Information Design: Exercises

GCD60504 Information Design 4.1.22 - 21.1.22 (Week 1 - Week 3)
Wendy Seto / 0348805
GCD60504 Information Design / Bachelor of Design (Hons) in Creative Media / Taylor's University
Exercises

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INSTRUCTIONS

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PRACTICAL

Exercise 1: Quantify Data

After a quick tour through our module information booklet and assessment briefing, Miss Anis assigned us to do the first exercise which is Quantify Data. In the physical class, she has prepared legos and buttons. But because I am not there, I have to find something else in my house.

I actually have a lot of options when it comes to these kind of things because I am a sucker for useless-but-cute things. When Miss Anis said that she have a collection of pens and markers, even the dead ones. She still keep them because they are simply “pens” and I can totally relate to her. I finally chose these beads for this exercise just because they are small and colourful so that I can manage to do my work in an A4 sized paper as instructed.

fig 1.1 my beads collection 4/1/22

The first step that we have to do is sectioning the objects we are using, but there is not much that I can do since my beads are pretty much sectioned already.

fig 1.2 beadsssss 4/1/22

I did not make any sketch of my layout, instead I just go with the flow. I organized the beads to make it look like braceletes and not gonna lie it was really therapeutic. It might look simple to you but the entire process took me approximately 4 hours because the round beads like to run away, I would definitely cry if I accidentally nudged them. 

fig 1.3 process 6/1/22

fig 1.4 quantify data attempt 6/1/22

fig 1.5 quantify data attempt 6/1/22

Miss Anis said it is so cute, she advised me to make the title more prominent and add “beads collections” as the subtitle. I was so nervous to write on the paper because i might 99% ruined it but I am doing it anyway. 

fig 1.6 final quantify data 6/1/22

Exercise 2: L.A.T.C.H Infographic

The L.A.T.C.H principles are a way to organize a group of information into a visual poster. This exercise sounds a lot of fun and I was actually really excited to start working on it. At first, I wanted to do Pokemon as it is one of the suggested compiled data listed by Miss Anis, but I think there are already too many people doing it. At the same time, some other Nintendo games crossed my mind so I decided to do some visual research and exploration on it.

Idea Exploration

Growing up, Nintendo is my most precious possession. I used to play so many games from Harvest Moon, Pokemon, Mario Kart, Mario Party, Tamagotchi, Cooking Mama and many more. I loved the fact that it does not need an internet connection to be able to play it and we can do multiplayer with our siblings or neighbors. Even until today, I still have my Nintendo and play it sometimes. I am pretty sure that no other video game can ever replace the classic Nintendo in my heart. It holds my childhood and it has became a part of me since day 1. Furthermore, I have chosen these 3 Nintendo games that I think would look cool as an infographic poster.

Idea #1 Harvest Moon Grand Bazaar

Harvest Moon Grand Bazaar is my favourite Harvest Moon game out there. Since I am already familiar with all the characters in Zephyr Town, I think it will not be hard for me to organize the information based on their house locations.

fig 2.1 idea #1


fig 2.2 existing harvest moon infographics

Idea #2 Hello Kitty Big City Dreams

Hello Kitty Big City Dreams is also my favourite Hello Kitty game on Nintendo. I am imagining a cute and feminine infographic poster from the Sanrio characters, organized based on their working locations.

fig 2.3 idea #2

fig 2.4 existing sanrio infographics

Idea #3 Tamagotchi P's

We have Tamagotchi games on Nintendo as well but for this Tamagotchi I wanted to use characters from Tamagotchi P's. Since I own it, I am pretty familiar with the characters. The figure below shows the characters for Tamagotchi Friends. The only difference is that in Tamagotchi P's there are no Bakuhoshitchi and Painaputchi which is why I am crossing them out. For this data, I am thinking of organizing them based on their stages of development as well as their gender. However, I will not be including the adult characters since there are too many of them.

fig 2.5 idea #3

fig 2.6 existing tamagotchi infographics

Idea Visualization

I decided to continue working with my third idea which is the Tamagotchi P's characters. And because it is originated from Japan, I wanted to make something "Japanese". I have always love everything about Japan even though I have never been there. Japan has literally the "kawaii-est" stuffs and I am totally obsessed with it. I am a big fan of Japanese mangas and the covers have never dissapoint me. I found this Sailor Moon comic cover on Pinterest that I really like the colours so I decided to use it as my colour palette.

fig 2.7 colour palette

I started up with creating the Tamagotchi shape.

fig 2.8 the tamagotchi shape 20/1/22

I asked Miss Anis about using graphics from other sources and she said we are allowed. But turns out I cannot seem to find any of the characters' images in high resolutions so I have to recreate them in illustrator. These took me like 8 hours in total.

Data & Images source

fig 2.9 recreating pinkbotchi 20/1/22

fig 2.10 recreating the rest of the characters 21/1/22

The only graphic that I did not illustrate by myself is this Tamagotchi icon/text/title in Japanese. I only did some masking on the background so I can use it as png in my poster design.

fig 2.11 graphic taken from other source 

fig 2.12 progress 21/1/22

fig 2.13 final L.A.T.C.H infographic.jpg 21/1/22

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REFLECTION

I had a lot of fun doing these exercises. The quantify data exercise triggered our brain to think in a more creative way when it comes to categorizing things. It is definitely more interesting than tables and charts. The same goes with the L.A.T.C.H exercise which taught me how to organize information based on its principles. In addition, I am satisfied with my work for both exercises, especially the poster. I really like how the final outcome turned out, it has that retro vibe that I intended in achieving. The colour palette makes me feel like I am somewhere in a game center. And the most important thing is that I enjoyed the entire process since the subject  I used are the things I like since I was a kid. Beads and Tamagotchi are both parts of my childhood, so anything about them always give me a warm nostalgic feeling.