Professional Studies 2015 Evaluation

For the professional studies module this year I decided to focus on the career of Blogging. Learning outcome one was “Demonstrate knowledge and critical understanding of professional practice in the relevant creative industry and the career opportunities within it”. I feel that I have fulfilled this. I have researched blogging as a career very well and documented my findings on my blog, which involved writing about the various factors in blogging professionally and interviewing existing bloggers to see what their thoughts were and how they blog. I also researched the necessary qualifications and skills needed to be a professional blogger and wrote about this as a section in my report. The second learning outcome was “Analyse, interpret and apply research and data from a variety of sources appropriate to the identification of your own career aspirations”. I feel that I did this very well because I made sure that I collected data from a variety of sources and I also made sure that I got different types of data, applying research method skills I had to make sure I had collected an ample amount of data to reach a valid and reliable conclusion. I made sure that I collected data from primary sources which were surveys and interviews, and also secondary sources which were websites and online articles. I also collected a variety of quantitative and qualitative data so that I could analyse the data collected in different ways to explore my research further. From doing this research I identified the career aspiration of becoming a better blogger with the aim of eventually turning blogging into a career, and decided to base my report on finding out how to do this. The final learning outcome was “Select and apply appropriate presentation methods for reports and professional documents” and I feel that I also did this well because I learned how to use Adobe InDesign so that I could present my work appropriately and I put these skills into practice when I was writing my report. I also applied these skills, as well as other skills in Photoshop and Illustrator to create my personal creative CV and I am very pleased with the result. I also managed to create a multi-page PDF document to showcase my work which acts as a digital portfolio which I can continue to build on throughout my professional career. My blogging skills have also improved during this module because I have written a number of long posts on my blog linking to my chosen career and I have set them out appropriately so that they will be appealing to my blog’s audience. Overall I have enjoyed this module and I think that I have learned a lot from it. The conclusion I came to in my report will help me in the future to become a better blogger which can hopefully lead to a blogging career in the future. If I was to do this module again I think the one thing that I would change would be to manage my time better because I would have liked more time to further experiment with and develop my digital portfolio.

Lauren xxx

My Creative CV

Blogging Platforms: My Experiences

Hello again!

Today's post is about the thing that most bloggers are stumped with first when they decide to start blogging: which blogging platform, and what's different about them. Now honestly, I've heard so many different opinions on which platform is the best that it's hard to come to a definitive answer. What I've gathered is that different ones are better for different purposes and different people, and since a non-objective approach to this question seems to be the most fitting, I'm going to write about my own opinions on the matter.

The very first platform I ever started using was Tumblr. Way back when I was around 14 and I stumbled across it, it was nowhere near as popular as it's grown to be now. It was mostly filled with amateur photography and teenagers complaining (I was one amongst them). However, since then it has developed much more status in the blogging world, often being a platform that most artists and other creative people turn to due to the image-based format of the site and the ease of uploading multi-media posts. I like this about Tumblr, because it makes discovering new artists and viewing their work in high-resolution very simple, and I like how there is no 'default' posting format, so to speak. You can literally post any kind of media: pictures, videos, speech, sound clips - anything, with ease, because it's not automatically assuming that you'll be wanting to write a text post like most blogs do. For this reason, I still use Tumblr now to host my Art blog. I also like the tagging system used on Tumblr; it makes your posts easy to find, and it makes finding others' posts on chosen topics easy to find. There's also the added benefit of the daily laugh you get with Tumblr, because there's a lot of blogs on there posting an abundance of internet-based humour, which is a nice thing to have on your dashboard. I think Tumblr is very easy-to-use, and I like the fact that the Tumblr community seems to be very informal and social. However, I have found that it has a lot of down-sides. Firstly, unless you're good with HTML coding, customising the appearance of your blog to anything other than a simple, pre-designed theme can be very tricky. There are no options to even make small changes to existing themes such as changing font colours without changing the actual HTML code, which sucks a little. Also, it's impossible to browse in public. Because Tumblr is one of the few platforms that still allows NSFW content and blogging, it's not uncommon to be leisurely scrolling down a dashboard of completely normal blogs when you get the shock of your life, because one of them has reblogged one out-of-the-ordinary post. Especially not good when there's someone stood behind you who completely misunderstands the situation. Not good at all. It's also easy to go off-topic from your blog's main purpose with Tumblr, because there are so many pretty pieces of art on there that you can find yourself listlessly reblogging hundreds of image posts and forgetting to write any actual text, or losing your text posts in between the hundreds of reblogged images.

