Week 3

Chosen protoype

BUT – I really loved the concept behind the t-shirts idea in week 2 concepts:

Therefore, I have done some thinking about how I could blend the two together because the t-shirts on their own is not enough, but the editorial could benefit from promotion of t-shirt sales alongside it. There are some things for me to think about here as yes, my audience is teenagers but for the age range I am targeting (15-20 year olds) their parents are most likely buying the younger end of the spectrum, their smart phones for them. Events such as birthdays, passing exams, christmas etc. will all factor into this; so here is my idea now that my thought process has evolved:

  • Produce an educational, informative 3 page spread raising awareness about the materials used in smartphones and the affects on the environment.
  • Teenagers could benefit from a playful campaign in that it will capture their attentions and spin the negative elements into a positive light. For example, don’t buy the new upgrade smartphone because all your friends have it/it’s fashionable when your phone does everything you need it to. Alternatively, purchase one of these playful campaign t-shirts that will fund towards sustainable mining practice and raising awareness around the impacts of smartphones in the 21st century.
  • Creating an editorial spread also means that the spreads can be distributed into all sectors of magazines, which makes my project audience much more flexible. I feel this would work really successfully due to targeting parents with various interests and hobbies; they are not going to read the same magazines. Therefore if my spread is created by myself with the notion that it is a versatile and educational spread to be put into a wide number of popular off the shelf magazines, the message would reach more people and therefore grow in strength.

Primary research

One of the reasons I chose this brief was because I have a passion for mineralogy and collect minerals. I have a grandfather who specialises in a very large Fluorite collection, and as a consequence he has given some to me over the years. I have taken pictures of all the Fluorite I own, removed all backgrounds in Photoshop and created a typology if you like of all of them together years ago (I just loved them all together; the colour range is fascinating!). I just think this could make really interesting features on the editorial – my mock-ups previously are all very basic in colour and image because I just wanted to ‘sketch’ digitally, but now is the time to start experimenting. Also I should mention, the reason I chose Fluorite was not only because that is the most of one mineral I own, but because Fluorite does actually exist in smartphones to make the phone case (Fluorite has great strengthening properties and is sometimes mixed with steel).

The original photos of my Fluorite collection

  • This one for below!
The transparent background images
All together in one image – small scale
After having tested out the image on the page; I’m not sure it is successful. There is a lot of white, and the rocks look like they’re floating. I have tried to do different colour and texture background but they didn’t look right and I think it’s just the small scale of the minerals themselves. I think for something like this project, large scale minerals will be better and more effective at getting my message across. I am glad I tried it though.

T-shirt development

Using the pink fluorite (labelled above) overlayed as clipping mask on the text, I experimented with other colours than black, because now my editorial has introduced hints of colour I feel the t-shirts should too. What’s interesting about Fluorite is that it glows in the dark; so I tried to pick colours I liked that looked almost neon:

After having experimented, I have to say I still much prefer the black (not in the above but in the general images). As my above experiments show; the text is blending into the black background of the t-shirt so I needed to adjust slightly.

Final t-shirts for editorial

Using the mineral background above the lettering as a clipping mask looks natural, and presents a better message. It’s funny how these t-shirts began as a playful, witty experiment but actually in the long run they’re simple and very effective at sending a message. I am excited to include them in my editorial as I think standalone they’re too simple, but with the editorial they may just add a personal element to it.
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