Project Brief
Information Graphics
We want you to assemble some data about a subject of your choice and devise an infographic which presents it in an engaging and informative way for an inquisitive and intelligent audience aged 18+.
The tone can be serious, or light-hearted, as you see fit. Remember to consider carefully the choice of image and typographic styling as appropriate to your subject matter and audience.
The tone can be serious, or light-hearted, as you see fit. Remember to consider carefully the choice of image and typographic styling as appropriate to your subject matter and audience.
Topic chosen: Nintendo (Animal Crossing)
Research
Designers
Peter Grundy, Information designer & illustrator
Editorial Infographics (Guardian/World Economic Forum)
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Design Booklets
Ross Thompson, Infographic & visual data designer
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Nicholas Felton
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Bikecycle (NYC data visualisation)
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Jing Zhang, 3d infographic designer
Altice
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Nintendo infographics
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Legoland map infographics
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Nintendo
Though technically not an infographic as such, the recent reveal for the Nintendo Switch 2 manages to convey a lot of information about the device, without using a single word. Technical details conveyed include increased display size, redesigned Joy cons, stand adjustment, surface finish, port selection, controller magnetic attachment mechanism and Joy con mouse control
Ideas
After toying with the thought of Nintendo's history (and seeing Jing Zhang's infographics on Nintendo), I feel it's something thats already been over done. Really want to try and make something unique, so decided that diving into a game would provide a better visual, along with also providing a lot more data to play with (game stats, sales, facts, hidden items/areas etc). Looked at Mario, Zelda and animal crossing - decided on animal crossing because there is a variety of options to explore, and out of the 3 games, is probably the game with the most info that could be applied to an infographic.
Brainstorming
Having the island map as the background to the data is definitely something I want to explore. it could be that in the case of an animal crossing 101, when animated the camera can zoom into specific locations on a tour, providing data through the use of narrative speech bubbles, or even appropriate iconography.
Although perceived as a kids game, during its first year of release, animal crossing new horizons was played mostly by millennials. It's impact in the pandemic is an angle that could be explored
Although perceived as a kids game, during its first year of release, animal crossing new horizons was played mostly by millennials. It's impact in the pandemic is an angle that could be explored
Game Stats/Facts
Haven't scratched the surface in regards to figures for the gameplay; depending on direction may need to find more. If it was a 101 infographic, it would likely need only basic figures. Excluding the game stats, the rest really relate to how the info would be presented when moving around the map (from location to location). e.g. Able sisters (clothing shop) could easily display those stats in animation.
Game screenshots
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The above game map would be a very rough idea of what the data would sit against. The map would obviously be a lot bigger, to include buildings and characters, and exclude the lists on the side.
The speech bubbles above are fundamentally part of the game experience, and are recognisable as belonging to said game.
The speech bubbles above are fundamentally part of the game experience, and are recognisable as belonging to said game.
Storyboarding
In total, there will be 12 scenes to be developed, + 1 static map infographic with a version suited for animation. of the map, there will be an additional 5 variations of the map scene adapted for animation, to be used as transitions/interconnects between the other scenes.
Asset Development
Before building the infographic, there's quite a bit of assets that need creating. Want to be able to change poses and freely change objects, so they need to be vectors to do this. I also want them to be in my own style, Ala flat.
Characters
Decided to tackle the characters first, as these will take the longest. Theyre not overly complex, and some include similar shapes that should allow me to reuse parts for others.
Drawing the characters
Wireframes:
Character outcomes
Grass...
Most important texture. Copied from existing stock texture of the game, but made into a vector so it can scale down/up without issue.
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Trees
The two trees in the game are quite complex, so need to figure out best way to A) simplify, and B) make them look like my own style.
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Fruits
Only things I need from the images below are the bits of fruit on the trees.
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Fruit drawings
Wireframes
Fruit outcomes
Buildings
Though the buildings on the map wont need to be detailed, I want the detail for when the animation would zoom into the 6 locations, so there's some detail in the background behind the infographic.
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Objects
Objects like flowers, bell bags, bridges, lampposts etc would be helpful when displaying information. want to use as little text as possible in the infographic, so the use of objects is a must to display data.
Some examples:
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Object outcomes
Buildings
Building drawings
Wireframes
Building Outcomes
Clothing
Drawings
Wireframes
Clothing outcomes
Other
Nintendo Switch
Outcome
Infographic development
Scene 1: Island 101 Map (Main infographic)
For the map, there will need to be two versions of this, one suitable for an animation, and the other as the main static infographic. Will need to finish the other scenes first before creating the latter, as I need elements from each scene to be slotted onto the map.
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Animated Infographic Development
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Tried applying the grass texture to the island map, however it has horrid pattern repeat, so decided to just abandon it for the main map. Might try and use it in other scenes
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Finding as I try to develop the map for the animated infographic, that it's not really working. All the elements are a bit small, and im not entirely sure on how to make it data driven vs. just looking like a game map... Had an idea to do a "bus-stop" like building map instead, where the player walks to each building along a path. Will still use the map for the A1 infographic as that's probably the right scale for it.
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Dont really think this option works either, so reverting to original. Will just have only the player on the map, and none of the NPCs
Animation frame outcome
Static Infographic Development
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Scene 2: Nook's House Loans (storyboard frame 4)
Development
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Outcome
Scene 3: Island Evaluation (storyboard frame 5)
Development
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Outcome
There was a lot of overlap with nook's cranny for this, so I've merged them together and got rid of this scene completely.
Scene 8: Able Sisters
Development
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Outcome
Scene 9: Museum Collections
Development
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Scene 12: Game Facts
Development
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Animation Transitions
As part of the infographic animation, I want it to transition like a pinhole between each scene, in a similar fashion to how the game does it.
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As for animating elements, the facts/objects would animate onto the screens in different ways, shown below using red arrows for direction of movement:
Feedback & DIRECTION
In feedback it was clear that I'd gone in the wrong direction, which I already suspected beforehand... got a little too hung up on presenting game graphics vs actual information. The plan is to start again but use the assets already made, making the static A1 infographic first, and then going from there.
Development v2
Quick Look Research
Initial Development
With starting again, thought it was an opportunity to swap apps, using illustrator instead. it has some features that may help with infographics, such as repeat tools and charting tools.
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However, after fighting with the pie chart tool for a good whole hour, abandoned this brainwave and went back. Possibly too late in the process to be swapping apps (nor is there much time left to create the infographic). Have got a layout out of it however, which is helpful
Development Outcomes
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Not overly happy with any of them. Cant seem to get the balance of colour right. Did contemplate just doing monotone colouring, but that would be really going against what the game is - colourful and energetic.
Animation Storyboard
Happy with the storyboard frames, adjusted some of the colours to the 4 main colours... will work this back into the final A1 graphic for consistency. Would have liked to have animated it (I can envision fruit rolling everywhere) but I've overestimated the time taken to do everything else.
feedback
Had the chance to get feedback from two creatives who work at the studio Hotfoot (Charlie and Julia). They gave some great advice on how to improve the infographic, so I want to implement the alternations they suggested.
Feedback response
A1 Infographic
Reworks some of the titles to Mae them work better, including rephrasing copies sold to just sales. Made demographics text bigger so it's clear what that panel is about, and also increased the size of 'Metacritic' so it's clearer that it's on about review score.
Full resolution version:
Mockup
Storyboard
Though hotfoot didn't comment on the storyboard, as I changed some of the language on the A1 infographic, I felt that I needed to update some of the frames from the storyboard as well.
Altered frames;
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Updated PDF Storyboard: