Welcome to the final assignment post for TYPOGRAPHY 1.

If you have yet to see how these final deliverables came about, you can click on the image below to link you to the documentation post!

Y2S1 TYPO1 – Assignment 4: PERSONAL CREATION (Process + Research)

Open Brief: Type as Image and Emotion.

Aged Emotions
For this project on Typography, I used the typeface ‘ Quicksand ‘ to create portraits of the elderly; expressing different emotions, using colors and placement of words to further emphasize the emotion.
And here is a flip through video of the book.

Main Deliverable: ‘Aged Emotions’ Book

Extra Deliverables 1: Poster for Typography 1

Digital Version:

Digital Version of the Poster. White background.

Printed and mounted on the wall version:

I printed the poster on an A3 300gsm Champagne Pearl paper

Extra Deliverables 2: Stickers

I figured that the icons would make pretty stickers or badges to advocate for Grandparents’ Day, since it is a day that not many celebrates.

Stickers! I made them in various sizes to see which works best!

I thought that the smallest sized stickers would look nice for envelopes as seals.

THE END!

Thank you for sticking through this post!

Cheers!

Seng Yi Ling.

BRIEF 4: PERSONAL CREATION

Brief 4 PERSONAL CREATION: Creating expressive typography
Summary The final component of the module allows you the freedom to expand on any of the assignments to date. Choose from one of the following briefs. Other ideas of creating your own briefs are also welcomed. All briefs below are flexible but please discuss with instructor for approval.

A. Visual analysis of type anatomy

Select an alphabet and analyse its anatomy in a visually exciting way with at least 20 different typefaces. Compile your visual analysis into a book form.

B. Exploring vernacular type

Expanding on your vernacular type assignment or creating a new idea scratch. Develop an extensive visual collection. This collection should include original imagery and also digital manipulations of the letterform. Compile your outcome into a book form or other tangible formats.

C. Organic type creation

Expanding on your organic type assignment or create a new idea from scratch. Develop an in-depth and innovative method of creating your own organic type. Compile your outcome into a tangible format.

D. Type as pattern

Design a range of patterns using typography and deliver them as creative tangible output. Keep in mind that this should not be a repetition of your assignment but to create an innovative way of looking at type as pattern.

E. Type as image

Using various letterforms, create a series of imagery. Conceptualize a theme to tie all your imagery together and present them in a tangible format. Keep in mind that this is not a repetition of your assignment but an opportunity to create innovative ways of creating images from typography.

F. Type as narrative

Select a poem or a song lyric and express them in black and white  using only type over a 32-44 pages book format.

G. Open brief

Think about which of the assignment you enjoyed most and how you can further expand on the making of it. Please discuss for approval.

Tips Employ typographical skills and knowledge gained over the last couple of weeks for the project. Be playful, have fun and justify your decisions!
What you
must deliver
for this assignment
  • You are free to decide on the final outcome of your creation but ideally no smaller than a dimension of 18cm by 18cm.
  • A process documentation link on OSS or PDF process
Grading criteria
  • Creativity of concept
  • Presence of typography appreciation (any form/method)
  • Depth of methodology
  • Aesthetics and craftsmanship
  • Due diligence of experimentation
Due date: Week 14

I am pretty keen to choose ‘E. Type as image’ as the choice of my expansion.


Documentation Journey for Assignment 4

16th October 2017 (Week 9/Week 14)
I would like to use alphabets of a particular typeface to make portraits of people. I was scrolling through my Pinterest feeds and saw many of these hand drawn portraits.

Looking at individual subject figures, my eyes tend to narrow their head, features into geometric shapes. That made me wonder if typefaces and letters can be used to make portraits.

I did up a try-out to see if the idea was feasible. I used the numbers 1 to 10 to create an image of an old man; I manipulated the numbers by playing with the vectors to create certain features, for instance, the foot of 7 to be the foot of the old man, and the curve to be his back.

Hence, I gave my own handwriting a try to create characters and see how it goes. I had the idea to create emotions of Old People with the letters of the emotion. For instance, the word ‘Happy’ to create a happy elderly.

I shall pitch this idea and see how it goes! 🙂


23th October 2017 (Week 10/Week 14)

Pitched previous week’s idea during group consultation and received many feedbacks! One of the feedbacks given was to leave the narratives out as layout and choice of type for story would be more difficult to tackle alongside with my characters.

A lot of reconsideration had to be done and a different approach was suggested if I were to carry on with this idea. Hence, I decided to give this idea another go and think of a backup plan if Type as Image wouldn’t do.

I pitched my idea to Miss Angeline via email and she finds both ideas to be workable, and gave comments too! Yay! 🙂 But now I am in a dilemma because I want to go ahead with both ideas.

Hence, as of now, my plan is to fuse both ideas together. But I can’t seem to churn out a platform which both ideas can reside on… Perhaps a book about old people on Christmas day? :/ I’ll just go ahead with a few motifs and see it goes from there! 🙂


30th October 2017 (Week 11/Week 14)

So in the end I decided to push forth with my Old people’s emotion idea and I created many more other old people portraits that illustrates different emotions.

In addition, I thought that having it in total black and white may be too flat and boring. Hence I added a color to each portrait to give it some life, while not taking away the attention from using type as image.

Emotion: Happy. The color Yellow is placed at her teeth. This is the ending page. Hence I wanted to end off the book with a message as written on the right.

I did a test print to show a prototype to Miss Angeline for consultation, and I already found lots of issues.

  1. Alignment of the pages on InDesign is rather complicated. Pages and Spreads ought to be odd an even numbers.
  2. Alignment of image. Margins. Gutter. etc.
  3. Alignment of different images on the same spread…yell

Oh well, at least I know about these issues BEFORE the actual printing day.

Upon consulting Miss Angeline with the prototype, these are the feedbacks and thoughts given to improve! 🙂

  • Likes the layout where there is space on one side.
  • Not so keen in seeing if can the emotion, but more keen in the typeface to create image.
  • Like how it flows to the next page.
  • Empty pages for? Can use blank space to write what letter you used? Or something fun the characters would say? Can use lesser words to prevent issues of long sentences type setting. Use something short. Or sound expression: ‘Huh? Hmm! Aiya… OI’. Start with the same typeface first just to play safe. Add colors and vary scale.
  • Type Setting. Centralized? Too big? Too small? Little space? Leading? Kerning? Margin? Next one is centralized or at the side?
  • Change size to A3. A4 is too small. Not 18×18.
  • Title page? Can keep things simple. Emotions with Type, Type with emotions.
  • Have 10 faces? 6 too little.
  • What kind of paper?
  • *How would you take it out of the book? Transfer it to a huge poster? Promoting for some Elder’s convention or event; type 1 class promotion etc. Choose 2 very good ones and transfer it to an A2 poster.

8th November 2017 (Week 12/Week 14)

So based on last week’s feedback, I made some changes and additional information to make the book more wholesome. I included more faces and additional texts with the portraits!

The texts used is the typeface, Quicksand. The texts are words or sounds I felt that the faces were expressing. Using the previous project’s brief on type as emotion, I manipulated the texts, and arranged it in a way that best expresses the emotion when reading.Feedbacks and Things to change:

  • Back and front cover can be the faces back and front. Happy and Sad man.
  • Images are fine, but type needs working. Use the first angry man as a model template.
  • Some spaces can be filled, some can be not filled. ‘Meh’ can be more impactful. Bigger Type face, bolder, lighter etc.
  • See the texts first then see the expression. That is the effect you would want to achieve.
  • ‘Urgh’ can fill up the whole space.
  • Title is very boring. Emotions of the elderly etc. Layout is dependent on the
  • Repeating pattern doesn’t work.
  • Questioning of choices of type size, layout and category must be explained.

