Spatial Experience. The Great Unveil.

*The sound made from the monument will be similar to the singing ringing tree that uses the wind and hallow tubes to produce a calm, meditative noise.

The dock will hold a plaque that explains the monument as visitors are allowed to walk around the meaning of Ausdauer. The following text is what we plan on telling visitors. Obviously, this will be read in both German and English as they are the primary languages of the area (95% German, 51% English).

"Fraktur blackletter figures were first designed by Nuremberg native, Hieronymus Andreae for Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I (c. 1493–1519). The term Fraktur is derived from the Latin term "to break" and calligraphy from Greek meaning "beautiful writing". This calligraphic hand is made up of repetitive strokes of the same weight with broken lines and a consistent angle. The process of calligraphy emphasizes harmony, consistency and retains a meditative quality. After its creation, Fraktur soon became the primary typeface of Germany and the surrounding countries and was set until the 20th Century. Today, Fraktur remains a reminder of rich history and significance to the German culture."

Ausdauer

SX. Project 1, Poetic. Monument, Calligraphy.

Bethany and I would like to recognize the elegance and emotion of calligraphy. We have identified a few characteristics associated with calligraphy that will help direct our form. These include; motion, strokes, ink, texture, content, and special attention to curves and angles. The location should inform the history. Because there are a number of different histories (arabic, chinese, german, etc...) we would like to choose one and focus on it's individual the qualities and meaning.

We want to focus on the movement within the restriction of German Blackletter. Here, the characters are disciplined yet fluid and spontaneous (much like Rococo Architecture :) We also want to show the fragility and the importance of the paper. We're thinking Nuremberg, Germany for the installation location...

cal·lig·ra·phy  [kuh-lig-ruh-fee]

noun

3.

the art of writing beautifully: He studied calligraphy when he was a young man.

5.

Fine Arts. line or a group of lines either derived from or-resembling letter forms andcharacterized by qualities usually associated with cursive writing, especially that produced with a brush or pen.

Here's What We Have Looked At

German architecture as influence for the structure of our monument.


Look over on Bethany's blog to see some imagery, and also this collection over on my Gimme Bar that doesn't have very many photos now, but will grow over time.

Pro Practice. Career Goals and Strategy for Getting There.

My passion is information architecture, user experience, and interaction design, and my ideal job would be designing for the digital space. I've known this for quite sometime without realizing it. In everything I do, I crave order and reason with a splash of flare, including my design. I appreciate design where the content is the main focus with the design supporting it and enhancing it. "Clean" or "minimal" isn't always the answer, but clarity is. Though it seems that I always default back to "clean and simple" (hell I'm typing this post in iA Writer, what's simpler than that?), it's clarity and understanding of content that I'm striving for.

How am I going to get to this type of job?
I plan on using networking, researching, writing, and quite honestly, Twitter(and other social media outlets).

            I've already been in direct contact with some bigger-ish names in the design/news field through Twitter. That's why twitter is so awesome, it's direct and fast connection to people that we never had that type of access to before. Use Twitter well, it can help open up doors and start conversations between you and people you admire and look up to. But no, Twitter isn't everything because not everyone has it, but it's a helpful tool to use and harness. There are also other social media outlets that work well, and for someone who is interested in social media, embracing them is smart.
            I've also started researching what companies and people are out there that are doing what I want to do. I don't know what setting I prefer yet, whether it's more of a design firm, or something more specific like an in-house team at a company, or even possibly a startup of some sort. But if I can find a place that is in the realm of my interests, contact will be made somehow.
            But something that will help me both get in contact with people and initiate conversation with them is writing. I've already been doing this over the winter break and really loved it. It was over social media, news, and design, topics that really intrigues me and gets my creativeness in overdrive. Thoughts and ideas are, at times, more important than actual design work. If you have interesting and thought-provoking ideas, people will take note. But ideas and writings don't have to be ground breaking, the fact that you are typing up your ideas and publishing them to a space that people can readily access is great in itself. It shows that you have ideas flowing in your brain and that you want to share them, plus it can also show off your mad writing skillz (but even if you don't have them yet, the more you write, the madder they'll become). So being articulate on the subjects that I'm interested in is important to me. It helps me talk about them easier and with more confidence, and helps break the nervousness I get when talking about my personal ideas and stances.
            All of these things together are how I plan on getting where I want to go. This is all coupled with putting myself out there and contacting/pursuing companies and people that I am interested in.

Degree Project + Other Updates.

I've started blogging for my Senior Degree Project over at ianarthurdp.blogspot.com. (Link also found up there at the top of my blog below the header labeled: degree project. Clever, I know.)

I also have a new, handy, personalized link shortener, ianarthur.info! Weeee! Now I don't have to worry about my blogpost titles being too long for twitter! Exclamation points abound! Whimsy and glee!

The redesign for this blog is, presumably, done. I can't say that I will have any more time to change it starting monday, so it is what it is. Don't like it? Ah well.

Oh yea, and school starts monday! 18 credit hours. Lots of projects. GRADUATION! Busy busy busy busy busy busy busy.

Blog Design Update.

'Scuze any awkwardness in the design of this here blog. it's well past due for an update. that update is happnin' now.

