The Facebook Handshake by Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Gold Award

Gold Award for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award for outstanding Friendship

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Gold Award

Gold Award for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award for outstanding Friendship

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Lewis Arnold Son. BA (Hons) Graphic Design. D&AD - Arjowiggins

So. From my understanding of D&AD, its a very prestigious design competition. Winning a Pencil award indicates innovation and skill, something that attracts positive attention. The D&AD New Blood 2017 Briefs are live, time to have a look and see what I can do.

Arjowiggins. Putting paper into the heart of a digital platform is significant because it reminds digital viewers that print is still a respected medium. The shift of going digital can distract us from whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s original, its vital that we still interact. The Arjowiggins D&AD Newblood brief looks appealing, highlighting key words and phrases can help me explore what I can potentially design.

Think. Mindmapping allows me to think of ideas, drawings, and (key) words from the top of my head onto paper; which will give me a sense of direction. The brief gives us a choice of three â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;digital realmsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;, Facebook, Instagram and Sony Music; I am to select one as my focus. I chose Facebook purely because of its variety of playable content. Facebook also contains a lot of emotion which can be beneficial for this type of project.

I like your style. In order for me to put paper into the heart of Facebook, I need to understand what Facebook currently provides. I need to recognise the visual language, what’s implemented and what isn’t. Looking at Facebook you can see quite quirkiness, and the illustrations compliment that. The Facebook icons are just as memorable as the brands logo; its part of their branding, their house style, and their visual language. By looking at the icons you can already tell its Facebook. And that’s striking, because it gives Facebook a sense of identity, what they are, who they represent, and why they do it.

Facebooks quirky identity can be shown within the card. As well as the thumbs-up icon, emojis are very popular. This too is a great icon that can be manipulated and distorted in such a way that it puts print into the heart of Facebook. Facebook has recently become renowned for its celebration of moments in time, whether that be memories or key events. Friend anniversaries have become a new instalment to the world of Facebook. You will now receive a notification from Facebook that tells you have been friends with this person for however many years.

Facebooks thumbs-up is probably the most memorable icon of the lot; its probably the most popular icon as well. The thumb is Facebooks identity; there could be something here perhaps.

To celebrate that anniversary, Facebook then makes you a compilation video of the best pictures of you and your friend across the history of your Facebook friendship.

Facebooks ethos is connecting and sharing. Communicating online with friends and family is truly special. However you can argue that the shift of online technology, and the eligibility web 2.0 has alienated us, and perhaps made us more disconnected from one another.

There are a lot of positives from this, one being it celebrates the moments of you and your friends, and also how it compresses your friendship catalogue of pictures into a quirky video.

You can also argue that on Social Media you can re-invent yourself, change your identity, and become indifferent to who you really are. On Facebook you can receive a happy birthday from someone that wouldn’t necessarily say happy birthday to you face to face. Birthday’s are traditionally a day of celebration, when someone gives you a present, its a token of gratitude; a card is along the same comparison. A happy birthday on Facebook is not the same. A card will always be more sentimental, because its tangible, qualitative, and you can keep it as a souvenir. Birthday cards compliment the usage of paper and print; integrating Facebook Cards to make Birthdays more meaningful than a happy birthday post.

However there’s something here for paper, since paper it’s tangible, it would create more emotion and add more sentimental value to this great celebration. I liked the sound of this idea, I thought of how I can execute it. However I didn’t want to rush into this project. I had an idea, and I needed to experiment with it. I started to ask myself does it have to be in the form of a card, perhaps something more innovative. Cards may be a great sentimental medium, however there’s already thousands of cards out their. With the large amount of card retailers and online business that allow you to fully customise your cards; it seems that my card needs to be unique. I brought together a mood board of Facebook branding and innovative cards to help be get inspired. I had the idea in place, now I need to need to come up with some initial design ideas (sketches).

The Facebook card. These sketches are rough ideas that I can potentially take forward for the brief. The initial sketches present articulated ideas, which allows me to put ideas into practise. The idea is Facebook cards; combining print and social media together in the form of a sentimental, tangible object. The card brings together Facebooks identity to present the brand to the user. The face of the card would include the brands use of emojis and stickers. Effectively the stickers are part of the instalment for Facebook Messenger. These illustrations can be sent via messenger, to create a visual communication between friends. These popular stickers along with the emojis increase and represent the emotion of the card. The user will receive a notification indicating their friends upcoming birthday. The user will then have the opportunity to use the Facebook template to design a card and send it to their friend. There would be a variety of templates available to the user, depending on the users gender, age, and character. Using the Facebook branding will allow the user to identify that this in fact is a Facebook card.

