Learning Designer & Content Strategist
Case Study: Giving a voice to creative exchange
How rethinking online discussion boards shaped a virtual community space for artists.
Overview
Building a better future starts with the ability to envision a better future, and no one has more power of imagination than artists and designers. The question is – how do we transform these ideas into a shared reality?
The Challenge
88% of art and design graduates feel they did not have opportunities in school to develop business and entrepreneurship
skills for the real world.
.
The Outcome
A virtual community space that gives learners access to bite-sized lessons on the go. Users can select the relevant modules for their goals, participate in the community discussions and receive feedback on their work.
The Constraints
This was a 6-week project based on a problem I’ve explored on 2 modules of the Learning Experience Design (LXD) certificate at Oregon State University (OSU).
Ideation
One of the initial concepts stemmed from my prior work designing in-person learning experiences for creative incubators. With some time and distance from my initial concept, I needed to ask more questions to challenge my assumptions and used divergent and convergent thinking methodologies.
The Creator's Model - refer to slide 6
This model visualizes the lifecycle of the creative process. It starts at the idea phase and ends at decision phase. I was interested in cultivating deep empathy for the creative process. Trying to understand an individuals emotions or feelings that go along with creating something new.
User Research
The first technique was sending out a series of surveys to collect a sampling of individual behaviors, needs, and motivations. Based on the responses, I made a mind map to visually represent the information. Then interviewed individual creators to share their ideas, methods and ways they approach or think about business in the current economy.
The Process
The Prototype
Field Play
A virtual community space for creative professionals where they can participate in easy to access learning modules, share their work on the platform and find collaborators.
Curious to learn more? Watch this 9 minute walk through of the prototype.
Field Play - Playbook
An up close view of the Playbook in action and the rules of engagement for the community and program.