The Rationale
Edition 7
13 October 2018
Adobe awards winners break records Page 7
Mageu feuls new generation of design talent
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The next potential Cannes
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Take your selfies
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Silence makes a film art?
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Is there a problem with period tracking apps?
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NEWS 2Has the digital age impacted the 13 October 2018
fundamentals of brand building?
DERRYN JACKSON
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or some time, the majority of marketing professionals have focussed heavily on becoming digitally savvy and left our knowledge of branding fundamentals at the back of the shelf that makes up the bookcase of our minds. This is something that they have witnessed, as well have been guilty of, which is why it was time to rethink the subject. At the end of the day, even with digital communications, whether that be through social or advertising, we are still moving towards the same goal, which is positively impacting the organisation that we are working for. This caused me to revisit this knowledge and even upskill on fresh literature that attempts to unpack how brands fit in and can successfully navigate the digital landscape. It was good to know that I wasn’t too far off in my initial thinking.
“Perhaps it is a question of semantics and responsibility”
THE TRUE POWER OF STORYTELLING This universal human insight really hasn’t changed in all our years of human evolution. As a species, we are motivated and react to stories that resonate with us. Maslow and Frankl weren’t wrong. Abraham Maslow proposed the hierarchy of human needs as seen below, and Viktor Frankl proposed that means man’s search for meaning is ultimately what drive his/ her behaviour. Our brains are hard-wired for story. Stories allow us to make sense of the world, and the pleasure our brains receive from an engaging tale is nature’s way of seducing us into paying attention to it. Our neural circuitry is designed to crave stories. Hence why brand building’s foundation is in storytelling. It motivates behaviour, which is handy when it comes to selling something. The fundamentals of storytelling haven’t changed in the digital era, we just have more ways in which to tell it, and more ways in which to disseminate that story. These factors need to be considered in overall brand strategy, even before the marketing strategy is plugged in. WHAT ENGAGEMENT REALLY MEANS It means participation. Collaboration. Digital allows for platform building that encourages co-creation. The psychology behind why co-creation is such a powerful motivator for behaviour is because when we feel like we have contributed to something and received positive acknowledgement from that participation, dopamine is created in our brains which is our feel-good hormone. As well as being neurologically wired for story, we are also emotionally driven beings and need to be engaged in something to act on it. With the social era that we are currently experiencing, we have moved from a time of ownership where brands communicating through monologue push advertising, and ultimately owned the communications space to a time of the relationship, where brands consumers are far more involved in the communications space, and monologue has changed to dialogue.
Relationships and valuable communication are built on genuine interest for another person. When it comes to brand communications, this means competing for consumers attention on their terms and not yours. When it comes to brand building through storytelling in the digital era, it isn’t about shouting, it is about encouraging dialogue which will foster loyalty and meaning. THE VALUE OF A STRONG BRAND Let’s not forget the fundamental perks of a strong brand. A strong brand in the marketplace attracts clients. It attracts talent. It has the perception of being great at what it does. From a randsand-cents perspective, research shows that a strong brand can pay less in salaries as staff members are attracted by being part of something grand and powerful, and not by remuneration. It can spend less on marketing efforts as the brand stands strongly in the minds of its stakeholders. These branding factors have not changed in the digital era, but it has forced brands to become more transparent and authentic because if you aren’t being so, the connected audience online will find out and tell people about it. To answer the question of whether the digital era has affected brand building, yes it has, the same as any environmental factor would, but the fundamentals remain the same. Perhaps it is a question of semantics and responsibility. Perhaps this is the true impact of digital when it comes to brand building. It’s no longer the marketing department’s responsibility for brand building. A consumer journey cuts across all business functions. From marketing, to sales, to operations and HR, to finance. Therefore, it is the collective responsibility of all these business functions to be heavily involved in brand building. In terms of semantics.
t n e l a t n sig e d f o n atio r e n e g w e n s l e u f Mageu Design student Hannah Smith has been named the winner of the Number One Mageu Art & Soul Competition. Last month, the popular beverage brand embarked on a nationwide search for South Africa’s freshest design talent. Entrants were challenged to create a highly unique design for the Number One Mageu’s iconic banana packaging. The judging panel included members from The Hardy Boys creative team, creative director Kevin Parry and designer Clinton Myeni, as well as Number One Mageu senior brand manager Aamina Shaik and Durban University of Technology lecturer Frank Kalala. They selected 10 finalists from over 100 entries and then asked the public to vote for the winner from the final 10 designs. In the spirit of competition, all finalists hustled their friends and fans to help them win the Art & Soul prize via an Instagram voting mechanic. The public voting stage was hotly contested with over 14,700 votes received in just 7 days and around 5,000 of those coming in the last 24 hours.
