Understanding the Novel Coronavirus (2020)
An open-source website I helped design, research, illustrate, and write. It summarizes the initial 3 months of the COVID-19 pandemic. In a team of 2 other designers and 1 engineer, we launched a website at the end of January 2020 and updated the website weekly as new information about COVID-19 broke to the public. The website was additionally adapted into a large format poster and a printable booklet, and a companion site focused on home care basics was later created.
Due to the rapid and changing nature of the virus and the response to the pandemic, the website only focuses on summarizing the relevant world events, and events within the U.S. related to COVID-19 from January 2020 to March 2020 for a lay audience. While some of the information was designed to be dynamic--pulling statistics from databases live--the website is generally specific to the information from the 3 initial months of the pandemic alone.
Co-Designers: Patricia Nguyen, Parsuree Vatanasurisuk, Craig McGinley (Engineer)
Contributors: Jennifer Patel, Meghana Karande, Juhan Sonin
Client: GoInvo (open-source)
Medium: Digital (Procreate, Figma)
Date of Completion: Mar 2020
Process Work
1. Finding a Story
We identified the need for an accessible and public place lay people could educate themselves and stay up to date about the COVID-19 during its outbreak period where news about it and what the public should do was dispersed.
First, we determined vital topics of interest to both limit the scope of the project and create a narrative flow; each topic being a different heading of the site and roughly mocked up in Figma. Then, we reached out to subject matter experts and audited credible online resources for historical information about coronaviruses, emerging findings about this novel type, and recommendations from official health bodies like the CDC and WHO. Our research was then organized within the narrative we designed with rough sketches by late January for internal review.
Despite its original digital destination, the rough draft was printed out large to better assess the narrative flow of the site, catch errors, and provide feedback from our coworkers.
2. Preparing for Initial Release
As the final flow of the site began to finalize, Parsuree, Patricia, and I divvyed up the illustrations by those we completed the rough sketch for, and began to polish them in as similar a style to each other as possible to ensure that the site was cohesive. Up until release day, we all continuously proofread and fact checked the information across section in the final draft, and updated any information that had changed.
We also developed a folder and naming system for all our assets and designs, so Craig--our engineer--would easily be able to identify the latest patch for the website.
3. Iteratively Updating with Incoming News
With news about the rapid spread of COVID-19 emerging and constantly changing, the website began updating on a weekly basis. Updates included any combination of text changes, new illustrations, and entirely new sections depending on what became official statements or findings about the disease.
4. Rapidly Adapting to New Venues
While keeping the site up to date, the community our studio is based in suggested that it would be useful for the site to have a printed format. In 2 weeks, we quickly redesigned the website into an open source booklet that was distributed at local town halls and schools, and 2 large format posters that were displayed in the community.
Lastly, I led the design and creation of a companion site only detailing the CDC's recommendations about how to care for COVID-19 patients at home. It was translated from English into 5 languages with help from netizen volunteers from around the world.
Large scale poster designed for print detailing the initial narrative flow of the Understanding COVID-19 site.
Large scale poster designed for print detailing the world's response to the COVID-19 outbreak that was detailed on the Understanding COVID-19 site.