Graphic Design BA (Hons)

Year 1 encourages an open-minded and exploratory approach to understanding design. You'll work on individual and team projects, to develop your knowledge of the design process, visual language, typographic principles and core skills.

Core modules

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30 credits

This module focuses on the generation of concepts and ideas. The aim of the module is to develop conceptual ability and creative confidence in responding to a range of design and communication challenges. It introduces you to different ways of thinking and generating ideas, with emphasis on currency, appropriateness and dynamism of approach and solution. Project briefs encourage you to expand your knowledge and experiences, challenge assumptions, subvert norms and learn about the role of risk within the creative process.

10/14/2021

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“Ideas are to objects as constellations are to stars. ”

Walter Benjamin, The Origin of German Tragic Drama (1928)

For thousands of years, humankind has used sign systems to help us navigate the world. Different cultures commonly found ways to use their environment to navigate. Ancient Polynesian civilization is said to be the first to have studied the stars for navigation. Skip forward a few thousand years to approximately 1900 when motorcars began to take off and the world began to realize it needed traffic engineers. These were the people who began to seriously focus on proper signage design for our roads and outdoor areas, but the developers of office buildings, shopping malls, and other large pedestrian areas were reluctant to conform in this way. Then in 1970, The Society for Environmental Graphic Design was founded, prompting designers to begin to study how to best navigate and direct people through public spaces. These designers argued that buildings shouldn’t be developed just to fulfil the ambitious visions of architects but with the idea of connecting humans better with these environments and this particular field earned the name ‘Wayfinding”, although the term was first used in 1960 by architect Kevin Lynch. Experiential Graphic Design is a development of wayfinding but is less concerned with effective and efficient communication and more with creating rich and engaging experiences. EGD embraces several design disciplines including graphic, architectural, interior, landscape, exhibition, as well as industrial design. The key that connects them all is a concern with the visual aspects of wayfinding and creating experiences that connect people to place.

Brief

You will produce a Typographic proposal for a space in Kingston that is informed by research and reflection. You can use the quote at the top of this project or introduce other words/texts or take inspiration from the space.

Research and Analysis

Produce a rich variety of primary research material by visually documenting the things you see through sketching, photography, and observational notes. Be attentive to details both small (micro) and large (macro). Use a range of equipment to reveal features that are inaccessible to human perception (e.g. time-lapse or a plan view). It can be beneficial to identify a general category first (e.g. things such as brickwork, fences, doors, numbers, etc. or qualities such as proportions, colour, shape, pattern, direction, etc.). As you research consider the following questions:

—Why do certain things appear or appeal to us while others recede?

—How would others understand and experience these same things?

—How might the perspectives of others inform you and your work?

To connect your research to your experiments you will need to engage with visual analysis. Use point, line, shape, form, colour to identify common features and anomalies of the material you have gathered. Use your analysis to identify secondary research material. For example, your research may be about colour, so you should go and develop an understanding of colour theory. Or it may have been about numbers in which case you should be research letterforms and typography

Experimentation

Make early and make often. It is easier to communicate an idea if it has been visualised. Visualising externalises our thoughts, making them available for reflection and critique.

Communication and Presentation

Visually clarify your intentions by giving a sense of the context in which your design will exist and the interactions and relations it supports and enables. Use a range of visuals to show different aspects of your design.

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Aims:

• To introduce students to the principles and components of graphic design and visual communication

• To develop an exploratory and investigative approach to methods, materials, processes and production across traditional, digital and emerging media

• To introduce students to a broad range of visual language to enable clear communication of ideas

• To introduce students to the relationship between historical and contemporary design practice, process and context.

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Learning Outcomes:

• Demonstrate understanding and a growing confidence in typography, layout, hierarchy and composition and how to employ these effectively and creatively

• Demonstrate understanding of the properties and potential of a range of methods and materials and how these affect message and meaning

• Demonstrate exploration and application of different visual languages to communicate a range of ideas

•Demonstrate awareness of different design contexts and how this informs decisions and directions within the design process.

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1.1.01

Points granted

hours spent

understanding / 100

Year 2 helps you develop creative and interpersonal skills, used to explore imaginative ways to communicate. You'll develop a particular area of graphic design through self-initiated projects, complementing your studio work. You'll learn about the wide social and cultural context in which graphic designers work, and will collaborate with students from other courses on projects. You'll also gain useful career management skills and will have the opportunity to study abroad or undertake a work placement.

Core modules

Many of our students take advantage of the ERASMUS scheme to spend a year studying or working in Europe. We have a network of links with prestigious design institutions.

Over 100 students from the course have made use of the ERASMUS Exchange over the last four years. Graphics students on the ERASMUS programme have studied in 17 different institutions.

Over 50 students have made use of ERASMUS funding to support industrial placements. The ERAMUS programme has supported over 40 students from all over Europe studying at Kingston. The study abroad programme with links in Japan, Korea, and the US supports students studying internationally.

Core modules

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In your final year, you'll work from a range of briefs, and develop your own, to reflect your personal interests and career aspirations. Some students work a range of areas; others choose to specialise in one. This could be branding, social design, editorial design, film and moving image, photography, advertising and promotion, typography or interactive design. Your interests and self-directed work will inform the written element of the course.