PhotoRefuge Process Book by Dustin Rhodes

PROCESS BOOK GD 400 | DESIGN FOR RELIEF & AID

PROJECT BRIEF GD 400 | DESIGN FOR RELIEF & AID So far this year, FEMA has declared 95 natural disasters in the United States. After the dust settles and safety and shelter needs are met, natural disaster victims’ next hope is to salvage what is left of their sentimental possessions. Following a devastating tornado in May of this year, residents of Joplin, Missouri collected over 30,000 displaced photos and mementos. After being cleaned and sorted at a nearby church, a few volunteers in the Joplin community took on the overwhelming task of posting as many of the findings as they could to a Facebook page, “The Lost Photos of Joplin.” This page (along with the later created Flickr page) has reunited hundreds of tornado victims with their lost photographs. Angela Walters, a genealogist and founder of the Facebook page, quickly realized the merits of the effort and created a non-profit organization, National Disaster Photo Rescue, with hopes of developing a similar system for other natural disasters across the country. While the Facebook and Flickr pages have been successful in reuniting victims with their lost photos, their limitations in regards to archiving and searching restricts the overall effort from reaching its full potential. To date, only a few thousand of the tens of thousands of photos found have been uploaded.

PRIMARY OBJECTIVE: My primary objective is to develop an online system that will serve as a dedicated, easy-to-manage database for photos found by National Disaster Photo Rescue volunteers. On the user end, it will allow natural disaster victims to intuitively and efficiently search for and reconnect with their displaced memories.

SHORT-TERM PROJECT EXPLORATORY STUDY DEFINING THE SEARCH PROCESS: In order to develop this system, I felt it was important to better understand how people remember and recall photographs. I chose to analyze this by conducting an exploratory study that provided participants with three photographs and asked that they familiarize themselves with and subsequently “lose” them over a short period of time. Afterwards, a follow-up was conducted that asked the participants to describe the photographs in any way they felt would be most effective for finding them. The results helped to inform the development of search options that were better suited to the context.

CONTENTS •

INITIAL HANDOUT

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COMPLETED RESPONSES

Photo Study Over the next week, familiarize yourself with the three photos to the left. Try to work them into your memory as if each was one of your own. How you choose to do this is up to you; you could look over them for the next five minutes and never look at them again, you could put it on your night stand so it’s the first and last thing you see everyday, or you could cut them out and carry them around with you. The only major requirement for this exploratory study is Picture 1

that in five days you “lose” the photographs. Trash them, recycle them, practice origami... it’s your choice, just don’t look at the photos after that day. A follow up will be conducted one week from today. Thanks in advance for your participation! Your help is greatly appreciated. Feel free to e-mail me with any questions you have. – Dustin Rhodes drrhode2@ncsu.edu

Picture 2

Picture 3

Photo Study: Follow Up I would like to give you a little background on what I am doing. I am currently in a course centered on design within crisis and disaster situations. It focuses on the development of systems and strategies needed for short and long term relief and aid. I am trying to partner with an ongoing effort to develop an online database that helps connect victims of natural disasters and their photos, documents and other mementos that have been displaced (take the recent tornado that hit Joplin, MO for example — 30,000 photos have been found spread throughout Missouri as well as in Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas and eastern Tennessee). Right now, victims are using Facebook and Flickr to post and claim found photos, but the process is slow and arduous. Where you come in! Without going back to look at the photographs I asked you to familiarize yourself with, please describe the photographs. You can do this in any way you feel would be effective. Try to put yourself in the shoes of a natural disaster victim that just lost all of their photographs. How would you describe a lost photograph in hopes of locating it? Thanks again! My hope is that your input will ultimately help to reunite people who have lost nearly everything with their displaced memories. If you have any questions, suggestions or ideas please email me! – Dustin Rhodes drrhode2@ncsu.edu

How familiar would you say you became with the three photographs? Very

Somewhat

Not Very

I have included a place for you to “sketch” the photograph. Like the written description, this can be as detailed as you feel effective. It can be simply gestural, imply composition, annotated, use color… it’s up to you. Picture 1

Picture 2

Picture 3

Recall a photo from your past that you havenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t seen recently.

LONG-TERM PROJECT PHOTOREFUGE.ORG MERITS: PhotoRefuge aims to be a system that fits into the framework set up by the National Disaster Photo Rescue organization and caters to the needs of both the back-end and front-end users. Because it is a dedicated system, PhotoRefuge will provide a much more efficient and focused experience on both ends, ultimately helping to preserve the histories of communities devastated by natural disasters.

