Hasta La Ideas

To mark its 50th birthday, D&AD is delving into its archive to highlight significant pieces of work that have featured in the awards. We will be publishing one a week. Next up, Bernard Lodge’s classic Doctor Who title sequence

This extraordinary work won a Yellow Pencil in the Advertising and Graphics for Cinema and Television, Television Graphics, category in the 1968 D&AD awards (a year, incidentally, when there were no Black Pencils).

Graphic designer and director Bernard Lodge was originally asked to create a Doctor Who title sequence for the first series in 1963 for which he used a technique called ‘howl-around’. This idea was suggested by associate producer Mervyn Pinfield who had recalled seeing it being used in the 50s by a BBC technician called Ben Palmer. Just as a microphone placed too close to a speaker can result in squealing feedback, pointing a black-and-white video camera at its own monitor can distort the image and produce abstract patterns.

Lodge had been asked to work the show’s title into his opening sequence – luckily, the type itself created interesting abstract patterns when the ‘howl-around’ technique was employed, conveying the required mysterious effect. The version awarded by D&AD and shown here is for the shows starring the second Doctor Who, Patrick Troughton. Lodge incorporated Troughton’s face into the sequence by placing a photograph of the actor’s face in front of the camera, photographing it and then using it in negative.

A great article on the h2g2 wiki here explains all.

And this video provides an overview of all the Doctor Who title sequences over the years

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The 1968 annual was designed by Bob Gill with typography by Malcolm Frost.

Related Content

Read the first post on this series, on Barrie Bates’ 1963 A union, Jack! poster, here

And the second post, on Derek BIrdsall’s covers for Penguin books, here

And the third, on the Go to Work on an Egg ad campaign here

And on the 1966 British Rail identity here

D&AD’s 50-year timeline of landmark work is here

The 50th D&AD Awards are open for entry until the February 1

CR in Print

If you only read CR online, you’re missing out. The January issue of Creative Review is a music special with features on festivals, the future of the music video and much much more. Plus it comes with its very own soundtrack for you to listen to while reading the magazine.

If you would like to buy this issue and are based in the UK,you can search for your nearest stockist here. Based outside the UK? Simply call +44(0)207 292 3703 to find your nearest stockist. Better yet, subscribe to CR for a year here and save yourself almost 30% on the printed magazine.

Waterstones’ identity has moved from Baskerville in full caps, to regular type (top row); to FS Albert Pro in 2010 (bottom left); and now, back to Baskerville, but without an apostrophe (bottom right)

In its second rebrand in as many years, Waterstones has ditched its 2010 identity, reverted back to Baskerville type and dropped an apostrophe. Frivolous? Well, with apparently only a handful of some 275 stores to change back to the old identity, the move is effectively bringing the previous rebrand to a halt. And that might be cheaper…

Back in May 2010, Waterstones’ then parent company, HMV, asked their preferred branding consultants venturethree to design a new identity for the booksellers. The agency came up with the sans serif ‘w’, shown above, combining that with a lowercase treatment of the name set in FS Albert Pro.

While the new identity was trumpeted by Waterstones as a reflection of its move into online, it only appeared on a handful of physical shops. Often it was used on in-store display material while the exterior shop signage was left in the old style (as on the Oxford Street branch near the CR offices). Despite venturethree’s efforts to create a ‘flexible’ identity system, the occurence of both treatments in the same shop just looked messy.

In effect Waterstones’ new MD James Daunt is putting a stop to that. He claims that the brand is now “deserving of a capital ‘W’ and a font that reflects authority and confidence.” As regards the removal of the apostrophe he says that “in a digital world of urls and email addresses [it offers] a more versatile and practical spelling.”

So essentially Waterstones is canning a rebrand that has taken nearly two years to roll out across a handful of stores. But it has dressed this up as a return to a “much loved” high street identity. While there’s something to be said for cutting your losses – and, personally, I prefer the classic Waterstones branding – the move seems more like a debrand than a rebrand. But Waterstones can hardly be accused of inviting the usual “how much did that cost” invective, so perhaps the move is something to applaud?

Yet the reasoning behind taking out the apostrophe still grates with me. Surely most internet users already know they don’t feature in web and email addresses, even if the company name requires one? Lowercase type used to be the default for brands who wanted to say ‘we’re online’, but claiming to be more in tune with the digital world is a poor excuse for removing an element of punctuation that is already under threat.

Save the apostrophe! The campaign starts here.

Massoud Hassani’s Mine Kafon is a wind-powered device for clearing land mines

The Design Museum has announced its longlist for the Designs of the Year 2012 exhibition and, as with previous years, the difficult task of showcasing a whole year in design reveals both the strengths and weaknesses of such a process…

The Comedy Carpet in Blackpool by artist Gordon Young and Why Not Associates

This year’s selection of work from architecture, digital, fashion, furniture, graphics, product and transport naturally includes a host of varied projects – from Barber Osgerby’s Olympic Torch and David Chipperfield’s Hepworth Wakefield museum, to the BBC’s homepage and the Comedy Carpet (above) by artist Gordon Young and Why Not Associates.

Perhaps the most bizarre design is Massoud Hassani’s Mine Kafon, a wind-powered land mine clearing device, constructed from a ball of sprung bamboo sticks which are attached to a plastic core. As the ball is deployed over terrain where landmines are known to have been hidden, it explodes any in its path and tracks its route via GPS.

United Visual Artists’ High Arctic installation at the National Maritime Museum in London

Designer Yves Béhar has work nominated for a fourth time (he won the inaugural competition in 2008 with the One Laptop Per Child initiative) and there are three electric cars, a defibrillator, an exhibition by the illustrator Noma Bar, plus copies of Bloomberg Businessweek, a promo sample of GF Smith papers and the album cover art for Join Us by They Might Be Giants among the selected work. (The full list of all the nominated projects is copied below.)

Anomaly and Unit 9’s One Thousand Cranes for Japan project

As Eliza pointed out in her look at last year’s show, exhibits from the furniture and transport sections usually come across particularly well, simply by virtue of how much space they command compared to, say, paperback books or websites.

Textile Field at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London by Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec, fabric by Kvadrat. Photo © Studio Bouroullec & V&A Images, Victoria and Albert Museum

And in that lies the ongoing problem with the competitive aspect of the show: just how do you compare a dress with a car, or a website with a house? And is there any point? Individual categories produce their own ‘winners’, where like is compared with relative like, but the final showdown between disciplines still seems a little confusing.

Homeplus: Tesco Virtual Store, Seoul, South Korea

But as we’ve seen since 2008, the overall winners do tend to emerge from the social/useful camp, with the aforementioned One Laptop Per Child project, Shepard Fairey’s Obama poster, and Min-Kyu Choi’s Folding Plug all taking the top prize (OK, so last year’s Plumen lightbulb is a beautiful exception to the rule).

Life-Size Paper Monster Hearse by Paul Sahre, from the video for Join Us by They Might Be Giants

But regardless of the judged aspect to the show, which, after all, does stoke reinterest in the show itself, the Designs of the Year is a welcome attempt to capture the best of the year’s design work in one place. Exhibits are nominated for inclusion, thus there is a wealth of professional expertise on hand to highlight some of the most interesting projects within a specific field, and, on past visits, the displays within the Museum are also given a lot of thought.

The T.27 Electric Car by Gordon Murray Design

Last year’s exhibition, for example, imposed the themes of Home, Share, Play, City and Learn over all the work so that the projects were completely mixed up. For me, that’s a much more satisfying way of experiencing everything that the show’s notoriously wide remit brings in. For designers and non-designers surely that best shows how design is a fundamental part of the real world.

Designs of the Year opens at the Design Museum in London on February 8 and runs until July 15. More details at the DM site, here, and also at the dedicated blog, designsoftheyear.com.

