Hierarchy of Needs and Copyright

The hierarchy of needs principle states that a good design must serve the low level needs (e.g function) before higher level needs such as creativity. The five key levels of needs are; functionality, reliability, usability, proficiency and creativity.

Fox Feud definitely meets functional needs because everything about it is works, as it should, there are no glitches with the buttons or sound. It also for fills functionality because it informs users about the characters of The Animals of Farthing Wood, which is what it was designed to do. Users should also find it fairly easy to navigate and use.

The project is reliable, and as it has been programmed correctly in Flash and tested many times, does not have any glitches. I have established a stable and consistent performance from the project - it always works.

Fox Feud is very simple, only containing clickable buttons with visual prompts. Therefore it is easy to use, and for fills the usability section of the hierarchy of needs.

There aren’t many other projects I’ve ever seen like Fox Feud because the game its based on isn’t real and The Animals of Farthing Wood is a fairly old story so isn’t explored much. Therefore it can empower people to do things better than they could previously, because the only way you could find out about all the characters in Fox Feud was to read The Animals of Farthing Wood books or watch the television series, which would take a lot of time, or look it up on Wikipedia. So Fox Feud makes learning about these characters quicker and more enjoyable, when referring to Wikipedia.

Creativity has been met as Fox Feud is aesthetically pleasing, and not many applications allow you to click on animated characters to learn about them in relation to this topic.

Therefore, Fox Feud addresses all aspects of the hierarchy of needs to a certain extent, making it a fairly good design.

In regards to Project 2, my experiences with copyright issues are extensive. As I chose to explain Framing through the plot and characters from Disney’s The Lion King, it is difficult to claim my work is original. However, the overall concept of the graphic novel, where Simba explains to his young daughter the concept of framing, is original. Even so, if I were to try to print my work in large quantities, and the Walt Disney Company found out, they would probably take legal action for copyright breach associated with using their characters and story without permission.

Morally, I didn’t find it hard to use characters thought up by Disney, because it is such a large corporation these days. This makes it feel less like I was taking something personal from a creator, plus they have already made millions off of the characters. The amount of profit Disney has made makes it seem like their characters should belong to everyone - millions own The Lion King film and have paid to have it available at their homes. In addition, Walt Disney took the story of Kimba the White Lion and turned it into The Lion King without giving any credit to the creators of Kimba. Therefore, it makes little sense to worry about using “Disney Characters” without giving credit, as the company hasn’t set the best moral example to follow, and no one would ever think I came up with those characters because Disney’s The Lion King is so infamous.

From a creative point of view, it didn’t feel like I was breaching copyright laws, because I still had to draw the scenes in the comic myself and then ink them in Photoshop, which took hours. In addition to this, I had to create a new script, where scenes from the original story needed to be short, as well as design the layouts for each page so that the comic wasn’t too long but readers understood the story and what was going on.

In conclusion, copyright in this case, comes down to money and profit. The primary reason why the Disney Corporation has such a strong hold over it’s characters, while wanting to share them with the world, is so that they can make money, while preventing others from making any kind of profit that they could be making. Seeing as I am not going to make a profit from Project 2, I don’t see a problem with using Disney characters. I would feel more of a sense of guilt if the individual Disney employees who created the film, rather than the company itself, owned the rights to the story and characters.

Wayfinding

Wayfinding is the process if using spatial and environmental information to navigate to a destination. This process always involves the same four stages; orientation, route decision, route monitoring and destination recognition.

Orientation refers to determining a location in relation to nearby objects and the destination. Signage is one of the easiest ways to communicate where you are and where you can go.

Route decision refers to choosing a route to reach a destination. Minimising the number of navigation choices on a website for example, will improve route decision making, as will providing signs or prompts at decision points.

Route monitoring refers to monitoring the chosen route to confirm that it is leading to the destination. Providing visual cues highlighting the path taken can improve route monitoring, particularly when a wayfinding mistake has been made and backtracking is necessary.

Destination recognition refers to recognising the destination. To improve destination recognition, give destinations clear and consistent identities.

