Graphic Design Methods

Overview

Designers and renowned authors Brockett Horne and Ellen Lupton lead an exploration of various ways that designers can generate content and create visual forms and structures.

In this course you will survey a range of approaches to design practice. Some sessions focus on the agency and decision-making process of the individual designer. Others discuss diverse methods for engaging users, from designing experiences and services to exploring the fundamentals of interaction design.

Each method is applied to contemporary practice with case studies, from problem solving to narrative thinking. You will explore both theory and practice by considering current ideas and debates about how to include and address diverse audiences. By the end of this course, you'll be able to apply these enriching ideas to a portfolio of designed objects, composing a collection of works that explore design methods.

Syllabus

Concepts

In this session, explore how designers build compelling concepts. We will examine strategies for working through a secure and certain process of developing ideas that can be applied at any time. No more creative block! We will examine several concepts relevant to storytelling, so that designers can make their work active and generating ideas: research, brainstorming, mindmapping, sketching sprints, action verbs, and forced connections.

Makers

This session examines how makers generate ideas independently from their clients or audiences. We will examine the tools that designers use and question how those tools shape design solutions. We will imagine different methods to author content, looking to related disciplines for inspiration. We will examine how assumptions about intellectual property and re-imagine who can own a designed object.

Engaging Users

This session offers insights on serving user needs. For many designers, creative methods begin from the perspective of the user: what does she need, believe, or contribute? How can her perspective inform the design process? Multiple methods are explored: design thinking with the audience in mind, designing products and services that create memorable experiences, designing for the senses, and creating effective interactions for complex designed objects.