The Designer as Producer

Can a Designer these days produce and distribute new things to the world market at a low cost?
So can any designer do his/her own business ?

In my opinion, i think that every designer starts with his own ideas and design from scratch, so he\she will produce the design and market it as well.
If the designer is capable of doing that and he\she is good at it, why not ?
it would even be better producing his\her own design than others . so in the begging, all designers must try producing their work by them self , for example like us student we design and produce our project at the same time, after a while it is acceptable , here in Saudi Arabia we can see that this is known and common for designers to create something then , the same designer produce it.
maybe here because people are capable financially or just by targeting it to certain kind of people.



for example kholod attar she graduated from DAH as a Graphic designer and started designing and creating what's known now as design magazine . she and her friend are the desiners and produsers .

in my opinion the better way for desiners is to start designing and producing at the same time ,
and as they grow big with their names , they can leave it for big producers and still supervise it.

A Life of Luxury

what is luxury ?
its pleasing our sense.some people consider luxury in brand name and vip section , money in general and others consider luxury in happiness.

in my opinion, luxury is consider in brands VIP sections, private planes , and jewelry.
that what i call luxury but that doesn't mean it a must, its never a Must.

People sometimes prefer the simple life.
we attend to see people who are expose to such luxury some times their luxury is to live a simple day or going a normal ordinary public place and off course vise versa.

In almost a lot of advertising we see that they attend use luxury and market it to give the consumers the luxurious feeling when using this product . this is sucssesful for a certian number of peaopl luxury is diffeient from person to another . but in general luxury gives u a feeling that this product is well done nd scpcial somehow.
for example Lurpak butter add
they market it as a luxurious butter and u get this feeling u in the colors and the music and the concept make u want to choose Lurpak than any other butter assuming its the best butter in the market.



Example Patchi chocolate also fancy luxurious chocolate,also marketed in a way that the consumer can associated it with big celebration and occasions. and make them think its the best for such event. which is true becuse am one of the people who believes that Patchi is the best Cocolate here.

luxury is maybe a way of grabbing consumers to a product but as well simple designs can also benefit it depends from a person to another.

Expelling School Violence

As much as parents make the effort to prevent their children from exposing to violence ,they wont fully prevent them . kids get exposed to such violence wither they like it or not , they mostly get exposed to media, because its the most powerful ,faster way to send messages thru the screen , if its either good or bad.

when kids get exposed to video games such as Grand Theft Auto and Call of Duty ,which is considered not for kids and the main topic of the game is violence (rated 18) off course , but unfortunately we all know that kids these days can reach it easily , and whats even more sadder and irresponsible here, they can sell these kind of games to absolutely anyone. which is very bad.but the question is does it really effect them? or is it the designer fault in creating such games effect kids with violence ?

in my opinion designers can design what ever they want to design in the range of what acceptable and ethical ... am not saying that, these games are good or bad . in my opinion, it might be one of the causes that raises the violence in kids and people in general but at the same time it might not .
maybe because of the culture ...
going back to the subject, us as designers its great to be able to design what ever we want , and in the same time some other designers try to create adds and games that have morals and ethics , which they want to prevent violence and awareness so its like dividing the designers in two categories . for exmple the prayer add that tackles youth in my opinion is successful and it encourage the youth . so after all in matters of designing such games it might not be harmful ,but yet when designing awareness adds and campaigns against issues such as violence would be successful in a certain presentege .

I Love NY More Than Ever

Is it acceptable to change a logo according to a cretin event , occasion ,and sometimes even disasters ?

changing an existing logo by adding stuff and changing a bit of it for example :" i love NY "

to
" I LOVE NY MORE THAN EVER " after 9/11

in this example "the" same designer who designed i love NY designed i love NY more than ever,
he changed his own logo .
In my opinion this is acceptable and even contains a strong msg and associated with a cretin disaster which is the booming of 9/11
here he made a cause for this new logo -plus a msg- and awareness.

it depends changing an existing logo by "THE" designer or by "A" designer

for example Jeddah logo
to

after what happened in jeddah the Floods
the new logo means Jeddah sank
in my opinion no one have the rights to change an existing logo only the designer who designed the logo it self can change it .

all though Jeddah new logo reached the public in a cretin level, that means it was successful somehow ( still everything has some exceptions )
but this simple change affected people seeing the logo , ex: the Jeddah logo is now in the eyes of whom they saw the new logo is associated with the floods of Jeddah no matter what, so that has affected the people
in conclusion my opinion is that only the designer can change his own existing logo .
because changing this existing logo by "A" designer which means any designer may reduce the value of his work and would not be respected .
so only the designer who designed the logo it self can change it . At least that can be fare and square .

Reality Branding

If Pepsi claimed that Pepsi max is Zero sugar and it actually contains some amount of sugar , i would be a millionaire right now.

HONESTY in general is important and its much more important when selling and advertising a product , but after all life is not perfect and people lie .
Every designer want their design to be the best or at least attractive somehow, and in order to that they ,designers have to focus on their product's positives and just ignore the negatives.
and that's what they call the Ugly Truth.
the designers job is to make things look nicer and that's their main goal.
off course their are some exceptions , like that they cant officially claim if something is not in their products and vise versa otherwise it well bring them bad reputation
and at the same time thats why in every product design there is a white lie that benefits the product somehow, and also for competing.