The second platform I used was WordPress. I don't actually use this platform anymore, despite not finding much wrong with it. I guess the reason I started using it was because I wanted to try a more 'traditional' way of blogging, heavy on the text posts, simple and easy. I figured that because WordPress was a text-based platform, it would be a good one to use. I started blogging about things that I did and was planning on doing, like baking cakes, attending social events, planning tattoos etc, basically a lifestyle blog. I found that it was really easy to use. Formatting was easy enough and I was able to make my blog look suitably pretty without too much fuss. Posting was easy, too. I figured it out pretty much straight away, which is always a bonus. I liked the dashboard, too, and how it picked out a few blogs to follow based on your interests. I remember my dashboard always being filled with really interesting, artsy textile posts from really great bloggers. I never got many views there though, which I didn't mind, but if I was planning on blogging about something that I needed as many people as possible to see, it would have been an issue. I found it pretty hard to connect with other bloggers there, too. Other than the crafty-type blogs that I followed and appeared on my dashboard, just browsing was pretty hard. I couldn't really find many more blogs, and I wanted to because I wanted more variation than reading posts from the same few people all the time. I guess I just felt kind of cut off from the community, because people weren't as involved in each other there as they were on Tumblr, which I was used to. None of this was really an issue though, and I guess the reason why I moved eventually was purely because WordPress was decreasing in popularity, and there were more other bloggers to connect with elsewhere.

That's when I started to use Blogspot, which obviously, I still use now. I like Blogspot because it's text-based, which makes traditional blogging easy, but since it's more popular there are more other bloggers on it to follow and connect with. I find it very easy to just browse here, too, using the 'next blog' feature. I find formatting very easy on Blogger because panels can be dragged around in settings and widgets added, and in addition to this the customize tool allows you to change small details like fonts and colours with ease, without having to be totally HTML-savvy. One thing that I also really like about Blogspot is that it's linked to Google Plus. It makes sharing posts with more people really easy, and it's another way to connect with other bloggers. I just think that it all works really well. I love the way that blogger offers stats as a feature, too, so that you can see exactly where in the world and which sources your traffic is coming from. The option of having multiple blogs on Blogger is great, too, especially for people like me who like to have their own personal blog as well as others for certain projects, like this one. I think that the only thing I don't like about Blogger is the lack of a proper dashboard. I know that there is one, but it doesn't really feel like a proper dashboard to me, and it's not so easy to browse.

Then finally, my most recent blogging muse is a new site called Ello, which is developed especially for creative people and is ad-free. It's currently still in beta-testing so I haven't had chance to properly blog on it yet, but I've found my feet and I think that it's simple enough to use. Formatting is fairly minimal on here so that gets rid of the problem of working out how to format your page etc, and I quite like the minimalist approach to it all. It basically just does what it says on the tin, and does it well, without all the ads and popups that other sites have. The community is pretty limited because it's just starting up but it's slowly getting bigger. Similarly to Tumblr, it's quite image-heavy but doesn't rely on that so much, although there is still a feature similar to Tumblr's reblog. I like it. I can see it going places.

So, that's all of my experiences with different platforms. There are loads more, but these are just the ones I have tried. Which platform is your favourite? How many others have you tried? I'd love to know your thoughts!

Lauren xxx

Social Networking: Why it's important

Hi everyone!

Today I wanted to talk about something that is often overlooked as a business tool: social media.
Social media is something that is absolutely everywhere these days, with the ever-growing popularity of sites such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. For most people, they are simply ways of passing the time, nosying around their friends' lives (or keeping an eye on their ex-boyfriends...), or procrastinating when there's work to be done, which we're all guilty of, especially me. However, sites like these hold a lot of power in their format due to their ability to easily reach a huge number of people very quickly, at the click of a button. Look how quickly things spread around Facebook and eventually go viral: that's the power that these sites have, and if they can make something as daft as a cat playing the keyboard fly around the world's computer screens within days, imagine what they could potentially do for a business.

