ADD ON IDEAS

CONCEPT 1

I found out this zine about nostalgia. The designer made use of image manipulation to create a really grainy effect to mimic old dusty vintage photographs. I think this is a really smart way to create an immediate effect among audience that this is something about the past. I tried mimicking the effect and it actually turns out to create a completely different vibe. It gives off a much vintage aesthetic and this could be a new concept for the photoshoot, making use of image manipulation to create that vintage effect to deliver the idea of past memories. 

CONCEPT 2

I also came up with a new idea on "old Hong Kong", being nostalgic of the old streets signs of Hong Kong. Street signs and neon signs are actually one of the most significant feature of Hong Kong. Most of these signs have its own unique typography on it. 

Most of these neon signs have been taken off from buildings due to safety issues. However, there are still some hanging on buildings in some old districts.  The fonts printed are all different and has their own style. I think using. these old Chinese typography as a new concept of the image manipulation of the photographs would also be interesting to deliver the idea of past memories. There are also a lot of local designers or magazines trying to make use of old typography to create the vintage aesthetics. 

I then tried to add some text onto the photographs to mimic old vintage designs. I also came up with the idea of making them into postcards. As postcards are used to keep memories and spread memories to people around, I think it would be an appropriate medium for the theme nostalgia and something that is related to a specific place. 

I also warped the words to create that flowing effect of memories, how it is not a physical and solid object. 

RESEARCH ON NOSTALGIA

VIDEOS 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WiTgn5QH_HU 

• Nostalgia was once considered an illness confined to specific groups of people.
• was seen to be a negative mental state
• intense yearning of home
• anyone separated from their native place for a long time is vulnerable to nostalgia
• mental condition similar to depression
• difficulties letting go of childhood
• longing to return
• homesickness
• general longing to the past
• mindsets changed
• does not generally put people into a negative mood
• remember personally meaningful and rewarding experience
• can boost psychological well being
• help increase self esteem and social belonging
• make them act more cheerfully
• can restore well being
• new marketing technique
• helps us remember the value of life
• and be confident and motivated to face challenges in the future

After watching this short TED video on YouTube, I discovered that nostalgia is not only about the present and the past, it is also about the future. I am amused that I did not know about this before the photoshoot... This could be a new concept for the photoshoot that talks about the future. As most of the final outcome is about how one is trapped in his past memories, and longing to go back, I can actually develop a series of photos that talks about how we can actually make use of the feeling of nostalgia to motivate ourselves and develop hope within us.

MY OWN OBSERVATION

I realised that it is very true that nostalgia can actually encourage people and trigger sense of motivation towards the future. Taking myself as an example, I used to live in a house in the countryside when I was small, I moved out to the city after 12 years living in that house. Even until now, I still thinks about that place very often and sort of associated the place with my childhood memories. This makes me want to develop my future career and earn more to actually buy the exact same house in the future. Although it might not work, it actually motivates me to work hard for my future.

Sometimes, when I hang with friends, we would also talk about the past memories of our generation, about different cartoons that we watch when we are young and we can talk about those for the whole day. This process of reminiscing the past actually makes people happy and create a sense of connection among each other. Sometimes, we even go to some old places in some old districts in Hong Kong to kind of have a little escape from the prosperous city. This also shows that people tend to make use of nostalgia to escape from their hectic life. It could be a quick review of old photos, or even a visit to old places.

INSTAGRAM

This also makes me think of the old cultural heritage of Hong Kong and also those that have already vanished due to the new world development. I have also discovered that there are a lot of Instagram accounts about the "old Hong Kong" and old places that we used to go when we were a kid. The prompt of these accounts are usually about nostalgia and how we can actually use social media to keep the memories and even spread it to new generations.

As seen in previous modules, I am really interested in Hong Kong culture. I think I can actually expand this module's concept of a person's nostalgia into a generation's nostalgia, where I can actually use some old features fo Hong Kong as the main element to deliver the message. Since I am staying in Hong Kong for the coming semester, I think this could be a really good opportunity for me to really think about how I can further develop the idea.

UNEXPECTED FEEDBACK

After asking for feedback from peers, I decided to ask adults for some feedback too. As I am afraid that the feedback would be too one-sided. I got some unexpected feedback from an adult.

From previous feedback from peers, they tend to think that playing the cards with close friends would be a better idea than playing with strangers. They thought that they would not want to show their darkest side to stranger or acquaintance as they would want to build a good impression in front of people. However, the new feedback I heard from my friend's parents is exactly opposite to that.

My friend's parents thought that it would be harder to reveal their darkest side to close friends. As close friends know about all their past, they would hold back when playing with close friends and would be scared to show their dark side. On the other hand, when playing with strangers, they thought that they would be more open to answering those questions. What they care more about is their close friends' thoughts, instead of strangers' first impression.

