Kuwasawa Design School 2022 指南

Press Kit

Unique Properties

They created a "Kinetic book" that is different from other school guides. They used analog methods (paper and print) to recreate digital images. At first glance, it looks like an ordinary book, but when the book is pulled out, the animation works naturally and surprises the person who sees it. The guidebook is divided into separate volumes so that people can enjoy it in various ways.

Dimensions & Packaging

Dimensions Width:182mm x Height:257mm x Depth:25mm

Tags

Kuwasawa Design School, Slit animation, Scanimation, There There, Kazune Watanabe

Production Technology

The case is slit, and the animation is worked by the expression of the cover partially visible through the slit. Although the cover appears to be printed only in black, it is not printed in one black color but in a combination of special colors. The slightest deviation of the color plates creates an optical illusion, reproducing the flicker of RGB colors that can be seen when the monitor is magnified. Under normal conditions, the colors are barely perceptible, but when the slit is passed through, the colors appear as a frame-by-frame feed.

Design Challenge

Slit animation has a narrower range of expression and is extremely difficult to express dynamically compared to ordinary animation. After more than 100 prototypes, they aimed for a digital expression using typography.

Research

As the coronavirus spreads around the world, society has shifted to a teleworking work style. And communication has shifted from face-to-face to online. Now that people see two-dimensional expressions online as a matter of course, There There wanted to redefine the value of the existence of objects. They created this design with the idea of designing an object that exists with a digital look and the sense of strangeness and unreality that comes with it.

Inspiration

School guide for Kuwasawa Design School, the first design school in Japan.
In recent years, online communication has been increasing, and the line between reality and virtual is becoming more and more blurry. In such a situation, There There pursued the possibility of design by expressing what was recognized as digital with analog (paper and print).
For students who are about to study design, they aimed not only to convey basic information about the school's curriculum and facilities but also to serve as a medium for designers to experience and recognize design as something exciting for the first time they are exposed to it.

Project Duration

The project started from July 2020 to April 2021 and was released in Japan in May 2021.

Operation Flow

The target audience is students who want to study design. The objective was to reach as many people as possible and get them interested in design. On social media, the information was shared by many media in Japan and overseas, an unprecedented spread as a school guidebook. The number of requests increased compared to previous years, increasing the school's recognition dozens of times over.