Wayfinding hasn’t really been implemented much in Fox Feud. It has been used on the introductory page via use of the “Enter White Deer Park” sign. This is part of orientation and communicates to users that they can go to the home page by clicking on the sign.

There are quite a few navigational choices in Fox Feud once users reach the home page. This is because there are eighteen characters to choose from. Therefore, route decision isn’t easy for users to make. Also there are no signs and little prompts within Fox Feud past the introduction, including these would have made wayfinding easier for users. Users know to click on the foxes because they light up when you roll over them with your mouse, so this does help with wayfinding.

In relation to route monitoring, it is not really possible to make a wayfinding mistake within Fox Feud unless you have accidentally clicked on the wrong character. Even so, there is a go back button on every profile page, so getting back to the home page is simple. Therefore it is not really necessary to provide visual cues highlighting the path taken to improve route monitoring. 

In addition, there is no specific destination within Fox Feud, it all depends on what information the user would like to find out, or their reason for using the application. There is a different destination for every user, as perhaps some only want to find out about one character, while others might want to read about them all. So for one person the destination will be reached once they have clicked on a single character profile, where as another user will reach their destination once they have clicked on and read every character profile.

Progressive Disclosure

Progressive disclosure is a strategy for managing information complexity in which only necessary or requested information is displayed at any given time. It involves separating information into multiple layers and only presenting those that are necessary or relevant. Progressive Disclosure is primarily used to prevent information overload. It is commonly used in computer interfaces, instructional materials, and the design of physical space. In addition, progressive disclosure helps to keep displays clean and uncluttered, as well as preventing confusion, frustration and disorientation caused by complexity.

I used progressive disclosure within Fox Feud to a certain extent. The introduction to Fox Feud was used to manage information and summarise the project. This was done through having the two main fox characters from fighting aggressively, symbolising the fight between blue and red, as well as including the title of the project and the words “The Characters” underneath. This gives users a good idea about what the project is and if they wished to learn more or use Fox Feud, they could enter the full version by hitting the “Enter White Deer Park” button.

Next, the home page was shown, and to minimise clutter, while improving the aesthetics of the project, symbols of each character are shown, rather than any kind of text. These act as buttons that can be clicked, if a user wants to know more about any specific character. Progressive disclosure has been used, because all the information for every character could have been displayed, but instead, the user has the option to choose whether they view the profiles of all the characters, just a few, or none at all.

Once a user decides to click on a character, a profile is shown and is divided into four sections; profile, information, statistics and family tree. The information is separated in order of importance, and level of detail. If a user wants to know basic information about each character, then they are able to view the summarised profile information straight away and go back to the home page, without having to click on any of the more detailed tabs. The go back button has been included on all four tabs so that users never have to view more pages than they wish to, and can go back to the home page with ease and at any time.

Progressive disclosure has further been applied to the information tab, which includes a video file. Instead of setting up the file to play automatically once the user has clicked on the information tab, the play button on the video needs to be clicked in order to play. This allows users to read the background information without watching the video, preventing information overload. If they want to watch the video in addition to reading the information then they can. The tabbing system used in Fox Feud keeps information relevant to each user’s needs, while keeping the interface clean and helps prevent information overload.

Satisficing

Satisficing is a process in which a designer settles for a satisfactory solution, rather than pursue an optimal solution. The best design decision is not always the optimal design decision. Sometimes, the success of a design is better served by a design decision that roughly satisfy (i.e. satisfice) rather than optimally satisfy, design requirements. There are three kinds of problems for which satisficing should be considered; very complex problems, time limited problems and problems for which anything beyond a satisfactory solution leads to diminishing results.

Complex design problems are characterised by a large number of interacting variables and a large number of unknowns, which makes an optimal solution unlikely. Therefore, the satisficer will seek only to improve upon the current design, rather than to achieve an optimal design.

Time limited problems are characterised by time frames that do not permit adequate analysis or development of an optimal solution.

There are cases in which a satisfactory solution is better than an optimal solution. Determining when satisfactory is best requires accurate knowledge of the design requirements, and accurate knowledge and perceptions of the users.  

