WELCOME!
HERE IS THE START OF OUR JOURNEY IN SEARCH OF A LOST UTOPIA.
ENJOY!
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IF DESIGN SOFTWARE IN EACH DIGITAL ERA HAS THEIR OWN DEFAULT SETTINGS AND TOOLS, WHAT ARE OUR CURRENT DEFAULTS? AS 21ST CENTURY DESIGNERS, WE TURN ON OUR COMPUTERS AND OPEN UP THE SAME SOFTWARE TO PRODUCE OUR WORK. WE OFTEN THINK THAT WE HAVE THE FREEDOM TO MAKE OUR OWN DESIGN CHOICES BUT OFTENTIMES, THE CHOICES HAVE ALREADY BEEN SET FOR US BY DEFAULT. THESE DEFAULTS COME IN MANY SCALES. FOR INSTANCE, SOMETHING AS SMALL AS THE DECISIONS ON TYPE STYLE, SIZE, AND LAYOUTS THE MOMENT WE TYPE IN A WORD, TO SOMETHING AS LARGE AS THE VAST ARRAY OF PRESETS THAT COME IN OUR DISPLAY ENVIRONMENTS. WITH THESE DEFAULTS, WE ARE PRESSED TO BE CREATIVE AND FOCUS ON THE CONTENT, BUT WE ARE STILL ALWAYS RESTRICTED BY THE NATURE OF OUR TOOLS.

THESE DEFAULTS EXIST TO BE UNIVERSAL TO ALL INSTANCES AND ARE DESIGNED TO MAKE THE SOFTWARE AS ACCESSIBLE AS POSSIBLE. THE DEFAULT IS MEANT TO BE DEFINED, CLEAR, PRACTICAL, USABLE, AND HELPFUL. YET, WE HAVE BECOME TOO COMFORTABLE WITH THE DEFAULT DUE TO ITS NATURE OF BEING INVISIBLE. IT SHAPES HOW WE THINK AND APPROACH OUR WORK. NOW MORE THAN EVER, THE DEFAULT AIMS TO BE MORE PRECISE, AND CLAIMS TO BE MORE HUMAN. BUT DO THEY LACK A NOTION OF OUR INDIVIDUALITY? A SENSE OF BEING HUMAN? SOME MAY ARGUE THAT BEING ‘HUMAN’ ALSO MEANS TO BE MORE ‘IMPRECISE’ BECAUSE AS HUMANS, WE INHERENTLY MAKE MISTAKES AND EVEN FAIL. THIS RAISES THE QUESTION, CAN WE HONOR OUR ERRORS AND CELEBRATE THESE MISTAKES? THIS IS THE UTOPIA I AM SEARCHING FOR.

WHY IS OUR CURRENT DEFAULT NOT A UTOPIA FOR ME? AN EXAMPLE WOULD BE THE HIGH RESOLUTION “CLEAN AND SIMPLE DESIGN”—A DEFAULT NOTION THAT WE LIVE WITH TODAY. RESOLUTIONS MUST BE MAXIMIZED; THE DISPLAY HAS TO BE CLEARER, EVERYTHING HAS TO MIMIC THE VISION OF THE HUMAN EYE. 4K RESOLUTION WAS INTRODUCED TO OUR LIVES JUST FOUR YEARS AGO. MEANWHILE, 16K RESOLUTION IS ALREADY BEING DEVELOPED. TO CREATE A HIGHER RESOLUTION DISPLAY, PANEL MAKERS PACK MORE AND MORE PIXELS INTO A GIVEN SPACE. WHAT WE SEE HAS BECOME SO REFINED, RATHER THAN BLOCKY OR PIXELATED. THE WAYS WE SEE AND IMAGINE ARE IRONICALLY RESTRICTED BY THE CURRENT NATURE OF ITS HIGH DEFINITION. DURING THE TIME WHEN 8 BIT WAS OUR DEFAULT, WE EMBRACED THE LARGE PIXELS THAT EXPOSED THE TECHNOLOGY. THINGS WERE LESS DEFINED, LESS SHARP, AND LESS PRECISE. THERE WAS ARGUABLY MORE SPACE FOR OUR MINDS TO WANDER AND IMAGINE WITH THE AMBIGUITY OF LOW RESOLUTION MEDIA. IF WE LOOK HARD ENOUGH, WE MIGHT BE ABLE TO FIND THE LOST LOW RES UTOPIA SOMEWHERE IN OUR VAST, HD +++K LANDSCAPE. THEREFORE, MY UTOPIA IS MEANT TO LIVE ALONGSIDE OUR CURRENT WORLD OF DEFAULT.

