" Welcome to Uni Work v3.0 "

Unit Brief

For this brief we had to create an information architecture website for a real or notional client, a proposal document was required to outline the structure, vision and creativity of the site with good user testing and feedback. On top of this a 1500 word literature review on books about IA was to be included.

Proposal

I propose to design and create a website for my stepdads business - JulianDJ's. He is a DJ/Presenter specialising in weddings, corporate parties and functions etc. His mobile disco services have limited advertisment at the moment so a website will be created to give his company a wider audience. The website should also include a way for potential clients to contact the company, through filling out a form.

Research

For research I searched various other DJ websites to see how they have gone about creating there sites. I looked at things revolving around information architechture such as accessibility, clear logos on each page, breadcrumbs and a decent user infertace. I visited the following sites:

www.eastcoastsound.co.uk

www.hulldj.moonfruit.com

www.paulbakes.co.uk

www.twinspin.co.uk

 

Planning

The only real planning that I needed for this project was planning when both myself and Gary had free time so we could talk about the site and have a sort of feedback session. These were planned every now and then when ever Gary had some free time.

Evaluation

I think this unit went quite well, the planning of the site on paper before hand really made a difference having something to look at and visualise how you want the site to turn out whilst creating it. I could have planned my time better though i order to have more meetings with the client, although the meetings I had were sufficient, more would mean a better site. Also, as mentioned in the proposal I wanted a section in the site where the user could fill out a form and send it via email to Gary. This could not be implemented due to my lack of knowledge of the technique and lack of time in order to learn it.

Unit Brief

Working as part of a small group, produce a website on the theme of "a treasure hunt", integrating story telling, gameplay and external resources such as Youtube, Flickr, GoogleEarth and Facebook etc. You may choose the focus of the "treasure hunt", for example it could have a marketing or an educational purpose.

Each group will run a Blog detailing week by week activitys of the group.

A C&C (Communication and the Community) thread will be set up in the NewMedia forums - this will be the Module noticeboard - refer to it regularly...

Communicaion between group members is a matter for the group to decide but a 'real' face to face meeting once a week is recommended.

Proposal

We propose to create an interactive ghost hunt sending the user around the old town of Hull exploring the places where real deaths have occured in Hull in the past. We intend to centre our storyline around a young girl aged 12-16 called Frieda who died inside a pub somewhere in the old town of Hull. Friedas skull is on display at The Olde White Harte and this is where we want the user to start off, we want them to see the girl on the website we create and then to go out and see her actual skull, which makes for a more real experience.

Research

For research there were quite a few thing that needed exploring. I looked online through google for information about Freda, the ghost. There was only a small about of info online about her and was not much use. We visited the Ye Olde White Harte, to gather ideas about locations for shooting the scenes. Primarily we used a Canon XM-1 which was pretty simple to use, except for the lighting setting which I researched online at About.com which provided some useful tips.

Planning

There wasnt much planning involved in this unit. We had to plan and organise when the best times to goto the White Harte pub were. We also planned nights over at Leons and Dans house in order to progress with the work.

We also had to plan the story, we did this by initially brainstorming ideas and working out which parts of the story we liked and which parts we disliked to come up with the perfect story.

Most of our meeting we held at Barracuda Bar near the HSAD, we'd usually go after our lessons for a drink and talk about which direction the project was going in. We had these meetings atleast once a week, although the majority if the time I was only the three of us out of four members who attended.

Evaluation

I feel this project went really well to be honest given the odds (having only three members instead of the proposed four). We managed our time rather well, and planned the project very well, meaning we achieved the desired results alot easier due to the amount of planning we did.

Unit Brief

The aim of this brief was to produce an essay in photographic form, telling a story/ educating/ or entertaining the viewer. It is to be produced ready for the web and displayed on my portfolio site (here).

Proposal

I propose to portray the story of a car crash through the medium of photos. The photos will be taken in and around the area of Hull / Beverley. I will take pictures of different stages of the day in someones life before the crash. These pictures will includes lots of differing images through using different angles, lighting, shutter speed, aperture and by editing the levels, hues, and effects etc in Photoshop. I will then open the photos in Fireworks CS3 and crop them to manageable sizes and compress (for the web). I will then import the photos into Flash CS3 and create some simple animations using tweening and some actionscript to give the user control over when to change to the next picture. I will also include some simple effects (e.g. fade in/fade out).

Research

To prepare for this project I had to come up with an idea first. The idea came to me while I was driving the university one day. I saw a couple of bunches of flowers tied to a road sign - the remnants of a car crash, the idea came. I thought of capturing the images which could have been taken before, during and after the crash.

In order to take good pictures I borrowed a Nikon D100 and a Canon EOS D30 from the university over a period of so many days. I used the internet to search for tutorials and tips on taking good photos. These are listed below:

 

I tryed to use lots of varied shots within the essay, such as long shots, close ups, macro, differing times of the day/night. I also altered several of the images in photoshop to give it the right atmosphere.

Planning

Not much planning was needed for this project to be honest. The idea just came to me one day as described above. I had to brainstorm typical pictures which could be used to portray the story with atmosphere and feeling. I chose pictures which hopefully evoke certain emotion within the user such as sympathy, empathy, surprise, sorrow etc. I feel I have achieved this to some degree. When developing the idea for the story i was going to tell I thought about music and decided I wanted some kinds of music in the background. After searching through most of my music I found what I thought was a fitting track, 'Your Revolution Is A Joke' by Funeral For A Friend. The track has the feel of the story and adds another dimension to the piece, making the viewing experience even more effective.

Final Photo Essay

Below is the final Photographic Essay with the Funeral For A Friend track in the background for added effect..enjoy.