The competition came to a close on Thursday, 30 August at RCL Foods Head Office in Durban, where the 10 finalists and Durban University of Technology student entrants attended an Afrocentric Pop-up Gallery exhibition event where the competition winners were announced. Two of the top 10 designers, established designer Rapule Mathonsi and student designer Hannah Smith, both from Durban, battled it out for votes until the final hour. At midnight on Wednesday both had received 2,500 votes and when voting closed just 97 votes separated them. In the end, it was Smith who secured the most votes and went home with the R10,000 prize and an internship at The Hardy Boys. "A celebration of life," is how Smith describes her design. “Jazzy characters, soulful faces and a coupling of art and photography; this is a showcase of how each unique individual has their own unique, individual flavour. Just like Number One Mageu,” she said. The runner-up, Mathonsi, walked away with a R5,000 prize. “Number One Mageu is an iconic South African brand that has been feeding the bodies and souls of South Africans for nearly 50
years, giving them a boost when they need it most. We believe in celebrating our South African heritage and culture – more importantly celebrating the individuals who make up our culture,” said Aamina Shaik, Number One Mageu senior brand manager. “We celebrate individuals who are able to express themselves with their passions, whether it is through dance, music or art. This time, we decided to choose the passion for art. We wanted to give these creative, artistic souls a voice on our cartons, a chance for them to speak their minds and express their souls on this iconic piece we love – our Mageu Number 1 Banana carton.” As part of its effort to nurture young South African design talent, Number One Mageu also gave DUT design students a chance to participate and have their work incorporated into their syllabus. The student whose design was voted tops turned out to also be overall winner, Hannah Smith. “I can’t believe I won both contests. I am really grateful for this opportunity and for all the people that supported me with their votes. I am looking forward to my internship and learning more about the Number One Mageu brand,” she said.
NEWS
13 October 2018
Nkanyezi Masango is the next potential Cannes JESSICA TENNANT
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ast month the Perth Advertising and Design Club (PADC) announced Cape Town as The Skulls 2018 judging city with chair of judges, King James CD Nkanyezi Masango. Someone PADC President Mark Braddock believes is “at the vanguard of the new voices rising in creative communications and someone who is a big advocate for the power of the creative industries to positively affect social change”. I absolutely believe in the power of our industry to affect social change. The first step is democratising the creative business itself by making it accessible to kids in townships, which is why I started Blackboard alongside Tseliso Rangaka and SJ Myeza, an initiative that raises awareness for our industry in high schools. The second step is encouraging clients to play a more meaningful role in society – beyond just selling products.
I’v HO e So alw W DO Sk , to h ays a ull a YO s 2 ve t dmir UF 018 he ed E o A – w pp D u OE EL A he ortu stral S I BO re TM U the nity ian a d t EA T IT cal wor o pl vert / N a WH ibr k i isin y TO WHA AT e – s g suc ga DO o YO T h is a ing n ES U? n e to a key d de IT M s no be EAN rol ign r o m . e I FOR ou f a h at res t confi sh SA, on igh com pected rms th THA ou a g m t ou TC loba wou unit r r l ldn’ YEA APE T t wa ies to i ly. It’s diverse O R ns als W ’S J nt c UD N IS end to com pire ea o a gre ulture a T GIN at o up b n e ju ch ot d G C HIS ppo crea her dge eing I TY? r t t an in iv u the nex such a d exch nity for ity hav t Ca a e nne gorgeo nge ide the tw becom o u s–e e a xcep s city? s. Besi creativ May des, e t th b ew ine e we m who is af ford ight able . WHAT As chair DOES YOUR o then I’l ROL l be driv f judges my ro le in OF JUD E AS CHAIR is g the obje to selec is fair – GES E t local ctives o for ins NTAIL ju heard. ? I’ll also tance, if ther f Skulls and h dges for each e are d e be flyin o lp f in t h g e ebates e fo n g to Pe u s u r re th jurie I’ll rth to d o a talk make sure ev at the judging s, and eryone’s at PAD process C and t ake par point of view t at the is ceremo on the n y awards night.
WHAT EXCITES YOU MOST ABOUT THIS OPPORTUNITY? I’m excited to see the work from Perth. Some of my creative heroes like Matt Eastwood come from Perth, so clearly the city produces great minds. I can’t wait to draw inspiration from the new wave of creativity that’s coming out of there and meet the creatives behind it. CAREER AND BEING A CREATIVE WHAT DO YOU LOVE MOST ABOUT YOUR DIRECTOR IN PARTICULAR?
creativity. Every day presents a new I just love the challenge of solving problems with on. I think creative direction is about generosity. problem which leads to a fresh creative soluti a lot of your time helping others be better, It’s quite a selfless process because you spend so rewarding. Fortunately, I work with insanely and when your team achieves success, that’s ing. talented people, which makes my job very fulfill ?
NING WHAT HAS BEEN YOUR GREATEST LEAR
best work is often rooted in good The greatest learning for me has been that the p is strong, so is the work. relationships with clients. When the relationshi RTANT TO YOU, AND IN GENERAL?
WHY IS DIVERSITY IN THE SPACE IMPO
s. Without diversity, it means Creativity is based on insights and life experience d, and we end up with work limite very is try indus the creativity we offer as an population because we’re drawing that doesn’t connect with the majority of the It’s not sustainable. inspiration from such a small pool of insights.
WHAT DID IT TAKE TO GET TO WHERE YOU ARE TODAY? Icaro Doria once wrote that ‘your career is a collective effort’. This is so true in my case. Where I am in my career has to do with the amount of people who’ve believed in me and gave me a shot, such as Graham Lang and Alistair King. The only rule I’ve stuck to from day one is to work with people who I admire. I’ve never chased money, I chase great mentors.
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GRAPHIC
13 October 2018
THE STRICKING IMAGES HAVE CAUGHT THE ATTENTION OF MORE THAN ZOLS LOVETTE’S FAMILY AND FRIENDS
Go ahead and take your selfies girl
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ody-positive artist Zola Lovette is the creative behind a series of illustrations celebrating bathroom selfies. The Pope does it, Obama does it and Tim Peake and Tim Koprah – two astronauts making repairs on the outside of the International Space station – have done it. So it’s safe to say that selfies are a phenomenon that have transformed popular culture and defined our cultural moment. Although selfies may have reached their peak Ellen Degeneres took the most retweeted selfie at the 2014 Oscars, their existence in fact predates the widespread use of the modern term: Robert Cornelius, a pioneer in early photography, took the first selfie in 1839. Today, pop psychology has a lot to say about selfies. Everyday Sociology has reported that selfies are a way for us to project our identities onto others: “The more pictures you post
of yourself promoting a certain identity – buff, sexy, adventurous, studious, funny, daring, etc.– the more likely it is that others will endorse this identity of you.” The photos have also been credited with damaging relationships by reducing intimacy among friends and partners.
“She ratifies the otherside of poppsych opinion” But New York-based illustrator Zola Lovette would disagree. She ratifies the otherside of pop-psych opinion, which says that selfies are all about context: “If you’re using it as a
tool to document feeling good about yourself and you’re just taking mementos of living a great life, that’s fine,” says Dr. Josie Howard, on Refinery29. Lovette’s collection of selfies titled “Take some selfies and love yourself girl” celebrates self-photography. Crafted in bold bubble-gum colours, the young artists illustrates women of curvier body types in various states of dress with their mobile phones up taking selfies. “I’m a bod-positive, bod-empowerment, self-love liberal feminist who’s is striving to change girls views of themselves through my art,” reads Zola Lovette’s Deviantart page. “I show a lot of body to encourage girls to fall in love with themselves and to also combat those who take part it slut-shaming judgement.”
Whimsical illusions of Moography
“My goal is always to create art that brings a smile to the faces of people who see it!”
Finding inspiration in the everyday activities EMILE UYS
Anshuman Ghosh is a South African creative whose colourful artworks have caught the attention of scores of folks on Instagram. Operating under the moniker Moography, Ghosh produces quirky designs that merge the tangible with the intangible in playful style. Brightly hued paper, photography and hand-drawn digital illustration come together to turn the screen of an iPhone into an imaginary window of infinite cartoonish realities. Using these simple visual ingredients, Ghosh produces vibrant illusions featuring his smartphone as the vehicle for his ideas. Writing to Bored Panda, Ghosh describes his open attitude when it comes to inspiration, a freedom of creativity that allows him
to draw the artworks of Moography on the fly and in an ongoing way. “I think one can find inspiration everywhere. My artworks are inspired by everyday occurrences, common observations and most importantly, the things that I love,” says the artist, “Depending on the complexity of the work at hand, it takes me between 2 to 4 hours to complete an artwork from start to finish. At the end of the day, my goal is always to create art that brings a smile to the faces of people who see it!” When he is not curating his own Instagram feed with cheerful and vivid artworks, Ghosh works as a designer to impart his signature sprightly visual style to advertising campaigns and other social media channels.
FASHION
13 October 2018
Our favourite pieces from SA Fashion Week
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RHODÉ MARSHALL AND GRETHE KEMP
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andton became a runway of top local design when SA Fashion Week launched the Spring/Summer 2018 season, with 66 exciting signature collections. Rhodé Marshall and Grethe Kemp pick some of their favourite looks. One of the most outstanding fashion shows that #Trending has seen this year was by the brilliant Woolworths Style by SA designers Rich Mnisi, Thebe Magugu, printmaker and sustainable textile designer Sindiso Khumalo, Wanda Lephoto, and Young and Lazy. The show set a solid tone on the first day of the 21-year-old South African Fashion Week (SAFW). Lephoto’s white T-shirt with ANC colours on the front was a spectacular hit on the catwalk. The designer used earthy colours with boldly structured garments that made it anything but ordinary. On day two, resort wear designers Lalesso, BeachCult, Judith Atelier and Helon
GERT-JOHAN COETZEE’S DESIGN
Melon delivered designs that inspired visions of glamorous destinations, party nights and endless summers. BeachCult introduced fresh, new pieces with prints and elegant wardrobe staples that encapsulate the anticipation of an outof-this-world trendy summer. Thebe Magugu : Kimberley-raised Magugu’s show was strong, with a magnificent use of gender-fluid clothes that would suit both men and women. Magugu’s collections have consistently reimagined masculinity and femininity for everyday wear. His showstopper was an awe-inspiring candyfloss pink ostrich trench coat with a cotton shirtdress and a duchess satin envelope clutch. RK Menswear: The relationship between fashion and the man on the street has always been a curious one, but this time around, menswear designer RK Menswear delved into gowns that are reminiscent of the sky. The designs are equally as bold as they are
RK MENSWEAR’S DESIGN
subtly charming. The exquisite creations had reaping lines of beads at the top and cloudlike layers of flowing soft tulle skirts. The relationship between fashion and the man on the street has always been a curious one, but this time around, menswear designer RK Menswear delved into gowns that are reminiscent of the sky. The designs are equally as bold as they are subtly charming. The exquisite creations had reaping lines of beads at the top and cloud-like layers of flowing soft tulle skirts. Rich Mnisi: It was Rich Mnisi’s collection that really stole the opening night of SAFW. Inspired by his mother, his series was all about retro Afro-glamour, with tailored dresses paired with elbow-length silk gloves and heels. Most delightful were his gender-bending male models – one was dressed in a zebra print minidress, a maximalist black wide-brimmed hat and gold hoop earrings. Mantsho by Palesa Mokubung: This col-
RICH MNISI’S DESIGN
lection brought the essence of bright African colours and fabrics, and reimagined them in a playful and magical way. “I thought about countries I have travelled to and the ones I want to travel to. Then I took my soul as the thread and connected all of them, and then translated that into fabric that is reminiscent of the indigo fabric made in Mali,” Mokubung said.The collection draws influence from Kenya, Nigeria, Botswana and South Africa. Gert-Johan Coetzee: The famed designer to the stars chose, for the first time, darker colours and patterns for his collection. This season he showed a collection in collaboration with McDonald’s and experimented with its recognisable logo, at times even placing it on the front of an evening gown’s skirt. This may not be the designer’s most daring collection, but it certainly is playful and worth a try on a night out.
