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Week 4 –Projecting a New Perspective

Updated: Sep 27, 2023

This week, I am going to source a scientific, cultural or environmental story that matters to me and create a piece of information design that presents the story effectively. I feel like last week’s competition has asked this from me due to the theme being cultural – I'm not sure whether I should develop on last week’s theme of dyslexia or challenge myself in a new area. To get a better idea of what I am going to be basing my workshop on, I am going to study and review current trends, political viewpoints and technologies.


SIDE PROJECT //

Big Fish : Rubbish Design Competition (Due 22/02/21)

Big Fish is a brand, design and marketing consultancy that has set up a design competition with the opportunity to win a job or cash prize.


The objective is to explore what is wrong with the bin category and demonstrate how I would position, brand, package and market a newcomer.


Bin bag category

  • Bin liners

  • Recycling Bags

  • Rubbish Bags

  • Food Waste


What is wrong with the bin bag category?

  • Consumers still get confused with what is non-recyclable

  • Seen as something that is un-reusable. I think 'rubbish' automatically dissociates from recycling. Also a phrase used to describe something as useless.

  • People earning a low income cannot afford bin bags - I remember my mother having to use free shopping bags. Are there any bin bags in food banks?

  • Covid-19 infectious waste - I didn't even know that was a thing

  • Cleaners are required to throw away rubbish, even when the bags are less than half full (Observation from being a cleaner).

  • Seagulls find ways of getting into the seagull proof sacks

  • It costs money to be sustainable (degradable bags).



Workshop session

For this session, me and a small group were generating ideas and a better understanding of what the brief is asking of us.

In pairs, we had to come up with a 'rubbish' product and give it a name. Our idea was the 'No bag for life', which was recommended to be changed to 'naked rubbish'. The idea is to have a DIY rubber lining that you can fit into your bin and reuse once emptied into the outside bin.

Collaborative Workshop

Ideas to build on this:

  • Raincoat bin lining - strong material, washable and reusable.

  • What if there was only one big bin bag for the outside bin. This would complement the 'naked rubbish idea' because you would empty out your kitchen bin into the outside bin, which will act as one big rubbish bag. The UK council are not yet open to the idea of loose rubbish due to the fact that it isn't hygienic and loose rubbish would fly away - this would reduce the amount of plastic bags required and keep intact for fast and efficient collection.

Why do outside bins need to be outside anyway? Couldn't we just have a big bin inside and have a garbage air freshener?

  • use recycled plastics


Idea generation

Brief never said it needs to be a bin-bag, just as long as it is within the bin-bag category.

  • Juice cartons and milk cartons don't get recycled? As a vegan, all the nut milks are in a carton. Could nut milks be re-packaged into milk plastic bottles but still be cheaper than innocent nut milk?

  • One big bag replaces many black bags - environmentally friendly, convenient to rubbish collectors, and saves money in the long run.

  • Something that can absorb garbage juices and can degrade naturally. Would this be a padding inside the rubbish bag, or would it be a linen at the bottom of the kitchen bin? Is it scented?

  • Each council in England collects plastic recycling differently (39 sets of rules). What if the bin bag has a QR Code, the app could tell you if it's recyclable once you select the region you are in as default. What if you could use the same app to scan products as you shop, which will reduce the amount of packaging being put in the bin due to lack of knowledge.

Look at Wales' system because they are 3rd for recycling in the world.


TED Talk by Robin Nagle

  • 11,000 tons of garbage everyday

  • Sanitation workers become invisible until something is wrong. Maybe there should be a message on the bin bag to say 'thank you'. They maintain a flow in everyday life - the oil in a working clock.


Key term- Aspirational recycling. In stead of wishful recycling and putting the other recycling at risk, what if there was an extra recycling bin for objects people aren't sure about? Wish-cycling bag collection! https://www.ted.com/talks/aparna_nancherla_the_joy_of_taking_out_the_trash?utm_campaign=tedspread&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=tedcomshare



Chosen Concept: 39 different rules

Each council in England collects plastic recycling differently (39 sets of rules).

  • Wish-cycling bag: an extra recycling bag for items you are not sure about. I looked at other recycling tables to inspire the colour of my recycling bag.