Here are the nominations:

ARCHITECTURE

Butaro Hospital, Butaro, Rwanda
MASS Design Group

Folly for a Flyover, London, UK
Assemble CIC

Guangzhou Opera House, Guangzhou, China
Zaha Hadid Architects

Hepworth Wakefield, Wakefield, UK
David Chipperfield Architects

Home for Senior Citizens, Huise-Zingem, Belgium
Sergison Bates Architects LLP

Maggies Centre, Gartnavel, Glasgow, UK
OMA

National Park of Mali Buildings, Bamako, Mali
Diébédo Francis Kéré of Kéré Architecture

Moses Bridge, Fort de Roovere, Netherlands
RO&AD Architects

Olympic 2012 Velodrome, London, UK
Hopkins Architects

Spaceport America, New Mexico
Foster + Partners

The Iron Market, Port-au-Prince, Haiti
John McAslan + Partners

Youth Factory, Mérida, Spain
Selgascano, Gestaltskate and Jarex

2012 Olympic Velodrome
Hopkins Architects

Guangzhou Opera House, China
Zaha Hadid Architects

DIGITAL

BBC Homepage Version 4, London, UK
BBC

Beck’s Green Box project
Beck’s

Face Substitution, New York, USA
Arturo Castro and Kyle McDonald

Guardian iPad edition, London, UK
Guardian News and Media in consultation with Mark Porter

High Arctic, National Maritime Museum, London, UK
United Visual Artists

Homeplus Tesco Virtual Store, Seoul, South Korea
Homeplus Tesco

Letter to Jane, Portland, USA
Tim Moore

Microsoft Kinect and Kinect SDK
Microsoft Games Studios, Microsoft Research and Xbox, UK and USA

Musicity, London, UK
Concept by Nick Luscombe and Simon Jordan and designed by Jump Studios

The Stanley Parable, California, USA
Written and created by Davey Wreden

Suwappu, London, UK
Dentsu London, UK, in consultation with BERG

Homeplus Tesco Virtual Store, Seomyeon Subway Station,
South Korea

FASHION

Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty, The Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum, New York, USA
Andrew Bolton with the support of Harold Koda of The Costume Institute, New York, USA

The Duchess of Cambridge’s Wedding Dress, London, UK
Sarah Burton for Alexander McQueen

Céline Autumn/Winter ’11, Paris, France
Phoebe Philo at Céline

Late Night Chameleon Café, London, UK
Store design: Gary Card, Creative director: John Skelton, Brand director: Dan Mitchell

Mary Katrantzou Autumn/Winter ‘11, London, UK
Mary Katrantzou

Melissa + Gaetano Pesce Boot and Flip Flip, New York, USA
Gaetano Pesce, Manufactured by Melissa, Brazil
Oratory Jacket, London, UK

Will Carleysmith, Head of Design at Brompton Bicycle Ltd
Suno Spring/Summer ‘11, New York, USA
Suno

Vivienne Westwood Ethical Fashion Africa Collection, Autumn/Winter ’11
Vivienne Westwood, London, UK

132.5, Tokyo, Japan
Miyake Design Studio

FURNITURE

Balsa Furniture, London, UK
Kihyun Kim

Chassis, Munich, Germany
Stefan Diez

The Crates, Beijing, China
Naihan Li & Co

Earthquake Proof Table, Jerusalem, Israel
Arthur Brutter and Ido Bruno

Harbour Chair, London, UK
André Klauser and Ed Carpenter

Hemp Chair, Berlin, Germany
Studio Aisslinger

Lightwood, London, UK
Jasper Morrison

Moon Rock Tables, London, UK
Bethan Laura Wood

Not So Expanded Polystyrene (NSEPS) , London, UK
Attua Aparicio & Oscar Wanless at SILO

Oak Inside, Rotterdam, Netherlands
Christien Meindertsma

Osso, Paris, France
Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec

Textile Field at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec, fabric by Kvadrat

