Negative Space

Time Capsule Part III

Published in

Ideation & Prototyping

7 min readOct 30, 2021

The final portion of the time capsule project consisted of completing our capsules and telling a narrative surrounding the hypothetical discovery of our time capsule in 125 years. This week proved to be difficult because of the shortened time but I believe I was able to extend into new creative areas because of it.

Theory & Theme:

To discover the theme, I looked at the various suggestions for different presentation options. The comic book spread was too intimidating as I’m still not able to successfully convey my point through even semi-coherent drawings. I then took an interest in the photo essay. Despite a background in film and photography, I had never done a photo essay before and so I thought it would be an interesting idea to explore.

Design:

I started with the contents of the box as the subjects of each photo. I tried to highlight the different unique aspects of each component in their own photos. I also did a few pictures of the box itself. I took pictures with my Fuji-film camera and utilized some LED light panels I have on hand to create different exposures and lighting scenarios. To avoid an essay of just time capsule photos, I thought it would be interesting to tie them together with images that complemented their theme but on a larger scale. This would offer both the viewpoints of issues on a micro and macro scale. For these images, I sourced complementary editorial images from the creative commons site Unsplash. For example, one of my items is a selection of seeds I salvaged from fresh produce used while cooking. They are contrasted in the essay with an image of climate change and plastic waste. This resonates with both the sustainability conflict of year-round produce but the downsides of globalized exported waste. Both of which affect our individual selves but also our collective human existence. I emulated this contrasting theme throughout the essay with the other photos to create a deep, dynamic range of emotion and scale.

I then had to construct a narrative regarding the discovery of the time capsule. Because I went with the photo essay, the storyboard template proved difficult to apply to a static visual element. Instead, I laid out several possibilities using the story-clock method. This method lays a narrative out clockwise along a circle and can help with pacing, plot, and development. After several attempts to derive a story, I landed on a concept that fit the theme similar to the premium and pristine aspect of my capsule. The story would be presented as a voice over of an AR museum assistant, presenting a new exhibit of the unearthed time capsule and its description. This voice narrates a short monologue of the item similar to short museum descriptions including time period, location, and importance; while relevant photos from the essay are shown onscreen.

For the beginning of the video, I focused on a quick overall process of constructing the time capsule, my thematic choices, and construction. For the second portion, I wrote a short script using the narrative from above and recorded the voiceover using my iPhone audio recorder. I then took the audio into a video editor known as Davinci Resolve to add the photos. I then paired the two together and exported the complete version.

You can find the original script and photo essay at the end of this article.

Challenges:

I faced some major challenges with this portion of the project. The main two challenges were the time constraint and coming up with a narrative story for the project. Managing the time constraint proved difficult because some items were time restrictive like finding a quiet space to record audio, or managing space to light and capture photos. I felt the struggle to both ideate and create media within a short time period rather difficult.
The narrative portion was difficult because I had longed for creating a rich story with detail and constantly felt the need to cut back due to both creation and presentation time constraints. Many of my initial story ideas failed to meet these restrictions and were thus discarded. Once I landed on the museum narrative it felt right because of the capsule’s theme on presentation and consumption. This led me to create both an abstract character (a disembodied voice) and a scene ( a museum narrative) to minimize the ornamental details and focus on the true narrative and time capsule’s purpose.

Takeaways:

The main thing I’ve learned in this process is a richer appreciation of the concept that “less is more.” Through designing packaging similar to luxury products like Apple or Google, the struggle is not adding eliminating every possible bit of information or guidance. The struggle is to parse all possibilities and only put the absolute and most crucial elements to convey a message. This was a major problem while attempting to construct a narrative or choosing a form for the capsule. I had printed icons and arrows to put into the box as instructions but ultimately decided against using them because they created clutter within the space. I struggled throughout this project to add intricacies and details where they simply weren’t needed and I’m not realizing this until typing the final sentences of the last portion of the project.

Having less does not create more. Presenting less allows the important aspects to occupy their necessary space and become a focal point. A rectangular box emphasizes its contents, white padding emphasizes what it cushions, and absent details highlight core concepts in a narrative. Less is more because you are only given what you need…

which is plenty.

Photo Essay and Script:

[Robotic Voice] I’m happy to present, the featured exhibit this week at the Museum of Amsterdam. Unearthed 125 years after its burial, this time capsule is a window into the life during the early 2000’s. The location of origin was the American Empire, the New York region, conveniently dated and confirmed by our experts, in the year 2021.

A unique aspect of this capsule is its presentation of contents. Many capsules of this era strived for preservation over presentation. The items have been laid out according to their order of presentation within the capsule.
The first and most interesting item within this is a set of seed pods. According to the creator these were salvaged from produce items a what they describe as a grocery store. During this time period, food traveled all over the world before being readily accessible and many people did not have agricultural responsibility through a distributed network like we do today. The shipping of these goods and many others contributed significantly to the narrowly avoided climate catastrophe of the 2050s.

The other items include a medical bill, a book, and a banner. All items are accompanied by creator stories which can easily be neura-linked at any time while perceiving the objects.
The advanced-stage of capitalism created many tumultuous situations of highs and lows in life for Americans during this time often their lives directed by financial decisions over communal ones, examples of which we see reflected in these objects.