"The cinema is a ribbon of dreams." Orson Welles 

Changing Seasons

Although we aren't always aware of change, it is one of the constants in life. Looking out the studio window this morning provides visual evidence. A new condo is rising just a block away and workers once toiling in the warm autumn morning light, now race to close in the structure to keep out winter's cold and dark. Photography is a powerful tool for recording events over time. The click of a shutter captures a fraction of time and lets us examine it in detail.

This month:

Feature Article: Being able to effectively articulate the purpose of a project facilitates the convincing of others that an idea is worth their consideration. This month we look at the topic of writing effective goal statements that clearly state your project's mission.

Random Links: Selected software reviews from the Scout Report e-news service.

Site Visit: The "Picture of Britain" web site explores how the British landscape has inspired artists for three hundred years. It also examines how artist have influenced and changed the way we look at and think about landscape.

Lighter Side: Take a few minutes for some online interactive fun in the tradition of those early computer games. Give Helicopter a try and see how well you can fly through an ariel obstacle course. This little game may be more of a challenge than its simple old-school graphics suggest.

On The Desktop: News from world sources about film, video, multimedia, and technology in society.

NW JOBS: Current postings of career opportunities in: Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, and other nearby states. Updated weekly.

Commentary:

E-mail has become one of the principal means for communication between project team members. Yet the key word "communication" is often overlooked in what has become an often sloppy approach to the digital exchange of ideas. Along with fragmented sentences, lack of references, and misspellings, comes misunderstanding, frustration, and anger.

Here are some e-mail tips learned from the school of hard knocks regarding effective project team correspondence.

• Be professional. Keep informal correspondence for personal use.
• Fully develop your ideas. Ask yourself if someone reading your message would understand it without the same background context from which you are referencing your writing.
• Establish a context for your message. Include background information that places your message within a context that will facilitate reader understanding. This can be as simple as changing the subject heading in your e-mail. (Recall how many generations of an e-mail message you have received that has the same original subject header but the message is no longer about that topic.) Or, spend a bit of time stating how your posting relates to other discussion that has taken place. Refer to specific postings if necessary.
• Write clearly with complete sentences. Short paragraphs are best. According to a recent MSNBC article, Americans have become abysmal writers resulting in ineffective communication.
• Use bullets to highlight specific information you want to communicate.
• Remember that an individual reading your message can not hear your voice or see your facial expressions. They don't see your smile, frown, or questioning look, as they do in face to face communication. Try this simple experiment. Say "I love you" out loud first with passion, then anger, with cynicism, and finally jokingly. Notice how different those three words can sound to the ear. Unless you are well known to a reader, he or she will add his/her own voice when reading your message.
• Try not to be emotional but if you need to be use an emoticon. However, use them sparingly :)
• Don't write when you are angry.
• Write your message and put it in a hold folder for a while. Go back and edit as needed. You will be surprised how much the message can be improved by waiting a while before sending it out to your team.

Reader Comments:

• Knowing designers can learn as much from those web sites that don't work as well as those do, reader JT of Eugene, OR. wrote and noted that "While I was looking for some costume ideas for Halloween, I came across some pretty "horrific" websites." He passes along these links as examples from which designers can learn: Holiday Spot - Halloween and Alice's Halloween Fun. Readers may also want to check out Vincent Flander's Web Pages That Suck for some really interesting internet disasters.

• MH of Eugene, OR. writes regarding some fun web sites to check out. A Japanese magician mystifies on the Hedonistic web site (watch his actions very closely); An Eye For Annai is a delightful animation as Annai searches for a second eye.

• DF of Gresham, OR. Sent along this link a set of unusual graphics photographed in a men's restroom.

• "Just wanted to thank you for maintaining this list & links! It's a wonderful resource for us creative types!" MS

Cory and Aaron Graham, former Proscenia Interns, appear on the Lane Community College Class Schedule for Winter, 2006.     Cory (right) designed the first Proscenia web site during her Internship with us. It served us well for several years as we grew and developed.     Aaron (center) worked with Proscenia Producer Ken Loge in developing graphics for a yet to be released presentation of Frank Baum's A Kidnapped Santa Claus.     Both Cory and Aaron went on to work with Monaco Coach after graduating from Lane Community College in Eugene. Cory has served as the company's artist director for web development. Aaron develops technical manuals and marketing materials for the company.

Proscenia Newsletter. This publication is dedicated to news about events, activities, careers, jobs, and technical information of interest to the multimedia community. This is a free monthly web-based publication made available without commercial advertising.

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Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of contributors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Proscenia Interactive. The Proscenia Newsletter provides links to other sites as a matter of reader convenience and is not responsible for content provided from other sources.

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