Another kind in reality branding , is attaching the product to someone famous to attract consumers attention and make them think its a great product or why would that famous person would use it . they might miss use it or lets say for a certain people who get attracted to these stuff easily but mostly it works : Example Ad Example 2
at the end in my opinion HONESTY is always the best solution and that would benefit the consumer for sure , but as a designer its smart to be aware of the strength and weaknesses their product has, and they have to try as much as possible to be honest and smart at the same time .

Mental Whiplash

My definition of qualified is not only checking a list of requirements.
A qualified instructor mean someone who know how to communicate with his\her
students, and successfully delivers what he\she has on mind .


A lot of instructors have some communication issues with student, it doesn't matter if he\she has a BA or a PHD if he\she does not t know how to communicate with his\her students, and help them in actually knowing their weaknesses and improve it.

Its very easy to find knowledge every where nowadays, but you rarely find experienced qualified instructors .
In my opinion experience is important, and If there is a combination of knowledge and experience together that would be much more important as well .

An old experienced instructor will maybe benefit the student more than the young one but that does not mean that the young experienced instructor wouldn't be helpful .
maybe experience can't be measure by years, sometimes in one year a person can experience things others cant experience in a life time, so it depends on the amount of experience they've had in teaching and dealing with people and life . thats why they attend to prefer the older because logically they will think she is more experienced, but still in my opinion there is no age or time to measure the amount of experience a person can get .

After all i think that experience is the most important qualification needed to teach because experience it defines the person's or the instructor's personality and what he\she is today .

Who Gets to Say What to Whom

People are visual . and most of them judge any design by its visuals . In my opinion that a strong logo or a poster has to have a very strong message behind it whether good or bad , it shouldn't reflect an idea behind it all the time but the strongest is the balanced one that has and idea plus attractive visuals and that what make the design stand out . for example " Coca-Cola poster that scratch Muslims in their religion " that off course not an official Coca-Cola ad logically why would they do such a thing ..? but another group of designer whatever their believes or concerns are.... they 'v designed such a thing to target a few number of people and in my opinion they had a strong idea which was the religion issue to muslims and thats very important . so they knew the target focus on the cause and designed something that effected them good or bad . they've succeeded in a way . for example nike line shoes which has an illustration of flames and it looked as if its one of god names ALLAH that is a similar example to Coca-Cola

Coca Cola news ( the crescent on the cans for holy month of ramadan )

So for a designer to make a huge impact to the world he\she should put in her consideration the balance effect , without offending any religion or a race . plus a strong positive message with an attractive visuals as well.

Healing with design

"one can argue that energy is the bridge between spirit and matter ".
I agree on the sound that it transforms negative energy to positive or vice versa , and even the light its very important in design.
It all makes sense when they use the balanced neon light in the supermarket in the fruits and vegetables section to enhance the colors, so it effects the consumer .
Studding each and every color and knowing the effect behind it, all that makes a good designer because he\she is connecting with the consumer psychologically.
some consumers are visual , what attracts them the most is the colors so it effects their mood whether they know it or not. for example you wouldn't be comfortable sitting in a fast food restaurant with soft lights and pastel colors , the same feeling you get when you see a fresh juice with black package .....???

Its important and its the designers job to attach a suitable sound and color and even image for his\her designs so the person can relay on it somehow , and off course a good research behind choosing every single thing benefits his design.

In my opinion That what makes a strong designer. and makes him\her the best in delivering the messages to the consumers.
sometimes it can gives you the positive energy for a negative reason


For example : Marlboro light advertising they chose very natural peaceful landscapes that makes u connect to it in a certain level and then a choice of sound that starts soft and then increases so it gives u the energetic feeling and challenges .
all thought its a smoking add and smoking is bad for the health but the designer here chose the right kind of music and sound long with the images of the landscapes to reflects a certain feeling for the consumer .
i cannot say that would be a bad design , in-matter of fact it is successful in delivering the massage to the consumer in the " advertising "
after all its the designers responsibility to make an impact of changing the world to a better place by reflecting a certain feeing and a massage in his\her designs

Socially Responsible Advertising Altruism or Exploitation?

Its true that consumers feel much better using products that supports a cause a certain campaign or which is safe for the environment like supporting breast cancer ,children cancer ,go green,and recycling etc... but the Question remains are these companies 100% honest ? after all they are responsible for it . in my opinion these companies for sure wants to market their products ,in order to do that they have to make a purpose for the customer to feel better about it and choose it rather than some other similar products and to make it stand out for them , its like giving the consumer a guilt free pass . we don't see that a lot in Saudi Arabia but its happening now a lot , i shall call it westernize marketing (foreign marketing ) because in the states every successful product has a cause "a campaign or supports and issue in the society or even donates money for something , it can be anything but still they have a plan , a plan to make the consumer believe and trust this product and also for companies to safe money in doing things for the environment i think as a local example " al Baik Campaign for the environment and anti smocking as well " is a successful markinting for the prouduct all thought in the bigger picture al Baik is not local barnded or marketed ,,,its wesernized as well but i still see it as a good example "ALBAIK Nazeeh & Wartan TV Ad"

Even the Mercy campaign was a successful local example

Another General Example Marks & Spencer 2007

they did something called "plan A" which is a 5 year 100 points plan to tackle problems that concerns the consumer
• Fights climate change
• reduce waste
• safe natural resources
• build a healthier nation
After all they want to please the consumer . they called it Plan A because they believe tackling such problems is the only way to do business these days .