This could be confusing you at this point, because you're thinking "how does this relate to blogging?" Well, for many people who have found success with their blogs, their blog is in fact a business, and a high-earning one at that, with the blogging industry growing faster than ever and more and more people reaping the financial benefits of having a blog. Just like a shop on a high street, more people visiting usually means more money, and with a blog it's exactly the same. The more hits the blog gets, the more money it's worth, so the main goal of most bloggers is to get people to visit their page in the first place, and that's where Social Networking comes in.

What are the chances of some random person knowing your exact url and typing it into their browser? It's really not very high, as you can imagine, thus other ways of directing people are needed. Think about when you visit new blogs, how do you access them? A lot of the time it will be through external links on other Social Media sites, through search engines like Google, or because someone on a conversation thread has linked other people to a blog. If it works on you, chances are, it's going to work on other people. This is why cross-referencing yourself on as many social media accounts as possible is important, because it means that if someone reaches you through just one of these accounts, which at some point someone inevitably will, they automatically are connected to your whole online business persona, and have immediate access to all of your social media accounts and very importantly, your blog.

There are so many options when it comes to social networking that it can be hard to find your feet at first, but it's about making smart decisions and choosing which platforms suit your business best.
Facebook is a good all-rounder. Their huge database of users means reaching a lot of people, and it's a suitable place for smaller sites and companies as much as it is huge corporate industries and very well-known, high-traffic sites. Twitter is also good for reaching many people but it's a little more personal as you're posting small snippets of your own dialogue, which can be handy in the blogging community as it can feel more personal when communicating with followers, which tends to be something desirable when blogging. Instagram and Flickr are both good for more visual bloggers such as artists or people who review products and need to post pictures of them, as they allow for very easy access to a large amount of images. Google Plus is a good networking tool for bloggers in particular, as it is linked to Blogger so it's easy to find other fellow bloggers and people interested in blogging through it, who may become strong contacts and gain you more traffic as you help each other and collaborate. There are also very new, creative networking sites such as Ello, which is a new, ad-free creative social network made especially for people interested in visual media. There are also sites such as Bloglovin' which are made especially for bloggers, by bloggers.

This list has barely touched on the many possibilities of social networking available, but it goes to show that there's something for everyone, you just have to find what works for you. In my experience, most of my followers gained on my blogs have been through linking to my other social media accounts, as people tend to click on the links they see on there more than searching for your blog directly. Blogger is very handy in identifying where your traffic is coming from as it actually shows you stats like that in your account info, alongside things like where abouts in the world your blog gets the most views.

Do you have a blog? If so, how do you gain traffic? Do you find that social networking helps?

Lauren xxx

New Blog Focus

Hello again everyone!

I realise in the last post I said that I had moved and that I would not be using this blog anymore. That is now not strictly true. I have still got a new blog which will be my main focus for personal leisurely blogging, but at the same time I will be continuing to blog here. The reason being is that last year, I started this blog as a fashion blog, as a project for university as part of my professional studies module. At the end of the year I thought that this module was over, hence my moving to another personal blog, but this year we are doing professional studies again, so I need to keep using it.
However, we now have to blog differently. We have to choose our main area of interest within our study and specialise in it, blogging about this in a more focused way instead of blogging about the course and fashion in general. My main interest is definitely blogging itself, so I decided to base my blog on that; hence its new name: The Meta-Blog.
So this is the cutoff point. I know that before I blogged about fashion and university and sewing, and the posts are still there as I don't want to lose all of my work from last year, but now I will only be blogging about, well, blogging. I think it will be a strange concept to do this, but nonetheless I am looking forward to doing it. I like a challenge.
I have a few ideas for posts I can do soon so watch this space...

Ciao,
Lauren xoxo

Professional studies hand-in day - My Evaluation!

Hi everyone! So, it’s hand-in day for the professional studies module! So here’s my written evaluation of the module now that it’s over.

The main things we had to do for the module were in two parts. Firstly, we had to create this here weblog of which you are currently reading, and post relevantly to our course and lectures, and secondly, we had to write a report of a minimum of 500 words on a chosen job role within the fashion industry, and research the job role ourselves and get interviews from experienced people where needed.

