01. Project 10 (final)

Final

Creative Brief
Screenshots
Concept Development 1 2 3
Moodboard and Inspirations 1 2 3 4 5
Soundscape 1 2 3
Rough-cuts and Mock-ups 1 2 3 4 5

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Creative Brief

Title: TEN Wishes

Project Background: This project is for David Gelb’s Timebased Communication 2 class of 2009. Its scope is for us to create about a minute long video that explores the notion of ten (10). (This was particularly inspired by YSDN’s turning 10 this coming September.) The project’s goal is for us to continue on and stretch our skills learned from Timebased 1.

Overview: My concept explores the idea of 10 as being the ultimate number of our lists, such that we always say Top 10—not Top 8, or 9. I surveyed 100 York/Sheridan students and asked for their Top 10 dreams, wishes, and aspirations. I then tallied out the results and figured out the Top 10 of the Top 10’s.

The results were the following (1 having the most, 10 the least):

1. career
2. money
3. travel
4. superpowers
5. love
6. happiness
7. independence
8. impact
9. paradise
10. contentment ← only one person wrote this in, but I think it’s the best way to end the piece.

This project draws on the notion of ten being the final yet also the beginning of a cycle (much like a defining point where the cycle restarts naturally), which is why I felt the need to get some control of what my 10 is going to be. It would be weird if I ended it with something materialistic as wanting a Mac laptop, for example. 10 had to be something “impact-ful,” or at least moving and more memorable than the rest.

The whole idea evolved from the importance of a person’s ten last breaths, to their ten famous last words, but now giving it a positive spin; hence, the creation of this dreams/wishes project. At first I wanted to juxtapose the difference of aspirations across generations (10 year olds, … to 40, 50s) in hopes that it will illustrate themes of maturity, losing one’s innocence, urgency of time, and the belief (or disbelief) for the irrational. However, the results I was getting wasn’t the right ones for this project. Having only limited access to 60, 70, and 80-year-olds proved this concept quite a challenge. Sometimes the response they give me were either too personal, or too irrelevant for this project (something that couldn’t be explained within a 5-second exposure for this video). So I decided to narrow down my focus to a group that is more accessible (i.e. YSDN design students), and to increase the number of participants to 100 for accuracy.

This change of direction definitely stretched the unexpectedness of results for this project. It removed all sorts of preconceptions that I had compared with my previous ideas, and challenged me to “let go” and prepare myself to accept/work with whatever the results I will gather. Although I had a vague idea of what could appear on the lists (i.e. own a design firm, for example), I was clueless (and most of all, curious) of which ones will make it on the Top 10 of the Top 10.

Perhaps the only control that I had was deciding on the overall style or aesthetic the list is going to be portrayed as. Prior giving out the survey, I was certain that the style needed to be something childlike, quite close if not similar to sketchbook doodling. Of course, I had in mind that the content will be scanned directly from the survey to make it more personal (handwritten nature considered). But my rationale for adapting this aesthetic is from the remarkable ability of young children to dream freely/innocently, without bias or malice (See Fig A). For about 3 years now, I have been teaching children ages 3 to 6 at my church, and it always amazes me how optimistic they can be when dreaming; they never doubt!

Fig A. Child dreams of a fortress, UFO, clone machine, etc.

The Requirement:

The goal then for this piece is to evoke a sense of whimsy, and take the audience to a hopeful and elementary† atmosphere — almost dream-like. It could either be a trip to the past (nostalgia) or to the inner self (dreamer as hidden away or too personal to be revealed in public).

†elementary as innocent, naive, basic/straightforward.

How the approach meets the requirement:

whimsy – The content (text and illustration of dreams) are playful and often quaint in nature; the whimsical nature is emphasized when all of these are combined altogether and revealed sequentially
hopeful/dreamlike – Nursery mobile quality in its presentation/animation, the clouds, and using white as the dominant color are indirect reminders of sleep/dream-state; pastel colors for childlike quality
elementary – This is achieved through the handwritten type or drawn illustrations (usually with pencil as a medium), as well as the casual (colloquial) language used in delivering the content; also, the simplicity of the accompanying sound

I added a genie lamp for my intro and outro to emphasize the notion of wishes. It is the element that ties it all together, such that the wishes and clouds/”smoke” emerged from the lamp after rubbing it. At the same time, it is shot at bird’s eye view to illustrate the number 10 in a subtle way: 1 as the hand rubbing, and 0 for the actual lamp.

Audience: The intended audience is particularly young, ages 17-25. Perhaps designers who are in the same cohort as us would be interested just because we all probably share the same dreams and aspirations.

Key Message: This is more of an information piece as opposed to anything else. It generates curiosity as to finding out what made the top 10 of our (YSDN-ers) overall dreams. I, for one, learned that a lot of us desire a good career than good health (hah!), which would probably explain why we pull all nighters all the time.

Content Planning: The content for this piece was obtained directly from the survey I had them fill out. I gave them an option to either draw or write it down. It was weird at first because I had no idea what I’m going to get, or to what extent it will match whatever I had in mind at that time / how I envision this piece would be. I did one test survey first to see how people might respond to it. Then I figured I needed to reword the question a little: for a positive spin, and also to give the participants a bit more direction (i.e. instead of asking What is, I put List or draw this).

I’m not sure if I should have the survey materials (what everybody wrote) available for public viewing. Comment here if you’re interested, then I’ll link you.

Acknowledgements: Thanks to all YSDN-ers who participated and took the time to fill out my survey. I also want to thank the members of JNCIM church for participating in the test survey I did prior this one. You’re awesome!

Bibliography: I have a lot of inspirations for this project. But if I were to pick a select few, it would be:

OCAD’s EMDes promo piece, in terms of the layering hand drawn effect.

Marie Digby’s Say It Again official music video; I was inspired by the clouds here! and the colors I found really lovely.

Technologies: Paper technology! (for survey), my loyal scanner (for digitizing the survey), After Effects for post-production, and Garageband for sound.

Deliverables: A .mov piece submitted to David’s dropbox, a DVD submitted at the top shelf box across Jane’s desk, and this (blog).

Screenshots