Reflective
Log

09/09/2019

In today's lesson I have learnt the basics stuff about a camera. Mainly about its settings and how can we improve a photo in different situations, such as when the light is decent or the light is not that great. I have also understood what "ISO" is, basically this is the camera's sensitivity and the lower it is the better the photo will be, however, to have a low ISO (100 is the lowest) the light needs to be good. As the quality of light decreases, you will have to increase the ISO. I will try to borrow the cameras as much as possible during this project as I feel that my camera skills are weak compared to my graphic design skills.

10/09/2019

Today I have learnt about the importance of identity. Identity can be used for example in a social campaign, a company, a shop, restaurant etc. For example in a social campaign the identity should represent its audience and its goals. By having an identity it makes easier to recognize and it stands out for the public. An identity can be represented by a colour, a slogan, a specific design (e.g. logo), and lower/uppercase letters. All of these can add up to a strong identity which will make a campaign easier to recognize.

After learning the importance of identity, I will try all my best to create a powerful identity for my social campaign. I am not sure yet how I will do it in terms of what colour or what words for my slogan or the logo itself. However, I will research on my audience and I will create something that will stand out for my audience.

11/09/2019

Today, I have experimented in Illustrator. It was my second time when I opened it and I was confused because is quite different from Photoshop. I have done two lessons on it and in the first one I was mainly playing with all the tools to understand what each tool is doing. However, in the second lesson I have done an experimental jetset. I've created a poster that might be useful for my social campaign in which the message was "Say yes to sports", of course it can still be changed because I didn't focused too much on the best words to use, but rather on the design. Later on today I have practising in After Effects, again, my first time using this software. Especially I practised the basic stuff such as how to import an image and a video. Afterwards I learned how to add in a shape and how to animate it. I really think that I will be strong at editing in After Effects because it focused on designs and is something that passionate me. So, far my project is going well and I hope to get good results.

17/09/2019


During yesterday (16th) and today's lessons, I have been experimenting with cameras and Photoshop. At the beginning of the day I took a few photos with the cameras withing the college and afterwards I edited them, as I saved the photos in RAW format because I wanted to have control over the photo settings. I have done a mindmap and I decided that I should do a social campaign about obesity as it is a social problem nowadays. I am not sure if this will be the actual topic I am going to do my project on as I don't actually like it, because I think I can find a better topic which will be more interesting for me. I also have done some research on "Constructivism". I don't like the topic as most works are in Russian and it's hard to actually understand anything. Also, I don't like these type of designs.

18/09/2019

Today I have mainly been practising on my Illustrator skills. I have experimented a poster using random shapes and I tried to see how colours such as green and pink will mix together and I think they really mixed very well. I used mainly circles and rectangles for my shapes but the poster is not done yet. However, during my other lessons I have been experimenting in the software After Effects and I have been searching for Lower Thirds design. I think my project is going well so far because I have put in a lot of effort especially in my Skills and Experimentation section.

25/09/2019

In today's lessons I have been doing research on the surrealism, what does it mean, graphic designers that used it etc. I have also started my surrealism image in the first lesson but I didn't create much as I wanted to be something creative. Later on today I attended a speech in the hall where someone from Aston University from Birmingham came to talk to us about the Degree Apprenticeship. He told us the benefits and consequences about it. Also he compared a classic Degree versus the Degree Apprenticeship. In my opinino a classic degree will suit me better because I don't like having a timetable from 9 to 5, I want to be more flexible and I think university is the time where I can have more free time and I can focus on work and stuff like that only after I finish university. However, later on today I have created my surrealism, I got inspired by an image found on Google with a guy that had his belly made of food. Therefore, I decided to do the same for my surrealism image as I knew that I had a similar image from one my previous projects so I could save time using that image.  

26/09/2019

Today I have recorded my Vox Pop about "Obesity". The question I used was "What do you think is the reason for obesity?". I have asked around nine people and it's the first time when I actually record something on a camera, also with an additional microphone to improve the audio quality. I think I have done the Vox Pop really good for my first time, the things that I could improve are the timings when I start the video recording and audio recording and in future I should do a clap before asking the question to be easier while syncing the video & audio. Later on in today I have been syncing my audio and video using PremierePro. 

30/09/2019

Today I have mainly been focusing to do a review on the documentary that I watched (Fed up). To be honest I struggle a bit as I watched the documentary two weeks ago and I am doing the review only today and I quite forgot most parts of the documentary so I might watch it again just to bring together my thoughts.

01/10/2019

Today I have done research on a few Graphic Designers that have been working on social issues. The designers I chosen are Tibor Kalman, Adbusters and David Gentleman. Their work is really impressive and it stands out for its audience with different important messages that can change the way the people worldwide are thinking.

02/10/2019

Today I have been mainly focusing on my unit 11, such as editing my personal statement. Also, I have been continuing my research from yesterday's work on the designers creating designs on "social issues". Later on today I have been researching about "promotional mix" and "marketing mix". I didn't understand well this theory, I found it hard to understand but I will try and research it on different websites as the information might be easier to understand on there.

03/10/2019

Today I have been working to catch up my work based on the documentary. I continued my documentary review but still haven't finished it because I am quite confused with it and I don't really know what to write about it as the documentary was boring and had lots of bad information. However, I also worked on how my primary target audience is going to be for my topic which is "Obesity". In future I will be focusing on the Synopsis and Modes for my documentary.

08/10/2019

In today's lessons I have been exercising my lighting skills. Me and two more classmates went to a studio and we tried to setup different interview camera setups such as high-key, short-key, broad-light etc. It was my first time using any type of 3D lighting and it took me a while till I got used to it. I am still learning even though I managed to setup different interview lighting setups to a decent level in my opinion. After I finished the videos, I had a look at them and I was quite disappointed as I have done two low key setups and in some videos I forgot to focus because the focus was manually. However, I will try to improve these mistakes in my future 3d lighting experiments and videos.

09/10/2019

Today I have been practicing my lighting skills in "Virtual Lighting Studio", I think it really helped me a lot as it is much quicker and you can see the difference much easier than in real life because you can "solo" the lighting. Later on today, I went to the studio with a friend to help him with the set up for a video. Once again, I practiced with 3D Lighting. I felt that I really knew what I am doing, it wasn't like in the previous day when I was a bit confused. Also today, me and a few classmates have re-created a scene from a movie. I was the actor, even though I wasn't feeling confident about it, I had to do it and in my opinion I have done a good job, especially that English is my second language and I am not a dramatic person (my character had some dramatic lines). 

10/10/2019

In today's lessons I have been editing the videos that we created yesterday. Mainly I tried to sync the video with the audio using Adobe Premiere Pro. 

15/10/2019

In today's lessons I have been starting my social campaign pitch. I am doing a social campaign about obesity and most probably I will do a social campaign pitch about the reasons why there is an increase in obesity rate. It is a major problem worldwide as there is more and more people becoming obese each year. Later on I watched and analysed about ten social campaign videos and I made a summary for each one of them with the main message and also what the creator used, things such as text, narration, different camera angles etc. I didn't like any of the videos because all of them were boring. 

16/10/2019

Today I went to the library and I found a book about fitness and nutrition and I read a few pages about nutrients, macronutrients, calories etc. The book was really interesting and useful. For the rest of the day I tried to catch up work that I missed or I didn't understand properly in lessons. 

30/10/2019

Today I have been focusing to catch up with research as I missed a few lessons. So far, I researched about Surrealism and Constructivism. I am feeling more confident about it than before. Later on today I was focusing on my social campaign pitch. I just started it and I am planning to deliver it next Tuesday during one of the lessons. Also, for unit 11 I made some adjustments to my personal statement as I got feedback a few weeks ago from one of my teachers but I kept forgetting about it. As a whole I feel that I am behind with my project as I cannot focus 100% during lessons but I will try to catch up all the work that I missed or I haven't done properly.

05/11/2019

Today I have presented my Social Campaign Pitch to the class and I got feedback from them. The feedback was positive but the "problems" that I received from feedback are that I should think more of the target audience as it 3 is quite too young and 80s is too old. However, later on I have done some research on Barnardo's campaign and I learnt what the campaign is about.

06/11/2019

Today I have been doing research on grids. I found out how important they are and also how the grids can catch my audience's attention. I think grids are important, specially in magazines and newspapers as there is usually a lot of information and by having grids you actually cut down the information in small parts and it is easier to read and understand by the audience. Later on today I have done some work in After Effects and I learnt how to create a 3D image. Also I have been doing research on two social campaigns such as Scope and Amnesty international. Both of them are trying to help children in need. I still have a few things to catch up in Unit 9 but I will do more work outside college in order to be able to complete it before the deadline of the project.

07/11/2019

In today's first lesson I went to the college studio to record my interviews. I only had four questions to ask because I felt that there is no point asking questions with yes or no answer so all my questions started with "What do you think..." and "How can...". In this way, I tried to force my interviewers to expand their answers. I also helped around with the camera, microphone and lighting setup and from doing this stuff I feel that I practiced more and I am more confident with the cameras. 

19/11/2019

Today I have started my Identity for my Social Campaign. More specifically, today I started my Logo. The name for my campaign is going to be "Healthy Food" because I am encouraging people to eat more healthy food, e.g. organic food and less processed food. I will try to have a simplistic logo as most famous logos are very simple but very good looking, for example some companies with a simple logo and a very successful one can be Nike, Apple. In my future lessons I am planning to finish my Logo and move on to something else.

20/11/2019

Today I have been focusing to finish off my logo for my social campaign. However, I also been working on my Unit 11 where I done some changes to my personal statement and I will need to get feedback from my tutor to be able to know what I have to do next with it because in my opinion there is still more changes and or improvements that I can do to make it better. I am planning in future to focus on finishing off editing my documentary and then to start my poster. Also I will need to find a client for myself for unit 10, probably I will ask a few personal trainers at my local GYM if they need anything such as a poster, photo shoot, etc. 

27/11/2019

Today I have been mainly focusing on finishing off my Personal Statement and uploading it on UCAS. Later on today, I had my first meeting with my client for Unit 10. I spoke with Mr. Heskey, a staff member from Stanmore College about what he wants me to do for him. Today I started to imagine how I will create my client's video, in what days I will record it, edit it, what equipment I will use, in what locations I will record etc. In the future week I am planning to actually start the project because I want to finish it as soon as possible, even though I don't have an end date for it.

03/12/2019

Today I am planning to start my social campaign poster. So far, today I have managed to start my poster and I already now what my poster is going to look like. The poster will have a bin with fast food falling into it and I will add a design to give the idea of falling down and also I will have a hand holding an apple or a bitten apple . Next, I will have to apply my ideas towards the poster and to finish it before the Christmas breakdown, but also there is some research tasks that I still have left to finish from the lessons that I missed.

04/12/2019

In today's lessons I have managed to improve my poster but I still need to do a lot of work on it as I find it hard to re-create my ideas in a poster. Probably, I will take the photos by myself and then I will edit them and use them for the poster or I will try and sketch in out and then draw it in Photoshop, I will see. However, after I finish my poster I will move onto research as there is stuff that I need to do. For example, I need to find out what percentage of children are obese, what percentage of men/women are obese and maybe to find out the main reason for obesity for all these different age and gender categories.

05/12/2019

In today's lessons I have managed to finish my documentary rough cut. I think the documentary is looking good but of course there could be made more adjustments. As I don't like the video part of media, I think I have done pretty good for my first video edit (in this case a documentary). After finishing editing the video and watching more documentaries, I realized that I could have changed the position were the interviewer was sitting, for example all my interviewers are sitting in the right hand site. If I had a few sitting on the left side would have been more diverse and visually better for the audience. Also I could have like an opening with a background related to food industry for the documentary with a voice over about obesity facts. I am not sure about it but I think I could have added in a soundtrack but also I think that being a documentary, I want my audience to take it as serious as possible so wouldn't have been really a good idea to add in a soundtrack. 

10/12/2019

In today's lessons I am planning to complete the research mentioned in the reflective log from 4th December. Today, I managed to finish the secondary research about what percentage of children are obese and also what percentage of adults are obese. I think the research I have done was successful as it had really interesting data and also quite shocking. However, I could research more websites as the data I found was from 2016 and will be a great idea to have data from 2019 to see if the things improved or got worse. Next, I am planning to catch up with the lessons that I might have missed throughout this project.


12/12/2019


In today’s lessons I have received feedback from my class about my documentary rough cut. Overall, I received positive feedback, but I also received a few positive constructions that I need to improve on my documentary. I totally agree with the positive constructions that I received as in my opinion my rough cut is too dry and it needs a few adjustments. I think that my project is going great and I will finish it on time If I will do more work in my own time.

16/12/2019

In today's lesson I have finished editing my Vox Pop. I also uploaded it to Youtube and in the Final Production section. Tomorrow, I will probably start to catch up work from the research section because there is some topics that I still need to cover.

17/12/2019

In today's lesson I have been completing my Social Campaign Poster. I changed my ideas on it while doing the poster because I am lacking in time and I decided to use one of the surrealism images I did at the beginning of the project. 

07/01/2020

In today's lessons and yesterday's lessons (06/01) I have been talking with my teachers about my university choices and seems like I did a good choice choosing Middlesex as my first university choice because it is a great university to study Graphic Design. I also updated my blog and I tried to finish off my flyer. My flyer is almost done and probably in one or two days it will be finished. In this week or the following week I am planning to start my Unit 10 work, I will probably do the planning during this week and I will arrange a meeting next week on Monday.

08/01/2020

Today we had a trip at the V&A Museum. I found some really interesting things in there and what I think will be relevant for myself in future was the old body sculptures because I think I will do a FMP about Fitness and I might do a comparison between how people used to look in the past and how the look in the actual time. Obviously, the sculptures don't show up any stats about how the people were in the past because the sculpture might be looking skinny, fit and healthy but in reality the people at that time were all fat or anorexic for example.

14/01/2020

Today I have been editing my flyer for my social campaign pitch. I had to change the design as it didn't fit my poster. I changed the background to a light black and also changed the three tagged labels into the pink from the poster so it will match. 

15/01/2020 

Today I have been recording my videos for Unit 10. I took a few videos inside the Gym, with a few students training in there. Afterwards, I recorded another students playing table tennis in the hall and last I filmed a basketball enrichment, it was two teams made of students that were playing each other. I really liked this experience as I practiced my camera skills. In future I am planning to record more enrichments and I will edit all of them and merge them together to get a nice video for my client.

16/01/2020

Today I have been analysing a scene from the Black Panther. I have analysed the positive representation of race. At first I found it hard to analyse because I was unsure about which scene to choose the represent the best the positive representation of race. However, after a while I found a scene that I really liked and I think it is a good choice for the representation of race. 

21/01/2020

Today I have been finishing off my flyer for my social campaign. As I am a bit behind with the project I decided to use some bits that were relevant from another project to save time. I am happy with the result that I got with the finished flyer as it is relevant to my topic and it also matches the poster in my opinion.

28/01/2020

Today I have been writing up my evaluation for the Social Campaign. I think that my evaluation is very strong and solid because all I have to do is evaluate my work positively or if I have something negative, I can mention what I should improve next time in order of it to be better.

11/02/2020

Today I have been working on my portfolio for University and I managed to upload it for my University Choices

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