Final Soundslide

Speech For Final Soundslide

Of the 44 official years in the NFL’s history, this past decade has provided us with some of the most exciting seasons and super bowls. Dynasties have risen then fallen, and records have been set then broken. Teams have come from nowhere and won their division to surprise everyone.

Most of the reason this decade has been so great is because of all the new talent coming into the league each year. Such amazing athletes make for a better, more exciting game full of more great plays. Coaches have also changed their styles and created new schemes to fool opponents. Every player in the NFL is a great athlete, but some are more than great. They’re legendary.

Here are a few of the reasons why this decade qualifies as a great time for football.

From 2001-2005, the New England patriots were a dynasty, winning the super bowl in ’01, ’03, and ‘04. In 2007, they were the first team to have a perfect regular season since 1972. They were consistently among the best teams in the league year in and year out, these past two seasons, have not been so great for them.

Peyton Manning is another major reason why this era of football is so great. When he retires, he could go down as the greatest quarterback ever. Not only does he have the ring on his finger, but he has the numbers to earn himself at least consideration for MVP every year.

Another such player is Ladanian Tomlinson. He has been no doubt the best running back of these past 10 years. This year, he eclipsed the top 10 in all time rushing yards, and he now ranks 3^rd all time in touchdowns.

Another amazing story is Brett Favre. After playing with the Green Bay Packers for over 15 years, he ends up joining division rival Minnesota Vikings. Near the age of 40, he wasn’t thought to do much, but is now having one of the best seasons of his career.

Now, to look at the current season. For the first time in NFL history, there are two teams undefeated after 12 games – the New Orleans Saints, and the Indianapolis Colts. Both teams have dominated all year, and seem to have great chances at continuing their win streaks into he playoffs where they can potentially meet in the super bowl for an epic showdown.

To talk about the Saints, in case you didn’t see last Monday, they thoroughly dismantled the Patriots on Monday Night Football. The final score was 38-17, and all the New England fans that were talking trash all week suddenly went silent. It was wonderful, and I loved every second of it.

Final Soundslide Rationale

With this Soundslide, I was trying to use images and limited text to get my point to show how the current decade of the NFL is so historic. I did so by bringing up several players and teams that are really a privilege to watch, and using appropriate pictures.

I found the most challenging part to be figuring out how I would get all the information/slides to fit into the 2 minute limit while still getting all my points across. I did so my just cutting down on what was said for each topic and only keeping the really necessary stuff.

I'm most proud of how I was able to do the Soundslide by myself this time. The first one really gave me trouble.

If I had more time, I guess I would have added some effects into the PowerPoint slides and transitions to make it a little more visually appealing.

Bi/Bi Card Rationale

With this assignment I was just trying to re-create the card that I had chosen. I did so by making it look as much like the original as possible.

I think i had the hardest time with getting all the fonts/font sizes correct. It was tough to find ones that were the same as the card's. I got past this obstacle with trial and error until I found the correct font/size.

I'm most proud of how I actually was able to do it. To be honest I didn't think I had a chance of completing this assignment coming into it.

If I had more time, I honestly don't know what I would change. I can't think of anything major I'd like to chance, and at the end of the assignment I was so just happy to be done with it.

Website Rationale

There was no real aim for this assignment, just to make a basic website for my favorite sports team, the New Orleans Saints. I did so by using several pictures and tables to represent the data I chose to display.

The most challenging part of this assignment was figuring out how to use Dreamweaver. I had only used notepad and other basic html programs in the past, so I had to disregard that knowledge since this program is completely different. I went about this problem by getting help from other students and just toying around with the program.

The thing I'm most proud of is that I made a descent looking and functional website about the Saints, because they're awesome.

If I had more time I would change up the headers and footers a bit, maybe get some different fonts in there, and possibly add a "highlights" page with videos to watch.

Brochure Rationale

For the brochure, I just wanted to make an cool looking brochure that gave some basic info about the New Orleans Saints. I did so by using their team colors (black and gold) and including information such as their team roster and 2009 schedule.

I had the most trouble with aligning everything and making all my text fit while still being readable and attractive. I had to constantly change positions and sizes to get it right, but I eventually did.

I'm most proud of how I got the hang of Quark - a program I had never used or even heard of before. I felt like I did a good job considering it was my first time using Quark.

If I had more time, I would decrease the amount of space devoted to the roster on the inside of the brochure, and add something a bit more interesting.

Soundslide Rationale

file:///Volumes/private$/bgagnon603/Bee%20Gees%20Powerpoint/Bee_Gees_Soundslide/small.html
...I wasn't able to embed it, so here's the file link.

With this Soundslide, I was simply taking the PowerPoint I had already made, and making it into a slide show. I did so by using the Soundslide program and combining the previously used slide show pictures and the song from it.

I found the hardest part to be editing the slides to go with certain parts of the song. I got by this problem by a lot of trial and error.

If I had more time I would have tried to edit the slide show so that the slides were a little more even in terms of length, which was hard to do because of the way in which I wanted the slides to transition.

Poster Design Rationale

While creating the poster I was trying to promote my event while emphasizing the disco theme, with a slightly humorous approach. I did so by adding the text "Bell Bottoms!" to the poster, to go along with "Disco!" and "Open Bar!" to grab the viewers attention, make them laugh, and check out what the event has to offer.

I found the most challenging aspect of this assignment to be finding the right spots and sizes for the texts and picture. I found it difficult to include everything I wanted to say/show and then organize it in a way that was appealing. I just kind of fooled around with the texts, tried organizing them in different ways until I found something that was spacious and attractive.

There's not really one key thing I'm the most proud of, I'm just happy with the way my poster turned out. I believe I effectively displayed my event, held the disco theme, and added a bit of humor. I know disco isn't popular anymore, but I feel my poster would still catch several peoples' eyes and at least make them laugh - making them remember it.

If I had more time, I think the one thing I would have done would be to give a more attractive background, or maybe just add a few minor graphics to the poster itself. I'm happy with how it looks, but a non-solid black background could have done some good.

PowerPoint Design Rationale

In this portion of my project, I wanted to create an entertaining PowerPoint presentation on the Bee Gees and their prominence in the disco era. I chose a song that I knew most people would recognize, whether they knew it was by the Bee Gees or not, so they would be able to relate to it more.

I found the hardest part of this assignment, by far, was to time the transition of the slides, pictures, and text with the music being played. I overcame these challenges by frequently adjusting the transitions so that they went accordingly with the correct part of the song.

The thing I'm most proud of from this assignment is how I was able to time the slides and effects to go with the rhythm of the song. It took a lot of trial and error, but I was able to figure out the timing and use the transitions effectively.

If I had more time, the one thing I'd do would be to cut down a little bit of the information on a couple slides, so there would be a few extra seconds to read each slide. I had to keep it like it was so the timing with the music would work, making a few of the slide transitions come a little too soon.

Postcard Design Rationale

With the postcard, I was trying to achieve the satisfaction of making a cool-looking design I would actually be proud of. I chose graphics that dealt with football, more specifically my favorite team, the New Orleans Saints. It doesn't really apply to the quote, but it's football season and it was something I was into.

I changed around the hue and saturation a lot to add some color to it, as the teams colors are white, black, and gold - which go well with many colors. I obviously layered the pictures so they were all visible even if overlapping, and I feel I accomplished my goals.

I was having a hard time adding colors to the right parts, as it would often be too dark or light to see a certain picture in the group. However, with much trial and error I was able to get the placement right and the colors to look good where they were without too much contrast.

I'm most proud of how I used several pictures of my favorite sports team to make one visually attractive picture full of color, sweet pictures, and of course the Saints. If I had more time, I guess I would add a few more detailed pictures of players or logos to liven it up a bit.

Contact Sheet Design Rationale

In this project, I used a variety of images to create several perspectives of each image in a contact sheet.
I wasn't really hoping to achieve anything about how good it looked, I just wasnted to do it correctly and get a grasp on the basics to photoshop.
Some of the variations included higher/lower resolution pictures, adding colored tints or black and white affects, close-ups and wide angle shots, abstract views of an image, and photos with various photoshop effects used on it.

What I found to be most challenging was altering the resolution to crop the pictures to the right size, while still making them fit into the contact sheet appropriately. I solved these problems with trial and error, but mostly got some help from classmates.
What I am most proud of would probably just be finishing the assignment correctly. As a photoshop novice, I didnt really know what I was doing at first, but after a little practice I got the hand of it fairly well.
If I was allowed more time, the one thing I would probably do differently would be to experiment more with color, saturation, and other basic effects to get a better feel for them.
There were 6 different pictures used in all, and 23 pictures after editing. The contact sheet shows just a sample of how you can show different perspectives of a picture using photoshop.

Font Poem Design Rationale

In the font poem project, I was hoping to convey my chosen quote in a visual attractive way while also trying to make the layout appropriate for the quote. To do so, I used a variety of fonts and sizes. I made certain words larger to emphasize them, and also used effects like "skew" and "warp" to change the position and layout of the word to alter its appearance.

I found that the most challenging part of this assignment was to get the words sized and positioned in an abnormal fashion that didn't look stupid. I didn't want to just place the words randomly, but I also wanted to make it look kinda funky and abstract. I solved these problems just by trial and error, seeing what looked good and what didn't.

I'm most proud of the quote that i picked and how i conveyed it. I feel my quote strongly relates to me, and I did my best to present the quote in a way that proves the point the quote makes.

If I had more time, I would add some minor graphics, or maybe a few more effects on the letters so there was a little more than just words going on.

Foundations Exercise

In this project, I took two images of a hand (both sides) and made them appear transparent.
This effect makes the image more interesting, and sort of gives the impression the hands are touching.

first blog

hurray. i did it.