Palette by Fred Wordie

Fred Wordie Fringe - November 2014

Palette

Special thanks to Rarity Fan 2014, Clue, N/A, Aurapandora and Cogsworth for giving up their time for this project. Thanks also to the Glasgow Bronies Facebook group for welcoming me into their herd for this project and for their support. Special mention should go to the Geek Retreat for giving me a space to carry out interviews and activities.

Brief

What is a Brony

Initial Research

Interviews

The Meet Up

Design Ideas

Co-Design Kit

The Concept

Development

The Product

The Brand

My Thoughts

By looking at cultures on the edge we are forced to look beyond our own assumptions about what the world is, and what it should look like. At the fringes of the consumer world there is a staggering mix of sub-cultures, from train spotters, computer hackers, superhero wannabes, cat people, car / motorbike / scooter enthusiasts and pigeon fanciers are just a few. In this project, you are going to tap into the world of these fringe groups. You will be focusing on the needs / desire / fantasies of people often ignored by mainstream design. You will engage with your chosen fringe group to understand their needs and gain insights about their lives. You will then draw inspiration from their values, artefacts and rituals to design a product or a service for them. We want you to spend time with your fringe group, interviewing and observing them in order to try and understand their values, what is important to then. You should combine this with visual ethnography, documenting with photos and film (with people’s permission) the visual evidence of the groups culture, such as things, places and activities which are important to them. Pay particular attention to ‘rituals’, activities that have gained additional meaning to the group, and ‘cultural artefacts’, the physical things that give you information about the group. Take care when you compose these images, these should not be merely factual documentation, but evocative images that can both inspire and inform about the context. You will then design a new ‘cultural artefact’ in the form of a product or service for them. This artefact might be for one of their existing activities or rituals, but it could also involve the invention of a new one. The artefacts should however respond to the groups’ values and embody aspects of the culture. At the end of this project you will be asked to deliver, alongside models and representations of your design, a poster that communicates both your design and the cultural context it is intended for. We want you to carefully consider the art direction of this poster, this should be an evocative compelling image that gives the viewer a glimpse into the world of your fringe group. 1

Bronycon in America, where 10,000 bronies met last year to celebrate the show.

What is a Brony? “Bro + Pony = Brony” ~ Urban Dictionary A brony is an unexpected adult fan of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. Many of the bronies I met with were friendly teenagers and young adults , who congregated in person and online to express their love of the show, that they view as being innocent, colourful, and funny. The latest rendition of Hasbro’s My Little Pony is very different than the previous generations most people associate the title with. The new show (2010) has a clean art style and tells stories that could appeal to people of all ages. Many of the bronies I met compared it to Pixar movies because it is “wellmade, well voice acted and relatable.” Since its start the fandom has thrived on

embracing the shows messages of love and tolerance. However, the main draw of the fandom is its crazy amount of fan content. From memes , to original music, to illustration, the brony fandom has embraced and celebrated its creatives. However, since its beginning the fandom has attracted a lot of bad press. Understandably the media have not been too excepting of a predominantly male cult following of a show made originally for small girls. Although some people have welcomed the idea of challenging the definition of masculinity and gender stereotypes, most have chosen to focus on the fandom’s less common but more notorious darker side. An example of a “ponified” meme.

First Contact on FaceBook.

Initial Research “1. Why on earth did you come to 4CHAN for this??? 2. We’re not all cloppers. 3. The show is well written, animated, and voice acted.” ~ Anonymous After watching various documentaries on the fandom and also researching online, I decided that it was time to find out some information first hand. One of the documentaries I watched stated that the fandom started on the infamous 4chan.org website. In fact the fandom grew to such a extent on the forum that it was actually banned for a period of time before 4chan gave it its own dedicated board. I decided that this is where I should start my independent research. I discovered very quickly that this was a mistake. I was instantly met with hostility or just sent graphic images of ponies, best not viewed ever again. These images are enjoyed by a minority subset of bronies called “cloppers”. However, some were helpful

but only as in so much as telling me that I should disregard all information I received from 4chan, as it did not accurately represent the whole fandom. My next port of call was The Glasgow Bronies Facebook group. At first they were weary of me because of the past experiences with journalists wanting interviews. However, after I assured them that it was for a university project with the aim of designing something positive for them, they kindly let me into their 250 member strong closed Facebook group. From here I managed to organise a number of one on one interviews and also a few group interviews, as well as gather information from surveys. This would be my base camp for the entire project. 5

