One last thing...

Forgot to mention that my final act as Project Manager (before presenting the site) was to draw up a presentation outline/rough guide so as to make sure we mentioned the main points of the project (although I missed a few points out in this, I think we covered the most important issues...if we went into fine detail, I think we would have bored everyone to death!).

All the detail needed will be accessible via the DVD of the site given to the lecturers, or in the reports attached.

Seya!!

Finito...hopefully!!...

So, we've done our final presentation a few days ago, and I just remembered that I haven't done my final blog entry!! So here goes...

I spent most of the week leading up to the presentation trying to speak a number of different languages (liaising with our Web-Designer, Audio Engineer, and Marketing Director)...that's how it seemed to me...my head was kind of spinning by the end of it all, but I'm proud to say that I managed to keep my team on schedule, and that we presented ourselves in quite a good manner on the day (despite a few unforeseen difficulties the night before, and on the day...but this is par for the course when dealing with a big project).

I think we did a good job in clearing the obstacles...we were well prepared, in my opinion...we got our website to a passable standard by the 16th of May (the original deadline), so the rest of the time we spent on it after that (amidst other assignments) was focussed on making the website more than just functional (the 'icing', if you like)...

I spent a lot of time with Eugene the night before the presentation working on importing music and video to the website, and with Eranta, speaking about why we made certain decisions in design and marketing so that I could finalise the Project Report and know that what I was saying there would be consistent with what was published in the Marketing Report that she was finalising.

Eugene spent a lot of time getting to grips with Flash in order to import the little audio players on the pages, as well as coming up with original audio layers (I asked him to give us something along the lines of "Flawless" by George Michael, in order to kep witht the whole "Celebrity" feel of the site)...Thanks for that Eugene!!

Adrian used Photoshop, Adobe After Effects, and Dreamweaver in making the site, as well as making the video of the rollercoaster ride and putting that together. Eugene made the music for this.

Like Eranta said in her blog, you will see the work that we did when you read the Project Report (and when you play around with the site for yourself), and I don't want to repeat myself here...

I referenced all the images that we used from the web, and provided details about the project in the report...so I guess all that's left is the conclusion of my blog...

As Project Manager of our project, the main thing I have learnt is that you need to be able to learn the basics of each area that you will be working in and be able to communicate technically with each "Deptartment Head" on at least a basic level...this means that you must know at least a little bit about every aspect of the project, from which colours convey which emotions, to what HTML tag you should use to give the desired result on your website...

Finally, timing a project, and being able to prioritise the elements of the project so that, if working to a tight deadline, you can achieve something presentable on time...meeting the deadline is essential...having a lovely product that you obsess over, but deliver a week late, is not usually good enough...harsh but true...

I've learnt to make important decisions quickly, to organise a team with efficiency, and convey the priorities of the project to them in order to allow autonomy with cohesion...

So, I think that's it for this module...

Any other questions?...

Playing around...

I've just found some free photo-editing software called 'Picasa', by Google, online, so I've just been playing with some images and seeing how the software works. This will be useful if I need to help Adrian out with the visual stuff.

I've also been looking at some elements that I would like to incorporate in our website (like a functioning search bar) and, by right-clicking on these images, I have been able to 'View Source', which means that you can see how the various elements of any site in HTML...this is useful, as it gives me more of an idea about what code is needed for particular functions ('align = center' is a nice function...I believe I am correct in saying that this tag means that, when you resize your viewing window, the relevant info stays centred in that window)...

Is it plagiarism if we use images from the web even if we edit them? If so, how do we reference these images so as to avoid any infringement on the academic rules?

I would appreciate if anyone could tell me the answer!!

Thanks for reading...

 

 

 

Oh yeah...

...I forgot to mention that I've ben putting my new-found HTML skills to use in Dreamweaver recently, which will help us in joining our pages together...

Gotta sleep now, work in the morning...

Thanks for reading...

Bringing the elements together...

The 'presentation' class that we had on Wednesday was pretty pointless and a waste of time in my opinion...I don't see how this module can be weighted with 30 Credits when we only have 2 hours of scheduled classes a week? Even then, the lecturers aren't there most of the time...we got no feedback on our project apart from the recommendation that we should 'just get it done', and that 'it's going to be hard'...I don't need to be told that...

