So much to do, in so little time

There are so many projects circulating at one point that it is very hard to keep track of who is doing what project. Many projects are assigned to different designers and establishing a form of communication is key to maintaining all of these projects at once. During weekly meetings, people update the creative director on their progress with regards to completing projects on time. This week I was assigned "The California Project", which was a digital timeline chronicling the historic events of California. It was for the private sector, which in this case would be for a woman who is employed by a library. Initially, I thought that Freedom Interactive would only do "in-house" advertisement, meaning they would only design for Freedom Communications' many newspaper and media outlets, but sometimes they venture outside the company confines and do design work for the private sector. I was given the files and access to the sight and would need to start updating the timeline for the "California Project" and would start the project as soon as possible. It seemed as if it was going to be a difficult project to do because of its complexity, but I know from experience that once projects are broken down they become easier to manage.

The development of the Text Message Alerts

For my next project, in accordance with the distribution of Freedom Communication's mobile applications launch, Freedom Interactive is also responsible with the promotion of their new Text Message Alert program that informs subscribers who do not have internet capabilities on their phones with valuable information as well. I was given the task to develop a mock-up of the landing site for informing subscribers of our services and how they can access text message alerts.

My initial design is shown below:

Daily meetings to keep everyone on track

One of the first things that I had noticed working as an intern in the interactive department of Freedom Communications is that a designer is given multiple projects that he or she must do within a short amount of time. Prioritizing one's tasks is a very important aspect to have in order to be successful in this industry. Keeping track of important deadlines to complete for launch schedules is very important as well because interactive companies invest a lot of money into a site and expect it to be done on time. Being on time is probably one of the most important factors when completing a design. This is quite contrary to what a traditional artist's belief that time should never dictate when a piece is complete because there should never be a time limit on creativity. The challenge of being a multimedia designer is to find a balance between the subjects of time and a limit on creativity. I noticed the artists and designers here at Freedom Interactive are very good at keeping an equilibrium between deadlines and the amount of work needed to complete a design to the best of one's ability.

In order to keep everyone on task, the Creative Director has weekly meetings to keep track of everyone's progress. From there, the Creative Director can then determine who will or will not finish on time, switch projects from designers, and make sure that designs will be finished according to launch schedules. Today, I was able to attend my first meeting and saw this take place. The experience was very insightful, as it gave me all access to how schedules are conducted within my industry and also see what is expected from me at a professional level.

My first design for Freedom Communication's Mobile Applications landing site.

For this week, I started compiling images and retouching them in order to put them together for our Freedom Communications and the launch of their mobile application for various media outlets they own. Pertaining to my section, I had to come up with a design for the Victorville Daily Press News application for Blackberry, Android, Iphone, and Windows Mobile. Since media and the internet are being more synced together than ever before, we as a society experience a product of globalization unfolding in our generation. Civilization is striving to find faster and more efficient ways to get a hold of information than years passed, and with the implementation of mobile forms of internet access via smart phones and other handheld devices, it is only necessary for a multimedia company to catch up with the times. Thus, my creative director has given me the privilege to design the Mobile Applications landing page to try and get more users to use the Freedom Interactive Mobile Application itself. My design for the landing page showcased below

:

Mobile Applications may be the way of the future.

During one of my projects here at Freedom Communications, I have opportunity to witness the initiation and implementation of the Mobile Applications promotions that new media has turned towards in order to inform the public about current events. For my next project, my director wanted me to make a mock-up of both Texting Mobile alerts and News Application landing pages to attract and inform potential subscribers. I then started a mock-on the News Application because the mobile application launched a week prior to the start of this project.

For the project itself, I wanted to make a design that would incorporate much of the cohesiveness and consistency with the other web page designs from other pages on the Freedom Networks itself. Working from the Orange County Register, I had about a week to come up with particular design to both inform and please subscribers aesthetically. I want to make a clean design, to encompass all of these concepts and implement it on the Freedom server.

Process of redesigning a website

Here at Freedom Interactive, people are assigned a multitude of projects and each individual that works within the Interactive team is expected to handle the amount of work that is given to them. Therefore, careful planning is involved in order to organize such complex projects and keep everyone on task. Specifically with creating a website, months of discussion, preparation, and collaboration are needed in order to provide a site that is both functional and aesthetically pleasing towards the targeted audience for which the site was created for in the first place. Many meetings discussing a multitude of aspects ranging from the overall design of the project to how it will function as a whole will be taking place between the creative, technical, and product directors of the companyto produce a site to meet the standard that has been set forth in those prior meetings. I have noticed that designing a website can take a considerable amount of time because a numerous amount of work and input amongst a wide array of individuals from different sections of Freedom goes into the whole design of the project. "Launch Schedules" are given to each team to come towards an agreement to complete tasks on scheduled dates to produce a product in a timely manner. What the team came up with,upon numerous revisions and combining elements from multiple designs is as follows:

Prioritizing projects is key to success here.

During my second week, I have found out a lot is expected from you and thinking about what needs to be done can be very overwhelming. I realize that it isn't a class anymore, but real-world expectations are put on you, and you have to produce results in order to stay on the team. Upon working on sales sheets throughout the week, and given a project to redesign an old version of the sports website, it seems like more and more projects are coming my way. I am open to these challenges however, dividing such large tasks into smaller more attainable tasks seems to be the key for success. This is a skill that is easily said than done, but working with the designers at Freedom Interactive, this skill is a must have to be a solid producer in the work force. My last revision was overviewed by Senior designers and I had to implement changes on my design to accommodate for new functions for the new version of the site. After working here for a little over a week, it is occurred to me that your work will constantly change from the initial concepts to the final production, with everyone giving their input as to perfect your work. I had to put in a section for video, as well as incorporate the idea of having the varsity team calendar and poll to make it truly interactive. So my design follows: