February 2, 2011
Symposium Concepting
Abstract to Practical: A Typographic Exploration
Type: An Exploration Of The Written Laguage
Typographic Breakdown: The construction and deconstruction of all things type.
Letter Mania
Now You Read It, Now You Don’t
It’s not all Books and Posters: Type explanations and experiments of KCAI graphic design students.
Typographic Map: Covering all corners of what lies within its borders.
ty·pog·ra·phy - Defining and redefining type.
[tahy-pog-ruh-fee] - Defining and redefining type.
I shot the serif: wrangling the elusive typography.
Typography Trapeze: A circus of exhibits and activities revolving around the world of type.
Since we have another snowday, and therefor a while before we review this list, it is subject to change between now and then. :)
February 1, 2011
Baby Boomer Care Givers Analysis
Caregivers of the Baby Boomer generation are genuinely concerned for the wellbeing of their patients, and are dedicated to whoever they are helping. During our research, it came up a lot that the baby boomer generation is an altruistic one, and this seemed to prove very true as all of our interviewees had past volunteer experience before becoming caregivers. A trusting personality is an essential quality of these caregivers, as they are asked to do a lot and they have to be careful not to offend or demean their patients throughout the day. This can sometimes be difficult, since sometimes patients can really give them a hard time. As one woman, Gwen, put it, “you’ve got to learn how to appease them, because you’re both set in your own ways.” But their patient, upbeat attitude keeps them going, in addition to being able to adapt to the person they’re caring for.
The caregivers we talked to were all very modest, downplaying their importance and happy with the gratitude they got. This surprised us, as we thought they might feel more burdened than they seemed to be. But they all seemed to love what they did and were content with the personal satisfaction they got from doing this.
Another thing that came as a surprise to us was that none of the women we interviewed had any professional experience that would have trained them to be care givers. Nancy said that all her experience came from being a mother, and another caregiver, Sandra, said that aside from some instructional packets (she is caring for her husband with a back injury), she relied learning quickly and being a good communicator to make things run smoothly. When shadowing Dianne, it seemed like she must have had some sort of training, the way she adjusted the wheelchair of her handicapped husband, or described all the equipment they used.
One worry that many baby boomer care givers seem to share though, is that they will soon need to start thinking about caring for themselves. As they age, they will be less and less able to take care of their patients, so they need to both find ways to continue aiding the patients, while accounting for any help they will begin to need. Financially, too, this is something that concerns our subculture quite a bit.
January 31, 2011
USA Today Wireframes
The design that I'm going to move forward with is a modular design. This webpage is meant to be totally customizable. In the first page, the user (Stacy_007) has arranged her news categories in to how important they are to her. The same thing is happening on the next page, where she has click into the category "news" and she has also arranged the subcategories to her liking. Although, on this page, categories that she sees as unimportant are still present on the screen. They're just much smaller. From there, she can choose and article, which she can annotate as she reads. When she's done reading, she can choose to submit her annotations as comments, and see what other people had to say about it.Other layouts:

I'll be working elements of these pages into the chosen layout.Brainstorming:
USA Today Improvements
To begin with, there are multiple links on any given page that lead you to the same place. Since the pages seem like they go on and on forever, they could really clear up some space by removing all the duplicates.When then primary navigation is hierarchically distinguished by being in a bar at the top, being in buttons, and being color coded, there's really no reason to put them again further down the page...and again at the bottom.
When you visit the site, you do seem to have the option to create a member account. But the benefits of this account are limited, allowing you to comment and subscribe to get emails. That's...about it. Granted, I didn't spend a lot of time signing up and browsing. SO, if they DO have more features available, I should be able to see them better.
And as previously mentioned, the pages go on forever, and the articles within each category are not organized in any particular method. hierarchy of individual articles could be improved, if there is any. And if there isn't any that is more important that another, for goodness sake, take them out of those boxes that they're almost randomly places in.
Design research, Designing for Interaction
- qualitative - is a smaller range and asks why and how
- quantitative- more general statistics, asks what. Really large groups surveyed.
- Qualitative is the kind of research that we want to do because it is more personal and gives us an idea of aspects like the cultures behaviors, values, motivations.
- It's essential to remain neutral toward the group you're researching, even though you need to be empathetic.
- Being ethical is also essential with interacting with the audience.
- Collect information long enough, and patterns will emerge. This is what you map.
- When interviewing, note things besides their answers. Note the tone in their voice, body language, etc.
- we must both observe an interpret:
- behaviors
- cultures
- belief systems
- attitudes
Ethnography - the study pf people in their own environment
It's important that as designers we are familiar with ethnography, so that we can research and analysis the people we are trying to appeal to.
Symposium Concept Map
January 27, 2011
Preliminary Research: Baby Boomers
- Defining a Baby Boomer
Generally.
Beginning with the secondary research, we thought it would be a good idea to see what makes this generation worth having its own name. Baby boomers are all of the Americans born between the years 1946 and 1964 beginning after World War II ended(this is also a generation in other countries like Canada, Australia, Great Britain, etc. But they have different names for this group in those countries) . Now, this group is about 29% of the population, about 75 million. But it's not just the time in which they were born. More definitely, it is the time during which they grew up that makes them so special.
BabyBoomerHeadQuarters is a great overview source for this. Fascinating stuff!
Economically:
- Boomers represent the majority of the work force, although, this is beginning to shift.
- The huge growth of the economy is because of boomers reaching their peak earning and spending years.
- Biggest buying group, currently-dominating big-ticket spending in areas like travelling (vacations), car sales, etc.
- Day care centers largely came to existence because boomers (so they also began the shift from staying home to take care of their kids)
- largely, advertising has been following this generation since they were kids. The story goes like this:
30 million baby boomers are around by 1950. Who comes along? Gerber, now probably the best known baby food company. The kids start to grow, and so does the toy industry, at a ridiculously fast pace. TV is just becoming big. So is children's programming. Disneyland pops up in in the 1950s as well. Later, in the 70s (now that the kids are a little older) Disneyworld is build and filled with thrill rides. Flashy cars of the 60s and 70s are also a result of catering to the Boomers.
Other products that are getting big because of this subculture: "active retirement communities and vacation homes, skin creams, tooth whitening goo, cosmetic surgery, lasik surgery, Depends, and, of course, the Hair Club for Men."*
And because I don't want to type this all out, I'll copy this directly:
Social Impact:
"Aside from that, what impact on society are boomers having? Well, let's see now... the CEO of General Electric is a boomer; the CEO of IBM is a boomer; the CEO of Ford is a boomer; Bill Gates, Paul Allen and Steve Ballmer (Microsoft) are boomers; Steve Jobs is a boomer; Steven Spielberg is a boomer; Ron Howard is a boomer; Tom Hanks is a boomer; Denzel Washington is a boomer; Meg Ryan is a boomer; Michael Jordon is a boomer. The producers of most TV shows and movies are boomers. The editorial page editor of the Wall Street Journal (Paul Gigot) is a boomer. Rush Limbaugh is a boomer; Oprah is a boomer; Barack Obama is a boomer; Mitt Romney is a boomer. Madonna is a boomer; Bruce Springsteen is a boomer; Tom Cruise is a boomer; David Letterman is a boomer; Jay Leno is a boomer; Dr. Laura is a boomer. Clarence Thomas is a boomer; Sean Hannity is a boomer; Glenn Beck is a boomer; Al Gore is a boomer; Bill and Hillary Clinton are boomers; Ben Bernanke, the chairman of the Federal Reserve System, is a boomer; Sarah Palin is a boomer; Osama bin Laden is a boomer; George Bush is a boomer; Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts is a boomer; every potential candidate for the Supreme Court for the next 20 years will likely be a boomer."
25 Defining Images in Baby Boomer History - pretty self-explanatory
"As a group, they were the healthiest, and wealthiest generation to that time, and amongst the first to grow up genuinely expecting the world to improve with time."
"In the 1960s, as the relatively large numbers of young people became teenagers and young adults, they, and those around them, created a very specific rhetoric around their cohort, and the change they were bringing about.[4] This rhetoric had an important impact in the self perceptions of the boomers, as well as their tendency to define the world in terms of generations, which was a relatively new phenomenon."
Terms:
