Pottermore has released the second part of their look at the making of the Hogwarts House Crests. It shows the process of making the Ravenclaw and Slytherin crests.

The Hufflepuff crest proved to be the most difficult creation for the team. There is a limited amount of detail about Hufflepuff house in Harry Potter and The Philosopher’s Stone and they were aware that they needed to work a little harder to make the crest feel authentic and representative of the Hufflepuff nature. There was also the question of how to show the badger as a tenacious animal, to show Hufflepuffs as unafraid of hard work.

The art team tried out a number of different snakes for the Slytherin crest, as they wanted to ensure the one they used didn’t resemble a particular type of serpent (such as a boa or a cobra). The coil of the tail was another focal point as the artists wanted the snake to look natural, but not inactive. […] the team set to work designing a snake that looked like it had been created by a silversmith. They felt this brought the whole crest to life, especially when combined with the green ripples in the background, designed to accentuate the water element.

Some of the Pottermore Slytherin community have already noticed that theirs is the only animal looking to the left, while the other house crests have animals looking to the right. This was a decision that came about during the final stages of design, when the crests were all placed together.

Photo © to Pottermore

The Pottermore Insider Blog has been updated letting fans know that their Beta Tester Survey is now available. So they would like for those of us who were lucky enough to gain early access to take the quick 10 minute survey so they can better the experience for when it opens to the general public.  You’ll be able to comment on the different areas of the site, letting them know what you enjoy, and what you think could be even better.

Please click the following link to take part in the Pottermore Beta testers survey: https://www.research.net/s/pottermorebetasurvey

The Pottermore Insider Blog has been updated showing fans how the Ravenclaw and Gryffindor House Crests were designed!  They were designed by the Atomhawk Design team and they have given Pottermore some of their design sketches which you can view along with the final products in the post right here.

The starting point for each of the house crests was the Hogwarts crest, which first appeared on the title pages of the Harry Potter books, and represents all four Hogwarts houses. This original artwork and J.K. Rowling’s descriptions of the houses were used to inspire four unique house emblems for Pottermore.

The artists started by talking about the best way to include the natural elements of fire, earth, water and air into each house; what the best positions and expressions for the animals would be; and the most effective way to include the house colours in the final designs.

Their main aim all the way through the process was to make the crests into symbols that Sorted Pottermore users would be proud to display as a token of their Pottermore identity.

To start with, three versions were sketched for each house crest. The team then looked at each variation to make absolutely sure the details and attributes of each house were clearly represented. The design they felt was the strongest out of the three was selected to go through to the next stage of the process, which involved adding colour to the designs.

Photo © to Pottermore

The Pottermore insider blog has been updated with some new information, including letting fans know that general registration will open at the end of October, some access may be quick, others may need to wait some weeks or months. Additionally the Pottermore Shop will open in the first half of 2012. They also answered some new Frequently Asked Questions:

As a Beta user, how am I helping to shape the Pottermore experience?

We’re tweaking different parts of the site based on how you’re interacting with it and the feedback you’re currently giving us. We’ll also be sending out a Beta survey to all Beta participants to help us decide which features to enhance and which to simplify.

The site isn’t always available, or can be very slow. Why is this?

As with most new sites, we’ve been experiencing technical challenges as more people begin to use Pottermore. These are usually quickly resolved as they arise, but can affect site performance or availability for short periods. We will continue to let you know, here on the Insider, if the site is unavailable for an extended period of time. We’d like to thank you for your patience.

When will I be able to duel again?

This area of the site has proved to be even more popular than we anticipated and we want to make sure that it will be able cope with the large number of users we expect before turning it back on.

We know people are keen for Wizard’s Duel to return and we’ll let you know, via the Insider, the moment it’s available.

I’m not in the Beta. When will Pottermore be available to me?

We expect to open registration to everyone from the end of October. Registering means that you’ll be able to create a Pottermore account and select a username. You won’t have immediate access to the site as we’ll be enabling people in phases.

Once you’ve registered, we’ll send you a Welcome email to let you know when your Pottermore account has been activated. This may arrive quickly but please note it could also take a number of weeks or months, depending on demand.

 

The Pottermore Insider blog has been updated to let fans know that all one million welcome emails for Pottermore Beta Testing have been sent out! This means we are a lot closer to Pottermore being open to the general public, so if you weren’t one of the lucky one million, never fear, you will be able to enjoy Pottermore soon.

Earlier today, we sent out the one-millionth Welcome email – which means that everyone who successfully registered for the Beta should now have access to Pottermore.

We’re expecting the site to be extremely busy over the next 24 hours as people log in and explore Pottermore for the first time. As such, you may have to wait to sign in but please keep trying if you aren’t able to gain entry straight away.

The Pottermore Insider blog has been updated to let fans know that Welcome emails will be going out DAILY for the next two weeks! Previously they had been sending out welcome emails in batches and then making sure bugs were fixed before sending out new emails.  According to the blog:

The good news is that we no longer expect to pause sending these (as mentioned in our Beta testing and Welcome emails post). Instead, we plan to send emails out daily over the next two weeks. As always, there’s a chance that our plans may alter as we assess the site and how it is reacting to new users but we will update you if anything changes.

Have you received your email yet? I finally got mine on Tuesday but haven’t really been able to explore yet.

[You may have noticed that news has been a bit slow, this is because I moved out of my parent’s house a couple of weeks ago and still have no cable or internet at my new house, we’re supposed to get it on September 22nd so after that news will be normal. But for now I can only update during my lunch break at work or if there is a lull]