Draft 01
The project I remade is a platformer game with simple commands, underscoring the critical role of the designer’s skill in crafting an engaging player experience. The Unity Game Engine, similar to Simultaneous Interpretation, operates as a dynamic tool where the real-time feedback loop facilitates iterative design, requiring adaptability and experimentation.
A notable technical challenge involved learning a new programming language, C#, with a subsequent focus on trial and error within the Unity Game Engine. Overcoming this hurdle involved acclimating to language terms and refining communication with the engine. Unity’s Real-Time Camera feature stands out, enabling the creation of high-quality output in diverse digital spaces, including 2D, 3D, AR/VR, and Mixed Reality.
The link between Unity iterations and Graphic Communication Design (GCD) was illuminated by the shared principle of reconfiguring meaning. Unity’s iterative process mirrors GCD methods, both involving the manipulation of elements to convey a specific message or experience. I would like to explore the tool further by using the methods of translating exploring the experience of the user. I will be looking at the tool and the process of using the tool as an iteration i.e. engaging in a process, where the process is the output.
Draft 02
I was fascinated by how changing variables like speed and time of the GameObjects affect the experience of the players. The interaction of the GameObjects with other GameObjects can make the game engaging for the player and elicit emotions like boredom, excitement or frustration which led me to wonder how can I put this in GCD context?
What if we add similar variables to graphic design elements to influence the user’s experience?
What if we give physics or audio variables to graphic design (visual) components- shape, size, colour, position, orientation, texture? How would these variables interact with each other in a 2D space?
While working on the iterations, various questions came up which were mostly about the form than the content. The iterations pretty soon came to be an experimentation of how we can reimagine the visual components of a page or even how can we reimagine and form a page itself. Unity game engine is intended to create an immersive experience with the user’s input. I tried to hack it by creating an experience where the user has no control over the input.
In his article “Fuck Content”, Michael Rock challenges the idea that content is the primary concern of graphic design, and argues that form is the essence of the discipline. He writes: “There is no such thing as bad content, only bad form,” quoting Paul Rand, and explains that the designer’s role is to shape, not to write, the content. He also claims that form is not a neutral or transparent medium, but a profoundly affecting one, that can convey meaning, emotion, and narrative. He states: “Designers also trade in storytelling. The elements we must master are not the content narratives but the devices of the telling: typography, line, form, colour, contrast, scale, weight. We speak through our assignment, literally between the lines.”
After applying Rock’s perspective to my project, I can analyse how the variables that I introduce to the graphic design elements affect the form and the meaning of the project. I can also evaluate how the form of my project reshapes the relationship between the content and the graphic elements of the page, as Rock suggests, and how it negotiates a new mode of communication and exchange.
By using Unity game engine, I am able to introduce variables that are not typically associated with graphic design, such as physics and audio, and see how they affect the form and the user’s perception of it. I am also able to create a dynamic and interactive environment, where the form is constantly changing.
In conclusion, Rock’s article provides a theoretical framework to understand the importance and impact of form in graphic design, and how it can be manipulated and experimented with to create new possibilities and experiences. It also helps me to situate my project within the broader context of systems that govern graphic design and language.
References
Rock, M. (2009). Fuck Content — 2×4. [online] 2×4. Available at: https://2×4.org/ideas/2009/fuck-content/.
Draft 03
References
Barthes, R. (1967). The Death of the Author.