Hopefully I can print this mock up before next week’s consultation and that everything will run smoothly! 🙂


11th November 2017 (Week 12/Week 14)

I have finally experienced the pain and stress that my peers were always lamenting about regarding printing day…

For some reason, I have been troubleshooting the issue from InDesign for several hours and I cannot solve the issue when the program cannot save my document in PDF for Booklet. The pages are always a spread instead of the chopped pages.

Hence, these are the solutions I have come up with to counter these problems.

  1. Manually cut the pages so that the booklet form can be saddle stitched.
  2. Change the binding technique to those that don’t require folding of pages.

Types of binding to explore

Types of binding

 

Type of Book Binding I may look into with regards to the spreads

  • Perfect Bind (Still in booklet form but in 2 stacks)
  • Perfect bind (Pages don’t have to be split, Glue sides to spine)
  • Plastic Grip (Pages don’t have to be split, but double side printing. Bind with paper clip)
  • Hole Punch ( Pages don’t have to be split, need side border for hole . Use ring to bind)

Trying Solution 1: ***Note to future self: ALWAYS DO A MOCK UP WITH RECYCLED PAPER FIRST TO KNOW IF U GOT THE RIGHT NUMBER OF PAPER AND WHICH SIDE OF THE PAPER IS WHICH PAGE!!!

Start Piecing the half images together using the mockup as a guide, while labeling to make your life easier.

YAY I AM OFF TO PRINT THE MOCKUPS.


12th November 2017 (Week 12/Week 14)

So… I printed the mock up for the designs yesterday and of course, issues are bound to arise.

Paper choices: 300gsm (Gloss and Matte) and inside spreads are about 128gsm

I printed the format with the idea that I want to try saddle stitching stapling or the landscape form where I can use binder clips to hold it down.

The saddle stitch stapler mock up had several issues.

  1. The stapler punched a hole through the paper
  2. Alignment of each page is inaccurate. Even though scored at the center, paper thickness which cases certain pages to be obscured is prone.
  3. Stapled not directly at the center, hence some pages cannot be fully opened and flattened.
  4. When closed, the pages protrude. Cutting off the sides is a must, but cutting off important parts of the pages may happen.

Stapled mockup punches a hole right through the paper after scoring 300 gsm paper.

White lines in the middle due to misalignment, and stapled inaccurately does not allow the pages to open fully.

Pages protrude out from the side

POTENTIAL SOLUTIONS

  • Score the pages, making sure each side really is at the center, poke hole on scored areas and manually put the stapler inside. Fold the book in half and slice the sides. ( Remember to allow allowance space in designs as well incase cut off)
  • Do all the above, but instead of staple, saddle stitch by sewing with dental floss. It will be neater too.

13th November 2017 (Week 13/Week 14)

Individual Consultation day! EXACTLY ONE MORE WEEK TILL D-DAY.

After showing my mockups to Miss Angeline, there is actually A LOT of room for improvement for not just only the binding issues listed above.

Feedbacks given

  • Relook into the margin space for the texts. Pay attention to space between text and image.
  • Visual hierarchy for each spread is important. Where you want the audience to look at first? Text or face first?
  • Tracking, alignment has relation to each other.
  • There are different ways of emphasizing. Not just size. Color, Bold it etc.
  • *PAPER. Take note of paper quality. Paper thickness and texture matters a lot to give the over all mood of your product.

I took a few magazines from school to examine the paper quality and overall feeling the magazines gaves off. Also observing the layout and placement of text and image.


16th November 2017 (Week 13/Week 14)

I reinstalled my InDesign because the Adobe Illustrator way of printing has a lot of human error. And yes, the reason I had issues with my alignment and spread issues was due to a bug in the software. I couldn’t save the document in PDF, and FINALLY after reinstalling it is working!! YAY.

I made amendments to the feedbacks given for the previous consultation and tried out several ways the texts can be presented in a neater manner.

I am pretty inclined to Row 2 for the first few pages, as the simulation of a conversation is represented by colors and positioning.

Changed the ending page too


17th November 2017 (Week 13/Week 14)

Given that my main deliverables (Aged Emotions Book) is just about complete, I moved on to produce extra deliverables given that I still had some time left before printing the FINAL product tomorrow!

I was rather stuck on how I can apply my characters on other items, so I went ahead with Miss Angeline’s suggestion to do up a poster for her TYPOGRAPHY 1 module.

I tried out some layouts and compositions to see which works best!

And since the motif used for the poster are circular and colored, I think it may look good as stickers as well!

And with the final rounds of editing for the main and extra deliverables, I am ready to conquer printing day tomorrow!!cool


17th November 2017 (Week 13/Week 14)

PRINTING DAY!
So I went to the paper shop at North Bridge Road called ‘Fancy Paper’ to choose better quality papers for the printing, as the feedback given was to be more sensitive to paper type and weight.

In the paper shop with a wide array of paper choices!

I wanted my book to express familiarity, and some sense of rootedness. The same feeling my grandparents evoked.

After choosing the papers I wanted, I went to Sunshine Plaza to print.

I was really worried that the printing would not be aligned as I would be  doing saddle stitch, and both the sides of the pages are necessary to be aligned so the pages would not overlap that drastically.

The printing shop lady was very helpful as I noticed that the alignment was off, and she recalibrated the machine for me. Look at all the test prints we did on the printer…

And thankfully, things turned out pretty well despite the multiple test prints by the re-calibrated machine. I took my prints home and started to do the saddle stitching.

The inner pages paper are A3 White Matte Paper, 160 GSM.

A. Lot. Of. Test. Prints.

At Fancy Paper, I chose a woody texture for the cover page of the book as I really liked the natural rooted quality evoked by the paper. But unfortunately, the paper texture made it hard for ink transfer and it. was. hideous.

Original choice of paper for cover page.

I chose another paper type that allowed better ink transfer while keeping to the rooted feeling I wanted my book to evoke. Hence, I chose this linen texture cover. The texture reminds me of the clothes washed by my grandmother when I was a kid.

A3 Linen White Textured Paper, 250 GSM

Left: Linen Texture Paper
Right: Wood Texture Paper

Regardless, I liked the texture of the papers and it felt really good to the touch!

I proceeded to do my markings for saddle stitching. I realized that every single piece of paper printed did not align centrally and I had to manually shift the paper when I wanted to use the awl to poke the holes.

Poking the centerline with an awl.

Self notes to saddle stitching

  1. Use a pencil to draw the central line of the page.
  2. Divide the line with the number of holes you want on that piece and proceed to poke the markings with an awl.
  3. Draw a line on the centre of the next piece of paper, put that poked paper and new paper against the light and use the light that went through the holes as markings for the next page. Bind it with binder clip and poke through the same hole.
  4. Use the second piece as template for the next few pieces.
  5. Saddle stitch the whole stack and fold the book in half. Pressing the book down with weights to flatten it. Process to cut off the crop marks with the book folded.

Aligning the hole to the pencil mark.

