Games with characters

We are playing games with fonts in DGC 1180 these days and this reminds of an old game I used to play when I was little with my grandparents.

This is a game to be played with Chinese characters. There is a children's song along with this game. The rule is simple. You just draw what the lyrics tell you to do. And when the song is over, a picture of an old man will appear in front of you.

The steps in the song are like this:

1. There was an old man whose family name is DING.

Then you can have the nose of this old man. (The Chinese character of DING is: 丁)

2. He got two cute grandsons.

The grandsons are fat and cute so the eyes of the old man can be replaced by two circles resembling the two grandsons.

3. He didn't eat for three days.

Here three lines appear on his forehead like three wrinkles.

4. And he was hungry and turned around.

The round head comes.

5. He bought three scallions.

His three hairs.

6. He used 3.3 dollars.

3 is just like the shape of his ears.

7. He bought a piece of cake for four dollars.

The Chinese character of four:四 is his mouth.

8. He bought a big melon.

It's his body!

9. He used 6.6 dollars.

Make his has the same way like ears.

10. He also bought some little cakes.

These are his buttons on his clothes.

11. He bought these for 9.9 dollars.

Also working in the same way as ears.

Then a picture of an old man appears as long as you follow the simple instructions!

This game is classic at least in my hometown and now when I am approaching to design, these old things just remind me of the fact that design is not only designed by professional designers. Everyone can design and there is really nothing new under the sun.

Hope you enjoy this little game.

The Chinese version of the song is listed below.

从前有个丁老头（眉毛和鼻子），

他有两个乖孙儿（眼睛），

三天不吃饭（额头皱纹），

饿得团团转（脑袋），

买了三根葱（头发），

用了三毛三（耳朵），

买个小方饼花了四毛钱（嘴），

买个大冬瓜（身子），

用了六毛六（两只手），

买串油果子（纽扣），

用了九毛九（两只脚）。

Le Chat Noir

I was quite surprised last class when I saw this cat poster shown because I bought a copy of this in Florence this summer and I wouldn't have thought this poster has so many things to say. At fisrt when I bought the copy I just thought it was prettier than other pictures there. However I always want to know the story behind this poster.


I have searched some information about this cat. First I found out that the word Le Chat Noir represents a kind of entertainment in late 19 century in France welcomed by a group of artists, especially Picasso. However this didn't exist for a long time. It was a shame for both Paris and the cultural field I think because Le Chat Noir represented a trend to move forward and develop. I have also read some articles in memory of those days. I guess it was a time for new things to emerge but was killed at last.

Then I found out the author of this poster, Théophile Alexandre Steinlen, was also inspired in Le Chat Noir, a cafe shop related to this trend and entertainment in Paris. I always like those coffee shops in Europe, where are not only a place to eat and drink, but also for people to exchage ideas and communicate whatever they like. Culture occured there, and we know something like this cannot happen in a busy and stressful life.

A Hand Job

First I must say after having an approach to typography, I start to worry about my visual lexicon. I guess the typography inside there may be all wrong because I wrote everything inside rather than print them. And I don't really know what to do to save it because it is already done.

Here comes what I have discovered in typography.

A CATALOG OF TYPE. HAND JOB.

I borrowed this book from the library accidenly and after the class it came to my mind. The author of this book names Michael Perry. He does typography design by hand. Poeple all say that "in this digital age of computer-generated graphics and typography, it is refreshing to see a small subtle of typograqphy who still believe in working by hand". In his book, there are various beautiful typograohys made by hand. Here are some photos.

He made letters into different shapes. I like this H very much because it looks like a dinosaur.

And his design are very detailed with patterns or lines.

However, I think his work is just for fun or in other words, his designs are all decorative typography are cannot be always applied to no matter formal or informal texts. And these designs more tend to be beautiful drawings rather than typography, though the author itself called it so.

It is indeed refreshing to see these designs because they are more vivid and colorful. But I still think we should in some way make it more useful.

When Culture Meets Design

We talked about culture and communication design in today's class. When it came to CULTURE, this picture sudenly came into my mind. This was a photo I took last weekend in a restaurant in Langham Place for my visual lexicon. I think there are a lot of things can be discussed in this advertisenment.

In this advertisement, the orange color slogan reads:"Let's go to eat SOFT RICE!!!" And below the main slogan are the penguins crying out the names of different kinds of SOFT RICE offered in that restaurant.(including the one with beef, with crab and with shells.) SOFT RICE is the thing this restaurant wants to promote. I didn't try this rice that day. So I guess this rice must have been cooked very soft in some particular way.

The shining point is the phrase "EAT SOFT RICE". This phrase in mandarin is spoken as "chi ruan fan" . This is a very negative phrase to describe those kind of a man who live on a woman and doesn't earn a life by himself and also has a weak character acting like a coward in life. It is originally from Shnaghai dialect and now has spreaded widely over China. Rather than its apparent meaning, this phrase has also been furthered to describe those kind of man who get a promotion by doing something unethical with his woman boss, such like this.

I guess whether the designer of this ad really know the meaning of this phrase. In one hand, I guess he / she knew this meaning and want to use this joking way to attract customers, just like the toilet restaurant in Mongkok. People nowadays are crazy about "not good things" and the designer are using this point attarcting customers. On the other hand, the designer doesn't know this meaning and the reason why using this slogan is just because he/she has heard about it but didn't do the research. If this is the situation, I think then CULTURE is vital here. Becuase this slogan will create an ironic impact on thepromotion. Maybe it will annoy its customers, and the restaurant will lose business.

One more thing, the designer should also know whether HK people know the meaning of this phrase. If this slogan is not known widely by HK people, then this slogan won't work out, no matter in the positive promoting way or in the nrgative ironic way.

So knowing a certian culture is very improtant if we are going to use this culture as part of our design. And what I don't understand in this poster is that, why the designer is using penguins to promote? I don't think the penguin is the symbol of this restaurant.

Try to think more...