  • What if the bin bag has a QR Code, the app could tell you if it's recyclable once you select the region you are in as default. What if you could use the same app to scan products as you shop, which will reduce the amount of packaging being put in the bin due to lack of knowledge.

  • Subscription bags by region. Printed on bin bags (info-bag) to say what can be recycled. Maybe it's just the packaging that can be hung up on the fridge - keep you updated on changes being made.

Help QR code on specific items can be seen on packaging.

Name ideas:

  • Regional Rubbish

  • Load of Rubbish

  • Confused Rubbish

  • Rubbish Rules (rules as in 'cool' and 'regulations')

Brabantia's icon looks like a combination of a recycling symbol and a house, so I decided to play with this concept through a question mark. The purpose of my fictional brand is to prevent misinformation and confusion on what can be recycled, which will be achieved by spreading awareness before people throw their rubbish in the bin - the question mark icon is directed at the consumer. is it really rubbish? Lets go check!

I liked the AltaCalifornia type (individualised letters) because it makes me think of scraps of newspaper being reused. Below you can see my process of choosing my typeface, which was focusing on which question mark would be most adoptable to the recycling symbol - a wide san-serif is most suitable.

Star indicates chosen piece


RESEARCH //

Lecture

  • 1086 AD, England – The Doomsday Book. This book has immense detail on the landholding and resources of the late 11th century – knowledge of where resources lay and where taxes could be gathered .

  • England 1801 – first official country wide census obtains an accurate picture of a population’s wealth, influence and individuals during the threat of France’s invasion.

  • Today - Regular national census every 10 years asks about income, sexual orientation, family relationships, workplace conditions, occupation and religion. Offical and legible design neutralises the amount of power behind that information and what it gives authorities; gives them the ability to understand their population, consider welfare distribution, public services and public policy development.



Misuse of information

Nigel Farage misuses numbers around immigration in order to create a particular perception and politicisation of demographic change.

Empathy to Anger

Reminds me of Patrick Thomas' Breaking News project because the database bases the results and news you receive from interests and doesn’t show opposing viewpoints – everyone is getting different information.


Emotive Imagery manipulated to convey the opposite effect. Death of a migrant child completely changed perception of what was happening



Future Laboratory

Developing a rigorous methodology and process of research, which they call Cultural Triangulation, they work with brands, cultural organisations and others, to forecast future needs. This has given me a clear idea of where to start with my workshop research.

Fallen Leaves by Menashe Kashiman at the Jewish Museum in Berlin

This installation contains more than 10,000 faces of victims of war, cut from iron plates. This is a physical representation of a pictograph, although, I think they should be spray painted for colour coding who they were. I like the fact that they are a bit like leaves - all are different in some way. I can see smaller versions of the plates, which I assume are children.


The exhibition is 2 floors heigh, which adds to the drama because it makes the room feel emptier and adds an echo sound as you walk on the iron faces. I notice how I immediately wanted to reword the description to 'iron plates' - maybe to try and dehumanise them for less guilt. Maybe the iron represents how Germans dehumanised them.


I like how quantitive data has been turned into something qualitive.


Social Chartology

  • Charles Booth, was an enquiry into life and labour in London between 1886-1903. An early example of social cartography, each street is coloured to indicate the income and social class of its inhabitants. Through direct first hand research and through detailed consultation with police records and residents, he mapped wealth and poverty throughout the streets of London. Booth’s attempts to visualise inequality and poverty was a revolutionary and controversial act at the time. But through making this information visible and public, over time it forced government to respond, directly intervening against poverty in the early 20th century and contributing to the creation of old age pensions and free school meals for the poorest children.

  • Police release crime maps so the public can be aware of the crime in their area. Useful when moving houses but also to predict future crime.

  • Bomb Sight- mapping bomb sensers. Photographs and narratives from specific areas. 20,000 killed. Bombs came in 3’s. 31,000 bombs in total.

  • Grenfellmediaarchive.org. the Grenfell Tower tragedy, aims to create a powerful and freely-available resource for members of the public to explore and better understand the events of the night of the fire. By inviting members of the public to submit their video footage of the fire, they intend to build a complex and evolving picture of what happened and why.