For my report, I chose to do it on the job role of a fashion designer, as that is the job that I think I would most like to pursue within the industry, ideally. I was lucky enough to get an interview via email with the owner of a vintage shop in Middlesbrough called Ticky Turner vintage, who has done everything from scratch for her business by herself and is successful, so she had relevant experience within the industry for me to learn from. I found this very inspiring and informative, and it gave me a lot of information to put into my report. Also, I used a number of different websites and books to research the job role, and things like which qualifications are needed for the job, and what skills you need to be successful. I found this part of the module challenging and informative but it was not particularly enjoyable for me. I think that in future to do better on tasks like this, I should use information from a wider range of sources to gain further knowledge.

As for the blogging part of the module, we had to create and run our own fashion blog, and post about topics that interest us but also were relevant to the lectures we received. I did this by posting about topics like contemporary styles of presentation, fashion ethics, and current fashion. I also posted about the work that I was doing as part of my course. To gain more hits on my blog, I used skills that I had learnt in my professional studies module, like publicising my blog myself and being professional, and through doing this I actually was offered space on blog hosting sites who publicise and promote peoples’ posts to get them read and noticed by more people, which proved to be a success. I also did things like linking other social networking sites to my blog so that it was accessible in more ways. I chose blogger as my blogging platform because after researching fashion blogs, I found that it was the most popular platform for fashion bloggers to use. I found this part of the module very easy because I had already had lots of blogging experience previously running other blogs, so I knew all about how to write and how to format my blog. I really enjoyed this part of the module as I like working with computers and social networking and blogging is a hobby of mine anyway. I think if I had to do it again, to improve I would ensure that I posted in more regular intervals.

Overall, I have found the professional studies module interesting and informative and I have really enjoyed it!

Lauren xoxo

Current project: Visage denim

Hey everyone! Just thought I should give you a little update on what I'm working on at the minute.
Our design and make module has two parts: the MoreMile project which I already told you all about, and the one which we're currently working on, which is a denim project. We're currently working with a company called Visage who have set us the brief and that is who we're designing for, choosing either New Look, Internacionale, George @ Asda, or Next as the store to design for as those are their four main clients. As research on these, we all went out into these shops and looked at existing denim products that they sold and took pictures of them for analysis.

 

 


We went to Manchester to their HQ a fortnight ago and it was very informative as we got to meet some of the staff and look at the collections that the company are currently working on.

Like the MoreMile project, we had to pick a theme. I've noticed that a lot of current fashions have a sort of artsy, bright, bold, abstract feel to them lately, so I decided to use abstract for my theme. Here's some examples from Celine's ready to wear collection:

Here's my moodboard for my project on my theme of abstract. I chose New Look as my client because I think that they have the youngest target audience who are more open-minded to bold styles that go hand in hand with abstract styling.

I'm still currently in the toileing stage so I don't have any more pictures yet but what I do know is that I'll be using a really interesting technique I just learned called TR pattern cutting in which you draw lines through dart points on a toile to make a new pattern with lots of abstract shapes, it's really cool so you should check it out!

Ciao for now,

Lauren xoxo

Pechakucha Presentations

Hi guys! So a few weeks back in professional studies we learned about a presentation format called Pechakucha which I'd never heard of before, and I wanted to make a post about them because I think that they're a really good idea. The basic idea of these presentations is to get across key pieces of information in a short space of time preventing rambling thus boredom and all kinds of such catastrophes. The format is 20 slides, which advance automatically and have no text on them, and last for 20 seconds each, so it's 20x20. You can do a Pechakucha on absolutely anything, but they're really popular within the design/creative community. It's even become such a craze that people hold Pechakucha evenings (ngl I really really want to go to one of these) which are casual social events where a little group of people each do a Pechakucha and drink and have snacks and things and I think it's all different kinds of adorable! Aside from that though I think for people like me it's a great format because I really struggle with things like presentations because I get anxious and I worry that if I have to read off a screen then I'll do something silly like stumble over my words and everything will go wrong, but since it's so quick there's no time for nerves and because there's no text on the slides you don't have that awful (and boring) reading-off-the-screen thing going on and it just feels more natural altogether because you just look at the image on the screen and it kind of jogs your memory into speaking about the image so that it's spontaneous and it feels more like talking to a friend than 'doing a presentation'.
Anyway, I just thought that it was a really cool concept and I really want to go to one of these Pechakucha evenings! Hope you guys found it as interesting as I did!

