full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Chip Kidd: The art of first impressions -- in design and life

Unscramble the Blue Letters

["'Perfidia' a novel by James Ellroy"] Okay, James Ellroy, amazing crmie writer, a good feirnd, I've worked with him for many years. He is probably best known as the author of "The Black Dahlia" and "L.A. Confidential." His most recent novel was called this, which is a very mysterious name that I'm sure a lot of ppleoe know what it means, but a lot of people don't. And it's a story about a Japanese-American deivtctee in Los Angeles in 1941 ingvtinetiasg a murder. And then Pearl hoarbr happens, and as if his life wasn't difficult enough, now the race relations have really ratcheted up, and then the Japanese-American internment camps are quickly created, and there's lots of tsnoien and horrible stuff as he's still trying to solve this murder. And so I did at first think very literally about this in terms of all right, we'll take Pearl Harbor and we'll add it to Los Angeles and we'll make this aplctiyoapc dawn on the horizon of the city. And so that's a picture from Pearl Harbor just grafted onto Los alneges. My editor in chief said, "You know, it's irittenseng but I think you can do better and I think you can make it simpler." And so I went back to the drawing board, as I often do. But also, being alive to my surroundings, I work in a high-rise in Midtown, and every night, before I laeve the office, I have to push this bottun to get out, and the big heavy glass doors open and I can get onto the elevator. And one night, all of a sudden, I looked at this and I saw it in a way that I hadn't really noticed it before. Big red cclire, danger. And I thought this was so oiuobvs that it had to have been done a zillion times, and so I did a Google image sercah, and I couldn't find another book cover that looked quite like this, and so this is really what solved the problem, and gclliaarhpy it's more interesting and creates a bigger tension between the idea of a certain kind of sunrise coming up over L.A. and aeirmca.

Open Cloze

["'Perfidia' a novel by James Ellroy"] Okay, James Ellroy, amazing _____ writer, a good ______, I've worked with him for many years. He is probably best known as the author of "The Black Dahlia" and "L.A. Confidential." His most recent novel was called this, which is a very mysterious name that I'm sure a lot of ______ know what it means, but a lot of people don't. And it's a story about a Japanese-American _________ in Los Angeles in 1941 _____________ a murder. And then Pearl ______ happens, and as if his life wasn't difficult enough, now the race relations have really ratcheted up, and then the Japanese-American internment camps are quickly created, and there's lots of _______ and horrible stuff as he's still trying to solve this murder. And so I did at first think very literally about this in terms of all right, we'll take Pearl Harbor and we'll add it to Los Angeles and we'll make this ___________ dawn on the horizon of the city. And so that's a picture from Pearl Harbor just grafted onto Los _______. My editor in chief said, "You know, it's ___________ but I think you can do better and I think you can make it simpler." And so I went back to the drawing board, as I often do. But also, being alive to my surroundings, I work in a high-rise in Midtown, and every night, before I _____ the office, I have to push this ______ to get out, and the big heavy glass doors open and I can get onto the elevator. And one night, all of a sudden, I looked at this and I saw it in a way that I hadn't really noticed it before. Big red ______, danger. And I thought this was so _______ that it had to have been done a zillion times, and so I did a Google image ______, and I couldn't find another book cover that looked quite like this, and so this is really what solved the problem, and ___________ it's more interesting and creates a bigger tension between the idea of a certain kind of sunrise coming up over L.A. and _______.

Solution

  1. obvious
  2. harbor
  3. button
  4. apocalyptic
  5. interesting
  6. america
  7. crime
  8. leave
  9. people
  10. angeles
  11. investigating
  12. search
  13. detective
  14. circle
  15. tension
  16. friend
  17. graphically

Original Text

["'Perfidia' a novel by James Ellroy"] Okay, James Ellroy, amazing crime writer, a good friend, I've worked with him for many years. He is probably best known as the author of "The Black Dahlia" and "L.A. Confidential." His most recent novel was called this, which is a very mysterious name that I'm sure a lot of people know what it means, but a lot of people don't. And it's a story about a Japanese-American detective in Los Angeles in 1941 investigating a murder. And then Pearl Harbor happens, and as if his life wasn't difficult enough, now the race relations have really ratcheted up, and then the Japanese-American internment camps are quickly created, and there's lots of tension and horrible stuff as he's still trying to solve this murder. And so I did at first think very literally about this in terms of all right, we'll take Pearl Harbor and we'll add it to Los Angeles and we'll make this apocalyptic dawn on the horizon of the city. And so that's a picture from Pearl Harbor just grafted onto Los Angeles. My editor in chief said, "You know, it's interesting but I think you can do better and I think you can make it simpler." And so I went back to the drawing board, as I often do. But also, being alive to my surroundings, I work in a high-rise in Midtown, and every night, before I leave the office, I have to push this button to get out, and the big heavy glass doors open and I can get onto the elevator. And one night, all of a sudden, I looked at this and I saw it in a way that I hadn't really noticed it before. Big red circle, danger. And I thought this was so obvious that it had to have been done a zillion times, and so I did a Google image search, and I couldn't find another book cover that looked quite like this, and so this is really what solved the problem, and graphically it's more interesting and creates a bigger tension between the idea of a certain kind of sunrise coming up over L.A. and America.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations

ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
digestive system 4
visual vernacular 3
los angeles 3
pearl harbor 3
human digestive 3
deft strokes 2
diet coke 2
blih blah 2

ngrams of length 3

collocation frequency
human digestive system 3

Important Words

  1. add
  2. alive
  3. amazing
  4. america
  5. angeles
  6. apocalyptic
  7. author
  8. big
  9. bigger
  10. black
  11. board
  12. book
  13. button
  14. called
  15. camps
  16. chief
  17. circle
  18. city
  19. coming
  20. confidential
  21. cover
  22. created
  23. creates
  24. crime
  25. danger
  26. dawn
  27. detective
  28. difficult
  29. doors
  30. drawing
  31. editor
  32. elevator
  33. ellroy
  34. find
  35. friend
  36. glass
  37. good
  38. google
  39. grafted
  40. graphically
  41. harbor
  42. heavy
  43. horizon
  44. horrible
  45. idea
  46. image
  47. interesting
  48. internment
  49. investigating
  50. james
  51. kind
  52. leave
  53. life
  54. literally
  55. looked
  56. los
  57. lot
  58. lots
  59. means
  60. midtown
  61. murder
  62. mysterious
  63. night
  64. noticed
  65. obvious
  66. office
  67. open
  68. pearl
  69. people
  70. picture
  71. problem
  72. push
  73. quickly
  74. race
  75. ratcheted
  76. red
  77. relations
  78. search
  79. simpler
  80. solve
  81. solved
  82. story
  83. stuff
  84. sudden
  85. sunrise
  86. surroundings
  87. tension
  88. terms
  89. thought
  90. times
  91. work
  92. worked
  93. writer
  94. years
  95. zillion