Human inc is finally taking shape. Actual things are being made to convince our audience we are real.
Over the past week I have been working furiously hard with Sarah while other members have been home for easter to create things to go into our performance. We have completed our market research questionnaire and have made a start on creating and printing some of the products and posters we are using in the space.
However, saying this, some things have gone a lot better than others…
I’ll start with the positives.
We were told that creating some form of small token the audience can take home is the right thing to do, as not only will it draw in audience, it will also make our company more believable. But what were we to put into these small tubes? Water is the only safe thing we can give our audience for fear of allergies in case anyone actually drinks it. One of the original ideas we had was ‘Emotions in a bottle’, so we could sell a vial of ‘Happy’ or ‘Calm’ or ‘Forget’ and so on. It was decided that we should give away a small vial of ‘Happy’, but what was the science behind the possibility? Short of a company selling an illegal drug, we looked into the science of endorphins, but found the actual creation of such a chemical seemed from research, impossible. However, we did find a product by a company called Endorphinate by Pondera Pharmaceuticals which claims to “Imagine finally being able to naturally experience the sense of calm, comfort, and well-being that leads to joy and happiness in life.” (Pondera, 2014). Knowing this kind of thing is on the market and available, led the believably we could create a liquid version was more possible.
We then found small vials online and bought 200 (very cheaply) and I printed over 200 tiny stickers with our logo on to create the small vials we will later fill with water, or what we have called Bliss™.
I then moved to buy 3 cheap pots of hand cream as to demonstrate the product we are market researching for, and since I printed more than enough little logos, I put one on each of the pots.
Now for the negatives… Printing big.
The only way we will have a professional looking space is with professional looking posters. I spent a few days looking at various Pharmaceutical websites. I came across the company VRTX who on their website (https://www.vrtx.com/) had classy pictures that changed near the top of their page featuring people looking very happy with the company’s slogan as part of the image. This was the inspiration I used for Human Inc’s images, with our slogan ‘A Promise of a Healthier Future’.
We decided to use the pull plotter in the library as you can print a huge amount of only £5. Perfect, considering our group are all low on funds at all times. Our first £5 was wasted as something went wrong with the sending across to the printer. Although perfect quality, it only printed half the image. (see below)
On the second attempt, we used a different printer and although it came out the right size, the image quality is dreadful and it pixelated the whole image.
We then did the same settings on the original printer but it came out pixelated again. So that makes it £15 wasted.
We’re going to see the technitians tomorrow in the hope of a refund, if we can get a refund then great, and we’ll attempt a different method as to getting them printed. If we can’t get a refund.. well our company is going to have rather pixelated images.
Hopefully people don’t stand too close.
(Below: The full sized pixelated image. Before anyone assumes – it was not because the image was low quality, the image is more than big enough, it was a mess up on the printer.)
Pondera Pharmaceuticals (2014) Why Endorphanite? [online] Available from http://ponderapharma.com/why-endorphinate/ [Accessed 27 April 2014]