean I do look at the nish in terms

of the books producon within reason.

Because as you know if you produce a

book you could be producing a run of two

hundred thousand an they could be printed

half over hear and half in the states, its

not really realisc to say do leerpress or

whatever. What youve really got to do is

nd a way to emulate that which is realisc

in a producon sense. So in that respect we

do look very closely at producon, but if

your talking about the very much hands on,

almost like a printers workshop aspect then

I dont really get that opportunity because

Im working in a commercial design area asoppose to a sort of bespoke design area. I

never really get that opportunity.

Alright I should be looking to do more

private, personal projects that allow me

to do that, but to be honest I just love

designing, oen on a budget, to the biggest

possible audience. I get a bit red, a lot

of designers strive to design things for

designers or themselves and I dont really

know what theyre for and I dont really

know why these things are going out into

the atmosphere. Id rather do somethingthat has some sort of purpose. So you

know, vanity designing is something that I

dont really agree with. Its easy for me to

say because I work with books and theres

never usually much money to play with. So

I dont want to get on my high horse about

it, everyones got dierent jobs to do.

Yeah absolutely, but I understand kind of

wanng your design to speak to not just

designers but non-designers as well.

Oh yeah thats just really excing to me,

when your mum understands it, thats

usually the litmus test.

That kind of leads me on to my nextqueson quite nicely. So do you think

those kind of experimental, bespoke

nishing techniques have much relevance

to non designers. Do you think the average

man in the street will noce a die cut or

spot varnished book cover for example?

I think so. Yeah its a very good queson

but the only reason i think so is because if

you look at wedding invites for example.

Anyone whos geng married is thrust into

this environment were theyve suddenlygot care about nishes and how luxurious

or how tacle something is, I think people

do have the aptude for it. I think we can

underesmate how image savvy people

are. Were so exposed to so many images

these days people are very sophiscated

in that respect. One of the reasons Great

Ideas solved so well it wasnt just because

of the design it was the nish, it was the

uncoated stock and the tacle nish to

it and that can be really under esmated

within design. So sort of going back slightly

I really think what I do is very much bound


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within the producon, it can really get

you out of jail somemes if youve done

something quite average it can pull back

some of the quality in the producon

process. Thats one thing I will really miss ifbooks increasingly become digised is that

ability to play with the nishes.

I think I looked on your blog the other day

and I noced you picked up on the lurid

green on the Penguin popular classics

covers. Its a really interesng talking point

in that it is a vile colour, your absolutely

right, but the thing is, its supposed to

be vile. the main argument with those

colours, theyre basically a two quid book

covers and they were originally quiet a nicepastally colour so it was all very genle and

sophiscated. There was a lot of muerings

in house at penguin, that a lot of people

would rather then buy those versions than

the ten pound black classic versions that

Penguin also sell because they actually

found them more aracve. So the whole

point of the green series was to almost; its

like a sort of Tescos value version. Its the

only me in my life Ive ever been given the

brief to make them look worse, that was it!

We had to make them look less aracve

so we used that horrible green colour. Itsmad isnt it really, they were just worried

that they would strip away sales from their

more expensive versions.

Oh wow, very, very interesng.

Yeah, yeah. Oh god, I go into a bookshop

and I see a whole wall of that green and it

makes me want to be sick!

I never thought you would track me back

to my blog!

Oh god no, Im very thorough! Youll be

running scared now.

Ok well my next queson, we kind of

touched on it a moment ago, is were

do you see the future of graphic design

going? In twenty years me do you think

there will sll be books printed and whatkind of quanty how important do think

that will be in ten or twenty years me?

Well, I think there will sll be books but

I honestly dont think there will be too

many. But you know, books and printed

maer will always be required in certain

circumstances like catalogues and novels

will always have a representaon in paper

form. But other books like reference

manuals and reference books and car

manuals, there is no reason why they cant

be digised. if you think of a student forexample in a lecture theatre if they can

have their whole years books on a palm

reader that gets very excing and it makes

a lot of sense. Im certainly not against this

kind of movement at all. To a certain extent

its a good way of passing on informaon.

But yeah I think increasingly, especially with

what I do, book objects will be increasingly

more, media driven. I think there will be

more glorious and more ne edionsaround. I think the cheaper paperbacks will

fall away a lile bit, which isnt necessarily

a bad thing. I think that it will exist but

in a much reduced state as it will with all

print. We cant keep cung trees down

at the rate that we are doing. I think i t

makes sense. The next generaon, it wont

make sense to them because the wont

have grown up with books. Thats a kind of

rambly answer but the emphasis is on the

generaon shi. If you grow up without

books your not going to need books.

Where you involved with graphic design

pre the introducon of the Apple Mac?

Hows the role of the computer changed

while youve been involved with graphic

design?

Well it was just coming in as I was studying.

Im 31 now so its kind of always been

there for me. Im maybe not best qualied

to discuss. Maybe ve years before that

would have been the real way in sort of

thing. Macs were just starng to creepinto colleges when I was there. So yeah Im

very much used to that really. But having

said that you only really get something

interesng out of a computer if you put

something interesng into it. You cant

really start on a computer and hope to

create wonderful work, it just doesnt

happen. I would always try and menon

that its a tool and nothing more, as much

as people want to celebrate virtual eects.The other thing is I naturally distrust short

cuts. I value process even if it means I take

ages to do something Id rather do it the

long way round. Im interested in what that

does to your head while your working on it,

the way youre evaluang constantly, thats

the process for me. Its not hing the eect

that will do something on your behalf.

Has the role of the computer, in terms of

communicaon and blogs, changed while

youve been a graphic designer?

Oh absolutely yeah. Blogs are sll quite a

recent thing I suppose. But yeah its great

for me to know what someone on the

other side of the Atlanc is doing with book

design. Theres a sort of solid core group of

book designers, we all kind of know each

other now because we know what each

other are working on and we commission

each other. It all stems from blogs really. I

mean I cant speak highly enough of a well

wrien design blog, I think these people

should be commended. That surely will bethe next generaon of star designers, they

will be people that have a blog presence

and quite a strong personality through that.

I N T E R V I E W : D A V I D P E A R S O N


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F E A T U R E : T E A M I M P R E S S I O N

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