I found it so valuable to have students in the class critique your work, that helps you improve what you already have and definitely ask for coding help and feedback from your professor.  I also found it valuable to check out multimedia/project websites to see if you can get ideas for your stories.

Here are some programs we worked with if you want to get a head start learning:

• Adobe Illustrator & Photoshop
• Motion
• Firebug
• FileZilla
• Dreamweaver

(Yea, you will know what this all means by the end of the semester)

I would advise future students to do this alongside your final project because you’re dedicating a lot of your time to your story and learning the skills as you build your infographic or website for that story.  Spend some time thinking about the title of your project so that you can get the right domain name early on, I would recommend running the title through your professor or project adviser.  Nothing too long and complicated and make sure it’s spelled correctly.

If you have an idea for a story, it’ll be good to check out related websites on your topic to see how they presented it, but try to make yours stand out and own it.  Trust me, you will be proud of your work in the end and you’ll be surprised how much you end up knowing by the end of the semester.

As far as advice, start early, like in the summer early. If you are like me at the beginning of the semester, you will have your 490 topic pretty much locked down, but be completely lost on the path you want to take for your website. Start thinking about design, layout and components before anyone tells you you need to. If you don’t, you will realize much too late the direction you should’ve taken your site, and what you could’ve done differently. I am happy with my site, but there are a lot of things I would’ve done differently if I planned ahead more thoroughly.

As a final word, this class was extremely beneficial and while I am ecstatic that it’s over and I survived, I enjoyed the class very much, and I am really grateful for the skills I’ve gained by taking it.

Advice I would give to fellow classmates is to start early. Know within the first month of the class what aspects you want to include in your website- videos, infographics and words, because it will help you when designing the website. Your one print or video piece and an infographic are not going to cut it. Knowing going in that you are going to have to create more than is actually required to make a good website.

Learning the tricks of firebug and dreamweaver will also help you code. Coding is tremendously tedious. It takes hours. And for me I think it took even longer. Always back up your style sheet and save it with the date and time so you have a security blanket to fall back on. Also be careful if you decide to buy plug-ins. They don’t all work with wordpress! Look for the ones that do.

Really think about the domain name you are choosing. While I did get one that is connected to my name, it has nothing to do with the name of my master’s project. I wish I had gone with my gut and done savingshinnecock.com to begin with.

Don’t wait until the last week to start coding your website!!!! And don’t act shy about asking for help. You will definitely need it, everyone will!

My Website

So for my website, I had a bit of competition beacuse the topic of my story, the Shinnecock Bay Restoration Program already had a great website. There was no competing, it is a really nice website. I did not want a copy of the information provided there, I wanted a place to go for further information. So I provided the link to their website and went from there.

Screen shot of www.carriemillermedia.com

So I really wanted to feature my final project video, and I didn’t want visitors to have to go searching and clicking for the main information. So the story, my inforgraphic, and a short video on how scientists collect data are all on the main page.

Screen shot of carriemillermedia.com

You can hit play on all the YouTube videos, not have to leave the homepage and already understand what’s wrong with Shinnecock Bay, and how the scientists are going to try and fix it. From there you can use either the menu bar or the slider to navigate to more information about the program, other programs, and how you can get involved.

Screenshot of carriemillermedia.com

I used questions to help people navigate themselves around the site, so they knew what they would learn from the different videos.

I really like graphics and photos because they are eye catching, so I used big graphics throughout my website. I also included the program’s twitter feed so people can see what they are up to. I have social media icons on the bottom so you can reach me on twitter, see my other youtube videos, and email me if you want to offer me a job. Oh and my résumé is on the about page so you can see if I’m qualified for the position!

Be ready for it. You’ll have all semester to build your website. Use that time wisely.

It’s not the making the website part that is particularly difficult. It’s learning how to read and manipulate the code that brings your site to life. You need to put in some solid hours just figuring out how to navigate and read this stuff.

Luckily, you’re not alone. Professor Ahmad is very helpful. COMMUNICATE. If you’re having trouble – and you will – ask for help.

There’s also the Internet. Use Google. Use websites dedicated to this stuff. (w3schools.com is SUPER-USEFUL! Bookmark it; remember it; read it.)

People always say there are different kinds of learners out there, but I’m a staunch believer in learning through play. The best advice I can give is to not be afraid to play with what you’ve got. Experiment and explore, whether it be with your website’s code or Adobe Illustrator. The best way to learn is by doing. Besides, you can always hit “undo.” What’s the worst that could happen?

A screenshot from my portfolio website.

Instead of building a website for my capstone project, I set out on building a portfolio site.

You can find it here: http://matt-gerardi.com/.

The biggest difference between this version and what was my draft is obviously the home page. Instead of going with a blog-style page with lots of posts, I opted for a simple bio page.

In terms of the look, I was going for something similar to the custom sites on the service about.me. I think I came pretty close with what little skills I have.

I wasn’t a fan of how the twenty ten theme handles category pages, so I opted to build my own directory in the form of a separate page that links out to the full stories. It’s probably not the best option, but it allows for more customization than was previously available.

I didn’t want the site to be too narrow, so I widened it up a bit. On the “Videos” page, I used some cross multiplication (GASP, MATH!) to get the right dimensions for the videos. I like having them nice and big.

There’s not much else to it — lots of little tweaks that added up to a lot of time playing with numbers and code.

I posted most of my stuff on the website. If anyone has time, please share your opinions. Here’s the link, annluk.com.

My project is focused around electronic music in America, so I wanted the logo that clearly symbolized America.  I was originally thinking overlaying a pair of headphones or speakers with an American flag, but thought it would misrepresent the story as being patriotic.  As for the headphones, I was trying to think of electronic music-specific images, but most things like knobs, sliders or other hardware wouldn’t be very distinguishable in a silhouette.  Headphones aren’t necessarily electronic music specific, but the silhouette is very clear and the blocky form gives off a more modern and digital feel.

This assignment was challenging because I found a black and white photo and tried to stick with the simplicity of the colors. I used the font Lucida Sans Typewriter because I thought it suited the quote for the album title. Fresno High School sounded like a young band from California, so I imagined them typing stories in a low-budget way.

Since Fresno High School is in California, I tried to add some bright colors for a warmer feel. I thought the angles might keep a persons eye moving throughout the cover. Also, I tried made Fresno High School in white  over the orange shape so it would look like it was carved out of the color.

Album cover made learning Adobe Illustrator.

For this album cover I decided to use the straight angle of the woman’s arm to display the band’s name “Felis Lunensis,” (otherwise known as the first small cat species). Being that her arm is straight for the most part I though it would grab the readers eye since we read left to right. I put the album title in the right bottom corner to balance out the text, and changed up the color of the text for the same balance.

For the cover art I used a texturizing effect to enhance the dark vs. light in the photo which was black and white to begin with. I wanted to emphasize it further so I also brought down the opacity. I though this effect would play on the album title “all through me” being that the woman is the focus of the cover.

I am not particularly happy with the font selection but wanted something with a bit of a country feel (that wasn’t cheesy). Using italics seemed to be my best bet.