Extreme Design

This week it seems I decided, unknowingly, not to continue to with the usual study but embark upon a stomach churning adventure. Which, in hindsight, I have no hesitation in recommending for classification as an extreme sport. The journey began as reading week came crashing to an end. All that I hope to comfortably achieve was now traumatising my mind as I desperately tried to float off to firework land but with no avail. The pressure I felt over the weekend was tremendous and I began to resent the commitments I had made which were, ever increasingly, eating away at any remnant of freedom I once enjoyed. So the familiar blackness of Sunday evening enveloped my mind and exhaustion prevailed once more.

I awoke Monday, unsurprisingly, in a state of despondency. Still questioning my decisions and contemplating a move to the HNC. The only positive was the fact I had got out of bed and I still was determined to go to college, even though I felt grossly unprepared for the presentations, which I had once been looking forward to. So I arrived at college after practising my talk to a number of unappreciative and unresponsive roads, vehicles and trees. My mind felt a little more settled more in the fact I had accepted my fate and a gentle slide into insanity.

The atmosphere at college was sombre, there was to be no gentle re-introduction, we’d hit the ground but were we running? My only comfort was in the fact I believed in myself and my ability to ‘fly by the seat of my pants’, as I’d done fair too regularly in my teaching career. So with wings desperately flapping I bumbled through my presentation to Steve. Steve who I knew I’d let down by not keeping up the correct level of communications in emails and blogs. I didn’t feel good, I didn’t feel in control and overall a huge wave of disappointment washed over me. Only I could take responsibility for the emotions I was experiencing and the slight burst of relief at completion of the talk was not enough.

My anxiety stayed with me for the rest of the day. I was impatient to know my grades for the first 2 units, as I was certain this would seal my fate. However, my spirits were greatly lifted by talking with the other members of the group. It helped me to re-focus and appreciate what life is really about; enjoyment. So I decided to just go with the flow and make the most of what was left of the day. I guess this was wishful thinking and as we re-grouped after lunch the atmosphere once again became suffocating.

My emotions were still in a state of turmoil, I questioned my every decision; about travelling, my financial commitments, how neglectful I’ve been of people closet to me, all in order to succeed on the course. What had it all been for? I had re-signed myself to a referral, a referral which would create a work load I felt I simply couldn’t cope with………then suddenly, I heard the word ‘pass’.

Confusion…….relief……..guilt……..compassion……..emptiness.

Now a few days on things are settling down and introduction of the new units helped to wash away the emotional perspiration which had clung so defiantly to my skin. Once again the realisation of why I’m putting myself through it all is with me again; the passion I have for Design or Art! So I’m back inspired, stimulated and enjoying being amongst others who share my passion.

I just want to congratulate everyone on their achievements so far regardless of their results, we have all worked so hard. Equally I was in admiration of how professionally everyone dealt with the difficult situation we were faced with. Each and every one of you have my respect.

Love the Things You Hate

Although we supposedly gained an hour over the weekend I’m certain this was merely a ploy by the government, to create a distraction, enabling them to steal an entire week. Either this or I have foolishly misplaced 168 hours somewhere. In which case I’m sure it will turn up in a ‘safe place’ somewhere, along with a couple of odd socks and a few marbles.

As you can probably tell any amount of freedom can be severely detrimental to the state of my mind. So despite regaining my thoughts over this ‘supposed’ week, on several occasions, to peruse Design magazines and inspirational art work Monday came as a relief! So the ‘surprise’ brief of giving a presentation on next week gave structure, momentarily, to my thoughts.

I have to say, surprisingly, I’m actually looking forward to the prospect of delivering the presentation next week. In the past, like many others, I have greatly disliked and tried to avoid presentations whenever possible. But, as time has gone on and I’ve gained more experience in presenting I’ve grown to like them. This may also coincide with my ‘love the things you hate’ policy I developed a while ago, which I will now explain.; A long time ago I figured if I trained or evolved myself to like the things I hated life would be a lot easier and more enjoyable. Really ‘dislike’ was really only a matter of my own personal preference (within reason) and served little function other than to make things worse than they seemed. As we all know everything has its pro’s and cons and so by focussing only on the pro’s the world seems quite nice, sometimes.

Therefore, by looking at the presentation in the same way you can see in fact it is a joyous and up-lifting experience (or at least its not as bad as it seems)!! So here’s a list of the pro’s of presenting;

• You’re in control (you have the power)!
• You can make a difference to someone’s hour/day/life by what you say (whether it’s the knowledge you give them or just a smile)
• You in turn have gained knowledge in researching the presentation (which you’re likely to retain because you have to know it so thoroughly)
• You gain self confidence
• You increase you’re employment prospects in the design industry
• You have the opportunity to show off your personality
• You feel a real sense of achievement at the end

So by ignoring, or at least excepting the negative side to a presentation you can look forward to it, I hope!

