Evaluation for semester 1

The last semester, as been harder than the 1^st semester has at the beginning I had 3 assignments to do. After I had handed my referral work in, I didn’t really worry about my grade I was too busy trying to get all my other assignments work done. But when I did get my results I was really happy has I wasn’t expecting to get my grade that day. I have enjoyed doing the 3 assignments so far, I have had good and bad moments while doing the assignment. It’s good when I concentrate for hours and get lots of work done, but the bad things are like when I lost my work and when I had problems with Photoshop, but I have learnt how to solve the problems I have had so if they do happen again I know what to do.

For assignment 4 I had to restore an image, this was the hardest task so far as I didn’t know how to use the software that I had to use to restore the image. When we were starting the Photoshop task I was about to hand in my a2 referral work so I was quiet stressed out and not knowing Photoshop but having to use it to restore the image I started stressing out more, which didn’t help. When I finished restoring the image I was quiet pleased with it, it wasn’t as good as other people in the class but I was happy with what I had done. I know I could improve with restoring images and when I have more experience with Photoshop I could have and other go and see how the second image, would look compared to the first image I restored.

There is a number of things that I have improved on because of this course, first my time management, I wasn’t bad a managing my time before but I am better at it now and It has been useful to use, when I have been doing my assignment work, to sort out when to do different tasks and get all my work done on time.

When I started the course my confidence was really low and over the past couple of months it has improved because of college and work. At both college and work I have done things I don’t like doing. When I had to do the presentation at college I was really nervous and I don’t think I could have done it in front of the class but I would be really pleased with myself if I had, and hopeful I will be able to do a presentation in front of the class and be happy with the presentation I give. When I found out I have to do a long presentation at the end of year 2, I didn’t mind as it’s a long time till I do it. I like preparing for a presentation I just don’t like showing it, so if I do, do the presentation in the second year I will be so happy, because I will prove to myself that I can do them and If I have to do it for a job one day hopefully I will be better with the experience of doing other presentations.

I like how I have to use the sketchbook to record every things, I find it useful for when forget some information or I want to find a useful web site I have been on before, as I can just go back and look in my sketchbook. I have enjoyed collecting inspiration for the sketchbook as it as help be with designs I have had to do, for example my screen designs. One thing I think I could improve on with my sketchbook, is taking more notes in seminar meetings, so next semester I’m going to aim to take more notes seminar meetings.

Having a blog was new to me when I first started the course, I enjoyed writing the blog entries as I get to reflect on what I have done in that week. When I found out that I had to leave comments on other people’s blogs I was a bit nervous about doing it, I thought what If I say the wrong thing or what If what I write doesn’t make sense people are going to think I am stupid, but the more comments I do the more I am less bothered about doing them.

I feel like I have learnt a lot so far this year and I have enjoyed learning all the new things I have been taught and improving on some things I knew. I am going to carry on working my hardest and aim to get getter grades next semester. I always just expected passes but when I get higher I am really pleased, so this year I am going to aim to get a merit for at least one of my assignments.

When I finish the course at the moment I would like to do a third year, I always think that it’s better to have more education, but I am not at the end of the course yet so don’t know exactly what to do till I am nearer there. If I decide that I don’t want to do a third year I would get employment. Since the start of the course I have said I would like to be a web designer and the course as made be surer about that. I have enjoyed all the designing of web sites and I am looking forward to getting to build web sites.

Screen design- please leave feedback

Banner- please leave feedback

Banner 1.

















Banner 2.

Week before hand in date

Last week I tried to get all my work done so that I could have it ready for the seminar group, so I could get feedback on, but I didn’t get all my work complete. I am happy with were I am up to now though, I have lot of work done and ready to put in the template, just few more things to complete and improve.

This week we haven’t had any lecture instead we had discussions about the assignments, I found it useful to have as it went over every thing we had to include, while we were going over everything I wrote down all and tasks with click boxes next to them, so I can go thought my work and click off what I have done and see what needs doing.

Today I have completed my first version of the banners and got feedback on them, I am going to improve the banners using the feedback I got and then post them on my blog. I have few more things to do to my screen design and when I have done them I will also post them up for feedback.

Next Monday, Steve as offered us the chance to do our work at home, I am going to get up in the morning sort some things out at home then go to college. I should have all my work done before Monday so all I need to go to college to do is have my work read though and checked for spelling and grammar errors, and also I will properly print my work out at college so I have it ready for Tuesday.

Completing assignment 3

Today I have designed and started making banners. The banners that are been designed, are for Jazz musicians. The class was given some pictures and I have to choose 2 to use to create the banner around.
I am not sure what I think to this task, I don’t dislike it but I am not existed about doing it, it’s probably because I haven’t done any think like this before, so it’s all new to me.
To design the banners we had certain amount of time to complete the design work including annotating the designs, this made all the first designed rusted and kind of messy. For the final designs we had about 9 minutes a design, the time went really fast, I finished on time the only thing I wanted to do was check I had done everything and the one thing I missed out was the font size. After designing the banners, I started making the design on the computer, to do this I had to use Photoshop. At the moment Photoshop is annoying me, I don’t know to use it so things I want to do I can’t do, because I don’t know how to use the tools. I spent about 2 hours looking for tutorials that explained how to do basic things in Photoshop like fill a square with colour, which I final found how to do and how to make squares have round corners.

Last week for self study I have been doing my screen designs for assignment three. I have completed some thumbnails and I have chosen four I like best and I think will best suit the purpose of the web site. I have posted the final four on my blog, at the bottom of this entry.

Also for self study last week I carried on doing the image restoring. I started again with the image, this time I think I did better than before. The only thing is that where the fold line was there is still a faint line, which I have tried to get rid of but nothing I have tried as worked. I haven’t added to colour the image yet but hopeful I will be doing that this week.

On Monday it was my birthday and on the same day I got the feedback for the improvements I did on my a2 referral work, and this time I passed which I am really happy about, and it made my birthday better, because now I can stop worrying if have passed or not.

Screen Designs

Below are my 4 final screen designs, please could you leave feedback about what you think to the designs and any improves you could reccommend .

Screen Design 1.
Screen Design 2.

Screen Design 3.

Screen Design 4.