503 Moving Pictures - Design Development

After some experimentation during my initial idea stage, I was quite confident in what I imagined I wanted the moving image to look like. I knew that I wanted the typography to tell the story of the audio clip, and that I wanted the feel/atmosphere of the moving image to be quite quick paced and overwhelming at times.

Before I started designing in After Effect, I first wanted to choose the right typefaces to work with. I knew that I wanted one typeface that was hand-written/script so that I could give the video some natural personality and make it relatable to the audience. The other typeface I knew that I wanted t to be sans serif and neutral, this was so that the typeface could communicate the words within the video clearly and easily, but without distracting from the message of the audio.

These are the typeface combinations I looked at. The ones that I liked the look and feel of where 'Remachine Script' and 'Sexy Queen', the first and third down on the left. The sans serif typeface that I favoured most was 'Century Gothic', that's because it is fairly thin and neutral, but at the same time quite soft, friendly and easy to read.

First Draft:

After choosing the typeface, I went into After Effects ad started creating the first draft of the video. I worked partly with the storyboard from my initial idea stage, and partly with just the way I imagines each part of the audio clip to transition and be communicated.

I first looked at the two typefaces I favoured previously, as well as tried an alternative 'Alarm' typeface. The 'Alarm' typeface felt too obvious and expected, as the title of the moving image includes the word 'time;. It is also didn't feel very feminine or visually appealing, so it would not have appealed to my target audience. From the two scrip typefaces, I liked 'Sexy Queen' better. This was because I felt that it looked much more attractive in a moving image context, as well as being more natural and realistic than 'Remachine' The typeface mimics real-life handwriting in a pretty and intriguing way, so it would appeal to the audience as well as possibly make them curious to see more.

Particular areas of interest from the first draft:

Overall, the colour at the time is just a placement colour. Purple was chosen at the start because it felt that it may be appropriate due to it being a quite mature colour. However, after finishing the first draft it was clear that start to finish simply the one shade of purple becomes quite sickening and boring.The first draft lay down the foundations for the moving image, where colour choices and other small elementscan easily be edited and tweaked to make it appeal more to the viewer and target audience.

The word 'Workshop' and the arrow zooming past the screen feels a little awkward and expected. The word is also quite difficult to read that quickly, so it doesn't quite communicate what it needs to.

The list of '70 women' also zooms past quite quickly, it does not allow the viewer the opportunity to grasp what the words are representing as the names cannot be read. This also feels quite awkward, as the pace in which the names appear in comparison to the pace of them zooming past does not match. This is visually unappealing and very obvious.

The 'Alarm' typeface from pervious exploration was added to the video, this was because I thought it would be appropriate to represent times of day and time passing. The zooming in and switching of the times communicates well the idea of 'timetabling', and does so quite clearly, attractively and abstractly.

The question aimed at the viewer, that was explored in initial ideas, proved to work well within the first draft. The chosen 'Sexy Queen' typeface, although a strange name, works well at creating a somewhat more personal and natural feel to the question. As if one of the '70 women' themselves wrote this question.

Part of the audio states how Tiffany Dufu asked the women to list what they would do on their ideal day, and also list how long it would take them to do it. I tried to represent this also in a somewhat natural manner, by listing each task one by one, then listing each time one by one. The times next to each task sit very awkwardly and seem to not fit, it almost makes the viewer feel uncomfortable by looking at it. However, I believe this is very effective as I want to make the viewer somewhat uncomfortable, I want the viewer to feel what Tiffany Dufu is trying to explain.

To emphasise where Tiffany Dufu says that most women had more than 24 hours when they added up their list, I decided to visualise than in a slightly realistic and personal manner again. By having the total written at the bottom of the huge list, and then corrected. This I believe is effective as it shows natural human error, as well as reinforcing Dufu's ideas/statements. However, the only issue I think is that this part of the video takes a little bit too long and gets boring to watch. It also slightly disrupts the pace of the video.

When trying to symbolise that each of the '70 women' got more than 24 hours as their total, this is the part in the video where I want to make the viewer start feeling even more uncomfortable and overwhelmed. By having the times overlap, I believe this is effective as it makes the eyes feel a little fuzzy, and the text underneath illegible. However, I believe this feeling can be even further enhanced using colour, at the moment simply the white, black and purple do no create that discomfort. But, if more bright colours were, this feeling could be enhanced.

Towards the end of the video, the same issue arises as the previous. I believe that even though the text overlapping is very effective and does what is was intended for, the use of colour des not help to communicate that discomfort and ease. Colour experimentation is definitely need at this point.

The video ends with all the crazy and busy things going on in the video shattering. This i believe works well as it creates a sense of finality, and in a way symbolises exhaustion. As if the women, by doing everything all the time will eventually break too. The only issue I believe is that the video ends on a black screen. I feel that there should be some sort of message in the end that should be left to linger to allow the viewer/audience to look away and still be thinking about the message that this video/audio has given.

Colour Consideration/Development:

After the first draft, I knew that I wanted to consider the use of colour within the video. I wanted colour to aid the storyline of the video, and to help represent the message. Colour needed to make the viewer gradually become even more confused, uncomfortable and overwhelmed.

 A I wanted a gradual change in emotion for the viewer, I though that a gradual change in colour could visually aid and reinforce that. Starting with softer and calmer colours, then slowly progressing into brighter tones of the same colour, and finally introducing completely different colours, I thought can be a good way in creating this effect. Above I looked at some colour stories I could use, with each containing black and white, as these are the main colours that help to make the typography stand out and be legible. Whereas, the rest of the colours can be accents that indirectly lead the viewer through this story/emotion rollercoaster.

Having done that, I next thought to experiment and to put these colour schemes into context. I choose the busiest and most hectic frame of the video, and applied the colours to see what effects they could create, and which would be most effective/appropriate.

The electric blue background is definitely striking, and the yellow, red and black typography over it definitely feels uncomfortable. However, I feel that the blue is a little too cold and maybe even too masculine. As the target audience is women, I want the colours to somehow relate to them a little bit more.

The bright green also works well in creating a striking visual. This, however, is not as uncomfortable or hectic as the green slightly overpowers the text too much, so you are almost not even aware it is there. The green also feels a little sickly, which is not the type of emotion I am going for.

The red similarly to the green is a little too overpowering for the text, however, it does a much better job at relating and appealing to the target audience of women. The red, with small accents of yellow and blue ate visually appealing, but at the same time nerve-racking.

The yellow background, unlike others, does a very good job at making all the text stand out. The viewer/audience is aware of how much is going on within the frame as yellow does not overpower the text. The colour yellow is also quite feminine and attractive, meaning it would appeal to our target audience, but at the same time, paired with black and red it screams 'caution' and 'danger', which fits well with the idea of chaos and discomfort I am trying to communicate.

The light blue, like the yellow, does not overpower the text, and makes it quite easy to understand how much is going on within the frame. Paired with yellow and green however, a lot of the information gets lost and feels weak. The overall atmosphere of this colour scheme is a little safe and calmer than the rest, where I am aiming for something more dangerous and hectic.