I thought we'd turned a corner a few weeks back when we actually had some semblance of a lesson, but the guidance has just fallen away again...

I'm sorry, but I think these things need to be said...I can't understand why I have to keep going to Adam Procter and Mark (who have been very helpful and obliging, so thanks for that, guys) to ask them about the basic skills that should have been taught in this module in order to allow me and my group to produce a decent project...

However, despite all of the above, me and my group are slogging away and producing the necessary material for our project...I assigned individual tasks (I sent a Gantt Chart to my group members), and we will meet on Monday to bring the elements together in order to proceed to the finalisation stage of the website...

If we didn't have Adrian Sinatra in our group, we would be totally lost, as he studies Media Production, and is a lot more comfortable with the visual software than myself, or the other members of my group (the three of us study Music Technology, and I don't feel that we have been provided with the necessary tools for this type of project by the teaching of this module...but we're working it out ourselves...).

I have a good team, thankfully...Eugene Lemanissier is a real maestro, so we'll have some beautiful music and effects, and Eranta Zelmene is our very thorough and passionate market researcher...thanks for all the hard work up to this point, guys...keep it up, and let's see this thing through...

I have been looking at the article on the design features of 'Web 2.0'...it was actually really interesting, and the main things I took from this artice was that your site should be bold and confident, but simplistic and functional ('each website has a reason for existence'...what are we trying to get the users to do?...make this function central...)...using as little clutter as possible, and minimising features so that what we have onscreen is just the essentials (however, there is always the need to draw the attention, so naturally some design flair is 'essential' in my opinion...).

To sum up the article...'if there are two ways to do something, you should go with the simplest one'...sound advice, I reckon (see my previous blogs for my thoughts on 'simplify,simplify').

Good luck to all the students involved in this module! I hope no-one has to repeat this!!...

Feel free to comment if you agree/disagree with what I've said...

Later, people...

Making the site 'live'...

We didn't have a lesson today, as such, but I did find out some interesting things, thanks largely to the help of Adam Procter...and a fortuitous discovery of a document that my colleague picked up in a class that I was not able to attend...this was the first time I had seen this document...this is slightly disconcerting, as the information on the sheet about the criteria of the assignment is not available (as far as I can see) on BREO, or on the MADWiki site...am I wrong?! Is the assignment information available? If so, please let me know...

I found out that the blog is worth 50% of our grade! I don't think that the blog should be given so much weight...I have been consistent with my blogging, but I still think that the website production is much more important...I can understand that there is the need for a 'production log', hence the blogs, but I still think that 50% is a very high percentage...

Anyway, I was advised that we should be producing some imitation letters to show that we are aware of the need to clear copywritten material, after the discovery of the before-unseen criteria, and Adam also explained how we could make our sites 'live' online, via the tutorial on the 'MAD Support' page...

I discussed some of the things I had been working on in HTML with Adam, and he re-assured me that I wasn't wasting my time (always a good thing!!), and he told me that one of the major things to remember in 'web development' was that it's a good idea to keep your 'styles' (CSS), and your 'content' (HTML) seperate, so that your site is easily maintainable...apparently 'J-Edit' is a useful cross-platform HTML program that works on PC and Mac, so I'll be looking that up...

Again, 'W3 Schools' came up in discussion of useful sites for 'web development'...there are some really useful definitions of HTML functions here...apparently we've got some new books on CSS in the library too, so that's my next port of call!

My group and I meet tomorrow to plan out our 'mini-presentation' for next week...think we should be ok...

Loads of work to do, so gotta run...

Later, people...

Wrestling with HTML...

Tonight I have been tackling the basics of HTML in order to have a better understanding of how programs like Flash and Dreamweaver work...the way I look at it, you have to work from the bottom up, so I thought looking closer at the foundations of these tools would be beneficial...

I've also just signed up to 'del.icio.us', so I've achieved some of the stuff that I proposed to do in the last entry!! I'm getting there, slowly but surely!...

