Trend Spotting

[Zendada]

What trends are you seeing in the industry today? What do you think the trends will be before they become trends?

We [creative people] are the trend setters. Its a long line and many trends have purposely or inadvertently been propagated from way back when man first put marks on stone.

Everyone can not be aware of every design style, theme, color palette, etc. and NOT stumble upon some former form. Have you done something and later saw something similar and thought to yourself “Hey! I did that first!”

Are new trends possible? If so why? Technology certainly plays a big part. From oil-paint to LED to silk screen to hand writing to 3d rendering to sculpture.

-------------------------------------------

But lets talk about whats current in our field and what we might guess will be a new trend. :)

I’m betting there will be more of a trend towards simplicity. With the barrage of information we all receive on a daily basis from every sort of media... its my opinion that two to five words, sans-serif black on white, will be the trend to get the eye and mind in this over-saturated information age.

[captain spanky]

the swirly ornamental thing is definatley the current must do... not a lot of message just lots of faf... suits the kids of today... nothing to say just image image image.

grunge was very recent i think things could possibly go slighly off tangent then further in that direction and head toward more graffitti/urban/sticker sub-culture style stuff

I'm big on thoughtful, limited colour, simplistic design and textureful stuff at the moment tho... stuff like iso50.. coooool

[keith1]

Yeah iso50 is sweet!! I like his stuff a lot too. Mark my words, the moustache is making a comeback with the younger folks. I'm not talking about a goatee (I think that's how to spell it) just the stache.

[PrintDriver]

Color trends are killing me at the moment. All those earthy aqua blues, beiges, and snot greens. Vinyl doesn't come in those colors! LOL!
And please don't ask me to CNC distressed type!

[Yossarian]

Well if the fashion world is any indication, we're revisiting the 80s already.

[BJMRamage]

I think (vectorized) Silhouettes are coming into play more as well as Line Drawings. Simple colors.minimalistic layouts.

I also see what appears to be vector but with a texture over the whole or broken into a different texture for each color block...like a scrapbooking feel.

Victorian style-inspired from the Ornamental style now.

I think Pirates as a large part has about a year to go before going out and still used but primarily for children and not adults.

[Typically]

i agree about the grunge style sticking around for a little longer as long as it keeps evolving. i would love if graff art gets more popular. after doing it for years in my sketckbooks and on pieces of plywood i could finally use it =]

i love working with 2 or 3 colors and lot of lines or just simple shapes. where i work now i'm pretty limited as to how simple i can keep it they always want something with more images or color blah!

[carter the artist]

Pirates cannot go out of fashion, it'll bring global warming.

[urstwile]

Indeed, here's the proof:

http://i7.tinypic.com/4vi3q0i.jpg

[balou]

I've seen a lot of black & white (mostly white) with great typography/fonts and one or two splashes of color around. I'm guessing the swirly grunge stuff is on it's way out. It seems like that's been around for quite a while already. And I agree about the 80's coming back into play. I keep waiting to see the collars flipped up again.

[John G]

I keep waiting to see the collars flipped up again.

Go to a college town. Look for fratties. Been back since like 00'

[carter the artist]

I remember in the Army, the Sargeants would call the privates "Elvis" if their collar was just the slight bit flipped up.

[LeftBrain Artist]

The best place to go trend spotting is internet mortgage ads. Its all about dancing silhouettes, jittery clowns, and otherwise garishly poor design that is so bad you have to look at it, much like a train wreck.

¿Tiene bigote?

[Zendada]

The best place to go trend spotting is internet mortgage ads. Its all about dancing silhouettes, jittery clowns, and otherwise garishly poor design that is so bad you have to look at it, much like a train wreck.

¿Tiene bigote?

:rofl: I’m fond of the tattoo one myself.

[Buda]

I like to look at what trends are going around, but I hardly ever try to replicate them. I'm at a point in my life where my style is dictated by my process. I don't normally have an exact vision in mind. I have a composition, a few elements and what happens, happens.

[TriciaLynn]

I keep waiting to see the collars flipped up again.

I've already seen this!


I love the swirly grunge, but really now how much more can we take?

[rainbow2bryte]

I agree w/ many of the posts.
i think it was a year or two ago I first saw some flourishy, graphic stuff...
and thought, ahhh, that's perdy!
Now, it's outta control!!!! In print.... on TV..... ugh.
I did one piece that had a little of that going on about a year and a half ago, and thought the piece turned out well, but now i look at it w/ a bit of disgust.

I was JUST thinking the same while reading the first post. damn the 80's.
that's totally what it will be. I will protest to the fullest! i HATE pastel and neon! I look back on stuff done in that decade and it's really terrible. what the hell were we all thinking???

i agree that there will be more of the urban/ graffiti hip-hoppish thing going on in the near future as well. already is. all these suburban kids gettin' all 'street'. ha!

Plus there's a big rage in 'distressed' looks. god... i'm soooo sick of seeing jeans out there that look my long-worn, stained and ripped to shreds selling for a basket full of money. can i start selling my clothes to these fashionable peeps?

don't think i've ever set any 'design/ art' trends, but i know i set some in highschool w/ no intention of-

i think it's strange to 'keep up on trends' in the industry... unless you want to know what to avoid which is how i'm taking it.
why would you want to mass-produce some crap that everyone else is doing?

[Mynock]

Bevel and emboss.

[rainbow2bryte]

I'm interested in finding out if the trends are fairly typical interenationaly or if there are some things that are just nation specific...

[AlyCé]

the new trend is the anti-vector trend
kinda like http://www.kerismith.com/
but thats maybe amongst the graphic art-geeks?

[Mitch Wood]

the new trend is the anti-vector trend
kinda like http://www.kerismith.com/
but thats maybe amongst the graphic art-geeks?


I agree.

I find the thing with trends, is that they are born for a reason, and spiral around this.

Personally I feel that Carson-esque grunge was born from an anti corporate non constrained computer vision.

Maybe the key word is organic design...

I feel this has followed through with the flourishes, and illy line work, text in sqewed boxes etc. I reckon just answer the brief as best as you can, while keeping an organic edge - break away from the bore of contraint!

[amadeupword]

glassy, bubbley(sp?) buttons that all look the same.

[kar-po]

I'm not a scrapbooker at all, but I like to flip through their paper aisle once in awhile.

I can't tell if they are always following trends by graphic designers, or if they are actually creating some... I think that they are having a lot of impact on things like photography, layout etc...

Everyone is now a "designer".

[kar-po]

heck, even photoshop caters to them now