Part 1 Local
For assignment Zine, I have chosen Kampong (Village in Malay Lanugage) Lorong Buangkok, the last remaining Kampong in Singapore. This location is located near my residence of Hougang which is coincidentally beside my primrary school! During Primary five in 2007, I had the chance to visit the then undeveloped Kampong and it was a 12 year gap since I have visited it again and I am surprised to see how much it has developed.
A source from the URA 2014 plan stated that this Kampong is to be razed in the future for development of a highway that connects Seng Kang town to Yio Chu Kang Road as well as the building of two institutions. Presently, the village chief, Ms Sng Mui Hong, is struggling with the authorities’ development plan as she wants to preserve the village, which is also her home from getting raze.
I have found this to be a crucial location to pick on as many youths in Singapore does not know what is a Kampong and let alone even knowing that there is one hidden in the concrete jungle. Thus I felt that presenting Kampong Buangkok will be a good choice as I can use this to educate the public on the situation of the Kampong.
Before that, researches were done to support my facts and also to let me set the direction of how I would want to present. Firstly, I went around to check on the current development at the estates around the Kampong. Seen below is the construction of the Buangkok link drive to be connected towards Yio Chu Kang Road via Gerald Drive.
On top of primary research, I had also conducted secondary survey research both online and face to face record. The online research were crafted to question users about their knowledge towards Kampong and it also serves as an informative sharing on it’s current and future development, it was spread to a wide demographic age range of age which made me realised that not many youths know about Kampong Buangkok.
On the other hand, the face to face survey interview were mainly asked around the vicinity for their thoughts towards the future development of Kampong Buangkok. These are the information of the survey responses collated in excel sheet, video recordings of the face to face interview and power point presentation slide show covering on the research information with pie chart visuals of the survey responses.
Locale Part 2.
From my research , the topics that I covered on were on the past, present and future of the Kampong. Which leads to the direction that I want to do – History, Gift and Mystery. Secondly, the approach of my Zine is based on the approach of an interactive comics which gives the audience a walk through from the current state of the comics to the future through humorous illustrations.
The comics that inspired me are Old Master Q, Crayon Shinchan and Doraemon. These are the childhood comics that saved me out of boredom before the technology kicks in.
A few examples of each comics and how do I share my reference from them.
These are the drafts sketches that I had before touching up for scanning.
After consultation with Ms Joy, these are the changes that I had made for the final zine.
Overall, Zine is an interesting project that allows me to stretch beyond my boundary through illustrating the comics in a humorous direction to depict myself interviewing non-human living things. And also adding a little touch of political reference into the comics as well.
The problems that I had faced for this comics were the conceptualizing of the comics, as I had previously thought of depicting it as a children comics in which Joy mentioned that if I were to do it, there should not be any references of real life pictures as it will be too jarring for the children. After seeing how the comics has been churned out, I decided to conceptualized it into both children and adult, with a hint of political reference in the latter.
Lastly, what would I do better given the opportunity and from the feedback? I would want to show a visual story telling on the transition from history to future, in which the story basically illustrates on how did the Kampong develop over the years to it’s unknown underlying fate in the future.
References.
Q, Old. n.d. Serenading a donkey. (picture). Retrieved April 20, 2019 from. https://www.pinterest.com/pin/342062534190396442/
Fabiola, Ixora. n.d. Crayon Shin-Chan – chapter 32 (picture). Retrieved April 20, 2019 https://i.pinimg.com/originals/38/f4/79/38f47918b27bfe3ab09c9e565f8b91ca.png
feihong. August 16, 2010. Serenading a donkey. (picture). Retrieved April 20, 2019 https://www.chinese-forums.com/forums/topic/27419-grand-comic-reading-project-1-doraemon-color-collection/