THEBE MAGUGU’S DESIGN
H&M eyeing local suppliers SIBONGILE KHUMALO
Swedish clothing retailer H&M is considering sourcing some of its merchandise from local suppliers, with teams from abroad in the country to assess potential partners, a spokesperson said on Tuesday. "It is still in [the] very early stages," said Amelia-May Woudstra. "Our production team managers have started with an assessment of South Africa as a potential sourcing market," she said. Woudstra would not say which companies H&M was eyeing as potential suppliers. The world's second-largest retailer currently imports all its merchandise sold in South Africa – to the chagrin of labour unions, which have criticised the H&M business model since it arrived in the country in 2015. Unions like the Southern African Clothing and Textile Workers' Union (Sactwu) have repeatedly accused H&M of damaging the local clothing manufacturing sector by not sourcing locally.
South Africa’s ailing manufacturing industry has been bleeding jobs for the last decade, with the sector losing busi-
“South Africa’s ailing manufacturing industry has been bleeding jobs for the last decade” ness to countries like Lesotho, Madagascar and Swaziland. In November 2017, the union staged protests outside the
country's major shopping centres that have H&M shops, demanding that the company start sourcing its merchandise from local manufacturers. The fast fashion retailer opened its first South African branch in Cape Town. It has since embarked on an aggressive expansion, with a total of 18 shops so far. Its presence has increased competition in the domestic market, with local retailers developing their fashion supply methods to meet growing consumer demands. H&M has production hubs across the Far East, South Africa, Europe and a few countries in Africa, according to the company’s website. In January, the Stockholm-based retailer temporarily closed some of its shops in South Africa following public outrage over a controversial advert depicting a black child in a sweater, with the slogan: "Coolest monkey in the jungle". The shop was accused of racism, with members of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) protesting nationwide and damaging H&M stores at Sandton and Menlyn malls.
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13 October 2018
OPINION
When does a film become a work of art? When it’s silent MOVING BRANDS
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isitors to this year’s Turner Prize show at London’s Tate Britain would do well to bring along a bag of popcorn. The 2018 installment of one of the art world’s glitteriest prizes doesn’t contain a sniff of sculpture, or a single pockmarked and pigment-splattered canvas. Instead, the four exhibitors — Naeem Mohaimen, Charlotte Prodger, Luke Willis Thompson, and Forensic Architecture — have submitted work which focuses its attention predominantly on the moving image. Aside from Naeem’s concertina-book Volume Eleven (Flaw in the Algorithm of Cosmopolitanism) and the slim pamphlet that accompanies Charlotte’s piece BRIDGIT the gallery’s central space is dedicated to a series of dark rooms. Some are lined with a single row of the kind of seats that used to sit proudly in every Odeon in the country before they were swapped for the super-soft juggernauts capable of hugging the prerequisite gallons of Coca Cola that have turned the cinema into an expensive creche for those of us too tired to talk to friends or partners. Others are fitted out with sturdy benches – benches that seem to only exist in art galleries, benches that have no place outside the hushed spaces so many of us give ourselves backache at.
