philosophy

bret hansennowprojector

i am now projector.

Now Projector is the pseudonym for Brooklyn-based designer Bret Hansen. The Now Projector moniker revives an eighteenth century term for creative entrepreneurs who designed and launched game-changing projects. Projectors were audacious iconoclasts known for their moxie and vision.

In the following pages I imagine what design might look like if designers were called projectors. Applying notions of projection from philosophy, psychology, literature, cartography and physics onto design offers an intriguing way to think about the discipline and provides a new vocabulary for talking about what designers do. Working as projectors, designers imagine, distort, invent, pretend, perform, launch and connect.

nice to meet you.

imagine

As the engine that drives fiction and the basis for empathy, imaginative projection is a literary term that for projectors describes the key to a rich creative process: an active imagination. Imagining a range of possibilities at the beginning of a project, for example, spurs the flow of ideas and propels creative explorations. Imagining the story behind a brand or message reveals its human side and sets the stage for focused experimentation; and imagining the audience’s perspective helps designers empathize with their users. Recasting design as a type of projection emphasizes the important role imaginative thinking plays in the design process.

distort

Distortion is a natural consequence of projection. When the globe is projected onto a flat surface, for example, the resulting map brings the entire Earth into view— but in the process continents are stretched or condensed. What’s more, different map projections emphasize different characteristics, offering countless ways to interpret the planet’s surface. Projection provides a way to see hidden features and the distortion it creates reveals new ways of understanding what we see. It’s the key to seeing beyond the obvious and it leads inevitably to innovative solutions.

pretend

In psychology, projection explains how we make sense of our surroundings. In an epic game of let’s pretend, we translate the world into something we can understand by projecting mental concepts onto external objects. Uniquely and profoundly human, our drive to imbue anything and everything with meaning is what makes us tick. Most of the time meaning seems to happen automatically, but during the design process it is something to be made, shaped or suggested. The designer’s search for meaningful form is strategic and playful, requiring both a clear goal and a wandering mind. It’s like a temporary return to childhood–to a mindset that can look at an empty coffee can and see both a container and a spaceship.

invent

In Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels, projectors are inventors who spend their days conjuring inane projects that never work–like extracting sunbeams from cucumbers and writing an encyclopedia by stringing together phrases read aloud by the operators of a word machine. They pursue their projects with no regard for practical outcomes and thus serve as a satirical reminder that good design is rooted in solving real problems for real people. But despite being written nearly three hundred years ago, the projectors’ endeavors strike a familiar chord. Gleaning solar rays from cucumbers mirrors current efforts to convert biomass into fuel; and an encyclopedia based on questionable user-generated content seems a lot like Wikipedia. Nevertheless, invention is a key part of design; and good design balances visionary day-dreaming with real-world practicality.

perform

In his famous cave allegory, Plato describes a scene in which prisoners whose view since birth has been limited to a cave wall equate cast shadows with reality. Unaware that performers situated behind them are projecting these shadows, the shackled prisoners live in a world whose features are in flux. For the prisoners, reality is embodied in the illusory forms projected before them. Similarly, our own cultural awareness is based in large part on the designed forms that surround us; and designers are complicit in this ‘performance’ of culture. When new products enter the public sphere meaning is made, values are reflected and the cultural landscape is modified. To ‘perform’ culture means to give shape to shared values. Doing so responsibly means developing products that reflect humanity at its best.

launch

When design is reframed as projection, the last phase of the design process – the project launch – gets a new meaning. When physical objects are launched, the laws of projectile motion dictate their trajectories. Their paths are affected by friction, wind and by gravitational force. Hitting their targets amid these interferences requires accurate calculations, and a sound and innovative strategy. Like their physical counterparts, ideas, messages and brand promises are susceptible to contextual factors, such as noise, competing messages and audience interpretations. For projectors, the design process accounts for these obstacles, culminating in a final launch that breaks the noise-barrier and makes contact.

connect

Our eternal wish to connect with others is symbolized mythologically by magic projectiles. Cupid’s amorous arrow, for example, reflects our desire to project our feelings, leave an impression and influence hearts. Like Cupid, a projector’s ultimate goal is to make connections. My aim, therefore, is to launch amazingly crafted experiences that not only connect people with people, but with new ideas, with shared values and with humanity’s highest ideals. Let’s connect.

BRET HANSENwww.nowprojector.com

email bret@nowprojector.com call 415/515/7051 write 266 Washington Avenue C10, Brooklyn, NY 11205