And I am rather happy with how the result turned out! It was rather neat and secure! 🙂

For the external deliverables, I made a poster for Typography 1 and made a few matte stickers with the existing icons for the poster!

Stickers! I made them in various sizes to see which works best!

I really liked the choice of paper I chose for the poster, though it is unusual for a poster, the sheen of the paper and color made the poster look elegant. Like champagne!

The paper is 300gsm and the poster is in A3 sized.

I really like the sheen when light falls on the poster. The lines are actually not there, I just enhanced the contrast for the shimmery sheen to be seen.


THANK YOU FOR STICKING THROUGH THIS VERY LONG DETAILED DOCUMENTATION POST WITH ME!

Not only this post was for sharing the journey of how this book came about, it was also a way of documenting notes on things I have learnt along the way, so in the future I would not make the same mistakes! 🙂

Next up, is the FINAL post for this assignment which I will show the fruits of labour and deliverables for presentation!

Click the image below for the FINAL POST! 🙂

Y2S1 TYPO1 – Assignment 4: PERSONAL CREATION (FINAL)

Cheers,
Seng Yi Ling

The day of presentation… DUN DUN DUN

This is the simulation of the walkthrough of Bunker 143.

Documentation

Do pardon the low quality of the clips as I had limited space on my Vimeo account to upload this video I placed together.
In this video, it will show u the brief thought processes that went by, setting up of the installation, feedback wrap up session with the class (00:53 to 09:40 mark) and the cleaning up process!

 

Oh, by the way, you can fast for

Concept

And why did we name our installation Bunker 143? Stay tuned. 😉

Reference Images

Post apocalyptic scenario

Escape room setting

Narrative and Characters

And the narrative kind of explains why we named our installation ‘Bunker 143.’ Because “143” simply represents the number of letters in each word of the phrase, “I (1) Love (4) You (3).”
The deaths of each of the members were the result of love. Dad loves the child so he risked his life to go back to take the blanket. He dies from the virus due to his risk. The mother kills her child because she loves her child and does not want to see the child die in pain and misery from the virus. Mother kills herself from heartache and guilt.

How did we PRESENT our idea into reality?

1) CCTV Video used are footages taken by each member of our group at different locations to cover more ground.
We followed a standard procedure whereby we took footages of scenes where surveillance cameras would be located, panning like how a CCTV would; recording scenes where the area seemed empty, barren and lack of humanity to show the post apocalyptic situation the family faced previously.

The CCTV footages pans on empty areas, and it gives a feeling as though something is going to pop out at you. Like the video game, Five Nights at Freddy’s >>

Multiple screens were playing on a several laptops in different parts of the room, with one master projection against the wall.

Afterwards, the videos were changed to black and white, blue cellophane paper against the projector to was used to create an eerie, distant and cold vibe; as compared to the red we rejected as looked straight of a horror movie which was not the intended feeling we wanted to evoke.
In addition, the projection on the wall creates space in a confined indoor area as it shows the vast outside world.

2)Props used are mainly from nostalgic object we had as a children. It kind of sets the time period as to when was the family in the bunker. This way, we do not tell the audiences directly which time period we are in, but show them.

3) QR codes – Audio Diary Logs

The speech in each audio log was designed in such a way that the audience could start with any QR codes they scan and still be able to piece the story together. The sequence does not matter.

Audio Diary Log 1

Intro – “February 28, it’s been 2 weeks since my family and I entered this bunker. Both of them are holding up well, they seem okay with this arrangement. Everything will be well soon… right?”

Audio Diary Log 2

“April 17, The room seems smaller than ever, there are too many things in this bunker. Why did my dumb husband bring so many things? Do we really need the old snow-globe? It reminds me of our honeymoon in Paris from way back. *Sigh…*”

Audio Diary Log 3

“May 30, she looks so happy, playing with her dolls. her toys are all over the place and it’s been getting in the way, but she’s happy so I’ll bear with it. She keeps asking for her blanket, but she still seems to be having fun playing board games with me and drawing. I’ve been cleaning up after her non stop but if it keeps her happy I’ll do it. I can’t wait for the day we can get out and she can live properly again.

Audio Diary Log 4

“August 26, We have enough food for another 6 months, if the virus doesn’t clear up by then then what will we do. I tried telling him but he kept saying it was fine, that we would be ok. But what if we aren’t? Why can’t he see that we’re in trouble, why does he never, ever understand. If he cares so much for the child why can’t be understand that having enough food is better for her than having all these toys. I don’t know how to do this anymore, he isn’t taking this seriously. ”

Audio Diary Log 5

“Oh no oh no. . . .he went back to get her blanket. She wouldnt stop crying… He said that it will be okay and that nothing bad will happen. FOR GOD”S SAKE THERE IS AN EPIDEMIC OUT THERE and he. isn’t. back…its been 3 hours… oh no oh no… if something happens…. He is back he is back!!!”

Audio Diary Log 6

“…He died today.” *long pause* “How could he leave us just like that? Just for that stupid blanket. I-I can’t take this. I need to lie down.”

Audio Diary Log 7

She keeps sneezing recently, and she looks so pale and skinny. back before he died she kept going near him, I’m sure she’s caught it. she looks sicker every day, I can’t watch this again

Audio Diary Log 8

*sighs, soft crying, then thumps onto the floor*

4) Use of Sound. The master soundtrack that was constantly on loop is a combination of cricket sounds I recorded when downstairs my house at night, and the whirring noise from Gabrielle’s computer fan. Safe to say that the two sounds matched really well together and so much so, the whirring of the fan sound seeps into your mind and disappears subconsciously as the cricket sound dominates the track. We wanted to have a mix of unsettling mechanical noises and sounds that adds to the sense of isolation in this bunker.

5) Used of Glow in the Dark paint to emulate the presence of blood. Allows the audience to ponder what exactly happened on that area. Especially when Audio Diary Log 8’s QR code is situated there.


Personal Reflection
Personally I think our team pulled this project off really well and everything was pretty cohesive as a whole.
Despite having some changes here and there as we had consultations with Ru Yi and on our own, I think this project managed to come together really well as the final outcome was even better than what we imagined in our heads!
And most importantly, I think the audiences liked our work considering that they were able to question themselves regarding their own memories of the items, and were able to piece the story together. The use of an immersive space and sound really put the audiences into another setting.
What I felt could have been done better was the use of glow in the dark paint. Because of logistic and location issues, we were not able to use fake blood for the scene where the mother committed suicide as it would be hard to clean off and we would probably get scolded by the management. Hence, the use of glow in the dark paint on white paper scattered on the floor was quite an eyesore, and even misleading as one of the audiences asked me if that was pee on pee pad..

BUT NONETHELESS…

We have finally come to the end of Foundation 4D II Final Project!! Yay!

It was  great pleasure to work with Gabrielle, Yu Lin and Yit Ling in this project! Not only because they are such great people, they are also important team players in this project! And we are very proud to say that we did not spend a single dollar on this project 🙂 !

Thank you Ruyi for your guidance! I have learnt a lot in these 2 semesters from you, and 4D lessons has always been something I look forward to. 🙂

CHEERIO~ See you guys around in Year 2 Sem 1 ;D

<3 Seng Yi Ling

 

HELLO fellow reader!! This post will be on the research process behind the creation of my Zine for PART 2 of the assignment!! 🙂

To view Project 2 Part 1 on the Research and Final, click on these two links below! 🙂

2D II Assignment 2 PART 1: “Zine: Neighborhood Explorer” RESEARCH

2D II Assignment 2 PART 1: “Zine: Neighborhood Explorer” FINAL

So! I went to do up some research on what Zines are though the net, as well as Pinterest; and get some hands on Zine examples around Singapore, which I found that are quite readily available around us! I also looked for several aspects of the Zines that I can draw inspiration from!

Got these Zines from the National Library and I really liked how the front covers were designed 🙂

Was really looking into the contents of how the ZINE was created for and how they displayed them using layouts.


Based on the weekly groups’ presentation in relation to ZINES, I annotated some very useful notes to take note for this project:

Experimental Formats Zines

  • What are Zines? Zine derived from Magazine, self published book. Print and bound by any manner.
  • Decide what is it for. What is your Objective, Main concept and Visual approaches through your Zine.
  • Pick the right title to your Zine that links to your theme.
  • Decide layout and order. Plan your structure allowing information to be organized.
  • Fonts: Don’t make it too small. Don’t use dark background, and upper case for main body. Titles headlines are chances for more elaborate and fancy designs.
  • Create a master copy to test the copy you have created before you do the final one to see if you got right color, texture of paper etc.

Publication book format and grids

  • Format is the area in which your design and texts sits.
  • Grid – A system which divides 2D planes to smaller fields. design made into visual math. Types of grid: Manuscript (Story books), Column grid (Newspaper), Modular grid , Hierarchal grid etc.
  • Typeface–  Font family. Each typeface has specific weight, style , ornamentation etc. Diff typeface alphabet will result in different effect for your viewer.
  • Column – Vertical division of a page of text is 7-10 words per line.
  • Leading – The amount of blank space between lines of print. Good leading carries the eye from line to line. It cannot be too tight or too spacious for the reader.
  • Margin – 1 to 5mm of margin space is recommended so you wont mutilate your text.
  • Page numbers – Be distinctive from your body text. Can use different font family.
  • Body and Display typeface –  Display space to stand out. Use similar typeface. But do not mix characters from the same style. Good to have contrast using different font size.

I then pondered the several points that I had to take note of, and came up with these initial planning stages as to how my Zine can go about.

Main Concept: Guide around Telok Blangah with an elderly.

“Day in Telok Blangah guided by Uncle Tan. Readers get to go on an expedition with Uncle Tan, and he will show you around the places in Telok Blangah he like to visit, where he thinks you might like and what to do there.”

The story will go around the primary information and personal recounts I have gathered from the interviews I conducted, as well as secondary research such as location names.

My objective:
To educate the readers that Telok Blangah can also be for young people, and not mainly for the old; Showing them places that the young and old can do, and what the older generations did then and now to pass time.

Visual Approaches? Art Direction?:
I had some dilemma with this because the Zines I see out there are so organized and minimalistic. I for one am not a minimalist and I find it really difficult to make my thoughts abstract visually, when there are so much expression and colors in my thoughts. Hence, Pinterest really helped me to see that not all Zines out there are minimalist and expression and colors can be incorporated!

I really like the vibrant colors and how organic the shapes are! I also really liked the path which guided the viewers as to where they should look at! Hence I would really think paths can help me in my Zine 🙂

Execution:
Cut outs? Interactivity by flipping?
I wanted to have this interactivity in my Zine by having cut out pages and flip tabs.

Initial sketching on how I want to incorporate the interactivity into the Zine.

The shaded area is where I want to cut the hole, and the rock at the bottom right can be flipped over to see insects.
However, after consultation with Joy, the cutting and flipping does not address the brief of the Zine project and sadly I have to scrap that idea. 🙁

Layouts:
I didn’t want the very organized approach as I feel rather restricted by such layouts, as much as they are really aesthetically pleasing to look at like this:

Hence I wanted to go for something where the fonts conform around the illustration like this:

Typography font to use:
Probably a serif font cause its more readable.

Choice of medium? :
Perhaps Watercolor and pen,scan in and enhance colors by photo editing software? Vectoring in Adobe Illustrator to create the clean edges?

All these are just the planning stages! The final confirmation post will be next!! 😀 Stay tuned!

Cheers,
Seng Yi Ling.

 

Our Group Proposal

Main Idea:

Our idea for this narrative site specific location is a set up in a post apocalyptic abandoned Singaporean bunker. The premise is that the room once belonged to a family of 3, and was abandoned after an unseen environmental calamity. The audience’s role will be to explore the space and slowly see what happened to the previous occupant, contemplate their place in the world, and possibly how to get out of the confined space.

The focus of the set will be on lights, sounds, and interaction.

Themes:

    • Existentialism (Feeling like a small person in a big world)
      • We want the audience to question who they are in the world and make them feel ‘small’, by showing them how people can just get up and disappear, leaving behind everything they value, and thus making them question if anything they do really matters if they can be wiped off the earth so easily.
    • Memories
    • Change (Isolation, loss)
      • In our hectic world, we are only able to slow down and think only when everything we know is gone. No distractions and no one around. This is when we are truly ourselves.
      • Forces the audience to slow down and think about themselves once all people/distractions are not in their immediate surroundings

Planned location:

  • ADM print room on second floor
  • One of the crit rooms
  • A small room

Lights:

  • Use of projection with video documentations of previous occupants, different portraits in black and white grain (Surveillance type)
  • Galaxy projection
    • Painting on transparency like in the project “Stellar”
    • To create another dimension within the same space. It also makes the room look futuristic which fits our post apocalyptic bunker set
    • It also gives the feel of floating away from your current reality into one of contemplation and reflection
  • Putting coloured transparency or cellophane paper against flashlights to create a coloured lightbox effect.

Sounds:

  • Futuristic sounds (Soft siren whine, radio noise, fan whirring)
  • An omnipresent narrator narrating in an ASMR style
    • ASMR as it can be comforting when tranquil, but as well as discomforting when you’re in a crisis
    • Undecided whether it will all be the same voice or different person to each object

Interaction:

  • Mirrors/reflective surfaces, seeing your reflected self everywhere
    • You are only with yourself.
    • Emphasizing the feel of isolation and the audiences’ place as a human being in a world larger than they thought before. In the room, there are no people, only the items they left behind and ghost images of the audience themselves.
  • Tangible items strewn around them that can be picked up
    • Triggers a unanimous, nostalgic emotional memory in audiences
    • E.g. A worn-out doll, old music box, plane ticket etc.
    • At the same time, the narrator will be narrating a memory associated with each of the items around the audience

References:

  • Stan Brakhage “Stellar” – Inspired to steer our light logistics according to his methods as well as to obtain the galaxy feeling which is crucial for our theme, so as to evoke a sense of loneliness and isolation in a vast space.
  • Black Mirror (Mirror/ reflective surfaces), our theme is similar in exploring memories and loneliness.Methodology:
  • Audience is brought into a dark room and made to lie down on some mats (childcare type)
  • They open their eyes, facing the ceiling projection of the slowly shifting galaxies
    • Story is that since civilisation (people around you) is gone, it’s easier to pay attention to the environment around you with no rush.
  • Around them are objects belonging to others, but most likely will trigger some sense of nostalgia and own memories to come forth. It makes you think of your own life. Your existence.
  • The narrator will be giving some history behind each of the object under the guise of the previous owner, prompting the audience to consider what the object means to them
  • The whole experience in own space is subjective. It is for you to explore your own existentialism and existence.

