When it comes to developing a new product or service, it’s important to create a persona for each user. A persona represents an individual’s actual needs and goals. The persona keeps the user at the forefront of design decisions, and can ultimately help you create a better product or service. Listed below are some examples of personas in films and television. To create a persona, follow the steps in this article.
Lene Nielsen’s persona method
The persona method was originally developed by Lene Nielsen, who has twenty years of experience solving problems for businesses. She holds a PhD in personas and works as a professor at the IT University of Copenhagen. Using her research and her own experience, Nielsen developed the 10 Steps to Personas method. The second edition of the book contains three new chapters and significant expansion of material covered in the first edition.
First, Nielsen’s persona method draws from narrative theory. Narrative theory posits that stories are basic human strategies. In order for a persona to become fully realized, it must be able to raise the reader’s engagement level. To do this, personas are described in stories. This allows them to easily imagine what might happen to them in the future. The persona’s feelings and behaviors are described in stories.
Examples of personas in television and movies
Literature has a rich tradition of using literary personas. The word persona originated in the Latin language and originally referred to a stage actor’s mask. The term has broadened to cover characters in any work, from plays to novels, and has a particular meaning in literary studies. In literature, a persona is the voice or personality that narrates a work. It can also be the voice of a fictional character or a real person in the public sphere.
Film and television shows often have characters that adopt personas to enhance their image. A movie or television show’s character may have a zany persona, but a movie focusing on a persona-centered character is much more memorable than one centered around a librarian. For example, a movie about a gangsta rapper might end with him blasting off in a rocket. Similarly, a movie about a musical artist named Social Sarah may end with a rock concert in front of a library, after which the college dean comes to help fund the event.
Lene Nielsen’s persona spectrums
The concept of personas is not new, but the use of this framework is still relatively new. Lene Nielsen, author of the Persona Lifecycle, posits that identifying personas helps design better products. Nielsen’s approach focuses on the role of context in helping create compelling personas. While a persona may be the same as another, context also plays an important role in defining them.
The first challenge with using persona descriptions is that they contain elements that are fictitious, which prevents them from being scientific. To qualify as scientific, a method must be reproducible. This requires a combination of two paradigms: the objectivistic paradigm that focuses on statements that can be verified and the interpretive paradigm, which posits continual clarification. In contrast, the persona method, which is qualitative, relies on deep knowledge of user attitudes, needs, and behaviors.
Lene Nielsen’s persona workshop
The goal of Lene Nielsen’s Persona workshop is to help writers create well-rounded characters with different perspectives and multiple traits. By applying fiction techniques, writers can create believable, dimensional characters. In addition to developing compelling personas, Nielsen teaches writers how to bring out tension between the traits of a character. To illustrate the process, Nielsen uses character descriptions of “Thelma” and “Louise,” two fictional women. In addition to a worksheet to guide the development of personas, Nielsen offers several templates to help writers develop their own fictional characters.
Once participants have completed the Persona exercises, they are encouraged to brainstorm different ways to describe their fictional characters. A typical scenario starts with a problem, and then the character responds by setting a goal. The scenario then follows an episodic pattern where the goal is attained, and an obstacle or two is encountered. The scenario concludes with a resolution. The framework for developing a Persona is based on narrative theory, which posits that stories are a fundamental human strategy.