Satisficing was used in Fox Feud because the project was a time-limited problem. Instead of creating the optimal solution, which would have been to design the profiles of all eighteen characters presented within the project, I created a satisfactory project where only one of the characters had a profile that was completed entirely. As a result, Fox Feud seemed more like a prototype, where users could get a good idea of what the final version would be like to use, rather than a finished piece of work. The guidelines students were given for this project, was to create an interactive piece, with at least four working pages. One profile in Fox Feud contained four pages so I was able to satisfice and still meet the design requirements. The main reason behind this decision to satisfice was because of time restraints. If I had attempted to make all eighteen profiles, I would have missed the deadline; therefore the best design decision was not the optimal design decision.

Another way in which I satisficed was with the animation loops for each of the characters on the home page. I animated each character frame by frame, and to get smoother results, should have had a lot of frames per movement. However, because there were so many characters and little time to study the movement of foxes, I usually only drew three frames for each piece of action. This produced satisfactory results, however, the optimum solution would have been to animate using more than three frames. If I had chosen the optimum solution I would have either missed the project deadline, or had half of my foxes animated, and the other half presented as still images on the home page. This would have ruined the consistency of my project, so I decided to satisfice. In this case, satisficing was used because of complexity and time constraints.

Storytelling

Storytelling is a method of creating imagery, emotions and understanding of events through an interaction between a storyteller and an audience. Traditionally, knowledge is communicated via storytelling orally, through the telling of a tale, visually, through films or still images, or textually, through novels and other text based mediums. However, in recent years, digital storytelling has surfaced - this involves telling a story using digital media, such as a computerized slide show, a digital video or educational software. Good storytelling requires a set of fundamental elements, these are; setting, characters, plot, invisibility, mood and movement.

Storytelling is used extensively throughout my interactive design work, Fox Feud. It is a vital part of the project and use of the fundamental elements of storytelling allowed it to be successful.

The first element, setting, orients the audience and provides a sense of time and place for the story. I created a setting in Fox Fued via a combination of language and imagery, such as a simple wooden sign containing the words “White Deer Park”, as well as through the general appearance of the project. For example, the background in which the characters are placed, is a woodland scenescape this combined with the words White Deer Park, suggests the story takes place within the wild, or in this case, a nature reserve.

The second element, characters, allow the audience to become involved in the story, and makes the story relevant. Fox Feud in its entirety, revolves around characters within a story, and features a detailed profile of each. These characters are initially identifiable through their gender, colours and markings. They are also identifiable through the team or side they are on; – blue or red. As the users explores the interactive interface, more information is given about each character, allowing them to be identified through qualities below the surface, such as personality, relationships with each other and roles they play within the story. Without the use of characters, Fox Feud would not exist as a project.

The third element, plot, ties events in the story together, and is the channel through which the story can flow. As Fox Feud is a medium through which users can learn about the characters within a 2D style game, based on the story of The Animals of Farthing Wood by Colin Dann, there is no actual plot within the project itself. However, parts of the plot in the game are revealed within Fox Feud.

The forth element, invisibility, is where the awareness of the storyteller fades as the audience focuses on a good story. The medium through which the story is told is forgotten. Fox Feud has a sense of invisibility as the information in it is presented as if one of the characters, The Park Warden, is sharing it. This allows users to get lost in the world of White Deer Park, rather than having the information given from an outside source.

The fifth element, mood, is an emotional tone of the story created through music, lighting and writing style. The mood created in Fox Feud, is done via the background sound effects, as well as the voices of the characters and their animated actions. For example, a woodland sound clip is used in the home page to create mood and enhance the setting, and a harsh voice has been used for the character of Scarface to create the feeling that he is an evil character. The background also plays a part in developing a mood, as one side has a lot of light and greenery, while the other is darker and less green. This creates a feeling of good and evil.

The final element, movement is the sequence or flow of events. Fox Feud flows clearly from the introduction of the project, to the home page, and then to each characters profile. Therefore, although it doesn’t have the movement of a story, because it is not a story itself, it does have a good sequence of events from a navigational point of view.