Tip Ton, London, UK
Edward Barber & Jay Osgerby

Waver, Munich, Germany
Konstantin Grcic

XXXX_Sofa, Eindhoven, Netherlands
Yuya Ushida

GRAPHICS

AA Files, London, UK
John Morgan Studio

Beauty is in the Street, London, UK
Four Corners Books, Cover designed by John Morgan
Book interior designed by Pierre Le Hors

Bloomberg Businessweek, New York, USA
Bloomberg Businessweek

The Comedy Carpet, Blackpool, UK
Gordon Young and Why Not Associates

Cover artwork and video for Join Us by They Might Be Giants, New York, USA
Paul Sahre

Cut it Out, London, UK
Noma Bar

Matthew Hilton identity and website, London, UK
Spin

Nokia Pure Font, London, UK
Dalton Maag

One Thousand Cranes for Japan
Concept by Anomaly and Unit 9, London, UK

Photo-Lettering, Yorklyn, USA
House Industries

Promotional sample book for GF Smith, London, UK
SEA Design

Stockmann packaging, Helskinki, Finland
Kokoro & Moi

Self Service
Editor-in-chief: Ezra Petronio

What Design Can Do!, Amsterdam, Netherlands
De Designpolitie

Your Browser Sent A Request That This Server Could Not Understand, Rotterdam, Netherlands
Koen Taselaar

PRODUCT

Ascent, London, UK
Edward Barber and Jay Osgerby

A-frame and Corbs
Ron Arad

Botanica, Eindhoven, Netherlands
Studio Formafantasma

Carbon Black Wheelchair
Andrew Slorance

Defibtech Lifeline VIEW^TM Automated External Defibrillator (AED), LLC, Guilford, USA
Defibtech

Heracleum, Schiedam, Netherlands
Studio Bertjan Pot

Hövding Invisible Cycle Helmet
Hövding

Jawbone JAMBOX, San Francisco, USA
Yves Béhar, Fuseproject

The Learning Thermostat, USA
Nest, Palo Alto

Mine Kafon, Eindhoven, Netherlands
Massoud Hassani

Olympic Torch 2012, London, UK
Edward Barber and Jay Osgerby

Orb-it
Black and Decker

Shade, London, UK
Simon Heijdens

Solar Sinter, London, UK
Markus Kayser Studio

Thixotrope, London, UK
Conny Freyer, Sebastien Noel and Eva Rucki of Troika

TMA-1 Headphones
KIBiSi

Totem, London, UK
Bethan Laura Wood in collaboration with Pietro Viero

White Collection, Finland
Ville Kokkonen

TRANSPORT

787 Dreamliner
Boeing

Autolib’ 3000, Paris, France
Bertrand Delanoë, Mayor of Paris, France

Bike Hanger – Bicycle Storage, New York, USA
Manifesto Architecture

Mia Electric Car
Mia Electric

Re-design for Emergency Ambulance, London, UK
Helen Hamlyn Centre for Design and Vehicle Design Department,
Royal College of Art

T27 Electric Car, Surrey, UK
Gordon Murray Design

Taurus Electro G4
Pipistrel doo Ajdovscina

Issue 8 of The Occupied Times of London

This week the Occupy London movement published the eighth edition of its newspaper, The Occupied Times of London. We talked to one of the paper’s designers, Tzortzis Rallis, about how the paper is produced, the aesthetics of protest and how corporate branding played a part in visualising the aims of this new political force…

The back cover of issue 4, which references the pink paper of the Financial Times

On Wednesday evening Rallis was on hand at the launch of the latest issue of The Occupied Times of London to help with folding the 2,000 copies ready for distribution around the St Pauls and Finsbury Square sites. Since the first OTL came out in October last year (we blogged about it here), Rallis and co-designer Lazaros Kakoulidis have taken the newspaper from a folded A3 publication to a 20-page weekly edition.

