Tag: Wen-Jason

Jason Wen

Set: SAFE AND EFFICIENT

Visual Language (VOICE)
Contrast of Space 75% white space
Shape of Forms Square 1×1″ and rectangle 1×2″ and 1×3″
Orientation of Forms 90 degrees
Size of Forms Forms are either all equal sizes or multiples of the smallest
Placement of Form Center
Space between Forms .25 inches

Objective Rules (assignment rules)
#1 Forms are symmetrical on a vertical line.
#2 Forms are placed in the center.

Interpretation of Visual Language
What did you interpret to apply your rules? Central focus
Explain your process. In contrast to the other sets, the forms of safe and efficient were placed in the center of the composition. Minimal additions of forms and space was used to incrementally move through the set. The orientation, symmetry, and location of the forms were used to representation simplicity and organization. The piece “Rhythm Emphasis” disrupted the horizontal symmetry but still preserved a vertical symmetry.

Set: DELICATE AND WHIMSICAL

Visual Language (VOICE)
Contrast of Space 75% white space
Shape of Forms Square 1×1″
Orientation of Forms Randomized
Size of Forms Forms are equal sizes except for rhythm
Placement of Form Top right corner
Space between Forms Unequal spacing

Objective Rules (assignment rules)
#1 Forms are oriented randomized and spaced unequally
#2 Forms are placed in the top right corner.
#3 Forms are small.

Interpretation of Visual Language
What did you interpret to apply your rules? Floating leaves
Explain your process. The forms represented floating leaves that move without a singular direction or a singular organization. So the forms are oriented randomly and spaced unequally. In addition the forms are placed in the top right corner, a space with more lightness and freedom. I used a large volume of white space to balance the forms and to shrink the perception of the forms. In “Balance-Scale” I interrupted the design and used a 90 degree orientated form on the left to contrast the randomness of the forms on the right. The design was also interrupted for “Rhythm Emphasis” again the emphasize the randomness of the other compositions. Randomness was still achieved through location and rhythm through form.

Set: BOLD AND DYNAMIC

Visual Language (VOICE)
Contrast of Space One third white space at bottom, except for rhythm
Shape of Forms Square 1×1″ and rectangles 1×2″, 1×6″
Orientation of Forms 45 degrees
Size of Forms Long lines extend off page and do not have a definite length.
Placement of Form Draping off frame
Space between Forms .25 inches and 1 inch

Objective Rules (assignment rules)
#1 Forms extend off the edge of the page
#2 Corners form a horizontal line at 1/3 of page
#3 Forms are at 45 degree angles

Interpretation of Visual Language
What did you interpret to apply your rules? Eye movement
Explain your process. I used orientation and location of the forms to create
motion. Normal orientation was used for safe and efficient,
so dynamic forms could not be at 90 degrees. 45 degrees
is less grounded and could be used for movement. Using
these 45 degree forms I wanted to draw the viewer’s eyes
out of the page towards the top right corner as this corner
is the lightest and most open. The eye is then traced back
in through a second line formed by the corners of the
forms. This horizontal line symbolizes the platform for
motion. I attempted to make this platform with these
corners as well as the edges of forms (balance, space).
This platform was placed at the bottom third of the page
according to the rule of thirds. This design was disrupted
for rhythm, which called for a cyclical pattern of spiral
forms. Rhythm with emphasis was created to feature
multiple lines of edges.

Data Visualization Workshop (Journalist)

What is your story?

We wanted to dig into the possibility that police divisions may be profiling certain races as stop-and-frisk suspects more often than they should. This hypothesis is based on some of the occurrences that happened in the last year that suggests police officers may be unfairly targeting African-Americans. As data journalists, we know this is a hot topic in the media and wanted to provide context on what we’re seeing in the Los Angeles region.

How does the selected data support your story?

Taking the top 11 police divisions that had the most number of stop-and-frisks allowed us to break down the contribution of each race as a % within the total number of encounters. This data showed us that there is definitely the possibility that certain police divisions are targeting African Americans more often than other races considering the racial makeup of their assigned neighborhoods. We need an additional set of data to confirm this, which would be the racial breakdown, by neighborhood, of residents over the age of 14 (a gauge for possible stop-and-frisk suspects). We would then compare our data with the racial breakdown data to see if police in certain divisions are unfairly targeting African-Americans (the % of African Americans in their stop-and-frisk encounters is higher than the % of African American residents in those neighborhoods above the age of 14). If this comparison did indeed show that certain divisions were particularly targeting African Americans, then they could be easy targets for division-wide training programs to help them recognize their biases.

What data did you omit, and why?

There are 25 police divisions that we omitted in order to just pick the ones that had the most number of stop-and-frisk encounters. Instead of just picking the top 10, we chose to also include the division with the 11th most encounters since it had a very large % of African Americans involved. As for the other data metrics, we felt that the police officers’ division and the race of the suspect were the most critical dimensions to evaluate based on our intended investigation.

How does the representation support your story?

The representation shows that there are a number of divisions with a very large % of stop-and-frisk encounters involving African American suspects. The data representation provides us with a clear starting point of divisions to investigate to see if they are targeting a higher % of African Americans than there are in their assigned neighborhoods.

What visual metaphor(s) did you use and why?

We want to present this data through a geographical representation as well so that our audience (readers of our journal) can easily identify what the data shows for their neighborhood. This is most relevant to our audience since it is a broader group that would be concerned about their location. We would want to also use the concept of small multiples to have a separate geographical representation for each race.

