Internship Journal #10: Event

Image of Career Fair

An event that I attended was a job fair that took place in Queens. For one day, I went with Lyle and another intern to a job fair in Queens where we were trying to get more interns as well as meet other companies. We had our own table and we had to talk to many individuals about the company and the goal of the company. Lyle did most of the mini interviews in the beginning to show us what to do, to give us an example. Afterwards, Lyle left the table to talk to the companies who were also recruiting around us to network and possibly find new collaborators for future projects for the company. While he was away, me and the other intern had to do the interviews/briefing to people who were interested. This whole process lasted for around 3 hours until we left the fair to return to the office. The fair was rather interesting because just a few months ago, I was in the other position; the one getting interviewed for the job. This experience allowed me to get familiar with interviews. However, I was still nervous even though I was the interviewing them instead.

Lyle Benjamin would be considered a mentor for me because he has taught me a lot throughout the intern process of 3 months. He had experience in many fields such as law, game design, graphic design, vet, and much more. He took his time to teach me how a real graphic design job works and mistakes I did that is bad for working environment. Lyle has also taught me stuff unrelated to work etiquette, he also gave me tips for life styles. He taught me to sleep facing up rather than facing down so I don’t get neck injuries. He taught me to speak louder and clearer because it makes me more confident and because public speaking is a required skill especially for the creative field where we have to present our ideas and projects. I was able to learn a lot of stuff from Lyle and Lyle was really supportive throughout the internship. Even though sometimes he would get really fired up by my mistakes and yell at me for making the same mistakes so often, he was doing it so I will correct it so I won’t do it when I find an actual job. Lyle also pushed me forward to make me change, change my personality and also push me forward to learn new things and new skills for my future.

Internship Journal #9: Self Evaluation

Self Evaluation Image

For my self evaluation, I will evaluate myself during my first animation project. For my first animation, I had to do storyboards before doing digital animations. I would draw storyboards based on the script that Lyle supplied me with. My first storyboard drafts were drawn really rough that Lyle couldn’t understand my illustrations. This was really bad because it left an impression that I was someone who does things really unorganized and that my work was mediocre. Afterwards, I took a little bit more time to make my storyboards more refined and also wrote down a description underneath the illustration so that Lyle could get a better understanding of the illustrations as well as my thought process. Another issue that I faced was not knowing how to edit audio and software for audio editing. When Lyle gave me the voice recording for the character, he told me to clip the parts I need for animation as well as edit the voice to match the previous animations of the same character. I didn’t know how to do it and had to take time to learn Adobe Audition for audio editing which lead to the animation to be done a bit past the original deadline. Due to my lack of experience, I couldn’t finish the animation by the deadline which is really bad especially in Graphic Design since time management and finish projects before deadlines is crucial. However, instead of avoiding my lack of knowledge, I took the initiative to learn something new to help me with my job.

Overall, I did rough work for my first animation because I wasn’t familiar with the work process and lacked experience. I drew storyboards too rough and messy that it was not clear and my lack of knowledge caused me to miss the deadlines. However, I was able to learn new skills and get familiar with new software necessary for my projects. By learning these software early, I was able to meet the deadline for my next animation. I learned from my early mistakes and change so that I can do a better job for future projects.

Internship Journal #8: Collaborative Project

Credit Screenshot for animation

Throughout my internship, I primarily worked on 2 animation videos. For the 2 animations, I primarily worked by myself; I worked on all the story boarding, animation, audio editing, and graphic images. However, throughout the animation process my mentor, Lyle would give me a script to work off of as well as give me feedback on animations. Lyle would check my animation progress and decide whether I have perfected the scene’s audio syncing and animations before moving onto the next scene. If he doesn’t give his confirmation on moving on, he would give me feedback and changes to do before moving on. Lyle also supplies me with the audio of the characters to edit for the video. Lyle was the voice of 2/3 of characters in both animations, but I have edited the voice to sound different for each animation. Another person that I can consider to be a “collaborator” would be Jane who was the voice of a female character in one of the animations. However, I wasn’t physically there when they do the recordings; I just get sent the audio recording to clip and edit for animation usages.