Really hope that our installation will be really awesome!! SO EXCITED!! 😀
Stay tuned to our documentation post soon!!! ;D

Cheers,

Seng Yi Ling

Hello! This assignment 2 Image Sequencing: Time and POV comes in 2 parts!

Part 1: Parallel Storytelling

Write and film two scenes with content that will intercut meaningfully and provoke audience to see a connection.

Intercut, cutaway and POV can be added to create a new narrative

For part 1, my group (Yu Qing, Hui Min and Yit Ling) and I came up with a story unanimously in our group we named it as ‘ Curry Murder ‘ and filmed it together! After filming the scenes, we each sieved out the good and bad takes for each scene and shared amongst each other before we parted ways (not totally) and moved on to part 2!


Part 2: Additional Voice Over

Working with part 1, we each individually have to write and record and alternative voice-over(VO) track from different POV/narrative voice. Whereby we can include additional shots for our intended edit (Cutaway and POV shots). We are also required to rework our script to at least 1 out of these POV below.

  1. 3rd person POV (Objective/Limited/Omniscient?)
  2. 1st person (Interior Monologue)
  3. Narrative Voice (stream of consciousness/Epistolary Voice)

Methodology

Working on Part 2 on my own now, I thought I should narrow down on what my next steps should be before I proceed with my individual quest into Part 2.

Sequence of Events to complete part 2

  1. Settle on the parallel storytelling scenes and order.
  2. Choose which POV to use. And reason why.
  3. Choose which scenes do I want to include Voice Overs.
  4. DIY Foley sounds
  5. Adobe Premier Pro edit.

Choosing the POV

Narrative Voice: The narrative voice is the teller’s voice.

1st person POV: Narrator uses ‘I’ in every moment as seen through the character’s eyes. The narrator is the character.

3rd person (Limited): The narrator only knows the thoughts and feelings of one character. Much like a stalker, know what the character feels and think, addresses others as ‘they’ ‘him’ and ‘she’.

3rd person (Omniscient): The thoughts and feelings of multiple characters can be shared through a God like POV

3rd person (Objective): Employs a narrator who tells a story without describing any character’s thoughts, opinions, or feelings; instead, it gives an objective, unbiased point of view. Often the narrator is self-dehumanized in order to make the narrative more neutral.

I decided to do the brainstorming part on paper and write out the script I want to use as narration.

Parallel Sequence

Creating my own Sounds.

Because we were tasked to create our own sounds, I did some research as to how to replicate the sound using different methods. And watching clips on people rendering Foley Art was really inspiring.

I am really awestruck by what goes behind the cameras. Because it is something we don’t take much notice of, this reinforces how good the Foley artists are in their jobs to the point the sounds created are seamless. In addition, the same sounds can be created using cheap and alternative materials. Like hooves of a horse walking can be made using toilet plungers stuffed with cloth, instead of recording a live horse walking in the pace you want.

Sounds I recreated using the art of Foley and Dubbing

I was not able to borrow a Zoom Mic from the school as they were all booked, hence I improvised with whatever I had! 😀

I used my trusty phone recorder and hid in the Sauna cause I needed a sound proof environment to do my recordings. And no, I did not turn the lights in the Sauna on because my laptop may die in the heat… Oh yea, AND SO WOULD I.

Couple arguing fade in and out: Recorded my own voice and used Adobe Premier Pro Audio editing effects such as tuning the Pitch.

Cutting Body scene: Squishing a wet towel

Cutting carrot and potato sounds: Scratching the tissue box

Feet shuffling sound: Rubbing waxy side of tissue box with water.

Keeping body scene (Hand in bag + Box): Rubbing plastic bag and hitting the box.

Using Adobe Premier Pro, I arranged the different types of Audio clips and Video Clips neatly and accordingly to have an easier viewing and editing experience.


FINAL PRODUCT

And here I present to you, the final product of Assignment 2!

Film Title: Love Served in a Bowl

Theme: You can have your lover’s body, but not necessarily her heart.

Set-up: In a married couple’s home

Credits:

Yu Qing – Wife

Jeff- Husband

BGM used: By Night – Sophie Hutchings


Thanks for reading till the end of my post!!

And I am very thankful for being able to work with such lovely group mates and cast! \^.^/

Cheers,

Seng Yi Ling.

GOOD AFTERNOON! This post concludes the FINAL of Part 1 Project 2 of Zine: Neighborhood Explorer presentation!

This is the infographics on Telok Blangah that I have finalized 🙂


The data I have placed in my infographics are mainly from the Qualitative data (Personal Recounts)that I have gotten from interviews and secondary sources of the exact location names or address online that they have recommend me to visit.

Concept : Present it as a schedule like guide as to how an elderly in Telok Blangah gets by in a day.

Tone: Light Hearted.

Methodology

  1. I used Haettenschweiler Font as the header and the body text .
  2. Colors used are neutral palletes of scenic blue and green, as well as monochromatic blue for the walking stick.
  3. Attempted to use different shades of the same hue to create depth.
  4. Main illustrations are created using vectors and exporting images into vector online.
  5. Icons are used as bullet points for each category of activity.
  6. Joy mentioned that a my initial idea of using a cane may be misinterpreted as ‘Immobility’ instead of ‘Elderly’. Hence I changed the type of walking stick to the one with legs that elderlies, as I really required vertical semiotic that represents elderlies.

I was inspired to use time stamp and used this two infographics obtained from Pinterest. I extracted the range thing } from the chili infographic to mark out the time line.

Classmates’ Comments and Feedback

Joy’s Comments and Feedback 🙂

  • Joy said that this is her first time seeing my illustrations digitally, good job!.
  • Liked that I staggered the information according to timeline. And that giving it a range does give us a guide to when they can execute their activity. However looking at it as a whole it can be seen that it is a day in the life of any elderly and not specifically unique to Telok Blangah elderly.
  • Site specific icons can be created instead of using a generic bird to represent “Recreational Activity”. Something recognizable for instance the location of the bird watching location or certain food from Telok Blangah acting as marker would be better.
  • Colors for “work” reminds her of Watsons logo. Joy worries for potential misinterpretation in my infographics.
  • Text is still cramped even though got drop shadow, hence readability of text is still difficult :(. Typeface that you used is used is better for display type for headers instead of body text. Generally texts on infographics still need to be readable. When you can’t see your text well due to the background colour, it is a cue that text is required to be changed.
  • Location names are long as “Telok Blangah” is repeating in many of the bullet points, hence re-emphasising the crampness. Putting a main header : “Telok Blangah”, in general and just list down may reduce the crampness.
  • Style is quite unique and there is still space that can be explored.
  • Shaf liked the concept of day in the life cause she don’t know  what old people do in genera But font though, it is still hard to read :(.

With that I conclude the completion of ZINE part 1 here and I’ll see you again in PART 2 😀

HELLO! So this is the second project for Year 1 Semester 2, which is actually 1 part of the entire project!

Part I( 2 Weeks) : Research, Sketches, Collection of Data and Presenting found data (soft copy) in a visually engaging manner.

Part II : Creation of Zine.

The area that I have gotten from drawing lots in class as to which neighborhood I had to embark an exploration to is…

TELOK BLANGAH

And what do I know about this place? ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. ZILTCH.

When I got the slip of paper that determines the choice of location for the rest of the semester, I even asked Joy,” Is this place even in Singapore??”