Look at :


Forensic Architecture research agency at Goldsmiths, University of London (2018), What is Forensic Architecture?


Forensic Architecture (FA) is a research agency, based at Goldsmiths, University of London. They undertake advanced architectural and media research on behalf of international prosecutors, human rights organisations and political and environmental justice groups.

Being a designer isn’t only about whether you take this or that commission, the morality of this or that project, but a way of acting politically as a citizen in the world. And of understanding the world through information in a way that other frameworks don’t allow.

The lecture replaced architect and architecture with designer and information. This quote resonates with me because these are the values I have. Although Spiekerman argues that designers need a balance between pay and doing the right project, which I also agree with because a designer needs a sense of purpose as well as money to pay for rent (and the motivation to push milestones).



It’s Nice That (June 2018), Nicer Tuesdays: Offshore Studio

Zurich-based graphic design studio Offshore – one of It’s Nice That’s ones to watch 2018. Christopher Miler and Isabel Seiffert designed Migrant Journal. Politically conscious, sensitive and striking at the same time


Related Links:


Migrant is the movement of people but also money, jobs and objects (trading), environment, information, resources. How do whales move? How do drones move in the sky?

Invisible and illegal parts of migration- drugs, trafficking, etc.



Alejandro Duran collected items from the beach, which contained many objects that have traveled across the globe. This reminds me of how Offshore referred to migration as the movement of an object rather than just people.


He was unable to recycle them due to how the damaged objects would ruin a whole batch, so Duran used them in his artwork. It makes me wonder whether damaged recycling can be moved to a facility where artists can gather free materials, which would also reduce landfill. Metals can be used over and over again but plastics can only be recycled a few times, is there a system that tells consumers how many times the plastic has been recycled? I ask these questions in reference to the 'rubbish' competition brief.


I like how these objects act as infographics and art at the same time, which aims to positively change behaviour. This reminds me of the Art-attack show, which teaches children how to make artwork out of household waste such as toilet rolls or water bottles.



DiSalvo, Carl (2012), ‘Chapter 2: Revealing Hegemony: Agonistic Information Design’ in Adversarial Design'


Keywords:

  • Agonistic- Conflict. Politicising cannot exist without the production of a conflictual representation of the world, which is what agnonistic information design is all about.

  • Transcoding- Converting from one form of coded representation to another (one format to another).

  • State Machine modeling- Design patterns that impacts everyday life through different software. System orientated rather than coding.

  • Proceduralism– the operational characteristic of computation. The ways arguments are embedded in the format.

  • Hegemony- Hegemony is a condition of associations and attachments to an issue, which can include individuals, organisations, ideologies and actions. Revealing hegemony is a tactic of exposing and documenting the forces of influence in society and the means by which social manipulation occurs. Marxist thought in Gramsci by defining hegemony from a position of class.


State Machine modeling

Josh On

This is an interactive mapping system that show how companies are connected via board members – shows the power of influence. A social network visualisation that acts as a censes for the US, which makes me wonder how this information is going to be used if it were to be public.

Oil Standardisation (2006) by Michael Mandiberg Installation of this web browser gives the value of an object into the value of crude oil. This demonstrates how information design and computational design can be brought together to construct a political expression that plays a part in everyday activities.


Computation information design

  • Information design includes typography, layout, diagrams, illustrations, documentary, photography, maps and visualisations.

  • Transcoding, procedurity and the network as a medium of storage, access and exchange are qualities of computational media- and have influenced a new way of acquiring, organising, transforming and presenting data (social media for example).

Ben Fry, Visualising data 2008.

Provides the process for doing computational information design (7 stages):

  1. Acquire- sourcing data from a file or the network

  2. Parse - deconstruct the data and categorise into different sections

  3. Filter - select data of interest

  4. Mine - discern patterns by figuring out what the minimum and maximum values for latitude and longitude are going to be for your visual model.

  5. Represent - visualise data into a visual model

  6. Refine - make the representation clear and visually engaging

  7. Interact - User testing stage, creating a chance to control what features are visible and see what needs improving for better user interaction.