NAEEM MOHAIMEN: TRIPOLI CANCELLED (2017)
“Tripoli Cancelled is absorbing, engaging, and at times breathtaking” One room — the one in which Luke’s work resides — there is nothing but the cold, bare floor. So you stand, or more accurately, you hover, always aware of how temporary your experience of this all is. You stand until the soles of your feet begin to twinge, or you feel the reassuring buzz of your phone tap-tapping against the pocket of your jeans. And then you turn on your heel and navigate your way back into reality. Regardless of what we can, or can’t sit on, each room — and these carpeted pens exist in galleries all over the world, not just here on a little stretch of the river that overlooks Terry Farrell’s still-startling M16 headquarters — is dominated by light. As I sat watching portions of Naeem Mohaimen’s extraordinary entry, Tripoli Cancelled I was plagued by a question. Tripoli Cancelled is a 93 minute long “fiction film” which first debuted at document a 14, last year. In it, a figure played by Vassilis Koukalani haunts an abandoned airport. He has spent a decade in this non-space, desperately attempting to find hope in a hopeless place. Dressed in a pilot’s now-soiled finery, he walks on the wing of a plane doomed to sit motionless on a runway until the apocalypse arrives. Like Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver he’s God’s lonely man. Except, our wanderer is more likely to read from Watership Down than harbour
NAEEM MOHAIMEN: TRIPOLI CANCELLED (2017)
psychopathic revenge fantasies. Tripoli Cancelled is absorbing, engaging, and at times breath-taking, with one particularly tender scene involving stolen kisses surely sticking in this writer’s mind for a long time. But watching it, I wondered: why am I doing this in a gallery? And when does a film become art? And then it hit me. It’s all about peace and quiet. Ever since Nam June Paik started playing about the possibilities of the Sony Portapak, art and video have found themselves entwined. This is something that is both relatively easy to grasp, and that has been documented countless times by people with far more authority than the subject than me. What I’m intrigued about, though, at the films like Tripoli Cancelled – the ones which could slot just as easily into your monthly MUBI package as they do a hushed little room at MoMA. My theory is thus: the fiction films which we get to categorise as ‘art’ as opposed to ‘entertainment’ or ‘something to absent-mindedly sort of, kinda watch while flicking through emails, Instagram, and the sale page on Verso’ are exercises in the potency of silence. Think about it; the kind of films that echo through white cubes from Lagos to Lisbon all hum with a charged sense of silence. Silence makes us feel contemplative, or at least look contemplative, because given that our collective attention span has been utterly decimated over the last decade or so, we’re more likely to be contemplating what we’re missing out on whenever we’re sat with, around, or in front of art. A paucity of punchy dialogue, extravagant explosions, and a screaming soundtrack reminds us that we’re not lining the pockets of whoever produced Mission Impossible 36: Croydon Cat Killer and allows us to slide head-first into the arthouse film dream sequences we’ve learned from time spent daydreaming in arthouse cinemas. This, largely, is a good thing, because who doesn’t enjoy the slight smugness that comes with being a self-identified gallery-goer? I certainly get a frisson from knowing that several times a year I sacrifice a Saturday afternoon to sit shoulder to shoulder with likeminded peers, peering into the dark, trying to keep up with the lack of action on the screen in front of us. While that isn’t to say the old Chaplin shorts might grab a nod by the bigwigs in charge of the Turner Prize come next yet, the sound of silence has given me the answer to a question I’ve been pondering ever since I first plonked myself down in a dark room on the Southbank as a callow teenager, wondering where my next hot dog would come from.
“the kind of films that echo through white cubes from Lagos to Lisbon all hum with a charged sense of silence” NAEEM MOHAIMEN: TRIPOLI CANCELLED (2017)
INTERNATIONAL
13 October 2018
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ADOBE GOVERNMENT COMMUNICATIONS TEAM
THE DESIGN WORK USING ADOBE PROGRAMMES PRODUCES A RANGE OF INSPIRING VISUALS
2018 Adobe award winners break records Adobe Government Communications Team
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ubmissions more than doubled this year, breaking a record for the Adobe Government Creativity Awards (AGCA). AGCA aims to recognize the top creative work in government and the public sector and to celebrate the impact it makes on the world. Adobe has organized these awards since 2015. “AGCA spotlights some impressive work in the public sector that might otherwise fly below the radar,” said Shawn Cetrone of Winthrop University, who won the Visual Communications Motion & Video category. “The competition has sparked new relationships in my industry and others, which is priceless.” The wide variety of organizations and submissions made the task of judging very difficult. Creative work was submitted across eight countries — United States, Canada, U.K., Germany, France, Australia, India, and Japan — and nine submission categories. In total, we received nearly 500 innovative and inspiring entries. A total of 52 projects were recognized, including: 9 category winners. 32 finalists and honorary mentions. 11 special designations. “Winning the award has definitely boosted my confidence around pursuing nontraditional design solutions to promote our agency’s mission,” said Kelly Ir-
“The wide variety of organizations and submissions made the task of judging very difficult”
vine of the National Institute of Standards and Technology. Kelly’s art exhibition, which has been featured in two locations so far, was the category winner for Museums and Park Exhibits. The theme was “Big Images of Small Things from NIST Labs.” It featured 20 microscopic images enlarged many times over and printed on acrylic sheets. Kelly was inspired to create this exhibition after 18 years of working as a graphic designer at the NIST Public Affairs office. She was struck by the beauty of the images and wanted to challenge the idea that science and art are mutually exclusive. “The breadth of creative work happening in governments around the world is incredible,” said Sandy Mervak, government marketing manager at Adobe. “There’s just so much.” Sandy said the outstanding entries had three things in common: A good story: it included a background, project goals, either visuals or a timeline walking through the creative process, and outcome metrics that matter to that agency. A standout brand: it had something unique — either excellent use of Adobe tools to push the boundaries of design, or an innovative brand design process that really listened to its users and made a larger impact. A user-centric design: it started with anticipating the user’s thoughts and needs as they interacted with the design or campaign. Designs often shifted during project iterations, and, in some cases, design teams conducted extensive user interviews before launching their projects. One example of citizen-centric design came from the New York City Mayor’s Office for Economic Opportunity. There, the Service Design Studio was tasked with improving the lives of low-income residents in the City of New York through design. “NYC Opportunity created a toolkit that helped public servants adopt user-centric design principles, and then sent out that toolkit to different agencies in the city, so that those agencies could use it to talk with their stakeholders when they were examining their own programs,” Sandy said. The Civic Service Design Studio + Toolkit was this year’s category winner for Citizen-Facing Campaign. Ultimately, it’s all about showcasing critical information for the public in a clear, meaningful, memorable, and creative way. For creatives, often the hope is to do purposeful work that moves people.
