Portal A Interactive

A little more than four months ago, my designer friend Alan Wells recommended me to his friends Kai and Nate for a freelance gig to build a website for their newly founded viral video production company. He sent me the link to their site at the time, which he had quickly put together showcasing their past video projects. I quickly did more research on these guys to get a sense of the type of work they do. (And by research, I meant watching all of their videos in one sitting.)

One of their larger projects was a video blog called Huge in Asia, where they lived in Vietnam and other Asian countries for a couple months documenting their adventures. (I mentioned this in my monthly review last December.) After watching the fifty-episode vlog series, I knew that these guys possessed the potential for excellent content and success, and despite the upcoming busy holiday season at Peet’s, I decided that I would help these guys out and build a site for their company Portal A Interactive.

Pre-work Work

Being a typical recent-graduate designer, I couldn’t help but start coming up with ideas for the site. (I suppose I was still in school mode, where I was compelled to act on any ideas I thought of without considering ownership and compensation.) At the same time, though, having completed a design project for my relatives a few months back without a contract, I definitely learned my lesson and was determined to do everything I was supposed to as a freelancer this time around to protect myself and the client from unnecessary unhappiness.

I looked up tutorials for drafting freelance design contracts, and like the advice that young designers receive from experienced designers for preparing portfolios, there was an unbelievably overwhelming wealth of types of ways that one could go about this. There was so much conflicting advice that I could seriously curl up under my covers and cry. I asked my freelancer friends for advice and tried to write my own contract, but I was still concerned that I might be missing something that would come back and bite me later on.

Fortunately, I remembered that AIGA’s site has a section for business practices. I found the AIGA Standard Form of Agreement for Design Services that designers can use as a template. I adapted the AIGA agreement and took out one or two clauses that didn’t apply at all and had no way of hurting me or the client. I also put together a project-specific proposal, and quickly tried to get all that legal stuff taken care of so I could stop turning off the part of my brain that is responsible for thinking of ideas for the site.

The Logo

After the administrative stuff was taken care of, the first task in the agenda was creating the logo. I enjoy designing logos not because it’s easy (it’s not). I love that good logos look simple, yet are highly complex. Generally, the more different elements there are in a logo, the weaker the logo becomes. So with this project, I tried to keep the logo as simple as I could, sticking to the criteria of using a “one” letterform design and projecting a light-bulb signage mood that the client had envisioned.

Here's the basic concept of the logo:

Here's the final version, lit up and against a dark background:

Since this logo doesn’t include the name of the company, I developed a secondary logo mainly for the website.

Details of the neon:

While the neon isn’t the same type of lighting as the light-bulb logo, incorporating both into the site creates a mood that could not be achieved by using just one. This results in a mix, a melting pot of ideas, something that is not completely established and boring, and something that is flexible and can change as it grows, which is, in a way, what this company is about.

WordPress

Before I took on this project, I had never touched WordPress. I had heard about it, but I always thought it was a paid service, and I just didn’t want to pay to create a blog that I could do the same thing for free somewhere else. But turns out it was free, and it gives you mad power for customization… in PHP. I was new to PHP, so this was both a challenge and an opportunity to learn.

As I worked on this project, I became more familiar with the WordPress setup as well as with PHP and MySQL, which I was also new to. But I quickly grew to like it. In fact, I liked it so much, I set up the video thumbnail section in the header that is based on MySQL. Furthermore, when I will be done with this project in a few weeks, I’m going back to my own site and convert it to accommodate the use of MySQL, such as my portfolio and experiments pages, which is currently based on PHP and XML.

Interactivity

This project has also allowed me to experiment with interactivity that I would not have needed with my own site. The video thumbnail section in the header has a slider that shows more thumbnails when you click on the arrows. It’s a simple function, but there’s a lot of planning involved. It’s even Javascript-disabled-safe in that, if you disable Javascript, the arrows disappear so you won’t have non-functioning arrows which would weaken user experience.

Another interactive feature is the Grayout. When you click on a thumbnail video in the header or a Featured video in the sidebar, the whole page darkens and displays the video on that page. The size also adjusts based on your window size (except for IE) up to certain max/min values. Again, it’s Javascript-disabled-safe; if you disable Javascript, the images act as normal links and bring to a different page so you can still watch the videos.