Oh well. One thing about this project is that the more foreign you are to the location, the better it is because you’ll be seeing things from fresh eyes and discover new things! 😀

SO LETS GET STARTED WITH THE RESEARCH PROCESS WOOHOO!!


SECONDARY RESEARCH ON TELOK BLANGAH

What is ‘Secondary Research’ Secondary research is accessing information already gathered from the originator or a distributor of a primary research. For instance, like obtaining information from third party sources, magazine article’s or my friend’s grandfather’s sister who lives in Telok Blangah (just an example).

So I made some quick online research about Telok Blangah and to my surprise, I did find some interesting facts already!

  1. Telok Blangah is a subzone region and housing estate located in Bukit Merah, Singapore.
  2. Founder of Singapore,Sang Nila Utama , landed at Telok Blangah and went inland to hunt wild animals, where he spotted a majestic Lion afar and decided to name our homeland, Singapura (Lion City).
  3. The area regained prominence during 1823, the British period, when Sir Stamford Raffles assigned Temenggong Abdul Rahman and his followers, 0.81 km2 of land for their residence and a cemetery. The area flourished under Temenggong Abdul Rahman because of his monopoly over the gutta percha (Some tree sap) trade.
  4.  Kampong Bahru replaced the old kampong along the Singapore River. And this first resettlement could be called the first urban renewal project in Singapore. The Hill maintained the old name of Telok Blangah Hill until July 1845 when it was renamed Mount Faber after Captain Faber of the Madras Engineers.
  5. Telok Blangah Road was officially named in 1907.
  6. The shrine of Puteri Radin Mas Ayu, a sixteenth-century Javanese princess, is located at Mount Faber Road, near the junction with Telok Blangah Road.

SECONDARY RESEARCH ON

WHAT IS TELOK BLANGAH KNOWN FOR?

Nature. Telok Blangah at first glance online screams ‘NATURE’.

Population Estimate as of 30 June 2016 : 10,500

Telok Blangah Hill Park (10 Telok Blangah Green, 109178)

Terrace Garden Mostly used as just a walkway between Hort Park and Mount Faber. There is an undisturbed, idyllic ambience with a solitary gazebo sits atop the hill along with classical European white railings. Despite what a sight the garden is, the real spectacle to behold here is the panoramic view of the cityscape from a bird’s eye view.

Henderson Wave Bridge (Henderson Road, Southern Ridges, Bukit Merah, Singapore 159557)

Singapore’s highest pedestrian bridge, at 36m above ground. Surrounded by greenery and bird’s eye view of the southern part of Singapore, the shell-like crevices doubles as shelters and is a great place for family and friends to relax there. The bridge is illuminated from 7pm to 7am daily.

Alkaff Mansion Ristorante (10 Telok Blangah Green)

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Built in 1918 as a weekend retreat for the illustrious Yemeni Alkaff family of spice traders. The Alkaffs ancestors arrived in Singapore from Yemen in 1852, and Alkaff Mansion was not only their family home, but also the venue for luxurious high society parties in the 1930’s – imagine Great Gatsby, Singapore style.

For an unknown reason, the mansion was abandoned after WW2, and went into a state of disrepair. With a large outdoor terrace, fountains, and a gorgeous interior, Alkaff is thought of as one of the most magnificent colonial houses still standing in Singapore. And now, it is an Italian Ristorante.

Old Habits Boutique Café (#01-315, 38 Telok Blangah Rise, 090038)

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Nostagia is in. Old Habits is part vintage boutique and part café, a place to appreciate the lifestyle of the old eras and immerse in the memories of the past. The interior of the boutique café is docked with many vintage items from the past which the owner of the café, Donovan Goh collects.

This section concludes the secondary research I had done BEFORE I went on my field trip as of 15 Feb 2017. 🙂 The following segment will be on my documentation of my field trip!


FIELD TRIP DAY 19 Feb 2017

And so, I went to Telok Blangah with my trusty partner in crime ( Dad cool) for the field trip and thanks to him, I was able to cover more area on this foreign ground in Singapore!

What is ‘Primary Research’? – Primary research is any type of research that you go out and collect yourself. Examples include surveys, interviews, observations, and ethnographic research. 

So when I was on my way to Telok Blangah, I was not certain what I was looking for. Its either food or shops and I didn’t want to touch on the nature parks aspect as it is the most prominent aspect in Telok Blangah and I didn’t want to do something that can be easily found on the net.

So I went to look for Food first since we were hungry anyway.

FOOD in Telok Blangah

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The place my dad and I went to eat at was 82 Telok Blangah Drive Market, I chose that specific location as it was within the Telok Blangah Mall area which I wanted to visit as well. Within the market, there was already a couple of lines queuing up for some local food which I also joined in to partake in the ‘Participant Observation’ aspect.

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The noodles I queued for took 30 mins and I was pondering what was taking so long. I observed and saw that the owner and his wife were perhaps in their mid 60’s and the cooking process was rather unique. The Uncle cooking the noodles had a system where his wife is the one taking the order and frying up the fishcakes (which I believe is handmade), and he was the one preparing for the noodles. He was swift in his actions and he bounced on the balls of his feet. And was the noodles worth the 30 min wait? Well, lets say I have tasted better. But the fishcakes were good though.

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And I also tried Shun Ji Dumpling Noodles as the queue died down after lunch hours. The dumplings were smaller than the ones I’ve eaten , but they are packed with fresh shrimps and pepper! It was really good.

QUALITATIVE DATA COLLECTION

What is ethnography and participant-observation? What are some ways collecting data?

The aim of ethnography and participant-observation is to gain a close and intimate familiarity with a given group of individuals and their practices through an intensive involvement with people in their cultural environment.

Some forms of collecting data are conducting informal interviews, direct observation, and analyzing personal documents produced within an age group etc. It involves the characterization of Qualitative Research and can include Quantitative Dimensions.

What is qualitative and quantitative data?

After which I toured around the market and was astounded to see that the wet market was extremely clean and spacious. There wasn’t a hint of poultry odor as the area was very well ventilated.

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Turning into a corner, I saw an elderly lady tending to her Incense Paper shop and I plucked my courage to conduct a Qualitative Data collection with my 1st interviewee.

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What I have gotten out from the interview:

Incense paper auntie has been selling incense paper for 10 over years, living here for 40 over years. She said that the difference between Telok Blangah then and now is that the markets aren’t as lively. She mentioned that there was a drastic decrease in the number of people living here. Don’t know where all the people go. Old residents die and the younger people don’t really want to move to Telok Blangah. Telok Blangah has more elderly people than youngsters. Houses here are all new now, not as before. She didn’t play a lot as a teen in this area, she was a housewife.

Shortly after, I was spurred to interview more people as I wanted to have multiple perspective of things and personal recounts of the resident’s perception of their own neighborhood. I walked around Telok Blangah Mall.

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A little boy caught my attention as he was drinking Ice Blended Milo from my childhood cheap bubble tea shops and I asked him where did he get it. He brought me to the shop and I spoke to him. (grabbing my opportunities right here~)

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What I have gotten out from the interview:

The milo ice blended he has gotten is from the ‘old store’, not the ‘new store’ that was closed today. New one is called Mei Li Shop. He always buy at the Old store. HE IS BORN HERE. HE IS SINGAPOREAN ( he emphasized on that, I was not kidding with the caps lock). He questions my nationality haha. He is walking around here as his parents are shopping for things. He goes to his friends’ house to play after school. Play computer games and Ipad. Telok Blangah is very boring. His parents work at Tanjong Pagar and Raffles Place. He can go home on his own.