Anyway, I now know how to create a page with text and images, which is fabulous ;-) This means that (hopefully) we will have a better understanding of how to construct our website, and how to join our individual pages and images together...

Adrian tells me that we have to pay for the use of URL's, but I'm sure there's some way that the University server can let us on there without payment...if anyone can fill me in on this, please do...

I drew up a small file containing some screenshots of the HTML files I've been playing around with, as well as some notes on HTML basics, and sent it to the members of my group for their perusal!...I didn't realise you could do so much with 'Notepad' on the PC!! I'm pleasantly surprised at the results I got tonight, although there were a few hairy moments when I couldn't get the images to appear and I was getting frustrated!! Then I realised I had to enter the exact location of the image and not just the name of the JPEG...D'uh!!

Anyway, that's what I've been doing all day...getting a piece of blue-coloured text to say 'This page is amazing' on a marble background with a dodgy close-up picture of my crows-feet-plagued eyes...lovely...

Ok, so, I shall continue to explore HTML, and figure out how to link our pages in a seamless, slick, professional manner...it'll be beautiful, people...

Thank you, and goodnight...

Working it out...

So I've just been trying to get to grips with what I should be doing now as a 'Project Manager' for the project...

The past two classes that we had were a lot more constructive in terms of actually being introduced to new software and helping us to see different ways in which we can use the online collaboration tools.

I particularly like "Thinkature.com", and see it as a very useful piece of software for our group. It will hopefully help us plot out our sketchings of the website structure. This is great for us, given the length of the Easter break, the University closure for a week (which I think is unnecessary...surely some kind of shift rota should be implemented?!), and Eranta being at home in Latvia!! I'm jealous...

Anyway, back to the issue of learning!

The discussion about " multimedia buzzwords" was quite stimulating too...I had heard of "Second Life", but didn't realise the scope of it as a vast virtual world...its kind of frightening to think that things are going towards "virtual reality" in such a big way, and kind of sad too...I enjoy human contact!! I would be miserable if my job AND my social life were contained within the virtual world...at the same time, it raises really interesting possibilities, such as "virtual lectures", and "virtual property developments"...

I'm conflicted on how I feel about these developments, and I'm aware that I'm raising issues that have already been discussed for years (people would have been afraid of "social networks" like Myspace and Bebo a few years ago!...Some still are!!)...it just seems a lot more possible to me that people will lose that human element now that I'm aware of these upcoming progressions!...But then there will always be people who embrace technology more than others, huh?...

...Is ignorance bliss?!!...I don't think so, but I do believe in the philosophy of "simplify,simplify"...when technology does this, it's at it's best, in my opinion...

People still use the phrases "slaves" and "servers" in the machine network, don't they?...What happens when AI begins to understand what these phrases mean, and decides it doesn't want to be subservient any more?!

Guess I'll just have to hope that an Arnie-like droid will come and save me if necessary...

Ok...so, the things I've been thinking about...

1. Learning how to create nice buttons in Flash to put on the webpages that Adrian is developing...

2. Becoming more familiar with Dreamweaver that the buttons will take the user to the appropriate page (Numbers 1+2 are severely hindered by the closure of the University this week)...

3. Making a 'Gantt Chart' to monitor the groups progress and help our development...

4. Different connotations of the criteria of the brief (i.e. definition of a 'web presence')...hmmm...

5. Signing up to 'del.icio.us' and getting my group members to do likewise, so that we can share information from sites that we have researched...

6. The structure of the presentation (is it on the 16th or 17th of May?...I'll have to check that out...)...

7. Things that could make our site different...

8. Things to write about in the 'Production File' (relevant research, why choices were made etc.)...

I'm off to bed now, people...feel free to 'comment' me!

...as Arnie said, "I'll be back..."!!

Lack of structure...

Last week's class was terrible...

I don't really have much else to say here except that there seems to be a total lack of structure with this module...throwing links at students and saying "get on with it" doesn't seem to be a justifiable teaching method to me, especially when even the lecturers seem unsure about how the software operates...

I can't wait until we finish this module, to be honest...I suspect the lecturers feel the same...

I hope that we have an organised class tomorrow...