Volunteers at the London Stock Exchange occupation site putting issue 8 together

Rallis and Kakoulidis both originally studied in Greece and came to the UK to undertake Masters degrees at the London College of Communication. Ironically, Rallis explains, it was the Greek recession that motivated them to travel and after freelancing post-LCC, it was a call to arms tweeted by the editor of a soon-to-be-published Occupy London newspaper that prompted them to volunteer their design skills.

Putting issue 6 together

After an initial meeting, Rallis and Kakoulidis were quickly put in charge of developing the look of the newspaper – and had 40 hours before the first issue was to set to publish. “It was very quick,” says Rallis, “as we had to come up with and propose the design within that time. We asked if they wanted it to be as radical as the movement and, in the beginning, we made something that was far too crazy. So it became more important to appeal to a wider audience.”

Covers of issue 5

While the designers recognised that the paper needed to represent Occupy London in print, they were keen to design something that would be accessible to people who weren’t necessarily familiar with the movement. Too many protest graphics, says Rallis, are designed to talk only to those already involved in political movements. Equally, a definitive identity, coupled with well designed communications material, gives a movement added authority and weight.

“Protest collectives are often limited in terms of their communications,” says Rallis, “and in the mainstream media they are often presented incorrectly, even as terrorists in some cases. But graphic design is a way to make people realise that these movements are not like that, that you can present the cause in a better way and make it more approachable to different people.”

Pages from issue 8

So while the language of the broadsheet was largely adhered to in terms of structure, headlines, body copy etc, the use of type was where the design really came into its own. And being in the capital city became a starting point for the design work. “Because we were in London we wanted to reference punk, the DIY and ‘zine cultures, and balance a strong graphic approach with the language of newspapers,” says Rallis.

From issue 8

As we reported in October, the designers made use of two distinct typefaces in the paper: Bastard, by Jon Barnbrook, and PF Din Mono, designed by Athens studio, Parachute.

The former, provocative in its charged references to Blackletter; the latter the accepted typeface of many mainstream corporations, businesses and banks. Sitting the two together – in fact, placing single letters set in Bastard ‘within’ the Din typeface for headlines – chimed cleverly with the ‘occupying’ metaphor. But there was another point to make, says Rallis. “Brands are now using the visual language of protest themselves, with stencils etc, to promote their products – they stole that language – so we are stealing theirs.”

Back cover/placard print from issue 6. Letters set in Bastard are placed in wording set in Din Mono

For the first issue, the designers needed to get hold of the type fast. “I said we should just use Bastard without asking!” says Rallis who had previously interned at Barnbrook and also freelances for the studio. “Then we sent the issue to Jon and he was very happy with it and asked if we needed more help.”

Rallis adds that using Bastard came with its reservations, however, from both journalists working on the paper and some of its readers. “But Jon volunteered to come in and talk to the journalists about why the typeface was appropriate to the project,” says Rallis, “convincing them it should be something we used. Then he sent us a new logo for the movement, too.” The logo, shown below, was chosen via an online poll.

Alongside this new identity, funding has also been sourced online via Sponsume, and this has so far raised over £2,000 to keep the newspaper going. Rallis now hopes to set up a “working designers network” with other designers like Barnbrook who can be called upon to work on briefs for the movement. Budget constraints have driven much of what Rallis and Kakoulidis have been able to do to date, but the newspaper’s success has meant that there is real potential for further development.

“First of all, we try just to keep it alive, because it’s very difficult to produce,” says Rallis. “We always want more things – something like the ‘revolutionary’ crossword we added, a small detail like that makes the paper more accessible. Maybe we can even have subscriptions soon, as we know that people from all over the UK are interested in reading it.”

The Occupied Times of London is available from the current occupations in the churchyard of St Paul’s Cathedral (next to the London Stock Exchange) and Finsbury Square, EC2. Copies can also be downloaded as PDFs from theoccupiedtimes.co.uk. Tzortzis Rallis’s website is at bricktz.com.