Text, Sequence & Interaction : Beginning, Middle and End

BRIEF

Beginning: Stage 1

Aristotle proposed that drama should be thought of in terms of three acts. Plays, he suggested, consist of a beginning, a middle and an end. Using string, produce a visual representation that suggests a beginning, a middle and an end. Your 3d string experimentation should be translated into print, but can be to any scale, or format, that you feel appropriate. When considering size however think about standard paper sizes and what is economically and environmentally sustainable.

You may use the string provided or use different types or quantity of string

Idea

For this part of the Project I have to illustrate a beginning, middle and a end with a piece string. The way I show the story/narrative can be in any form as long as it has these three elements and made from string.

The Book is about a young man called Kunta Kinte who was ipped away from his village of Juffare in Gambia and bought as a slave to Annapollios, Maryland United States.I Have Seen the Movie Adaptation of the original book by Alex Haley. As the story goes on and Kunta Kinte starts a family each generation it seems they have lost thier Roots from africa and are more westernised and integrated in the american lifestyle. Customs and traditions that Kunta Kinte had since he was in africa are filtered out from generation to generation. In some way i could relate to this story because Im the first generation of my family to have grown up in United Kingdom and I have lost some of my roots even though my dad does try keep certain customs going.

My Chosen Story

Design Objectives

My goal is to use string to show how I identity and traditions are lost through a period of time. The end result will need to clearly show a beginning middle and a end and they should be easily identifailble.

Becasue my idea is to show the lost of culture, heritage and identity over a period of time the first idea that came into my head was to make a time line. First of all I started to rap the string around a piece of mountboard then i thought wht if I made the gaps bettween each strand of string bigger and bigger to show the integration of the western civilastion to Kunta Kintes family.Image on the right hand side is the very first thing I made with my string. The concept is very simple as the string unwinds more it shows black card = the loss of identity.This design is nowhere near finished looking at it because the main objective is to show a beginning middle and a end and so far its unclear. I’ll have to think of a way I can make obvious that there is ment to be three separate sections on the same piece of mount board.

The image above is the continuation from the first string object I created. I made another time line this time i separated the three different acts so its more visible that it has a beginning , middle and a end. Even though it is much clear that there is three acts i preferred it when it was a single bar then being apart like that Each of the pieces can be easily lost. Being a single bar represents Kunta Kintes Family in america they all lived on the same plantation farm and the next generation grew up on it.

With this experimentation I was just looking at another shape other than the single bar Idea. In all fairness I do not like this shape it looks awkward and not balanced like the bar. i also had problems wrapping the string around it so i had to make it section by section. From making this shape I got the idea of closely making the three sections the same lentgh but the gaps will be bigger. On the single plank it will show that there is three different sections beginning, middle and a end.

Final Development

This is my final 3D object which illustrates the story of “Roots” on a single plank of mount board. You can see the gaps getting bigger and bigger reinforcing the idea of lost identity. The best thing I like about this plank is that it can be read in different terms for example just looking at it I could say its also showing the gradual integration of slaves in american society after is emancipation in 1865. Part of the project requires the 3D object has be to be transferred to print for my design its easy I can either scan it in our take photographs. I dont want to do anything more to it because I want the message to speak clearly and be easy for the end user to read. If they don’t get the design I would have failed this part of the project.

I toke various photographs of my timeline and i was not happy with the way it looked even though the photographs are decent my message and idea have been lost. The loss of identity overtime is not that visible as when the plank was scanned in and flat. I also like the colouring in the plank thats laid flat it looks distressed and worn out over a period of time. I did anticipate that I will have difficulties in photographing my final outcome but im pleased I gave it a go and tried something different. My favourite photo out the ones I toke is the 2nd one on the bottom row I like how the aperture has focused on a particular part of the plank and blurred the rest making it the focual point.

This is the final print image for my stage one. I choose to use a sans serif typeace rather than a serif becasue it looks more formal and sutle the serif typeface i looked at was to blocky and ominate and toke the attention away from the final piece itself. I also Placed the text away from the image to give it some distance so they don’t clash.

CLICK IMAGE FOR HI RES

KudzD