I have found this stage of the MA challenging, frustrating, enjoyable and downright hard work! I have learnt the importance of knowing the visual language of the area you are looking at in order to communicate to your target audience. I started off the phase by deciding what I wanted  to do for my project. I have decided to create a walking pack and viral campaign for walks around the Roaches and Luds Church in the Peak District.

I have been up and down this semester (again I know!) With my original designs and ideas not really suiting my project. Eventually I found my theme and narrative by developing the map that will go with the walk. From there I have gone on to create my walking pack idea into a doable piece of work…but there was one problem, the viral side had taken a bit of a back seat and whenever I was trying to create a viable strategy for it I ended up with too much stuff. Since the work in progress presentations I have managed to narrow this down to something much simpler, but I believe its going to work quite well for my target audience. feedback received from tutorials and the presentation reminded me that I was in danger of losing focus. I hope now that I am back on track.

The hiking community in general are very social both on and offline and I found my browsing the forums that they are very willing and eager to share stories, information and experiences about walks they’ve been on and areas they’ve visited so this made me think that they are a good choice to release a viral out on.  I’m keeping it simple. I am going to create direct mail invitationals to send out to key people in the hiking community such as walking group leaders etc. I will also produce some promotional materials to go along side that will be left in pubs, tourist centres, youth hostels etc surrounding the area. If I get to a point where I feel I can release it to the public to test it, I will try and involve the landlords and shop keepers. The second stage of my viral will be creating a persona for one of the myths of the roaches. Most likely Jenny Greenteeth, resident water nymph of the Doxey Pool and create social media pages posing as her. I was thinking about this a few weeks ago but never gave it another thought. Just the other day I was watching The IT Crowd on 40d and one of the ads in front caught my attention. It seemed like a viral video, and by doing some further research I realised that it was for Kensington palace. they have recreated one of the stories from history of a feral boy named Peter coming back to the castle and causing mischief. They have created a facebook page and a twitter account for him, both of which I plan to do so a little gutted it’s not that original anymore but is a good insight to a live campaign to follow. It was only, launched on the March 11th so it’s still very new, and it will be interesting to see how it progresses.

You can see the first video here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSOeHsyPcI0

The website here http://www.standingstill.co.uk/peterthewildboy/

and someone who came to the same conclusion I did here http://adamanddan.wordpress.com/2010/03/18/peter-the-wild-boy-kensington-palace/

Anyhoo time to get this bit finoshed off. I feel this term has been a bit rocky but feeling like Im finally making some progress, all I have to do is try not to lose focus again, and hope I pass the PGD phase…

Good luck everyone!

I have scrapped the  treasure hunt idea, deciding to keep it simple with the walking pack just including the map, route description (done in a narrative way) and the book will hold information on the area and the myths of the walk so people can refer to it.

To decide on a size for the book I thought about how big it needed to be for people to read easily but not so big that it was difficult to carry around on the walk. I have settled on a traditional portrait size book in keeping with the old style theme, and the measurements are 17.5cm x 10.5cm. I got the idea for this size by looking at route cards and Harry Potters ‘Tales of Beadle the Bard’ Collectors edition book, from which I got a lot of my inspiration for tis particular aspect of my work from it’s style, layout and design.

Layout out example from 'Tales of Beadle the Bard'

I have also decided to hand make the book so each one would be different if it was to be released to the hiking world.

I started to play around with layout ideas, but thought the simplest would be to have an equal margin around the sides to keep the images and text aligned equally. I don’t want to overcomplicate the book as things are usually better if they are kept simple.

Layout idea

I did a few sample pages  to have a look at how the typeface and image stylings worked together. After several trial and error attempts I came up with the one above. It is a little rough around the edges, but the idea is there. Simple text and image balancing each other out.  Originally the paragraphs had line spacings rather than indents but i felt this was not really suitable for the theme, and was not in keeping with the medieval stylings it has taken on. I also tried centered texts bu they looked more like peoems. i i had the skill to dwrite a pem about each area, that would have worked quite well.

Anyway I will show them in tutorial and get some feedback on them.

I have started looking at examples and these include

Column with text

Colours

One worry for me this term has been the viral side of things. It seemed to have taken a back site after I got a bit carried away on the walking pack design. I know this was because my original development of layouts and ideas for the viral side including the posters and classifieds weren’t working with my theme.  I have some ideas about how to promote it because after the work in progress presentation, I really needed to simplify things a lot. I now need to work on a strategy in order to show how I plan for my viral campaign to develop and predict how it will ‘spread’.

I have narrowed this down to simple direct mail invitiationals sent to key people within the hiking community including walking groups and forums. if there is one thing about this market it is that its very social both on and offline, with people talking about their experiences, stories and walks they have been on. I feel this provides a great platform to release viral to a market that has not really been subjected to this kind of campaign before.  The plan is that people will spread the news of the walking pack for the roaches, through word-of-mouth amongst their friends and peers as an interesting way to undertake a pleasure walk. I also plan to use the local pubs and tourist information centres as location in which to leave promotional materials for people to pick up and look at. Through this they will be directed to the website. I may also talk with landlords to inform anyone asking about good walks in the area to inform them of mine, and to link to my website from their homepages.

I may also use a social networking strategy by creating a persona for Jenny Greenteeth, the water nymph of the Doxey Pool using sites such as Facebook and Twitter, and using keyword searches to target my desired market directly to create something that will intrigue them as to who/what she is.

For the project we split of into pairs and were given an area of the city to base it on. Connie and I ironically had the area within which Anne Frank House was located! This was a bit of a shame as we’d already spent some time in the area and it would have been nice to see some more of the city. But either way it was great fun riding around on our bikes and getting lost…a lot. Turns out yes it is a quicker form of getting around, but much easier to get lost as you cannot just stop and look at the map without nearly crashing!

El Diablo

As we had the bikes we thought we could utilise this within our project somehow. So on day one of the project Connie,and I, along with our faithful steeds Wedgie and El Diablo set off for the start of our route.

Doing their best "long Way Round' pose

After riding around taking photos and generally enjoying the scenery we came up with the idea of creating an online blog through the eyes of our bikes acting as escorts to tourists in Amsterdam. This was a fun way of showing the city through a different point of view, and ran well with the theme of Anne Franks Diary, thus creating a connection with the project and one of the key aspects of our route.

Westerkerk

The canals

You can find the blog here

http://redgiediablo.wordpress.com/

Feel free to leave your comments and I’m sure they will get back to you as soon as possible!

The whole area was around the Prinsenstraat canal and was the rather more cultured edge of town with a mix of cafe’s, museums, art galleries and had a nice eclectic mix of both tourists and locals enjoying the day.

The ducks that wouldn't move out of the way of the pedalo!

A good time was had by all in Amsterdam, I just regret not being there longer so I could have seen a few more of the sites. I suppose I’ll just have to go back

So I decided to focus on one thing at a time. One of the key points of my project is the map pack that the walker will receive. The projects essence is based on myth and legend and some of the work I had been producing such as the logos, classified ads, and initial teaser poster ideas weren’t working.

As you can see these clearly weren’t working with the theme. I needed to decide on the narrative so it all fit together in one style. The directions I wrote for one of the walks helped establish this.

6.Wander through the the chasm until you get to the very steep steps going out. It can be very muddy at the bottom of these steps. At the top of the steps keep right until you emerge onto the path and turn to the left.

Continue through this prehistoric world dripping with life. Do not get sucked down, pick your path carefully traveler, for hidden dangers lurk.

This damp place so legends say, the sun only fully shines on Solstace day.

Ascend the crevice curving round. When the top is reached keep left.

The normal is the original and the bold is the new text.  But be warned this is a work in progress. The language isn’t quite right for either of the walks yet. So I started to think about the actual target audience. Those walkers who are interested in myth and legend. I started to look at various things that might inspire me. particularly old maps. I also thought about how popular culture is associated with myth and legend. I began experimenting using the Lord of the Rings, and World of Warcraft (an online role-playing games) maps as inspiration.

I started off just doing simple experiments with ink, and looking at shapes and symbols within the maps. With these style maps I’m not to worried about them being absolutely accurate as it’s the theme I’m worried about at the moment. Although the walk is the correct shape and the landmarks are in the correct places along the route.

Within the pack I intend to put a scale map of the area as well, or recommend which map people should take with them for health and safety reasons. This one is to be part of the special pack.

After hand drawing a few maps I started to play around with materials. For instance a lot of the themed maps i have found and the older style ones have aged paper. As I am still trying to figure out what the best material to use would be I decided to go old school and tea stain some paper to get the desired effect, as a tester.

These experiments have turned out quite well and you can see a theme beginning to develop. My next stage of experimentation was to try this on the computer to get a printer friendly look and play around with colour and texture. I am not dismissing the idea of using a handmade map, as I think it would add authenticity to the piece and materials such as indian inks and a variety of paper stocks could come up with some interesting creations.

Through experimenting on the computer. this is one stage of the possible design. I have added colours that are around the area, using the natural tones of the environment. My intent is to keep it quite muted in order to keep that aged effect. Through research I have found little to no colour is used and when it is, it doesn’t appear very bright. the shapes is the area in which the roaches lies within the peak district and I have created several sections based on villages and areas surrounding it. the boundary lines are estimated but the general area in which they sit is almost correct. I have only chosen a few of these to show on the map to give it a sense of being its only little world.

On the left is a map generated on the mac, using the shape of the area taken from the larger map. The text and route were added digitally, and I then printed it off worked on it with black ink adding texture and shapes, which was then scanned in again and the background added.  these maps are a work in progress and I am continuing to develop these ideas further.

The first week we were doing short life drawing sketches on the theme of the beach, and he encouraged us to just use single line drawings to draw the model. I have always found this a little tough as I tend to draw quite sketchily.

I was experimenting with pen and charcoal, and when I did do the line drawings, they started to look like John Lennon! I stick to the fact that I was out of practice!

The second week we were encouraged to draw from memory. And the main topic was how you left your room that morning. Unfortuantely mine was a mess, and I’ll admit the dimesnions are a little off but I ran out of time when I was adding in the detail.

The third session was the most exciting for me. I had forgotten to take a supermarket product with me, so Martyn gave me some cling film. I spent some time toying with how I would include this in the drawing, so started off by giving the model a peg leg…my obsession with pirates and peg legs seems to be showing through in some of these mini projects! I then thought about utilising the actual clingfilm somehow, so I pulled some off and drew directly onto it. I quite liked the idea of experimenting woth different materials as its something that I used to do a fair bit of in my college days. I have always been interested in colour and texture within a piece of work.

After doing that I strated drawing with the cling film, just using pritstick to keep it in place. I enjoyed moulding the shape, and the final image turned out quite abstract. I then photocopied this several times using different contrasts to make it darker and lighter. I then ‘drew’ with the clingfilm again on top of the photocopy and then put it through the machine again. I did this 3 times so I ended up with 3 layers all concentrating using black and white as the main source or colour. I was impressed with what kind of work you can produce just using simple materials, and some that are unorthodox and it would be nice to be able to incorporate some unusual techniques into my project if I can.

I’m struggling a bit on the name for my event. I want something catchy and easy so it can be remembered, but also holds the essence of the event.

I want it to be a journey of discovery and a way for people to experience the countryside and hopefully see it in a new way.

The key words I have indentified include adventure, discover and experience. The idea being don’t wonder, wander. And for the past week or so trying to narrow this down to a name has proved quite a challenge.

The NSPCC does charity walks called HACK (Can you HACK it?), which stand for Hiking Against Cruelty to Kids. This is simple and does exactly what it says on the tin, and I would like my name to do the same. Even though at the moment I am not planning to associate it with a charity, I’m not going to completely dismiss the idea just yet. I just want people to do it as something for themselves and experience tehir own personal journey.

So any ideas are welcome Please let me know if you have any ideas!

• What do they see when walking?
• What do they see that other may not?

The idea behind the event is to get people to engage with their surrounding and look at things in a different way. The map will be used as a basis to this aim with a sort of a ‘Treasure Hunt’, but without the gold at the end . The user will solve riddles and spot landmarks in order to continue their journey and find their way around the route. the only problem is the fact I will not be able to make it too complicated. I don’t want the danger of anyone getting lost!

I want to encourage the walker to document their journey as they go, highlighting the points of interest along the way using whatever media they’d like be it photography, film, diary or sketches and the plan is that they will upload their journeys onto a website, or email them to me so I can put them on so people can share their experiences. this will also help in gaging whether the campign worked or not.

For children I intend to create their own treasure map so that they can engage in the walk in a different way. This will involve a list of things to  for them to collect such as a rock and a specifically shaped stick. Of course the adult walkers may do this as well

I will be looking to make some sort of interactive map for the web, so people may get a feel of it before they go. My current time scale for the walk may happen for the two weeks around May Bank Holiday. Originally I was only going to do it for a day or a weekend, but giving a larger times scale enables people to do it when they are available and able to undertake it.

I have also chosen two walks: A 7 mile one covering more points of interest, and a shorter 3 mile one for people who feel less able to do the longer one. It is also a good one for evening walks after work.

Question of the map…..what style to use?

Ordnance Map

Treasure Map

Interactive Map

OK so the examples aren’t great but it gives an idea of the types of things to ry. The question is what media do I apply? I am currently spending sometime experimenting with style. For examplt the ordance survey maps tell the user exactly what they need to know, but can the shape of the walk be utilised insome way? Will it be illustrative or more graphic?

The area I have chosen is steeped in myth and legend so at the moment a traditional map is the element I’m looking at.  Examples such as the  Lord of the Rings Maps or gaming maps that give the essence of another world might be the way to go. I want people to feel like they’re on an adventure and a journey of discovery, all whilst having fun. Maybe a run of the mill modern map won’t work as well as that…..although I do admit and up to dat map must be including for health and safety reasons!

Middle Earth, Lord of the Rings

World of Warcraft World Map

Close up WoW area map

Blizzard have also used the mapping style to design an invertational in Paris.

Blizzards map of Paris

Anyhoo, what have I been doing? After all the snow that stopped me driving high into the hills I have managed to do part of the 6 mile walk, but I will leave that for a separate post. After my first tutorial of the year, it was decided I needed to find out more of the visual language of hikers. I spent a fair amount of time looking into this over the last couple of weeks so I knew how to target my audience. It is not about what I like but about what speaks to them. Fortunately I found that a lot of the adverts, magazines and associated press are all very visually based.

As I said the design etc associated with the walking collective in general is all very visual. The target audience is brought together by a state of mind rather than age, gender or profession, and a lot of the ads, magazines, websites and blogs etc all point to this.

Some of the examples I found include Berghaus and The North Face

Berghaus, 2008

The North Face: Endorphins

These are two examples of my research. As you can see it is very visual, using dramatic locations and shots, whilst keeping text to a minimum. This seems to be the trend among outdoor brands ad’s.  These images speak to the viewer, and get them excited. What could they achieve? Could they visit these places?  It ignites a sense of excitement from within one’s self.

Vango, 2010

From the example above we can see that the colours used are either natural colours such as blues, greens, browns etc , or mixed with bold bright colours such as reds and oranges. The theme generally seems to be the brighter the better, all of them giving a positive attitude to the viewer. The text is generally kept to a minimum, and when it is used it is, more often than not, a sans serif typeface that is used. This may be because these typefaces are generally considered to be more informal and  connect with the viewer on a more even level than a serif typeface, which can seem quite serious and formal.

The language used is again very positive, using words such as adventure, explore and experience. All words which describe the thrill or the outdoors. Ads I have found that are for a particular piece of equipment, state how good they are for the hiking sport. For instance  ”‘Vango’ placed an ad in a magazine with it’s strapline being “You get out, what we put in”. They all have one thing in common….enthusiasm for what they do.  The descriptions are the same, always stating how practical something is, what it can do for you and make your experience better.

Humour is also a large factor with a lot of brands not taking themselves to seriously, this is another way to draw the audience in without patronising them, and keeping them on the same level.

Mammut

Carhartt, Amer Sheikh (Student)

From the Mammut example we can see that it encompasses what I was talking about earlier. The use of positive language but this time it is combined with humour to really speak to the audience. The way it hints at the fact the wearer may lose common sense because the equipment is so good the wearer can forget what they’re doing. This was a follow up ad after a viral campaign Mammut launched in 2006, but that will have to wait for another time.

The catch up posts will continue tomorrow!

Our final piece consisted of a series of photos depicting the use of satire in popular culture such as TV shows, film, music, politics. It also consisted of a live performance piece by Paul who did a satirical intro to the exhibition and stayed around to do live tours of it for about 2 hours.

The experience was different and I have to admit it was 3 days of hard work and high levels of stress. I personally didn’t feel like I learned anything about designing editorials as the projects format was changed into an exhibition. At times I found RV to be quite friendly but other times about and rude which I found quite unprofessional. Positive aspects included the ability to work as a team to produce a mostly finished piece of work in very little time. Three days from idea’s, through to development and final piece certainly takes it’s toll on you!