OUGD202 - Module Evaluation.

I have to say, I was very nervous about this module at first, but I really enjoyed it. It's definitely been the most challenging and frustrating module, for me, but also one of the most rewarding.

My research was generally consistent and was constantly informing my design direction. Searching on YouTube became a daily occurrence, though I found it difficult to find animations and DVD menus in the style I was looking for. So I found myself taking small influences from a lot of different videos. What I think has let me down, however, is research into print based materials. Other than the film covers, there was very little, print wise, that I looked into. I think, because it was a digital brief, I began to forget about it and focussed on looking into film titles and general animations, and I feel I've suffered because of this.

My storyboarding was good in the Silent Movie brief. I enjoyed it and found it was a good process for getting my ideas down. However, in the Movie Season brief, I started working on design sheets which I felt more comfortable with, and then putting them into storyboards once I felt they were working. My blogging wasn't as good as it had been in previous modules, especially on the context blog. I found that I had, and still have, a desktop full of images and videos that I got with the intention to put on my blog, but left it late to do so. This also applies to design sheets, storyboards and test videos, which is why I decided it was best to create a PDF for the module hand-in. I think my blogging was still really good, I just need to make sure everything goes up there, and to do so as soon as it's done, which is definitely something I will do in the next module.

I was really happy about how quickly I grasped the new software, I was confident about opening it up and testing different effects. I found that watching tutorials off YouTube was extremely helpful and encouraged my design development. I did, however, find it difficult in the beginning to think about how to animate objects. I didn't fully understand what was available to me within the software and there were a few occasions where what I had designed I wasn't actually going to be able to create in After Effects, which of course was quite frustrating.

Though I started creating my DVD Menu at quite an early stage, I found it took up a lot more time than I was expecting and everything became a big rush towards the hand-in. I had problems attaching my PDFs to the DVD, which I didn't timetable for, and had to sacrifice some of the time I was going to put into my DVD packaging. I know that technology never goes as planned, and will consider more time for this in the future. I found that towards the end of the module, once I had complete understanding the software, I was generating a lot more ideas and almost wished I could go back and start again, believing I could now come out with a much better outcome, which shows how much I have gained from this module.

I'm happy with my final idents. I feel they target my audience effectively as well as being appropriate for the E4 channel. I'm not overly keen on how they look though, which I guess is because they are all I've looked at for the past few weeks. There are a few things that aren't in time, and i'm constantly thinking of things I could of done differently, but overall I feel they are successful. I am very happy with my packaging, however. I really enjoyed this and wished I'd of given myself more time to develop it. Again, I began to forget about this as it was a digital brief. I hope I get the opportunity to look more into DVD packaging in a future brief.

One thing I was disappointed about was the quality of DVD Studio Pro. I know it couldn't be helped, but I found it very frustrating how my vector images looked so pixelated and almost tacky.

5 things I will do differently:
1. Blog everything. Make sure everything I look into and create goes straight up onto my blog.
2. Be more organised. By this I don't mean my time management, I mean my computer. I had folders and images everywhere on my desktop and it took time to find the files when I needed them.
3. More sketching and idea generation throughout.
4. Take advantage of the one-to-one tutorials, even if I don't feel I need it, or have things to be getting on with.
5. Test more ideas.

Attendance: 5
Punctuality: 5
Motivation: 5
Commitment: 5
Quantity of work produced: 4
Quality of work produced: 5