"Jones Generation" - the second half of the baby boomers generation. The name comes from the phrase "keeping up with the Joneses." Supposedly, the Jonesers were given huge expectations as children in the 60s, and then were confronted with a different reality in the 70s and 80s. Also, it seems they are "less optimistic, distrust of government, and general cynicism."
"Golden Boomers" - Boomers who are retired or will retire from an occupation or profession.
In the 1985 study of US generational cohorts by Schuman and Scott, a broad sample of adults was asked, "What world events over the past 50 years were especially important to them?" For the baby boomers the results were:
- Baby Boomer cohort #1 (born from circa 1946 to 1955), the young cohort who epitomized the cultural change of the sixties
- Memorable events: the Cuban Missile Crisis, assassinations of JFK, Robert Kennedy, and Martin Luther King, Jr., political unrest, walk on the moon, risk of the draft into the Vietnam War, anti-war protests, social experimentation, sexual freedom, drug experimentation, civil rights movement, environmental movement,women's movement, protests and riots,Woodstock, mainstream rock from the Beatles to Jimi Hendrix and the R and B style of Motown.
- Key characteristics: experimental, individualism, free spirited, social cause oriented
- Key members: Former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, Former U.S. President George W. Bush
- Baby Boomer cohort #2 or Generation Jones (born from circa 1956–1964)
- Memorable events: Watergate, Nixon resigns, the Cold War, lowered drinking age in many states 1970-1976 (followed by raising), the oil embargo, raging inflation, gasoline shortages, Jimmy Carter's imposition of registration for the draft, disco music from Donna Summer and The Bee Gee's, punk or new wave from The Clash and Deborah Harry and techno pop to Annie Lennox and MTV.
- Key characteristics: less optimistic, distrust of government, general cynicism
- Key members: Douglas Coupland who initially was called a Gen Xer but now rejects it and President Barack Obama who many national observers have recently called a post-Boomer, and more specifically part of Generation Jones
CURRENT CONCERNS (pre interview assumptions)
"Baby Boomers control over 80% of personal financial assets and more than 50% of discretionary spending power. They are responsible for more than half of all consumer spending, buy 77% of all prescription drugs, 61% of OTC medication and 80% of all leisure travel."*
boomers start retiring during 2007–2009.
With a grain of salt, since this is from a 1993 article:
42% of baby boomers were dropouts from formal religion, a third had never strayed from church, and one-fourth of boomers were returning to religious practice. The boomers returning to religion were "usually less tied to tradition and less dependable as church members than the loyalists. They are also more liberal, which deepens rifts over issues like abortion and homosexuality."
As of 1998, it was reported that, as a generation, boomers had tended to avoid discussions and planning for their demise and avoided much long-term planning.
Baby Boomers are in a state of denial regarding their own aging and death and are leaving an undue economic burden on their children for their retirement and care.
Alzheimer's Defining Disease of the Baby Boomers
Continuing work after retirement
New Issues as Boomers continue to Age
Information Architecture Readings
- Location
- Alphabet
- Time
- Category
- Hierarchy
- make sure the appearance portrays the relationships between things on the page.
- larger, bolder, in a distinctive color, more white space, nearer to the top, etc.
- things that are related logically are also related visually, via grouping below a heading, similar style, or putting them in one area.
- nest things that are part of other things.
- conventions are what allow us to scan through information faster, because we know the significance of each portion of the page (ie. a headline, a caption, an image)
- conventions seem pretty universal, with only slight variations
- they're conventions because they work well, saves effort on the designer and the user side of things.
- suck it up and utilize them, don't be pretentious. OR
- make something that is clear and self-explanatory, or so incredibly useful that it is worth adding a bit of a learning curve (and hopefully eventually making it into a new convention)
- divide the page into areas so that users can quickly choose what to focus on, and which to ignore.
- once a section is ignored though, people almost never use it.
- let this be mindless, it's not something users want to waste time looking around for
- distinguish buttons as buttons, links as links
- look to conventions again, to help clarify this
- everything is visual noise, so try to get rid of what you can
- busy-ness is when everything is competing for attention
- and background noise is all the small things that add up
- number of clicks that a user has to make to get to any given page can be costly to their attention/patience
- there are obvious clicks and ones you have to search for. people will click more, if the clicks are very obvious.
- mindless is good, don't confuse the poor people
- give all levels of the site the same amount of thought and planning, don't just assume that the user will understand then navigation after 2 clicks
- have all levels worked out before even thinking about the finer details
- The text lines (measure) are too long
- 100% scalable is not a reader friendly solution: Don’t make me think, ok, but don’t make me resize my window either
- Lack of whitespace
- Lack of active whitespace
- Linespacing is too narrow
- The text blocks are not well aligned
- Too many font sizes
- Pictures are badly placed and disrupt the reading ease
- Text-background color contrast
- Lazy handling of titles and subtitles
- Text sizes
- Text blocks that are not split up into enough small, scannable, digestible parts
- Indiscernible links. Visited and non visited links are not discerned
- Text is not treated as an interface but as decoration
- It’s not clear if the text is a navigational element, a link or plain text
- Fancy navigations marking the center of attention (content is the center of attention, content deserves the most love from the designer)
December 5, 2010
Helping Hands Final Process and Comments






