MILTON GLASER
Milton Glaser was born in New York in 1929. He studied at the Cooper Union Art School and attended the Academy of Fine Arts before he became a graphic designer and is now the most celebrated graphic designer in the United States.
Throughout his career, Milton Glaser has been a wonderful creator of posters and prints. He has designed and illustrated more than 300 posters for clients in the areas of publishing, music, theatre, film, institutional and civic enterprise as well as advertising commercial products and services.
From the start of his career, Milton Glaser has been an active member of both the design and education communities. He is an influential figure and has contributed essays and granted interviews extensively on design. As an icon who strived to pass on his legacy to the younger generation, Glaser has lectured in the Cooper Union and the School of Visual Arts in New York City.
Milton Glaser has designed more than 50 magazines, newspapers and periodicals around the world. His artwork has been featured in exhibits worldwide and is in the permanent collections of many museums. Glaser’s designs and illustrations have won him numerous awards from prestigious art clubs, institutions and societies.
His poster designs play an enormous role in the contribution to the development of the poster industry. He got people/artists thinking about graphic design and the design disciplines he used in his posters. He introduced a trend in art and design by influencing and inspiring young students, who wish to improve their artistic flaws or to start their careers in areas of graphic design.
From 1975 to 1977 Milton Glaser was the design director of ‘Village Voice’ magazine. In 1983 he founded the company WBMG, a studio dedicated to magazine and newspaper design work.
Glaser has founded and co-founded many successful establishments in his lifetime. He was the founder and president of the ‘Push Pin’ studio in New York, and from 1955 to 1974 he was the editor and co-art director of the ‘Push Pin Graphic’ magazine. After his Push Pin Studios period, Milton Glaser established a graphic design studio of his own in Manhattan, known as Milton Glaser Inc. The work produced at this Manhattan studio includes a wide range of design disciplines.
In the area of print graphics, the studio produces identity programs for corporate and institutional marketing purposes, including logos, brochures, signage and annual reports. He has designed environmental and interior design, exhibitions, interiors and exteriors of restaurants, shopping malls and supermarkets, hotels and other retail and commercial environments.
He continued to work as a graphic designer for the print media and also designed corporate logos and styles for the corporate image of various films. Milton is renowned for his graphic and architectural design and his iconic logo, I Love New York. He continues to produce an astounding amount of work in many fields of design to this day.
Milton Glaser describes graphic design to be a way of communicating clearly in whatever way you can. He used any style to solve the ‘picture problems’ that his clients gave him. Other artists copied his many styles but Glaser maintained his success because no one could imitate his ability to solve problems visually. It was due to this reason why Glaser’s work became so famous, and also for its simplicity and originality.
As a graphic artist, Milton Glaser drew both on contemporary culture and historic period styles for inspiration; his playful style is lively and witty, developed by his choice of psychedelic colours. This is what interests me most about Milton Glaser, his sense of colour he uses in his poster designs. I love colour, and I especially love the way Glaser enhances his designs with their vibrancy.
I could incorporate these features into my own designs by choosing very vibrant and psychedelic colours. Colours that I rarely use or admire, to give my work a different, more playful feel. Just as Milton Glaser does.
Glaser’s most recognised logo, I Love New York, is one of my favourites as it’s so simple yet it says a lot. Milton demonstrates that you don’t need a lot of imagery or text to get your point across. He truly is an inspiration!
NIKLAUS TROXLER
Niklaus Troxler was born in Switzerland in 1947. From the age of 19 he has grown up with a passion for jazz music.
Following the completion of his apprenticeship as a typographer, he studied Graphic Design Education at the Art School in Lucerne. He became the art director of the Hollenstein Creation in Paris in 1972 and then started his own Graphic Design Studio in 1973.
Troxler is an internationally renowned Swiss Graphic Designer who specializes in poster design, corporate design, illustration and architectural murals, as well as book covers and textile design.
The main purpose for Niklaus Troxler’s posters was advertisement. He designed over 150 posters for jazz concerts due to his love of the music.
