Good Bad Design
The good design nuances of Colors magazine ‘lend’ well to the Mac systems advert. Maybe this comes from the similar design goal that a magazine and advert share. Their functions are to clearly and effectively communicate information, whilst also visualizing an identity for themselves. As a chief social function of design is to visualize the identity of institutions and audiences. To reiterate this point.
Think about what the Mac systems advert would look like if it were redesigned with the Underworld/Tomato sleeve. The result for me would have been more interesting to look at. This would however detract from the advert’s readability, making it harder to decode, ineffective as an informative advert, and therefore a bad piece of design. Just because something looks interesting to look at doesn’t mean it’s a good design.
Deciding whether something is a good design or bad is a difficult thing. There are so many variables such as taste, current ideologies, social values, and attitudes on design to base a decision. The graphic design described by Ellen Lupton is a category encompassing any form of communication in which signs are scratched, carved, drawn, printed, pasted, projected, or otherwise inscribed onto surfaces.
Graphic Design is utterly commonplace, appearing everywhere and being produced by anyone. More people today have the potential to produce graphic design, than ever before, whether it be good or bad. Graphic design can be produced by anyone with access to computers with design applications, whether this is at home, school, college, university, or the library. Anyone truly can use the technology, but not all can design with it. As a final piece of design, the Mac systems advert is defiantly much better.
The success of redesigning something bad out of good in this way really comes down to how appropriate the nuances of the good design are. Can we conclude that truly great pieces of design, are the ones that can be formulated and used universally? I don’t think so, Graphic design can never be that simple. As the ideologies of society change, so does the effectiveness of the design.
Are the pieces of design that survive this change any better than the others? A single formula for great design can never exist. Graphic design is too diverse, with many languages and levels to communicate through. Graphic design doesn’t have a Holy Grail. It can never exist because everything based on one formula would begin to look similar and so boring. Who would stand for it?