Finally, launched two weeks ago, a video player that plays more than one video in sync. This was something that Kai and Nate had first suggested, way in the beginning, before we even met and agreed to work together. Currently, the controls are basic, but using the YouTube Chromeless Player API, I set up a player that plays two or more videos at the same time, so that one (or more) video(s) can sync with one another. Here’s an example of what they did with this player. I’ve added volume control that Kai and Nate can determine beforehand to maximize viewer’s audio experience.

What I Learned

There’s a lot more to talk about than what I can cover here (or that you’re willing to read), so let me wrap up by briefly going over the many things that I have learned through this project.

• Contracts. This once nerve-wracking issue has been resolved thanks to AIGA.
• Neon. I never had to draw neon before, but thanks to Bert Monroy, I’m proud to say that I did a pretty good job with the neon I created on the site.
• WordPress. Move over Blogger, I’m with WordPress now.
• MySQL/PHP. My new best friends whom I still have much yet to learn.
• Interactivity. Much love for scripting (and a little bit of hate for troubleshooting).

Flush.

Portfolio Page Linked

It’s sort of a milestone. For more than two months, I’ve been working on my portfolio page whenever I could find the time. Design, code, and test. There’s still a lot of testing to do… and coding… and designing. It’s not 100% done and not 100% good yet, but I have enough good stuff to show you what I have so far.

This page may not look that complicated or that impressive (even to designers), but there’s more than enough happening in the backend that I am proud to have come so far in the past two months. In the process, I’ve learned a new programming language that is very powerful and opened a lot of doors for my creative outlet. I look forward to learning more PHP as well as the next step up, whatever that is.

Next entry will be very special. Another milestone. I haven’t decided what to do yet.

Flush.

What Have I Done? (Anniversary Review 2008)

Today marks the first anniversary of Flush. A year ago, I “soft opened” this blog, and believe it or not, I still haven’t “grand opened” it, although I’m not sure if I really need to anyway.

Flash Review

The past year has been a bumpy ride. I finished my last undergrad class, got sucked into the world of Sim City 3000 and Sims 2 as I prepped for my job search, started my beta site, got a job at Peet’s, went to see Sagmeister speak, skipped out on Alumni Day (I’m sorry!), worked on a freelance project for my aunt’s business, bought a new printer, watched the impressive production of the Beijing Olympics, resumed working on my portfolio and site, and rekindled my passion for web developing.

My attitude on design has changed, and that has helped me narrow down the types of careers that I would like to pursue. And every day, I’m getting closer to that job and that career. Working on my site almost every day excites me and motivates me because 1) I’ve grown to enjoy coding and designing, and 2) I can’t wait to share with the world what I’ve done.

Prediction for the Next Twelve Months

I don’t know.

Nobody does, and I’ve been wrong enough times about where I would be right now to not make any more general predictions. But I will always have hope, I will always have my expectations, and I will always believe in the future.

A year from now, I may or may not be a designer, and I may or may not enjoy coding still/anymore, and I may completely change my mind about this site and start a brand new one, or career. And that’s perfectly okay, as long as I am okay with it and it’s for the better. I may not reach my current desired destination, but that may or may not be as important as the journey to get there. I mean, I totally wish I were rich already and not have to work but become a philanthropist and help starving children in Africa or save the rain forest in South America, but it would probably mean more to me if I actually pay my dues, work my way up, meet interesting people, and learn about the issues to get there.

Flush.

Lot of Progress with the Portfolio Section

Made a lot of progress in the past week.

I tried to make the portfolio section available to both JavaScript-enabled and disabled browsers. With JS-disabled browsers, visitors will have to refresh the page. But for JS-enabled browsers, visitors can click on different projects and pieces without needing to refresh. Initially, I thought I needed Ajax to make it refresh-less, but it wasn’t as accessible as I would like it. Fortunately, my new friend PHP allows me to solve my problem.

It’s not all done, yet. But once I get the navigation down, I can start to populate it with real images and text.

The path is portfolio/index.php.

Flush.

What Am I Doing? (Oct 2008)

Web Languages

As I had posted in the past few entries, I’m teaching myself the relatively basic web programming languages by working on my site, mostly the portfolio section. I’ve conducted a couple experiments to get a better understanding and grip of these languages. Learning Cookies, Ajax, and PHP has been very exciting and has stirred up project ideas.

Every day I wish I would have enough energy after work to work a little bit on my site or an experiment. I could see myself doing this as a career, although I haven’t been with the big kids yet, so troubleshooting one line in the haystack of hundreds that others have written might make me think otherwise. Still, it’s exciting when things work the way you want it to, and that might make it all worth it.

