Graphic Design Sources

In this visually exciting book, an award-winning graphic designer and teacher addresses students, educators, computer graphics users, practicing designers, and others seeking to understand the principles and process of good design. Kenneth J. Hiebert extends the innovative approach he used in his previous book, Graphic Design Processes, showing how inventive graphic design arises from diverse stimulus sources. Interweaving theory and concrete, creative activity, he demonstrates the integration of such stimuli as nature, music, personal experience, statistical data, vernacular expression, and architecture in well-designed work.

With clear explanations and hundreds of revealing illustrations, Hiebert discusses and demonstrates the process of design creation: first finding more universal and latent beginning points inherent in sources, then engaging in a thought process that leads to fresh and unpredictable interpretive results. He explains how to use the computer as an enabling tool while avoiding the cliché forms of obvious computer-generated design. When designers understand how to meld form, technique, and communication, Hiebert says, design becomes an exciting personal process, independent of stylistic trends.

Kenneth J. Hiebert is professor of graphic design and as former chair was instrumental in organizing the graphic design department at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia. He has received two individual design arts awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, and his work is in the permanent collections of major museums, including the Museum of Modern Art, The Cooper-Hewitt Museum, and the Gewerbemuseum Basel.