Design Research Dissertation - Final Compilation

29 August 2023 -  28 November 2023 / Week 1 - Week 14
Sim Jia Min 0349784
Design Research Dissertation / Bachelor of Design (Hons) in Creative Media / Taylor's University
Final Compilation

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INSTRUCTIONS (MIB)

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Task 1: Dissertation draft

Task 2: Final dissertation turnitin report

Task 3: Visual Design Publication (Flip book)

https://online.fliphtml5.com/tmzob/hrde/

Task 4: Research Article Publication

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FEEDBACK

Week 2

- add in visuals in discussion section

- add short intro for discussion section (for other sections too) 

- introduce overall graphic design in films in 5.1 

- 5.2 is related to RQ1 & RQ3 - 5.3 is related to RQ2 

- max 3800 words - week 3 expectation: intro need to be done, or even til 5.2.1 

- refer to wk 2 slides for discussion writing

Week 3

graphic elements analysis: 

- apply secondary data to newspaper and zz symbol part (like box section) 

- the historical context of ss can be shortened 

- mention the impact of the graphic elements clearly audience engagement

- the survey data pics can be removed, mention the data by words 

- add a conclusion for the audience engagement part

Week 4

survey response:

- take the most meaningful part and quote partial of it, minimum 2 quotes 

- pick the one that is suitable for audience engagement discussion 

- [sic] behind the grammatical mistake figure number 

- lead the audience by mentioning the figure number behind the texts

Week 5

- relate back to visual narrative 

- gothic script: is it the overall image of the movie? why? (exp: the movie titile) 

- believability and authenticity in visual narrative 

- use examples in real life

Week 6

survey: 

- Therefore there is a significant influences... (dont mention "respondents"/ "the data highlights..."_ - include 2-3 qualitative responses 

- in summary, it can be said...

project recommendation: 

- could be a final year project or any other creative project (not necessarily present irl) 

research methods:

- assignment 3 from research methodology 

- dont use "will be" bc the methods have alrdy carry out, use past tense

Appendix: 

- include the survey google form

Week 7

- literature review is good to go
- abstract: a shorten version of conclusion

Week 9
- dont use the colours from movies, go with the general colour palette 

- serif fonts from idea 1 work 

- book cover can explore more 

- list of items on imprint, no barcode - smaller descriptive title of movie names

Week 10

- content layout is fine 

- cover needs to rework

Week 11

- centralised the texts on cover 

- include reference url at imprint 

- content layout looks clean and consistent 

- change the colour of the images to the colours from palette (the grand budapest hotel: pink, harry potter: blue)

Week 12

- bold the section 

- add more words to introduce graphic design in films in introduction

- miss out survey at the abstract two research method 

- combine discussion and conclusion

Week 13

- need image below abstract (7 images in total) 

- will hv around 600-700 words for discussion for both movie 

- miss out research objective at problem statement

Week 14

- figure number 

- images placement refer to template 

- appendix: compile all screenshots of survey into 1 or 2 images

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REFLECTION

Writing the dissertation was a challenging but exciting experience, as the topic is something that I am interested in, with the combination of graphic design and film. The coolest part of writing this research is that I discovered some graphic designers who worked in the film field, one of them was Annie Atkins who worked for directors like Wes Anderson and Steven Speilberg. Looking through her portfolio website (https://www.annieatkins.com/) and Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/annieatkins/?hl=en) is so inspiring, especially how she shares her experience of being a graphic designer who works in a film crew, and constantly gives advice to people who are trying to get into the field. I also found out she is giving online courses on teaching people to make specific film graphic props, I am actually considering buying it and might do the course exercises during semester break. 

The writing part of the dissertation (task 1 and 2) was actually quite fine as I already had written the basic data from design research methodology module, and just needed to refine and add some necessary details in the writing. I noticed that I actually overdid the primary data for design research methodology, I analysed too many graphic elements in the visual analysis for The Grand Budapest Hotel, doing all that for ended up only choosing 3 of the graphic elements for the dissertation writing this semester. However I did not regret about it because some of the analysis was actually quite fun to do and discover the detailed context behind the design. 

The challenging part of this module is the visual design publication, I think is because I was overwhelmed by other design-based assignments at the same time, which is why I lacked of motivation to do the book design for this dissertation. Considering the time I had spent on writing the research, I also didn't want to roughly do the book design for the sake of getting it done for the submission, because it would be a waste if I didn't take the book design with my own writing seriously. This kind of ambivalence is the reason why I ended up struggling and took more time to do the designs. But I am glad that I still made it in the end, and I was quite happy with how the overall layout looks like

Overall going through this module was a great learning experience, it has given me the motivation to delve into my field of interest and learn more about it from the professionals.