Creative in my Mind

Designing a Transmedia Experience: Jem and the Holograms

2012-02-12T20:05:00.001-08:00

**NOTE these ideas are created for an assignment developed for a Transmedia Story creation class. These fictional ideas are developed completely by me.***

Image from Google images

Jem and the Holograms is an animated television series that syndicated from 1985-1988. The premise revolves around Jerrica Benton, the inherited owner of a music company, and her alter ego as the lead singer of glamorous pop band Jem and the Holograms. The band takes on adventures as they are faced with problems and choosing between right and wrong.

Although the series began as a transmedia experience starting as a Hasbro Toyline, because the show took place in the late 1980’s the technology and interactive experience depth to viewers was not the same as it is today.

Since October of 2011, reruns of the series have made the show relevant to todays teen audience. In order to begin a new transmedia experience, using the premise of the popular 80’s cartoon, it would need to be reintroduced to a broader audience. The best situation to reintroduce this show, would be a live action movie with a full soundtrack. Stressing the importance that the creation would need excellent writing, current music and the right casting.

The build up for anticipation of the movie would be introduced through movie previews, and several hit songs from the movie soundtrack. Having several hit songs on radio stations would create unintended popularity and familiarness to a broad audience.

The role of social media today cannot be underestimated. Having viewers be able to look more in depth to story and continue the story line around the original premise enhances the engagement. Facebook could be used with a fan page to provide updates and discussions, in conjunction with viewers opinions, contests and serving as a information hub. Twitter would be functional to provide the fictional characters to update as their everyday life. It would also be helpful in creating announcements and spreading the word through hash tags.

A video blog for previous main characters Vivian “Video” Montgomery and Clash, could provide two different view points and give insight to the upcoming movie. The Vlog would be best if created in live action, but set in the 80’s to provide another view point from the past. It can serve as trailers to the movie by providing backstory and nostalgic depth.

In the original cartoon, fashion was something that was important to the storyline. Today we can use that knowledge to help enhance the new storyline, as well as keep the consistency to the old one. The fans can purchase a glamorous clothing line available at a popular stores such as Forever 21 or Macy's. The story can continue from the 80‘s cartoon, explaining, after leaving the Holograms, Shayna continued her life becoming a famous fashion designer. The clothing line could be based on her creations and named "Shayna". The actual clothing line will be specifically developed based on Jem’s past fashion and today’s present style.

In order to catch viewers up to speed through fallen plot points or unexplained events from the late 80’s until today, a web comic would be an excellent medium. Since the original cartoon was based on comic style animation, the transition would make the old cartoon familiar to current fans. The web comic would allow the continuation of the original story go on to introduce how the new characters are connected and their personalities in depth. It would also allow for the time lapse between the 80’s and today make more sense.

One of the primary plot points to the original series was the importance of the Starlight Foundation and the Starlight Mansion, a foster home for girls. Although these girls were not the primary focus of the series, their sub-story provides a perfect transfer to create new story lines for todays market.

The live action movie would be set to the present and primarily focus on the development of a new band using the next set of Starlight girls. Just as the 80’s cartoon, the setting will primarily come from the focus of being in the music industry. Glamorous, Hollywood style scenery.

The lead singer, or the “new” Jem character, could be reintroduced as the daughter of Jerrica and Rio Pacheco. This would allow for the secrecy of Jem’s alter ego, to be kept in the family or for a reasoning to hand down the special earrings to someone new. The new holograms would be the starlight foster girls. The primary plot would be to enhance the development of these new characters, and explain the reasoning for the creation of the new band.

The secondary plot, would allow for the conflict to be created and resolved specific to music. The antagonist characters would be a band signed to Misfit Music, the preexisting antagonist music company. The new band introduced, would preferably be a band that was composed of primarily male performers and a female singer. The idea of having male characters in the opposing band, would allow for more depth in the plot, and the creation of love stories for the future. The reason for providing a female character would be to spur more conflicts for future plots.
Continuing the story past any created movies, to integrate the audience with participation could be done through several platforms. A traveling concert to attend an actual Starlight Girls concert would allow for fans to experience a show in real life.