Jason Wen

Fierce and Dynamic:
Motion
Surprise
Attack
Wild
Aggressive
Blast
Bold
Brave
Running
Breathless

Whimsical and Delicate:
Light
Swirl
Breeze
Floating
Bubbles
Windmill
Flowers
Snowflakes
Fragile
Thin

Safe and Efficient:
Straight
Grid
Rigid
Simple
Purpose
Goal
Professional
Practiced
Office
Suit

Jason Wen

The process of cognitive mapping guides the user to concretely break down an object into its components and associations. What happens afterward is that the user not only knows WHAT he/she feels towards the object but more importantly WHY he/she has those feelings.

In the example of the prescription bottle, a user may harbor negative feelings towards the bottle e.g. frustration, irritation, etc. By starting with the object rather than the emotion, we get a clearer picture of the path from object to emotion. There may be many different paths between the same object to the same emotion. For example, if the user feels frustration, the path may have originated with the child-proof lid and repeated failures at opening the bottle or with the plastic orange container that is non-degradable and washes ashore on the beach that she spends her family vacations at. But if we probed at the emotion beginning with the emotion, it may be more difficult to pull out one reason from another.

Cognitive mapping can be practiced with every way that we express ourselves. Associations can be created for any signal or stimuli able to be interpreted by the human body. Associations are attached to things we can see, hear, smell, taste, feel. And if associations exist, then cognitive mapping can be practiced to elucidate those connections. So then, cognitive mapping is most useful when we want a very specific user response.

For example, in a job interview, we want to potential employer to attach very specific associations to us, the applicant. If that association is professionalism, then we can practice cognitive mapping on our attire (sight), our interview question responses (audio), handshake (touch).

Jason Wen

Inspired by my walk to the Berkeley BART station past both a bar and a bakery, I combined the visual and olfactory experiences of smoking and freshly baked pastries to create a cigarette-pierced bun. The original blueberry and cream cheese bun brings up associations of pleasure, a pick-me-up, a smile, warmth, and family. However, the soot covered bun brings up associations of confusion, questions, and a suggestion of darker themes. The combination brings up associations of waste, deliberate or accidental harm or loss of value, carelessness.

My initial thoughts was to leverage this association as an anti-smoking strategy: replacing ash trays with ones that reminded the smoker of objects that smoking would be damaging e.g. taste (ask tray would look like a pastry or pasta), health (tray would resemble a clock or lungs), earth (plant, animal). But probing deeper, the smoker is often aware of those costs. However, the benefits of smoking still outweighs those costs. So the design must eliminate the value of the routine of lighting a cigarette and smoking.

1) The cigarette is designed for a slow burn, allowing the user to enjoy the ritual for several minutes. An instantaneous flammable cigarette that burns into ash in 2 seconds would fundamentally change the experience of smoking and provide no time for enjoying the smoke. 2) We would replace the value of a cigarette by replacing the tobacco leaves with a firecracker or with a marshmallow. This provides the user the same routine of lighting an object but either ends with a light show or tasty treat. 3) Exploring a haptic analysis of the cigarette paper, the current texture is clean, familiar (paper), almost natural. We can bring on associations of combustion, ignition, smoke fumes, industry, and cold steel by replacing the paper with a metal tubing. Even the consequent heating of the metal and burning of the lips can be a useful haptic association. 4) What value do cigarettes provide for the user? Relieving an addiction to nicotine, an opportunity to break from their problems and routine. We take away that value by reminding users that smoking generates more problems. We design a cigarette that melts and drips paint as it is smoked. However, paint stains has a metaphor of childhood accidents and minimizes the severity of smoking to that of an inconvenience. More extreme would use corrosive acid. 4) In order to strengthen the association of cigarette smoke to toxicity and use the metaphor of the color green, we design cigarette smoke to be green rather than the more benign gray color.

The cigarette has been really well designed. From the visual (small, efficient) to haptic to cultural associations, the smoking industry created a product that delivers value with very few obstacles. How can we decrease that value or create a worse user experience?

Jason Wen

Through tastings with the miracle berry, the Unexpected Associations exercise helped me see how expectations can influence and supersede logical thinking and how quick cognitive associations can be accepted and trusted.

Having read the article about the miracle berry beforehand, I was very excited to try it for myself. What was the basis of that excitement? I anticipated that I would enjoy the experience and that the experience would be new; the two expectations probably heightened each other. Not too surprising. But that anticipation and expectation manifested its power when I was tasting the vinegar. Disclaimer: the miracle berry did not change the taste of vinegar for me. However, there were hints from the professor that the taste would be mind-blowingly different. I went to take a big gulp and started tearing up as the still very much sour vinegar burned down my throat. The strange thing was the expectation of change. After a few minutes, I went back to taste the vinegar hoping that the miracle berry would kick in. Against my logical thinking, I continued to believe that the miracle berry would work. It would be interesting to explore how that conviction was constructed with such strength.

The lemon tasting brought to light another quality of cognition. Thankfully, the miracle did work on the lemon, transforming the normally bitter citrus fruit into a still a slightly sour but very much sweeter lemon drop. Associations of sourness, puckered lips, and a quickly-swallowed cup of water and lemon were replaced by associations of sweetness, lemonade, popsicles, and camp. It was amazing how quick I was accustomed to the new quality; I began planning pairings that would go well with this new taste. The sweet lemon became the reality and was a platform that I could trust and jump off for new ideas. With two or three tastes, I trusted this change. An understanding of the bitter lemon that was accumulated over 26 years was suspended after 5 seconds. Would I adapt to any new reality this quickly? What if gravity was suspended, would I be convinced to jump off a cliff and soar over the valleys below?

Yet, despite the positive associations with this sweet lemon, I don’t think that I would have continued to enjoy the new reality if all lemons tasted this way for a year. The effect disappeared before I got tired of the taste but there was a loyalty to the original taste. There is a preference for natural, even if that meant a less conventionally pleasing taste.

The experience was an interesting experience and brought to light new observations and behaviors, challenging myself to find out why my mind worked this way.