Design Processes in Pictogram Design: Form and Harmony through Modularity

Abstract

This research project aims to study and systematize design methods and procedures included in each method in order to achieve formal coherence within and between figure pictographic systems. The study focuses on two contexts included in the area of information design: Airport facilities and Olympic Games facilities. One of the intended outcomes was the possibility to propose and systematize one, or more, design methods and design procedures that aim to achieve a formal coherence in pictographic systems for use in cross-cultural facilities. Not only was it possible to obtain four different design methods and procedures, but also the opportunity to test and validate these results with a group of university students majoring in design. Of all of these, the one that ensures the attainment of formal coherence within and between figures is the Modular Standardized Grid Method. It was also considered that, when we follow a series of design procedures, which uses modular elements (formal syntactic attributes) articulated on a generating principle (grid or skeleton), the better we solve the problem of obtaining within and between formal coherence. In this paper I will mostly focus the design process through modularity. This idea came from the active research process initiated by me through the ideas originated by Otl Aicher's and Gui Bonsiepe design procedures and the way that they applied the idea of grid/pattern to the exercise of design. The results were tested in a group of 93 students. Besides the possibility to test and support the idea that a modular methods is better to obtain formal coherence, and it was also possible to get results about two different ways to use modular grids in pictogram design: Generating Grids and Regulation Grids.