New Media Projects (EL405)tag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2007-08-07:/EL405/2010//402010-12-01T22:10:59ZDennis G. Jerz | Fall 2010 | Seton Hill UniversityMovable Type Pro 5.02Final Portfoliotag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.132172010-12-08T15:42:47Z2010-12-01T22:10:59Z1) Written Report (30%)Abstract (10%)Body (20%)2) Final Portfolio Screencast (30%)3) Presentation and Project (40%)1) Written Report Your final project report starts with a blog entry, written for the benefit of an outside audience (one that does not know anything about...Dennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.edu
Abstract (10%)
Body (20%)
2) Final Portfolio Screencast (30%)
3) Presentation and Project (40%)
1) Written Report
Your final project report starts with a blog entry, written for the benefit of an outside audience (one that does not know anything about the purpose of EL405). The written component of the final portfolio should
be about 800 words (roughly three or four pages, not including illustrations). Feel free to link to more
detailed blog entries if you have more detail than will fit in 800 words.
The blog entry that starts your final project portfolio should either contain or link to an abstract.
Note: The abstract does not simply list the questions you are going to answer. Instead,
it actually provides the answers (as briefly as possible).
If your term project is an IF game, then I ask that you create a promotional page for your game, as part of your iPad-optimized web portfolio. (Why? Because I would like to see your polished HTML skills; further, your game may be of interest to players who aren't that interested in your educational goals.) Your promotional page should include a screen shot, instructions for first-time players (you can link to existing online instructions rather than write your own, but a few original lines will be useful), and a prominent link to where your visitors can play your game online. Don't forget to beta-test this promotional page. Here are examples of Emily Short's promotional pages and Adam Cadre's promotional pages. Artwork is optional.)
If your term project is a web site, then you don't need a separate promotional page.
Your reader will read your abstract first, but you should write your abstract last -- after you have written out all the details in the body of your report.
Your complete abstract will feature, in a usefully-organized manner,
Content: ___ a description of your final product ___ the goals that motivated you at the beginning ___ the resources you used as models and tutorials ___ your previous experience in your chosen genre ___ your most important beta-testing results ___ the most important changes you made since the beta report
Form: ___ concise, informative prose ___ specific answers and conclusions (an abstract should not simply tease the contents of the full report)
___ a link to your final online project ___ a link to your final portfolio screencast (see details, below)
The abstract should be very concise, with no more than a sentence or two devoted to each item, but feel free to share your frustrations and triumphs, demonstrating your ability to engage as well as inform; please don't just write down the information in the order that I've listed it here. Instead, write an informative, persuasive package that highlights your accomplishments. Ask yourself, if your reader looks at nothing but your abstract, will he or she get your best points? You can leave the details for later, but the abstract is not a table of contents or a teaser.
The body of your portfolio should offer
___ more detailed treatments of each point you made in the abstract (with specific examples or narration, as appropriate), following the same order in which the points were presented in the abstract. (You might offer additional blog entries to supply details of the various supporting points, or you might divide your work up into numbered subsections.) ___ as part of the details mentioned above, useful, selective screenshots of both the code and final product. (Carefully explain each screenshot, but note that three or four detailed examples that show diversity and creativity will be more valuable than an exhaustive record of what happens when you click every link or type every command)
2) Final Portfolio Screencast
Your final screencast should be four to six minutes long. Mention
all the components of your portfolio report, but feel free to emphasize
those parts that would be most interesting in video format.
The screencast should not simply walk the viewer through your project. Rather, its main purpose is to demonstrate how your usability testing helped you improve your project.
(Try to make this engaging, rather than dry; hit the highlights.)
That screencast should include brief clips (introduced and/or captioned so that their purpose is clear) showing ___ a volunteer user (not someone who is already familiar with your work) struggling with some area of your project (perhaps the user gets lost or confused, or gives up, or misses something that you thought was obvious) ___ your explanation of the code causing the problem (remember to change the font size so the code is legible) ___ a demonstration of your ability to modify the code to address the problem ___ a demonstration of how your code change avoids the problem
(it would be acceptable if you simply demonstrated the revision
yourself, but it would be even more persuasive if you can show a clip of
a volunteer who, thanks to your revised code, sails through what had
been a problem area)
Overall, your screencast should show ___ careful explanations of what you hope to accomplish by showing each clip.