The Marketing and Media Services team at the City and County of Denver, which oversees denvergov.org, did exactly that when they revamped their website in 2015. “Today, there are 400-plus services that can be completed through the website, and it remains our number one marketing tool,” said Karen Pellegrin, Webmaster and UX Designer. “Denvergov.org’s service-based, mobile-friendly design drives clicks rather than calls to our 311 call center and makes it easier for residents to find the information they need quickly and effectively.” The City of Denver website was this year’s category winner for Web Design. Important work like this is done every day in governments around the world. From helping deliver traffic updates faster, to making public data more accessible, creative professionals are working to help make government communications and service delivery more engaging and efficient.As we close AGCA this year, we’d like to celebrate all those creatives who continue pushing the envelope, and the judges who gave their time and expertise to help the contest run smoothly. And congratulations to all the winners.
“Important work like this is done every day in governments around the world”
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13 October 2018
TECHNOLOGY
What's wrong with period tracking apps? JENNIFER LANGSTON
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martphone apps designed to track menstrual cycles often disappoint users with a lack of accuracy, assumptions about sexual identity or partners, and an emphasis on pink and flowery form over function customisation. Researchers collected data from 2000 reviews of popular period tracking apps, surveyed 687 people and conducted in-depth interviews with a dozen respondents to understand how and why they tracked their menstrual cycles. Nearly half of the survey respondents used a smartphone app to track their periods for the following reasons: to understand their body and reactions to different phases of their cycles; to prepare for their periods; to achieve or avoid pregnancy or to inform conversations with healthcare providers. As well as the apps, women say they also use other strategies for menstrual tracking including digital calendars, paper diaries, birth control cues, being aware of symptoms, and simply remembering. “People didn’t feel like the apps were very good at supporting their particular needs or preferences,” says the study's lead author Daniel Epstein, a doctoral student at the University of Washington’s Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering. “People felt they were better than tracking their periods on paper.” The study is among the first to investigate how women track their periods—which is surprising, researchers say, given that it’s one of the first questions doctors ask women. A lack of attention to such an essential component of women’s health surfaced publicly in 2014 when Apple rolled out its HealthKit without any way to track menstrual cycles. The apps are most accurate if your cycles are really really regular, but the people who most need an app are the people whose cycles aren’t regular. The new study focused on nine different period tracking apps currently available on the Android Market and Apple App Store, and on what features users liked or disliked, rather than general opinions of the apps themselves. While some apps were much more successful in meeting users’ needs, none was perfect. The modeling assumptions used in some period tracking apps weren’t accurate or flexible enough to consistently predict their menstrual cycles, particularly when periods weren’t regular. Many apps don’t allow users to correct them when the predictions are wrong or to input data or explanations about why a particularly stressful month or change in birth control might have thrown off their cycles. Apps rarely allow users to customise results or how they are presented. Someone
who is trying to avoid getting pregnant or to prepare for their period, for instance, might want an app to provide a more generous window for predicting when they are ovulating or when their period will arrive so they aren’t surprised. Someone trying to become pregnant would likely want the app to zero in on a narrower span of time when their chances of ovulation are highest. One significant issue is that few apps are transparent about explaining their methodology or limitations, says coauthor Julie Kientz, associate professor of human centered design and engineering. In working with healthcare providers on a teen health app, she learned that teenage girls were relying on smartphone apps as their primary form of birth control to tell them when they should avoid having sex. “That’s pretty disconcerting because accuracy can be a problem with these apps. I wanted to understand why they had so much trust in the technology.” Other users complained that the iconography used in the apps assumed that a woman’s sexual partner would be male, failing