CTS Year 2

Portfolio Task 4- Communication Theory

The Shannon and weaver communication theory was aprt of a military experiment to develop a perfect model of communication and to allow you to analyze ways in which people communicate. Shannon-weaver said that the model can also be applied to a wide range of communication.

The task is to apply the Shannon and Weaver's communication theory model to this piece of advertisement for Australia post.

The information source would be the creative minds who came up with the concept. This could be the a single designer or a copy writer. In this case, the message is that if you really want to touch someone, you send them a letter. and because this is an advertisement for Australia post. The viewers should associate this idea of sending someone a letter to Australia post. The possible promblem at this stage is the information itself and the effectiveness of the idea. This is a level c communication problem, which is the effectiveness problem. The transmitter would be the designer, or creative director in charged of the art work. This includes the photography, typogrpahy, imagery, layout and other visual decisions. There is also the risk of noise here which depends on the quality of the artwork and how well it demonstrates the idea ( information source) . The problem could also be technical problems with the programmes used to create this artwork. The chanel is the media in which this advertisement has been created for and this would be printed poster. There is a small chance of redundancy here as there is a high likelihood of noise happening. This entirely depends on the location of the poster and how well its located in comparison to the targeted receiver. However, with a poster, the information can be made more redundant the information can be reduced as much as needed. The receiver is the target audience which is quite difficult to reduce as the amount of people who are capable to writing letters is quite vast. The destination how the message is being interpreted, if there hasn't been too much noise between all the different stages. the message should be interpreted correctly

A piece of chocolate....

This is an extra task to support my 'employment of appropriate critical methodologies a piece of design'

This is a piece of 'green' Graphic design by celery design. The packaging really demonstrates an attempt to make design more sustainable. 'It’s a no-holds-barred eco solution; 100% recycled paperboard box, compostable inner biopolymer bag, no glue, efficient on the press sheet, and it’s reversible for reuse as a gift box'. This is in fact an excellent example of the Cradle-to-Cradle principles are. The design follows the basic practice of green graphic design. The packaging is made out of a 100% recycled paperboard and reusable which in a way follows the ' waste equals food' principle. To eliminate the concept of waste means to design things--products, packaging, and systems--from the very beginning on the understanding that waste does not exist." ( McDonough and Braungart, 2002, p.27). The material that had been used in other products, or goods had not been sent straight to the incinerator or a landfill but instead, it had been recycled into this paper used in this packaging. However, the flaw is that extra energy and material are needed in the process of recycling. The pre recycled paper may have had other chemicals in them and was not intended to be recycled which results in more energy to rid of that chemical or causes the recycle paper's quality to worsen and still has a negative impact enviorment due to the released chemicals into the atmosphere. "By creating whole species of permanent garbage to clutter up the landscape, and by choosing materials and processes that pollute the air we breath, designers have become a dangerous breed"( Papanek, p. I.X).However, this lack of consideration is not something new. We create paper with the expectations of it being recycled but many a times, manufacturers do not consider the chemicals that will be released from the paper due the process of recycling and a lot of paper pulp are bleached in order for us to have a nice bright white paper for our internet print outs which end up in the bin within a day anyway. This lack of hindsight, could be due to the way in which our industrial world as developed " The remarkable achievements of the celebrated Industrial Revolution are now beginning seriously to be questioned principally because the environment was not considered at the time.' ( brudtland, 1984, p.45). However, Celery design has made an attempt to change the way we design things. For example, The box has been designed so that glue is not needed for assembly, meaning less chemicals and energy needed for manufacturing.

Bibliography of 13 books for essay and their relevence

Lewis, H. and Gertsakis, J. (2001) Design and Environment: a Global Guide to Designing Greener Goods. Sheffield, Greenleaf (745.2)

This book is a straightforward practical resource and guidelines for designer who want to create greener and less environmentally damaging products. This book is basically a back up of how harmful some materials and chemicals can be to the environment without anyone even knowing about it. It helps one look at pieces of designs more critically in terms of how 'green' they are.

McDonough, W. and Braugart, M. (2002) Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things. New York, North Point Press. (745.2)

This book is my main resource in which I base my essay on. Therefore it probably has the highest relevance to this essay than any other books in this bibliography. I am using all these other books to basically back up the cradle to cradle theory proposed in this book. and also to back up their other proposed design theory which is supposedly the one all designs are based on at the moment. Therefore , this book is more of a base

Papanek, V. (2nd edition 1984) Design for the Real World:Human Ecology and Social Change. London, Thames and Hudson. (745.4)

Also another really important book for this essay. Papanek is one of the first people to have written about how our method of design has been shaped by industrial revolution and how it lacked the hindsight of the effect the industry has on the environment.

Chapman, J. and Gant, N. (2007) Designers, Visionaries and Other Stories: A Collection of Sustainable Design Essays. London, Earthscan Publications Ltd. (745.2)

This book contains differen journals on design, the environment and sustainability and it is a very useful book to reference to for informed opinion on sustainability.

Dougherty, B (2008) Green Graphic Design. New York. Allworth Press

Shedroff, N (2009) Design is the Problem: The Future of Design Must be Sustainable. New York, Rosenfeld Media.

This book was mainly written about product design and its impact on the environment but I thought that a lot of the principles and observations made in this book can be applied to Graphic Design as well. the book also provides examples of unsustainable design solutions which will back up the 'design to grave theory.

Fuad-Luke, A. (2009) Design Activism: Beautiful Strangeness for a Sustainable World. London, Earthscane Publications.

Hawken.P, (2008) Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution. New York, Back Bay Books.

Berman, D.B (2008) Do Good Design: How Design Can Change our World: How Visual Communicators Can Save the World. California, Peachpit Press.

Roberts, L. (2006) An Introduction to Ethics in Graphic Design. West Sussex, AVA Publishing.

Shedroff, N (2009) Design is the problem: The Future of design mist be Sustainable. New York. Rosenfeld Media.

Fry, T (2008) Design Futuring: Sustainability, Ethics & New Practice. Basingstoke, BERG.

Stephens, S. (2009) The Big Book of Green Design. London, Harper Collins Publishers

Dougherty, B (2008) Green Graphic Design. New York. Allworth Press