Overall Evaluation

We initially struggled to find a style that we liked, that looked cohesive, and that would appeal to children. However, we finally figured this out by merging our three best ideas into one and taking inspiration from some TV adverts and the pop artist Roy Lichtenstein. Once we had our concept things started to come together.

We found the critiques where we had to put everything up on the wall and stand back were really helpful for seeing how cohesive our touchpoints were a well as to recognise small details that needed tweaked. We continued to use this technique to evaluate our work throughout the whole process, both in class and during our independent study, and found that it was a very useful tool when refining our final designs.

There were a couple of touchpoints that we found challenging to keep consistent with the other platforms and we learnt a lot about how you can bring the style subtly across without having to use exactly the same elements to link them all together.

In the end we created a convincing and cohesive concept that develops and keeps the user interested throughout the journey.

W6: Independent Study

This week was all about final refinement and getting our work ready to hand-in. We printed our three posters, our flyer, and our costume page on Tuesday and we printed our certificate on Thursday (after spending more time reworking the concept). We kept re-evaluating our website and making tweaks right up until Friday morning so that it is impactful, user-friendly, and cohesive with our other touchpoints.

This week advanced the project as we got all of our touchpoints to a standard where we were ready to hand-in!

W6S2: Class

During class we got technical help from Phoebe on a small issue we were having with the white fade on our posters. Using a feathered brush worked for screen, but when we printed our posters the printer couldn't print the fade. Phoebe showed us the tool to use on Photoshop (Filter-Pixelate-Colour Halftone) to create a fade that the printer could print. We worked on bringing our posters, flyer, and costume page to a standard where they were ready to be printed for the final time as we planned to take them to a professional printing bureau after class. At the end of the session today we all had to present our work on the table. We then had the opportunity to walk around all of the four VCD streams and look at what everyone else had created this term for this project.

Today was quite rushed as we were focused on getting our touchpoints to a print-ready standard, but then we were told (with no prior warning) that we would have to present our work in 15 minutes. This meant that we had to hurry to print something to have anything ready to present at all. We only managed to get our three posters ready to present, but walking around the other classes they had their whole suite of touchpoints presented which we think looked a lot better as you could see how their concept was working across multiple platforms. We wish we would have had warning the day before that half of the time in class would be spent presenting. We then could have worked on what we planned to do in class for homework on Monday night so that we could've then had time to get all of our trans-media platforms ready to present.

W6S1: Class

We had our final one-on-one critique with Tristam and Phoebe. This critique was great as the teachers seemed generally positive about our body of work and seemed to only have minor tweaks/things to reconsider. We then used the rest of class to start making these minor changes in our work.

This made us feel as though we can get this project completed on time and presented to a high standard.

W5: Independent Study

This week was purely about developing and refining our idea. We used techniques such as printing out our whole suite of touchpoints and pinning them up onto the wall to see if we were creating a cohesive concept. We found that this technique of stepping back and looking at your whole body of work really helps you see the weak points in the different mediums. We edited all of our trans-media aspects to a point we we thought we needed further critique from our teachers and our peers in order to move forward.

This week advanced the project in leaps and bounds as we actually have a working website and a full suite of touchpoints that are all looking quite refined.

W5S2: Class

Today we had a one-on-one critique with Tristam and Phoebe. The work that we showed them had progressed quite a bit from the work that we showed during the interim critique based on both the feedback we received and that fact that we were able to meet up and work on the project as a team. Also, at the end of class the teachers went over the hand-in requirements.

This critique was fantastic as it gave us a clear sense of what the teachers thought was working in our concept and what needed to be changed/reconsidered/taken out entirely. This will allow us to move forward with ideas for how to make our work stronger and more cohesive. By reviewing the hand-in requirements for next week it gave us sense of purpose as we were reminded of the goal we are working towards.

W5S1: Class

This class was our second interim critique. We split into groups of three pairs and showed each other our suite of trans-media touchpoints to get feedback/complements/constructive critique on them.We then had time to ourselves to work on our projects in our pairs.

This really helped us as it confirmed the areas that we thought we needed to work on but also reassured us that we were on the right track with our rhetorical approach, style, and appeal to our target audience.

W4: Independent Study - Georgia

For homework this week I developed our ideas (from the critique we got from Phoebe on Tuesday) into a cohesive visual style that incorporated our three best ideas. To help do this I looked into comic book styles and pop art artist references. I then made three posters, a flyer, a cape, a t-shirt, and a website design for interim critique using this visual style. I had to do this mostly by myself as Shelby was away for four days.

This independent work that I completed really progressed our project as we finally had our idea rolled out across all of our trans-media touchpoints. By having the concept on all of the different platforms it made it easier to see what was working and what could be altered to make them more cohesive.

W4: Independent Study - Shelby

This week I made some poster concepts because we were struggling with how to make our background and boy look cohesive. I thought the best way to go about doing this was by looking at different styles yet similar to the original style we discussed.

I also started looking into a basic idea of how we may incorporate the idea of our poster with the layout and content a website needs.

W4: Class

During class this week we decided on a direction for our visual style and subject matter through a process of development and critique. We also talked to Phoebe about our third item; the personalised storybook. She said that it would be too big of a task to undertake, even if we only made a short story, and that we should do something more simple like a drink bottle etc that could still relate to our target audience.

Class this week helped the project as we finally have started to refine our ideas down into a concept that we could apply to lots of different touchpoints. We also have started thinking about what we could produce for a third item that wouldn't be too big of a task to complete on time, but will appeal to our target audience.

W3: Independent Study

This week we separately looked at websites we liked the design of and examples of touchpoints (spreading a design concept across a range of media).
We also separately started developing the style of our illustration using Disney as a reference.
We then met up and finished developing our main concept into a cohesive image that we could use for a poster.

This helped us advance the project as we finally settled on an illustration style. We have also started thinking about the other media that we have to produce rather than just the poster.

W3S2: Class

We started off class today in The Pit having a lecture about touchpoints and being shown a few examples from students who did the Fair Trade Coffee theme last year.
We then were given studio time to work on our ideas in our pairs. We solidified our vision and what decided on which style we think is going to be the most appropriate and appealing for 5-8 year olds as well as pastiching cartoon illustration. We also produced an initial journey map for our three touchpoints and webpage, and how the user would encounter them/interact with them.
We finished the lesson by going back down to The Pit and having a tutorial about InVision; the program we will be using to create our websites.

Today helped us as we started to think of how we could apply our concept across the range of media that we have to produce for this assignment and also how our target user would experience our media. Today was also important as we honed in on a specific concept and style that we want to focus on and develop further.

W3S1: Class

Class started today with an interim critique. We split into groups of four pairs and showed each other our posters (that we had printed out at A3) to get feedback/complements/constructive critique on them.
We then had time to ourselves to work on our projects in our pairs.
We finished off the lesson by having a lecture in The Pit about transmedia.

The interim critique was very helpful as it gave us clear direction on which of our ideas people were responding to better and what we could focus on to improve our work. We really enjoyed that the critique was in a small group environment as we felt this was more helpful than a full class critique. We think people can often be too shy to speak their minds in front of the whole class - even though they can have some good points/helpful comments.

The lecture was interesting as it allowed us to start truly thinking about the transmedia requirements of this project.

W2: Independent Study - Shelby

This week I made 4 designs based on some of the thumbnails we did during class.

This help me visualise our concepts to figure out how to develop this further.

W2: Independent Study - Georgia

This week I looked at what rubbish could be found at the beach and how animals can be harmed by this rubbish.
I've also started looking at illustration styles to get inspiration and ideas.
Finally I looked at inspiration for subject matter like superheroes.
I then came up with a few poster designs to share for interim critique.

This week helped me solidify our ideas in my mind and work out how I could start to illustrate them.

W2S2: Class

Class started today with a lecture in The Pit about style and getting inspiration.

We then went back to our normal classroom and put the concepts we came up with for homework onto the tables. We then got to go around and look at everyone's. We had to put comments on other people's work using post-it notes that were either complementary, constructive critique, or helpful ideas for copy.
We finished off the lesson by having time to ourselves to come up with with more concepts.

At this stage in the project we preferred having time to ourselves to generate more concepts as we felt this was more important than looking at everyone else's work yet. We understand that the task was to help our peers see which of their concepts was strongest, and in turn receive constructive critique or praise back, but we appreciated the time we were given to work together as a team to solidify our idea and make it stronger more at this point.

W2S1: Class

We started off this class session by reviewing the homework with a buddy team which was doing the opposite topic.

The class then split into two groups based on which topic we were doing and completed a table together on the board which would help us come up with concepts quickly.
We made our own table using the exercise we had just done as a class as a template - but we inserted our own chosen subject, audience, themes, and style and then came up with tangibles that would be relevant to our ideas.
We then did an exercise where we were given 10 minutes to come up with 10 concepts. This was difficult as we had been given no warning so had to think up concepts and draw them on the fly.
We shared our '10 minute exercise' concepts with each other and picked our favourite five that we thought were the best/most successful to draw up at A4 size.
We had to then share our five concepts with the other groups sitting at our table and have them decide which of those five concepts we could improve, which we then were given time to do.
At the end of class, every pair had to present their best concepts to get some initial critique and see which of their ideas people liked best.

These exercises helped us as we generated more concepts and took our initial ideas further. We also got to see which of our ideas our class mates thought were better. We think that the direction we are going on is a good one but we need to think of new ways we can show what we want to say.

W1: Independent Study

This week for homework we had to choose either a beach clean-up day or a neighbourhood meet-and-greet. We chose to work with the issue of a beach clean-up day.
We researched the topic to gain a better understanding of the issue - trying to focus specifically on New Zealand as other countries might have different scales of the problem and also maybe different types of litter.
We created a project plan based on what we had decided in class in regards to our target audience, tone, style, imagery etc.
We brainstormed thumbnail concepts for a beach clean-up day that used rhetorical devices and then made our five favourites into rough A4 posters.
We created mood boards that show the direction we are thinking of taking in regards to the project as a whole. The mood boards included images of what we think will be our subject matter, images that inspire us in regards to style, and colour swatches of the colour scheme we are currently thinking of using to create our desired tone.

This independent work helped us advance the project as we now have a clear direction/vision of what tone and style we want to produce. We feel that we know more about the general topic after our research so we feel more confident in our opinions. The rough concepts helped us to start thinking about how we could possibly portray what we want to say and how this will support our key outcomes (educating children and making them want to save the animals at the beach).

W1: Class

This week in class we were given the Simpsons Exercise, in which we had to analyse a character from The Simpsons and create some poster concepts (for either the beach clean-up day or the neighbourhood meet-and-greet) that would appeal to this character.
We formed pairs for this project!
The tutors separated the class into two groups based on which topic we were doing and then had us discuss in these big groups the issue we were focusing on and why people would want to participate.
In our pairs we discussed who we would like to target as an audience and visualised who this person was/what their life was like. We also started to think about what tone and style we could produce that would appeal to this audience.

This helped us as we formed a team and started thinking about who we wanted to target and how we could go about inspiring them to go to a beach clean-up day.

Brief

Aim:

To develop an explicit understanding of how a visual rhetorical concept can be implemented across multiple platforms.


Koha:

This project responds to aspects of koha. It takes ideas of gift, of reciprocity and exchange and examines how design/art can contribute to wider community networks.


Brief:

The processes, thinking and activities developed in your learning so far will continue to be utilised and progressed throughout this assignment. The power of design to influence for good will be explored through social enterprise subject matter. Working as part of a collaborative team will enhance your empathy for colleagues, client and audience. Collaborative teams bring a wider range of complimentary skills to the development of a transmedia strategy. The transmedia nature of your solution enables a deeper audience connection to your message across multiple touch points and time-frames.


Objective:

Your task is to develop a trans-media campaign that promotes and facilitates a community event. This will involve redesigning the home page and event resource page for an existing non-profit organisation’s (NPO) website. The event resource page will include a range of promotional material that can be downloaded by individuals in order to initiate their own community event.

The visual rhetorical concept you develop must be applied holistically across the different forms of media. The approach must also evolve dependant on the role and stage of the campaign each form of media is used for.

In addition you are required to document your design process by summarising each day’s activity through an online blog. Each post will outline what you did and how it advanced your project. It will also be tagged according to the stage or stages of the design process utilised.


Submission:

• Webhub and all 3 touchpoints 
• Interim 1 (Week 3) and interim 2 (Week 5) clearly labelled on your blog
• Written rationale (approx 100 words)
• Process Blog + Workbooks