Art Direction Task 1: Project Proposal
Lew Guo Ying / 0365721 / Bachelor of Design in Creative Media
Art Direction
Index
Instructions
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| Fig2.1 Ideation |
As a team of three, we began our project by brainstorming a wide range of possible themes, gradually narrowing them down to three strong ideas that clearly connect to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs): HUÄ€ (Cultural Beauty Heritage), AURA (Wellness & Health Awareness), and Four Treasures Beauty (Cultural Sustainability & Equality). For each concept, we discussed the underlying problem statement, potential outputs, and the design opportunities it could bring. This early exploration helped us understand how each idea could create social, cultural, or emotional impact through art direction.
After presenting our initial ideas to Mr. Kamal, we reflected on his feedback: strong art direction must always be grounded in user needs and real market relevance. Based on this, we ultimately selected AURA as our final direction. The concept’s focus on wellness, emotional balance, and youth-friendly visual storytelling offers clear opportunities to address user pain points and align with SDG 3 (Good Health & Well-Being). Moving forward, our priority is to deepen user research—understanding what young audiences need, how they perceive wellness, and how design can naturally create demand through meaningful visual experience.
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| Fig2.2 Task |
After finalizing AURA as our project direction, we divided the tasks based on each member’s strengths. Winnie focused on packaging and design references, while Yaniny worked on the moodboard, typography exploration and color direction. My role centered on data collection, which included creating the Google Form survey, preparing interview questions, and analyzing all responses. This step was essential because Mr. Kamal emphasized that strong art direction must begin with understanding the audience — their needs, preferences, and emotional patterns.
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| Fig2.3 Google Form & Mascot |
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| Fig2.4 Mascot references |
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| Fig2.5 References Animation |
As the project progressed, we refined our task distribution to match the final outputs we planned to create. Winnie took charge of the application design, focusing on the UI elements and user journey. Yaniny handled packaging and merchandise, translating our visual identity into physical products. My direction moved toward animation, where I began exploring motion treatments, transitions, and how aura colors could flow, pulse, and shift to reflect emotional states.
To begin shaping our animation style, I collected references related to light effects, gradients, glowing elements, fluid color motions, and atmospheric visuals. These references helped establish the mood we want for AURA — soft, immersive, and emotionally responsive.
At the same time, we used insights from our Google Form results to refine our color system. By analyzing how participants perceive aura colors and their emotional associations, we developed a clearer direction for our palette. This allowed us to deepen our interpretation of each color so that the visual design — whether in animation, packaging, or the app — accurately represents psychological states and mood transitions. The goal is to make every color both aesthetically engaging and emotionally meaningful.
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| Fig2.6 Nowaday example of these product |
One of the main reasons we decided to create AURA is because mental and emotional health is often overlooked, especially among young people. Psychological topics are usually only discussed seriously when someone reaches a breaking point or requires medical attention, but everyday emotional well-being is rarely talked about. Many people avoid the topic entirely due to stigma, fear of judgment, or the belief that “mental issues = weakness.”
Because of this, many wellness-related solutions have shifted away from heavy medical language and instead use symbols, colors, and visual metaphors to express emotions and energy in a more subtle, approachable way. However, most existing aura visuals are outdated, overly spiritual, or visually unappealing, as shown in our comparison images. These “old school aura charts” feel disconnected from today’s aesthetic expectations and do not resonate with modern audiences.
Young people today respond better to visuals that are soft, gradient-based, minimalist, and emotionally expressive—a style that feels contemporary and safe. This sparked our idea to redesign aura-related visuals into something modern, beautiful, and relevant to current design trends, so that emotional wellness can be communicated in a way that feels natural, aesthetic, and non-intimidating. AURA aims to bridge that gap by transforming traditional aura concepts into a modern visual language that people actually enjoy and feel comfortable engaging with.
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| Fig2.7 Aura output |
We chose packaging as our first output because colors play a powerful role in shaping emotions. Psychological studies show that warm tones like pink and yellow evoke happiness and warmth, while blue and green create calmness and balance. By incorporating soft gradients and aura-inspired forms into everyday items such as water bottles, vitamin C packs, snacks, tea bags, and lifestyle products, we want users to subconsciously feel comforted, energized, or calmed simply by interacting with the packaging.
This approach turns aura from a “concept” into something tangible and usable, making emotional wellness part of daily life.
Our second output is an application that allows users to quietly record their aura state throughout the day. The app acts as a private emotional journal where users can draw daily “aura cards,” understand their current feelings, and receive guidance on how to stay balanced and positive.
The features include:
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Daily aura logging
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Card-drawing interaction to reveal emotional insights
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Tips on how each aura color can help improve mood
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A private space for users to understand themselves without judgment
The goal is to make wellness accessible, personal, and stigma-free.
Our final output is a motion-based animation that introduces the seven core aura colors and demonstrates their emotional meanings. Through flowing gradients, light movements, and immersive transitions, the animation will show users how each color behaves — calm blue waves, growing green lines, energetic yellow bursts, compassionate pink pulses, and more.
This animation helps users understand:
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What each aura color represents
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How emotions can be visualized
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How aura behaves as an identity for the brand
It also highlights the aesthetic appeal of AURA and sets the tone for the brand’s future visual identity.
