Interview

Adapted from Glitch: Designing Imperfection (Mark Batty Publisher)
By Iman Moradi, Ant Scott, Joe Gilmore & Christopher Murphy
Dateline: October 23, 2009

Q: Please outline your working ethos and history as a graphic design studio—your experimental glitch research and the commercial side. How did this way of working come about?

The Apple logo is one of the most famous logos in the world. Apple fans not only put this logo on their vehicles to show their loyalty, they go to the extreme of tattooing themselves with it, a level of dedication very few brands achieved. The logo is admired for it's simplicity and many meanings that people attach to it. It's timeless. For 30 years it has been unchanged and I expect at least another 30 before anything drastic will be done to it.

When Jean Louis Gassée (executive at Apple Computer from 1981 to 1990) was asked about his thoughts to the Apple logo he answered:
One of the deep mysteries to me is our logo, the symbol of lust and knowledge, bitten into, all crossed with the colors of the rainbow in the wrong order. You couldn't dream of a more appropriate logo: lust, knowledge, hope, and anarchy.

There are many theories about this logo and many of them are just that. Find out the truth, read the interview with Rob Janoff, the designer of the original Apple logo, who will tell you all about his design.

CB: When did you design the original Apple logo with the colorful stripes?
RJ: Early 1977. The agency got the account (Apple) sometime January. The logo was introduced with the new product Apple II in April of that year.

CB: Were you working for an agency at the time?
RJ: Yes, I was working for an advertising and public relations agency called Regis McKenna and I was an art director.

Here is an interview with the talented icon designer Jonas Rask from Denmark. Hopefully you will find it useful to have a bit of insight into his professional thinking and get to know him a bit better personally as well.

When I stumbled upon Jonas work some time ago on the net. I particulary fell in love with his highly detailed icons and the complexity of them. I wanted to know more about who he is and how these icons were created so I'll just had to ask him if he was willing to give an interview. Luckily he was more than happy to do the interview so here it is:

I'm a big fan of Frank's Media Artist Secrets podcast, also available through his website.

If I had to categorize this podcast I would say it's a partly motivational, partly inspirational and partly tips and tricks show. Frank has worked in many different fields of the creative business. In his podcast he shares his views and gives advice to creative professionals as how to run their professional careers. Some of the subjects he discussed were very much relevant to my career at certain times and it was great to hear a well thought through opinion and advice on how to approach a certain situation. Some shows touched on subjects that I had a well formed opinion about, but it still was a time well spent to listen to a different point of view.

One of the misconceptions many new designers have when they start out in an ad agency is that they will work alone in a plush office taking client supplied copy and photos and designing the next great ad.

In reality, you’ll be working as a team with a copywriter tossing ideas back & forth about the text for the ad, as well as the overall design. That’s because any great ad has to speak to a viewer with words and pictures, at least most do. Some ads are pure text and can be quite successful and creative. Others offer only a word or two with a stunning visual to get the message across, such as Apple’s “Think Different” campaign.

To read the interview at CreativeGuy, click here.

This is the first of a series of interviews with talented designers who are readers of CreativeBits. Hopefully you will find it useful to have a bit of insight into their professional thinking and get to know them a bit better personally as well.

I particularly love Cian's icons for their character, extreme detail and clear simplicity of ideas. I wanted to know about how these small jewels of design come alive, so I thought I'll just ask him if he's willing to give an interview. Luckily he was happy to respond, so here it goes: