KEN
JEBSEN
SEBASTIAN PURFÜRST
MAREK BAUM
SEBASTIAN PURFÜRST
SEBASTIAN PURFÜRST
MAREK BAUM
MAREK BAUM
ANATOMY OF A TRANSMITTER: KEN.FM
KEN FM is a unique on air show in the german sea of airwaves.
Host, producer and mindmanger on stage and behind the scene is
Ken Jebsen. The online portal of his weekly KEN FM urgently needed
a relaunch. The website was supposed to mirror the systematically
chaotic character of the show. Ken Jebsen is fast. He invented
within 12 min the complete concept including branches and content
of his new website. All we had to do was to respond to his verbal
fireworks with some appropriate design. The interface is playful
and full of gadgets, gimmicks and of course strongly supported
by sound effects as you would expect it.
Most of the navigation is done in flash, the rest
of the site is based on HTML. Since the editors are not supposed
to be web-expert we decided to give them an extra-simple access
to the contents. The website is completely editable online. This
completely suits the mobile character of KEN FM. You never know
where they are transmitting from...
BASTIAN
ENTERING
THE SITE For the frequent users excitement ;) comes up a random
banner. You got the choice between the actual interactive flash
interface and a simplified HTML version.
CHECK
OUT THE STATIONS For the main navigation we used a radio metaphor. You simply
let the needle wander across the display. A little light bulb and
a sound effect tell you when you got a station otherwise you got statics.
LED
- INFO For further information we installed a little 2x16 char LED
display. As soon as you enter a mouse over region you get some additional
explanations.
RADIO-BUTTONS This is a simpler and redundant version of the radio-display
navigation. Some impatient people seemed to get easily bored of playful
interfaces, so we offer here some serious, reliable buttons.
BACK
BUTTON If you want to go back step by step you can simply use the
back button in the border area. Additionally there's the current page
title integrated.
MAGIC
EYE MOVEMENT This is some magical from the good old radio days - a magic
eye. It's brightness is sensitive to your mouse movement.
MUTE!
This litte buttons allows you to switch off the sound effects
of the interface. Like in life it's up to you to choose the degree
of fun.
GEZ
IS WATCHING YOU! Ken wanted to have a countdown for you credits. You got to
pay the GEZ fee if you want to enjoy the site so you better feed the
slot!
THEME
PARK Every categorie got it's own little theme. It's basically
collages of all kind of totally unrelated, pure associative nonsense,
ha ha.
The GEZ alarm rings if you're credits are up. You gotta pay (virtual
money of course). This function is as nerve wrecking as much as
the real GEZ and their letters.
POST-NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY The control panel was supposed to look as mixed up and improvised
as the radio show itself is. All the time anything can happen. Ken
Jebsen wanted a proper "Mad-Max-Post-Nuclear-Trash-Factor"
so I went to the Berlin - Mauerpark flea market to get some cool stuff.
I think scanning and collaging those elements was a better approach
than trying to render it.