Economy and Job

So the economy’s not doing so well. Just when you think you’re at the bottom, you’re wrong. This isn’t really affecting me as directly as other Americans, since I don’t intend to buy a house or borrow large sums of money in the near future.

But when others suffer, we might, too. I’m talking specifically about companies’ ability (or inability) to keep their finances in the black, which may require them to lay off some employees, employees who might now compete with me in the job market, or employees whose positions that I desire but seize to exist because they’re laid off.

So that makes me reconsider the length of my employment at Peet’s. But then again, if I worry too much, which I probably already have, I won’t get anywhere.

Flush.

Career Routes: Web Developing and “Green” Companies

In the past few weeks, as I have been working on my portfolio site and learning PHP and Ajax, I re-found my excitement and fascination in coding, and I could imagine myself working on it as a full-time gig, despite the hairsplitting troubleshooting (but when it works, it works beautifully!) At the same time, my interest in environmentalism and sustainability still exists. Not so much, though, is visual design, at least as a career. Therefore, I now have narrowed my choices down to two: web developing and “green” jobs.

I don’t know which is more correct, web “developing” or web “programming,” but I know what I want to do. The problem is that a quick job search online shows that most of those jobs require multiple years of experience, which I don’t have professionally.

And with green jobs, I still don’t know where to start, because I don’t know what my education in (mostly visual) design can contribute to the organizations. But I’m sure there is a future and potential for growth for the entire industry, so I’m not too worried; there’s something to do for everyone.

Therefore, the perfect job right now would be to combine both: to code the website or whatever for a “green” company, letting me contribute to my passion of changing/saving the world by doing what I enjoy doing.

This is not too far-fetched of a dream, compared to my other ones. If I have to pay more dues by working for a year or two somewhere to get there, I just might do it.

Flush.

Learning PHP

I’m learning PHP right now in conjunction with AJAX for my portfolio site. I’ve been hitting a couple of roadblocks but I think I’m getting the hang of it. It’s funny how all these languages look sort of different but are more or less similar in structure and goals, just like cultural languages.

Flush.

Cookies Basics

I can now write cookies. I had been avoiding it for a while because I knew it would be a little more complex than basic JavaScript, and that I don’t like how cookies are used for “evil” sometimes. Cookies have a bad rap of taking personal information and whatnot, and I want to avoid that for my sites as much and as long as possible. And now I’m using it only to enhance visitor experience and it does not collect personal information.

I created an experiment with cookies in my Experiments section. It involves taking a name and storing it into the browser cookies, and then also created a switch button that just makes a setting go on and off. I did it for my portfolio section, where I want the visitor to have the option to show the “panels” of navigation within the portfolio section or to hide them, and not have to keep setting it every time the visitor returns to the site.

It’s a basic function, and it’s non-intrusive, and it still works without the function or JavaScript. In fact, if the browser disables JavaScript, the button disappears! You can test it yourself with your browser. And like I said before, the portfolio page exists; follow my site’s navigation format and you’ll get there.

Flush.

What Am I Doing? (Sept 2008)

Peet’s

It is discovered and decided that I will be working at Peet’s for only four more months, through the holiday season. Hopefully, this gives me a sense of having a deadline again and I can get more things done.

Olympics

I don’t know if I had made it clear a couple of posts ago that I love the Olympics, but I do. Not only did I enjoy racing home from work to watch Olympic history being made, but I was also impressed with the level of detail with which the Beijing team executed the events and their appearance in the world.

The opening and closing ceremonies were the best ever in my opinion, but not only that, it makes me want to take part in performances like those for a living, mainly in the planning and conceptual stage. This goes beyond “graphic design,” but I never said I am interested in graphic design alone. It’s times like this that lift my spirits and believe the best of days is always ahead of us.

Beta Portfolio

I’ve been working on the portfolio section for the past few weeks, and now I’m working on the coding before I pump out the images and make the link available, although you can still access it by manually entering the URI based on the site’s navigation. Constructive feedback is always appreciated.

Future

With a four-month timeframe in place, I now have a sense of what I’m doing in the near future. After that though, I don’t know. I’ve been revisiting the idea of a road trip a lot, and it seems like there’s no better time than the present (or asap, e.g. four months from now). I would have some money saved up, and either get on a train or drive myself across the country, maybe with a friend or two.

