An Appreciation of The Martian's Art Direction

The Martian's art style is a dream for anyone interested in both graphic design and space exploration - it harmoniously combines the realistic with the visually dramatic, and pays homage to NASA's actual graphic design history. Above is an image taken from a user interface design within the film, and below is an actual user interface taken from an actual NASA rocket launch. The difference is clear and obvious - the film UI looks nicer. It's debatable whether the improved aesthetics of the film UI would make a positive or a negative impact on its usability as a system, but almost everything else about the film version is an improvement. Instead of squashed, unequal aspect ratios and bland black backgrounds, we have a perfectly proportioned grid system, much more interesting and in-depth 3D models, beautiful typography and smooth blue gradients. 

There is a point to this observation. Some people argue that not everything has to be 'designed', or that not everything can look pretty, but if a few large screens showing a lot of maths and physics can be turned into a work of visual art, I'm not sure there's anything that can't. 

It's also worth appreciating that the film's graphic design team chose to use both the original and the temporary redesign of NASA's logo. The original blue logo, seen on the left, was designed in 1959 as the first official logo of the agency. The red 'worm' logo seen on the right was a redesign done in 1975 as part of the US government's attempt to improve its departmental visual identities. It served to replace the blue 'vector' logo, but in 1992 the new director of NASA retired the worm logo and went back to the blue vector logo, in what was seen by many as a terrible step backwards and a disservice to the masterful craft of the worm identity. In The Martian, whilst the NASA logo used is the blue vector, the typeface that's used on the uniforms and the EVA suits bears a striking similarity to that seen on the worm logo. So in a subtle but distinct manner, both logos manage in some way to make an appearance.