This feedback his so interesting to me. However, I received it a few days before the deadline and there is already not much time left to make big changes. Therefore, if given more time, I would definitely further develop the concept of my work and listen to more feedbacks from different age group to get unexpected comments that I would never have thought of. 

MODULE EVALUATION

I feel like this is the least time given for finishing the whole module. I don't know if it is due to the pandemic or its just my own personal issues, but I am definitely working under loads of stress in this module. As the deadline is around one month after COP's I tend to feel so dead and not motivated to work for this module after the COP deadline. I procrastinated and had no motivation to work for the almost 2 weeks after the COP deadline. I felt so stressed every day, yet, have no motivation to start doing work. Whenever, I got that slight motivation to start, I felt like I was having a creative block and that my ideas were so bad. 

I also realised that I tend to magnify my stress a lot. I always feel like there is no time left to finish everything and I would not be able to handle it before the deadline. This habit of magnifying my stress is giving me even more stress. However, I would say on the other hand, it helped me to work efficiently..? I started to officially start working around one and a half week before the deadline. Before that, I did some brief research and reviewed the brief to get myself familiarised with the requirements. After officially starting to actually work on the design work, I felt like the pressure that I gave myself actually pushed me to produce a large amount of work within a day.

Overall, I am quite satisfied with my final outcome. This module requires a lot of observation work and responds to feedback. These kind of primary resources from peers actually is turns out to be taking a big part in my research work. I would say crits with peers were the most useful primary research. I even changed the whole design direction 4 days before the deadline. It was tough and I was working under a lot of stress, but luckily I ended up liking the final outcome even more when compared to my work before the change. Peer feedback really had helped me a lot in the module and their feedback actually acted as a primary research for my work. Although I was not comfortable in attending the google hangout crits, I tried my best to get feedback from peers. I texted my friends for comments and asked them "what if"questions in order to get more audience's feedback. 

FINAL OUTCOME PRESENTATION

RATIONALE

POINTS TO INCLUDE IN RATIONALE 

• to break the tradition of first knowing the good side of a person when you first met them 
• test real friends 
• get to know each other more 
• minimal design, hiding something, arouse curiosity 

"You Dark As Fuck" is a set of playing cards that is designed to play in drinking occasions. The idea of the deck is to break the tradition of first knowing the good side of a person when you first met them. Audiences can get to test real friends, know more about acquaintance, or even know more about their true selves. 

Minimalism is applied in the packaging design. On the front cover, "You Dark As Fuck" is printed at lower right corner in a small text size. This is to communicate the idea of people tend to hide their dark side from others, instead of revealing them directly to people. Using this way of presenting the text is definitely not the most comfortable in terms of legibility. This is to create the sense of curiosity and confusion among audience. 

The same concept is applied on the back cover. The sentence "not-so-nice to have met you" is printed in the same size as the text in front, except, it is in grey. This is to further create the sense of confusion among audience, and make the text even harder to read,  with an underlying justification of hiding the text, like how people hide their dark side. 
As for the inside, a distorted image of old paintings of Satan is used on the fronts and a dreamy gradient of pink and blue is used on the back of the cards. The distorted images represents the the idea of the dark side of humanity as a distorted personality of people. As for the pink and blue gradient at the back, it represents the good impressions that everyone would like to give when they first meet a person. This is also the side which other players can only. see when they were playing the game. This also creates a contrast between the good and the dark side of humanity, as well as to further create the confusion among players. Players would not expect the card holder to read out dark content when they look at the dreamy colours on the back of the cards. 

INSTRUCTIONS 
Gather in a circle, continue clockwise.
1. The first person who entered the room picks a card.
2. Read the question aloud.
3. Pick a yes/no card and place it in the center of the circle, with the card facing down.
3. Everyone guess his/ her answer and pick yes/no.
4. The chosen person should reveal the card.
5. Those who got it wrong has to drink.
6. Everyone will proceed to guess the reason behind his/ her choice.
7. He/ she chooses the player with the closest answer.
8. Others will all have to drink.

NEW PACKAGING

DESIGN PROCESS

To be honest I am so stressed as there is not much time left until deadline. I came up with a decision of changing the whole direction of the branding and packaging design style. It makes me feel really insecure as the final design looks a lot simpler than the initial one. The final design looks effortless and so simple. However, I think that it is the best execution to the theme and the whole idea and meaning of the project. Only the back design of the cards are key from the initial idea and everything changed and is looking really different from the initial design. 

INITIAL 

DEVELOPMENT 

FINAL

PRESENTATION