Greg Carrick – HND Interactive Media

After taking a year out and finding out what it’s like working full time in a job I really don’t like, I can honestly say I’m glad to be back. I’ve spent the last year regretting leaving the course but to my defence it was partly because of my financial situations that lead to me leaving.

I was very much looking forwards to rejoining the course and picking up from where I’d left off but there was a large part of me that was/is quite nervous. This is due to two things; firstly I was joining a class that I only knew one person from (who actually wasn’t there on my first day). I’m not the most confident person and I would like to thank everyone for making me feel welcomed and part of the group. The second reason is that I’ve spent the last year not using anything I’d learnt in the first year and now I have to refresh myself with the first year while trying to work on the second year projects. This is why I’m still slightly nervous because I know I’ve got a lot to catch up on.

I feel that my first day on the second year went better than expected since I felt confident with what I had to do and know I’ll be able to get it complete by the next lesson. The only real worry for me was the pace I worked at, I feel that I worked quite slow today and although I expected a bumpy return, I felt I could have got more work done.

Looking back at my ‘End of the First Year Evaluation’ I still feel like I’m in the same position and the goals I set myself are still goals I’m going to work towards but now with the added PHP and MySQL goal.

Here is my list of resources I will use whilst learning PHP and MySQL:

1. PHP 6 and MySQL 5 for Dynamic Web Sites: Visual QuickPro Guide

Many reviews I read about this book said it was easily accessible by beginners and gave them a very good understanding of PHP and MySQL. This should be very useful to get me started with the languages.

2. PHP In Easy Steps

This book comes with many examples of PHP and shows the main features of the language. Many reviews say it was easy to follow and a definite for PHP beginners.

3. http://php.net/

This is the home of PHP and will come in useful with the PHP Manual section, which has a language reference and getting started section.

4. http://w3schools.com/

I have used this website before and found it very useful as it splits the tutorials down into easy to follow sections and has many examples of using the different syntax. This site also has plenty to help me along with MySQL.

5. http://tizag.com/

There seems to be plenty of information about PHP on this site, with sections that guide you gradually through learning the basics. There is also a more advanced PHP section and a tutorial on MySQL I will be able to use.

6. http://www.homeandlearn.co.uk/php/php.html

This website looks very useful with many different sections on PHP and plenty of examples to try myself.

7. http://www.webmonkey.com

Another useful website which looks to gradually bring you into writing PHP from the basics with examples.

8. http://phpfreaks.com/

There are many tutorials on this website to have a go at once I get the basics of PHP out of the way. Using these should help improve and extend my PHP skills.

For the Self Managed Learning Plan (SMLP) I will be learning PHP (Hypertext Preprocessor). PHP will allow me to create more dynamic websites, since the language can be used for many things, from making the website more appealing with photo galleries and feedback forms, or creating more advanced features such as shopping baskets and forums.

After searching through a number of jobsites I found that the vast majority of available employers required you to know how to code PHP. Learning PHP now will give me a higher chance of gaining employment after this course.

After some research I have found that a large amount of people who learnt PHP said it was easy to pick up. So it makes me more confident that I too will be able to pick up PHP without too many problems.

It also has many similarities to other programming languages, such as C, Java and Perl. So after learning PHP I will have an opportunity to expand my knowledge into these other languages. This will increases my employment prospects if I venture into other languages.

There are many tutorial websites available online along with a number of dedicated books that I will be able to use to learn PHP.

I will also learn MySQL (Structured Query Language) alongside PHP as the two languages work together and will enable the use of databases alongside the website.

I feel learning PHP for my SMLP is the correct choice because:

• It will enable me to create more dynamic websites.

• There are many employment prospects for people with PHP skills.

• It is easy to learn.

• It has similarities with other programming languages.

• There are many tutorial resources available.

I can’t believe that all the first year assignments have been handed in and there’s only one week left of the first year, which is actually where we find out about the first, second year assignment.

Looking back at my first ever post, the formative statement, I feel like I have come a very long way, and I have to say I’ve realised that before starting the course, I didn’t really know much about the industry at all. The vast variety of subjects we have covered and the depth we have gone into, in the first year has made me realise how large the industry is.

The first assignment A1 – SketchBlog, is an on going assignment and was one, that in my case got forgotten some of the time. The Online Journal part of this assignment was not forgotten as it was a task we had to do every week and when we required feedback. But with the sketchbook I just seemed to forget it was an assessable part and sometimes forget to work on it.

Both keeping a sketchbook and updating an Online Learning Journal were new to me and I did find the Journal hard to start off with. Mostly because I have not always been an open person and found it hard to write down my thoughts and feelings about events. I have grown to like the Journal and find it a very useful thing to have, to update everyone on what I’m going through and also to find out if I’m at the same stage and have the same feelings as others.

It was only half was through the year when I realised how helpful and important the sketchbook was. I started to take it every where and always have it open and next to me when I’m working, now I wish I’d realised that earlier.

The second assignment A2 – That’s the Plan, is when I first realised how little I knew and how much there was to know. The amount we need to know and do on this course really did hit me quite hard, as the work load on my previous course was no were as near as large as on this one. On top of the larger work load, there was the way the course is run and the formal submission of the work, which was unheard of on my last course.

I learnt a lot about how much more there is to the internet than what meets the eye. The whole web accessibility was an unheard of subject to me and something I had never really thought about. I found the web accessibility subject quite hard to take in at first, as there is just so much to it. It took me awhile to get to grips with the subject and now it’s one of the first things I think about when I access or create a website.

Even though we didn’t build the website and use the technologies required to build one, I still feel I learnt a lot about them and it helped me in the second assignment. Another experience was setting the out work in an academic format and making effort with the view of the final submission. This was something I’d never done before and I was pleased with my work when I saw it in the academic format.

I spent a lot of time researching the Great Briton, J.R.R Tolkien, just to find out the needed information on him. This brought out one of my weaknesses ‘researching’; I spent too much time researching and not enough time doing the work. This is something I feel I have improved on, I can now get the information I need in a quicker time and seem to find more relative pages for what I’m looking for.

The next two assignments were enough with the easy work and into the standard of work and speed required for the course. Having two assignments on the go and less time than the previous one to do them in, really helped me to improve on my time planning skills, which didn’t go very well on the A2 assignment. During these assignments was when I really started to feel confident with my time planning ability and really understand at what speed I could work at.

The A3 – Back to Basic assignment was another web plan like A2, but it had to be improved and in a lot more detail. I didn’t feel very confident going into this assignment as there was more to do and less time to do it in. I didn’t think I would be able to handle the larger work load, but to my surprise I managed quite well.

I feel I’ve got a broader knowledge of computer terms while doing this assignment and really improved on my researching skills, due to researching 40 computer terms and finding out more about the technologies used to create the website.

I feel I preformed a lot better on this assignment over A2, I think that’s down to knowing more of what is expected of me and been used too how the course is run and the work is handed in. I felt pleased with the extra detail I went into on the screen designs and site structure diagrams. Since I needed them to be precise as we had to make this website and used the measurements and I’m glad to say they were at a good size and worked out.

The A4 – Image Rights assignment faced me with some new challenges, ones that I really enjoyed. Getting the experience of timed tasks was something new to me and I have to say to start off with I didn’t like it but in the end I really enjoyed them. Using Photoshop was a great experience and I really started to get into the attention to detail with the image restoration.

Learning the PARC principles was a real eye opener and I started to look at everything differently and as soon as I saw something I would think about it using PARC. But I need to improve on my ability to use the PARC principle myself.

The A5 – Builder was a really enjoyable unit, getting down and creating the website was so much fun. I did quite a lot of hand coding and learnt a lot about XHTML and CSS; I know I’ve only touched the surface of both codes, but I’m really looking forwards to learning more. I also found out more about Dreamweaver, as I had used it before but not for anything extensive.

The A6 – Revert to Type was probably the subject I found most interesting and still do find very appealing. It was something I’d never really thought about before and didn’t know there would be some much about it. It’s also a subject I’m not very strong with, and is something I’m going to try and improve on during the summer. My main weakness is my knowledge of different typefaces and using typefaces in different circumstances. The subject is something I’m interested in so I should enjoy working on it during summer.

The final assignment A7 – Wailing Whales was by far the hardest assignment for me. I really enjoyed the designing and creating parts of it, but found it hard to come up with a suitable design for both the Logo and Digipak. This was when I realised how uncreative I am and although I got quite a few designs for them, they seemed to be similar and not to a standard I was happy with.

When I’m sitting with a blank piece of paper in front of me I can never seem to start to design anything, my mind goes blank and I can’t do anything. This wasn’t too bad with A7; but I just couldn’t seem to open my mind and most of the designs were similar.

I was happy with the final look of the Emit logo but not too impressed with the Digipak as it did not represent the music in the way it was to me. I did improve my Photoshop skills creating it and learnt some new software in the form of FreeHand and Illustrator.

I feel I have progressed a lot since the start of the course and my knowledge of the industry has increased dramatically. I have really enjoyed the first year at college and I know I have a long way to go to become employable, but I know this is the right course for me and probably the best one to get me in the industry. I feel I’ve got to improve to get to the second year standard, but I’m going do revise the things I’ve learnt from the first year and try to improve on my weaknesses.

Goals for next year

• Improve on my creative ability, try to open my mind more when sketching
• Be able to hand code CSS efficiently
• Be more confident with use of typefaces
• Use PARC efficiently in my work

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This is the artwork for the Digipak. I’m still touching up the Outer and deciding the final font for the artist’s name. I would appreciate any feedback on the design. Thanks.

Working from home these two days has made me realise that I can concentrate on my work quite well and overcome the distractions of the nice weather. This puts me in good stead for the summer assignment and now I feel a lot more confident that I can concentrate on it even though I won’t be at college.

