Week 4 Blog Assignment

Hello again fellow blogers! This week in class we are discussing podcasts and programs to assist in the making of podcasts! If you don't know, a podcast is an audio recording of someone talking about a subject. Usually podcasts are made about subjects people are very passionate about. The word podcast is a play on the word broadcast combined with the word iPod. I thought that was interesting because Apple had no part in creating the term podcast. Furthermore, anyone can create a podcast, it is becoming the "new" radio.
 
The main program we learned in class this week was Audacity. Audacity is an incredibly useful and easy program to use. It allows you to easily edit your recording, apply effects, and mix it with music. There are so many cool tools like fading music into and fading out of your voice recording.We also learned about some really cool side effects that you can add to your voice recording. Some of these included the sound of eating in a cafeteria, the sound of rain pouring, a door opening, and various animal sounds. These are creative ways to catch your listeners attention, build suspense, and maybe supply a laugh or two. The different number of sound effects are almost endless.

All in all, I foresee podcasts becoming even more popular than they are now, and people will continue to make and purchase them. Doing a simple search of 'podcasts' on the apple istore will provide you with hundreds of podcasts that you can choose from.

Until next time!

http://www.how-to-podcast-tutorial.com/what-is-a-podcast.htm

http://multimedia.journalism.berkeley.edu/tutorials/audacity/audio-editing/

http://podcasting.about.com/od/recordingequipment/fr/deepaud.htm

http://www.freemusicbeds.com/

Week 3 Blog Assignment

Hello again bloggers! This week I will be writing about basic web design and key principles. I will first start with the acronym called C.R.A.P. which stands for contrast, repetition, alignment, and proximity. These four key concepts can make or break your website! Contrast stands for how much something appears to stand out, finding the right balance of contrast can be difficult but necessary! Repetition stands for repeating a a certain theme or style throughout a website. If every webpage is different on the same website then the reader will probably be confused and wonder if they accidentally left the site, so make sure to stay consistent with your style! Alignment can be a difficult concept to master at first, so there are a couple things that the you must realize! You cannot be afraid of white space, or blank space. This space often sets something apart and is done purposefully by a lot of design professional. The next thing to take into mind is the tendency to want to center everything. Centering all of your text/pictures was cool when you were young and didn't know better, but it's time to master the art of a hard edge right/left alignment. Also, stay consistent with your alignments! Proximity is how certain information is grouped together. If information is related to each other or all has something in common, it should be grouped closely together so the reader knows!

I got all of my information on basic webdesign from the following site. For more information on basic webdesign, please see this site: http://library.albany.edu/imc/webdesign/


The next thing to consider when designing are a few simple rules. First, your website should be easy to read! The reader should have no difficulties reading your text or trying to find important information. The next rule is your site should be easy to navigate! No hard to find pages or hidden links. The last rule I will discuss is supplying your contact information. If you do not have your information, at least have a "contact us" page so readers can summit comments, questions, or concerns.

I got all of my information on these from the following site. For more information on these rules plus more, please see this site: http://www.grantasticdesigns.com/5rules.html#find


The last topic on basic webdesign I will cover is layout. There are three important parts to layout. First is the home page. Your home page is similar to your "first impression" when meeting someone, so make sure it is clean and clear! The next part is your site index section. This is where all your links/tabs to the webpages contained on your website. Make sure these links are easy to find and are consistent throughout the website. The last part of your layout is your content. This could be text or pictures. With your text and alignment your content sections it is important to stay consistent throughout each page!

I got all of my information on web layout from the following site. For more information on basic web layout, please visit: http://www.rocketface.com/organize_website/website_basic_layout.html

Week 2 Blog Assignment

Hello again bloggers! This weekend in COMM 350 we have began learning about Adobe Photoshop and just the basics the program offers. Thus far I have learned about the text, move, gradient, and layer functions. I find it so interesting that there is so many different things you can do with the limited functions we have just touched on. The most important aspect of photoshop that I have learned so far would be about the layers. When creating a image, I find it so cool that you can tweak and edit each layer without effecting the entire image. Here are some helpful websites and videos to help you get started with the basics of photoshop!

http://www.photoshopessentials.com/basics/

http://sixrevisions.com/graphics-design/35-basic-tutorials-to-get-you-started-with-photoshop/

http://www.photoshoplab.com/photoshop-tool-basics.html

Week 1 Blog Assignment

Hello readers!

My name is Jake and this will be my blog for Winter quarter of 2012. I am a senior at Western Washington University, and this blog is an assignment for my COMM 350 Emerging Technologies. I chose to take this class because when I gradate on March 17th 2012, I want to be a step ahead of people that I will be competing against for the same jobs!

The top ten rules of webdesign!
 

One	Simple is good. All of my favorite websites are very simple. Google, Apple, Facebook, all ready simple designed websites. When I make my website I imagine it being very simple and easy to follow for the reader while still being aesthetically pleasing.
Two	Design is paramount. When I first visit a website, I always look at the overall design of the site. If it has a good design the site will flow well and be organized in a way that makes the reader have to the least about of "searching" possible.
Three	Navigation should be intuitive. This goes off of organization and "searching". The better your website is organized and there are clean and clear links to information, which will make "searching" very easy for the users.
Four	Consistency is key. Just like designing any sort of page (brochure, magazine, book, ect) it is very import to stay consistent for the entire piece. It will make the website much easier to follow for users.
Five	Color choice is critical. We have all been to websites that just plain hurt our eyes, that is not what you want to do. This rule goes off of rule number one - stay simple. You neutral colors that do not clash with each other. Do not use too many colors on one page.
Six	Don't forget the content. Nothing frusterates me more than visiting a website that has little information on each page, but a lot of pages! Make sure you haee a lot of information on the topic you decide to create your website about. No one wants to visit your website and feel like its "missing" something.
Seven	Make use of the full browser window. People with large monitors typically don't like seeing all the content of a Web page crammed into one tenth of their screen. Most sites created by Sharpened Productions scale to fill the browser window so that people with monitors of all sizes can make the most out of their screen real estate. If you need to use a fixed size, you can count on most visitors using a resolution of at least 1024x768.
Eight	Develop for multiple browsers. Despite what Microsoft would like you to believe, not everybody on the Web uses Internet Explorer on a Windows-based PC.  That is why we check our sites in multiple browsers on multiple platforms -- to make sure everything appears uniformly. It is always best to catch problems ahead of time instead of relying on visitor complaints.
Nine	Check the site for errors. Just like we proof-read our academic papers before we submit them, it is important to check your website for errors! We don't want our users to come to our site and find bugs or errors.
Ten	Write your own code. Though we typically use Adobe GoLive to create your page layout, we also follow and edit the HTML that is being generated. When it comes to Web scripting, we write everything from scratch.  While some people tend to grab pre-written scripts for every action they need, they are clueless when something goes wrong or doesn't work.  It is also easier to customize the code we write, allowing us to avoid the "template appearance" of many other sites on the Web.