Calendar: Multimedia Writing / Santos 2007

Week One: Introducing (Almost) Everything

Welcome to English 419, Multimedia writing. Over the course of the semester this homepage will display our current week's calendar. Additionally, I'll post announcements and reminders, so be sure to check here before every class.

For our first session, we'll be going over the course syllabus and projects. I look forward to working with all of you. The books for this course are on sale at Border's on the Levee--be sure to pick them up this week.

As the header suggests, we'll use this week to accompany ourselves with ourselves and meet some of the primary software and concepts we will be relying on this semester.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - Course Syllabus, Projects, Materials
  - New Media Introductions
- For Next Session:
  - Watch Maria Claudia Cortes' Flash animation Color in Motion
  - Read Mike Rundle's article on Robin Williams' introductory design concept: C.R.A.P.
  - Read article on focal points from N-Sane
  - Purchase books from Borders
Thursday
- Class:
  - Finish New Media Introductions
  - Quizercise! PowerPoint Reflections
  - Introduce Project One: CD Package Project (Genre Analysis)
  - Macromedia Fireworks Introduction
- For Next Session:
  - Develop content for Project One
  - Begin sketches for Project One
  - Locate 10 images for Project One (add to print or digital journal)

Week Two: See the Music

This week will focus on developing image manipulation and design skills.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - Examine a little more C.R.A.P.
  - Introduce typography (types of fonts)
  - Quizercise! Recreate a CD cover (30 minutes)
- For Next Session:
  - Read GDS, "Overview of Graphic Design" (22-43) & "Packaging Design" (229-250)
  - Create a Creative Brief (GDS, 27) for Project One
Thursday
- Class:
  - Share creative briefs, sketches, and portfolio materials.
- For Next Session:
  - Read GDS, "Fundamentals of Graphic Design" (46-71)
  - Complete roughs of Project One

Week Three: Let Us See the Music

This week will focus on completing Project One, with emphasis on typography and peer review.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - Reading Quiz
  - Share Project One review rubric
  - Workday
- For Next Session:
  - Finish Project One
  - Read GDS, "Typography" (74-101) and "Layout" (103-123)
Thursday
- Class:
  - Peer review session for Project One
- For Next Session:
  - Project One: CD Package Project Due Next Session
  - Read GDS, "Advertising" (255-291)

Week Four: (Re)Make it Work

This week introduces our second project: the advertising project. We'll continue to work with visual rhetoric as groups design advertising campaigns (make-overs) for existing products.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - Introduce Project Two: Advertising Campaign
  - Begin developing product "pitches."
- For Next Session:
  - Quizercise! Compose a brief (2-4 minute) PowerPoint "pitch" for your project.
Thursday
- Class:
  - Share Quizercise "pitches"
  - Form groups
- For Next Session:
  - Read GDS, "Visual Identity and Branding" (161-176) and "Logos/Symbols/Pictograms" (129-154)

Week Five: Sex Doesn't Always Necessarily Sell Stuff

This week teams will work out their marketing strategies, conduct more research, and collect materials.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - Develop team creative briefs
  - For additional market research, check out your product on YouTube.
  - To validate your code, input your URL into the w3c validator.
  - For a list of the basic HTML tags, check out the w3c HTML Basic Tags tutorial.
- For Next Session:
  - Email complete creative briefs to Santos by 6:00 p.m.
  - Begin research and collecting materials (time to pump up those portfolios)
Thursday
- Class:
  - Quizercise!
  - Professionalism, ethos, and email
- For Next Session:
  - Work on Project Two

Week Six: And the Winner is...

This week teams will complete Project Two.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - Work session
- For Next Session:
  - Work on Project Two
Thursday
- Class:
  - Complete advertising campaigns
- For Next Session:
  - Project Two: Advertising Campaign, with postmortem due Tuesday
  - Bring an html, xhtml (preferred), .doc or .txt resume to Tuesday's class
  - Read, from Karl Stolley's Sustainable Web Design resources site, everything through and including the "Material Treatment" section.

Week Seven: Introducing Everything Else.

This week will introduce XHTML (eXtensible Hypertext Mark-up Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets)--the core materials for the rest of our semester. To hone our skills, we will develop "web resumes"--in Tuesday's class we will work on creating valid XHTML (our content); on Thursday we will create valid CSS (our form). Look ma, no tables!

Tuesday
- Class:
  - Look at Karl Stolley's Sustainable Web Design (SWD) site
  - Discuss file naming and saving to your WWW drive
  - Learn the basic kinds of semantic XHTML tags (p, h, ul, li,)
  - Introduce Project Three: Web Resume
  - Code our resumes
  - Show how to link to validator
- For Next Session:
  - Complete semantic coding of resume
  - Make sure resume is valid XHTML
  - Read SWD, "Document Structure"
Thursday
- Class:
  - Quizercise: XHTML validation
  - CSS and you
- Homework
  - Finish coding content; validate three XHTML pages (your resume, another and yet another)
  - Try a CSS tutorial; either search and find one or try Eric Meyer's Complex Spiral.
  - Read SWD, "Document Structure" and "Advanced Document Structure"

Week Eight: CSS' All There Is to It?

This week we will practice some advanced XHTML mark-up techniques and introduce CSS.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - Quizercise: What's wrong with this code?
  - Introduce CSS selectors
- For Next Session:
  - Read SWD, "Document Presentation"
Thursday
- Class:
  - Quizercise: Santos' grocery list
  - Lots of CSS
- Homework
  - Work on Project Three

Week Nine: CSS' All There Is to It?

This week we will practice some advanced XHTML mark-up techniques and introduce CSS.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - Collect URL's for Project Three (Professional web presence). Please begi make your subject line "Project 3:[lastname]"
  - Run "webfix" for with CRT 5.1
  - Introduce Zen Garden project
  - Give inspiration surf and sketch time
  - Point out CSS tutorials--especially CSS Play and CultureCode's "properties" reference.
  - Demonstrate a code grab: how to find and "borrow" xhtml, css, images, etc.
- For Next Session:
  - Read Zen Garden, Chapter 2. We will discuss chapters 1 and 2 on Thursday. Here's a helpful link from mezzoblue (Dave Shea's personal site).
Thursday
- Class:
  - Advanced CSS selectors: working with classes and spans
  - Zen Garden reconstruction: last chance for questions
- Homework
  - Work on Project Four
  - Read Zen Garden 3-5

Week Ten: TBA

This week XXX.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - x
  - y
  - z
- For Next Session:
  - a
  - b
  - c
Thursday
- Class:
  - x
- Homework
  - a

Week Eleven: TBA

This week XXX.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - x
  - y
  - z
- For Next Session:
  - a
  - b
  - c
Thursday
- Class:
  - x
- Homework
  - a

Week Twelve: Service Learning Project

This week we will finish our Zen Garden project and begin working on our service learning project, redesigning the INVOD [srceenshot] website.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - Work day for Zen Garden Project.
  - Upon conclusion, project URL's should be submitted to Santos
- For Next Session:
  - Finish Zen Garden projects
  - Review comments on Resume projects
Thursday
- Class:
  - Introduce Service Learning Project
  - Review client's email
  - Explore existing website
  - Form groups
  - Set calendar
- Homework
  - Complete (X)HTML validation due Thursday, April 5th

Week Thirteen: Accessibility and web Standards

This week should be spent re-coding and validating the INVOD website. Groups should consider meeting with Santos as they begin sketching designs.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - Optional: Santos will be in MTHW 301 should you have questions
- For Next Session:
  - Bring your validated XHTML code for accessibility check.
Thursday
- Class:
  - Mandatory:
  - Accessibility
  - Display Validation: for your final project, this information should be displayed on every page (at least XHTML and CSS 1.0 Strict validation information should be displayed).
    - Standard W3C validation logo
    - Modifying the W3C validation logo
    - Text replacement for W3C validation
  - Preparing for the Beta Test
    - Plan to meet with me when you have a rough done. I will be available during class time next week, and also other times by appointment. I expect to meet with each group (at least two representatives) before the in-class beta test.
    - Additionally, for the beta test, we want a cross-browser check. This means creating a "conditional comment" CSS sheet. Instructions for this XXX. I have an example of a conditional comment in action on the Friends of the Cary Home website.
    - Briefly: A conditional comment requires a separate CSS document for Internet Explorer. Its important to remember that CSS cascades values--simply deleting something from your IE style sheet will not do anything--you need to "overwrite" the value. For instance, lets say you are putting in 20 pixels worth of padding through your original CSS. This looks terrible in Explorer, so you want to get rid of the padding. Do not delete the padding:20px;, instead you have to change it to padding:0px;. Make sense?
  - Homework
    - Due Tuesday, April 17th: Site beta testing. You need to have your site, with working and validated CSS, available on line.
    - Remember that your final portfolio is due during finals week. This is a significant revision to your 3rd project--and it needs to have a conditional comment CSS page (I will look at the page in three browsers: Mozilla Firefox (PC), Internet Explorer (PC), and Safari (MAC).

Week Fourteen: TBA

This week I will meet with groups to see their design sketches.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - Optional: Santos will be in MTHW 301 should you have questions
- For Next Session:
  - Continue working on design
Thursday
- Class:
  - Optional: Santos will be in MTHW 301 should you have questions
- Homework
  - Continue working on design

Week Fifteen: TBA

This week will focus on beta testing redesings and ensuring cross-browser support. We will create conditional comment sheets for IE and work on media="print" CSS.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - Mandatory: In class we will beta test sites. Additionally, sites will receive commentary from Jeremy Tirrell's 419 class
- For Next Session:
  - Each group should summarize feedback from beta testing (both the in-class and the other 419 class) into a one single-spaced page report. A hard-copy of this report will be given to Santos in class Thursday
Thursday
- Class:
  - Mandatory: Collect beta-testing reports
  - Create conditional comment for IE
  - Create CSS for media="print"
  - Cover final project submission guidelines
- Homework
  - Completed Project URL due on Tuesday. In addition to URL's, completed projects should be submitted to Santos on CD in manilla folder (CD should contain entire website along with cover letter).

Week Sixteen: Professional Portfolio

This week wraps everything up.

Tuesday
- Class:
  - Mandatory: In class we will cover final project requirements. Final project URL's must be sent to Santos by the conclusion of final's week.
  - Additionially, final portfolio CD's must be delivered to Santos' office (Heavilon 415) by the conclusion of final's week. Final portfolio CD's should contain the following folders (if you can't figure out what goes in each folder then you don't belong in college):
    - project1_cd
    - project2_ad
    - project3_resume
    - project4_zen
    - project5_service
    - project6_final
    Be sure to include project post-mortems where applicable.
- For Next Session:
  - You have plenty to work on.
Thursday
- Class:
  - Mandatory: Our final session will be a course reflection. Class location T.B.A.
- Homework
  - Live well and play nice.

English 419: Multimedia Writing

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