Lauren xoxo

The Dorman Museum

A while back now me and two others on my course went to the Dorman museum, Middlesbrough, to do a workshop with a local artist who taught us how to draw textures like feathers, which we thought would be useful when doing fashion illustrations. We went into this room they have called the "bird room" which is filled with taxidermy birds and nests and eggs and it's fascinating. We used those as reference to draw from life, using lots of new techniques and media. Here's one picture I ended up with; a negative drawing of a birds' nest done in graphite and eraser:

While we were there, we also had a look around the rest of the museum, which was really good. I took some pictures while I was there so you guys could see what it was like. There was also a medieval torture exhibition on when we went which was really fascinating; I got lots of pictures of that too! Click here to see them.

Lauren xoxo

Oil Slick pictures: Inspiration

Hi guys, here's a quick post just to show you some of the photography I did of oil spills on the ground as primary research on my theme for the MoreMile sportswear project! Click here to see them.

Lauren xoxo

The Bowes Museum: photos from my visits

Remember I while back I said that at uni we were going to the Bowes museum? We've been twice so far, First time we looked around the whole museum, second time we saw the Laura Ashley and the Tailoring exhibitions. I took a lot of photographs while we were there and I've now got them on Flickr so you guys can see what it was like. I really enjoyed visiting the museum both times, it was very interesting and also quite inspiring. There was a lot of Rococo and Baroque styling in the architecture which we were learning about in Material Culture studies at the time.
Click here to see the photos!

Lauren xoxo

New term, new project!

Hello! So yesterday was the start of a brand new shiny term and it's all very exciting at the minute because that means that having handed in our visual communication and design & technical modules now, we are starting a whole new project! It's a design-only project and we are going to be working with a company to their brief. The project is on sportswear and we will be working with a UK-based company called More Mile, and designing for them a range of sportswear and running shoes. To do this, we will be completing another sketchbook like our previous design project and composing range plans on boards using Adobe Illustrator. Now I'm not usually a big sports person myself by any stretch of the imagination (however I AM forcing myself to the gym tonight!!!) but I am actually really really excited about this project! It's a short one lasting only 5 weeks but I feel really inspired and have already picked out my theme and started working, and we aren't even receiving our intro talk from the company until Thursday! I just want to throw myself into it and really knuckle down and produce a lot of different ideas. I don't know why I'm so suddenly enthusiastic but I am really glad that I am! Maybe it's because I'm excited about the opportunities working with a client to a brief could bring. Maybe all the tea I drink has gone to my head. Alas, it's a good thing either way.
Updates to follow!

Lauren xoxo

Connect with me on LinkedIn!

Hi everyone! Just a quick post to let you all know that I'm now on LinkedIn, so feel free to add me as connections! Click here to go to my profile :)

Lauren xoxo

Visual Communication: The big hand-in!

Hi everyone! really sorry I've been a bit quiet for ages again, hand-ins have been hectic! The big ones are done now though, so I thought I would just write a quick post to tell you about it. Okay, so the first hand-in I had was for visual communication; the module that the work in the previous post was for. This one was made up of two parts, hand-rendering and IT, which eventually came together in three final boards depicting a chosen collection, garment flats of it made on Adobe Illustrator, and your final illustrations of the collection which were made by hand-rendering first and were then scanned in and coloured digitally. If any of you missed my previous posts on this module, they can be found here and here! There was such a huge rush towards the end of my time up until the deadline and I was like a woman possessed trying to get it all done! I managed it in the end though with a whole three minutes to spare!!! (Time management isn't my strong point at all as you can tell!) Here's my final three boards for the project!

I'm really pleased with them, especially the last one with my final illustrations on!
Alongside this we also needed to hand in a sketchbook showing evidence of hand-rendering work and experimentation with different media. This bit was the worst and I didn't get much sleep getting it done! There was loads of work in it by the end though so I can't post every bit of it on here, but here are the best bits, and a few edits of them I did on photoshop as experiments!