I might have a revelation in the four-month period and know for sure which path I want to go on after Peet’s. It might not be far from what I had been planning all along; it could be a regular graphic design job right here in the Bay Area, or it might be somewhere in the East Coast. Or, I could be in Asia, or Africa, or Europe, following some hint of an opportunity that is remotely related to design and more related to the environment or humanitarian work.

Flush.

Portfolio Section: The Basics

So for the past week, between work and the Olympics, I started working on the portfolio section of my beta site. I figured that I could draw inspiration from the Olympics and get a boost in pursuing my goals and all the good stuff.

I purposely have not yet made the link available from the home page because I don’t want new visitors to stumble upon my site thinking that the active link to my portfolio leads to a complete collection of my work. You may, however, manually type in the URI and see what’s been done so far. If you don’t know what the URI is, there is a hint on the home page’s navigation.

I haven’t figured out exactly how to lay out the page yet. I’ve designed probably five or six web portfolio sites, always trying to figure out the most efficient and logical way to navigate. My criteria for the layout include:

• how easy it is for new visitors to understand how to navigate within the portfolio section;
• how the work is displayed against the rest of the layout;
• how accessible it is for browsers without/that have turned off style sheets, JavaScript, and other applications;
• how it would translate onto mobile device displays;
• and what kind of experience most visitors would get from viewing this site.

I’m trying to avoid laying out boxes (or squares of “transparencies”) into neat little rectangles. I’ve done that before and even I’m getting a little bored. I’m trying to let the function take care of the form.

And it doesn’t look like I’ve done much so far, but I’ve actually fixed the code behind the navigation so that it works in more than one page with the same code, as well as allowing it to work (more or less) in JavaScript-disabled browsers.

Comments on the background image?

Flush.

What Am I Doing? (Feb 2008)

The Sims 2 obsession has faded (fortunately), and the words “portfolio,” “site,” and “job” have become the three most used terms in my daily mental query.

Live Site

The most significant thing that I’ve worked on this past month, I believe, was my site. On January 28 or 29, I suddenly had the motivation to start my web site with a “just do it” attitude, constructing it in public and requesting feedback. This process is moving along, and I’m glad I got started, not only because I’ve moved onto the next step, but also because it makes me realize how much work (and time) I need to put in to have a fully functional, content-rich, informative web site about me and my work. Therefore, I’ve decided to not wait anymore for this site to complete and move ahead to search for a side job.

Job and Sagmeister

Yesterday, I ordered a ticket to attend a now soldout lecture featuring Stefan Sagmeister in San Francisco on March 6. For those who don’t know (although I might have mentioned it here on Flush), Sagmeister has sort of been my hero ever since I’ve heard of him last year, when I was researching for my “Why Don’t We Care?” project. In any case, I made my first not-directly-related-to-portfolio,-site,-or-job purchase in a long time, under the condition that I get a job/side job before I go to the lecture. We’ll see how that will turn out.

Portfolio Review and Helvetica

Last Friday, a couple of my design friends and I met up to present and review our portfolios (By the way, Y.I. and T.P., the address to my main site has always been in the About sidebar). It was a very helpful experience for all of us, and I’m glad we did it. Somewhat sticking to the promise to myself, I unwrapped and watched Helvetica with my friends. Maybe it was the mentally highered expectation, but 1) I thought it was supposed to be longer, and 2) it was a different experience watching it with friends. I think caring about what others think of the film (which none of them had seen) distracted me from paying attention to the film. I shall watch it by myself next time, including the bonus material and take names and ideas for future reference.

Words Pondered

Here are a few things that I’ve been thinking about in the past month:

• “Safe is Risky.” —Seth Godin
• “Trying to look good limits my life.”—Stefan Sagmeister, from his Things I Have Learned in My Life So Far Series
• “Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none.” —William Shakespeare, from the wrapper of some chocolates my cousin-friend gave me for Christmas.
• “Hope”
• “Change”
• “Honesty”
• “Dreams”

Flush.

Beta Mode

This afternoon, I was officially in the last stage of putting my interview portfolio together. I had all the prints I need, and I just need to crop them and mount them. There are gonna be a couple other things to take care of, as always, but I was pretty much ready for the next stage.

What that next stage is is not that defined, really. I could continue with creating a simple, or elaborate, leave-behind for my interviewers, but I felt that I wasn’t ready yet. I was ready to, however, build my web site. It’s taken me a long time to get to this stage, and I’m excited. After weeks of working with a print-oriented goal, I was ready to get digital (“Let’s get digital, digital.” Sorry.)

Even though real construction began today, I had spent the same print-oriented weeks to think about the website (I was that excited). What it must have, what it could have, what the concept should be, how it would look like, etc. I actually started sketching layouts during an off-print day to get that crap out of my head (the fine spirit of Flush), and I’m glad I did, because I’m (currently, at least) going with a different approach.

Usability Testing

While setting up the basics of the site today, something dawned on me. I thought about the importance of usability testing as mentioned by Steve Krug in Don’t Make Me Think! While I don’t have the money to conduct the proper research (nor do I really need a usability test for a site this small, though it's still important), I have the resources: designers I know (including most of you guys)!

Live Construction

Long story short, I’m going to construct my site live. As I work on it, I would like everyone to give me feedback, whether via Flush or by email. I haven’t gotten the whole plan worked out, but I will probably provide mini-plans for the next few things I wanted to work on, like navigation, layout, special coding, etc., and visitors can give me suggestions, comments, notes, criticism, food, etc.

I figured that this way, I would be more motivated to work on the site, because I don’t want it to look like this for longer than I need to. Displaying incomplete work to the public makes me uncomfortable.

Beta Mode

I’m calling my current site “in beta mode.” I’m not sure if “beta” is the right word because it seems to me that every web service I’ve used that are in “beta” mode (Gmail, mind42, Blogger before) are pretty much functioning services. Am I using the word “beta” correctly?

Anyway, the beta site is up, and the first round of feedback is appreciated. As of right now, the site:

1. has a gridded background that I use to layout the content. I might take that out in the final version and let the content stand on the invisible grid, including the black-border boxes.
2. has a text-based navigation. I plan on making the navigation image-based but still accessible when all the CSS is taken out, because I know it’s better to have the navigation text-based so if I’m making it image-based, I should at least make it accessible. I want to do this because I have this “hover” idea that I want to try.
3. has a giant orange/yellow image as a space holder for either current news images or a Flash slideshow/movie, which is a pretty common feature these days. I’m not doing this just because everyone else is doing it; but because I want to learn more ActionScript. And if that couldn’t be done in time, I will just leave it like this and rotate images periodically or with JavaScript.

Please Comment/Critique/Suggest/Wash Your Hands after Using the Bathroom

So if I could get anybody to make any constructive comments on what I have so far, that would be really great, even if you think it’s silly or unimportant. If you don’t tell me, I won’t know what you’re thinking. Eventually (soon), I’m going to add a comment box on the beta site so you can give me notes while you’re looking at the page. But for now, comment via this post.

Flush.

Photographing for Portfolio

So yesterday, I successfully (after a devastating double-stuck-tape first try) assembled the accordion book for the Mandolins Brochure that I designed almost two years ago. I planned on putting it in my portfolio, so I had to mock it up and photograph it instead of just showing the flat designs. Today, I had a long photo shoot of the piece, taking pictures from the front, of the inside, of the outside, from different angles, and in both black background and white.

Light Source

Unlike my test photo session from last time, I used natural light through the window as my light source. It’s been cloudy for the past couple of days, and that’s actually a good thing, because the clouds emit a pretty neutral white light through my bedroom window. You’d think that a clear day would be better but I recently realized that clear skies (but not from direct sunlight) actually give your indoor subjects a blue/cyan tint because the sky is usually blue. I’ve just never put those two phenomena together because I assumed that clear skies give off “real” light because when you take pictures outside, you get a “real” range of human skin tones (because the sunlight balances it out or something).

Anyway, having a natural-light photo session meant that I had an unpostponeable deadline of the darkening sky to meet. Surprisingly, I took the last batch of my photos even when it’s too dim to see, thanks to the manual shutter speed setting on my camera; it could make a somewhat dark scene look normal.

Black or White?

So all in all, I took 367 photos today of the brochure, although I had a wide bracket of different exposures in almost every pose; I wanted to choose from more than just two or three bracket shots to make sure I got the best one. Better more than none, they say.

All the photos in thumbnails:

Actual screen size of the thumbnails:

Black or White?

Since this is my first real photo session with the light tent, I’m still trying to decide whether the white background or the black background works better. Of course, in certain situations, one is definitely better than the other. But I have two pairs of relatively unedited photos here to show the difference. What do you think?

1-B. Page 1 and 2 in black background

1-W. Page 1 and 2 in white background

And then there’s 2-B. Exterior in black background

And 2-W. Exterior in white background

At first impression, I think the black ones stand out more. But I have a personal attachment to subjects photographed in white backgrounds, so I’m not ready to toss them out. Maybe there’s not enough light to make the white really white?