The thing about Troxler’s poster design that is so original was the fact that his inspiration comes from both jazz music and design for they both include rhythm, sound, contrasts, interaction, experiment, improvisation, composition and individuality. The Willisau Jazz Festival offers Troxler the perfect opportunity to merge his two passions of graphic design and jazz music into one unique idea.
Troxler’s poster designs play an enormous role in the contribution to the development of the poster industry. Introducing unique poster design into the century using jazz music as an inspiration, Niklaus Troxler has inspired many artists to attempt their own, including myself.
Niklaus Troxler’s posters are layered with visual puns and musical metaphors, completed in hand crafted illustrations and typography. Troxler uses silkscreen and lithographic prints to communicate both figurative and abstract ideas created from paper cut-outs, collage, stencils and brush and line drawings. His posters have been exhibited at numerous exhibitions and are almost always immediately recognisable as a poster by Troxler. ¬¬
His love of drawing is expressed through a range of styles and techniques which include abstract, typography and figurative. His abstract designs have been known to influence the Geometric Abstraction and Op Art styles in the 1960s.
I admire the fact that Troxler sought his inspiration from his love of jazz music and I love the way he expresses his passion for the music through his poster design.
I could incorporate these features into my own design by listening to a particular genre of music and use it to inspire me through my art. I believe that various genres of music have different affects on your mood, and I believe this is shown in styles of artwork that many artists have produced.
I love the way Troxler sets out some of his poster designs, using only type. I find typography very interesting for there are certain interpretations that people may have when they see various styles of type scattered on a page. But scattered in a way that makes it art. The genius of typography is you can say what you feel without using imagery and it still looks aesthetically pleasing.
Niklaus Troxler inspires me to listen to various genres of music, put pencil to paper and see what results I get.
Future Development and Directions of Poster Design
Subscription Details for current magazines/journals
There are a number of various design magazines/ journals that would be relevant to poster designers, a number of them include Desktop Magazine, IdN Magazine, CMYK Magazine, Digital Arts Magazine and Design Graphics Magazine. Three magazines that I would choose, based on personal choice, would be IdN Magazine, Desktop Magazine, and Digital Arts Magazine. I find these three magazines very interesting to read as they have a lot of information that would interest me, and also because I find looking at the illustrations very inspirational. There are also design blogs that contain similar information as the magazines, one for example is Design is Kinky.
There are a number of ways you can subscribe to a magazine, such as through email on the internet, or through post. Most magazines have subscription details like forms that are to be filled out and sent to a given address.
Digital magazines that are accessed through the internet may ask you what your email address is, whereas forms may contain areas which need to be filled out with your details. For example they will ask you relevant information such as your name, address and suburb, phone and fax numbers, signature, email, payment and how long you wish to subscribe for. Others may ask you what type of software you use, such as MAC or PC, because there are CDs that are generally sent out with the magazine that contain information about design that the customer might find interesting. Others may ask you what your job title is and what company you work for, for payment reasons.
Professional Graphic Design Associations
To name three professional associations that are available to poster designers for membership, I have chosen are Poster-Designers, Naughtyfish and the Australian Graphic Design Association (AGDA).
Poster-Designers is a website that was created to inform people about the characteristics, importance and creative process of a poster, its influence on the communication of a message and its function as a means of mass information. Poster-Designers’ main objective is to help their client communicate a message through a poster that fully represents their company and that has great impact on the market.
Poster-Designers feel that there are important aspects when designing a poster, such as structure, background, figure and blanks, print supports, language and it’s also important to take into account the client, the company, the audience and the competition. Poster-Designers offer packages including several versions of the poster design for the client to choose the one that best satisfies his expectations and needs.
Naughtyfish is a design association that work with a number of disciplines including identity, print, digital, art direction, and publishing, illustration and motion design. Like other graphic design associations, Naughtyfish associate in the design of posters. Naughtyfish act as an objective partner, asking questions in order to gain an understanding of the essence of the clients business before they start on the design process. They ask ‘why’ before ‘what’ and ‘how’.
Naughtyfish believes that design should be simple and relevant; trusting the power of ideas to solves problems and creates points of difference.