For communication, I only need to communicate with Lyle for changes. Jane is another intern but I don’t communicate with her because Lyle is in charge of the voice recordings. Lyle is more experienced and more familiar with the ideal emphasizes of words in the script since he wrote it. Most of the communication is in person, when I go to the office to work we usually do meetings to watch the animations and talk about parts that require fixing and changes. When I work remote, I would email and text Lyle about the changes I made and to send files to him to review.

The collaboration was successful because Lyle was the director of the project. He was able to supply me with files that I need to finish the animation such as audio recordings and feed backs. The only thing that wasn’t successful was that I wasn’t able to work with other animators because I was the only animator in the internship. I wanted another animator to work with me to help speed up the process as well as give me on the spot feed backs because Lyle wasn’t available all the time, he has to do work as well.

Webinar: Pro Tips for Picking Web Fonts

Webinar Screenshot of typeface

For the webinar assignment, I watched “Pro Tips for Picking Web Fonts”  by Dan Rhatigan on the website Montotype. This webinar talks about web fonts and how they operate as well as tips to choose your ideal web font. Dan first talks about choosing your ideal web font based on the the project you are doing; whether it is suitable, functional, and capable for your work. Then around 7 minutes into the webinar, Dan pulls out a screenshot of a typeface comparison (image I posted in beginning of post) that shocked me. He showed the same typeface displayed on 2 different product screens and it looked really different. This taught me that I should look at the typeface on different platforms like mac, windows, and smartphones as well as browsers like chrome, internet explorer, and safari because the same typeface can be displayed completely different depending on the hardware and software of viewers. Dan later said “So you have to make choices and accept that you’re not necessarily in total control of the results, but you need to understand what happens with them” which was really interesting and true about design.

After that, Dan started comparing typefaces of the past. He compared Garamond to Helvetica of how the sizes are different. That’s because they were made for different usages and purposes. Dan then moved on to characteristics of typefaces such as sans-serif and serif fonts as well as the x-height because it can affect how the eye perceives it. The x-height and serifs can control the space the eye perceives and can affect how “readable” the context is.

Afterwards, Dan discusses about the elements you need to take into consideration for choosing the ideal typeface. These elements are size, style, color, and spacing. These elements can really affect your design because the context and typography is a key element. By choosing an ideal font that fits your project, you can allow the viewers to read easily and get the message effectively while allowing your project to look great. This webinar was really informative and taught me a lot about typography’s impact and how it isn’t easy to find the ideal typeface especially with the amount of available typefaces in the internet nowadays.

Webinar Link:
http://go.monotype.com/Picking-Webfonts-June-2_Post-Webinar.html

App Review #2: Autodesk Sketchbook

Autodesk Sketchbook Icon of App

 

Autodesk Sketchbook app is by far my favorite drawing app. Sketchbook has many great tools that can be used and options that are available for drawing. Sketchbook offers many drawing tools to be used for sketching and coloring.

One thing that I instantly noticed was that Sketchbook has layer functions. Not only that, the layers also has layer options such as multiply, opacity, blending, and also merge. The layers tool box on side also has a drag and drop function to easily delete layers that you don’t want.

Sketchbook has a somewhat decent color swatch available and has a color wheel to choose color from. The color wheel has the HSL options and uses RGB color.

The drawing tools has a large variety ranging from pencil to marker to brushes.Sketchbook offers over 25 tools for drawing and coloring. Each tool has their own unique texture and settings to change the color, size, hardness, and for brushes a wetness option. As well as charcoal tools, where they have special settings like flow, blend, persistence, and dilution. Also sketchbook has a redo function which you can go back to a previous state if you accidentally draw or color over something.

Sketchbook also has some image editing tools as well like rotation and also an importing option where you can import images to edit or draw over.

Overall, Sketchbook is a great app for both simple drawings or professional drawings because of the layer functions, image editing tools, and as well as a large variety of tools to use for your art.

App Review #1: Paper 53

App Icon of Paper 53

Paper 53 is an interesting application for drawing. Paper 53 has many different tools to use for drawing and coloring art. Their wet brush tool is really cool by the fact that it has a wet texture for the brush and that it has a blending/mixing color function. If you draw a line of yellow, then draw another line across if of blue, you’ll actually have a green color in the area of intersection. Also you can keep coloring the same area to darken the color.

The pencil tool is another drawing tool of Paper 53. The pencil tool also has a unique texture as well and can get darker lines by drawing on top. Changing the color of the pencil can create a color pencil effect that can also be used for coloring rather than line work or sketches.

The default color swatch has limited colors to pick from but Paper 53 also has a color wheel to choose variety of colors from. Has basic HSL color wheel to pick color.

My favorite drawing tool of the app is the nib tool because it draws clean lines and has different line weights.

Overall, Paper 53 is a decent drawing app but it is more for non-professional use. I feel like it is more geared toward kids to draw stuff on the pad since there isn’t advanced options such as layers; just drawing on one flat layer.

Internship Journal #7: Typical Day

Laptop and drawing tablet

I am currently doing an animation in my internship at the moment but after this I requested to Lyle that I want to also do Graphic Design related work like advertisement or informational brochures to improve my skills. For clerical duties, sometimes I answer phones and write down who, what company, time. and reason they called and give it to Lyle if he is available. I also have to type of files for the next project so that it can be shared to other people if they will also be working on it. But mainly my typical day involves me arriving at 10am, then I would show my work progress and write down notes of what I need to fix and do for the day. When it gets to lunch time, I would go on my 30 minute lunch break and come back with coffee to continue on. Around 3pm, Lyle would check up again to see my progress and give me extra fixes to do. When I leave, I would upload all the working files and a video to the Google Drive account so I can continue working on it later on or if I decide to work remote.

For working remote, I just have to text or call Lyle when I start and tell him what I will be working on that day. Periodically, Lyle would text to tell me to upload whatever progress I made to the Drive so he would go over it and text me they changes I need to do. When I am done, I would upload it and text him that I am done for the day and the stuff I have accomplished for the day.

Internship Journal #6: What I learn #3 Tone

Speech bubble regarding Tone

Another lesson that I have learned during this job regarding the industry is how I talk, my tone. I was told that I talk really low and it is difficult to hear me when we talk. Also I tend to talk too fast sometimes or use to much filler words like um and uh. Then I was told that I have to practice my speech skills because it is really important to this field. I will have to do presentations and talk to clients and talk people/persuade people to buying my idea and concept. Therefore my communication skills is really important. I was told that first I have to speak loudly and clearly, also to get straight to the point. To be more direct and loud, I am presenting myself as someone who is confident and know what he is trying to accomplish. Then i was told how fast and how I pronounce something can also change your presentation a lot. That I should control the pace and enunciate words that are important. Then I was taught how to deal with issues; that after you tell them what is wrong of what they did, you tell them how to fix it and deal with it. This way you aren’t just complaining, you are helping them and assisting them to fix the issue.

Internship Journal #5: What I Learn #2 Research

Type Design of Research

 

Another important lesson I learned while working is to Research. Lyle constantly tells us to research something if we don’t know or don’t understand. Every week there will be a moment in which another intern or I don’t know how to do something and Lyle would ask us “What do you do when you don’t understand or know something?” and we would all answer “research”. This made me constantly research methods and techniques to do an effect or to fix problems that occur. This lesson is really valuable to me because it taught me that I shouldn’t limit myself and stop myself if I don’t know anything. I have internet on my hand, I can literally find the answer in a matter of minutes. By researching, I can learn new stuff and also good tips that I can use in the future. Through researching, I can gain new skills and learn more about other possible programs to use that can assist me. It makes you seem ignorant when you don’t know something and spend a bit of extra time to learn it. This will make you look bad in the future especially in interviews. It will change a lot if you answer “I don’t know but I can learn it” instead of “I don’t know” because it shows you are willing to learn.

Internship Journal #4: What I Learn #1 Role

Transfer

One thing I have learned about the industry while working is that you won’t be staying as one position. I was told that in the industry, I won’t always be doing illustration at first. That is because I am limiting myself and I won’t be able to find a job that easily unless I have a strong portfolio for it and/or a lot of experience. Even if i were to get a job as an illustrator, there will be times where they will send me to help someone and it might not be illustration related; it could be helping them with type or something else. It’s even possible that I won’t even be helping someone Graphic Design related, I could even be sent to help someone to video editing and post editing. This being said, Lyle has been giving me small jobs of each field to help me get some type of experience and familiarity to it. For example, I am working on a short promotional video for our app. I have to do some audio editing where I have to cut audio files and change their properties to insert them into our animation clip. During this process, I have got a bit familiar to Adobe Premiere and Adobe Audition for audio/video editing.