WORKSHOP //

For this week's workshop challenge, I need to source a scientific, cultural or environmental story that matters to me and produce a piece of information design.


What am I passionate about?

  • Mental Wellbeing

  • Climate or Political Effects on health

  • The dyslexic brain

Austrialia's bush fire's effect New Zealand


1/3 landfill is architecture. Automative industry is the best for recycling. Makes me wonder what the rest of the landfill is made up of.

Nanocellulose, synthetic spider silk, enzymes


Housing for Health. The healthy living practices were washing, clothes, wastewater, nutrition, crowding, animals, dust, temperature and injury.

This graphic was used to help the illiterate understand the healthy living practices, putting an individual at the centre of each image to show how they rely on their physical environment to sustain their health.


I thought this was a very simple but excellent way of making the audience understand what low income families are going through. Once Paul Pholeros asked the audience to note down which house they would like, he revealed the ticks and crosses to inform most of the audience (65%) that they are unable to have a shower like they do everyday. This reminds me of my FH Foundation project that I mentioned last week - maybe this could be turned into an interactive social media game?

The graph represents the ratio of 7,800 houses that were surveyed in Australia.

0-5 years of age is a critical age because washing is an antidote to the diseases that affect skin, lungs, eyes, ears; it permanently damages the body for the rest of their life due to the first 5 years being a crucial stage of development. This means an individual might not hear, see, or breath as well.


Other statistics included:

  • 90% unsafe electrical systems

  • 42% non-working toilet


Climate change and its health impacts

I was considering doing an infographic about how Austrialia's Bushfire's have a negative impact in New Zealand's air quality, however, I thought about keeping it local. After reading an environmental health essay by Jouni Paavola and considering Pholeros' TED talk, I noticed that people with lower incomes are more vulnerable to disease due to the bad architecture and location. As mentioned by Pholeros, bad architecture causes disease through lack of maintenance and no access to clean water, however, rising temperatures and bad building ventilation leds to respiratory and cardiovascular disease.


How can being poor influence health problems?


Architecture- Low maintenance, no access to clean water, can't afford heating bills is linked to cold-related deaths and low access to showers, bad building ventilation, located in a polluted area.

Food- Little access to fresh food, mainly processed. Malnourishment and heart related diseases.

Nursing homes- low budget homes serves lots of processed foods and not enough staff to attend to resident needs such as cleaning.

Shoes- tight fitting shoes deforms feet.

Asthma- effects 10% UK population with most of them coming from lower backgrounds. Outbreaks in asthma are caused by mould, pollution, cold air, pollen, stress, dust.

Crime - Lack of neighbourhood security causes regular stress and anxiety. Drugs are very common in low income neighbourhoods, and if a parent smokes infront of children, the child can develop bronchiolitus and cognitive developmental problems in attention, motivation and memory.



What if I can do an updated version of Charles Booth's economic map and list the diseases that people are vulnerable to?


The CDC website didn't say who designed this chart, but I do like how they have connected the diseases with the different types of climate change. Maybe I could make this similar to Nightingale's rose chart and show the proportion of deaths - could I compare lower class to higher class with overlapping the wedges?

CDC diagram


Change in direction: Covid-19 and the Poor

I decided to change the direction of my infographic slightly because I thought researching something more specific would make my data less generic - I can go into as much detail as I like with the visual statistics. And due to the current climate, most research and news is focused on the pandemic.


I think my previous idea to use the rose diagram doesn't work because as discussed last week, the data doesn't inform the viewer on the statistics. I did enjoy the interactive infographic used in the TED Talk, which would challenge my limited knowledge of interactive design.


How is Covid-19 affecting the poor?

  • Key workers such as cleaners can't afford not to work

  • zero-contract jobs don't get furlough

  • Less frequent maintenance work means risk of no shower?

  • Extra cost of masks and sanitiser to the list of necessities

  • Washing hands more frequently means more water and electric bills

  • People with a weekly budget (benefits) struggled during the first lockdown because everyone stocked up on necessities, leaving poor people with empty shelves and expensive toilet rolls

  • Even lower job prospects than before - causing mental health issues

  • No more free school meals

  • No access to computers for job searches or school lessons

  • Housing would have bad internet connection

  • Reliant on the internet would increase costs for electricity

  • No access to charity shop clothing

  • Lower metabolism because processed foods are cheaper

  • Poverty can play a major role in developing asthma, making them vulnerable to Covid-19.

  • Nearly 3 in 4 smokers are from lower-income communities. This is due to stress related to material hardship. And through experience, my mother's smoking was a way for her to reduce her appetite so she only needed 1 meal daily - coffee also helped reduce appetite. Smoking drugs is the social norm for this community, which also explains why loose tobacco would be popular to the lower community.

  • Overcrowded housing means less social distancing

  • Malnutrition creates a low immune system against the virus.

Asthmatics within low-income housing (during the pandemic)

In order to narrow my statistics, I have searched a common factor in both ideas. Asthmatics being listed as vulnerable during the pandemic and my previous idea talked about how architecture and the environment can influence its development. I think this will be an interesting one because it relevant to my own experience of growing up with asthma in low-income housing, and it will investigate how today's current events have affected this.


Questions to answer:

  1. Do parents smoke more?

  2. What is it like being an asthmatic during a pandemic? Do they avoid going out because of the mask requirement?

  3. What is is the ratio of child asthmatics within low income housing? And are there any other factors affecting them?

  4. What is the pandemic death ratio between asthmatics and other people?

Facts on Asthma UK

Asthma UK is a research centre that wants to stop asthma attacks, improve diagnosis and find a cure for asthma. They also support people with asthma to reduce their risk. So far, they have funded the replacement of steroid treatments that were ineffective for severe cases with a Xolair- growing up I remember there were occasions when the steroid treatment didn't work so I had to concentrate on my breathing before going to sleep, and luckily I woke up whenever I stopped breathing.

  1. According to Asthma UK, 47.3% off sufferers from low income have had more than wo asthma attacks in the past 12 months.

  2. 57.4% people have uncontrolled asthma, whilst people of higher incomes have well-controlled asthma.

  3. Deprived areas have poor air quality and exposure to mould, cold air and dust triggers.

  4. Many people still pay for their asthma prescriptions, so many lower income asthmatics skip their medication. The government website says people are entitled to free prescriptions if they are in full-time education, a pensioner, under 20 years old or receiving benefits, which seems adequate. So why are people still having trouble?

  5. People with asthma have more of a special type of a calcium receptor in the lungs than people without asthma, so they are currently developing a drug that blocks the receptor and reduces the airway inflammation. Plant-based diets have shown to reduce inflammation and because this diet is high in fibre, this improves lung function.

  6. Losing weight improves asthma related symptoms, which is difficult when food quality is reduced to being processed.

This research explains why my asthma drastically improved when I turned vegan and how my lockdown comfort food has worsened my condition; processed food is also listed as a trigger. I would think this would be difficult for people on lower income than me because fruit and vegetables are more expensive, however, being a student has taught me that frozen fruits and veg contain more nutrition and are cheaper. Would need to educate the public but this research is more of a theory, so I can't base my infographic on this.


Research areas I could go into

  • Diet and Asthma

  • Promoting funding towards Asthma UK

  • Smoking increases with the stress of Covid but makes children more vulnerable to developing asthma

  • Air quality inside and outside of deprived areas

Weather and exercise triggers more in children than adults. Smoking only seems to effect 37% of children, which is half the amount as weather. And pollen and the air pollution effects over half of adults and children, which can be worsened depending on the location of housing.


Weather, asthma and Covid-19

High humidity causes mild and dust mites to thrive. Air pollution goes up during hot weather. There is research suggesting pollution makes allergy symptoms worse. According to NASA, air pollution can make thunderstorms stronger, and the thunderstorms cause pollen grains to burst into smaller pieces, making it easier to be inhaled - this is called thunderstorm asthma. With less access to green spaces in these areas, the air quality cannot be improved.

Additionally, indoor air pollution can be caused by poor ventilation, which is common in deprived housing. The government suggested to keep windows open for ventilation, so it makes me wonder whether lower-income families caught Covid-19 quicker during Christmas compared to families with higher income housing? Indoor air pollution is also caused by smaller rooms, overcrowding, non-working kitchen fans, and opening windows in areas of high outdoor pollution.