Australian Graphic Design Association (AGDA) is a national organisation for professional graphic designers. Their goal is the establishment of fair and productive working relationships between graphic designers and their clients. AGDA believes that graphic designers specialise in the structuring and organizing of visual information to aid communication and orientation. The graphic design process is a problem solving process that requires substantial creativity, innovation and technical expertise.
AGDA creates designs for any means of visual communication, such as illustration, typography and/or calligraphy for a poster, surface design for packaging; or the design of patterns, books, advertising and publicity material.
Internet is impacting on the production of poster design
One current trend that is impacting on poster design is the internet. The internet has opened many doors for the advertising world, making many new advertising opportunities available. Including popup, flash and banner advertisements on websites, advertisements on computer games and even spam (email advertisements).
The advertising community wanted to go that one step further and take advantage of the World Wide Web and use internet advertising as a form of promotion to deliver marketing messages to attract customers. Since technology has become more and more viable to the public, the advertising community have used the internet to widely distribute their advertisements to anyone willing to see or hear them. The advertising community look to internet advertising as its fast, easy and affordable. Whereas advertising through poster design is more time consuming and sometimes expensive, depending on the project.
Every day we see commercial advertising on wall paintings, billboards, street furniture components, printed flyers and rack cards, shopping carts, bus stop benches, human billboards, magazines, and newspapers, sides of buses, taxicab doors, roof mounts, posters and now the internet. Internet advertising has increased by approximately 20% over the last two years, whereas other much older advertising has decreased by almost 30%. Sadly internet advertising is slowly taking over, to the point where print design will no longer be needed.
Though this isn’t necessarily the case, a poster designer wouldn’t be without a job if the usage of internet advertisement continues to increase. A graphic designer whom specialises in poster design can take as much advantage of the World Wide Web as any other designer. A designer working within the poster industry could upgrade their skills in order to effectively utilise this new technology in the workplace by creating a Website or BlogSpot that demonstrates their knowledge and skills of designing/developing posters. Why not embrace a new trend?
Not only in the poster industry but the design industry itself. Graphic designers could find it relevant to keep up to date with trends as new trends could inspire new challenges as well as maintain industry currency.
Graphic designers should be encouraged to browse the web or magazines to give them inspiration in order to maintain industry currency. I researched ‘maintaining industry currency in the design industry’ and found that graphic designers are actually doing things to keep up to date and maintain industry currency. Such as attending design events which may help to get in contact with other designers or to meet people from other industries to build their own network. Staying in contact with former colleagues, go to the library or bookstores, surf the Internet by browsing other designer’s websites and blogs, travel, take up photography in spare time, and more importantly keep up to date with the latest Adobe software.
Although updating with the latest Adobe software could be expensive, it is very worthwhile in order to keep up to date and increase skills, which are much needed to be able to work in the design industry.
We were given a task to design a children's map for children 3-6 years old. We had to come up with a kind of theme to base our characters on when designing them. Here is an example of my Map of Australia! Hope you like!! :)
Niklaus Troxler - 1947
A designer is a business professional who develops solutions to commercial needs that require the balancing of technical, commercial, human and aesthetic requirements.
A designer can be said to be both technician and artist.
A designer plans things for manufacture or construction. The difference between a designer and a craftsperson or artist is that designers usually develop things that have requirements set by others and will ultimately be produced by others.
Design serves industry
Design is a commercial activity. Professional design grew out of a need for skilled individuals who could plan products and environments that would appeal to customers. An essential part of design is the preparation of plans and instructions that will allow for the accurate production of the design by others rather than the designer also performing the production task.
Defining design
Design is a widely used word. It is applied to any process where an outcome is being planned rather than relying on chance. So people in all sorts of occupations speak of designing aspects of their business activities. In many cases they are using the word as a synonym for plan.
Design is also a term used by technical professionals such as engineers or software developers. These professionals must reconcile the technical and commercial requirements of projects.
The fundamental difference between the two preceding examples and the definition of design as applied by design professionals represented by the Design Institute of Australia is the skill of incorporating the human, cultural and aesthetic aspects of projects.
Rational creativity
The requirements that a designer works to are both objective and subjective. The objective requirements are easy to understand. They are technical and business requirements that allow for measurement and direct comparison. How much will it cost? What is the best material? When can it be finished by?
It’s the subjective, creative side of design that’s hardest to explain and hardest for most people to understand. The aesthetic side of design relates to fashion, human behaviour, emotion and cultural influences such as the cultural meaning of symbols.
Designers are immersed in the visual language of their culture and industry specialisation.
Designers bring human and cultural values to business problems, values that sell products and services, create demand and inspire customer confidence and loyalty.
Design is a planning process. It produces the best solution based on the stated business objectives and the information and resources available. It uses a methodical procedure to ensure that solutions are well thought out and all the known criteria for success are considered.
Design as a strategic business tool
Design is a strategic tool used to gain market advantage by companies operating at an international level. Their products, their branding, their promotion and their business premises are all designed to maximise customer acceptance of the goods and services they have to offer and to optimise the day to day operation of their business.
The benefits of design are also available to national and local businesses. The process can always be tailored to the resources available. However the available resources will limit the viable design solutions.
Specialist designers for all industries
There are professional designers that provide a balance of technical and subjective skills that match the business needs of many industry areas. Whether you manufacture furniture, provide banking, build cars or sell wine there is a design professional who can help you improve your business.
Design skilfully bridges technical and marketing requirements to put sizzle into a product, desire into a promotion or confidence into an interior.
Working for you and your customer
Designers must balance the needs of their employers with the needs of the intended users of the design. These are often the employer’s customers.
If the design doesn’t meet the needs or desires of the end user, rather than just the commissioner of the work, then sales will be compromised.
In addition designers must reconcile their own standards of aesthetics, quality and ethics with the requirements of the intended commercial purpose of their work. Both designer and client should also consider community values and constraints.
Designers have the skills to increase the market acceptance and profitability of your products, premises and services.
Professional designers bring to your project extensive training and a wealth of experience. Use their expertise and product knowledge to expand your ideas, solve problems, offer unique solutions, save time and money.
Design embodies the full range of problem solving skills from those that are strictly rational, analytical and objective to those that are inspirational, artistic and subjective.
Graphic Design/Visual Communication
Graphic designers develop and prepare information for publication with particular emphasis on clarity of communication and the matching of information styles to audience requirements.
Graphic designers sometimes refer to their area of specialisation as visual communication and some university courses use this as the course title.
The information they deal with not only requires a sound understanding of text based communication but also requires them to skilfully use the communication properties of symbols, colours and pictures.
They prepare concept layouts and mock-ups to discuss project details with clients. They prepare or subcontract diagrams, illustrations and photography. They resolve all communication elements into a final format to suit the required physical or digital media.
They select paper and other printing materials, resolve manufacturing details and produce instructions for others involved in the reproduction process. They organise and oversee proofs and colour separations to prepare for printing and liaise with suppliers who specialise in the many forms of digital and computer based information distribution mechanisms.
Graphic designers often work as part of a project development team. While other specialists such as marketing managers and advertising specialists work on the strategies of distributing information to the market place and determining beneficial product positioning the graphic designer may be working on the image and branding that will appeal to and attract the intended customer.
The immense volume of visual material produced to support both commercial and cultural purposes means that the areas of employment open to graphic designers are very broad. There are many opportunities for employment within companies that have constant graphic requirements as well as great scope for self employment selling services to businesses and organisations with only occasional needs.
The rapidly developing areas of digital media relating to the internet and multimedia business presentations are opening up new areas of employment for graphic designers.
ANZSCO (2006) occupation code 232411
What you’ll study
* Design Theory & Practice
* Communication Skills
* Materials & Media
* Printing Processes
* Design History
* Presentation Drawing
* Illustration & Photography
* Computer Aided Graphic Design
* Digital Media
* Business Management
Where you’ll work
* Advertising Agencies
* Public Relations Firms
* Design Consultancies
* Government & Business Promotion Departments
* Desk Top Publishing
* Web Design
* Printing Companies
* Packaging Companies
* Manufacturer’s Promotion Departments
* Publishers
* Newspapers
* Magazines
* Self Employment
Other areas you’ll find work
* Television Studios
* Computer Games Development
* Exhibition & Display
* Museums
