Objectified: Form and Content

The film “Objectified” directed by Gary Hustwit, is a look at industrial design and it's presence and impact in our everyday lives. The film interviews several designers who all discuss design, as well as the importance of form and content. Although the designers have somewhat different perspectives, their similar view is that good design should not be noticed as design. Good design should be simple and feel natural.

To refresh the memory, let's define form and content. Content is the “subject matter, story, or information that the artwork seeks to communicate to the viewer”. Form is “The purely visual aspect of design” or how a designer says something. In this sense, content usually influences form. Jonathan Ive, VP of industrial design at Apple is well educated in the relation of from and content. He believes that form should develop in a manner that causes the consumer to believe it was inevitable, or “Of course it's this way”. Examples of this are present in every apple product from macbooks, to iphones. Apple's simplicity reflects the idea that products should require no extra thought, which is is the power of good design.

In regards to designs such as Apple's iPhone, it is mentioned in the film that form is not necessarily connected to function, due to the advent of the microchip. In cellphones, computers, video games, mp3 players, etc, the microchip has allowed digital interfaces to control what an object does. This changes the connection between form and content creating two levels of form. One level is the exterior of the actual device, while the second is the user interface of the software on the device. Someone who has never seen a cellphone would have a hard time understanding what an iPhone is.

Bill Moggridge, co-founder of the IDEO design group, also makes reference to the idea of “digital form” when discussing his design of one of the first laptop computers. Moggridge states that after spending so much time on the industrial design of the computer, he soon forgot it all as he became fascinated with the user interface design. David Kelly, another member of the IDEO team believes that “people need to demand that design performs for them”. In the field of user interface design, the interface should always be simple and understandable. If this is not the case, then the designer has failed, not the user. Kelly again brings up the idea that the most successful design is simple, natural feeling form.

The documentary really opens ones eyes as to how much of our lives is affected by industrial design. Everything around can be judged as to how well the form represents the content. Almost every item we come into contact with has been considered by a designer in order to achieve a successful form that accurately connects with the user.