On my last week I thought I was going to be not doing much, but just like the first week here at whole whale they’ve got something for me to do. I’m glad about that because I won’t be bored.

On Monday my first assignment was to create a blog graphic on 101 best podcasts for nonprofits .

101 Best podcast for nonprofits

Later that day I sat down with Ann for a bit and we reviewed my resume and my portfolio progress. She gave me a few tips on what i should change or how I should word certain things in my resume. She also sent me some examples on Portfolios so I could have a better idea on how to layout my work and get the most out of an interview. I wrote all of the tips she gave me on how I should set up my resume and portfolio.

On Thursday I also had a few things to do one of was creating an email promotional ad for the new Online social media course. The trick to doing this kind of ad, is that email promo ads are really Small. So contrast and hierarchy of information are very important.

But before i could finish it Ann had another task that was more important to do. George Weiner had made a presentation deck for a talk he’s going to do later that day.  Ann just wanted me to go through the entire presentation and make sure it was according to brand guidelines. I could tell that George had just typed the information in and not really paid any mind to the brand guidelines. It took me about 45 mins to make sure the logo, colors, font size and page layout was consistent.

Before I left I spoke to Ann about being able to come back through the summer and shadowing her on the new website redesign. I thought at first she would tell me no because there was no room for me, or some other reason. But she actually said yes that she would be a great idea because they are about to start on it and work all thru the summer on it.  I was really happy to hear that because I feel like there is still so much more i wanted to learn from them.

I am always going to thankful for this amazing internship. I’ve learned and done so much at Whole Whale, I honestly hope with this experience I can be a bit more valuable wherever I end up. It’s a little sad leaving them but I hope that wherever I end up next I could have another experience like this one.

It was a short week at my internship, I only went on monday because I was leaving to florida for the break. We checked in with Ann and she told me that I could help by looking for some inspiration on a new website redesign that Whole whale will be doing. Then we also spoke for a bit on UX and UI design and what it takes too designa website. Later we checked in as a group and spoke on what each of us was going to do. I told them that I would look for some other websites that you could use as inspiration when they begin the website redesign. Then George asked me if I was interested in making a blog post graphic for him. I took it immediately, because I knew that it was not going to take me 6 hours to find website inspiration. I really wanted to do some more graphics so I was excited.

The article was about how Pepsi vs Coke and Democrats vs Republicans compare.

i thought about how I could design it and keep it simple. I think I had about 8 different versions on how I wanted to do it. and none of them were good enough in my head. It was a bit of a struggle but after some more thinking and Talking to ann a few more times I came up with this graphic. And I really liked it I felt like it was really well done and you can kinda tell what the article is going to be about about.

once I was done I sent it over to George and he told me that he would let me know when he would post it up onto the Huffington post. I swear I almost broke my neck looking back at him. I was not sure if he was being serious because I didn’t believe my work would be published like that. but he was very serious because the next day on my way to florida I saw this.

I seriously can’t thank the people at my internship enough. they have taught me so much and help me out with. Whole Whale has to be the best company anyone can intern at because of all the support, patience, knowledge, and guidance. im truly going to miss them when my internship is over. Thank you Whole Whale.

Well it happened, i was finally reviewed by my supervisor Ann. Here are my results;

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Alex Design Intern Review

April review

Content – what you do

• Blog graphics – 100% produced on time, learned WW style, proactively creating graphics in tandem with article writing
• Infographics – 60% big learning curve, friction with finding data and learning new tools
• WW branding for Snorkl and postcards – 80% set the stage for snorkl branding, finished with help from Ann
• Social media template for WW and clients – 85% for WWU and PP on canva

Methodological – how you do it

• Use Producteev as to do list – 60%
• Look for inspiration and existing assets on open source sites – 90% learned about mood boards
• Ask for clarity and feedback – 70% don’t be afraid to ask questions
• Use the right tool for the right job – 80% nice job using canva and piktochart, infographic tool could have been more efficient

Goals – what you achieved

• Learn Sketch by March – 10%
• Get familiar with flat design – 100%

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I agree with all of these points 100%. My supervisor would asked me, what did i think i deserve for this topic and i would give her an honest score and she would for the most part agree. Even unfortunately with learning Sketch by march. I was not able to learn it and i almost never used it. But i have made it a personal goal to learn it especially since it’s a new and very upcoming program in design. Another thing she did mention that hurt a bit to hear was, about how they had hoped to give me some more project in wireframing and UX designs. But since i took a really long time with the infographic they did not feel i would be able to handle all the work. And she was right, i found myself really busy with the infographic and school work, so i would not have been able to do something good.

aside from that she did tell me that i was killing it with my work and my designs. Especially in how much faster i had gotten.

Yeah this week for some reason i was late both on Monday and Thursday, my alarm didn’t wake me up. My supervisors didn’t even mind, I also had Slack messaged them that i was running late so maybe that’s why they weren’t a upset about it.This week i worked on some more blog graphics for the next upcoming post on social media. i’ve gotten a lot faster at making them and not over thinking them as well.

One of the other interns did a small presentation this week on Snapchat and should nonProfits use it. I actually missed it but my supervisors had put it up on Pariscope ( another social media tool) so i was still able to see it. In the end of her presentation the conclusion was that nonprofits should not use Snapchat, because there is no way of tracking the interactions on it (aside from who views it).

Ann and i also set up to have a meeting next monday on my evaluation. I am excited about it just to see what she has to say about me and i am scared because i feel like i could’ve done more.

This week at my internship we had a team meeting. They told me I didn’t have to go since I wasn’t an actual staff member, but that I was invited. They didn’t really tell me much about it but I assumed it was going to be on how the company was doing.  I arrived at my internship at about 1130 am, the meeting was at 12 and I surprised my supervisor Ann.  They had already ordered lunch and forgot I was actually going to attend so they didn’t order me any lunch. Which was fine with me, because I wasn’t expecting them to anything in the first place. Ann insisted to go get something and even gave me the company card!  I was extremely surprised because they were getting me lunch especially since Dumbo is really expensive ( eight dollars a grill chicken and tomato sandwich -__- ) and because they trusted me with the company card.

i left and went to a few stores to see what I wanted, I ended  up getting a chicken sandwich for about eight bucks. I ran to the building and had to go to the 9th floor in a separate building that connects through an air bridge. I finally get into the meeting room and  they had already started so it was a little awkward interrupting them to get in the room.

My sandwich was a mess but tasted really good, everything tastes better when it’s free. The meeting was a ‘quarterly report” on goals that Whole Whale had set up from themselves.  A lot of the goal were on the companies they work for (all non-profits) Like The century foundation, Breakthrough and PowerPoetry  Some of the goals were did the website redesign help the organization gain more followers, or did the way they set up the google adwords work for that organization work. Most if the goals were achieved by them and some weren’t because the company budget was to small or the organization did not stay in contact with Whole Whale.

Then they began Discussing about the money they’re putting in and getting out. They were certainly not doing bad but they said they could be doing a lot better. Plus with the three new companies they got this past month things should be looking up for WholeWhale. During the meeting everyone was encouraged to ask questions or anything they had in mind. One of the questions asked were how come we dont just let go our ties with the least lucrative companies and fully focus on the other bigger companies that are much more lucrative. Since they are taking up out time and we could be doing more for them. George responded by saying, He feels loyal to those companies that stood by him and trusted him when he was starting out . He wants to continue helping those organization out, until WholeWhale has nothing else it can give it, Not the other way around.

This week was pretty basic, nothing much really happened at my internship. I did finally finish my Infographic, it took me longer than I expected but I did it. Pros about it, I think I looks pretty cool and something i definitely want to add into my portfolio. Cons, I struggled alot with it, i wish i would’ve finished sooner so i could’ve done something else. My supervisor Ann says it alright, next time i’ll be faster. I also chopped up the infographic into 6 different blocks and placed them into some templates (using canva) so they could be used on social media. I made the templates too so that also took some time.

Aside from that this week i didn’t do anything else. As a team we started using slack. Slack is like a group chat but for companies.  You can make categories where the whole team sees the comments being made and  you have a direct chat option. I’m still not 100% sure on how to use it because i’ve only had it for four days but, it seems very useful.

This week i continued the design on the Social media infographics. I feel like I’m almost done. I’ve gotten it approved twice, which tells me that i am headed in the right direction. I still feel like there is something missing.  The whole point of the infographic is to have more people sign up to take their online social media class. They don’t want to be very obvious with that but in the end of the graphic they want to suggest it. Ann is always looking at the small details that I overlook sometimes and she sees things in a creative way much quicker too. Some things i overlooked were the company colors and some stats that didn’t make sense.

Draft 2

Draft 4

During the week my supervisor and i were reviewed by someone from BTTIP. The review was about what I am learning and what i’ve been doing. I was honest and spoke about how at first i was extremely nervous but now i feel comfortable.  I also mentioned how almost every week I’m given a new resource that I can use somewhere else in my design or career also how I’m encouraged to ask questions and ask my other co-workers. Ann also spoke about me and pretty much said very nice things.

On a sidenote I can’t believe my internship is halfway thru. hope wherever I end up next in my career the environment will be similar.

So this week has been a bit stressful at my internship, because i have been assigned to make an infographic on how Nonprofits use social media. At first i honestly thought it was going to be much easier because infographics look very simple and easy. But I quickly learned that it’s not like that. There is a ton of raw information that i had to look for and pick out what i can use. My supervisor Ann sent me some links and some information that our company had done in the past.

Once i found all the stats that i needed i went over it with Ann, we Broke it down into four parts, what social media outlets are Nonprofits using, What’s the social media landscape looking like,why some nonprofits aren’t really using social media, and what can Nonprofits use to make social media easier on them.  Once i locked this down I began to finally make the infographic on Illustrator. It was taking me a while to get it, mainly because of all the data that’s suppose to go into it and not knowing how to creatively show it. Ann saw that i was having trouble with it and showed me to this amazing website called Piktochart.com that has all these preset templates of charts and graphs for infographics.  “You don’t have to reinvent the wheel if you’re trying to get it, you can just use it” is what Ann told me. So before the end of the day on thursday i did one because i was still trying to learn how to use it but i think it came out okay then friday I did another one and it’s looking better. I was a bit frustrating throughout the week because i wanted to get it done faster but i couldn’t to impress my supervisor.

Draft 1

Draft 2

I worked on Snorkl this week, a new Whole Whale product that will make it much easier for organizations to contact whole whale with a project. It also helps the organization that is Making the Request For Proposal (RFP), get a clear idea of what actually want. Its basically a survey that asks you fourteen questions and you done a RFP is generated. Now the organization that applied can use it with Whole Whale or anywhere else.

the design process behind Snorkl was interesting but also a bit frustrating.  I didn’t think it was going to take me as long as it did, on monday i looked from some inspiration on how i wanted my logo design to look. When i showed Ann she made me realize something. It was all too literal and all the same thing. I had to think beyond what Snorkl was and think about what it does. It helps Nonprofits, it’s a generator, it’s meant to be easy and save you a lot of time. I started sketching on thursday and i had ideas flowing and different directions i wanted to go in, but i quickly realized when i jump onto the computer that most of the designs that i had would not work. So i went back to sketching trying to find something to make the logo fit. Ann told me not too worry about it because it’s a process, getting it right the first time is rare and that maybe if i went back to basics it could work.  So i did that and she approved one of my sketches and on friday i began the final on illustrator.

When i finished it i sent it over to her too see what her thought were. She emailed me back like 2 hours later with some edits and i feel like it works alot better than what i had. So it was frustrating but i feel like i did learn a lot this week because there is no correct way of finding a design. Trail n error is the name of the game.

This week was fun i banged out a new blog graphic everyday i was there. i feel more fluent and more comfortable with what i’m doing now. i remember that the first week i was there i felt very anxious, but now i know what WWs style is like and i can adapt to it better. Ann my supervisor is also extremely helpful she’s always giving me advice on how to do it make a design better or tweaking a concept for a graphic.

Mondays Graphic

Thursday Graphic

Next week i’m going to start working on one of WWs new products they have call Snorkl which is a Request For Proposal generator for non profits. I’m going to be working on creating a logo, so i’m very excited about that.