Part of Facebooks brand is floating emojis. An example of this would be Live Facebook Video. Any user watching a live video on Facebook will have the opportunity to react to it, using a selection of emojis. Once the selection is made, that same emjoi will pop up on the screen over the video and then float to the right hand side. The option is given to all users watching the live video, and so effectively all these emojis start floating across the screen. I thought maybe I can convey this visual through print, and so as you open up the card, all these emojis fall down, like confetti. Another idea is the concept of invitations, how a Facebook invite isnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t the same as a paper invite. Maybe itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s time to go backwards in time where people would send invitations as a form of print. These ideas maybe slightly too obvious, and less innovative; but its important to just put ideas onto paper, that way you can figure out what can work well, what doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t, and how I can tweak that idea to improve its concept.

When I was young I broke my arm; I had to wear this bulky cast until my arm healed, and all my friends would wrote on it. I then thought of a three dimensional Facebook thumb; what would people write on it? What would they put inside it? What emotion would they have?

Thumbs-up. The Facebook Card idea needed to be more innovative. I need to challenge the idea of a card, and how it opens and closes. There could be a 3D element to it, perhaps a net. I thought that there might be something in the thumbs-up icon. Maybe the message is inside, or the outside, or even the way on which the fold reveals a message. At this point Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m experimenting so its important to see where this single idea can go.

The handshake. I thought about the way on which the thumb can reveal a message, either on the outside, inside, or perhaps along the fold. I focused on the fold and thought that there could be something that can reveal a message. It’s more different than a traditional card and how it simply opens and closes. I then thought to myself, what part of the thumb folds? When you open your hand. I thought that there can be a fold transition. As the hand opens up, maybe there can be a second fold. Using Facebooks identity I then thought of friends and friendship. A Facebook memory is where you receive a notification of a anniversary, whether that be a status, a photograph, of a friendship.

Figuring out a method of fold meant I need to create multiple drawings. I needed to think whether this is even possible, to create the fold with one piece a paper, perhaps its two. I don’t know yet.

It seems that everyone is on Facebook. Friendship Anniversaries are meaningful and special. Facebook keeps the date of the day you became friends with someone (on Facebook). Effectively Facebook celebrates the birth of your friendships. This then gave me the idea of a thumbs-up folding into a handshake. The thumbs up represents Facebook and Facebook Likes. The handshake represents the birth of a friendship, the first real gesture you make when you meet someone new. I thought of the fold and maybe I can have this folding sequence that combines the two together. Never mind the message or what the message even says, the fold and the sequence is innovative, and this is a good starting point.

I started to illustrate the Facebook Thumb and how I can illustrate that into a handshake. A handshake needs two people, so effectively I need to hands that connect together to create the handshake. I tried looking at folding techniques but I couldn’t seem to find anything that was relevant. Therefore I needed to find my own way to create and design the fold of the handshake. I started to think of possibilities and ways to create that fold, but nothing came to mind. The only way to figure out a technique that’s appropriate is to create multiple folds. This would then allow me to narrow it down one fold at a time so that I’m left with something basic. I now need to make a dozen different folds.

I made a cut-out and it looked like a heart; I thought that maybe the shape of the paper can be experimented.

Finding the fold. Testing enabled me to figure out what works and what doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t. Trying to find the best possible fold will enhance the user experience when they interact with this. At this point I drew out some hands onto rough pieces of paper, and I added simple folds to see how it looked. Testing with one fold, two folds, even three folds. How the hands folds over to create the thumbs up, and how the hands open up to create a handshake is rather tricky.

Revisiting the concept of placing a message into the fold is something that creates further emotion.

Method found. In this experiment I thought to play around with a thicker paper; I thought maybe the thickness can create a more secure handshake. I also thought to cut out the shape of a hand, as opposed to drawing one on a piece of paper and folding it that way. By cutting out the shape of a hand it meant I was able to experiment with the fingers. I created a fold of the thumb that sits on top of the other hand.

Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve allowed space for the message in between the two hands. I think the fold is one aspect, but to reveal a message is another.

No fold. Yes fold. Now that Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve found the fold technique, I need to develop it. I think to many folds makes it complicated, so ideally I would like to keep the number of folds to a bare minimum. For me to narrow down the folds, I need to figure out the most significant. I used a red pen to highlight the folds I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t intend to include for the final outcome.

Quality. I am well aware of the house style of Facebook. Its blue colour brand is recognisable. Arjowiggins had a huge variety of paper; but it was the golden metallics that stood out for me. The super gold paper looked absolutely beautiful. The gold metallic can also compliment the friendship.

Golden friendship.

You are gold. I cleaned up the handshake by introducing a design. The illustration comes from an original ‘thumbs-up’ icon on Facebook. As the thumb extends to open up the hand, it meant that I had to improvise with the design. I’ve introduced the gold pantones, to compliment the Arjowiggins super gold metallic. I’ve also narrowed the folds down to just four stages. The thumb, the open hand, the revealed second hand, and then the handshake.

