MIDTERM PROJECT BRIEF (PART ONE)
Directions: Read through the whole brief before going back and listing down whatever questions you might have. Note that this takes from what you have already done in class, and all the other exercises you’ve had, as well as the critical creativity discussions on our Instagram account. If you’ve missed anything, everything is on our course site.
WHAT IS THIS PROJECT?
We are building your portfolio. This means you are revising the work you’ve done for this class, but also creating new work. Your portfolio, as such, will be made up of two sets of things as we hit midterms: Part 1 is revisions on existing work, and Part 2 is new work.
This brief is on Part One, revisions on existing work. You’re going to go back to all your existing work and revising based on my comments. This includes the following:
- Three personal essays.
- About Page for personal site.
- Personal site design.
- Photo plus caption exercise.
- Feature essay on an advocacy.
General Points For Revision
Format. I’ve been consistent about giving format instructions: margins, font, font size, spacing. Few of you have followed this. Go back to those videos, and look for those instructions. Revise accordingly.
The Personal Essays. Directions were very clear about these essays. You were going to answer the questions through the essay, but you weren’t going to divide your answers based on those questions. Revise accordingly.
Note as well that all your essays will be returned to you with comments for revision.
The About Page. The About page should be about your website, not just about you. What happened for a majority of you was that you just ended up talking about yourself, instead of talking about the website and what it might contain. This is why there was a disconnect between the design of your personal site, the text on your about page, and the photograph + caption, and feature essay that you ended up writing.
The personal site is supposed to be about specific aspects of yourself. NOT everything that’s about you. You want to anchor your site on a specific aspect of who you are: does it capture a specific cause you believe in, or a particular kind of work you like to do? Is it about being a part of your generation, or your gender, or a hobby that is unique to you?
Make your About more specific instead of general. Then you can revise how it looks, what your photo is, and that caption, as well as your feature essay, accordingly.
The Site Design. For those who only did mood boards, please take the time to revise and actually do a sample site design, bringing in all those elements of color and typography and images. Note that the samples that are up on the course site, is what you are required to come up with, too. It was totally my mistake for calling it a moodboard, instead of a design for a personal site. The goal is to make sure that text and image come together on the screen, as per the lecture on Text And Image.
Photo + Caption Exercise. As was detailed in the lecture, and as seen in the sample, this photo + caption exercise was supposed to expand on what you describe as the point of your website in the About. For some of you this connection wasn’t made clear. Here’s some questions to ask in revising your output for this exercise: (a) what is the connection between this photo and caption that you’ve written to the goals of your persona site? (b) what aspect of yourself does this particular photo + caption talk about?
If you have no clear answers to this that relate back to your page’s About, then you can revise to a new photo and caption.
The Feature Essay. For some of you the feature essays was not on an issue or advocacy, and as such needs to be revised to something more … relevant.
Some of you wrote a feature essay with numbers. While I get why you did this, an essay means flowing from one point to another with no clear markers that you are doing so. J Revise accordingly given use of transitions for how your thinking evolves throughout the essay.
Some of you also still don’t have feature essays. This is your last chance to write it. Since you’re going to submit it as part of your midterms already, what will be graded will be your first draft instead of the revision. This is fine, of course, as long as you double-check yourself and your writing so that you get a high grade regardless.
REMEMBER: We will be using class time this week, October 20 and 21, to do consultations on your work so far. This means you DO NOT NEED TO COME TO CLASS as a group, but you can consult with me anytime during the three-hour period given my comments on your work and the Midterm Project Briefs. :) ***