Outline
In this lab you will:
- look through the spec for your portfolio
- brainstorm some interpretations of the theme
- find examples of images/code art/music/interactions to use as inspiration
- articulate your interpretation of the theme and form an early plan for the portfolio
- start to learn how to write Markdown
Introduction
It’s an exciting time of year folks! Today we begin working on your individual portfolios which will lead into your final project. We have finalised the specifications for your project and you can find all the details about the portfolio and the final projects by visiting the portfolio deliverables page and the final project deliverables page.
You can find the template repository for both your first portfolio submission here.
If you’ve had a read of the deliverables page for either the portfolio or the final project, you will have noticed that we are doing things a little differently this time around. This year, you will all be given a separate theme for each portfolio submission. The final project will have a separate theme as well. It is your job to interpret those themes and produce an engaging user experience or performance through your creative code artefact for each portfolio item and for the final project.
The theme for the first portfolio item this year is A Better World. Although you have all been given the same theme, you should work to bring your own style and interpretations to the table as you develop your artefact.
Part 1: Brainstorming Interpretations
In this first activity, you will work to brainstorm as many ideas as you can which relate to the theme of A Better World. For the purposes of this activity, you don’t need to worry about whether or not you can implement your ideas in code, just write down as many ideas and interpretations as you can.
Fork and clone the portfolio 1 template repo.
You will see that the template repo for this week has a folder called assets\
with a powerpoint file brainstorm.ppt in it.
You do not need to write any code in this lab, so go ahead and open up the powerpoint file. You will see that there are several slides already in there, each with a heading. These headings are there to help you interpret the theme from different perspectives.
We will work in 15 minutes sprints. For each slide, spend 15 minutes working individually to come up with as many interpretations of the theme as possible. There are prompts on each slide which will give you a better idea of what to write about.
Be sure to commit and push your work to git after each sprint.
After each sprint, either with someone next to you or in small groups, spend 5 minutes discussing what your interpretations, ideas and associations were.
Part 2: Finding Sources of Inspiration
At this stage, the slide deck looks pretty boring—it’s mainly got text in there. During this activity, you will have some time to scour the internet for examples of images, music, interactions, code art and code music to include in your slide. You can just add the images directly into the slide deck. For music or code art where you can’t include images, just include a reference; the title of the code art or music and a link to the source website in your slides. The process of adding sources of inspiration to your slide deck doesn’t have to be done neatly, we just want you to put together a palette of examples of how others have conveyed the ideas you wrote down through various visual, audio and interactive media.
Part 3: Interpretation
Now that you have done some brainstorming, and even potentially discussed some ideas with your classmates, it’s time to consolidate your ideas and write down your interpretation of the theme. Your interpretation of the theme will serve as the “guiding light” as you develop your project. It should include the main message you wish to communicate to an audience member who will interact with or experience your artefact.
In the fourth slide of your PowerPoint deck, you will find some space to write down your interpretation of the theme. You should also discuss how you want to express your interpretation by thinking about how the audience should feel in response to visuals/sounds/interactions. Lastly, we want you to write down two ideas for an artefact which you will begin roughly implementing in next weeks class. You should think through how the artefact will change over time and whether it will have a specific narrative.
Part 4: Starting Your Portfolio Documentation
You will see that the template repo for this week has a folder called portfolio\
in it. Open up the portfolio-entry-1.md file.
Markdown is a lightweight markup language. It uses symbols and line structure to impart semantic meaning to parts of a file. Markdown is automatically rendered by gitlab. Advanced styling is possible, and there are many resources to learn Markdown. We will start with the basics. Your teacher will give a demonstration. Feel free to ask if you have specific questions.
You will see that there are several headings already in there. These headings are there to help you structure your portfolio documentation and, perhaps, interpret the theme from some different perspectives.
Start writing your ideas into the markdown file portfolio-entry-1.md
Try out some formatting. You may wish to include an image (put the image in your assets folder).
Summary
Congratulations! In this lab you:
- read through the portfolio deliverables page
- did some in-depth brainstorming to set you up for implementing your portfolio
- formed an interpretation of the theme and an early plan for your portfolio
- started learning some Markdown
Before you leave class today, make sure you commit and push your work to GitLab.