Inormation

RESUMEN

En esta comunicación presentamos algunos de los resultados de, Informanimation, un proyecto educativo y de investigación. Nuestras conclusiones hacen referencias a dos temas principales:

1) La tendencia hacia la creación de “paquetes informativos” integrados y accesibles desde las redes digitales; como uno de los rasgos principales del panorama informativo actual. 2) La necesidad de formar a nuevos perfiles profesionales, de marcado carácter multidisciplinar,para afrontar con éxito el desarrollo de estos “paquetes informativos”. En este sentido, las Universidades que participan en Informanimation están considerando seriamente la posibilidad de dar continuidad a la iniciativa con la creación de un Master Internacional de ámbito europeoen este ámbito emergente.

ABSTRACT

The paper aims at presenting some of the results of the Informanimation project, covering two main aspects:

1) A shift towards the creation of network-accessible, integrated, informative packages based on the language of animation as a main aspect of the contemporary informative landscape.

2) The need to shape new multidisciplinary profiles, capable of developing such integrated informative packages. In this direction, the Informanimation core group is evaluating the possibility to give life to an European/International Master's Degree on this emerging area.

PALABRAS CLAVE

Animación, Visualización de datos, Formación, Redes

1. Background

Starting from June 2011 a group of European educators and scholars has been running a project called “Informanimation”. The project aims at exploring, either on the educational and the research ground, the use of animation as a medium to convey, explain and communicate, complex contents. The Informanimation project developed as a natural evolution of key research activities carried out at the Alghero School of Architecture and Design. Here, the AnimazioneDesign Laboratory develops research work on e ducation and production of communication through the animated image.

The project is in first place a didactic experiment: in collaboration with a network of fellow European Universities, two years ago we successfully applied for an Erasmus grant within the Intensive Program (IP) . Since June 2011, Erasmus funding allowed the undertaking of the first two editions of the Informanimation IP, gathering so far in Alghero more than sixty European students, lecturers, authors, experts and reviewers, for an intensive design workshop about informative animation. The project also encompasses a vast research project, which has so far triggered debate and lead to the production of papers, scientific articles, a book, an extremely content-rich website, involving a network of European academic, experts and professionals in Italy, Spain, Greece, the UK, Portugal.

2. The Context: Moving towards web based 'animated' informative packages

Although animation has an established use in the production of documentary films ranging from technical reference to scientific dissemination and to process simulation, it has recently been increasingly used as a n ew mean of communicating, proving itself to be an extremely useful tool for making complexity understandable. Animated images, graphics in motion and typography have merged into what we have called 'informanimation', an emerging new genre in the scenario of contemporary communication. Short films of such kind animate today the web supporting informative action in areas that embrace social, scientific, health-related and environmental topics.

Moreover, further recent developments in informative practices, have brought to life new forms of increasingly interactive and integrated networks of informative 'places'. Adapting to the new patterns of social networking, emerging players in the information arena have developed new ways to engage their audiences: viral short animated videos are used to launch a given topic, engaging the audience and directing it to informative websites that offer insights on the subject, by means of reference materials, interactive apps. Social networking and the growing use of mobile smart devices also play an important role in such strategies, providing a real-time participatory backbone to these initiatives. Following this pattern, information has been exploded into a sophisticated networks of increasingly accessible distributed -if not ubiquitous- web based informative packages. Within this communication strategy, short animated stories, often based on interactive real-time generative graphics, are becoming a standard, as they show to be very effective in delivering a base of information, and often being the very starting point for the start of awareness campaigns and of the construction of vast social platforms.

3. Informanimation: a discussion of some relevant cases

The scenario we have outlined sees discreet modules of information, based on the language of animation, sometimes interactive and based on real-time data interpretation, becoming today the kernel of an increasingly sophisticated communicative system distributed on a network of nodes. Let's now discuss a selection of relevant case studies.

Currently the IP Informanimation Consortium is composed by Alghero Dept. of Architecture, Design and Urbanism, Univ. of Sassati, Italy (Program Coordinator); Technological Educational Institute TEI, Athens, Greece; Departamento de Diseño-Universidad Europea de Madrid, Madrid, Spain; Faculty of Creative and Cultural Industries-University of Galmorgan, Cardiff, UK; School of Art & Design della Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, UK; Communication, Arts and Design Dept., Algarve University, Faro, Portugal.

The “Story of” short film series is the product of the collaboration between American activist and researcher Annie Leonard and the animation company Free Range Studios. Started as an experiment in 2007, the first short of the series, The Story of Stuff rapidly turned into an internet success, developing into a universe of spin-off activities, pivoting around a website that has become the core of a vast web-based community on environmental and social issues. Today, with over 15 million views, the original short is not only 'one of the most watched environmental-themed online movies of all time'-as stated in the project website-it is the first chapter of a number of other 'stories' (of Change; of Broke; of Citizens United vs. FEC; of Electronics; of Cosmetics; of Bottled Water; of Cap & Trade...). Furthermore, with a community of over 350.000 members, the Story of Stuff ecosystem has opened the way to new patterns

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