For my final project, I decided to make a prop that fits in a fictional world where enhancements exist in the form of beauty and medical products. You can find my project proposal here.
WEEK 1:
The first iteration of my project was intended for coming up with prop ideas and making very rough outlines of them. Because I wanted to create a product line of enhancing items, I found some things around my house that I could quickly adapt to test out my speculation.
The very low fidelity prototypes that I built are:
- Face lotion – meant for enhancing happiness sort of like taking melatonin or rubbing essential oils would
- Pill Bottle (pills) – meant for enhancing humor (a higher dosage = more humorous — this range I still want to think about)
- Patches – like nicotine patches but for enhancing skills of a certain type (release the stuff necessary to make you a better dancer, fisher, skier, swimmer, etc while you are wearing it, limited lifespan)
- Wax Melts – smelling enhances features (weight, height, etc — specific wax melt for different bodily changes)
While these are not quite the final ideas just yet, I wanted to test out some of the form factors and their accompanying enhancements to see how they fit. Below is an image of the prototypes:
WEEK 2:
During the second week of the project, I updated the 4 junky prototypes from week 1 into higher fidelity digitized labels through Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign.
For the pill bottle, I re-created a Rx label in InDesign based on the existing label from the original bottle. Because this bottle is showing what a prescribed version of happiness would look like, Dopamine was the main ingredient.
For the wax melts, I used the same label from the box and photoshopped it to show a different image. Then I imported it into InDesign to show the new FG Collective branding and the enhancement type — “Tall & Skinny”
For the sunscreen, I copied aspects of the original label and then changed the wording to portray the lotion as happiness enhancing:
For the patches, I used the basic outline of the Bandaid box to portray a patch as something that can temporarily help you when it sticks to you up to 24 hours:
WEEK 3:
This week, I updated my prototypes from week 2 to have better labels that all had the same theme. I chose purplish/blue colors to represent the products as a sort of luxury line with calming associations. Below are the finalized labels.
And here are some initial photographs:
Lastly, to further expand on the “Fairy Godmother” aspect of the project in the sense that sometimes wishes aren’t granted as you’d think, I put together a series of comparisons for the “best-case” vs “worst-case” scenario for each product:
Lotion for enhancing happiness:
Pills for enhancing humor:
Wax-Melts for enhancing height:
Patches for enhancing skills (drawing):
In each of the above scenarios, we can see that the result of enhancing is not an idealized one. These are meant provide insight into items that may initially seem only good but have the potential to develop in a different manner.
WEEK 4: Finalize physical form factors, finalize and print out photos (Dimension)
After playing around a bit more with the “weirdness” of this speculation, I changed each piece slightly and combined them with the enhancing scenarios in ad form.
First, I changed the lotion bottle to look a bit more strange. Instead of words on the front, I added chemical formulas to show that the product isn’t so typical. I then rendered this label on a bottle in Dimension and added to an ad based off of the SolarOil ad below.
Next, I altered the wax melts. The label now describes the wax melts as “squalaline oil infused” which is a type of future oil. It also includes that they are “prismane cubes” which describes the crystalline structure of the compound. Finally, they are weighed in special units that are unfamiliar. The inspiration is from a gatorade poster shown below.
Next, I worked on the patches. The patch box itself is was the most unique of all items and I liked the amount of strangeness that it possessed so I kept most things the same. I did change the color of the patch to purple to show it is no normal looking patch. The ad I created for this one emphasizes the product as something powerful. The ad I used as inspiration is below
Lastly, I updated the prescription bottle. I changed the symbol for the amount to be something foreign and changed the “Rx” typical prescription label to be another foreign sign. I also made the directions funky to show the atypical use of this drug. The ad was inspired by typical prescription drug ads found in magazines. The headlines are large and concise but straight to the point which is somewhat strange for such a unknown medication like “Humor”. The final pieces are below.
WEEK 5:
During the final week, I re-printed the labels with the new updates and replaced them on their respective bottles. I also printed out the posters. These items were presented in class for critique.
MB's WIP 