CIU 210
Practical Transmedia Project
(Supplementary assignment)
Pete Minnikin
Student Number: 1005801
Lecturer: Toby Wren
The Rainbow Serpent
The Rainbow Serpent is one of the most well known Aboriginal stories. It is a very; significant and meaningful story for Aboriginal culture, as it outlines the importance of keeping peace, and has many other vital hidden meanings. The story is about an immortal being, known in the story as the ‘Rainbow Snake’. The snake is a God in the Aboriginal Mythology. It is a very well known image in lots Aboriginal Australian Art. Throughout the story it tells the important connection between the snake and the rainbow. Whenever a rainbow is seen in the sky, it is supposed to be the Rainbow Serpent traveling from one waterhole to another. This is meant to explain why some waterholes never dry up when drought strikes (Artlandish, 2015). There are many other names and stories, which do connect with the serpent, identifying the importance of the serpent in many other environments. The Aboriginal story strongly shows the significance of them and water in human life. In the version of the Rainbow Serpent story we are using, the story is about how the rainbow serpent slept beneath the ground with all the animal tribes in her stomach awaiting their birth, as there were only humans living on earth in this point of time. When the time came, she pushed up, shouting to the animals to be awaken from their slumber. ‘She created the sun and fire, she cast the land out, creating mountains, valleys and hills and flooded water over the land, forming rivers, streams, billabongs and lakes’ (Aboriginal Art Online, 1996).
Using the Rainbow Serpent story I am going to design a transmedia project that involves people from the ages of 20-30, male and female. To create a sufficient plan that people from these ages will enjoy, I must turn the story into a transmedia project that involves the audience, and makes them interact with the story (Transmedia Storytelling, 2017). The ways I am going to interact the story of the Rainbow Serpent is going to be through:
- Story Telling Website, that also explains how the importance of the environment, and how to help the environment
- Live media event, during the Brisbane Festival
- And a brand of clothing which depicts certain Aboriginal Paintings of the Rainbow Serpent
Website
The website is going to be the key factor of having the Rainbow Serpent make the readers make a change within the world. As the story states, “All the environment asks for, is for the humans to look after it”, and this is exactly what the point of the website is going to be. The website will be telling the story about the rainbow serpent and at certain points which state the importance of the environment. After this, facts or ways to help the environment will pop up on the screen, informing the reader about possible ways they can change their lifestyle to help the earth. With the Internet being what it is, there is no doubt that this idea will have some influence. It has been proven that the Internet has helped the environment before in many ways (Tree Hugger, 2016). With people being able to publish articles, facts, and stories on how to help the environment, it makes a large impact on peoples minds. In the past there have been petitions that have made people make an impact and actually do something about helping the environment, due to what they have seen on the web (Green Peace, 2017). As Australians find the knowledge of Aboriginal stories to be something of meaning, there is a definite way this website will be able to convince people that read the site to make some form of impact. The set out of the site is going to be similar to the one of the Winter Games site (Winter Games, 2016), instead of the years though it will have chapters of the Rainbow Serpent story, and different Aboriginal stories regarding the Rainbow Serpent. The website will be sent around Queensland, asking peoples from the ages 20-30 to get involved, and after they view the website, they will receive an invitation to the live event at the Brisbane festival. Each chapter will have different facts of how to help the environment, this way the reader will be able to get involved. I have chosen to do a website over an app, as I believe people from the ages of 20-30 are more likely to see go to a website if it is advertised to them (Social Media Week, 2015).
(http://wintergames.olympicchannel.com/#!intro)
Live Media Event
The live event will be the major ‘wow’ factor when it comes to telling the story of the rainbow serpent. As the Brisbane festival is very well known to celebrating Aboriginal culture, there is no doubt that having this live event will gain a lot of attention. As people in the ages of 20-30 are very interested in engaging in other cultures (The Guardian, 2012), they will definitely be interested about learning more about the story of the Rainbow Serpent. The plan is to have a large screen, which shows the story of the Rainbow Serpent, with multiple different people from the Aboriginal culture telling each chapter. At the end of each chapter, the crowd of 20-30 year olds will have the opportunity to ask questions about the story, asking the people from the Aboriginal culture to give their perspective on the story or the particular chapter of the story. Giving the audience the chance to interact with the story is very important, as it will make the audience more interested, and think about the topic/story a lot more. Having the audience feel as if they are engaging within the performance is one of the best ways to make a presentation successful (University of Leicester, 2015), and by giving the audience a chance to ask questions at the end of each chapter, the audience will feel as if they are participating within the live event. The most important aspect of this live event is to keep the crowd interested, and by using the transmedia method of giving the audience the opportunity to interact with the event, the crowd will definitely be kept intrigued.