Evaluation

WRITE EVALUATION

Unit Brief

Produce an audio piece suitable for radio broadcast. The final piece must incorporate recorded voice, some music/sound fx and show a greater awareness of the technique used in the production of a radio advert. The group i was in produced a 3-minute American cop spoof/drama entitled Hammer of the Bronx.

Proposal

We propose to create a 3 minute long American cop spoof/drama suitable for being broadcast on the radio. We intend to plan the story, script the story then capture the audio (vocals) using professional audio capture equipment then edit the piece and include sound fx and (perhaps) music.

Research

There was no research needed for this unit, as we had already learnt how to use the audio capture equipment and editing software from the first semester sound project. All we had to do was brainstorm for ideas then put the pieces together in a structured and linear order. We also had to maintain some comedy throughout the piece.

Planning

Firstly, we started by brainstorming our ideas and after some discussion we came up with 'Hammer of the Bronx', a fictional American Cop Spoof/Drama theme. The piece would be entertaining and comical (if all goes to plan).

On further disscussion over a period of hours we came up with the whole storyline for it, including which sound fx we would need. After these planning sessions we got down to the recording, editing and manipulation of the audio we had recorded.

Final Audio Clip:

Below is the final audio clip - entitled 'Hammer of the Bronx':

 

Evaluation

I feel the group did well as a whole and everyone contributed something to the final piece. We could have, however greatly improved the quality of the audio in places which were badly recorded due to our inexperience with the given equipment. The finished product is fairly professsional to be honest though.

Unit Brief

Produce a 3-5 minute long documentary style video. It must have a coherent structure with the typical beginning, middle and ending. It can be a serious documentary, mockumentary or docu-drama type piece.

CLICK TO VIEW FULL BRIEF

Proposal

For this brief we intend to create a 3-5 minute long mockumentary/interview about one persons experience with the new Grand Theft Auto game for the XBOX 360. The piece will follow Leon from buying the game through to playing it and his reactions, expectations and perhaps a review on the game. The video is not to be taken seriously, there is some mildly rude language in it due to the situtation it was filmed in (a Tuesday night, after quite a few beverages of the alcoholic type). We propose to film it all the way through to the end without pausing to setup shots, so it will be slightly improvised. We will then go into the editing studio and crop, edit and manipulate the footage to our liking using Adobe Premiere Pro.

Research

The project is based around the game Grand Theft Auto, a first person game centered around brutal violence and theft. The storyline is focussed on the central character of Niko, a slovakian immigrant who moves to America to take revenge against someone unknown.

For research, I visited many sites about GTA and read about all the hype. The games expected sales in the first month went into the millions. I also looked into the documentary, mockumentary for a definition to focus my intentions for the brief.

 

Planning

The final movie will be roughly 5 minutes long and rendered in two different formats. One uncompressed (.avi) for large scale viewing, and the other will be a smaller compressed (.flv) version with dimensions 320 x 240 pixels for viewing and dissemination via this site. The compressed version will not exceed 2.5MB in size.

The video will be structured into my site in the following way: HOME PAGE > UNI WORK > SEMESTER TWO VIDEO > FINAL PIECE > Embedded File: GTAVideo.mov

I plan to shoot the film at Leons house in Hull which isnt far away meaning we can easily get transport to and from his house, making shooting the film easy.

Final Video (GTA 4 Mockumentary)

Evaluation

Yes, this project did goto plan actually, we only had a short amount of time to do it but we managed it in the end. All the planning, shooting and editing was done in a week. We made quite quick progress from the start, however we had to do this as we only only had two weeks left when it was set. But overall i think we've succeeded in making a mockumentarym and hopefully a pretty comical one too.

Unit Brief

Create two fully functioning websites, one using basic HTML/CSS and one created in Flash. The websites are to display reviews on 5 differing independent sites. The sites will be reviewed and judged on such things as navigation, usability, design, interactive content etc. Each site will be given a star rating out of 5.

Proposal

I propose to create two websites. The websites will display reviews of 5 other websites of a similar nature (eg Sports, Music, TV Show etc). I will create one site in Adobe Dreamweaver using HTML and CSS. The other website will be created using Adobe Flash CS3, and will involve timeline animation to skip from page to page etc instead of hyperlinks.

I have chosen to review 5 different band websites, the bands/groups are as follows:

• Funeral For A Friend
• Motion City Soundtrack
• Bloc Party
• Jurassic 5
• Enter Shikari

Research

The research required for this unit was quite minimum because basically all I had to do was decide which type of site I wanted to review, visit the site and then review it. Saying that, I did need to research certain things when creating the Flash Version of the site. Certain areas suchs a actionscripting which (at the moment) I'm not all too familiar with, so research was needed there. The followig sites were used for research during this brief:

Adobe LiveDocs!

Actionscript.org

FlashKit.com

Planning

I plan to use my existing site structure (one structure of this site), yet obviously alter the CSS and content slightly, this will save me time and effort because the HTML/CSS version does not need to be anything extravagant. I then plan to visit each of the bands websites in-turn and write the reviews seperate from the developing websites, the content will be written in Microsoft Word and then later transferred when the required adjustments have been made to the site in which the information will be contained.

I plan to make the Flash version look alot more intersting than the HTML/CSS version, mainly due to the fact that it is alot easier on the whole to create 'flashy' looking sites (no pun intended) in Adobe Flash. It allows you to be alot more creative in the positioning of elements and the fonts used etc.

Evaluation

Overall, I feel my OCD brief was carried out successfully, though it was rushed towards the end (the result of bad time management on my part) meaning that I could not fully complete the brief to my usual standards.