02 September 2008

storyboards

was hoping to make some animated GIFs for my storyboards, but type is definitely still due tomorrow...

storyboard 1
storyboard 2

reading two

must say, considering we are doing sound & motion for our project, it felt like the end of the reading tapered off without an adequate set of examples for this element. ah well.

Q:

i loved the phrase "craving the curated experience." for me it sums up what information graphics is all about: as users we want to be led around, directed which way to go, and sometimes even told how we should feel. and with the overload currently bombarding consumers, it seems that people would understand that much of the time less is more in terms of directing the viewers. then why, over and over again, do designers still feel that more is more? we are inundated enough as it is; why make it harder for us?

01 September 2008

brain storms

CONCEPT & STORY

21.5% of respondents who failed to vote in the 1996 elections said they had no time.

As the world becomes more globalized, the business world keeps up the pace. The internet expands exponentially and information and work overload overwhelm. Daily schedules are busier and people have a hard time escaping and finding time to relax and fully take their minds off constant worries.

This spot portrays voting as not another responsibility to place into a loaded schedule, but instead a break from regular programming and an escape to relax and take well-earned time to make choices that could easily affect their everyday lives.

ASSOCIATED WORDLIST

schedule
overload
burden
strain
busy
stress
speed
nervous
obligation
burden
charge
clutter
maze
confusion
/
take a break
positive
relax
unwind
slow down
easy
unwind
paid vacation
free time
personal
“me”
individuality
/
modern
work
meeting
school
social
family
commute
productive
efficient
organized
time
money
/
helpful
dedicate
commit
public
just cause
choice
contrast

KEYWORDS

burden: a load, esp. a heavy one; a duty or misfortune that causes hardship, anxiety, or grief; a nuisance; the main responsibility for achieving a specified aim or task

unwind/relax: make or become less tense or anxious; rest or engage in an enjoyable activity so as to become less tired or anxious; cause (a limb or muscle) to become less rigid; calm down

efficient: achieving maximum productivity with minimum wasted effort or expense; working in a well-organized and competent way; order, coordination

moodboard



i'm not happy with it. i don't know where i'm going even though i've been trying to brainstorm for a long long while now.

:/

qft



wordsarepictures.co.uk

don't know much about this designer but just ran across this lovely poster on ffffound.com. so so unfortunately true. also, he's done some beautiful experimenting with a program called cinema 4d...wowowow type rendering. can't believe this is digital.



///

also, etta james is killing it right now. moodboard is not nearly so successful, yet.

27 August 2008

informationists


(before)


(after)


EDWARD TUFTE
/

Tufte studied statistics at Stanford, got his doctorate in political science at Yale, and had a public-policy professorship at Princeton. And his long roster of impressive accomplishments is not for nothing. Tufte is a statistician that has practically perfected the art of displaying information graphics with clear, data-rich graphics. He has written numerous books teaching and explaining the discipline of visually making data much more meaningful than statistics and numbers. One mantra, almost seemingly oxymoronic: To clarify, add detail. He encourages designers to make use of the higher and higher resolutions possible in print and digital, and readers to not feel rushed in working through a graphic's meaning.

///



NIGEL HOLMES
/

Holmes is a British graphic designer, graduated from the Royal College of Art, that especially specializes in information graphics and illustrations. His work is a lot more playful and colorful than Tufte's, but in this way more easily accessible and simpler. He also approaches the field of motion graphics and successfully makes comparisons clear for the viewer to understand.

///



RICHARD SAUL WURMAN
/

Wurman is an American architect and graphic designer that also specializes in making information clear. In 1984 he founded the TED (Technology, Entertainment, and Design) Conference, which meets annually and has lectures addressing science, arts, design, politics, culture, business, global issues, technology, and entertainment. He believes that we are inundated daily with information yet have few reliable methods of organizing and interpreting stark data, and thus coined the term information architect as a way to systematically comprehend.

///

Tufte approaches information with a stark minimalism, Holmes with a playful quality, and Wurman with a complex and colorful organization, but all three reach out to the viewers with their engaging graphics. Designers can easily find clarity in striving for either of the three.

two stories

A

21.5 % of respondents who failed to vote in the 1996 elections said they had no time.

As the world becomes more globalized and the internet expands exponentially, many people feel overwhelmed and overbooked in their daily schedules, and have a hard time escaping and finding time to relax and take their minds off constant worries. Instead of portraying voting as another responsibility, it might help to show it as a break from regular programming and a (perhaps righteous, even) escape to make choices that can easily affect everyday lives.

or

People make many ridiculous excuses or various reasons for not finding time to go to the polls (embarrassing reference: You've Got Mail's Meg Ryan character who was getting her hair done instead). This tactic would be more negative, implying guilt on the public by showing what else people have time to do: stop to get coffee, spend time surfing gossip sites, going out to party, etc. yet can't find time to make it to the polls.

B

In Palm Beach County, FL alone, Tuesday's primary and November's general election will eat up more than 178,400 pounds of paper ballots: that's about 90 tons, or 21 Hummer H2s.

This tactic targets the supposedly "green" tactics that each election promises yet never quite delivers. Optical-scan voting is an electronic scanning system that scans marked paper ballots; it uses technology to tabulate but still wastes an incredible amount of paper. If you've seen the movie Brazil, you know that government paperwork can be incredibly wasteful, and this is just the example. Although electronic voting technology can be vulnerable to hacking or foul play, obviously this has been an issue with manual tabulation as well. By making clear how much waste this method uses, maybe individual voters can make a difference in getting the government to rethink mediocre solutions.