Thursday 19 April 2012

Web design using HTML & CSS... at last!

So I have dipped my toe into Dreamweaver before, using tables and the design front end, without a clue of how to use HTML.  Finally, the second reason I chose the Multimedia degree, we finally get to study web design using HTML and CSS!

I haven't hosted the site yet, but here is the design.


Confessions....... this is the .psd design.  That is what it will look like once I iron out some glitches.

For now, it looks like this....


Finally got it to sit in the centre of the browser, I put the margin: 0 auto; in the page settings rather than the suggested wrapper, and it worked a treat!

The nav bar changes colour on rollover and active but they don't have the alternating colours as per the design yet.

I also need to resize the header title and amend the colour for the home content background.  Nearly there!

Final Marks: 73 = First

Burning Desire asked me to produce their blog for them, I was delighted to accept the task.  The blog is a wordpress site, take a look here: http://burningdesirestoves.wordpress.com/

Tuesday 17 April 2012

Group Assignment 3D work






I decided to include some 3D elements into our game... this was a bit selfish on my part.  If I am to criticise our degree at all, it is simply that we do not spend enough time in one area or on any particular software.

We have only studied 3D once and I am nervous that the next time we have to use it (possibly in our final year) I will have forgotten how to use the software and as often happens, will have to start from scratch.

It isn't as if we have time to practice in our 'free time'.  In that we are part time students, many of us are working full time and have a family to take care of. So our 'free time' is used working on our current assignments.

So here I got back into Google Sketchup (now Trimble) to create a 3D model of a digital SLR camera.

The idea was that this would sit within the tutorial part of the game.  Players could rotate around this and learn about the functions of the camera.

In the end I simply didn't have the time to stitch the parts together for the user navigation functions.  Instead I did a walk around film.  I didn't have time to lay a voice over either.

Reading this blog you may think I was a lazy student, 'not having time'.  In fact this was the assignment that I was working on when I gave birth prematurely slap bang in the middle of it!

For those of you who may need enlightening, this required hospital stays and then of course the 'newborn' phase is prolonged, so rather than perhaps 3 months of life draining days and nights, we had 6.  So less than empathetic people may suggest that I had all the time in the world to complete this assignment.... well they can get knotted.

Fortunately I was able to critique the work effectivley and describe how the product would have been developed if the unexpected arrival hadn't taken place.

Here is the video:


Final Marks:

Development Report: 67 = 2:1
Evaluation Report: 70 = First

I am ecstatic with these marks as I was convinced that I would fail, there had been many a tear shed over this... not in vain.