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After being critiqued by my classmates I realized that I needed to change the way I got people’s attention, the font of my text, my slides cohesivity, the eye appeal of the slide, and most importantly the background. I also learned that even though my slide was bad I had a good idea and was headed in the right direction.

First I changed all the font to times new roman so that it was more cohesive. Then I added the word effect so that my slide had a good amount of eye appeal. Next I centered and sized all the words so that people’s attention would go to the right places. Last I changed the background because the original one wasn’t going to give me a good product no matter what I changed and that’s how I got my final product.

The research I did helped me create a better slide because of its broadness. It showed me that in order for my project to succeed I needed to stop being so picky and specific, and start having an open mind; because with an open mind there were thousands of possibilities, hence my new background. Finally, most of the sources I used were sources Ms. Hull gave us and information from prior experiences. These being classmates, links/websites, teachers, and of course Ms. Hull.

My name is Michal Czapla, and this is the google slide that I have created after weeks of planning and designing. Before this unit began, I had virtually no knowledge on this topic, but I soon got the hang of it and tried my best. After the critique of my google slide, I learned that I'm not that far off making a great slide design. That being said, I still have much to learn. Even when I did a lot of research, my classmates and Mrs. Hull pointed out a few changes I could make that I wouldn’t ever of thought of.

 The critique of my google slide inspired me to make a few changes to my slide design. I unstretched the soccer ball and foot in exchange for the foot not bleeding off of the page, which my peers told me wasn't necessary. Also, I moved the text a bit so it looked more like the ball was getting kicked into it. Finally, I made the name of the person who made the quote larger and even used Mrs. Hull's tips to lower it and have the name pop out. These changes were crucial to making my slide easier on the eyes and better overall.

To create my slide, I used a few sources for this project. There were several websites that Mrs. Hull linked in the canvas assignment, but I found that Presentation Zen and a bit of google allowed me to learn the basics of designing. That was the reason why I wasn't killed during my presentation. Overall, this unit was a great learning experience, and I'm going to continue to improve and get better.

What I learned from the critique of my slide was that I needed to make my pictures blend together in a better way. I also learned that my slide shouldn’t have too many colors because that might distract the viewers from the point that I’m trying to make. Another thing that I learned was to make my title stand out from the pictures so the viewers would know what my slide is about.

Based off the critique of my slide I made several changes. The first thing I did was I thought of what my theme of the slide should be. I chose to make it blue. Then I found pictures that fit the theme of my slide. I know some of the blues are different but I tried my best to match the blues. After that I made the pictures even and balanced out.

The research that I did helped me make a better slide because it gave me advice on how to make a presentable slide. It showed me what it takes to make a slide more appealing to the viewer and why certain slides are better than others. The sources that I used was Presentation Zen and a video about slide designing.

I learned many things from the critique of my slide. I found that contrasting colors that are not adjacent does not look good. If you chose to have colors opposite one another, the must be directly contrasting or it will turn out poorly. I also learned that imperfect symmetry is not symmetry at all. I found that it is difficult to make different-sized images be symmetrical.

I made many changes to my slide. I changed my previously lime green text on a sea blue background to a peach red, matching my title. I reduced the length of my title to make it more concise and to-the-point. I centered my title and moved the images to either side to create as much symmetry as possible.

My visual consists of a handful of art materials scattered across a table. The materials include pencils, value pencils, crayons, compasses, pencil sharpeners, and paintbrushes put into a mixture of warm and cool colors. Bigger objects, like the crayon box and the journal, bleed off the edge, since you don’t necessarily need to pay attention to those things. As you may know, this is a remake with its design based on the criticisms I recieved. It still has the same format: materials scattered all of the art materials around the paper as is if the piece of paper was a final art piece.     

       I still didn’t use as much reference for this slide.  I reordered the materials as I remixed the visual. The first critique I had was the color of the ‘table’. Before I remixed it it was a light shade of blue, but the brown color adds to a realistic style. I also stood up the cup of paint, since the color of the paint bristles were blending in too much with the paint color, because they were touching. The normal pencils still have two locations in this setup; one is still on the journal, and three others are still towards the lower right corner. There’s definitely a lot of more value, too, on nearly every object, and this also adds more to this realistic style.

My visual kept the same center piece. The incredibly crappy looking pencil drawing of a rocket and another planet is still there. I didn’t want this visual just to say “so yeah, this is me”. A moral or message is my way of making sure people can really take something out of the artwork. The one I decided to stick with is “what you allow is what will continue”. It’s simple and self-explanatory, unlike “I am within and without, simultaneously enchanted and repelled by the inexhaustible variety of life”. I split the moral into two and then put one half on each side, since I didn’t want it to interfere with the visual. So, after considering the message, I was pretty much done.

