Day 3

In class an old acquaintance of mine Alex Clark gave me a lead to a possible non profit website project with La Esperanza Granada.

Located in Granada, Nicaragua, La Esperanza Granada is a volunteer group focusing on children’s education. ‘Born’ in 2002, we started in one small village on the outskirts of Granada, and now help in seven poverty stricken areas. Our volunteers go out into the rural schools and assist the teachers, tutor young children, run sports programs, introduce children to computers, and help stimulate an interest in learning.

This type of educational nonprofit would be especially gratifying to work with.  My girlfriend had a  suggested work project for some organizations in India through Design and People. 

Design & People identify how design can intervene to make a contribution to the ongoing efforts to improve the lives of people disadvantaged by war, disability, and political and environmental conditions. We unite and encourage graphic, industrial and architectural designers to use their experience and skills towards social and humanitarian projects. Mission: Design For People In Need.

So thankfully there are plenty of options to run with!

As far as domain names I went ahead and purchased the domain for my name, evantheurer.com even though it seemed to long and cumbersome.  The idea of being an independent freelancer with this type of domain instead of a company name (like Filament Studios) which could be construed as a competing organization to those you apply to jobs for was brought to light by Pontuti.  This aspect of a web domain I would have never thought of before and its implications to potential employers.

Today Pontuti spoke about creating a portfolio site.  From an hour and a half lecture the quick and dirty was too focus focus focus on what you really do well and allow the site to clarify, illuminate, and really get out of the way of the work you are able to do for clients.  Don't let the portfolio site interfere with your work!  Ideally clients would not notice the site but just see the amazing work you do because the design is so conductive it points the electricity and attention to where it should be, your amazing work!  Other more administrative ideas came up like the order of your images, not publishing things on your site the day of but waiting and seeing if in the clarity of the next day you still want to post said item, speed/ease of updating your site, possibly creating multiple focused sites for clients that you want to only see select targeted work, not posting the resume so you can personalize and work it specifically for your company of choice to present it to, and for me having large images for companies to clearly see my photography.  In the end a lot of good information that needs to be put to work.

After Senior Studio I was able to relax and finally see the movie Inception.  For a long time I heard many people wax about its great story and inventiveness; which after watching I full-heartedly agree on.  This is a movie which requires patience (Momento) to understand but if you are able to wait thirty minutes for more bread crumbs to follow, your mind may spontaneously combust.  Granted it does borrow a lot of ideas (Matrix) but clearly stands alone in the use and interpretation of reality vs. dream world.

The girlfriend pointed out how annoying the blue blogger banner (say that three times) was on top of my site and suggested changing it to transparent.  I assumed it was a necessary evil till I found makeuseof.com that showed you the css to completely hide it.

#navbar-iframe { height:0px; visibility:hidden; display:none; }

This site also gives you some other useful tips on using blogger, such as referring the blog to your own domain name at no cost!