In terms of progress leading up to this momentous day things are going quite well. I’ve found lots of research on the internet and I’ve found it pretty interesting. My main task at the moment is cross referencing what I’ve found with paper based sources. This is proving to be a bit of a problem as the local library isn’t that fantastic, but hopefully I’ll overcome this somehow.

Other than that my sketchbook is slowly developing and I’ve purchased some lovely colouring pencils which I’m very excited about. I’ve also got some design books on order which I’m sure will make for good bedtime reading. So tasks for this week are;

• Annotate up to date in sketchbook
• Finish presentation before the weekend and practice
• Ensure I have sufficient paper based references

Vacant Minds

This weeks journal entry my be slightly shorter and less thoughtful than usual, this is due to my body and mind currently being on vacation! I have to say I definitely feel I’ve earned the rest and I’m thoroughly enjoying regaining my thoughts and composure in sunny Norwich (Norwich is always sunny!).

However, I’ve learnt by now I can never fully switch off , so I’ve spent plenty of time reflecting on last term. My biggest conclusion is that I have to tighten up my creative and chaotic approach to tasks! However painful and difficult this may be I must persevere, and once again I call on anyone with any incredible strategies in combating this. Hopefully I’m not quite classed as an ‘old dog’ and there’s a few new tricks in me!

So as I’m now greatly digressing or regressing I better finish up. Targets for this week are as follows;

• Start my new love affair with the new sketch book?!
• Progress to reading the design mags I’ve bought instead of just looking at the pictures
• Have a play around with some new programmes
• Don’t get addicted to Jeremy Kyle

Enjoy the rest of your holidays folks

Dead Calm...

The title really says it all, not particularly for me but more a statement about the group ethos this week. In a sense it has been a surprisingly pleasant hand in with a feeling of togetherness amongst the group. Well that’s everyone apart from Gary who imposed his obvious superiority with his callas rejection of my plastic sleeve! However, contrary to this my feelings over the week have been somewhat more chaotic, nothing new there then.

Really, this week should have been a breeze, I had an entire week solely dedicated to completing the assignment, but yet again circumstances over took. So instead my leisurely week was completely over shadowed and my time was distilled once more. Thankfully my major task for the week was one that I enjoyed, involving completing my screen designs in InDesign. This all went without a hitch and it was pleasing to see the designs professional presented. It gave me a real sense of reality as to the direction this course was taking me in. In-fact, even though it is earlier on in the course, I often muse about the future career I am heading towards with a real sense of delight. I finally feel that after several ‘detours’ I’m on the right track, about time really!

The rest of my time this week was dedicated to the dreaded ‘humdrum’ evaluation. As usual my time estimation for this task may as well have been pulled from a hat, hopefully next project I may get a little nearer the mark. Anyway, progress was initially slow which was mainly due to my inability to simplify things. After taking great pains to detail every breath I’d taken over the past six weeks I scrapped the whole thing, made a nice scribble diagram in my sketchbook and began to move forward. The unfortunate interim fire bell created a completely loss of focus which really didn’t help a great deal, such is life. The remaining tasks seemed to fade into insignificance, but of course were all of equal importance none the less.

My main concerns about the project, which always have a tendency to linger on, mainly surround the technical aspects of the unit. I hope I have grasped these well enough to pass the unit and I’m determined not to feel this way next unit! Equally as I reflect, I know I made un-necessary work for myself revising references and indexing my sketchbooks. Most of all I must sort out my time management and this means revising outside work commitments. Back to being a dirty student again, lucky I like beans.

So the deadline has passed and we all made it through. Well done to everyone, enjoy your break and thanks for the birthday card it was a really nice thought!

Humdrum and Merriment

After putting in a momentous effort over last week and having time off only to eat and sleep I managed to get back on track with the assignment. So on Sunday night apart from being exhausted and bleary eyed I felt relieved and confident about meeting the deadline.

