The first half-semester review
The past seven weeks seem to have flown by, and we’re now half way through the first semester. There was a definite change in the feel of the group compared to last year, probably because there were less people around than before.
I found that the first week was probably the hardest so far on the course, as there was a lot to take in with the new assignments. The pitch for one of the team project clients was a struggle to put together, as our team didn’t really know how to approach pitching for such generic briefs. We persevered, however, and managed to get the in college project to design a website for the athlete development program.
The team project seems to have been like swimming through treacle right from the start, as we have top juggle the needs of our client with what can be done with the college system. I guess this is what a lot of projects in the industry are like, as some clients have specific requirements which need to be carried out in specific ways.
The perseverance and endurance needed to do a project is one of the things I’ve learnt most while doing it, and keeping momentum in the project can only be done by doing hard work. As designer/PA I’ve also had to look after the documents which the team produce, which I have enjoyed quite a lot.
Doing the minutes has been something which I have got use to doing, and some weeks there can be as many as 3 or 4 meetings to do minutes for. This is quite a monotonous task, and the only way to do it is to get on with it straight away. Again, taking the rough with the smooth is all part of working in the industry, and I think I have learnt this during the team project.
The CSS beauty project was an interesting project, and has filled a lot of the gaps in my knowledge of CSS. I now understand how things like selectors work, where as before I was just using them without knowing what they did.
I did find that the ideas generation was quite a hard part for this project, as I didn’t find any of the themes particularly exciting. To combat this, I used spider diagrams to outline what ideas I had for each, and then selected the one which I had the most ideas for. I will use this process again if I am stuck for ideas, as it helped me to find an appropriate theme to generate my site with.
In some ways I still feel that I am bumbling my way through with the CSS. I can create a site, fix a lot of the problems in it, and test it in a lot of browsers. The thing is, I don’t always understand why the changes I have made have worked. The question is, do I really need to? Or should I just be content with the fact that it is working? I’m not really sure just yet.
The PDP part of the iMe assignment has been a nice change to do on Wednesday afternoons. I’ve found the prospect of thinking about applying for jobs and going for interviews quite horrifying, as I don’t feel anywhere near ready to do that just yet. I don’t think my answers to the interview questions have been wonderful either, especially after ‘the passive debacle’ in my previous post.
I’m not even sure what the ‘describe yourself in 3 words’ question is all about, what does it matter what I think of myself? Surely it should be what they think of me and my abilities, as they are the ones who are going to be handing over the cash.
I think my answers have been far too wooden. I think that talking to a person would generate a different set of answers as you can get some kind of reaction or feedback to what answers you are giving. I don’t even think a faux interview would change that, as it would still feel forced, and nothing would be riding on giving the right answers. I think I’ll just have to sort in my own mind answers to potential interview questions.
Over the next half semester I will be looking forward to completing the team project, as well as doing the Culture Vulture assignment. For this assignment, I will be looking to do a large range of experiments with a variety of media, including collages, photography, drawing and other methods. I think this approach should give me plenty of options for the production of whatever product is revealed in the assignment.
6 comments:
Describe yourself question? Not sure what it's all about. It is an insight into your character and why you think those three words suit you. It helps the employer understand a bit about you and your character.
I too think that the first seven weeks has gone too fast. It makes you think where's it all gone?
As for the swimming through treacle if it had been for any other client apart from a college or educational establishement it would have gone smoother as we wouldn't have had to worry about imposing software on a network.
The '3 words' question is one of the hardest to answer. You can't overcomplicate with a barrage of words, or talk your way around a faltering answer. It's simplicity and directness is the beauty - there's no where to hide. The choice of each word is crucial, so too their order, so too their relationship to each other.
For what it's worth Julian, I think some of your answers have been excellent, and I'm sure in a more natural situation [if an interview can ever be described as 'natural'] they would sound less stilted.
I actually felt that the "3 Words" question was the easiest to answer. I've never actually been asked as an interview question yet so I think I'm missing out.
@Chris: You could argue that things like punctuality and honesty are prerequisites, so shouldn't need to be mentioned. When seen in that context, maybe that's why you found the question easy. It sounds like the answer you would give for a bank clerks job, not a position in the creative industries.
Go on Chris, have another go. Choose three words which give the essense of a dynamic, innovative, proactive interactive media designer.
Erm ok, I didn't really want to use the word Creative because I thought it would be pretty much across all the Journal's.
Creative, Driven, Independant
Creative: I am a creative person
Driven: I will stick to a problem until I have solved it
Independant: I can find the answer to the problem at hand either by myself or by learning how to finish the project.
I still don't think calculating is an ideal word for an Interactive Media Designer sounds more 'Mad Scientist'
And yes that was a bit harder. I didn't want to use words that other people would have used, so the difficulty I had was finding words that would fit that hadn't been used.
Unfortunately Creative is a word that I couldn't think of another Synonym for.
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