Category: Zine: Locale

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Zine – Locale Part 2

Based on my research in Part 1, I decided to design my Zine as a guide to a one day trip around Kranji Farm Area. Seeing as how many visitors are families with young children, and also the fact that majority of the survey respondents said that they would bring their children to Kranji Farm if they were parents, I decided to make my Zine’s target audience to be families with young chilren. The content of the Zine would be a guide for families who wish to visit Kranji Farms. The Zine will include things like what to bring, what activities are there, what to eat etc, it will be a complete guide to Kanji Farm. As for the aesthetics, I wanted to make it appealing to young children, almost like a kiddy handbook.

For my zine, I wanted to design it in such a way that it starts with the preparation of going there, the activities while being there and it ends off with leaving the place.

Cover Page:

For my cover page, I decided to included things of what to bring there. The items I have included are insect repellent, an umbrella and a water bottle.

                                   

Of course, we will need a bag to put all of these items. I chose bright primary colours for the bag to make it more attractive to children.

I wanted to inform the readers why these times are chosen but I don’t want to do it too directly. Hence, I decided to do it in the form of danger signs, which also goes with the idea of a road trip/outing.

             

Going with the idea of a road trip, I designed the Kranji sign interns of a road sign hanging from the top. I chose the font that is more adventure like, almost like that of “Jumanji”.

 

Second Spread (Activities):

I chose 5 activities, one from each place/farm. These activities are chosen because they provide a variety of things to do and also they are activities I think which are more suited for children.

Goat Feeding at Hay Dairies

Frog Catching at Jurong Frog Farm

Breakfast/Lunch/Dinner at Poison Ivy Bistro in Bollywood Veggies

Prawning at Kranji Farm Resort

Nature Walks at Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve

 

Second Spread (Map):

My original thought was to create a map with the actual route lines as follows:

However, seeing as how this is a friendly guide for families with the aim of appealing to young children, I decided to keep the basic shape, but design the map like a treasure map for children. The lines are simplified and more kid-friendly, and relevant.

I wanted to mark each place with a simple landmark.

Initially, my drawings were drawn like the tree above. However, keeping to the kiddy style and to make sure that the aesthetic is consistent throughout, all my following designs have a black outline and as much as possible, filled with solid colours.

Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve – Marshes/Swamp

Hay Dairies – Farm Gate

Area Signs – Jurong Frog Farm

Kanji Farm Resort – Resort

Bollywood Veggies – Plantation

I put the landmarks together on the map with “x” on the place (going with the treasure map style). I also put alphabets for easy reference when introducing a place or item.

 

Third Spread (Animal):

I decided to dedicate a page to introducing the animals because I thought that animals will appeal to children. I split the animals into 2 groups, the featured animals of each place like the goats, and the animals that need to be looked for in Sungei Buloh.

Featured Animals: Goat, Frog, Koi

Shy Animals: Spider, Squirrel, Grasshopper, Mudskipper

I wanted to design a little activity where as the children walk through the Wetland Reserve, they can try to spot these animals around them. I think it will make a fun activity. Hence, the design of the animals in this part are made to look like they blend in with the surroundings.

 

End Page:

I wanted to end off with leaving Kranji Farm. Hence, for my last page, I decided to feature some of the products which can be brought back from the farms

Goat Milk

Tadpoles

Quail Eggs

 

For the overall style I decided to do it in the form of a kid journal. Instead of a solid background, I decided to go with a notebook background. I printed a grid paper and crumpled it to make it looked used and textured. I scanned it in as the background.

Overall Spreads:

I combined everything together and decided to hand write the words to make it more journal-like.

 

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Zine – Locale Part 1

When choosing a location, I wanted to choose a place that interest me the most. I tried to steer away from places like neighbourhoods or the city area because personally, those places didn’t really speak to me as much. After considering other possible areas, I thought that it would be interesting to study about the Singapore Zoo. However, after consultation, it was decided that my chosen area of focus was too narrow and I would end up doing a brochue for Singapore Zoo. However, I still wanted to do a location on animals or something related. In the end, I decided on Kranji Farms. I felt Kranji Farms was a good fit because it had a mixture of Fauna and Fiona.

In total, I visited the place twice. On the first visit, I scouted the place to see which of the specific farms/areas I could potentially focus on.  After the first visit, I prepared some questions which I thought would be appropriate and applicable to my area based on my primary observations. I prepared a survey and 41 people responded.

The results are as follows.

As seen, most of the survey respondents are teenagers aged 19-24 and with slightly over a quarter: adults (probably parents) aged 31-60.

Most of the survey respondents said they do not Kranji Farm Area. It can be seen how little people actually go there and how little the place is being publicised. We can also infer that most teenagers do not go to Kranji Farm Area. This survey results tally with my observations that majority of the visitors are families with young children or the elderly.

From the above results, we can see that most people either has never been to Kranji Farm Area or went there when they were young children (Primary 6 and below).

Based on the survey, we can see that other than Max Koi Farm, the other 5 places are much more popular in terms of places people wish to visit.

90% of the respondents said that if they were parents, they will be willing to bring their children on a one day tour around Kranji Farm Area.

Contrary to popular belief, tourist actually visit the area quite often. During my initial visit there, there were two big China tour groups at Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve.

Majority said that they think that the prices of food will be similar to that of regular coffee shops in the city area. However based on observations, the food that is actually pretty expensive. Due to the supply and demand of food, and the fact that many are home produced, the food there will be slightly more expensive.

 

Lastly, through this survey, the above word cloud consists of what the survey respondents feel about Kranji Farm Area. The bigger the word, the more common the word is. We can see that many people thin that the place is Ulu but is nice and relaxing because it is away from the urban city of Singapore.

After considering the results of the survey and my observations from the first visit,  I chose 5 areas to study on:

  1. Bollywood Veggies
  2. Hay Dairies
  3. Jurong Frog Farm
  4. Gallop Kranji Farm Resort
  5. Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve

The chosen areas had a good variety of activities and points of interest. They are also some of the few more popular places in Kranji Farms area. The map above depicts where the places of interest are located at, each with a red location marker.

Based on these five locations, I have some observations:

  1. Most of the visitors there are families with young children, about 4,5,6,7,8 years old.
  2. The place is remote and rural, ulu even for those going there without a car. But fear not, there is a shuttle bus service.
  3. Eating there can be quite expensive exensive because the ingredients are home grown and there are only those few eateries out in the area. So demand and supply.
  4. Kranji Farm Area make quite an educational learning journey place because children can learn so much things outside of their text books. Like the process of raising and milking goats, the natural cycle of animal migration etc.
  5. The area is generally very hot and an umbrella and extra water are highly recommended must bring items.

The following are my in depth research into the areas chosen.

Majority of the people spotted are families with young children.

As seen, besides the vending machine, the food there is actually not cheap.

Being a farm area, there has to be farm produce of course. The above shows some of the products that they sell there.

The next few slides features each individual areas and the things or activities they have.

The information above are taken from their main website because I didn’t manage to see any during my visit. These activities are mainly conducted in groups.

In conclusion, despite the area being quite ulu to many people, this place has its own unique charms worth exploring. While the people I surveyed online say that this place is inaccessible, not publicised enough, and ulu, there are still some who think this place us educational and relaxing. The people I surveyed in Kranji Farm area said that this place helps them relax from their hectic lifestyle. It is also a good chance for the family to bond. That is way people still come here. Its a different side of the hectic Singapore City we all know and live in.