Progression over the week had been varied on different tasks and it really bought to light my strengths and weaknesses which I will elaborate on now;

Humdrum

At the age I’m at I’m quite aware of ‘what makes me tick’ and equally ‘what makes me zzzzzz’, unfortunately an awareness is not a cure! Written tasks which involve repetition of a writing structure have never been a pleasure for me. Even though I know I’m capable of completing them the left and right side of my brain have an on-going battle about discipline and having fun! The competitive analysis fell into this category and a task which should of only taken a couple of hours filled the expanse (on and off) over a week purely due to my Id dominating my Ego. After 27 years I still haven’t managed to win this battle and with nearly any task I undertake I have great pains in sticking at it till the end, so instead I live in the world of ‘half-finishedness’ which is very exciting and interesting but not very constructive! Any strategies for over coming this I’m all ears!

Merriment

At the opposite end of the scale I rediscovered one of my strengths which I had missed greatly over the last two years in my teaching career, Creativity! Transforming my screen design from a sketch to a screen was a joy, from taking the photographs, manipulating them and then placing them in my design. Sadly as with all good things it was quickly over and I was surprised at what little time it actually took, lucky it did really as things took a turn for the worst..

Unforeseen Circumstances

As always the monster of ‘unforeseen circumstances’ reared its ugly head as I opened up Page Maker and tried to import parts of my screen design. My beautiful photographs transformed into pixelated monstrosities and my heart sank. After spending considerable time trying to place the down sized jpeg files in a variety of ways into the programme I retreated and decided to re-think. I then spent at least 3 hours down-loading a trial version of ‘InDesign’, learning how to use the programme, re-drawing the site structure diagram and tables. Finally I got around to attempting to transfer the screen design. The results were a considerable improvement but more than 4 hours on it had been a costly realisation.

Sketchbooktastic!

Finally the invented word ‘sketchbooktastic’ must be mentioned. Although my sketch book and now books are becoming journals discovery of enlightenment they are also falling awkwardly between the categories of ‘Humdrum’ and ‘Merriment’. I have discovered I just love printing (especially screen shots!), cutting, sticking, drawing, doodling and drawing the odd arrow but that’s about as far as the fun goes! So I must make a concerted effort not to move onto the next pages until I’ve added all the annotation, otherwise ‘sketchbooktastic’ could transform into ‘sketchbooktragic’ which doesn’t bear thinking about.

So in conclusion the state of play is good, I’ve now formatted all of my written work into the InDesign template have left pages for the screen designs (which still need a lot of work to transfer) and added all of the other components to the document. Over this week I need to do the following to meet the deadline;

• Write a detailed Evaluation
• Complete the screen designs using InDesign
• Make minor edits to the ‘Delivery Requirements’ section
• Add all references and align
• Document Merit and Distinction evidence
• Index my sketchbooks
• Print and proof read
• Buy CD labels and create the CD

Feedback Please!

With the deadline looming I'd greatly appreciate some constructive 'urgent' feedback on my screen design, more so for evaluation purposes at the end of the assignment than major design changes!

The website is aimed at teenagers revising GSCE English (Shakespeare), I'm aware I need to format the layout and include browser chrome etc.

Thanks

Stiff Upper Lip

This week has passed with considerable speed as now seems to be the norm. It’s difficult to assess my current progress as my mind presently seems unable to focus on any one task. Every element of the whole project is careering around my poor bewildered head and the control and focus I had on Monday morning is ‘temporarily unavailable’.

However, I feel it is important, in the traditional British way, to keep a stiff upper lip! I’m not entirely sure what this will do, or even how to achieve it, but I’m sure if I do manage it it’ll do absolutely no good. So back on track, what have I learnt this week? I have learnt that simple tasks are not simple, time planning is not my forte and the quality of my Blog entries is deteriorating. The actions I have taken to resolve this are;

• Make sure I have all the back up research complete before starting any final task
• Be more disciplined in my time keeping and move on to the next task after the allocated time period
• Don’t rely on my frazzled brain to write a Blog on Tuesday afternoon, start a rough draft Monday evening

On reflection my current state of being in a state is not due to my complete incompetence but more the pressures of life. One thing I have learnt is that these pressures cannot be ignored but must be dealt with. Those of you who work, travel, live busy lives I empathise with you and thank-you for the support Chris, and equally the comments everyone has made so far. Those of you who are lucky enough just to be able to focus on the course make the most of it, you are in a really privileged situation make sure you push yourself to your full potential!

So this week I have an awful lot to do, unfortunately Royal Mail may suffer a devastating blow but it will be for a greater good. I feel positive about the impeding deadline and all I can do is work as hard as I can to meet it, worrying never helps. So Good luck to everyone else and remember we’re all in this together!

Targets for next week

1. Complete competitive analysis of 2^nd website
2. Refine screen designs
3. Complete screen designs
4. Review past project sections
5. Comment on Blogs of others…I promise!!
6. Learn how to survive without sleep