Project Update: Wednesday 14 October 2020

Hi again!

I’ve been further developing my response to the Met Office YCN brief over the past couple of weeks, and I’m about to start prototyping my final outcomes.

After my initial research into the Met Office as a whole, I looked more into the data they provided, and the resources available on their website. Following this, I found surveys pertaining to Generation Z’s outlook on climate change. According to an online poll conducted by Amnesty International, climate change is the largest issue facing the world right now, in the eyes of 18-25 year olds, and pollution is the largest issue in their local countries. Generation Z are overall very active on this issue, taking to the streets and social media to protest governments and corporations. Greta Thunberg is a notable example, not only in Gen Z’s approach to climate change, but in terms of how much she is respected in that age group, compared to older generations, where she is often belittled.

Future of Humanity survey (Amnesty International)

Because of this, I felt that engaging with a sincere tone of voice through my design would be the best approach. This is an issue which is taken seriously within the target audience. This perspective was furthered by an article I found another survey conducted by Rebecca Green, in which she discovered that climate change messages which spark ‘fear and disgust’ were more likely to be seen as trustworthy; imagery that isn’t emotive indicated the message was from a corporate origin for some viewers, corresponding to distrust. Participants also provided the insight that aesthetic style indicators such as colour, typeface and decorative elements help them to determine the author of the message, and the implied perspective. For instance, though this infographic from grassroots organisation The Consensus Project provides compelling evidence, it was dismissed due to its ‘corporate’ colours, unintentionally looking like a ‘corporation […] trying to justify their position’.

The Consensus Project (Matt Birdoff)

This demonstrates that incorporating the Met Office logo into the design in some capacity will actually provide credibility when viewed by members of the target demographic, although they may not directly associate the Met Office with being a key figure in climate change information (as evidenced in the brief itself). It also shows that my design(s) will have to be sincere, and not take the climate change issue too lightly, as Generation Z take the issue very seriously. And to consider the use of colour and type, and prevent my design from looking too corporate, thus insincere.

Initial sketches

After consolidating my research, I decided that the best way of impacting the target audience in the UK was to bring the issue of climate change home. Often, climate change is thought of as occurring elsewhere: Arctic ice caps melting, Australian bush fires, overseas hurricanes. The reality is that climate change is happening everywhere. One quote which resonated with me was from German chancellor Angela Merkel: ‘Climate change knows no borders’.

One of the most measurable effects of climate change in the UK is the rising sea level, due to Arctic ice melting. Because of this, I decided to sketch out some famous British landmarks partially submerged in water, to give a dark picture of what our future could look like. Shockingly, our oceans are predicted to rise by at least a metre by 2100, which would mean that coastal areas especially will be at high risk of flooding.

Whilst sketching potential concepts, I was reminded of the vintage posters used to promote railway travel to holiday destinations from the 1920s onwards. I decided that this may be an appropriate aesthetic to tap into, to provide successful synthesis between familiar imagery and landmarks, and the jarring unsightly effects of global warming. I later realised that in fact, a lot of the holiday destinations advertised in these posters are actually the places most at risk of flooding in the future due to their coastal location, so the coalition is even more appropriate.

Now, I’m going to get to work on these posters. The focus on specific towns and cities would hopefully spark more recognition within people, and they’d be more likely to use these designs in a real-world application, which is the whole purpose of the brief. I’m excited to see how these potential designs will look as posters, on t-shirts, bags, bottles, and other applications.