Interviews “Watching the show isn’t completely it.” ~ Rarity Fan 2014 During the first two weeks of the project I interviewed 10 people for a total of 12 hours recorded conversation. From this I learnt a lot of things specifically to do with the Glasgow group and also clarified a lot of my more general internet research. The first thing that became apparent was that watching and loving the show wasn’t completely it. Almost everyone told me that for them, the weekly meet ups were like “just meeting with old mates now.” What had started as a place where people (bronies) could openly express their love of the show, had now turned into a gathering of friends talking about anything and everything. One of the most potent examples of this I found was when, during my time researching, one of the bronies close friends died. Other bronies from the group flocked to his aid on Facebook, offering to meet up, Skype and just be there for him. What really binds the group together is embodiment of the show’s values. Namely love and tolerance.

Another point that was raised by the majority of the interview subjects, was their resentment of the fandom’s public image. One brony said that he was more scared of telling his parents that he was a brony, then he was of coming out as being gay. Others hated the fact they were put in this box labelled bronies and just assumed to be “gay, weird and a furry.” Not to say that none of them were furries, a fantasy dedicated to anthropomorphism, many claimed to dabble in that subculture as well. One Interviewee told me of how he re-cut a entire documentary so his grandmother would understand his love of the show. This closely links to another issue many of the bronies faced. Although most claimed that their parents and friends were accepting of them being Bronies; most felt there was a difference between accepting and understanding They wanted their loved ones to understand why they loved the show, not just endure it. 6

First Round of interviews

Photos taken by anon during a Saturday meet up

The Meet Up “Just a genuinely good group of people.” ~ Clue Every week the Glasgow bronies meet up at 12 at the old HMV steps, wonder around town visiting geek related areas on the hunt for “pony merch” and also just for the fun of it. They then congregate at the Geek Retreat at five. This has been happening for over a year now, and the Geek Retreat now set aside a area for what they dub “The Brony Bunch”. At my first meet up, I met a small group of bronies at the now closed HMV and gave them a disposable camera to take photos of their day’s activities, in exchange for a drink at the Geek Retreat later. After a few hours of meandering around town we met up with the rest of the group at the Geek Retreat. There were already many members of the group already there playing the official My Little Pony card game and comparing various merchandise they had acquired.

There were about 20 of us at my meet up, mostly aged around 16-18 and only a few girls (named Pegasisters), most adorned in varying amounts of my Little Pony merch. They defiantly stood out. The most noteworthy thing that happened through out the whole day was when one brony whipped out the card game Cards Against Humanity. A game which styles itself, “a party game for horrible people.” It was odd to see people who so strongly aligned themselves to a show of happiness and friendlessness saying such things as, “Life for African Americans was forever changed when the white man introduced to them dying.” It was such clear evidence that My Little Pony was not the only reason they met and that they weren’t these creepy, immature and unapproachable people that I had been led to believe by news articles. Bronies playing the game Cards Against Humanity at the Geek Retreat.

Post-it Affinitizung. Notes are from interviews

Design Ideas “I face a lot of judgement, being called things from “weird” to “Child abuser” and everything in between (although that isn’t that wide a gap) lol.” ~ Innermokalover Another thing that became apparent through my interviews was how hard it was for bronies to explain to their friends and family why they liked the show. Most said that they didn’t even bother trying to explain, and ended up settling for just not talking about it with people who didn’t understand. This led me to think about tools that would help bronies explain their love for the show and fandom. Either though education, poster, film or even a tool kit to aid them. The final idea, was proposed by one of the group interviews I arranged. They said that even though they loved to wear all of the colourful merchandise when they were at conventions (huge gatherings for the fandom) and at meet ups, they said they wouldn’t feel comfortable wearing it in day to day life. They wanted everyday merchandise that would identify them as being a brony, but only to other bronies. It shouldn’t be obvious and bright like most of Hasbro’s offerings. They wanted it targeted towards them rather than My Little Pony’s original demographic.

After my first round of interviews and attending two Saturday meet ups, I decided to collect all my data and see what design opportunities arose. After much post-it note shuffling, three different themes were discovered. My first idea was a way to enhance their already successful community. Many bronies I met, said that being part of the community had helped them and been there for them when they needed it. That being said, it was sad to hear of lots of bronies who couldn’t go to meet ups due to insufficient funds or illness. One girl I spoke to said that even though she loved the Facebook group and Skyping other bronies, she felt left out because she couldn’t afford to travel to Glasgow for meet ups. I think that one way of possibly dealing with this is to gather funds from other bronies, and to therefore pay for activities and travel for less fortunate bronies. However, this would not help bronies effected by illness. Hence I toyed with the idea of bringing a physical aspect or manifestation of their Facebook group.

Co-desgin Kit “My Little Pony makes you feel like a kid again...” ~ Clue is most apparent when they chose to draw on the only page, that was not designed to be drawn on. I had left a blank image of a pony on the front page of the booklet as nothing more then a indication of their task to come. However, as seen on the bottom right of the opposite page, all ten of my focus group decided to draw their original character on the front page. All of them bar one felt it was very important to get their “OC’s” colour scheme correct. This lead me to ask if they thought the shows colour schemes were recognisable. They responded that they thought they would be able to recognise pony’s just from their colours. I was going to need to test this before committing to using it for possible more subtle merchandise that only they would recognise.

Using the Co-design kits with the “The Brony Bunch” at the Geek Retreat.

After focusing on these three design opportunities: a connection enhancer, more subtle merchandise and a tool to help explain. I wanted to get a better idea of the bronies aesthetic values, as I felt they may differ from what the shows’ merchandise was already like. I created a 8 page booklet that asked them to draw various things, with the aim of uncovering not only what they liked about the show but also things that they felt reflected specifically just bronies, not the shows wider demographic. The results were incredibly interesting but not at all what I had set out to discover. Even though I did uncover more evidence of the bronies’ love of references and memes, the only consistent information the kits provided was the bronies use of colour. This

Collated data from ten design kit

SPIKE

DERPY

FLUTTERSHY

APPLEJACK

RARITY

PINKIE PIE

VINYL SCRATCH

OCTAVIA

RAINBOW DASH

TWILIGHT SPARKLE

LUNA

LYRA HEARTSTRINGS

The Concept “I love [My Little Ponies] colourful art style and design, it makes the characters look more colourful.” ~ Nanomint5000 After conducting interviews, affinitizing my data and carrying out a co-design task with the bronies. I finally settled on using the ponies vibrant colour palettes as a way to adorn subtler, more sophisticated merchandise for the bronies. I was worried about using the colour palettes, if they weren’t as recognisable as it first appeared. So I created around twelve pony palettes of the “mane” and favourite ponies. Above you can see how I chose the colours for each palette. I then took blank copies of what you see on the right to a brony meet up and

tasked the bronies with deciphering the colours. Every single brony I challenged named each and every one of the colour palettes. They also said that they would recognise the colours as being from the show, even out of context. The other thing that became clear through talking about my ideas with them, was that they didn’t just want more “crappy merch”. I realised that I now needed to identify how I could best use this information to bring about a positive outcome for the bronies, rather than just more “tat”. Pinkie Pie’s Colour palette.

Development “You know what, I want that on a pair of cufflinks. You should do that on cufflinks.” ~ CogsWorth During the development phase I worked closely with the bronies in finalising not one but a range of products which would tie into three of my earlier design ideas. Firstly a range of more subtle merchandise that bronies could wear out and about with out feeling judged. Secondly that the money raised from these products would go to helping people. Whether this meant locally supporting bronies to come to meet ups or to support charities in general, was still to be decided. What was

clear was that the money raised by this concept should not go into Hasbro’s pocket. The final point, which I think is the most important , was that these products should in some way aid the bronies when discussing their passion with non brony friends and family. Create objects that were beautiful to everyone and to therefore get across the message that this show was not just for little girls but was something everyone could enjoy. 16

Concept drawings done with the Bronies

T-shirt and shirt are Photoshop mock ups, the cuff-links were made using cuff-link blanks

Pinkie Pieâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s cutie mark embroidered onto the T-shirt tag

The Product “Classy, Rarity would approve.10/10 would wear to any and all formal/work environments.” ~ Animate Ergonome

Pictured left are my final Photoshop mock ups (t-shirt and shirt) and physical mock up (cuff-links), all featuring Pinkie Pie’s colour scheme. I decided to go with the simple vertical stripes as the main motif for the designs. This is because it was the pattern that the bronies could most easily identify the colour schemes from. It also seems to be a nice reference to the colour palettes designers would have used when creating the new generation of ponies. The items I decided to go with were chosen from the long list of concept ideas and sketches I did with the bronies. I think that there is a nice sophistication with the items chosen. They are all things that feel bespoke and not mass manufactured. This lends to them a

feeling of not just being merchandise. Other possible product ideas included socks, scarfs and woollen hats. One detail that I added other then the simple pony palette was having the ponies’ cutie marks on the tags. Not only does this give the items a further sense of quality but it also gives the items a closer link to the franchise. The hope with these items is that even we, the nonbronies, like them and might even comment on someone wearing one. This could in turn open a discussion about why they like the show, to which we would be more open to listen, more open to understanding. For starters we like the bronies shirt, why should we not like the show? Mock up a Tie with Pinkie Pie Colour Scheme

The Brand “Amazing!!! Galacon 2015, Reservoir Ponies anyone?.” ~ Cogsworth I decided that I wanted to visualise how these concept products would be branded, sold and marketed. I settled on the name Palette, as it just seemed right. Throughout the development phase I had been toying with many names, from ‘body and stroke’, to ‘Rebus’ (The name given to picture puzzles). However, I always came back to the name Palette, when referring to my idea. I also wanted to create a stylish logo and website to really embody the brand’s difference from current fandom merchandise. I chose to use the six main ponies coat colours for the logo colour, as this was another thing the bronies would recognise. On the right is a mock up of the website, complete with search by pony name feature. It can be found at http://palette.tictail.com. The final aspect of the concept was to decide where

the profit should go. Along with the admins of the Glasgow Bronies Facebook page, we decided that the issues of people not being able to go to meet ups was too much of a local issue and should be solved by the Glasgow group. They instead suggested that I look into The Sophie Lancaster Foundation, which was set up to educate people on subcultures and challenge to prejudice and intolerance towards these fringe groups. The charities own aims aligned so closely with the bronie’s mantra of Love and Tolerance, that it seemed to fit the concept perfectly. I do recommend that you head to both their website (http://www.sophielancasterfoundation.com/) to learn more about Sophie’s story and Palette’s (http://palette. tictail.com) to see my final outcome. 20

Concept website (www.palette.tictail.com)

My Thoughts â&#x20AC;&#x153;Tis a pity that they are only concept designs.â&#x20AC;? ~ Pony Assassin This project has both been one of the most interesting and infuriating projects. I especially enjoyed going into the field, filling up a sketch book about a subject I had no idea about beforehand and I think my skills in this area have improved. I was really happy that I chose such an interesting and diverse set of people to design for. Throughout the project they were incredibly kind and accommodating of me. However, I did feel that at times their main objective was to present their best aspects and shy away from any controversy to do with their possible darker sides. The very mention of cloppers in group situations brought about hushing from other members of the group. I did feel that they are a genuinely good bunch of people, who have been treated unfairly and this is why I struggled so much with this project.

It was obvious from the beginning that they were happy, content with their lot, strong in their community. Enter me, coming into their life, using their free time for interviews, asking them to speak to a stranger about personal issues and feelings. Then invading their group meet ups like an eagle watching out for any morsel of controversy. Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m very proud of my end result but it was just a concept. Recently however, I have been feeling better about my outcome and this is because a few of the people I interviewed have decided to take the concept forward. So I am now currently working with them to develop a few more concepts into tangible prototypes. The hope is that if we like the prototypes, we can produce a small batch and sell them to support The Sophie Lancaster Foundation, a charity they feel very strongly about. 22