Place

This tool reimagines the traditional postcard /a format that often reduces places to landmarks and clichés/ into a personal and generative expression of emotional landscape. Built in Processing, the open-source tool lets users create personalized postcards and graphics from photos of their travel/loved ones/moments, adjust emotion sliders and draw on graphics to leave a personal mark. The result is a unique visualization that merges subjective experience with abstract aesthetics. place is a platform for experimenting with emotions through visual communication and is now on GitHub for you to try and create your own postcards. Link to the project: https://github.com/karlajaran/_PLACE/tree/main. The title PLACE refers to the absence of place, a gap not captured by geographic maps, but by personal experiences. The project explores how a cluster of emotions /both positive and negative/ is produced within a space. The whole project was inspired by Christian Nold’s Emotional Cartography, which examines the political, social, and cultural implications of visualizing intimate spaces and emotional experiences. The visualization of parameters (NOSTALGIA, EXCITEMENT, SAFETY, LOVE, HAPPINESS) comes from my theoretical research and personal perception. As a designer, not a sociologist or psychologist, I used technology to translate emotions into visual forms. I didn’t want the project to remain purely technical, I also wanted to shape its identity. The inspiration for the branding came from pixels, reflecting the look graphics the tool produces. Alongside pixels, the main expressive element was a palette of bright colors, chosen to mirror the intensity of emotions. To complement the visuals, the project also developed a series of copys: no sunsets pls, no more fridge magnets, big ben who, emotionally abroad, not tripadvisor-approved... These ironic phrases playfully subvert the clichés and standpoints of mainstream tourism, reinforcing the idea that place is about your perception of spaces. Best for last, I didn’t want the project to remain only on a screen and I wanted to show how it could live as a system even beyond postcards. With that in mind I produced a small series of five 50x50 cm scarves, each carrying a graphic of a place that holds personal meaning to me. Dear friends modeled them here, bringing the pieces to life. A few sets (scarf + postcard+stickers) are still available and waiting for a home.