My dad is a vey good paparazzi. I didn't even know he was secretly helping me document my explorations haha!

My dad is a vey good paparazzi. I didn’t even know he was secretly helping me document my explorations haha!

I saw an elderly sitting on his own and I guess that he lived here as he was sitting rather comfortably on the benches. Hence I approached him and asked him about his personal recount of his past in Telok Blangah.

What I have gotten out from the interview:

Uncle stays in the vicinity. Here is nice. Stayed here since 1980. No play. Now retired. Last time work at PSA Container Port. He is happy with his CPF. After eating at the market, he go home. Occasionally goes to the nearby shopping centre.

I was on a roll. It was a heat of a moment spur of courage and I went round searching for people who looked like they lived here and I was determined to collect as many personal recounts as possible. Which led me to this group of uncles who sat at the fruits stall discussing about their lifestyle.

What I have gotten out from the interview:

(In this group I’m interviewing consist of 4 uncles) 3 of them have been staying here for 10 over years, whereas the other has been staying here for 40 over years. Constantly asking me why am I asking them questions (they seem wary. I don’t know why). Here has no place for their leisure. Only form of leisure they can frequent is Marina Bay Sands (MBS) Casino or here at the fruits stall to talk to friends. Here is full of old people nothing else, its so dead here. Its a dead end. Eat and go home that’s it. Houses here 30 years ago used to be short and tiny, now is all high rise. The uncle (71 Years Old) whom I spoke to has been living here the longest came to Singapore in 31 August 1983, selling fruits since then. He was 30 plus when he started selling fruits. He was an immigrant, he ran from Russia to Singapore. He did not go for dates in Singapore because he was busy working. Work and go home. People who used to live here has passed on. Or if they are alive they eat their lunch, go home or sit with friends and talk. 

One of the uncles told me that I should visit the 2 old temples behind to interview the elderlies as they have lived there far longer than any of them. So my dad and I went to look for the temples they’ve mentioned.

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Sad to say, it seems like the elderlies has gone home at that timing we went, but the temple was really beautiful and intimate as it was rather small, and the devotees are the residents within the neighborhood.

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While walking back to our car, my dad and I chanced upon this very vintage looking Mama shop (A mama shop or mamak shop is a convenience store or sundry shop in Singapore that is often located under a high-rise apartment block ) . Most Mama shops I recall as a kid are usually ran by Indians, but this was a Chinese Mama shop. The interior looked extremely different as well so I decided to speak to the owner.

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What I have gotten out from the interview:

Stayed here all his life. The company he worked for is 50 over years old. (the mama shop now used to be a part of a company, explains the grand shop sign) . Used to be in a office in Henderson Crescent ( location is at the back of a SGD$10 note), but got chased out by government to Tampines. Uncle started doing business when he was 23 years old, now he is 73 years old. Telok Blanagh here is a hill. Used to be a hill right here *Gesture area which has carparks and HDB flats* , government bombed the area to pave way for making roads and houses. Hill was as tall as Mount Faber. Used to have a very big temple on the hill, and a reservoir. Temple is so large you can see it from the distance, that was over 30 years ago. When he was younger, his childhood was playing in a natural cave in Mount Faber which has been sealed off by the government now. He went there often since he was 6 years old with his friends and his class teacher, playing with mud and clay to make dolls in the natural cave. Not like now, so many things to play with. Last time don’t have so many things to play with. In the past after playing he would go to the waterfall and hydrate himself, waterfall is contaminated now or even gone. Used to eat bird food (鸟饭)as a kid, the ones mother bird brings to their chicks . Venus flytraps are poisonous, they are inedible.

After speaking to the kind owner of the Mama shop, I wanted to visit Old Habits Boutique Café which I saw on my secondary research just to see if I would chance upon any younger age group of interviewees.

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Surprisingly, the patrons of Old Habits Boutique Café were middle aged and families were there too for Sunday brunch. The interior was really beautiful and intriguing as it was heavily decorated with toys, vinyl records, sign boards collected from the past.

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On my way back to the car, I was estatic to see a group of elderly men chatting at the Bird Shop along with their bird cages. I was even more estatic when I saw Parrots on the railings. I talked to the Parrot (What? Parrots can be a part of my Qualitative Data collection too okay? XD) .

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The owner of the parrots told me that he has lived here for many years already and part of his and his friend’s past time here is bringing their birds out to ‘Chat’ together as they drank their afternoon coffee.

Overall conclusion from Qualitative Data Collection:

  1. There is a drastic decrease in the number of people living here as compared to the past.
  2. Telok Blangah has more elderly people than youngsters.
  3. There used to be another hill as tall as Mount Faber here, but was removed to pave way for houses and roads.
  4. Here has no place for their leisure.
  5. Here is full of old people nothing else.
  6. Eat and go home that’s it.
  7. Houses here 30 years ago used to be short and tiny, now is all high rise. 
  8. Work and go home.
  9. People who used to live here has passed on. Or if they are alive they eat their lunch, go home or sit with friends and talk. 

How I would think of presenting my data for the infographics

Since, Telok Blangah is quite a hill infested area, I was thinking of presenting the infographics like this. Like a map.

Perhaps using real images to represent certain activities the residents do? Like eating, talking to friends etc.

What are infographics and how are they used to effectively communicate data? What other ways can we visually represent data?

Information graphics or infographics are graphic visual representations of information, data or knowledge intended to present information quickly and clearly. They can improve cognition by utilizing graphics to enhance the human visual system’s ability to see patterns and trends.

After my field trip today, I am sad to say that I still don’t have a concrete methodology as to how I would want to carry my Infographics out. But what I am certain of is that I would like my infographics to be based on my interviewee’s personal recounts and where they would frequent in Telok Blangah. This is not a very concrete resolution, but I would like to brainstorm more on how I would want to convert that to infographics.

That’s all for today!

Hope that the next time I post would be more concrete!!

Cheers,

Seng Yi Ling.

For this assignment I have heavily depended on my Visual Journal for note taking and thought processing as compared to last semester where OSS was where I post most of my thought process. Regardless, I will still take you through this journey from the start to end of this ‘Que Sera’ assignment via OSS, so… LETS GO~~


Ideation

Because the name cards require the use of the conceptually driven solutions and letter forms, combined with literal or abstract image to express our future jobs in typographic portraits, I did a mind mapping process in my Visual Journal to help with coming up with the 4 Jobs for each of the name cards: Florist, Egyptianologist, Home maker and Food Science Technologist.

Joy emphasized that we ought to have these 3 factors before consulation in order to give a good framework and direction for our assignment.

Concept

My concept for this project is using the delivery method of my goal now, which is to create a interactive children’s book, to execute the name cards for all 4 jobs.

Message

Individual name cards have their own messages and an overall message as a whole.

Florist – Do not let small thinking cut your life down to size. Dream big! Work hard!

Egyptianologist – Do not let someone else’s opinion define you.

Homemaker – Be as awesome as a Domestic Goddess.

Food Science Technologist – Never stop asking ‘Why?’ until you get you answer.

Overall message – Your job does not define who you are in the future. YOU define who you are in the future.

Tone

The overall tone of the Children’s Book concept is positive and educational. While urging the readers to discover and learn new things.


