My Paper on Funny Garbage

Funny Garbage has been in the forefront of web design, interactive entertainment and broadcast production for over 10 years. Their slogan is “making the web worth watching” and they do just that. On their web sit you can view some before and after screen shots of this company’s work. Funny Garbage designs with a lot of bright colors and exciting imagery. Everything they have done is very pleasing to the eye.
John Carlin and Peter Girardi started the company in 1996; each of who had extensive experience in the world of art, design and media in general. Funny Garbage now has a reputation as one of the most creative and innovative interactive design companies in the world. Funny Garbage has been one of the preeminent producers of interactive and tradition media; creating large scale web sites, advanced user interfaces and con ten t that consumers want. Has produced successful projects for some of the most important companies and consumer brands in the world. Including Fox, PBS. NASCAR, Bloomberg, Intel, Disney, Comcast, Viacom, Nike, Lego. Funny Garbage is dedicated to innovative Research and Development, particularly in the area of advanced user interfaces that help people find and store what they want on screen. Music To Go is an example of original software that Funny Garbage spun out into a separate company, which builds music download stores and promotional marketing campaigns for hundreds of radio stations across America.
This company has a great website that includes a very entertaining and thought provoking blog, which is very important in the field of graphic design. Currently, Funny Garbage remains in the forefront of both web development and broadcast production. They also design a lot of online projects, including a prestigious web site and analytic database for New York City's Department of Cultural Affairs through The Alliance for the Arts, and are producing content for a number of TV networks including Disney, Cartoon Network and MTV. At the same time our development of original intellectual property continues to grow with successful rounds of investment in Music to Go, the digital strategy company for terrestrial radio we co-founded, and new projects with Maria Bartiromo and L’il Jon.
When the interest in innovative web sites waned around 2001, FG turned to traditional media production such as the show "Crank Yankers" for Comedy Central as well as maintaining its web production through work for Bloomberg and Viacom; notably developing sites and applications for Noggin and The N, which became leaders in the new wave of web design.
Funny Garbage has some of the most fun designs out on the market today, no wonder why they are so successful. This company is an inspiration to young graphic designers entering into the work place. They put a fun spin on all of there work and this is very evident even if you visit their website for only a few minutes.




Scribblevision is an online “animated coloring book” that Funny Garbage developed for Noggin, the children’s cable network.

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Movie

This is the video that plays when you click the "Watch the Trailer" button

animated gif

Final Site

Video Pop up

Today i added my video pop up screen. I decided to use a trailer for Prom Night. I found my video on AOL video. I then saved the quicktime movie as the appropriate name. The video makes my website look very professional i am really happy with how my site is coming along.

slicing

Today i took my first stab at slicing my website. It was difficult and frustrating at first but I think I finally got it! Now i am a Pro.

Watching my website work and come together is really exciting i cant believe I made this myself!

revisit to the definition of a screenager

screenager
(1) From Douglas Rushkoff's 1997 book "Playing the Future," a screenager is a teenager who spends a lot of time at a computer screen. Screenager activities are sending e-mail and instant messages, downloading music and movies, gaming and Web surfing

When designing a project for a specific target audience you must keep them in mind through out the whole process.

What makes a good website?

Today i decided to do research on what makes a good website here are some of my findings...

1. Purpose:
This is the crux of what we talk about when we're up on our soapbox. You'll hear us use the word 'objectives' a lot. Why do you have a website? What its purpose? How are you going to measure your success?

2. Design:
We're talking about things like colour choice, alignments, visual interest, and meaningful metaphors.

3. Message:
Content is king. Every page in your website needs a goal. You need to understand who your target audience is and what you want them to do. Then you must provide them with the appropriate information and a meaningful call to action.

4. Architecture:
How are your pages organized? Is it intuitive? Will your target audience understand? Think about Disney.com will differ from Microsoft.com.

5. Usability & Accessibility:
HTML is still a coding language and it needs to be well formed and accessible. Not everyone who visits your site is perfectly enabled. Some people have disabilities, some have slow connections, some can't install the Flash plug-in. Knowing your target audience and your goals certainly helps to set your usability and accessibility standards.

6. Online Marketing:
Appealing to the search engines is a game. Get it wrong and you'll find yourself banned. Do it right and you'll be rewarded with lots of free, targeted traffic. It's not difficult, it just takes experience and planning

7. Technical Stuff:
Is your domain easy to remember? Is your ISP reliable? Do they have 20,000 other websites hosted on your server? Do they support the right technologies for your website to grow?

urbandictionary.com is cool!

You can stay up to date with the hottest buzz words, search for a word your curious about or just browse away!


1.screenager



a teenager who loves to watch the small screen in front of him/her.

John is a screenager who does nothing but play computer games and watches TV, it's little wonder that he failed his exams.



2.screenager



A teenager who spends the majority of his/her time in front of the computer, usually surfing the net.

Mom No. 1: "I can never get my screenagers to go play outside."
Mom No. 2: "You think that's bad? My screens are 20 pounds overweight and have damaged retinas thanks to all the time they spend on Second Life. Screenagers these days!

color pallet and more inspiration

My website design progress

here is my redesign so far. The main thing i wanted to focus on is making the website look more fun and inviting to the screenager. I like the black background because it reminds me of a dark movie theatre and the movie still in the center adds drama to the page. This screen shot could be chnaged easily making the webite easy to update.

Next class i will definitly play with the colors, there is still many improvements to be made this is my first layout draft.

My website progress

Logo Redesign

After much research and brainstorming i decided to go with a simple and sleep logo made of typography

here it is....






This is the current logo for IMDB





I would like to give this logo a fresh new fun look. A logo that will grab a Screenager's attention.

Brain Storm: things associated with Movies
tickets
ticket stubs
spotlight
camera
red carpet
video tape
DVD
theatre

Inspirational Websites

I asked my friends what their favorite websites were...here are some they said interested them the most. I am going to use inspiration from each on in redesigning the IMDB web site.



Cosmopolitan.com

The Websites

I have decided to redeign the Internet Movie Database website. It is a well known site but lacks good design. I am going to redesign this website to be geared toward a younger audience. The 18-22 year-o;d age group, also referred to as "Screenager", "Gen-Next" etc.

What is a "Screenager"?
Screenagers are technologically savvy young people. They are the first generation to grow up with television and computers at home, music downloads, instant messaging and cellular phones. Douglas Rushkoff first coined the term in his 1997 book Playing the Future.



I am going to look at websites that are already geared towards my target age group to get inspiration. Being a member of this age group I am also going to ask a few of my friends what their favorite websites are and what about the site that they like.