A Kinect and Wii video game to teach concert dance moves and would allow for fans to be apart of the experience by providing the feeling of preforming. Songs can also be downloadable through Rockband or Guitar Hero.

Jem and the Holograms contains a lot of potential for a full Transmedia experience. It is a show with a lot of depth, and established fans. If given the right music, casting, plot and writing this 80’s cartoon could be something popular today.

Serious Gaming News

2012-02-01T05:33:00.001-08:00

I know it's been a while, but I have some exciting news articles to share!

"If you're training for a new job someday soon with a video game controller in your hands, thank Constance Steinkuehler."

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/story/2012-01-26/edcuational-video-games-white-house/52908052/1

"The Serious Games Showcase was part of the Interservice/Interindustry Training and Simulation Education Conference (I/ITSEC), and was held in Orlando, Fla., from November 28 through December 1."

http://gamepolitics.com/2012/01/30/first-person-cultural-trainer-wins-serious-games-showcase-award

Happy New Year! 2012!

2011-12-31T09:21:00.001-08:00

Images from This weekend

2011-12-20T05:53:00.001-08:00

*Images taken by the Grandma Party Staff - From their Facebook page*

I was a Vendor at the Grandma party Bazaar this weekend. It was my first time attempting to sell my jewelry and art. I learned a lot of lessons, in not only displaying but in the creation of my items - what people buy, and pricing them. I didn't do as well as I had hoped, but my cousin did great. But like I said it was a great experience and I had a lot of lessons learned.

Jewelry Inventory

2011-12-14T06:42:00.000-08:00

Bottle Cap Jewelry

2011-12-12T07:09:00.001-08:00

The Inspiration:

How it Turned out:

I've been busy preparing for the Grandma party craft bazaar, which is this weekend, I've been collecting bottle caps for a while, and have probably over 100000 of them. So I wanted to create some jewelry that utilized them. I came up with this concept after seeing some ideas via pinterest and etsy.

My Christmas card for this year

2011-12-08T12:53:00.000-08:00

It was a big year for me this year I bought a house and a new car, since I am independent from Daniel I figured it would be a perfect year for me to make a christmas card for me.

Sonic and Crew

2011-12-07T20:16:00.000-08:00

Drooooid!

2011-12-07T16:29:00.001-08:00

Zelda

2011-12-06T13:45:00.001-08:00

I've been trying for a while to make a Zelda poster that fits my style. I finally was able to come up with something I like.

Nursing Necklaces

2011-11-21T08:27:00.000-08:00

These are "Nursing Necklaces" I am making them for Natural Baby I've finally gotten into a good rhythm for making them, but I'm not going to lie, these are probably the biggest pain in the butt necklaces I've made, just because of the requirements associated with making them, and the difficulty in trying to find the right materials that are non toxic for babies.

These necklaces are not intended to be worn by babies, they are to be worn by moms during nursing to keep babies attention.

Tangled

2011-11-17T08:00:00.001-08:00

I finally, recently saw the movie "Tangled" of course I instantly fell in love with the Disney movie. So when sketching during a meeting I doodled an image of Rapunzel, and then digitized it to look as follows:

Inspired Poster

2011-11-14T12:30:00.000-08:00

original image: http://sportsandconcertupdates.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/ts1.jpg

Sometimes I get inspired after a concert and really just need to photoshop someone's image to give it the flare of what I saw.

Out Takes

2011-10-20T20:58:00.000-07:00

An out take for the logo I'm working on, so I have to Re-do Natural Baby's logo again.. I'm really not nailing this at all, which is really buggin my ego. She specifically chose this font, which, I really like as well. Instead of focusing on Nature I need to start focusing on the baby "slings". She likes my original idea where the sling is actually a leaf... so I'm going to have to do some drawing and scanning.

Fight like a girl, Fight for a Cure.

2011-10-19T08:22:00.000-07:00

Last night I received the horrible news that my aunt was diagnosed with breast cancer. Being breast cancer awareness month I felt that this graphic was only appropriate to make.

