We interviewed each others critical friend in order to develop written portraits. Written portraits describe and analyze a person giving deep insight that goes beyond superficial. We used the ethnographic research method of in-depth, open ended interview.

 

This stage started a peer reflection process and re-enforced group dynamics.

 

The image is an abstract of the portrait I wrote about my fellow classmate and critical friend, Jess Myra.

Here our design subject changed. We portrayed in a picture a fellow student using the techniques of the photo essay: addressing a certain issue by capturing the essence of a character.

 

Here, I took the picture of Alexis based on the text that a fellow student had previously written about him. I tried to capture Alexis' as I saw him: driven and focused; technical and artistic.

Yet another change of design subject for portraying a classmate took place. This time in a poster, using the previous created material (the written portrait and the photo); as well as new graphic elements.

 

In this poster I tried to convey Clayton and his quest for change.

This was the last stage, and here there was a final change of design subject. This time we had to create the illusion of movement of graphic elements, for the conveyance of a fellow student.

 

The concept is based on a poster based on a picture based on a written portrait about one of my classmates, Linus (aka "The Runner").

The methodology had us portrayed 4 times: by 4 different people and in 4 different medias. This opened the question: are this portraits conveying who we really are?

 

Later on I chose this project to write a paper for the SIDeR conference on the topic of research, and I gave it the title of interpret the interpretation.

 

IxD MA1 students

4 weeks project

Umeå Institute of Design, Sweden 2010