OUGD503 - Studio Brief 1 - G . F Smith (Large Individual) - Positioning pieces

Digital Development

It was considered that each colour would be a separate layer of card with the cut off shapes allowing the next colour to be visible underneath, creating the combinations of colours decided upon digitally. Initially that the hole for the central pin was in the center of the calendar / memo block. This would have worked for some of the shapes however for others (e.g. the half and half colour combination) this would have mean that the hole would have half gone through one piece of card meaning it would fall off. 

It was considered instead that the hole would have to be off centre in order to go through all the pieces whilst allowing them to be securely fastened to the central pin. Using radiating lines from the center of the design would allow for the accurate positioning of the hole in the same place for all of the pieces of card, meaning they would all line up when slotted onto the central pin. 

Placing the hole near the edge of the design meant that some of the smaller designs would not fill the cut out space meaning multiple colours would be seen past the cut out which was not wanted. 

Having the central pin closer to the middle would mean it would go through all the papers and allow the cutouts to be better filled with one colour. However the hole could not be too large or placed on a circle too big otherwise it would interfere with the edges of the paper or be too close to the middle.

Rotating the individual pieces in a sequence allowed for a better visualisation of how the pieces would overlap and fill the cut out shapes above. It was found that having each of the pieces so they reflected each other allowed the colours to come through beneath the cut outs whilst also meaning that all the pieces could be fastened together. The typography for each piece would be laid out so that when a new colour combination comes up the user would have to rotate the calendar around to read it properly, this would also allow for the cut out angles to be positioned as they are in the original designs.

Overlapping all the shapes created a grid system that helped to work out where the central pin could be positioned so it would go through all the pieces.

Having each of the pieces so that they were opposite to one another meant that the central pin could be positioned to the right of the central line, whilst still allowing all the pieces to be attached. 

Using Divide in the pathfinder tool meant that shapes could be overlapped to cut the circles to the correct shape. 

Using the grid lines, both straight and curved allowed for the accurate positioning of the hole in all the pieces.