About 1 in 8 women in the United States (12%) will develop invasive breast cancer over the course of her lifetime.

Besides skin cancer, breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer among U.S. women. More than 1 in 4 cancers in women (about 28%) are breast cancer.

A woman’s risk of breast cancer approximately doubles if she has a first-degree relative (mother, sister, daughter) who has been diagnosed with breast cancer. About 20-30% of women diagnosed with breast cancer have a family history of breast cancer.

http://www.breastcancer.org/symptoms/understand_bc/statistics.jsp

Natural Baby

2011-10-18T08:17:00.000-07:00

My friend Tej is one of those people who make things happen. She started a Baby wearing group, since there has been nothing like this in Orlando, the group has grown to over 75 members! She took the opportunity to start a business and has begun consulting and selling All Natural baby wearing and Natural baby products. I offered to help with some of her marketing, and to make Nursing Necklaces. I'm really excited about this. This is the logo ideas and colors I came up with for her.

The Leaf is supposed to represent not only natural but the shape of it represents the look of a baby being held with the supportive baby wearing material.

If you are interested to learn more about baby wearing check out her website at:

http://www.tlcnaturalbaby.com/

Andrew McMahon

2011-10-17T12:27:00.000-07:00

I took this picture at a concert and photoshopped it way back in 2003? maybe 2004 when Andrew McMahon serenaded me with Something Corporate (Yes he was serenading me.. I didn't see anyone else at those concerts...) Being that I've never posted this picture on this blog, I felt it was only relevant because, Here I am almost 10 years later and I am still lusting over this mans voice. Although Jack's Mannequin is a completely different style of music than Something Corporate, I still get swept away at their concerts.

I was born today

2011-10-11T07:47:00.000-07:00

It's my birthday today, I'm 27, In 3 years I will be 30. I need to start working on my things to do before I'm 30 list again. Had a pretty good Birthday Weekend, you can read about it Here.

More Characters

2011-09-27T12:56:00.001-07:00

Creating a character

2011-09-22T10:58:00.001-07:00

After drawing the character below, I noticed that the shape of him looked similar to Daniel's face, so I added a beard, and different facial expressions, and came up with the final image above

How to make Flag Garland

2011-09-19T12:22:00.000-07:00

I've been seeing everywhere on Pinterest these cute Garland Flags. I knew this would be a simple DIY project and perfect for halloween so I decided to create some this weekend.

The Materials needed are Stiff Felt (usually you can find this in the same section as regular felt, but it only comes in a limited amount of colors), Patterned material (I went with a halloween themed colors since I was making them for halloween, you can shop in the remnants if you wanted to), a Spool of thin ribbon (so you can string them all together) and of course Glue, you could also Sew the material together....But I'm really lazy and like my craft projects done quick, so I chose not to sew.

First I cut out a template of a triangle I drew by using a ruler from a poster board material that I received in junk mail, I then used that template to cut out the Triangles from the Stiff Felt. After I cut them all out I made one slightly smaller to use as a template for the patterned material.

I then took my patterned material laid it out and cut along the template into several small triangles.

After I had a good amount of the triangles cut out I then glued the cut patterned material on top of the stiff felt.

After laying them out all next to each other I then measured out my ribbon, and Hot glued it on top of the Triangles.

I cleaned up any extra strands and made sure that the garland looked clean. and Viola! it is done!

Here is the Finished Product!

I Also Made the Wreath.

To see How I decorated the rest of my house check it out How I decorated everything here.

UKnight in Pink - Marshall shirts

2011-09-13T07:56:00.001-07:00

I made this design for the October 8, Marshall game. I'm planning to go to print this week, so let me know if anyone is interested.

Each are only $15, so Reserve yours today!

Beach Themed Wedding invitations

2011-09-12T05:28:00.000-07:00

St Patricks Day themed Wedding invitations

2011-09-02T06:24:00.000-07:00

Craig and Stacey's wedding invitations came in!

They turned out great I was really excited.

ReeeeVAMP!

2011-08-24T12:13:00.000-07:00