Adobe Flash Week 6, Assignment #6 - Car Driving

Our short animations are getting more and more complex!!  Fun right!  This week you had the opportunity to explore more tools that allowed you to create a car that drives.  Of course, within that animation you should have also demonstrated some of the many tools we have been working on throughout the semester including motion tweens, panning and zooming, working within symbols, your drawing skills, etc.  That said, the goal of your blogs is not for me to rehash the skills you are learning but for you to discuss them.  As usual, please respond to the following questions:

• 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, panning, etc.  Reread the assignment description or watch the tutorial to remind yourself.  Don't forget to discuss what a shape tween does and any other unique tools you used to create your final product.
• 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 sky change color using the newly learned shape tween, 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, it is important to remember we have 2 weeks left in the quarter.  You must stay on top of your work and make sure that all Flash assignments - yes, I am talking about the ones you may have missed along the way, are submitted by March 24th. 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 :)

Adobe Flash Week , Assignment #7 - Talking Tomatoes?

Talking Tomatoes? Well hopefully not everyone! I cannot wait to see the wide variety of talking fruits and veggies you produce this week. In addition, by completing this weeks assignment successfully you have not only demonstrated your ability to work with frame by frame animation but have also demonstrated mastery in managing your symbols and library well. You should be excited about your animations getting increasingly complex and proud of the work you are completing.

As a reminder, take pride in these blog posts - they are your public portfolio of work which demonstrates what you are learning, what you are capable of and a great marketable tool for you! Be sure to post your you-tube video (like mine above) and a response to these questions:

• 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.  Discuss the process you had to take in order to have your little veggie or fruit friend talk.
• What about the assignment was easy and what caused you problems? How were you able to overcome the problems you had?
• What did you do in your animation to add creativity? Was there anything you wanted to do but didn't have time for?  
• What else would you want to know how to do to increase the creativity in your animations?  Do you like Adobe Flash?  What are things about this program that you do like and what are things about this program that make you question if you would want to use it again in the future?

Remember to really emphasize the skills you are learning and what you enjoyed about each project in these blogs. It is your opportunity to showcase the high end work you are completing in a public forum.

Adobe Flash Week 5, Assignment #5 - The Butterfly Effect

Hello!!  Congratulations!  Your animations are getting increasingly complex!  You should be proud of the work you are completing and your ability to navigate the Adobe Flash Interface.  It is not an easy program to work with!!  Before we move on to our next assignment, it is important to make sure we have posted a blog for this assignment that includes the posted youtube video (like mine above) and a response to these questions:

• 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.
• What about the assignment was easy and what caused you problems?  How were you able to overcome the problems you had?
• What did you do in your animation to add creativity?  Was there anything you wanted to do but didn't have time for?  What was your impression of the pan and zoom tool?  Cool?
• Besides making the butterfly flap its wings consistently and using the pan and zoom features in your animation, what other types of animations could you make successfully now using similar tools to the ones used in this project? How do you think the pan and zoom effect will help you with our next assignment that will involve a car driving down the road?  What other ideas do you have for animations now that you are getting more familiar with Flash?

Remember to really emphasize the skills you are learning and what you enjoyed about each project in these blogs.  It is your opportunity to showcase the high end work you are completing in a public forum.

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!