Gold award certificate - for outstanding friendship. This is the message I want to reveal to the users.

The message. I experimented with the message that is secretly revealed in-between the two hands. Originally I didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t intend to have a message, but then I allowed space for one, to further the sentimental aspect of the fold. Using Facebooks branding, Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve incorporated the usage of emojis into the design. Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve created a certificate into the centre, that opens up - to make the users friend anniversary more special. I also used this opportunity to test paper weights, to see which weight would give me the best fold.

This was a dark yellow on top of the super gold material. You can see the ink as a bold image, but as a text it is unreadable.

Refining. The test prints allowed me to see what pantones showed up on the super gold metallic. By conducting the test prints I found that a brown looked the most effective on the gold. I created a stencil-like effect on the design so that the super gold material will show through - instead of inking the entire surface. I also realised that if I wanted to create the thumbs-up fold I had to scar into the centre of the fold (over the message). So for this reason Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m unable to create the thumbs-up fold.

Gold award certificate - for outstanding friendship. This is the message I want to reveal to the users.

So. What went well? I really enjoyed the Arjowiggins brief as made me really appreciate quality paper. I’ve never worked with metallics before, and so I thought this might be the best opportunity. At the start of the brief I had to select either Facebook, Instagram, or Sony music. I’m happy with my choice of Facebook and I have no regrets. I’m satisfied with my direction, and I’ve enjoyed every moment of this brief. Creating the innovative fold is one of the main strengths of this project. I looked online to see if anyone had come up with a handshake fold, and I couldn’t find anything (at least not to my knowledge). And so I felt almost honoured that I’ve created the first handshake fold. Using Facebooks ‘thumbs up’ provided more character to the project. I don’t think this project would be the same if the hands were different. Even experimenting with different folds was enjoyable. I had no idea how I was going to produce the fold, I think it was a matter of patience. I had lots of fun creating the folds, and I think that took the pressure away - me trying to find the best fold. Initially I thought that the Facebook card was a strong direction. It was only when I had a tutorial that my eyes opened up. The Facebook card was too much like a traditional card how it opened and closed - even with the Facebook brand; the idea was not innovative. But when I focused on the thumbs-up, there was already something there, I immediately imagined it, and so it became my direction.

One of the weaknesses of this project is its flexibility. The fold may be a handshake, but I’m limited to the different variations of the fold. For example different celebrations, if this was a genuine fold that people can send to one another, what other event variations can I produce? The only customisable feature to the fold is the text within the certificate. If I was to take this concept further, I’d experiment with embossing. The quality is certainly a significant aspect of this project. Without the quality of the super gold metallic, you probably wouldn’t appreciate the fold as much. Arjowiggins supply beautiful paper, and I want to translate that into the world of Facebook. Embossing will add emphasis on such materials, focusing on intricate, rich, quality of paper. A beautiful embossing on the front of the handshake would be a significant improvement. I thought of having the handshake inside a golden card. The user would receive this card, and notice the cut-out of a thumbs-up in the centre. The user would then pull the fold out and notice that its a handshake instead of a thumbs-up. I thought it was a shame that I was not able to create the thumbs-up element to the fold. Originally the stages would be a thumbs up, then an open hand, and then two open hands (with the message in-between), and then a handshake. It was in fact a design fault, and so I was not able to include it in the final outcome; it would have added more flexibility to the fold.

The idea is simple. A Facebook handshake to celebrate friendship anniversary, through the means of paper, print, and fold. I’ve almost gone back in time. Instead of creating something digital, the outcome is print. The fold is tangible, interactive, engaging, and sentimental. I’ve never created a fold before, certainly a different brief to what I have previously done. But I like that. I enjoy a challenge. I understand that this brief probably is not the most open, but it certainly influences creativity. Taking Facebook and putting it into the world of paper and print was no easy task. The brief influenced creative ideas. This is certainly one of the most creative briefs I have ever done, and I loved it. It wasn’t the most technical brief, but I loved how we produced an outcome through the means of print. I will certainly revisit this. I will want to produce a video. I’m thinking white background, birds-eye-view camera, golden hands in the centre. I’ve simplified the folds throughout this project, and so for the video, I want to focus on these simple folds. I think that way the audience can really appreciate the essence of the fold. A handshake is the first real gesture you make when you meet someone knew. Either that or a hug. Or perhaps a kiss. Bit too keen. But I feel that I’ve succeed in capturing the motion of the handshake. And portraying this through Facebook was really fun, it furthered the creativity of this project.

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Gold Award

Gold Award for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award for outstanding Friendship

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Gold Award

Gold Award for outstanding Friendship Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award for outstanding Friendship

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son

Gold Award

for outstanding Friendship

Awarded from Josie Mathews to

Lewis Son