Artist references

I did not limit myself to one specific artist to use as reference because I did not want their style to be seen in my work. Hence I went online and offline to expose myself to interactive books and illustrations for children to serve as inspiration; extracting the pros of each book and learning to avoid the flaws which I did not want to see in my work.

Expression of tonality: I used different shades of the same color on to express tonality in the designs. This creates slight depth and also has an old school children’s book feeling.

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Methodology

For all of the designs, I used hand drawn illustration, scanned the designs and used Adobe Photoshop to fill in colors and cleaned up the edges.

Florist (Age >5)

I used flip book animation to carry out the ‘Flip O’ Rama’ concept from the children’s comic: Captain Underpants. The following video below is how it would have looked like.

I wanted to show the growth of the plants from a boring seedling which looked like it may die any moment , into a blossoming plant. Hence, for the top image, I used the upper half of my initials : ‘SYL’ as the feeble seedlings in pots, and a full grown blossoming plant for the bottom image. So that when the user flips it repeatedly, it will look like the seedling is growing.

Joy also suggested for me to put out instructions on how the interactive-ness can be carried out by children, hence I pasted a ‘left hand here’ and ‘right thumb here’ instruction on the outside like how the Flip O’ Rama book did.

slide5Egyptianologist ( Age 10-15)

I used the pull tab mechanism in this name card as seen in many pop up books.

I used Golden Flint paper on the interior of the Mummy coffin to act as the bones, which forms my name. My idea for this name card is to show that a dull looking exterior of the Mummy gives one the impression of something less of value. However, upon uncovering the truth by pulling the tab, it reveals the bright and golden bones of the Mummy.

In a way it also has many interpretations that can be taught such as:

‘Do not judge a book by its cover ‘ 

‘Its more important to have a heart of gold than a fancy exterior.’

‘Do not let what others think of you define who you really are.’

slide7I also included a ‘Pull Here’ instructions with a red arrow to direct the child’s attention to it.

Homemaker ( Age >10)

For this name card, I used Velcro as the material to work with as I wanted to let the children organize and arrange where each of the item should go in the household chore. I was considering using felt to carry out this idea, but Shi Teng gave me a suggestion to draw out the illustrations and have them printed out instead, so that it is more consistent with the overall image of a sketchy hand drawn illustration. Thanks Shi Teng! 😀

slide8Food Science Technologist ( Age 16- 19)

For this name card, I was highly driven ‘Touch and Feel’ books for young children.

I used Sequins to simulate the texture of fish scales, Bubble wrap to simulate the texture of corn and duct tape to simulate the waxy surface of Chilli.

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Colors

Joy suggested I use a common color for the 4 compositions to express unity throughout. However, as much as I try to pick a common color, I don’t think it worked out very well to have  Blue in my Egyptianologist illustrations ( It would have looked like an Ice Tomb) and neither Orange/ Yellow for my Food Science Technologist illustrations ( I required Blue to express the sterility of the Science lab).

Hence I split my compositions into 2 sides: Blue and Yellow

Blue (Hex code: #A4DBFF) –  Florist (Complementary) and Food Science Technologist(Monochrome)

Yellow ( Hex Code: #E4C877)– Egyptianologist (Warm) and Homemaker (Analogous)

Instruction typography used

I used ‘Ravie’ Font and spaced out the individual letter because Children’s book has to be highly legible.

Font used I have chosen is Ravie because it has a rather whimsical feeling to it, but yet I chose to bold the fonts because it is still instructions and I didn’t want the children reading it to turn a blind eye to it.

Choice of color for font was something that was bugging me as well. As I felt Black was too strong as compared to the rest of the colorful compositions. But yet if I were to choose a color that suits individual composition, I felt that there was no unity to be seen as a whole in a book; and the instructions just blends in with the background where the children might turn a blind eye to it.

Hence my solution came about when I was researching for the way Children’s books present their instructions:

touch_and_feel_board_bookI really liked how…

  1. A muted dark color was used to give the instructions. There is a mild sense of authority which I felt that one’s eyes would be drawn to read.
  2. The key word ‘WALL‘ is in capital form.
  3. The color used for the key word allows children to draw a relation between the word and the object. There is a sign (the word ‘WALL‘) and the signified (the wall picture)

Thus, I applied this reference to my instructions for the children.

I capitalized and gave a color to the keyword which is seen in the object.

to-print


 

Things I could’ve done if I can turn back in time.

I am really shooting myself in the foot for saying this. But, I think admitting to my mistake and learning from it is better than to bury it under the carpet. So, for my future self, here I go.

  1. Explore different types of paper. I felt the struggle the most when I was carrying out the pull tab mechanism for the ‘I am an Egyptianologist’. I felt that if I explored the different type of GSM for paper before I executed the cutting, I would have achieved a better and smoother pull tab mechanism for this name card.

 The following post would be the FINAL one for Assignment 1 Que Sera!

Cheers,

Seng Yi Ling.

For this class assignment, I watched this film with Kam Yit Ling! :D,

Last Year at Marienbad (1961)

Chronological order of the movie: Very inconsistent and irregular.

Q: Do you think the way this film is told works best for your story (in regard to the Alter Ego Assignment 1) ? How would you re-tell the story?

Yit Ling –  Flashbacks of the relationship between Emily and Alexy can be incorporated. Whereby Emily constantly shows affection to Alexy, would help in the story line of my film to build the history between them, so that the viewers can be more engaged in their relationship.

Yi Ling –  Flashbacks of the relationship between my grandmother and I can be added into the film as we reminisce about my childhood. I think the characters in my film in this case ought to be realistic with the age when it comes to flashback. Like when the flashback scene comes on, a child version of me and a younger version of my grandmother ought to be there.

Q: What makes this narrative (Last Year at Marienbad) work?

– The story centrals around Frank’s point of view about the female protagonist. Hence, it entwines the past, present and future of their relationship together.

– Metaphorical interpretations of their hallucinations/ potential conscience brings about depth of the characters and their inner struggles.

Q: Does this non-linear narrative work for other films

-Sci-fi, Fantasy and Thriller films would go very well with this form of narrative, such as The Time Traveller’s Wife,

Interstellar

Alice Through the Looking Glass.


What we like about this film?

– The cinematography is amazing. Everything seems aligned perfectly.

-We liked how they connect one of the hallucination/past memory with the present scene with the same dialogue, but different scenario. For instance when Frank was counting in the room with the female protagonist as he try to incur memory out from her in the past, the scene changed into the ball room scene where the female protagonist’s husband was counting the cards.

-Flashing of the 1 second scene whereby the female protagonist is holding her shoe, when she is in fact in the bar tells us that she might have remembered something about the past she can’t recall.

– The multiple reflections of the female protagonist in the mirror can be interpreted as her different selves in the past, present and future.

– The triangle arrangement of her own reflection can symbolize loss and confusion of her current situation, as well as the past she don’t recall.

Doubts about this film we had:

– We do not understand the purpose of having the freeze moments, whereby only one person moves. The movements are focus and exaggerated.

– We do not understand why they kept repeating the dialogue over and over again in different scenes.

– Frank always used past tense to talk to the female protagonist, so we had this illusion that Frank can travel through time. However , if it is really the truth, why would Frank lose to the female protagonist’s husband in the gambling game? Is he a psychopath who is trying to enforce certain ideas onto the female protagonist, or is he trying to mold her into the memory he believes in??