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Please note that dates listed are due dates for assignments!

9/10/07

9/17/07

  • (in class) Blog Post: Recommend a site! Tell everyone about a site you recommend and why: what do you like, what will people find or do, what do you think of the design. The site doesn’t have to be about web design or even be an example of good design.
  • (in class) Submit your “final” XHTML document, created in class

9/24/07

  • (in class) First Published Documents: Publish two documents (created in class) and submit links to them using the homework form.
  • Weekly Blog Post: Stinky Sites! In your blog, nominate at least one site whose “design could be improved” or that “needs a little help” or that “stinks like something long dead.” Tell your readers what is wrong with the site and provide some practical advice on how it could be better.

10/1/07

  • No extra homework. Make sure you are caught up with in-class work and your blogging.

10/8/07

  • Publish Chapter 4 Exercise files from text. Submit link to chapter folder using this homework form.
  • Keep blogging— two personal posts this week

10/15/07

  • Publish Chapter 5 Exercise files from text. Submit link to chapter folder using this homework form.
  • Weekly blog post: Typography - Some sites use type and fonts well, some do not. Find and share at least one example of a site where you think the typography is particularly well-done (or meaningful) and one where it is not well-done or even a problem. Submit a link to your post.

10/22/07

  • Weekly blog post: Color - Try to find and share a site for each of the color schemes we talked about: monochromatic, complementary, triad, analogous. If you are successful this will be at least four sites. You may not find them all. But for every site you look at, ask yourself: what scheme does this most closely fit? Submit a link to your post.
  • In Class Exercise: Submit a link to your home.html page.

10/29/07

  • Weekly blog post: Who’s using CSS? Revisit your “recommended” site from Sep. 17 homework and some of your favorite sites… view the source— are they using CSS? Can you find any tables, font tags, or other “old-school” code? Does the “print preview” look significantly different from the visual site (are they using a print style sheet)? Document your findings on your blog. Submit a link to your post.
  • Publish Chapter 6 Exercise files from text using this homework form.

11/12/07

  • The Super Page. Using nested tables and CSS formatting, create a page that looks as similar to this one as possible. A few notes about the page: it should scale to fit the browser window (that’s the grey border in the image), be sure to create styles for links and headers (as well as other text), and you can use any image you want. This isn’t about making a “pretty” page, but about making a page that looks like this one using the proper skills! Use the Super Page form to submit a link to your finished page.
  • Complete the (short) Final Project Paragraph form. This just gives me an idea of your topic and some very basic information. If you are working on a site from the CIOS 246 class or a site for work, etc. please submit the form anyway, just note in the form to see that submission.
  • Weekly Blog Post: Dreamweaver Thoughts. Answer the following questions in a blog post:
    • What are the most frustrating/difficult things about Dreamweaver so far?
    • What do you like best about Dreamweaver so far?
    • If you have experience coding pages with other tools (or by hand), compare your experience using Dreamweaver… is it better? Worse? A mixed bag?
    • Submit a link to your post.

11/19/07

  • Weekly Blog Post: Thinking About Copyright Consider these scenarios in a blog post— do you think the current copyright laws are fair, unfair? Should there be such a thing as “intellectual property”? Have you ever used materials in a way that was against copyright? Have you ever been unable to use something because copyright law prevented it? Submit a link to your post.

12/03/07

Weekly Blog Post: Fireworks - Good, Bad, Ugly

Now that you’ve had some hands-on time with Fireworks, what did you find most interesting and/or fun about using it? What was the most frustrating or difficult aspect so far? Submit a link to your post.

Bitmap Editing

For this assignment you can use images you have created yourself (by scanning or with a digital camera), or you can use bitmap images found on the web at sites like flickr. If you use an image from the web, please provide a link to the original image.
We will go over exporting and file formats in a later lesson. For now, you can use your images in any of the popular web-viewable formats (JPG, PNG, GIF)— just use “Save As” to save the image in an appropriate format if it isn’t in one of those three already!
Use this homework form to submit a link to a connected set of web pages that display pairs of images, one original and one finished version, demonstrating the following techniques:
  1. Scaling Starting with an image that is larger than 400 pixels wide, make a copy that is scaled to be 250 pixels wide and 72 pixels/inch. The height can be whatever is necessary to maintain the proportions and not distort the image. Example
  2. Cropping Your page should show the original image you are starting with and a cropped version emphasizing a particular aspect of the picture and scaled appropriately. Example
  3. Selecting Using the selection tools (magic wand, marquee, lasso) select a part of an image and place it on a new image with an appropriately colored canvas (or background image). Example
  4. Cloning Use the Rubber Stamp tool to clone a piece (or pieces) of an image. Example

Vector Editing

Create a new Fireworks document of your own, sized 800 pixels wide, 600 pixels tall. On that document use vector tools to create objects and perform the following tasks:

  • Create objects using the ellipse, polygon, and your choice of at least two other shape tools
  • Use tools to scale and rotate some of the objects
  • Add live effects (live filters) to one shape
  • Group some of the shapes into a group
  • Import a *small* graphic from outside Fireworks (a thumbnail or small sized flickr image works well for this)

Use this homework form to submit a link to a web page with your final image.

12/10/07

Optimizing and Exporting

Find or create two different images—one should include bitmap information (a photo) and another with vector items. Save three different versions of each in the format you think best:

  • No compression
  • High Compression and Settings with Artifacts and Flaws
  • Optimal Compression (in your opinion)

Put the first set of images on a page, the second set on another page, publish them, and send me a link to view them using this form.

Playing with Text

Create a new Fireworks document of your own, sized 800 pixels wide, 600 pixels tall. On that document use vector tools to create objects and perform the following tasks:

  • Place some text that is 48 points, bold, stretched to 130%, color (your choice), no anti-aliasing
  • Place the word “AWE” on the canvas twice in regular text, at least 96 points in size. In on copy, kern between A-W and W-E to make the word look more balanced.
  • Place some text that runs vertical, left to right
  • Place a vector shape of your choice and attach a line of text (at least three words) to it. Try to size, arrange, stretch, and otherwise manipulate the text (and shape) to make an aesthetically pleasing combination.

Publish your document(s) with text images to the web and submit them using this form.

12/20/07

Final Project

Use the Final Project form to submit a link to view your final project. If I can’t discover all your work by following links, please provide additional direct links in the “Additional Links” text box. Use the “Notes” text box to point things out you want to be sure I pay attention to, questions you might have about proceeding further, etc.


Page last modified on September 15, 2008, at 11:01 AM