This project is a commentary on the Alegria art style that was created by the design firm Buck for Facebook in 2017. Over the past years, many other big tech companies like Google, Youtube, Airbnb, etc have adopted this style and use them in their advertisements and websites. The public began to notice this takeover and started to question its motives and intentions. This art style portrays humans as pastel-colored with long limbs in an effort to "represent" everyone and show diversity. However, this affect represents no one. These characters serve as a way for tech companies to control the narrative around their company and make it seem like they are doing some good for the world. Meanwhile, headlines pop up everyday of privacy breaches, selling data, and scandals that tell a different story.
I aimed to showcase this diacotomy with a short animation. The first scene is a loading/intro scene that lores the user in with wavy text and some people in the Alegria art style. Next is an abstract face using similar pastel colors with words evoking a feeling of happiness and joy (the namesake of the art style). The last scene is the "gotcha" moment where the face is peeled back to reveal a gray background and New York Times artcile of Facebook's scandals over the years. There is also my headline for this piece "What's Lying Underneath" which has two meanings: the first being the literal meaning of what behind the face and the second refers to these companies lying about their wrongdoings and trying to cover them up.
Link to the Youtube video of the animation
React
Typescript
Django
Laravel
Facebook
Microsoft
Google
Alibaba
D3
Tencent