Culminating Blog Reflection

Culminating Blog Reflection

          Throughout the project, I had used critical thinking as a tool to be able to work professionally and proficiently. I used all the information I know and applied it in the most effective way possible to the project that me and my mentor had worked on, which happened to be a website. I practiced the basics of the softwares that we had to use such as Adobe Photoshop, and Dreamweaver even before we started the project. Eventhough my mentor was my sister's acquaintance, I thought that it would be hard for me to set meeting and appointments with him since he's a family guy. But no, he was actually pretty cool, which allowed me to communicate easily with him. I was pretty comfortable with my mentor. In fact, whenever I got questions to ask him regarding what and how to use something, he would always be there and exchanging ideas with me. During the project, I would give the first thoughts and he would add ideas or, if my idea was bad, change it, then ask my opinion about it. I thought that it was nice to work on something hands-on. Unlike the other things that we do in school, working with a mentor is such a wonderful experience because you get to express yourself. I was able to use my creativity most of the time if not always as we decorated and designed the website that we worked on. It was really a good feeling seeing how your own work looks like and how beautiful it is for something that was done by an amateur. 

          I have learned a lot of things personally, socially, and intellectually throughout the whole process of the Capstone Project. I'd say that I have become more confident with myself  and with my abilities. At first, I was actually not paying attention and giving interest to the project. But then, as I started doing it and surprisingly enjoying it, I realized that it's the real deal. It made me love the job that I want to do in the future even more. I saw how much effort my mentor puts on the project and it made me feel embarassed because I wasn't being so cooperative. He opened my eyes that in the real world, you can't procrastinate. I've learned how to be more responsible with the tasks that are given to me. Not only as I work by myself, but also with a team or a partner. He told me that in the industry that I'm going to go into most of the time I would be working with someone if not a team. He taught me that in order for a team to be productive, we all have to talk and throw ideas, we have to socialize and give our thoughts and opinions about things. I remember how my mentor would tell me "It's not just about the doing, it's also about the talking". It was a good experience because it molded me to become more mature and I learned how to take others' comments and opinions in a good way that I could benefit from it. I've learned that getting upset would only make frustrations worse. I've improved my ability to make judgements on any negative and positive circumstances that I might encounter everyday and use it to develop my skills as I enter the working world. All in all, I'm now more ready to challenge myself to go out of my comfort zone and challenge myself to go beyond my capabilities.

          In everything, it's almost impossible to not encounter any problem. As I was doing the Capstone Project, I had encountered a lot of trials and difficulties, which, as I said in the previous paragraph, I was able to take positively. One of the biggest problem that I experienced was my self procrastinating and being so lazy. It really taught me a lot of things. Eventhough I was procrastinating, believe it or not, I was also worried about it because I knew that it might cause my mentor losing interest in helping me out. I had to think deeply and ask my self questions on how I'm going to fulfill and reach my dreams if I can't even do this project. That really poked me and push me to start meeting with my mentor. Although at some point I still procrastinated, yet I was able to at least lessen that habit. Another problem was my transportation to meet my mentor. It was not that hard to resolve it but it held our schedules back. We could've gotten the project done if this did not become an issue. Anyways, what I did was I would ask my mom when she's free to drive me to my mentor's house. There are also times when my mentor would pick me up and drive me back home. As an amateur, I also struggled using all the softwares that we had to use to make the website. I didn't have any background to it except the study I did before actually starting on the project. It helped me a lot but some of the tools that the softwares have to offer were pretty complicated to use. Frustrations were everywhere everytime I encounter something that I can't resolve. At first, I was shy to ask. But as what my mentor had told me, "it's also about the talking". I always hated asking too many questions then I realized that if I wouldn't, who would? I'll say that those problems that a trainee might encounter are just like military bootcamp obstacles that they would have to go through in order to develop their skills and become the general they want to be.

The Final Job

The Final Job May 6, 2014

Last tuesday was the last day of me working with my mentor. I was sad about the fact that we cant really finish the project as how we planned to do it. Anyways, we started off by planning what we are going to put in the banner. There were different factors that we had to consider. One was the name, which happens to be "Marcello Kingpin Line". Other factors were the background color, the picture that we're going to put in it, and of course the layout. It is important to have a sketch first or just an idea of how it's going to look like. Ours happened to be a picture of "Marcello" and it's sick-looking puppies beside it. We sliced the actual puppies out of the original pictures. But prior to that, we had to have some background. Since, unfortunately, we didn't have that much time, we just decided to get a dark background image off the internet and enhanced it a little bit by adding effects to it. It was pretty cool that you can costumize it however you want it to be. But of course you have to have the knowledge on doing it. It was actually easier than I thought. My mentor said that it is easier to operate the new photoshops from today than the ones from back then. Yet, the new ones have more effects and functions that you can use to make a simple picture look better. So, after putting a layer for the background, we put the "sliced puppies", what me and my mentor called it, into the picture. But of course, of a different layer. Layers are important so you could re-edit a part of the picture if any changes occur. I thought doing photoshop is pretty interesting cause you can really put yourself into it by expressing yourself and being creative. Anyways, then, we put some effects into it such as shadowing and all that sort of stuff. The shadow around the puppies and Marcello makes them stand out. Even if it was not finished, yet, I actually found it pretty sick. I thought it looked so cool. And the fact that I made it made it even more exciting and fulfilling. Then after that, we chose a font for the text, which will be the name of the store. We used some cursive looking font and decided to arc it a little bit to match the shape of the dogs below them. We, again, added some effects to it to make it emboss. We finished it off by adding shadows around the text and making the background fade a little bit. I thought it looked pretty decent for a work done by an amateur like me. But, at the same time, I felt sad because it was the last day that we are going to work together for the capstone project. But the good thing is, we are still going to work even if it is outside the project. We didn't get to actually using Adobe Dreamweaver but he kind of introduced it to me and taught me where to find which, but he said that I have a lot more complex things to learn to be able to make a website. I'm looking forward into learning all of those because I know I can use them in the future. And thus, we ended that session by him signing off on my mentor evaluation. It's been a great experience working with a professional like him.

Time logged for this session: 4 hrs

Total time logged: 26 hrs