Too big. Too small. Just right! The hand were supposed to link together, and lay flat(so they could stack).

December 3, 2010
Portfolio
Here's my shot at making a portfolio, the project that never ends. Since taking these snapshots, I've already edited it. Several times.
December 1, 2010
Nonlinear Final Statement


November 23, 2010
Readings and Analysis.
- Show your outline to the audience from the beginning. It's good to let people know what's coming up.
- If you can't talk that well, then let the visuals do the bulk of your talking.
- Be unpredictable in your voice and gestures and style.
- Combine formal language with informal talk. Makes people feel more comfortable.
- Give the right amount of information at once. Not too much or too little; enough to keep attention, but not overwhelm them.
- Tell jokes through your visuals. Humor makes people comfortable (the right kind of humor, at least).
- If you have to read, keep it short. No one has a long attention span for that. Plus, you're messing with their inner voice that's trying to read what you're reading at the same time.
- Lastly, let your audience know how long your presentation is, and how far you are into it.
- Uses simple graphics, they're not pretty, but they are direct.
- Short slides, concise but interesting statements that go along with each slide
- Cute jokes that are relevant to the subject, but they make the audience more comfortable and interested
- he knows his subject, has technical fact (but they're explained well so that everyone can understand them)
- he makes personal anecdotes, shows that he's interesting in his subject. very enthusiastic.
- numbers his points, so you have an idea of where he is in the presentation.
November 16, 2010
Narrative: Simplified Communication Model
I took some of the details/descriptors out of the model. I think that for this project, I want that information to be reveal instead of already given to the viewer. I'm excited to try and animate this into a non-linear, interactive model.
November 11, 2010
November 10, 2010
Project 7
Text Fact from Kelsey Anderson on Vimeo.
House from Kelsey Anderson on Vimeo.
Growing Up from Kelsey Anderson on Vimeo.
And here is the videos placed into a fake webpage. I didn't go ahead and make a full-out webpage, since that wasn't really the focus of my project, but I did add some shapes and the organization logo to try and simulate some of the noise that would be on a real webpage. The animations would rotate through, and loops and continue to play until the viewer moved to a new page. The best way I can think of describing it is like a web reel.
Web Mock-up from Kelsey Anderson on Vimeo.
Edited Logo Build from Kelsey Anderson on Vimeo.
And my logo build. I've got the visual aspect down but could add a few things. I need to add the actual name, "PlayDates" to the logo build somewhere, since you don't know what PD stands for otherwise. Also, some sort of sound could help.
Poverty Simulation Brainstorming



These simple models were what we made to tried and organize our thoughts after we did all our mind mappings. The three directions we came up with were:

The school incentive turned out to be a bit too much. And we were kind of having trouble finding a good design solution. Oops. So we'll be dropping the school idea, and elaborating, refining, and trying to work out our other ideas, while creating a new one.
November 7, 2010
Koenig Layouts : Round 4? 5?





If you can't tell, I'm a huge fan of the illustrated images. I sucked the colour out of all of the images, and did a little correcting to make them have higher contrast. And no, I am not going to make them duo-tone images. They will remain black and white. My Pull-out quotes are a vibrant orange, and I've got blues for the titles. Still tweaking the colors, and I also need to add some images from outside the ones given to us. I seemed to have read over this requirement initially. womp womp.
Narrative Reel Pieces
Untitled from Kelsey Anderson on Vimeo.
Untitled from Kelsey Anderson on Vimeo.
Communication model

- needs title
- feedback dots need to be something else, too many dots
- need to show a directional element at the beginning
- some people seem to read along the feedback path before reading the actual model
- shadows too harsh
- channel is blocking the message
- "receiver" is not the appropriate word?
- improve color pallet and type