IN ORDER TO EXAMINE A FUNDAMENTAL COMPONENT OF OUR CURRENT DEFAULT, THIS UPCOMING SERIES FOCUSES ON STUDYING THE ‘PIXEL’ WITHIN MY DESIGN PRACTICE. AS A FUNDAMENTAL PART OF OUR RESOLUTION WORLD, PIXELS HAVE BECOME A MEASUREMENT UNIT AND A STANDARD. IT TYPICALLY HAS A STANDARD SHAPE OF A SQUARE. A PIXEL IS AN EXAMPLE OF AN UNQUESTIONABLE DEFAULT, THAT IN OUR SYSTEM WILL NOT BE LIKELY CHANGED, AT LEAST UNTIL THE NEXT GAME-CHANGING INNOVATION.
01 — BABY STEPS! TAKE RISKS!
(PERHAPS MAKE AN ‘EXPRESSIVE UNIVERSAL’ FONT?)
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AS A STARTING POINT, I LOOKED AT THE INTERSECTION OF THE DEFAULT TYPE AND RESOLUTION. I FOUND MYSELF LOOKING AT THE SIMPLIFIED FONTS WHICH I FOUND ON RECEIPTS AND TICKETS FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD (1) Taiwanese Universal Receipt (2) digital era (3) digital era (4) digital era (5) digital era. THESE FONTS IN THEIR DEFAULT STATE ARE COLD AND MECHANICAL. HOWEVER, ONCE PRINTED, THEY START TO GAIN INCONSISTENCIES IN THEIR FORMS THAT START TO SHOW A SENSE OF WARMTH AND HUMANITY. THUS I CREATED A PIXEL FONT WITH MY OWN EXPRESSIVENESS TO CHALLENGE IF THEY CAN SHOW MORE HUMANITY WHILE IN THE DEFAULT STATE.
‘EXPRESSIVE DEFAULT FONT’

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CAPS LOCK ON?
CHANGE TEXT SIZE.

TYPE HERE!

02 — SLIPPAGE TO UTOPIA?
(THE UNDEFINED AREA?)
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AFTER EXPLORING THE OUTCOMES OF MY OWN DEFAULT FONTS, I FELT A LACK OF INTERACTION WITH THE SOFTWARE. I WANTED TO SEE IF THERE'S SOMETHING THAT I MISSED THAT'S ALREADY AT PLAY IN THE SOFTWARE — A SLIPPAGE WHERE BOTH HUMANS AND OUR TOOLS CAN NO LONGER CONTROL THE OUTCOME OF A DESIGN. PERHAPS I COULD USE THIS AS A CLUE TO FURTHER MY SEARCH FOR UTOPIA.
‘SOFTWARE SLIPPAGE’
READ MORE
1. PICK A GRID
2. PICK A COLOR
03 — REDEFINING THE UNIT
(CAN WE CHANGE THE UNCHANGABLE?)
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AFTER TAKING A CLOSE LOOK AT THE PIXEL ITSELF AND OBSERVING WHAT THE PROGRAMS UNDERLYING INFRASTRUCTURE IS DOING WITH THE PIXELS. I START TO WONDER WHAT WILL HAPPEN IF OUR RESOLUTION, OUR PIXEL, IS BASED ON AN EVER CHANGING GRID? WHAT IF THE PIXELS ARE NO LONGER SQUARES? WHAT IF THE FUNDAMENTAL DEFAULT—THE BASIC SHAPE OF OUR PIXEL. THUS I STARTED MY EXPERIMENT WITH A HALF ROUNDED SQUARE, AND KEPT BUILDING THE NEXT GRID USING PARTS FROM THE PREVIOUS GRID.
‘RECURSIVE DRAWING’
MORE! 3000PX!
HI! CONGRATS FOR FINDING ME.
I HOPE YOU HAD FUN BREAKING THE DEFAULT USE OF WINDOW BROWSERS.
CHECK OUT MY VISUAL DUMP!





THIS IS LABELLE'S FALL 2020 DEGREE PROJECT :)
WRITTEN AND DESIGNED BY LABELLE CHANG IN DEC 2020

ADVISOR: MINKYOUNG KIM
SPECIAL THANKS TO: JAMES GOGGIN, FRED HORTON, JAVIER SYQUIA, JORDAN WEED