Cold Dry Air is a trigger, but covering you mouth and nose with a mask helps humidify the air you breathe.


With Covid-19 causing people to stay at home, it is important to outline maintain issues in housing. 4.3 million homes do not meet the minimum requirements defined by the government's Decent Homes Standard.


IDEA 1: Compare number of UK Asthmatics to Asthmatics in deprived areas

1 in 5 people in the UK have asthma.

20% homeless people have asthma


IDEA 2: Pollution rises with asthma

IDEA 3: A house chart to show different levels of asthma


Stepping back

After my tutorial, I realise how I am overthinking this brief and how I am too set on statics because it is difficult to find local research specifically for low-income housing and the effects of asthma. I have thought of knocking on doors and surveying low-income areas, however, I would also need to measure the pollution levels within that area and compare it with an area with higher income. I have been reassured that I can illustrate my findings but there needs to be text to support it.


Apparently I can buy a pollutant measurer online but first I need to make sure I can access data on whether concentration levels of air pollution vary as you go through town. It would be ideal to be able to monitor air pollution within housing, however, the pandemic restricts me from doing this - I would need to back up my findings with research on what percentage of people with asthma have low income on average in the UK along with my research on how air pollution is the most common cause of asthma. additionally, I could also do some research on the housing market and discover what areas within Falmouth are most deprived. I should think lockdown would influence my results because most people are working from home and wouldn't need to use their car as often.

Advise from British Lung Foundation

According to British Lung Foundation, suggests to stay away from main roads and junctions, and to avoid rush hour because this influences the pollution build up. This supports the idea that even within a small town there can be different concentrations of pollution. As you can see below, air quality in Falmouth is good, however, the outskirts are slightly lower in quality so I am intrigued to know whether these areas are low income level.

A map of air quality in Falmouth

Due to Cornwall being well known for its lower area pollution, I have decided to focus on Weston-super-mare, a town near Bristol that I used to live - I noticed my asthma improving when I moved to Falmouth.


In D & AD awards 2020, there is a project called ' address pollution', which is a similar idea to what I had. It is a website that allows you to type in your address and informs you of he pollution levels as well as health issues that can be caused by living near this area. First I am going to map out the income levels, and then use this website to see the level of air pollution.

Falmouth (current address)
Weston-super-mare (old address)

REFLECTION //

This week's research has shown me different ways that I can communicate my story and I have concluded that I have no interest in politics. I enjoyed the more emotive projects such as 'falling leaves' and 'Grenfall tower tragedy', which both add qualitive features in completely different formats.


I found it difficult to think of what interests me. I suppose it is similar to asking someone what their favourite book is and all of a sudden you forget. Maybe it has something to do with your brain only being able to make connects when you are in the moment. Answering what interests you have is based off experiences and memory that acts as stored data, which can only be remembered when linked to familiar stimuli (creates a connection) - this reminds me of advertising techniques and how they connect memory with the brand's visual stimuli. Anyway, I found it helpful to reflect back on last week's blog because even though I don't see myself as enthusiastic about the environment as I do with social change, I did find a few pollution collecting projects very interesting- maybe due to how it considers the wellbeing of others (the impacts rather than the cause).


The feedback session allowed me to make a final decision on what I want to base my infographics on, which is climate change and its health effects. After reflecting on a TedTalk, I looked into the health effects of living within deprived areas, which led me towards more difficult decision making as there are several categories within this area to choose from. I did a lot of procrastinating so in the end I decided to make my work more relevant to what is currently going on with the pandemic and the role deprived areas are influencing asthma. As I have grown up with asthma within areas like this, I found it difficult to reframe from finding solutions to fix the problem rather than just informing people about the problem.


My time management hasn't been great this week due to the 'rubbish' competition being a bigger project than anticipated. I found it difficult to come up with an original idea for an industry that is often ignored in visual culture. At the time, I didn't realise how much of this week’s research contributed towards this project.


REFERENCES //

Side Project

Big Fish: Rubbish Brief


Research


Ideas Wall

Things I've looked at



Workshop Challenge

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