Visual Communication Design

Finding, reframing and resolving design problems

In this unit students are introduced to the practices and processes used by designers to identify, reframe and resolve human-centred design problems. They learn how design can improve life and living for people, communities and societies, and how understandings of good design have changed over time. Students learn the value of human-centred research methods, working collaboratively to discover design problems and understand the perspectives of stakeholders. They draw on these new insights to determine communication needs and prepare design criteria in the form of a brief.

This process of discovery introduces students to the phases of the VCD design process and to the modes of divergent and convergent thinking. Students integrate these ways of thinking and working into future design projects, together with their newly evolved conceptions of good design across specialist fields.

Practical projects in Unit 1 focus on the design of messages and objects, while introducing the role of visual language in communicating ideas and information. Students participate in critiques by sharing ideas in progress and both delivering and responding to feedback. Students learn to apply the Develop and Deliver phases of the VCD design process and use methods, media and materials typically employed in the specialist fields of communication and industrial design. Student projects invite exploration of brand strategy and product development, while promoting sustainable and circular design practices. They also consider how design decisions are shaped by economic, technological, cultural, environmental and social factors, and the potential for design to instigate change.

Design contexts and connections

Unit 2 builds on understandings of visual communication practices developed in Unit 1. Students draw on conceptions of good design, human-centred research methods and influential design factors as they revisit the VCD design process, applying the model in its entirety. Practical tasks across the unit focus on the design of environments and interactive experiences. Students adopt the practices of design specialists working in fields such as architecture, landscape architecture and interior design, while discovering the role of the interactive designer in the realm of user-experience (UX). Methods, media and materials are explored together with the design elements and principles, as students develop spaces and interfaces that respond to both contextual factors and user needs.

Student learning activities highlight the connections between design and its context, and the emotive potential of interactive design experiences in both physical and digital spaces. Students also look to historical movements and cultural design traditions as sources of inspiration, and in doing so consider how design from other times and places might influence designing for the future. Design critiques continue to feature as an integral component of design processes, with students refining skills in articulating and justifying design decisions, and both giving and receiving constructive feedback.

Connections between design, time and place are also central to the study of culturally appropriate design practices in Area of Study 2. Students learn about protocols for the creation and commercial use of Indigenous knowledge in design, with a particular focus on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander design traditions and practices. Students also consider how issues of ownership and intellectual property impact the work of designers across contexts and specialist fields.   

Visual communication in design practice

In this unit students explore and experience the ways in which designers work, while also analysing the work that they design. Through a study of contemporary designers practising in one or more fields of design practice, students gain deep insights into the processes used to design messages, objects, environments and/or interactive experiences. They compare the contexts in which designers work, together with their relationships, responsibilities and the role of visual language when communicating and resolving design ideas. Students also identify the obligations and factors that influence the changing nature of professional design practice, while developing their own practical skills in relevant visual communication practices.

Students study not only how designers work but how their work responds to both design problems and conceptions of good design. They interrogate design examples from one or more fields of design practice, focusing their analysis on the purposes, functions and impacts of aesthetic qualities. This exposure to how, why and where designers work, what they make and the integral role of visual language in design practice provides the foundation for students’ own investigation of the VCD design process.

Students explore the Discover, Define and Develop phases of the VCD design process to address a selected design problem. In the Discover and Define phases, research methods are used to gather insights about stakeholders and a design problem, before preparing a single brief for a real or fictional client that defines two distinct communication needs. Students then embark on the Develop phase of the VCD design process, once for each communication need. They generate, test and evaluate design ideas and share these with others for critique. These design ideas are further developed in Unit 4, before refinement and resolution of design solutions

Unit 3 and 4 Assessment breakdown

Unit 3 School-assessed Coursework    20%

Unit 3 and 4 School Assessed Task      50%

End-of-year examination                        30%