Website

I looked at a variety of different websites which similar climate change themes. Most climate change websites are fairly serious, here aren't too many out there that are entertaining too.

I want to try and present the information and tips in an entertaining way. One idea was to have an interactive website where the user discovers the tips for themselves by exploring the interface. It could be accomplished in flash but I'd need to know the coding/ get somebody else to code for me. Also it would be fairly difficult to update, regular content adds more interest and returning users so I want to be able to add new content with relative ease.

I decided then that a blog format would be best suited to what I want to achieve. I could update and archive occasional tips, combining the serious stuff with video's, games and funny images to keep the audience entertained.

Looking back on this video I thought it might be fun to talk about climate change from the point of view of a cat, adding humor through the cat's take on things. There are plenty of examples where a made up character has an online presence, such as the meercat in the compare the market adverts (has its own facebook page). Of course I'd have to make sure that the humour and entertainment come from a variety of other sources too and not just the fact that it's a cat, that type of humor works well for a first impression but can easily get old and is unlikely to attract regular users.

Hopefully, coming from a cat, the tips wouldn't appear as preachy as if a human were giving them. It's a different perspective and not a completely serious one. Through the tips would be completely valid, they wouldn't be a strict set of rules. For example for travel tips Climate cat could evaluate all the different modes of human transport (even the ridiculous ones) and decide on the best according to his own view on the world (which would also happen to be the view of official climate change organisations such as Act on CO2).

Logo design



Website working progress

I commissioned the L5's to produce short (10-15 second), entertaining animations for use on the website under the categories Water, Energy, Waste, Travel and Diet/Lifestyle. I wrote them a brief so that they were clear on what they had to do.

I achieved mixed results, some were more entertaining than others. Some told the information in a plain way, others had a humorous twist. A few were great too look at, others not so much so I will have to pick and choose which to display and which to leave out.

The content will be from a variety of sources, found links and resources, climate change news, fun games that I come across, other climate change films that I find. I will commission some content and make some myself, the rest will be found from elsewhere on the Internet. Eventually I'd like to get to the point where people come to me asking for their film/ game to go on the site rather than me asking them if I could use it.