Communication Design Honours @ RMIT

Using design to impact community.

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Just a few of our amazing studios who are apart of Studio Access. Have you booked your ticket?

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I am speaking at the Applied Design Thinking conference this week, check out the link for more info. I am presenting the following talk.

Value or Values How a social designer adds value to business through engagement with social innovation and design for community?

This presentation introduces a new kind of designer, a designer that is better prepared to tackle wicked problems. This designer is less concerned with artifact creation and more concerned with the values of society and the long-term future of the planet. This designer can engage with businesses not only because they understand the moral values of society but also can connect these values to businesses in a manner that are authentic and make good business sense as well as being grounded in the best interests of humanity.

Social Design is a name that is widely used today to describe a new design methodology and practice. This ‘mythical design savior’ is an interdisciplinary design thinker that leads innovation and champions’ social innovation. The truth of the matter is that, at present, the Social Designer is merely a concept, a complex manifestation of wishful thinking and good intentions. This presentation argues the case for the Designer as Innovator and showcases examples of how innovation and social entrepreneurship brings value to business. The research presented documents Innovative Design projects and educational programs that are socially and entrepreneur focused.

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Alex McAlpine www.alexmcalpine.com

I'm interested in a little bit of everything. science, history, philosophy, cultural studies,reading, writing, art making, you name it. Communication Design is a really good way of taking all those interests and making something useful and creative of them. Honours is a way of taking my design skill and thought and using it for the forces of good.

My research question investigates design for community asking the questions Where does our food come from?, and How can I use design to educate people about it?

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Interesting video from the Cultivator conference in Mildura. I am speaking at the one later in 2012

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Very interesting conference run by the Portland State University in Portland Oregon.

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lemozinger:

Work in progress frames from ‘In Animate’ 2011.

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AIGA Design For Good. Great video explaining the Design for Good project at AIGA in the states. It gives an insight into the experience students of the communication design honours program will have next year. We can make a difference.

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Program Director Russell Kerr has been invited to attend the Ethical Design Round Table in November hosted by the Ethical Design Lab at RMIT. http://www.rmit.edu.au/cfd/ethicaldesignlab 

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Highlights from AGIdeas 2011.

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Uniform Belinda Howarth 2010 ‘Through style, placement & symbols, the visual makeup of a uniform is refined.

By adding or subtracting certain elements we are able to create a visual language. Extracting conceptual ideas from these elements & reconstructing their sign value offers an alternative way of communicating with clothing.’ This thesis project focuses on the relationships within society through clothing & the hierachy cetrain wearable items possess. The creative outcome consists of a stop motion video as well as a flick book through a colour blocking excercise.  A collection of jewellry & badges was also created based on simplistic sign values.

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I Made This Photograph Because Hamish Smyth 2009 I Made This Photograph Because; is the visual component of Hamish's research thesis. It is a 184 page publication documenting Hamish's photography from October 2008 - October 2009. Every image was shot on film using a range of cameras. 

188 of Hamish's favourite images are complemented with insight into the process behind creating them, as well as the thought process behind selected photographs. The publication supports a written thesis focusing on subjectivity in street photography. Above is a video showing the entire book, further photographs of selected spreads can be seen at Hamish's website listed below. 

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As a student your week will look like the diagram above for Semester One and Two respectively. The top image represents Semester One where you get an introduction to the course and you build up your knowledge of the theory that underpins Practice Based Research and Communication Design for Social Change. In Semester Two you focus on your own personal research project and also the group based research project that happens in the interdisciplinary research labs. You will be expected to work outside of these timetables classes on your projects and small assessment tasks that are required of the individual theory subjects. One of the big differences between honours and your previous study is that you are required to locate (or position) your work into a research theme. For 2012 the themes are Advocacy, Slow and Un-Fiction (detailed information about the themes are available here), the reason for positioning your work in these themes is so that you can focus your research within a broader context and create projects that have a specific focus. By doing this you will leave with a portfolio that showcases Communication Design in a global context.

As a student your home will be the Works studio space located in Building 9, Level 1, Room 3. This is a dedicated space that you can use to develop and design your research projects. 

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'Social Design' Programs

I decided to compile all of the Social Design programs into one post so here goes. 'Social Design' is in inverted comas as we are still to decide if they really are Social Design. Master of Arts (Social Design) Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) http://www.micasocialdesign.com/ Media Design Matters -  Media Design MFA Design Matters Art Center College of Design http://www.designmattersatartcenter.org/ http://www.artcenter.edu/accd/programs/designmatters.jsp MFA Social Innovation School of Visual Arts (SVA) http://http://dsi.sva.edu/ MFA Visual Communication Herron School of Art and Design http://www.herron.iupui.edu/designleadership 

Six week Intensive Workshop Impact! Design for Social Change School of Visual Arts (SVA) http://impact.sva.edu/ World Studio http://www.worldstudioinc.com/home/

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Design For Community  Forlí Italy Workshop 2011   

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Monstrosity The tale of pantless Darryl and his trinity of inner social monstrosities. Beck Haskins 2007 While fossicking through design wit, I uncovered a correlation between design, madness and genius that I dubbed Madesignius. Alas I also found the one many fear the one called madness. Monstrosity is a shameless showcase of nonsensical madness that aims to relax these fears by making madness a delightful read rather than a daunting, socially monstrous trait to find in oneself. Socially  monstrous tendencies manifest out of a nonsensical publication to encroach upon reality as soft embraceable parts of ones life.

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Backspace Exhibition Posters Stephen Watkins, 2006 

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COMMON is a creative community for rapidly prototyping social change. Launched in January 2011 by Alex Bogusky, Ana Bogusky, Rob Schuham and John Bielenberg, COMMON connects entrepreneurs, designers and creatives to accelerate socially beneficial businesses and ideas using the power of rule-breaking innovation.