IN THIS PAGE I WILL BE PRESENTING ALL THE WORKSHOPS WE'VE DONE IN CLASS AND THE THINGS WE LEARNT ON THE LECTURES. I WILL ALSO BE SHOWING THE RESEARCH I’VE DONE ON MY OWN
INSTALL PARTY
WE INSTALLED NUMEROUS OF SOFTWARE TO HELP THROUGH THIS PROJECT AND TO EXPLAIN FREE CULTURE.
THESE ARE THE FOLLOWING SOFTWARE WE DOWNLOADED:
INKSCAPE
nkscape is a free and open source software vector graphics editor. Its goal is to implement full support for the Scalable Vector Graphics 1.1 standard. It also supports various other formats for Import/Export.
SOURCE: WIKIPEDIA
SCRIBUS
Scribus is a desktop publishing (DTP) application, released under the GNU General Public License as free software. It is based on the free Qt toolkit, with native versions available for Linux, Unix-like operating systems, Mac OS X, Haiku, Microsoft Windows, OS/2 and eComStation.Scribus is designed for layout, typesetting and to prepare files for professional quality image setting equipment. It can also create animated and interactive PDF presentations and forms. Example uses include writing small newspapers, brochures, newsletters, posters and books.
SOURCE: WIKIPEDIA
FONT FORGE
FontForge (known until March 2004 as PfaEdit) is a full-featured font editor which supports all common font formats. Developed primarily by George Williams until 2012, FontForge is free software and is distributed under the 3-clause BSD license. It is available for several operating systems (including Linux, Windows and Mac OS X) and is localized into 12 languages.
GIMP
GIMP is an acronym for GNU Image Manipulation Program. It is a freely distributed program for such tasks as photo retouching, image composition and image authoring.
It has many capabilities. It can be used as a simple paint program, an expert quality photo retouching program, an online batch processing system, a mass production image renderer, an image format converter, etc.
GIMP is expandable and extensible. It is designed to be augmented with plug-ins and extensions to do just about anything. The advanced scripting interface allows everything from the simplest task to the most complex image manipulation procedures to be easily scripted
SOURCE: GIMP.COM
Free culture is a social movement that promotes freedom distribution of files online.
We had a guess lecturer called David Crossland. He talked about the importance of free culture and a brief tutorial about the free software called 'FontForge'
My views on Free Culture are mixed. First of all I think it’s very generous that Artist, Designer and programmers creates software free of charge. It enables people who can’t afford software such as Photoshop to experience similar software and create something digitally for free. They made it easy for people to download free software, it only takes couple of minutes to download and the software is already available for you. Comparing to buying software. You have to sign up, select the software you want and pay a lot of money for it. If I was the person who created the software, I would like to get paid for it because I worked hard on creating this software.
MICRO RESEARCH
We were asked to identify and collect the variety and kinds of information sources that are in the immediate environment, and be able to analyse, categorise, and interpret the information, so that it can be re-presented such that its characteristics can be highlighted meaningfully for an audience
WE LEARNT ABOUT ARDUINO.
WHAT IS ARDUINO?
Arduino is a tool for making computers that can sense and control more of the physical world than your desktop computer. It's an open-source physical computing platform based on a simple microcontroller board, and a development environment for writing software for the board.
WE ALSO LEARNT ABOUT THE PHYSICAL COMPUTING.
INTERACTION DESIGN IS A RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN A SOFTWARE AND HARDWARE, A COMMUNICATION WITH EACH OTHER. TO DO THIS YOU WILL NEED A MICROPROCESSOR. IT IS A SMALL COMPUTER CHIPS AND IT ALLOWS YOU TO PROGRAM BEHAVIOUR AND ACTIONS INTO HARDWARE. MICROPROCESSOR WILL HELP YOU CONNECT SOFTWARE AND HARDWARE TOGETHER; IT IS A BRIDGE BETWEEN THE TWO COMPONENTS. INTERACTION DESIGN IS MADE TO SERVE A PURPOSE, ANY PURPOSE THAT THE CODER DESIRES.
HERE ARE SOME EXAMPLE OF INTERACTION DESIGN:
CONDITIONAL DESIGN
We had to work as a group for this task. (Conditional Design is a design method formulated by the graphic designers Luna Maurer, Jonathan Puckey, Roel Wouters and the artist Edo Paulus, in which conditions and rules of play are drawn up that invite cooperation within a 'regulated' process towards an unpredictable design or result. www.conditionaldesign.org/) We needed 4 people in a group and had to follow the rule. I really liked this task. It's design in a different kind of way. It's quite fun and interactive.
ARDUINO
We had a workshop on Arduino. (Arduino is a tool for making computers that can sense and control more of the physical world than your desktop computer. It's an open-source physical computing platform based on a simple microcontroller board, and a development environment for writing software for the board.) This was a very exciting experience for me. This was very new to me. I've never done this before and it was just thrilling that you're the one who's creating the movement on the board.