Alleylight Interactive Reflective Statement
Alleylight Interactive is a project based on improving the atmosphere of a dark late night alleyway, my role in this project is to design visual assets that help the aesthetic of the project as a whole.
The theme is based on the stream that ran underneath Aotea Square (Orsman, 2011) and the objects that float through the stream represents the man-made impact on the stream. Aotea Square has a long history and having players interact with the stream helps bring more aspects of Aotea Square to life, such as the swampy area that is now Aotea Square that used to have traps to catch food (Lewis, 2008). Another aspect of our theme is a tropical type setting, which helps people relax more because the tropics are commonly associated with holiday and time-off, “We were delighted; We were enthralled. Hawaii was fresh, magical.” (Adler, 2004, p. 22).
Our project had a slight evolution over that past twelve weeks. At first, all we wanted was for people to be able to feel more comfortable walking around Aotea Square at night. The idea of having something in the square that was interactive is a great start, but this project has evolved into an experimental game/plaything (Crawford, 2007). This project is designed to let players either stay or move along, but there’s nothing that holds the audience; like a challenge, for example.
Figure 1. Chris Crawford on Game Design, (Crawford, 2006, p. 6)
One main aspect of this project is the art style, which has been the most questionable aspect of this project throughout the semester. After some research we decided to go with a simplistic style with bright colours, inspired by the game, Kingdom Rush (Wong, 2014). We are aiming to make the audience feel comfortable as part of the aesthetic as a whole. According to Pastore (2011) cartoon themes can create a comforting experience for the audience and help defuse tension. Another reason for the style choice is because it’s much easier to replicate with multiple designers with much less experience than actual artists, which we experimented with. According to Duszczak (n.d) a simplistic art style can help make it easier for the audience to focus on what’s more important about the exhibition rather than trying to understand what the art style has to do with the rest of the exhibition.
Using crates and other objects as part of the assets to this project represent objects that would clog the stream in the experience. When I was designing the crates and barrels I did some research on the history of Aotea Square and tried to relate the crates and barrels to the history of Aotea Square. According to Orsman (2011) there was a stream that ran down under where Queen Street is and also ran into a swamp that is now Aotea Square, people used to use traps and other contraptions all around that area. The crates and barrels and other objects represent those objects that clutter the stream and swampy area in the past.
Developing the assets for this project was very interesting for me since I’ve never created anything with this particular art style. The methodology I used was a quantitative approach (Creswell, 2014) which involved making the artifacts quite early and getting feedback and observations from my peers. This methodology helped me develop the aesthetic along with the other designers in my group and it allowed everyone to observe from my perspective what part of the aesthetic could become.
Starting with a very basic look:
Development continues with this:
Thanks to Quinn Trethewey, I was able to create these assets using his concept drawings:
Using Adobe Illustrator, I could easily change anything about them when I was asked to. Using vectors was a great way to be able to adjust according to what was needed for the project. I would differently use Adobe Illustrator in the future especially when working with simplistic designs and bright colours. Heavy line-weights and shadows make these assets a lot more vivid, according to an article by Technical Drawing and Alphabet of Line (n.d). Using heavy line weights create the effect that they’re more important that other lines such as the thinner wood-grain lines. I used a wood-grain look to give the assets some texture while keeping the simple style.
What went well about this project was the communication with the team and how easily we were able to share files between each other. The project was managed well and we got most things done by our deadlines using Facebook messenger and Google Drive.
This is one of the plans we kept up to date with everyone in the group, this made sure we knew what was to be expected by each week’s meet-up.
What didn’t go so well was figuring out what type of art style to use and there was a lot of speculation on not using the cartoon-like art style and instead going with some Maori symbols and other patterns. In the end, due to time constraints, we ended up sticking with the more reliable art style that would mean letting us play test.
An idea for use in the future would be to place multiple versions of this exhibition over multiple locations around Auckland. There are a few constraints for this idea and that is security, cost and space. Aotea Square is a brilliant place to get started and I hope it goes well and according to what we’ve planned so far.
References:
Wong, L. (2014, September 10). Making Kingdom Rush: An Uruguayan tale. Retrieved August 12, 2017, from https://www.polygon.com/features/2014/9/10/6045757/kingdom-rush-uruguay
Duszczak, R. (n.d.). Why Cartoons Are Such Effective Communicators…. Retrieved October 10, 2017, from http://www.cartoonmotivators.com/blog/why-cartoons-are-such-effective-communicators/
Pastore, J. (2011, November 16). Why a Cartoon? You Might be Surprised by the Answer! Retrieved October 10, 2017, from https://www.rootinc.com/uncategorized/why-a-cartoon-you-might-be-surprised-by-the-answer/
Schulenkorf, N. (2011, July 22). Sustainable community development through sport and events: A conceptual framework for Sport-for-Development projects. Retrieved October 18, 2017, from http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1441352311000465
Orsman, B. (2011, May 9). Artist paints downtown garden vision. Retrieved October 3, 2017, from http://www.nzherald.co.nz/super-city/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501110&objectid=10724371
Lewis, M. (2008). Stream daylighting: identifying opportunities for Central Auckland: concept design. , N.Z.: Auckland Regional Council
Beach Visualization Relaxation: Free Relaxation Script. (2008). Retrieved October 5, 2017, from http://www.innerhealthstudio.com/visualization-relaxation.html
Adler, P. A., & Adler, P. (2004). Paradise laborers: hotel work in the global economy. Ithaca (N.Y): Cornell.
Crawford, C. (2007). Chris Crawford on game design. Indianapolis, IN: New Riders.
Creswell, J. W. (2014). Research design: qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.
TECHNICAL DRAWING & ALPHABET OF LINE. (n.d.). Retrieved October 2, 2017, from https://schoolworkhelper.net/technical-drawing-alphabet-of-line/