Think of the needs of an audience with no outside knowledge of your
project or EL405. (It may help to think of a potential employer as your
primary audience.) ___ good production values (smooth edits, audible sound, legible text) ___ selective editing (I am not asking to watch a user's complete encounter with your project -- just brief highlights; any long sequence where a player is
reading or wrestling with a problem or the text isn't legible might need voice-over narration or
pop-up captions so that the viewer can tell what's going on and why the clip is important; trim the dry stuff, so that your viewer spends more time
watching interesting stuff)
Relationship between the written report and the screencast
While your screencast and your written portfolio cover the same subject, design them so that they make sense separately.
Your screencast should not assume the viewer has read your report, and your report should not refer specifically to something you say in your screencast.
I'd rather not watch a screencast that simply clicks through each section of your portfolio, but if you reuse some material, that's fine. Just bear in mind that you are demonstrating your ability to present the same information in two different formats.
3) Project Presentation
Update, Dec 1
Form: Either a video posted to YouTube, OR a formal live presentation.
While the portfolio screencasts focuses specifically on how your user testing helped you improve your final project, the entire project presentation has a broader focus. (See the subject checklist, below.) Pitch your final presentation to your classmates and your professor, who are deeply familiar with the goals and methods of EL405; avoid summary, and spend time on analysis, synthesis and evaluation. (See "Writing that Demonstrates Thinking Ability.")
___ Presentation revisits your initial goals in terms of your artistic, technical, and personal goals ___ Presentation showcases your methodical, thorough user testing procedure ___ Presentation assesses how your final project has approached your artistic, technical, and personal goals ___ Presentation includes hand-coded HTML optimized for the iPad (for IF
projects, a single promotional page is fine; for HTML projects, the
project itself is enough)
___ Project ambition (to what extent does it stretch the skills you demonstrated at midterm?) ___ Project depth/scope (to what extent is it bigger/longer/more complex/better than your midterm project in the same genre?) ___ Project polish (writing, mechanics, small details) ___ Project organization (how do the components mesh, flow, interact? Are the purposes of each component clear? ) ]]>
Term Project Workshoptag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.132162010-12-02T15:39:51Z2010-10-25T15:42:39ZDennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.eduJQuery Tutorial Filestag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.132492010-11-30T17:42:15Z2010-11-30T17:44:42ZJQueryTutorialFiles.zip...Dennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.edu
JQueryTutorialFiles.zip
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Beta Release Reporttag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.132152010-11-30T14:58:27Z2010-11-23T14:40:55ZWhat did you learn when you asked a minimum of three volunteers to play/use your project? What changes have you already made?What further changes (prioritized from most to least important) will you realistically be able to make by the Dec...Dennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.edu
What did you learn when you asked a minimum of three volunteers to play/use your project?
What changes have you already made?
What further changes (prioritized from most to least important) will you realistically be able to make by the Dec 8 deadline?
What additional changes would you make, if you had more time? (Prioritize these, starting with the first thing you would do if you had more time, and ending with more ambitious, long-term possibilities.)
Present your findings in the form of a short technical report. Length: 500 words of original analysis, plus some useful combination of screenshots, code samples, transcripts, video clips, etc., as needed to support your findings. (Link to a full copy of your beta release, and assume your reader has direct access to it, so there is little need for a detailed summary.)
A short technical report is like a news story, in that it is written in the inverted pyramid format, but unlike a news story in that you are not writing a technical report for the general reader. (For this assignment, you can go ahead and write for your classmates and for me-- insiders who know has happened in the classroom, rather than writing for an outside audience. Feel free to link to older blog entries that provide background information.)
A technical report would not focus on your personal journey of discovery, nor is it a reflective self-assessment. Instead, it focuses on how the process leads to the product.
Submit your report by e-mailing it to me. (You are welcome to post it on your blog, but I am thinking of this report as a down-and-dirty, practical, internal document, so it would not be of much interest to outside readers, and I don't think it would be the most productive use of your time to make this particular document interesting to outside readers.)
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Term Project Workshoptag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.132142010-11-30T14:57:58Z2010-10-25T14:58:18ZDennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.eduBeta Releasetag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.132132010-11-23T14:57:38Z2010-10-25T14:57:50ZDennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.eduTerm Project Workshoptag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.132122010-11-23T14:56:27Z2010-10-25T14:56:49ZDennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.eduOutlinetag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.132452010-11-23T05:43:36Z2010-11-23T15:49:44ZReview: "usability testing" vs. "asking friends what they think of your project"Preview: "Beta Release Report" (due by email at the beginning of class, next Tuesday)Write: respond to a brief promptDownload: JQTouch examples (on iPad or smartphone)Group Sharing: (of today's "Beta...Dennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.edu
Review: "usability testing" vs. "asking friends what they think of your project"
Preview: "Beta Release Report" (due by email at the beginning of class, next Tuesday)
Write: respond to a brief prompt
Download: JQTouch examples (on iPad or smartphone)
Group Sharing: (of today's "Beta Release" assignment)
Open Workshop
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Term Project Workshoptag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.132102010-11-18T14:53:31Z2010-10-25T14:53:55ZDennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.eduAlpha Releasetag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.132112010-11-16T14:53:59Z2010-10-25T14:55:55ZAn alpha release is a rough draft, with plenty of rough spots and "broken" areas. But there should be enough to work with that a patient, forgiving volunteer would be able to get the general idea of what the project...Dennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.edu
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Term Project Workshoptag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.132092010-11-16T14:53:09Z2010-11-16T17:44:44ZDennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.edu Blog about your term project plans (in terms of your creative, technical, and personal goals), and post a link from this page.
What do you intend to have ready by Thursday?
By Tuesday?
What technical details make you feel confident? What is one specific area, related to your goals, that you feel you could use a refresher or more instruction? ]]>
Revised Midterm Portfoliotag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.131942010-11-11T16:49:43Z2010-11-08T21:59:02ZScratch Screencast w/ audio of first-time volunteer using your Scratch projectUpdated projectScreencast of you demonstrating changes in project Inform 7 Screencast w/ audio of first-time volunteer using your Inform 7 project (you can use someone who already knows interactive fiction)...Dennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.edu
Scratch
Screencast w/ audio of first-time volunteer using your Scratch project
Updated project
Screencast of you demonstrating changes in project
Inform 7
Screencast w/ audio of first-time volunteer using your Inform 7 project (you can use someone who already knows interactive fiction)
Updated project
Screencast of you demonstrating changes in project
Web App
if it's not technically possible to record a screencast from an iPad, document a volunteer's experience as best as you can. (Video camera pointed at screen? We'll figure something out.)
Updated project
Screencast of you demonstrating changes in project
CSS for screen, iPad, mobile, and print.
Blogging
A main page that operates as the center for this entire portfolio, perhaps with links to separate pages on each unit, perhaps all in one.
I recommend that you blog major milestones as you go, rather than wait until the last minute. (You are welcome to use class time to blog.)
The organization is up to you, as are choices that you make about how much information you provide, how you use hyperlinks and linked text, and how to make it as easy as possible for a potential employer to view your accomplishments.
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Term Project Workshoptag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.132082010-11-11T14:52:39Z2010-11-08T23:34:44ZToday I'd like you to announce your initial plan for a term project. What tool(s) will you use?What do you hope to accomplish? (Artistically? Technically? Personally?)How will your project help you to stretch your current skills?What do you foresee as...Dennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.edu
What tool(s) will you use?
What do you hope to accomplish? (Artistically? Technically? Personally?)
How will your project help you to stretch your current skills?
What do you foresee as the biggest obstacle you face?
Your final presentation should include a website optimized for the iPad, a video that includes clips from beta-testing, and blog entries that chronicle your progress. (More details on those TBA.) ]]>
Workshoptag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.132282010-11-09T21:59:06Z2010-11-08T22:00:19ZBy now, I would expect you to have all or most of your screencasts finished. I'm particularly interested in hearing how the iPad screencasts are going....Dennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.edu
By now, I would expect you to have all or most of your screencasts finished. I'm particularly interested in hearing how the iPad screencasts are going.
HTML and CSS Workshoptag:jerz.setonhill.edu,2010:/EL405/2010//40.132072010-11-04T14:52:18Z2010-10-25T14:52:32ZDennis G. Jerzhttp://jerz.setonhill.edu