A Fluding Heart

This post is in response to a tweet I posted about the iPhone App Flud that had two subsequent replies from Flud Support and Bobby Ghoshal, founder of Flud News. I proposed the idea that the button to flud an article in Flud should be more unique and brand oriented than a heart. It was a fleeting question in my mind, but getting responses from two people from Flud made me go back and think about it more. It made me ask myself, "Why did that heart stick out to me so strongly as not being the best possible option for an icon to represent the "flud" action?" This blog post is purely my own opinion of how the visuals of fluding could be stronger. The heart icon is completely valid and works well, and like Ghoshal said, there is a reason they chose the heart. I am curious as to the reason why they went with the heart. If anybody from the Flud community reads this I would be interested in a comment added to this blog about your reasoning.

I have NPR, CNN, BBC, HuffPost, Flipboard, and Flud on my iphone for news consumption. The first four apps are essentially your basic news apps. They give the user access to the news they are reporting about and ways to share it. Overall however, that's about it, no other real layer of interaction. Flipboard is nice because I choose what news is given to me. I get news about design, fashion, apps, etc, because that's what I chose. The tailorability of the app is quite nice. Flud gives me this tailorability, but with a social layer added on top of it.

In the research phase for my MX project this past semester, i came across the idea of the "information bubble." In that, websites, apps, search engines, etc, can all get so customized that the user is missing huge areas of information because the system deems it "unworthy" to the user. This is set through anything from personal settings to the analysis of past searches. The systems analyze all of the data collected by and about the user and creates an experience unique only to them. Part of the reason I like Flud so much is because it has an answer to the information bubble hinderance.

Flud initially only gives me the news and information I chose to receive, then opens it up to what other users I'm following are reading. I can read the articles provided and then "flud" them to my friends and followers if I feel it is worthy to share and have other people read. Once I started following other users, a "flud" of articles is created from everything the people I follow have fluded. This is where the information bubble starts to break down. I'm readily given other content outside of my tailored experience that opens my mind up to other topics and points of views that I may not have known I liked or was interested in.

The term/action "to flud" is uniquely theirs, and helps set them apart from other apps. I enjoy the term "flud" because it creates a strong, all encompassing image in my mind. When land physically floods, water goes everywhere. When I flud an article, I know that all of my followers will see it in their flud curated by the people they follow. I'm saying that this article is important enough to me that I want everyone I know to know about it, and read it. This is the part of Flud that sets it apart from other news services, the strong emphasis of sharing content so easily and readily to everyone. Though it's such a core part of Flud, I feel that the heart icon of "fluding" is too generic.

The "button" I tap to flud an article is a heart, but is that a strong enough icon to use? I argue no, it is not. The heart icon is employed on Tumblr(Instagram, too) to love/like things. It says, I like this post enough to save it, but not enough to fully reblog it to my blog. It's a lower, less important way of denoting content that I like. It works more like a personal catalog of saved items for me. This "like" feature shows up in pretty much every other social network. Facebook's thumbs up "like" and Twitter and Flickr's favorite stars. All of these platforms use these means to denote a lower level sharing/saving. Flud uses the heart as top level sharing, but the fact that all of these other platforms are saving the heart/star/thumb icons for a lower level, makes the heart icon in the Flud app less meaningful. The action that I'm doing when I tap on the heart in Flud isn't "liking", "loving", or "hearting" it, I'm "fluding" it. I argue that Flud needs a more unique and ownable icon for their action of "fluding". Because the action "to flud" is so strong and powerful, not to mention so important to the entire app, it needs a strong icon to support it visually. It should be something that isn't directly affected/influenced by other platforms and ideals like the heart. It should be an icon that users know as the "flud button" that will always flud content and articles to their followers, instead of a heart with a speech bubble above it saying "flud your followers".

But what do I think the icon should be instead? I'm not sure entirely. Initially I felt using the really nice "U" shape in their logo could be a nice alternative to the heart. They're already bringing attention to it in their logo, and the shape itself also looks like a basket/bucket of sorts. The shape that the "U" is on in their app icon looks very drawer-esque, as well. Both feel container-like to me. However, should the icon be so literal or container feeling? Not necessarily. If you go in more of the literal route, the container would have to stay very iconic like simply using the "U" itself. But I don't necessarily think a container is completely the right image either. The articles I flud are saved in my account, yes, but I flud the articles first and foremost so other people can see them. It's less about the saving, and more about the sharing, the fluding. In the mocked-up images above, the "U" seems to fit better between the facebook and twitter icons. The icon to flud becomes its own icon, not only letting the use know what they're about to do, but also reiterate the logo, or part of it.

I love what Flud is and what it's doing. The overall design of the app is top level work, highly crafted and finessed. The color is a smart choice, and works nicely to create an app-specific color, one that people come to associate Flud with if done right. The concept of Flud is awesome and I definitely plan to continue using it as one of my primary news sources on my phone. I can hope to encourage more of my friends with iPhones to download and use it as well. I enjoy knowing what others are reading and interested in, and Flud does a nice job of that.

This is little more than my thought process on something that could be seen as so trivial. But for an app that focuses so strongly on the idea of sharing, or here known as fluding, this is rather important. Creating a strong visual language for the action of fluding could quite possibly help visually strengthen the app even more than it already is. Helping solidify itself as a top-notch app with a huge following.