'What is Good' Rationale

When I began my practical response I looked back at my essay, I had discussed whether designers had the responsibility to make the world a better place. I thought about what I could produce as a response, I looked into various ways designers have tried to make a good social impact, I had found a few case studies that showed this. I looked into certain types of design, but then it occurred that I could produce a piece of design that in itself would have a positive social impact. This is where I got the idea of my content from, I worked back from the audience of my essay, I broadened who should make the world a better place, by including everyone, I feel that everyone has a responsibility. 

I was exploring these ideas and I remembered that I had referred to the First Things First Manifestos in my essay, I looked back over these and within them Garland and Poynor had mentioned various forms of design that they considered to be worthy, and ethically/ socially good/positive. In one of the manifestos the term 'educational tools' was used, and this is where I got the idea for my audience and format from. I decided that I would make a publication aimed at young adults who where still at school, I had decided upon this particular audience with the help of someone else's work (that I have mentioned in my research) who had decided to aim at a younger audience as there opinions and views of the world are still changing and still being questioned, instilling these positive views into a younger audience could change the future, whereas with adults it can be harder to change their minds. 

As well as this in my research I had found a quote that I felt was key, I think that this quote gave me the idea for my content, which was looking at four views of good ethics from religion and four from non-religious, I wanted to show the two fundamental sides, and I wanted to compare them and show the audience there are different views and we should understand this but we can work with one another, as well as this I wanted the audience to understand that there is no definite good and bad, it is an undefinable term, hence the name of my publication 'What is Good'. 

I wanted the book to visually represent the idea of two sides, I thought back to when I was younger where I had a book, one half was english and one half was french. And the idea was that a mole on each side starting in either country, travelled under the english/french channel and they met in the middle. This is where the idea of a back to back publication came from and this would be the format, as well as this the two sides would meet in the middle and there would be a summary. 

As for my design decisions, I kept a simple appearance, I used icons as a key to summarise important information, this is all with the age of the target audience in mind. There was a lot of information and it was hard to simplify down as it is such a vast topic, I highlighted key principles in colour. I wanted the piece to be engaging, not overwhelming so I had a spacious layout as well. I chose to print on an off-white, more textural stock as I felt that it would add to the look of the book as well as this the colour and texture may be more inviting to read.