Last week I hoped I’d have more work done on the CD, so I could have said it was basically completed by now, but I’ve not got that far. I’m still feeling confident that I will have everything completed for Monday’s seminar group and will do plenty of work this week.

I’m quite pleased with the work I’ve done this week, although I would have preferred to have done more and have had more work to show at this stage of the assignment. This is mainly because I’ve only just started to design the CD package on the computer and thinking at how much time there is left, I should really have a few developed ideas and just be touching them up and choosing the most appropriate.

On Monday morning I was getting quite worried as I’d still not had an appropriate design for the CD package. After the lecture on Monday I got straight on with designing the CD package and started to look at the music with a more of a genre based theme. I came up with a couple of ideas and then had a look to see if I could find an appropriate image. After spending most of the day trying to find the image I was after, I had to change my idea slightly and admit defeat.

I spent Monday night creating the Digipak® Outer and was happy with the results. I continued on with the Digipak® Outer on Tuesday and am starting to realise that I need to get some more practise in using Photoshop. I had to use quite a few tutorials and ended up trying several different things to get the effect I wanted.

I found the seminar groups really enjoyable and got some good feedback on the CD package. I also get some feedback on the logo and applied it straight after the group. I now feel that the logo is finally complete and I can fully concentrate on the CD package now.

I am going to put plenty of self study in this week and hope that the CD package won’t be far of completion for next week. I can then do the finishing touches to everything and check it all over, so it’s fully completed for the next seminar group. I’m also going to start thinking about the evaluation this week and then make a start to it next week.

This week has had its ups and downs; to start with I finally had a logo design approved by Steve. This has taken quite a big burden off my shoulders and brought back a bit of confidence within myself. As I was starting to think I would never get a logo design and just have to stick with a text only font. It’s also getting closer to the deadline and as most people have already completed the logo, I’m starting to feel behind.

The approved design is below and any feedback would be very helpful. At the moment I’m just trying to find an appropriate font, so it would be appreciated if you could let me know which one suits to logo most.

The down part of this week was referring A5; I don’t have too much to do to the website, but am quite disappointed as I put quite a lot of work into it. It’s also going to put some more pressure on me this week, as I’ve got quite a lot to do this week, with the logo and CD package.

The final first year lecture really makes a point at how close the end of the first year is. I can’t believe how fast the year has gone and how much we’ve learnt in that time. The lecture was very useful and now I’m feeling confident to get the CD package template done.

I really need to make a start on designing the CD cover on the computer, they were my plans until I found out I need to do some work on my A5 website. I’m going to get the website done and out of the way as soon as I can. I did get some work done on it after college on Monday, but I wish I’d done a bit more so I can concentrate on the CD package and try to make some progress on that.

This week has been another get on with it week and I’m actually quite pleased with some of the ideas I’ve had for the CD cover. And I’m suppressed because it took me quite a while to get into doing anything. I ended up sitting with a blank mind for ages, before I decided to take a look back at the mind maps and mood boards I did for the music.

This then reminded me of the thoughts and feelings I felt while listening to the music. I then had quite a few ideas in my mind for the album cover. The artist’s music makes me think of an urban environment and images of light trails done with slow shutter speeds (not sure exactly what it’s called or how it’s done!). The music is quite dark so it makes me think of a city at night, with a few sky scrapers in the view and the light trails from the cars lights on the road.

In the seminar group it was pointed out that it’s best to design the full CD cover instead of what I’ve done and just concentrated on the front cover. It’s better to do it this way so I’m not just designing the front cover and then trying to create something for the spine and back cover. I’ve also not been thinking about the inside sleeve or the CD design, and these need more thought about because of the information that is needed to go on them.

I’ve still not got a design for the Emit logo and have come to the conclusion I’m defiantly not a logo person. So I’ve been concentrating on a text only logo and have been doing a lot of playing around with fonts. I found plenty of fonts that could work and I’m going to spend some more time seeing which are more appropriate and narrowing them down. I’m also going to start to look for an E that could be used for the logo and can go above the word Emit.

The rest of this week is going to be quite busy as I need to do some work on the logo, full CD package and also do some research on the pre-flight document. I’m still not fully sure what’s include in the pre-flight document, so I’m quite interested to see what is included in one.

This week has been quite enjoyable and I am really enjoying the new unit. I’m looking forward to using FreeHand, as I’ve not got to the stage of developing the logo using the software. I found the lecture on FreeHand very useful and am going to have a play around with it to get used to it.

The presentation from Mark Feather was very enjoyable and again gave a great insight into working in the industry. It’s great to see how much more confident he’s got with writing code, since he said he was scared about it before.

This week has been mainly concentrating on sketching some more logos. At the moment I’ve not got a logo to stick with and improve, I should hopefully have one before next week as I’m going to be doing a lot towards it this week. I was quite pleased with some of the designs I came up with for the logo, but they would not have worked very well at small sizes.