Siri Bergmann Stolen

This is an interactive commercial, or a teaser for the film Beyond Apollo. The first thing you see is a loading bar witch says “Bayond Apollo – the film”. You navigate on the site by using the mouse, but it took some time before I understood how, but you basically just move the arrow around on the screen without clicking. (Or you can click on it, but it doesn’t make a difference) The site acts different based on where the arrow is, if it is placed outside the window or kept silenced over the picture, the same thing will happen over and over, and if you move it, it is like you destroy/interrupt the TV-signal. First I thought that this was a really old site, because it looks like the view of an old TV screen. In addition to the bad resolution the screen is divided into a grid. When you press the entry button on the lower right on the screen a new page comes up. There is a satellite in the center of the picture and it is surrounded with moving symbols. When you hold the arrow over the symbols, a new background comes up and a message is reviled on the screen. The messages are cryptic and don’t give you much information, but still enough to make you interested in seeing the movie.

I would say that this site fall into the category of design. It has a function witch is to get people to see the movie. We are also from the beginning aware that this site has something to do with a film because of the introduction. But because of the unknown design we still have to click around to discover that this is a commercial. If you click on the info button you can read about the movie, but I have here focused on everything except this.

The screen is as mentioned earlier divided into a grid, and all the information come as messages typed in with an old typewriter. This gives a retro feel, and reminds me of the design of an old computer game. Lets take a racing game for example, where you can choose from which angle you want to see the road. You can choose if you want to see the car from above (from a bird view), or sit “inside” the car. On this site I’m definitely placed inside the spaceship.

The effects make you feel like you’re in outer space and watching out of your spaceship. I feel like I have a certain control and personally take part in the narrative. I can click what I want to in witch order I want to; I am the captain of this space ship. It doesn’t really matter witch order you get the information, because it is taken completely out of its context.

This is online marketing. Internet marketing ties together creative and technical aspects of the Internet, including design, development, advertising, and sale. (Wikipedia, 08.24.09)  Because of the opportunity to take part in the action I become more interested than I would be if I just read the review of the movie.

If we search on Wikipedia for web design, we find that web design is the skill of creating presentations of content (usually hypertext or hypermedia) that is delivered to an end-user through the World Wide Web (…). And this site proves that content can be presented in many different ways.

It is not easy to define art, but look at Wikipedias’ definition might help us understand the difference between design and art. Art is the process or product of deliberately arranging elements in a way that appeals to the senses or emotions. It encompasses a diverse range of human activities, creations, and modes of expression, including music, literature, film, sculpture, and paintings. The meaning of art is explored in a branch of philosophy known as aesthetics (Wikipedia, 08.24.09). Even tho film can be art, this definition of art can confirm that the website is not a piece of art. As far as I have understood the page does not has a deeper meaning than to convey the film’s content and create interest among the public.

The characters that communicate with us through this commercial is one or several fictive characters, the director of the movie have invented different identities witch we will meet if we watch the movie. While watching this site we are only able to see a part of their identity, the rest is hidden. It is almost like an online chat, you don’t know who you are talking to before you meet them in person. But that is maybe what makes it exiting to people. It takes time to get to know a person, and since people can have several different identities you might feel that you never really know them.

I have not really decided how my final project will take form, but I like the idea of a hidden identity, and how you trough what you wear and say can try to create your own new identity.

Visit the site HERE

Sources:

Wikipedia, Internet Marketing, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_marketing [downloaded 08.24.09]

Wikipedia, Art, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art [downloaded 08.24.09]