Make America Doodle Again
This class project aimed to get people thinking about candidates’ positions and issues in a fun and engaging way. This took the form of an engaging drawing game that encouraged people to be politically informed through research and doodles. Our intention was to spark conversations and laughter. I contributed to this project by setting up, promoting, and running Doodlethons. As well as contributing to the overall identity of the project.
Check it out at www.makeamericadoodleagain.com
AdvisorsScott Thomas, Nathaniel KerksickFieldsInteraction Design, Experience Design, Branding, Rapid PrototypingYear2016
01
Problem and Opportunities
Voters lacked knowledge on the candidates they were going to vote on. We saw an opportunity to launch a product one month before the election that would increase voter engagement.
02
Our Approach
We initially created events called ‘Doodlethons’ where we would collect doodles in order to support our online growth.
Doodlethon Findings
We found that people were excited about sharing their doodles with others. It was a fun and engaging way of learning politics. Through these live events we found that:
1. There was a need to be timed when researching the prompt
2. We needed a way to better prompt communication
3. Users wanted the prompts to be more random
4. There was an opportunity to translate these paper prompts into something digital
03
Translating To Digital
We decided to translate the activities we did in the Doodlethons onto a mobile web page. This made it easier to take out into the world in order to get a broader audience and more feedback.
Findings
- Some users were confused by the ‘randomize’ visual
- Users said it was difficult to know when to stop doodling
- Finding information on certain candidates was more difficult than expected
- Users wanted a way to share their doodles online
04
Final Doodlethon
After iterating on our mobile web page, we were ready to host our final Doodlethon. We hosted this event the week before the election at Dolores Park in San Francisco. We were able to collect over 600 doodles throughout the project and were able to spark conversations amongst participants. In addition to that, we were also invited to a pop-up art gallery at WeWork where we displayed the doodles alongside other artists’ work.
Check out our experience at Dolores park and a few of the doodles below.