Notes on the Light Tent

During this photo session, I learned a few things about using a light tent:

1. I need a larger light tent, for subjects that span wider than the width of the box, like this accordion book.
2. Having a really controlled environment with light is important. I realized that when the relatively white walls behind me and my light-color shirt reflected onto the subject, which led me to pull up a piece of black fabric every time I set off the two-second timer to take a shot.
3. The inside frames of your light tent should be prepped so you can Velcro black/white paper strips at the edges because that part of the frame also reflects unwanted hues onto the subject.
4. The top and bottom edge of the front frame (the frame your camera sees through) are useless, as they can obstruct the view of your high-angle shots or limit the amount of backdrop whitespace you would like to allow for below your subject in the photograph. I can be as brave to say that the entire front frame is useless, although I cannot be as brave yet to completely cut it out, for fear that the entire tent would somehow collapse.

That’s it for this portfolio-building update. Sorry for not posting as often as I wanted; I really want to get this portfolio done, what with the scary economy and all.

Flush.

What Am I Doing? (Jan 2008)

Taking a step back, I noticed that I made a lot of progress in the past month, relatively speaking. Not having school anymore freed up my time to work on my portfolio. Since I last posted a progress update, I have completed the “redos” that I wanted for my portfolio and I am now in the process of branching my attention to put together a “general interview” portfolio, a leave-behind, a portfolio site, a PDF version (for those who ask for it), a CD/DVD version (just in case), and a general portal-like website, which will connect my portfolio, this blog, and another section that I really want to have on my site.

As always, I have a lot of ideas and very little time to execute them well. And time is definitely becoming a larger factor as my dependencies on others for survival have begun to tire me out. So the focus of my life right now can pretty much be summarized into one phrase: job searching.

A Note on the Redo

During the past month, I spent most of my time working on project redos. I was surprised as to how long each project took. I had to find the files, figure out what to fix, work on the changes, prep the files for portfolio and for general purposes, and then package and archive the entire project so I don’t have a harder time finding it the next time. Even the smaller projects that were only one page (flyers, posters, etc.) took at least a day each.

I think what happened was I had to organized I lot of my old files that were just in their own little organization system. I basically took the time to rearrange everything into a more standardized organization system, which has been working pretty well for almost a year now. So from now on, I can work more on the design and less on the organizing.

Holiday Season

With December being the heart of the Holiday Season, I encountered a conflict between having to work on my portfolio as much as and as timely as I could against celebrating the season by not wanting to work at all. Debates went on daily in my head, trying to find a good reason to let me off the hook for the day by promising myself to do more work the next day. It was a lose-lose situation, especially when a rediscovery of an old hobby emerged.

Sim City 3000/Sims 2—A Little Sidetrack (Skip to the next heading if you wish)

At a family gathering for the holidays this winter, I noticed that my cousins brought their laptop to play games and kill time. Usually they play role-playing games and go around shooting things. This time they brought The Sims, and I found myself unable to resist watching them play. They offered to let me play, and I, being the kind of person I am, took a hour or so creating two new people and building a house before actually playing the game.

That got me going. I spent the ride home that night thinking about playing the Sim City 3000 that I got in high school: “And now with a faster computer and larger screen, it’s going to be so much better!” I thought. So I started playing it at home, but the problem was that this is not the type of game where there are stop points. It’s like a casino, where there are no windows to tell you what time it is; you just keep going.

I knew I had to control myself, but my mind couldn’t stop zoning land and expanding city limits. So for the whole week or two, I periodically thought about special building strategies, and even dreamed in squares.

At another family gathering, my cousins brought Sims 2. I was even more drawn to it than Sims 1 because of the graphics, the functions, and the new playing experience. Again, I spent an hour or two creating people and building a house. I think I enjoy that a lot more than actually playing the game; something about making things.

When I got home, I knew I had to ask my sister for her copy of Sims 2. But this time, I had more self-discipline (at least in the beginning). I had one short session of just checking out the neighborhoods and the interface, and another one creating the people, and then one more to build a super fancy house just for fun. Last night was when I started playing, but that’s not enough.

Long story short (too late), I need a vacation.

“But Ivan,” you may ask, “you don’t have a job. Aren’t you on vacation?”

“Well, you,” I respond, “have you ever heard of the saying, ‘Finding a job is a full-time job’?”

“No, I haven’t, Ivan,” you replied, “why don’t you extrapol…

Well, it is. I’m sure a lot of people work wish they weren’t working. But for those who aren’t working, like me, getting a job is almost all they think about.

I’ve been so into this project called Get-My-Portfolio-Ready-So-I-Can-Find-A-Good-Job that I think I’ve put in more than forty hours a week, since I “work” on the weekends, too.

But according to Neil Fiore in The Now Habit: A Strategic Program for Overcoming Procrastination and Enjoying Guilt-Free Play (which I read this past month for somewhat obvious reasons), I should allow myself time to play so I can be more productive in my work.

And I realized this as I was playing Sims 1 on my cousins’ laptop. My “Bachelor,” who was living alone, was basically working, eating, cleaning, sleeping, every day. Eventually, he started crying because his “Social” and “Fun” levels had gone red.

Funnily in a not funny way, I played Bachelor like I would with my life, always chasing that extra dollar and not thinking that social interactions matter that much. In the game, they tell you so and you suffer the consequences. In real life, it’s less black and white, and you don’t know it until your leprechaun friend tells you.

So, I want a vacation, but I still feel guilty for playing before finishing my portfolio. And I know that once I get a job, I’ll be head-on into my work, although I love working anyway. Still, it might be years before I get a decent vacation. Maybe I will make a more appropriate use of my weekends then.

Recruiter

This past week, I was contacted by a recruiter, who heard about me from one of my friends to whom I mentioned more than a month ago that I was looking for a job.

It was a very surprising email, and I really freaked out, because I wasn’t done with my portfolio and all that stuff. Nonetheless, I contacted the recruiter, and it turned out that the job opening was for someone with a lot more experience. Still, she let me send her a résumé to keep on file in case something else comes up.

Our discussion of the job opening and its responsibilities actually made me realize what kind of job I wanted, and where I stand in the field: gumshoe bottom. I actually don’t mind that, as long as I don't stay there my whole life. I know where I stand, and I am ready to move on up.

Also, this surprise recruiter episode allowed me to see what I’ve done so far with my portfolio and how much more I have left to do. I’m excited that slowly but surely, I am getting there.

I’m going to end this apparently monthly post with lyrics to a song to stick in your head. I heard my favorite radio morning show mentioning and singing this song this morning as they said that Obama’s using this song for his campaign. I had to look it up on YouTube for the song and the classic TV show that went with it.

Well, we’re movin’ on up, (movin’ on up)
To the East Side, (movin’ on up)
To a deluxe apartment in the sky.
Movin’ on up, (movin’ on up)
To the East Side, (movin’ on up)
We finally got a piece of the pie!

Fish don’t fry in the kitchen;
Beans don’t burn on the grill.
Take a whole lotta tryin’,
Just to get up that hill.
Now we’re up in the big leagues,
Getting’ our turn at bat.
As long as we live, it’s you and me baby,
There ain’t nothin’ wrong with that.

Well, we’re movin’ on up, (movin’ on up)
To the East Side, (movin’ on up)
To a deluxe apartment in the sky.
Movin’ on up, (movin’ on up)
To the East Side, (movin’ on up)
We finally got a piece of the pie!

—“Movin’ on Up,” Ja’net DuBois

Flush.

My DIY Light Tent

Warning: Photo-Heavy Post.

As I continue the journey of putting my portfolio together, I realized more and more things that I need to do to have at least a decent, presentable portfolio. When school started again last Fall, Core77 posted a “Hack-2-School” Guide for design students. I read through it and found some pretty useful things, one of which is a light tent. We didn’t make light tents to photograph our class projects in Davis, and I really think the kids there should start doing that. I believe it improves the quality of your portfolio presentation, because how that design exists in its environment, in a three-dimensional world, matters as much as, if not more than, the design of the piece.

So ever since I read that post, I really wanted to make a light tent for myself, even if I only have two thin book things that I would photograph for the portfolio. I wanted to have it for future projects so I have less of an excuse to take pictures of whatever I will design for my portfolio and archive. So here’s an annotated photographic journey into the construction and testing of my DIY light tent. I pretty much followed the instructions from Instructable’s tutorial, with a few modifications.

The Construction

Cut squares from all four sides of the box as well as the bottom.

Tape the exterior bottom.

Tape the interior bottom. Put foam core or something with the same thickness of the cardboard to make the bottom even.

Line the bottom with a black and/or white matte board to 1) level the bottom, and 2) serve as the base backdrop color in case the main backdrop is not large enough. I had a leftover matte board that’s black on one side and white on the other that I could use for both backdrop colors.

Get three large pieces of tracing paper. The tutorial said to use something semi-transparent like Tyvek or whatever. Yeah, I’m not that fancy. I used tracing paper leftover from Art class. Cut each piece of the paper to the size of each of the frames.

The tutorial said to just glue-stick the semi-transparent paper over three of the holes, leaving open the frame you’re going to photograph through. I’m adding an extra step here in case I want to use colored tissue paper or something in the future. Left: Put Velcro dots (they call them “coins”) at the corners of the tracing paper, but make sure those corners would go over the cardboard part of the frames and not where the holes are. Right: Get the opposite side of the Velcro dots and stick them to the first dots.

With all corners “double-dotted,” hold the paper over one of the frames, stretching it flat, and stick the dots to the cardboard one by one. It’s better to start at the top corners first and stretch the paper downward.

Since my box was larger than the one in the tutorial, and that I didn’t just glue-stick the sides like in the tutorial, I noticed after the fact that the paper was still a little loose. So I added another dot in the centers of the top, left, and right sides of the frame. Gravity automatically pulls the bottom side down, so no Velcro dots there.

Your tent should look something like this at this point.

Get large sheets of black and white paper for the main backdrop. Try to find paper that is long enough to cover a length that is the sum of the height of the tent and the length of the tent running from the front to the back. If not, use two pieces like I did; you just have to deal with the seams later on in Photoshop. You could also try using fabric. I might switch to fabric later on, but at this time, I couldn’t find any good, cheap ones that are not reflective. Left: Two black posterboards and two Bristol boards. These posterboards were not super black; they were as black as I could find, which means it’s another thing I have to deal with later on in Photoshop. Also, Bristol is good to use because it has a solid, low-to-no-texture, bright white color. Right: If you’re using two sheets, line them up and overlap one on top of the other.

Left: Tape the back side to temporarily secure their overlap. Right: Fold one sheet over at the tape seam, and glue-stick the overlapping area.

Left: Once you glued the two sheets together, do the double-dot thing at the center of the shorter edge of the sheet and stick a Velcro dot to the center of the top of the back frame. Right: This is an optional step: take another Velcro dot that’s the same side as the one on your backdrop sheet, and stick it a few inches from that spot. This will allow you to pull the sheet higher and make the curve at the bottom smoother.

And that’s how you make a low-budget DIY light tent!

Testing

First test of the tent with the Velcro box as the subject.

One thing I’ve discovered is that not everything is black and white even when you made it so. Here’s the photo from my camera.

Here’s the exact same photo, but I did an Auto Levels in Photoshop. This is not at all a surprise, but it’s just really interesting to see how different it can be and how yellow my light source is.

A close up of the Velcro box without the frame. Also Auto Levels’d.

Here’s the white backdrop. Auto Levels’d.

The following three pairs of photos show the difference between using one light source and using two.

The differences aren’t too noticeable here, but that’s because I haven’t really experimented with the light source, yet. Side note: that book is my “Why Don’t We Care?” book that I made for class almost a year ago, refined and “professionally” printed and bound.

One of the problems with my black backdrop is that it’s not black enough. Whenever a light source gets too close, it starts turning brown in the photo. Here, the two photos compare the differences between placing the light source near the bottom and placing it near the top. Placing it at the top also illuminated the subject a lot better.

Here’s a close up of the book, Photoshopped.

There’s me holding the book while the tripodded-camera took the photo with the ten-second timer. You should see my stance as I tried to position the book so that the pages didn’t glare and that I wouldn’t bump the camera with my chest, all the while holding still before the timer goes off. But I think that was worth it, because this is pretty much why I wanted to build the tent: to show book pages the way they're meant to look, curved like real pages, with a gutter, maybe with hands to show the scale and the way it’s handled.

An extra advice for those building the tent: make sure your black/dark paper doesn’t scratch that easily (or just try to not scratch your paper). Mine’s already shown signs of wear created by my recently-cut fingernails when I was holding the book open.

And an extra photographic treat: a portable fluorescent tube light on the white backdrop. It’s going to be fun experimenting with this tent.

Here’s the link to the tutorial if you’re too lazy to scroll up. Instructables—Super Simple Light Tent.

And I found this link yesterday on Core77. Just when I make something new, other people make it a lot better.

If any of you are going to make a light tent of your own, please show me photos (completed and/or in-progress) so I can see what other people are doing/using to make this tent!

Flush.