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3 of the minutes meetings missing, they can be found on Cameron's padlet. Don't know which ones are missing currently as dates are messed up on the original minutes that I have. Have been done, didn't know which ones should be sent due to the dates.

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Unit 5 + 6: Harlow College e-book creation.

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In todays lesson, we were taught animation by Dave. We were given the task of animating a duck on a river, and making it seem as if the reefs that were present were moving out of the way to clear the scene. We completed this task in Final Cut Pro, a program that I am not as familiar with as other programs and something that I can say that I have improved on and a new skill that I learnt. As I am familiar with editing and the program is similar to the ones I use regularly, there weren't many problems that were picked up, but as I needed to familiarise myself with the software, I did come across few problems in this process. One problem that I came across was the perspectives and scaling of the duck when zooming in on the subject. What was supposed to occur was the duck getting larger as the camera moved through the foreground, but the ducks size stayed the same size for a large majority of the time. I fixed this by going to the transform tab, and adding keyframes at the start and at the end of my composition, then changing the scale of the duck as the timeline moved on. Although this didn't turn out as smooth as I wanted it to, this resolved the problem nonetheless. The final problem that I encountered was with the movement of the duck, and making it move straight. Originally my subject started at the wrong point, and ended up at the place where I wanted it to finish. I fixed this by removing the keyframes and adding the relevant position keyframes to make the duck move in a straight line, as well as making it look natural. In conclusion, in this project I didn't come across many problems when editing this scene. I avoided problems by knowing the software and how keyframes work to make it run smoothly, as well as following the tutorial closely to ensure that no mistakes were made. I feel that my final product came out just right, and not much could have been changed to make it look better. The only thing I would change for the next attempt is getting the scaling of the duck correct for the perspectives, as it did not look like the duck was getting larger when going towards the subject.

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Describe what you completed today and what you have learnt- in today's lesson, we began to start sculpting our scripts, and the illustrations that go with them. Learning about how different textures and patterns can be used to create a memorable effect on the illustrations for our books. Using the information given we began to create our own collages for our e-books, in preparation for our final draft. I learnt how textures and patterns can be used to create a different look on the e-book, and how they can be used to interact with the younger audience.

How did you create your background using collage/ mixed media?- I used different materials and templates to create a collage for my e-book. I decided to go with a simple design for my collage. The setting was a field as this is the main setting for our character 'Murray the mole'. I used green chalk for the grass of the field, following the outline I had previously drawn to get a clear understand of what it might look like at the end. I then used paper cut-outs to show the outline and shape of the mole. I used fine liner to outline the hills and clouds, although originally the clouds were supposed to be made out of a sponge material.

What problems did you identify and how did you solve them?- I did not identify many problems when on this task, the only notable problem was the change in the material for the clouds from a sponge material to just using fine liner. I feel that if I were to use the sponge material it would look better, and would have a better effect towards the audience that we were targeting.

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when drawing my mole character, I came across problems when drawing the character from the side angles. The first problem I encountered was thinking about the angles and the first hand view as well as the side angle. I overcome this problem by using mental images of my character at a side angle. I then proceeded to draw the character including the foreground features and it came out looking fine.

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Why did we conduct the focus group?- as a part of our research, we were told to research our potential audience and the feedback that we got back in relation to our e-book. By asking a selection of questions on the past of the focus groups, and the nostalgia in relation to books and interactive books in the childhood, it enabled us to look at what the originals done well that we could use in our book. Meaning that we needed to note down things that people enjoyed or liked in their past, and the things that they didn't like or the things we should avoid. We done this by asking questions like "what did you enjoy in book when you were younger". This enabled us to gather a clear understand of what people liked and disliked when they were younger, meaning we can reach out to the younger audience despite the generation gap.

Secondary research: what did you learn?- When we went to the local library, we chose a few books that could directly relate to our e-book. We feel that by looking at these books we can see what they done to get the book published and successful, as well as looking at the content and illustration so we have a clear understanding of what children like to read and see when turning the pages of these books. We learned that by using simplistic language and cartoon type illustrations, we could appeal to the audience that we are branching out to just due to the simpleness of the book. We also noted that by using bright colours and bold text could appeal and have a good effect on the younger audience.

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What did you do today?- for the majority of the lesson I was further extending my photoshop skills, throughout this time I was creating my cartoon look background as well as looking for problems that I may encounter. as well as generating mine and my partners idea for a children's interactive book. We also wrote up a project proposal for these ideas.

What did you learn?- in today's lesson I learnt more skills in photoshop and to analyse problems that I encounter while in photoshop. As well as this I learnt how to generate ideas for a children's interactive book.

What skills did you develop?- I did not develop many skills other than my photoshop which I had a clear understanding of anyway.

What do you need to improve?- I need to improve my evolvement in the group and idea generation of the children's interactive book. I can do this by putting forward my ideas in the hope that they will be taken into consideration or even used.

What problems and solutions were found?- the problems I came across were the ones that were found in photoshop which were resolved later on. When it came to the idea generation we spent a large amount of time thinking of the idea, but nothing that would seriously impact the deadline and the process.

What are the next actions you need to take to produce your e-book successfully?

We need to create some illustrations for the characters and to build on the story of the e-book itself. Once this is completed they can be put into digital form to start the editing process. As well as this we hope to get audio clips and voices out of the way as soon as possible.