I presented my slide to a smaller group which made my critique more personal and less nerve racking rather than sharing it with the entire class. I had  Preston in my group which I was frightened by but also happy about because i knew he was a harsh critiquer who would give me good advice. After seeing half of my class present i knew that some things needed to be changed and my group agreed with me. The first thing I changed was my placement of everything on my slide.

The reasoning behind changing the placement is because it wasn’t aesthetically pleasing to the eyes. My shapes were overlapping and my pictured seemed stretched. I fixed my shapes by overlapping shapes that were supposed to and moved things around to make it proportional. I deleted my picture entirely because in order for it not to look stretched it would be too small for my liking. After deleting the picture, I made my name my focalpoint and it made everything look more aligned. When the picture was placed in the middle I had to move my name to the counter and it caused it to look awkward because it wasn’t proportional, but that wasn’t the only thing I had to change.

I also had to slightly change my color pallet. My group told me that my wording didn’t have that much of a contrast. In my opinion color/contrast is one of the most important to a slide, because that’s the first thing I pay attention to. My mind works through color so I made sure that i had good contrast which I learned learned on a color pallet website. The changes I made did make my slide more appealing and more clear to read.

Sources

http://www.presentationzen.com/presentationzen/2008/08/learning-from-the-design-around-you-ikea.html

https://zachholman.com/posts/slide-design-for-developers/

http://www.colourlovers.com/

When my slide was critiqued on my slides I learned many things. My group helped me realize that my bottom slide was too stretched out. I also learned that I shouldn’t just se basic fonts. Finally I learned that I should always make sure to prepare before a presentation the hard way. I also heard that I should speak up a little more when I present.

With the critiques I received started to edit my slide. I took away the Quito and Philly labels because they took away from the presentation. I also changed the front because I felt that front didn't represent me.  I also tried to un stretch the image but that didn't work out. I also made my text bigger because it was too small. I finally added a black border to make the photos pop.

As I look back on this assignment I have realized that research definitely made my slide better. Not only was I able to make my slide look more presentable but I was also able to understand their reasons why it looked presentable. For example I never knew about the rule of 3’s before this project. I feel that you should always be able to have a thorough understanding of what you researched. I used two main  sources for this project. One was my friends, I asked them for their recommendations and sometimes definitions. I also used an essay by Zach Holman

This is my new slide. Yes i did not change the theme but i added more things and they have a deep mean then when you just read them, well at least they to me. So the most important thing is that in the middle of the slide there is a quote that says ‘ i learned a lot about life with a ball in my feet’ and this quote just means that playing soccer taught me alot. The second thing is in the left upper corner it says ‘My ha'pennies’ and that just means that soccer just really keeps me happy. And then in the right upper corner it says ‘My home’ and this just means that  when i'm playing soccer or just when i'm at a soccer field i feel like i'm at home. Then in the left bottom corner it says ‘My goal’ what i mean by this is that i wanna be a soccer professional player and also when im playing soccer i always set a goal for myself before practice or even a game. And finally bottom corner it says ‘My life’ and this is the most important one because  it's just basically saying that soccer is my life and i would do anything to continue soccer for my whole life and never stop playing no matter what because i truly love it with a passion.

   Soccer helped get through life because it shows me different stuff for example when your during a game people will push you and trip you and many other stuff but you never give up you always get back up and keep running after the ball and also when you shoot the ball it doesn't always go in but you don't give up you try again and again until you get it in.

   I made the changes because i felt like in my first slide wasn't really interesting and it didn't really have a lot of information it was just a picture with two words so this time i put it more words and also it has different colors because they all blend in together and also you can really see the words because they are bright.

My 1 Google Slide based of my Me Magazine was presented to a group and I received information to make the slide better. Preston told me that instead of my slide being blue and white I should make it all one color. Cameron Jones said that my title should be in the middle and should differentiate from my other caption. The group said I should make my slide more symmetrical and add shapes. I was also told to make my slide more eye catching. Jakob had told me to bleed my pictures to make it look better and I combined all of these suggestions to make a better slide.

The research I did helped me to see what makes a billboard eye catching. I learned that those billboard advertisements worked on me unconsciously and that I should use those strategies to make my slide look good. I used presentation zen especially to really shape up my slide. I applied bleeding the second time around to change the aesthetic to my slide. I also adjusted my color to make the contrast look more pleasing. I learned that when making a slide everything is important and the tiniest mistake can be seen or mess up the whole presentation of the advertisement.

When making the slide I referred to the sources provided. I used Elements of Design Defined, Slide Design, and Presentation Zen. The source I used the most was the Presentation Zen because it served the most useful source to me. The useful information included great details and good visuals that would help guide me while making my slide. The Elements of Design helped me figure out the fundamentals as well as the useful vocab I needed to know.