(The live event production will be similar to this)
Clothing Range
The final part of the project is a clothing range. The clothing range is only going to be 2 different shirts for men and women. The design of the shirt is going to have pictures of Aboriginal art work of the Rainbow Snake, and also have one of the interesting lines from the rainbow serpent story on it; such as, “Far off in Dreamtime, there were only people, no animals, or birds, no trees or bushes, no hills or mountains”. The types of designs will be similar to the NRL Aboriginal Jerseys (NRL Aboriginal All Stars Jerseys, 2017). The reason these have been chosen as they show of a very proud Aboriginal culture. When people will be seen wearing these jerseys it will show they are involved within Aboriginal culture, non-aboriginal Australian or not. People also love wearing clothing of past events they have been to, as it displays they were apart of a specific event (Share Print, 2012). The shirts will obviously have the ‘Rainbow Serpent’ written on it somewhere. The importance of having this on the shirt is that if someone sees this shirt that haven’t heard of the rainbow serpent story before, there is a possibility they will search it up, and learn about the story. The shirts will be sold at the end of the event, as this is when customers are most vulnerable to purchase a shirt (Share Print, 2012). With the distinct, intriguing Aboriginal design people will love wearing these shirts. The main importance of having these shirts is that when they do, they will be able to always be apart of the event, even though it would have ended. Which is the final part of the transmedia project.
The three different parts of this transmedia project, connect each other to each step. Going from the website, which leads to the main attraction of the live event, and then the shirts, which means they can be apart of the event forever. All these separate parts are important, as they all need each other, whilst also including the people who take part of the project.
Reference List:
Rainbow Serpent and the Dreamtime – Aboriginal Art Online. 2017. Rainbow Serpent and the Dreamtime – Aboriginal Art Online. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.aboriginalartonline.com/culture/rainbow.php. [Accessed 14 May 2015].
Artlandish Aboriginal Art Gallery. 2017. Rainbow Serpent in Aboriginal Art & Culture. [ONLINE] Available at: https://www.aboriginal-art-australia.com/aboriginal-art-library/rainbow-serpent/. [Accessed 15 May 2015].
What is Transmedia Storytelling?. 2017. What is Transmedia Storytelling?. [ONLINE] Available at:http://athinklab.com/transmedia-storytelling/what-is-transmedia-storytelling/. [Accessed 14 May 2017].
Greenpeace Australia Pacific. 2017. Take action online to protect the environment | Greenpeace Australia Pacific . [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.greenpeace.org/australia/en/what-you-can-do/take-action-online/. [Accessed 14 May 2017].
TreeHugger. 2017. 5 Ways Technology Helps Us to Consume Less : TreeHugger. [ONLINE] Available at:https://www.treehugger.com/clean-technology/5-ways-technology-can-help-us-consume-less.html. [Accessed 14 May 2017].
Olympic Story. 2017. Olympic Story. [ONLINE] Available at:http://wintergames.olympicchannel.com/#!intro. [Accessed 14 May 2017].
Social Media Week. 2017. The 9 Major Social Networks Broken Down By Age. [ONLINE] Available at:https://socialmediaweek.org/blog/2015/04/9-major-social-networks-age/. [Accessed 14 May 2017].
The Guardian. 2017. Why students need a global awareness and understanding of other cultures | Teacher Network | The Guardian. [ONLINE] Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/teacher-network/2012/sep/25/students-global-awareness-other-cultures. [Accessed 17 May 2017].
Involving your audience — University of Leicester. 2017. Involving your audience — University of Leicester. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www2.le.ac.uk/offices/ld/resources/presentations/involve. [Accessed 16 May 2017].
Indigenous All Stars 2017 Men’s Jersey – NRL Megastore. 2017. Indigenous All Stars 2017 Men’s Jersey – NRL Megastore. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.nrlshop.com/indigenous-all-stars-2017-mens-jersey-160878.phtml. [Accessed 17 May 2017]
OPEN Forum. 2017. The Marketing Power of a T-Shirt | OPEN Forum. [ONLINE] Available at:https://www.americanexpress.com/us/small-business/openforum/articles/the-marketing-power-of-a-t-shirt/. [Accessed 17 May 2017]
Site Title 