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| Fig2.8 Typography and color |
In addition to understanding user behavior and emotional needs, we also explored the symbolic meaning of colors and the role of typography in shaping emotional perception. Aura colors are traditionally understood as dynamic energy fields, each linked to different emotional, spiritual, and psychological states. Colors such as red (confidence), blue (calmness), yellow (optimism), green (healing), violet (intuition), and pink (gentleness) commonly appear in aura-related interpretations and reflect subtle emotional shifts. These associations reinforce our decision to use a seven-color emotional system in AURA, aligning both with cultural symbolism and user expectations from our survey.
Typography also plays an essential role in emotional communication. Serif typefaces feel elegant, timeless, and introspective, while modern sans-serif fonts suggest clarity, calmness, and openness. Through our typography study, we compared different styles—from refined editorial serif fonts to minimal, rounded sans-serif families—to determine which tone supports AURA’s identity. We found that a blend of soft, contemporary sans-serif for readability and light serif accents for emotional warmth creates a balance that reflects wellness, introspection, and trust.
This research ensures that every visual element—color, type, and form—works together to support emotional clarity and modern appeal, creating a consistent and soothing experience across packaging, the app, and animation.
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| Fig2.9 Google Form |
To build a credible and user-centered foundation for AURA, we collected data from two research approaches: a guided interview with a psychology professional and a Google Form survey targeted at youth aged 18–25. These two methods allowed us to understand emotional wellness from both an expert perspective and a real user perspective.
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How young people perceive aura visually vs. emotionally
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Whether aura colors can serve as a metaphor for mental states
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How visual tools lower the barrier of talking about emotions
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What makes wellness concepts credible and responsible
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What type of visuals (colors, motion, sound) help emotional regulation
The interview helped us ensure that AURA stays scientifically grounded, emotionally sensitive, and ethically responsible, especially when working with mental health themes.
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Lifestyle & mental habits
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Perception of health and stigma
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Visual preferences (gradient, glow, mascot, motion, etc.)
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Color associations with emotions
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Expectations for a wellness brand
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Personal interpretation of aura
This survey helped us identify patterns across a wider audience — including color-memory mapping, preferred art styles, emotional barriers, and what visuals feel “comforting” vs. “stressful.” These insights directly shaped our color system, brand tone, and animation direction.
By combining expert insights with youth-centered data, our research allowed AURA to evolve into a visually appealing yet psychologically meaningful wellness brand.
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| Fig2.10 Google Form Analysis |
Most participants reflect on their mental or emotional well-being “occasionally”, with only a few doing it weekly and a few almost never. When stressed, they mostly listen to music, sleep, watch movies, eat, exercise, or talk to someone. Many define “being healthy” as a combination of mental + physical health + emotional stability, not just physical fitness.
However, when asked whether people around them openly talk about mental health, many answered “No” or only “Sometimes”, and repeatedly mentioned fear of judgement and the belief that “mental issues = weakness”. This shows that although awareness exists, stigma is still strong — which supports our intention for AURA to be a softer, more approachable bridge to mental wellness.
For the brand direction question, almost all respondents chose Option A: Modern Minimal Gradient, while only one chose the more traditional, spiritual aura visualization (Option B). The favorite visual elements are very consistent:
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Flow and movement of light
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Color transitions / gradients
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Soft glowing textures
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Plus, some interest in organic shapes, mascot characters, and typography
They clearly dislike visuals that are:
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Too harsh or intense in lighting
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Too clinical / medical (like hospital UI)
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Too overly “spiritual or unrealistic”
This confirms that AURA should avoid a “hospital app” look or overly mystical visuals. Instead, a soft, design-driven, lifestyle-oriented gradient style is exactly what users expect and feel comfortable with.
When asked which colors represent wellness and emotional balance, participants frequently associated:
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Blue with calm, peace, intuition
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Green with nature, healing, growth
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Yellow with happiness, joy, friendliness
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Orange with energy, outgoing, warmth
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Violet/Purple with imagination, magic, spirituality
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White with purity, clarity, “new understanding”
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Grey/Black with stress, fatigue, negative emotions
Most respondents have heard of “aura” before, and associate it with energy, vibe, or mood. Many said that if their aura could change colors based on mood/health, they would feel curious and interested, and they liked the idea of seeing their condition visualized. Their own “current aura” answers (blue, green, yellow, orange, grey, black, etc.) also match their emotional states (calm, happy, tired, stressed).
These patterns directly support our decision to define seven main aura colors (Blue, Green, Yellow, Orange, Pink, Purple, Grey) and give each one a clear emotional meaning in the animation and UI.
When imagining AURA as a wellness brand, participants think of:
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Digital experiences – apps/websites that track or reflect mood
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Packaging for wellness food, tea, or skincare
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Lifestyle products – candles, aroma diffusers, journals
Across all formats, their expectations are very consistent:
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Calming and soothing visuals
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Reflective, self-care mood
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Room for personal expression and creativity
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Soft, organic motion and forms
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Sometimes, bright energizing colors and interactive features (e.g., AR filters)
Most rated 4–5 when asked whether visualizing health/emotions through aura colors would make wellness more relatable. This confirms that our core concept—using aura colors as a visual language for well-being—is not only understandable, but also engaging for them.
From this survey, we concluded that AURA should be:
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Modern gradient-based, not mystical or clinical
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Focused on soft light, flowing motion, and emotional color transitions
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Built around seven core colors, each with clear emotional meaning
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Positioned as a safe, non-judgmental space for mental and emotional reflection
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Visually aligned with lifestyle + wellness, rather than hospital or purely spiritual imagery
These insights directly guided our color system, animation style, mascot direction, and UI decisions in the later stages of the project.
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