Site Critique #1

BrooklynKids.org

Navigation

It was definitely easy to navigate. I automatically saw the links in the middle of the screen, and when I hovered over each, options showed up. Then once you click where you want to go, you are sent to a page that has all the new options on the left hand side and the original ones at the top. 

The tabs and drop-down menus are visual clues. The tabs are kind of metaphors for real tabs and folders. These metaphors are organizational metaphors. The site also uses a mix of visual and functional metaphors at the bottom with the conta

ct information. It show s letter for the E-Newsletter and a calendar for their calendar. The site also uses arrows to go to the next image, which perform as visual metaphors.

Information Architecture:

I am right off the bat shown from the large title that the site is for the Brooklyn Children's Museum and see below who they are with a description. I then see tabs of information organized by category. I can easily access this content by clicking. However, I have to hover over the tab to get drop-down menus in order to see all the options. 

Usability:

This site is very easy to use. By categorizing the options in menus, the user can easily navigate to the desired page. The metaphors make sense because they are typi

cal metaphors used on many websites. Overall, the site sustains my inter

est and engagement because I am curious what is beneath each menu. I see animated graphics, but I am not distracted by too many things going on. 

Meaning-Making (Narrative and Metaphoric Structures):

Through the graphics, text and colors used, we see a site that is aimed toward children and parents. Metaphors are being used with the tabs, the arrows to go to the next image, the rectangular shapes that bevel out to look like buttons t

hat exist just as that, the bottom contact visuals, and even the images are put on a background to make them look like Polaroid pictures. there is somewhat of a story that happens with the top graphics as ch

ildren move within the city, riding bikes, dancing, etc. The narrative is non-linear. I t only exists on the main page.

Reflection of the User:

The site reflects the user when you get mouse feedback. The color of certain text changes when hovered over, or a drop-down menu come up. The site does not change according to my specific visit and does not store any choices that I have made. I am engaged at first to explore the site by the music, animations, drop-down menus and colors, but get bored easily especially on the other pages. 

The design of the site leads me to pay more attention to certain conten

t. I pay attention specifically to content such as the menus. 

The site is very transparent and natural to use in that it is setup as most websites are with tabs and drop-down menu. In doing this the viewer is led to focus  more on the content, however, the viewer is reminded of the design with the graphics up top. The transparency of 

the site makes sense for what it is intending because it is aimed more at children and parents who want to be able to easily navigate through the site and et the information they need, but also need a little non-complex interactivity to stay involved in the site. 

Screen Shots:

All Done!

Here is my final video! Overall I am really happy how it turned out. Obviously if I had more time, there are a few things I would change, but I think it's complete!

Ok so maybe I won't post this video and you all will just have to wait to see it until class, because it was taking forever to load and I am too impatient.

Almost Done!

So I worked the other day on the video for about 6 hours and got a lot done. Today I am just making some final alterations and rendering my video for output. I obviously ran into a few problems while making my video, but I feel like I successfully figured out how to make the video work. I was proud of myself because when I did run into problems I didn't just give up and change the video. I looked up the tutorials or asked questions in class, and figured it out.

One problem I ran into was how I was going to zoom into sections by scaling up using the anchor points. I figured out how to move the branches and blossoms together, but since the blood had its own anchor point I didn't really know what to do. I finally realized that I could use the branches/blossoms as a parent, and the blood as a child. So that whatever the branches/blossoms did the blood would do as well. This worked out great.

I also ran into the problem that I couldn't watch my entire video all at once because it was too long and detailed. But with the help of Krista I render some parts of it into videos, which saved on space and figured out how to watch certain sections by moving the time ruler.

Next I had to figure out how to use an illustrator file and move around the parts within that one layer. I used the puppet pin tool and created points on the blood in order to pull and move certain sections.

Now I just have to finish and put up the video, woo!

Workin...

I have been working on this video all day today. Here is a small section of it.

Video... so far

Here is my video so far. It doesn't have much of the titles yet, I am going to work on that next. But the tree grows, woo!

Woo!

Well, I feel pretty proud of my progress last class, and am excited that we have an extra week to complete this project. I now can put a lot more time and effort into it and have a better result. Last class I got my tree branches to grow, and they look pretty realistic, at least compared to what I originally had. First, I was going to animate my hand drawing the branches, but this was looking really sloppy and unrealistic. So I watched the tutorial on masking and learned that this technique would work well for my situation.

My next task is animating the blossoms. I have found that the time consuming part is not the actual animating, but finding and understanding the technique in which to use. I talked to Krista last class, and I think I have a good idea of how I am going to do this. I am going to simplify the blossoms further, making them look less decorative. I think this will help tie the blossoms back to the movie. My goal is to work on this this weekend and then next week I can work on the blood dripping and the text.

Starting to work in After Effects

So I started working in after effects the last few days. I watched almost all of the tutorials, but I still feel overwhelmed. Right now I am trying to animate my tree branch growing, which is not working out as I planned. After Effects unfortunately doesn't have very many paintbrush types, so my branches look very unrealistic, but I think the clean lines may be better for Kill Bills tone. I am also very bad at using the brush tool and my hand goes all crazy. I am using the duration write on effect that records what I do and how fast, but I am just not good at reenacting a realistic betrayal of a tree growing. Hopefully this will work out.