Burleigh Wedding Vacay Bible
Problem Framing
My Digital Artefact started with a real problem I was experiencing while planning my destination wedding. Important information was spread across emails, Excel spreadsheets, Word documents, Canva designs, venue forms, screenshots, handwritten notes and conversations. Some information also still only existed in my head.
My original solution was the Burleigh Wedding Vacay Bible, a central digital and physical resource that other people involved in the wedding could use. The infrastructure behind the Bible was more important than simply creating a nice-looking planner. My test from A1 was: can someone find what they need, when they need it, without asking me?
Castells’ (2011) concept of network-making power helped frame this problem. He explains how networks can be programmed towards particular goals and different networks can be connected through switching. I applied this by treating my different sources of wedding information as nodes that needed to be connected around one goal: getting accurate information to the right people.
Current State
My original system was quite linear:
Information sources -> collect -> categorise -> consolidate -> Canva Wedding Bible -> users
When I actually started building it, I realised I had confused centralising access with putting everything into one platform.
My real documents were becoming increasingly complex. Excel worked well for guest lists, accommodation and seating information, while Word worked better for detailed run sheets and operational information. Trying to rebuild all of this in Canva created even more manual work.
Privacy also became part of the infrastructure problem. My operational documents contain personal guest information that should not be publicly available. I used ModeM during my planning to help me think through creating a sanitised public version of the DA while keeping the actual operational information private.
Proposed Architecture
My revised architecture was:
Information sources -> specialised working tools -> human verification -> Wedding Bible/access layer -> users -> feedback -> update source
Instead of Canva replacing every tool, each platform now performs the job it is best suited to do.
This was an important change in how I understood Castells. The nodes do not need to become identical to function as one network. What matters is how effectively they are connected around the goal of the system (Castells 2011).
Tool Selection
To explain my thinking the best, I put it into a chart:
| Tool | Purpose | What testing showed |
| Excel | Guest lists, rooms, seating and structured data | Best for information that changes and needs clear structure |
| Word | Run sheets and detailed operational documents | Better for longer, detailed information |
| Canva | Visual pages and overall Wedding Bible design | Strong visually, but not suitable as the only operational tool |
| ChatGPT / AI | Organisation, drafting and experimentation | Useful assistant, but outputs need checking |
| ModeM | Uni sounding board | Useful when there wasnt tutor access. Helped establish public/private information boundaries |
| Physical binder | Wedding-day access | Allows outputs from different tools to exist together |
Canva supports DOC/DOCX and spreadsheet imports, but different formats have their own requirements and limitations; for example, spreadsheet imports have row and column limits (Canva 2026a). Canva also provides separate tools for Docs, Sheets and Charts, reinforcing that different types of information have different functions within the platform (Canva 2026b).
See example below of the elements I have put into canva, stylistically I used Canva, some of the other docs are screenshots from Excel/word:
Workflow
The working process now:
Collect -> categorise -> choose appropriate tool -> create/update -> verify -> add to Wedding Bible -> test with user -> revise
Importantly, updates return to the relevant source document. This reduces the risk of having multiple conflicting versions of the same information.
Testing and Results
My biggest testing cycle involved AI.
After attending the Fortuna One seminar in Sydney (2026) and seeing advanced examples of AI workflows, I questioned whether I was manually doing work that AI could help automate. I connected ChatGPT with Canva, supplied my existing Canva design and source documents, and tried to get AI to build the Bible.
I expected this to save significant time. Instead, I spent hours prompting, reviewing and correcting outputs. Pages looked finished but information was missing, layouts became generic and the output moved away from my existing design.
One moment summed up the testing process perfectly. After reviewing another generated version, I asked ChatGPT: “where is my info?” ChatGPT acknowledged that the generated Canva did not contain the full information I had supplied.
This showed me that faster content generation did not automatically create better infrastructure. AI had actually introduced a new step: verification.
I told it how disappointed I was and this is what it said:
(I told it that if you know what you need to do, then do it, but it still didn’t, outputs kept looking like this)
Evaluation
Siena, Malcolm and Kennea (2025) demonstrate the importance of iteration within human-centred design processes. My project became an example of why iteration matters. Rather than continuing with an inefficient system simply because it matched my original proposal, I changed the architecture in response to what testing showed me.
The Wedding Bible itself is still a work in progress because the information will continue changing until the wedding. However, the infrastructure is now more functional. My original question remains important – can someone find what they need without asking me? – but I would now add: can they trust that what they find is current and accurate?
The biggest improvement was accepting that a central system does not have to mean one platform. The Wedding Bible now connects the network rather than trying to replace every part of it.
References
Canva 2026a, ‘Check file upload formats and requirements for Canva’, Canva Help Centre, viewed 3 October 2026, https://www.canva.com/en_au/help/upload-formats-requirements-variantb/.
Canva 2026b, ‘Canva Charts’, Canva Help Centre, viewed 3 October 2026, https://www.canva.com/en_au/help/canva-charts/.
Castells, M 2011, ‘A network theory of power’, International Journal of Communication, vol. 5, pp. 773-787
Fortuna One 2026, Fortuna One, viewed 3 October 2026, www.fortunaone.com
Siena, FL, Malcolm, R & Kennea, P 2025, ‘Developing ideation & iterative design skills through human-centred product design projects’, Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Engineering and Product Design Education (E&PDE 2025), pp. 595-600, doi:10.35199/EPDE.2025.100.
Generative AI acknowledgement:
Generative AI was used as part of the Digital Artefact itself, including experimentation with ChatGPT, Canva and ModeM during the development and testing of the infrastructure. ChatGPT was also used to assist with organising and editing this report. All outputs were reviewed, fact-checked and edited by me.
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