SITE: OVERALL PROJECT, ITS USERS AND PURPOSE

Commotion is a website for a fictional weekly drag show. I have attended many drag shows and have a number of friends that work in the field, which led me to choose this subject. It is rare that a show, even a weekly one, has its own dedicated web presence – there is normally just a website for the main organisation that hosts it, something that a brief competitor analysis confirmed – so it was for this reason that I decided to build this site.

Its purpose is to advertise and promote Commotion, both its performers and the show. Commotion has a completely new show each week and advertising that, and its special guests, is important too. Throughout the site however I have endeavoured to keep the information light, the text short and easily digestible, the images sparse yet striking and overall, to create an intriguing, fun website. I settled on a compound colour scheme whose secondary colours I tried to bring in through my selection of images. I also purposely decided that the page for the fictional main bar (The Boiler Room), whilst still retaining elements of fun, would feature more distinctly “male” pictures to promote the bar (in contrast to the arty drag pictures that promote Commotion).

In planning the website, I created a few of personas. Out of this work, some basic ideas became apparent. One group that this website targets are students. One persona, Paul, is a 22 year old student who attends drag shows with friends because it is free entertainment – something I mention prominently on the homepage. His main reason for checking out the site is to see what time the show starts – a crucial element that I decided to include in both the header and footer so it would be present on every page. Once there, he finds that there is a weekly show, which piques his interest and, being a music student, loves that there are Spotify playlists for the show on the Audio page. Also, given the age of the persona, it was important that the site and template worked when viewed on a mobile device, which it does well. Another persona is a drag performer called Kitty, based in France, who is travelling to Ireland soon and is looking at the site not only for leisure, but for business – she looks at Fiona’s page, and the contact page mainly. Other motivations for visiting the site included; where Commotion was; to find out who was performing this week (regular visitors would know about the rotating cast and would check the website for such information); and for information about the regular performers. Without the website, there would be little space for promotion of the performers, both regular and special guests, whereas with this, all of this information is catered for and Commotion now has its own identity online.