A safety message with a difference! In 2008, Survival Skills was contacted
by the European Motorcycle Industry Association – ACEM – to research and
storyboard (lay out the basic design) for a series of road safety messages
aimed at powered two wheeler riders. This was to be within the framework
of the European Road Safety Charter, and the design brief was to explain
the hazards created by the road infrastructure itself, in a format that
would appeal to younger and more mature riders alike. After discussions,
we settled on a cartoon series, with a nod towards the style of the famous
'Joe Bar' cartoons of the 1980s.
Kevin continues: "My brief from ACEM was to use my experience as a motorcyclist
to identify the kinds of issues caused by the design of the riding environment
itself causes powered two wheelers problems, for example, metal access
covers, junctions, poor road surfaces and decreasing radius turns, After
some weeks of research and discussion with ACEM, I had a total of thirteen
different topics I wanted to cover.
"The next step was to turn these into a 'storyboard' so that a cartoon
could be drawn around each theme. To do this I had to summarise each issues
as succinctly as possible, in a way where the dialogue flowed from beginning
to end.. I also had to keep the language non-technical, not just so it
could be understood by riders but also to aid translation! This stage of
development took several more months of work.
"Taking my words and design of the storyline for each cartoon, a Belgian
cartoon studio created the character, Lucky 13, who features through the
series of cartoons. He tackles the issues just as a new rider might, and
learns a lesson from each experience."
The thirteen cartoons were published throughout 2009 and were
translated into at least eight different european languages.
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