Adobe Flash Week 4, Assignment #4 - Visiting the Dutch Countryside!

Wow! It's the week of February 13th!! The weeks are flying by - after this week, we will have 5 days of school left in February!! Soon we will be sending out progress grades and the quarter is going to be over!! This blog is your opportunity to post your completed assignment for the "Working with Symbols and Managing our Library" assignment - also known as the Windmill Assignment. I hope you had fun creating your own little windmill scene. I aways associate windmills with the Dutch countryside - specifically Zaanse Schans and Keukenhof ... perhaps you'll travel there someday.

Similar to previous assignments, the blog questions are:

• Describe the assignment you just completed? What was the task and what needed to be done in order for you to successfully complete the assignment?
• What new skills did you learn from completing this assignment? Be specific and use correct names for the different tools you needed to use to complete the assignment. ie Classic Motion Guide, Keyframes, symbols, etc.  Reread the assignment description or watch the tutorial to remind yourself
• Was the assignment easy to complete? Did you have any trouble? What did you have trouble with and how did you resolve the issue? What was the most fun aspect of the project and the most challenging?
• Besides making the windmill rotate consistently using these new skills, what other types of animations could you make successfully now using similar tools to the ones used in this project?

As we finish this week, for those of you who have had a great start, keep it up - for those of you who struggled as we got going, now's your time to stay focused and get all of your assignments in - progress grades come out Friday. For your blog - please be sure to write well written thorough responses that you would be proud to share your friends, family and, of course, ME :)

Menlo College Reflection

  

Good Morning and Happy Tuesday!  What an amazing experience yesterday - to be able to get off our High School campus and have the opportunity to visit a college/university in our own community.  This morning, it would be a shame not to take a moment to reflect on this experience.  Below are a series of questions I hope you will take the time to think about and reflect on to personally benefit yourself.  Take your time - this is due at the end of the period:

• Introduce the activity you were involved in yesterday - what did you physically do?  Include the name of college visited and day/date visited
• What was your overall impression, or feeling, about this college?
• Can you imagine yourself attending this college, or one like it? Why or why not?
• What did you like best about this college?
• What did you like least?
• What were some important details you learned from being on the trip yesterday?
• What would you like to know more about?
• How will your visit yesterday affect your future plans? Will you apply to this college (or one like it)? Why or why not?
• How has the college visit affected your decision about going to college and ideas about what you need or want from a post-secondary education?
• What is your interest level in getting a 4 year college degree on a scale of 1 to 5 (1= not interested; 5 = absolutely will get that degree).  Did yesterday's trip affect your commitment level to this?
• What do you personally need to do (be specific) to go to a college like the one you visited yesterday?

Although it seems like a different topic, please finish your post today by discussing the class scheduled you plan to sign up for next year.  While you will all be enrolled in Academy Government/Econ and AP Computer Science Principles, what other courses do you also plan to enroll in and how will those help you with ensuring you are meeting your personal academic goals?  What are some steps you can take to ensure you are getting the best grades possible?

Thanks for your thorough and thoughtful response!!  I look forward to reviewing it!

Adobe Flash Week 3, Assignment #3 - Planes will fly!

Hello!  This week we continued building on our skills by learning how to better manage layers in our animations, and make simple scenes that can ultimately be strung together to make more complex animated movies.  For this assignment you were required to use a minimum of 4 layers to create a background image, a plane flying from one side of your screen to the other while doing a flip in the air as it follows a motion guide. Work to have a very detailed background as you use this as an opportunity to develop new skills using a variety of drawing tools. Remember, the more creativity, the better.  Once you have completed the assignment and posted it to Google Classroom, please embed your video on your blog and respond to the following questions:

1. Describe the assignment you just completed?  What was the task and what needed to be done in order for you to successfully complete the assignment?
2. What new skills did you learn from completing this assignment?  Be specific and use correct names for the different tools you needed to use to complete the assignment.  ie Classic Motion Guide, Keyframes, etc.
3. Was the assignment easy to complete?  Did you have any trouble?  What did you have trouble with and how did you resolve the issue?  What was the most fun aspect of the project and the most challenging?
4. Besides making a plane fly using these new skills, what other types of animations could you make successfully now using similar tools to the ones used in this project?

Once you have finished all of the assignment requirements for this week, please use any additional time you have (if any) to complete work for your classes that is either due soon or is past due, take a look at the opportunity board posted in Google Classroom, etc.

Thank you!