Josephine Bowes' Dress, Bowes museum, from life, Oil Pastels.

Kate Moss, from reference, watercolours and fineliner.

Vanessa Paradis, from reference, ProMarkers and Adobe Photoshop.

Photoshop experiment from a reference of an Estee Lauder magazine advert.

Final Illustration 1, Photoshop.

Final Illustration 2, Photoshop.

Final Illustration 3, Photoshop.

Final Illustration 4, Photoshop.

Experiment in drippy inks, from magazine reference.

Hand studies, from life and magazine references.

Feet studies, from magazine references.

An eye, Biro Pen, from reference.

An eye, graphite pencil, from reference.

Negative drawing of a bird's nest done on a workshop at the Dorman Museum, Middlesbrough. Graphite crayon and eraser, from life.

Montana Forbes study, ProMarkers.

Freya Flavell study, Watercolour.

Freya Flavell study, ProMarkers.

Ilse Valfre study, Oil Paints.

Hajin Bae study, coloured pencils.

Sabine Pieper study, Oil Paints.

Sky Ferreira, Biro pen, from reference.

Edits, Adobe Photoshop.

Hope you enjoyed seeing my work! I'm really pleased with how it all turned out. I'll be updating my art blog with it soon. I also had deadlines for my technical folder and my design project too, but I'm still yet to get decent phots of it, but I will make a post on it when I've got some!

Lauren xoxo

Christmas catch-up

Hello everyone! Really sorry I haven't posted in absolutely ages, I've been so so busy with it being Christmas and everything I just haven't had time. I hope everyone's had an amazing Christmas and New Year! I have, but the downside to that is that I now have a LOT of work to do for uni before Monday... one of these days I will learn not to leave it until last minute! Nonetheless, I've had a really productive night so far. I'm trying to catch up with my work for Visual Communication because the deadline for the module is really soon after we go back after Christmas. Something I've been meaning to do for ages is do my artist research, so I've been focusing on that for the past few days. I have to do 5 studies of the same piece in different media, for 5 different artists/illustrators. I've chosen Ilse Valfre (one of my favourite illustrators!), Sabine Pieper, Freya Flavell aka. Doodloodloo, Montana Forbes, and Hajin Bae. So far I've got through all five for Montana Forbes and Sabine Pieper. Here's a look at what I've done so far. I'm only posting one of the Montana Forbes ones though because it's the only one of those five that I really liked; I just don't think that the other media I used really lent itself very well to the image. I guess that's why you experiment though, to find these things out! Anyway, here they are:

Another thing I've been really excited to tell you guys is about my Christmas presents. I know what you're thinking: how is that relevant at all? Stay with me though! There's two that I'm particularly excited about. The first one is this baby...

ISN'T IT GORGEOUS?! (Like I needed to ask!) This is the Nikon D3100. I've been lusting after an SLR for quite some time, I've been sick of distorted and pixelated and blurry images and I thought that since I run a blog now and my course is one that will involve photography at some point, it makes sense to have an upgrade. Courtesy of Santa, of course... (ahem, thank you Mother!!!)
I also got a long distance focus lens and a tripod for it off my Dad. So expect better quality images hereafter! Yay for great cameras!
Onto the second thing. Here she is...

(Excuse the hairy carpet, I have two Jack Russells and no motivation to hoover.)

How gorgeous?! I'd be over the moon if I got this just as a pretty ornament, but I'm particularly excited because it's fully serviced and working, so I can actually use it!!!
Which brings me onto my exciting news! I shall be using my new machine very soon, because over the holidays my inner entrepreneur has been niggling away at me, and I am very excited to say that I am opening my own online shop! I'll be selling handmade things, however I'm not going to spill the beans on what that is until it's fully up and running, but a post is to follow announcing the launch very soon I promise! Eeeek! :D
I'm wondering if I've missed anything to tell you all... I've always had the memory of a goldfish, no doubt I will have missed something. Oh well, if I have it will come to me. I'd better go now though because I have to be up in eight hours for work! No rest for the wicked...

Ciao for now,

Lauren xoxo