to account for those in same sex relationships, and also assume all users identify as female, which excludes transgender users or those with non-binary gender identities. Across the board, app users objected to the use of pink, flowering imagery rather than a more useful and discreet display of the information. “It’s a trope at this point that the ‘shrink it and pink it’ approach to designing technology for women revolves around making something smaller and making it pink and taking all the functionality out of it,” Epstein says. “We definitely found that in the menstrual tracking apps, and that was one of the things that users had the biggest negative reaction to: ‘Why is my app so pink?'” The researchers suggest five changes could make period tracking apps more functional:Allow users to provide customised feedback to boost accuracy.Ditch the pink flowers and other heteronormative stereotypes. Be discreet in the design. Allow users to export data to other health and fitness tools.Recognise that an individual user’s menstrual tracking needs change over time.Researchers will present the paper at the 2017 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. The Intel Science and Technology Center for Pervasive Computing, the University of Washington, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, and the National Science Foundation funded the work.
Origami-Designed Drone Can Deform Upon Impact ELIZABETH MONTALBANO
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DRONE RESEMBLES THE INTRICATE DETAIL OF OPRIGAMI
STEFANO MINTCHEV ADMIRING THE DRONE
he Japanese paper art of origami is inspiring scientists to come up with designs to enable new properties in materials and thus the products created with them. One of the latest examples is work from the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, where researchers have developed a drone that is flexible enough to absorb shocks without breaking before returning to its initial shape. The drone—inspired by insect wings as well as origami—is composed of a unique structure that allows for both stiffness and flexibility, enabling it to have these two opposite characteristics simultaneously. Moreover, researchers can actually tune the properties of the drone at will, said Stefano Mintchev, one of the researchers from the Institute of Microengineering in EPFL’s School of Engineering and the lead author on a paper published about the research in the journal Science Robotics. “When we make a drone, we can give it specific mechanical properties,” he said in an EPFL news release. “This includes, for example, defining the moment at which the structure switches from stiff to flexible.” The drone also has the unique characteristic of building up elastic potential energy when it’s folded up, he added. This means it can unfold automatically when so instructed. Origami has inspired robotics and material designers to develop two types of origami-inspired structures for new types of robots and drones: rigid structures that have a certain weight-bearing capacity, but will break if that capacity is exceeded, and flexible structures that can’t carry much of a load, but are much more resilient. EPFL researchers have gone a step further, Mintchev said. Using what they observed about insect wings, they developed a drone that combines the best of both of these types of structures. When the drone is flying, it’s stiff enough to carry its own weight and withstand the thrust of the propellers, researchers said. But
if the drone runs into something or hits the ground, it becomes flexible in order to absorb the shock and therefore minimize any damage. “The current trend in robotics is to create ‘softer’ robots that can adapt to a given function and operate safely alongside humans. But some applications also require a certain level of rigidity,” said Dario Floreano, one of the paper’s other authors. “With our system, we have shown that you can strike the right balance between the two.” Researchers achieved their goal by stretching an elastomer membrane and then sandwiching it between rigid plates. This results in a structure in which the plates hold together when the drone is at rest, giving the structure its stiffness. But when
“The drone also has the unique characteristic of building up elastic potential energy when it’s folded up” enough force is applied, the plates draw apart and the structure can bend, they said. Drones aren’t the only robots or devices that can be built using this type of structure. Researchers demonstrated this by using the same technology to create a soft-touch gripper as they also were developing the drone, Floreano said. The gripper softens once it reaches a certain level of pressure, which prevents it from breaking the object that it is picking up. This type of design also means it can’t pick up a load that exceeds its capacity and would cause it to fail, researchers noted. Other products and devices also can benefit from this structure.