Adobe Flash Week 2 - Assignment #2

Hello!! Thanks so much for working well on your Motion Guide Animations this week. You are learning a lot of new skills and, while there is still a lot to learn, this first part can often be the steepest of the learning curve!! Stay calm, focus and you'll do great!! A reminder that once you are done with your motion guide assignment, please export it to a Quicktime file and upload to youtube so that it can be easily posted in Google Classroom and embedded on your blog. For more specific instructions, please refer to the assignment handout.

Under the video you post to the blog, please quickly respond to the following:

• Explain the assignment in your own word for the person who may be viewing this assignment.
• What were you expected to do to successfully complete this assignment?
• What were 3 different tools (or more if you want to be extra thorough) that you had to work with in Flash to successfully complete this project?
• What did you enjoy about this project? What was challenging? Why, when sometimes things are difficult, is it an important characteristic to be resilient?

After completing and posting this assignment, please be sure to also read this weeks lecture and complete the quiz!

Thanks and looking forward to seeing some amazing animations and your skills continue to grow!

Happy New Year!!

Good Morning and Welcome Back!!

It is hard to believe that it has been over two weeks since we have been together!  I bet you missed me :)  In any case, I wanted to start off the morning with a quick recap of your break!  How was it? What did you do?  What was the highlight?  What is one reason you are excited to be back at school?

As a second part to today's post, as you know around the world as the New Year kicks off, people take an opportunity to examine themselves, their lifestyle and goals and are able to focus on how they would like to make a difference starting with yourself in the new year!  Did you make a New Years Resolution?  What are you committed to doing in your life in 2017 and how will it help you be happier, more successful, a better person, etc.  On a secondary level perhaps, what are some goals that you have set for yourself for the second half of the 2016-2017 school year?  Perhaps bad habits you want to break, things you want to do better, goals you want to achieve, etc!  It's a new year, be realistic but dream big :)

Lets kick off the year right with a thorough thoughtful response addressing all parts of the prompt! Thank you and Happy New Year! :)

Adobe Flash Week 1 - Assignment #1

Welcome Back!  Today you will have the opportunity to post your very first animation on your blog.  To do this, be sure to first save your completed animation in your home drive.  Below is a written reminder for how to successfully export and post your animation on your blog.  You can also view the tutorial video here for a visual explanation.

1. Export your animation by doing the following:
1. File > Export > Export Movie 
2. Give your file a name and save as type "QuickTime"
2. Next, upload your file to your youtube account.
3. Once the file has been uploaded, grab the embed code (you may have to wait until the file has finished publishing), go to your blog, click the HTML button on the top left and paste that embed code in under the existing code.
4. Switch back to the "Compose" mode and respond to the following questions:
1. Name a minimum of 3 different tools that you used.  What does that tool do and how did it help with creating your final animation?
2. Which tool would you say was the most helpful in creating your animation?  Were multiple tools important?
3. What did you enjoy about this first Adobe Flash animation?  What was challenging?
4. Lastly, having been introduced to Adobe Flash and completing this first assignment, what is one thing you would like to learn how to do using this software?

Thank you for your thoughtful feedback!!  I look forward to seeing your creative work.

A Week of College and Career Preparation - It Starts Today!

 

Good Morning, Happy Monday! I hope you had a relaxing Thanksgiving Holiday. Today, we are back at it, but this week looks a little different. Tomorrow we have a guest presentation in the PAC Theater.  Our presenters include Kyle Wong from Pixlee and Nina Kouyoumdjian from nhastrategy.  Today, I want you to think about a few things:

1. Do a little research on Kyle Wong and/or Pixlee.  Name 3 things that you learned and what about his story or Pixlee is interesting and/or impressive to you.
2. Having read about Kyle and Pixlee, what are 3 questions you might have about either his personal business or about starting your own company?
3. Have you ever been interested in starting your own business?  Regardless, list a few personal characteristic traits you feel are important in making your business a success?

Switching gears, our second speaker will focus on college and the importance of preparing for college as early as possible.  She has a lot of experience in the field and can be of great value in answering questions you might have.  Here are a few things I would like for you to think about in relation to her presentation:

1. Why is college of personal importance to you?  What is the number one reason you want to go to college?  Name a few schools you would be interested in attending and why those schools stand out as "top choices."  Feel free to spend a moment looking at schools on the College-board Website
2. What do you know about the college application process?  Outline the process to the best of your ability for me in terms of what is required for a successful applicant!  Start with grades all the way to pushing the submit button.
3. What is your personal brand?  A personal brand is typically an impression you form in the mind of others.  What would you say your personal brand is with your friends?  Does it differ from the personal brand you have established with your teachers? boss? mentor?

Tomorrow should be an amazing opportunity for you and all Academy students to think about all of the options you have ahead of you.  All I ask you to take advantage of the opportunity!