The Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA) is a non-profit organization of journalists and photographers who report on the entertainment industry activity and interests in the United States for information outlets (newspaper, magazine and book publication, television and radio broadcasting) predominantly outside the U.S. The HFPA consists of about 90 members from approximately 55 countries with a combined following of more than 250 million. It conducts the annual Golden Globe Awards ceremony in Los Angeles every January that honor notable examples of cinema and television and achievements in entertainment businesses.
They needed to improve their website and online presence with a new design, a searchable historical database (73 years) and a blog where to post their journalism activities with interviews, photos, and videos. Also, they need to update in real time, winners, photos, video and articles during the annual Golden Globe Awards ceremony, the Nominations day and other events as their Philanthropy activity and the Golden Globe Ambassador, a position traditionally held by the daughter or sometimes the son of a celebrity.
Process
I started collecting, analyzing and organizing the entire archive of winners and nominations lists, pictures and videos. The first step was to design the structure of the website, the information architecture and the core engine along with the architecture of the server. At the same time, the entire historical archive, Winners, Nominations, photos, and videos, needed to be verified, organized by categories, years and countries. For the past old years, a scanning process required.
Persona
CardslSort
Wireframe
The Team
Navigation
Screenshots
Personas
The users of the site are identified in three categories: Stars followers, Journalists, and Producers.
JENNIFER SMITH
Age: 32
Career: Secretary
Gender: Female
FOLLOWER
JOHN FREDERICK
Age: 43
Career: Reporter
Gender: Male
JOURNALIST
STEVEN SPIELBERG
Age: 71
Career: filmmaker
Gender: Male
PRODUCER
Information Architecture
The website needs to have easy access to several sections to meet the expectations of 3 different user categories:
The Followers, who want to read news and see pictures of the Stars, the Production Companies, who need to provide information to the HFPA and submit their entries for a Nomination at the Golden Globe Awards and the Publishers, from all over the world, who need high-resolution photos.
The Team
For each event, it was crucial to building a team that could follow and execute my directions in multiple tasks. I previously trained each member of the team to avoid problems and mistake while we are working live from the events. Responsibilities include Video editing, conversion, upload, and captions, publish winners in real-time, editing, upload and distribution of high-resolution photos for the press and the HFPA members.
Problem
The HFPA was looking for a Web Designer based in Los Angeles that could redesign and maintain the website, the blog and the social accounts throughout the year. A CMS capable of supporting multiple actions and accesses from members and their studios’ networks. They also need someone who could manage the servers and update the website during their events, someone who could bring and coordinate a team to capture, edit and publish photos (red carpet, ballroom, and backstage), video interviews from the press room during the events, update the database and announce winners in real-time.
Solution
I’ve designed the website based on WordPress (PHP, MySql), perfect for blogging and streaming all kind of media and customized script integration. In particular, I’ve designed a plugin that converts in link any star name or movie title while you type into a post. The link is connected to the related profile in the past awards database.
Wireframe
Screenshots