CONTENTS •

TIME LINE FOLD-OUT

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INITIAL SKETCHES

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PROTOTYPE SCREENS

May 22nd 2011 Joplin, Missouri

A NATURAL DISASTER OCCURS

Laura Vanzant Joplin Resident

May 23, 2011 Search and rescue begins.

May 24, 2011 Search and rescue continues. Damage assessment and cleanup begins.

The National Disaster Photo Rescue team prepares new online archive dedicated to victims of current natural disaster.

An NDPR team is deployed to location. NDPR cooperates with local efforts and volunteers to locate, collect and document photos and mementos.

Laura calls her family members and learns everyone is alright. She makes plans to stay at her mothers house.

Laura returns to her home to assess damage and salvage her sentimental possessions. She is particularly concerned about her photos.

June 5, 2011 Major cleanup finishes.

THE PHOTOREFUGE CAMPAIGN BEGINS.

During cleanup, Laura is able to salvage a few items and photos but is unable to find any photos of her son, Scott.

June 7, 2011 Rebuilding begins.

August 12, 2011 Schools and businesses reopen.

NDPR returns to processing location with found photos and mementos. Photos are cleaned, sorted, scanned, uploaded to archive and assigned â&#x20AC;&#x153;genesâ&#x20AC;? by NDPR staff.

NDPR returns to the affected location to reunite claimed photos with owners. Through partnerships with the American Red Cross and Operation Photo Rescue victims are presented with opportunities for counseling and photo restoration service.

Laura hears about PhotoRefuge from a neighbor who saw an advocacy poster.

Laura uses PhotoRefuge to find more photos of her son as well as other family members. While browsing she tagged her neighbors to help them reconnect with their displaced photographs. JOPLIN

BROWSE

INITIAL SKETCHES EXPLORING INTERFACE OPTIONS

PROTOTYPE SCREENS DEFINING THE USER EXPERIENCE

HOME PAGE The home screen displays the most recent uploads in a background slideshow. The user has the option to control the slideshow and claim or tag an image.

JOPLIN

BROWSE

HELP OVERLAY At any time, on any page, users can click the

icon

to bring up a help overlay. Here the user can click through a walk though that spotlights features and options available on

The most recent uploads will be displayed in the background slideshow. You can navigate the slideshow and view or claim the current photo here.

the current page.

JOPLIN

BROWSE

PROTOTYPE SCREENS DEFINING THE USER EXPERIENCE

BROWSE PAGE Users without a specific photo in mind can visit the browse page to view PETS

photos separated into categories. First time

CHILDREN

COUNTY FAIR

visitors are prompted with warm-up questions (i.e. “Did you attend the County Fair?”) to generate

WEDDING PROM

BLACK & WHITE

a more personalized browse field.

JOPLIN HIGH SCHOOL

FAMILY

JOPLIN

BROWSE

JOPLIN

BROWSE

SEARCH OVERLAY When the user selects the search option, they are presented with a simple search field with very little directions. This allows users to search however they want to. The user also has the option to search by sketching or by uploading another image (reverse searching).

PROTOTYPE SCREENS DEFINING THE USER EXPERIENCE

SEARCH OVERLAY When the user begins to type their description, the bounding box disappears.

A dog wearing a Kansas City Royals hat.

The goal is to let the user feel unrestricted.

Press RETURN to search.

JOPLIN

SEARCH RESULTS The photo refuge backend selects “genes” from the user’s search and sorts them by importance. The

BROWSE

DOG HAT KANSAS CITY ROYALS WEARING Add additional description.

user can sort and edit the genes in any way they feel would aid the search.

JOPLIN

PROTOTYPE SCREENS DEFINING THE USER EXPERIENCE

PHOTO HOVER By hovering over a photo, the user can view the full

DOG HAT KANSAS CITY ROYALS

image and has the option to tag a friend or relative

WEARING Add additional description.

using Facebook Connect.

JOPLIN

BROWSE

PHOTO BIN DOG

When the user finds a photo, they can drag it to their photo bin to claim it. If a search is unsuccessful

HAT KANSAS CITY ROYALS WEARING Add additional description.

the user can save the “gene” combination so they can receive alerts notifying them of potential matches.

JOPLIN