I knew from the start that my slide was not going to be perfect, but I was prepare to handle any critique that was thrown at me. While I was presenting to my small group, the critique that everyone gave was constructive and resourceful. From their critique, I learned that everything could not be interpreted the way you want it to be. For example, in my slide I put a feather and ink as a symbol my for passion of writing, but Doug suggested that people may not what it means or what it is in the first place. I also received criticism for my placement of arrows, pointing out that I was taking away emphasis from one part and focusing it all on another and instead suggesting of balancing the ensemble of visuals correctly by connecting them. Finally, Jacob P. pointed out that my video game controller lacked depth and felt like it was “not up to par” and suggested I use a more modern representation of the video game controller. His final comment was that the color scheme threw off the balance of the slide and created discord.

In my reworked slide, I made those changes so the finished product will look more urbane and polished than the first time around. Instead of a feather and ink, I replaced it with a fountain pen writing some words so it could be interpreted as symbolism for writing. I also changed the arrows completely; instead of having a circle of arrows focus on the baseball I connected the “Choose Your Game” visual to the baseball just by using one arrow, which shows that they are connected in a way. The one arrow also makes it superior to the previous arrows, because that way there is less clutter on the slide to open up more room for empty space.

The research I did helped me create a better slide, by introducing me to terms I’ve never heard of before. Things of rule of third and empty space creates a visually appealing slide that reduces the amount of things that your eye has to see, allowing the information being processed to be quicker and faster. Previous elements such as texture, color, and lines that I had a basic understanding of before, I became more advanced in those specific areas. Not only this research allowed me to efficiently finish the project, it will also allow me to create future presentations that will be aesthetically pleasing. Finally, I’ve learned that I should keep it simple and not to overkill the design. In fact, while researching I found my new favorite quote that is a homage to what my design is like; “Simplicity is complexity resolved.”  Various resources across the web were helpful in the creating of this slide. Some resources included Presentation Zen, pictures of IKEA advertisements, and various videos on Youtube.

When I was offered critiques, I learned that making pictures bigger gives the audience something to focus on while also focusing on the big words. By hearing my pictures were too small I made the pictures bigger so the audience can really see them. I changed the positioning of everything, and added a new border around my pictures that was still flowers like my original slide. People said they liked “family” in the middle, so I kept that and put my two cities on the top and bottom of that. The arrows show that family is represented through those two places.

I actually thought that my other slide was good, I put a lot of thought into it, and was very proud of it. Then I realized that some things didn’t make sense, like having the cat and basketball made it look bad. So I took them out and made everything simpler. I also asked my friends and teachers about what they thought and kept asking for advice so that really helped me.

Even though I changed the slide I still have most of the same design elements, like symmetry, texture, color, sizing, contrast, framing, and repetition. These design elements make the slide have more thought and care. Overall I think my slide is more presentable looks simpler but in a good way.

I learned from my critiques that I needed to pick a lighter font for my words and to make my words bolder. Also that I need to add another thing onto my slide so that it doesn’t look so dry. So I chose to add a bitmoji of my dog and I to go with my central idea of my dog (family). I learned that short sentences or a low amount of words will make it easier for a person to read your slide and that light eye catching words attract more eyes than dark colored words and everyone loves dogs so the picture of the dog and bitmoji will draw more eyes.

Link I used this document to learn about the color I should use for my text.

Another link I used this link to show me that shape is a major key which is why everything on my slide is big or bolded.

I learned new things and new ideas that could help me and my slide that I hadn’t thought of before. I learned that I had a lot of blank spaces and I could use those blank spaces to my advantage. I also learned that I should probably add color to my background because it was a little boring and tepid. In all, the critiques were constructive and all useful. I kept basing my slide off of the one idea of always keeping everything simple and I might’ve went a little overboard.

I made my slide dramatically different as in terms of displacing the words, the images to cover blank spaces. I took advantage of all of the blank spaces I had. I also made my background a light faded blue color to contrast the black letters. I had to pick a new earth image because in order to change the background color, the earth had to have the blank space around it. I had to make sure the picture was also legal to use.  The faded blue isn’t very loud, it’s calming in a way, so the letters and image aren’t disrupted. I enlarged the words and the picture. I also slanted the writing, made sure they were all at 341 degrees or else it would’ve looked wonky and tilted unevenly. I placed it exactly 341 degrees because I had positioned it in many different angles, some were nice but I ultimately decided on 341.

The research definitely helped with my slide and my talking parts of the project. I researched other sites and youtube videos about how to make things pop. Most of them all had the same suggestions, and critiques. I really enjoyed looking into Project Zen, when explaining the simplicity of the IKEA signs. Even just learning new vocab words such as contrast. There were many things that I knew of but didn't know the official title for it. It helped a lot, I had less repetition of words. I also learned new techniques that I maybe wouldn’t know or use in my slide. I used the different rules from presentation zen, and the other websites.

More than anything, I think I got inspired when I saw my other classmate’s slides. I saw all the different techniques they had used to make their own slide. When I originally made my slide, I think apart of me wanted to keep it as simple and easy as possible, everything was an average scale of things.  When I received my critiques, I decided to go out of my comfort zone with dilating everything bigger.