A BOOK IN A MACHINE AGE
DESIGN QUESTION: HOW CAN I MAKE THE READER AWARE that technology is changing our way of reading?
These website iterations show my process into finding the right visual language to translate my concept. The first examples are really focusing on making the reader think about there way of thinking and therefore are not focused on the changing of our way of reading enough. I later on tried playing with the translation of awareness in different ways. Highlighting for example seemed too direct so I started playing with the sizes too make the reader feel powerless and confused. however the awareness part still missed too much here so I played with ways of making the reader aware and this is when I came up with the pop-up and flashing word concept. See description of the final project down bellow.
For the translation of my concept in the printed publication I tried to make the reader experience digital overtake. To visualize this is started playing with font sizes and going from hand script to mono type and adding glitches. But this was to literally for me and the readers so i ended up finding a way of playing with the digital translation of my concept by adding websites as writers of the book that summarize the text and therefore take over the book. See description of the final project down bellow to read more about the final additions that added meaning to my visualization.
This is my hybrid publication re-design of the short story’s of Hao Jingfang in the book invisible planets by Ken Liu.
This book gives us a good understanding of a possible emerging technological dark age.
These technological changes our effecting our way of seeing, thinking and reading. Why? Because we are getting lazier in our way of reading and this is because of the bombarding of information. We are becoming less analytical readers, which makes us more vulnerable to fake news. This was something I wanted to visualize in my hybrid publication. Because we need to be aware of these changes in order to stay in control of our way of seeing, thinking and reading. Because we have a responsibility to be good readers!
I translated this concept into a website and a book. Both publications are different and build up a story together. In the book you can visually see the text changing because the text is not only written by Hao Jingfang but also by two summarizing website’s. I did this to give the reader the feeling that they are loosing their control of reading. The percentage and word amount are shown on a bigger scale. I also added a spread after every chapter of invisible planets that whiles reading the story lead me to this concept and therefore they are indispensable for me. The book is unreadable and in this way you need to use the website to really be able to read the original text. Both publications are in grey colors. These colors represent the new emerging technological dark age. On the website I show the original text that at a point is combined with pop ups which become worse and worse. With this i want to show the technological overtake and give the reader the feeling they can’t ignore these changes. After accepting the pop-up you will see a page that shows you flashing words. This is the laziest it can get and therefore is the ultimate visualization of my concept.
