Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Monday 4th May
Today we are wrapping up all the loose ends of our website and presentation. First off I showed the guys my help document to positive results. I will upload it to the site after writing this. We all then went out about town to make some new videos of sales around Wellington, this gives us more content for the site and they are also a better representation of what we would like to see coming onto the site as our last shoot of videos were very minimal in length and description of the sales. Feka took care of clothing and travel, David was on entertainment, Byron did food, clothing and a Video Ezy shoot (I guess that would come under entertainment) and I took care of Home and Living to go along with my previous videos which I believe were put under entertainment (Gamesman sale), clothing (Shoe Connection sale) and sports and leisure (Tent sale). Places I presented for Home and Living were the Furniture Liquidation place that is set up where good old D.E.K.A was and the Salvation Army store on Taranaki Street, a great place to pick up home and living sort of gear for cheap cheap prices, perfect for students! :p
Final Help Document - Including mobile info etc.
Logging into Cheerino:
Logging into Cheerino is fast and easy to do. Simply type in your username and password and click on the “login” button. To login you will need to have created an account. If you haven’t done so already you will find the link to do so under the login box on the left of your screen. Simply follow the on screen instructions and you’ll be good to go. For more help on this, see below for more details.
Creating an Account:
You will first need to create an account in order to make full use of the Cheerino website, this will give you access to be able to upload your own videos to us to share with your friends, family or the general public. To create an account you will need a username and password. The username doesn’t have to be your name; it can be anything you want. A nickname or something unique created by yourself, an alias perhaps? You will then need to create yourself a password. This can also be whatever you choose, just make sure it’s something you can remember! The final thing you will need to verify the account is a valid e-mail address. If you don’t already have one of these then there are a lot of free email services out there for you to choose from e.g. Hotmail, Gmail.
Login Problems:
If you have forgotten your password, don’t panic! Simply click on the “request new password” link underneath the login box to the left on your screen, type in your email address and we will send you out a new password for you to be able to login again. Any further difficulties, please don’t hesitate to contact us using the details provided.
Changing Account Information:
Tired of your password? Have a new email address? Care to change your Cheerino skin theme? All of this is available to be changed or altered by first logging into Cheerino and then by clicking on “my account” in the left menu and then on the “edit” tab. Simple. Any problems please contact us on the details provided.
Searching for Content:
Searching is all the fun, can you find yourself a good deal? If there is something in particular you are trying to find then make use of our search box. Simply type in a keyword related to your search and Cheerino will do its best to find all items relevant. You may also do a self-search to find items that interest you. Click on the category tab in the link menu at the top of the screen. There you will find a range of categories that should pretty much cover all bases, e.g. after a good deal for a new TV? Click on the “entertainment” link to see if there are any good deals. You may search Cheerino whether you are a guest or a valued member.
Uploading Content From Computer:
To do this, you will need to become a member of Cheerino, simply create yourself an account to do so. This takes less than a minute and it’s free! So there’s no reason to hesitate.
Step 1: First you must login to Cheerino.
Step 2: Next click on the “upload video” tab that should appear in the header menu.
Step 3: Fill out the on screen details, i.e. choose a title and category for your content and browse your folders on your computer to choose what you want to upload. When you’re done with all this, click on the “upload” button, how easy was that!
NOTE: If you are connected with our good friends “Twitter”, you may also send out a tweet to let your friends on there know about your listing on Cheerino! For more information on this see “Twitter Help”.
Uploading Content From Mobile:
Step 1: Record a video with your mobile phone.
Step 2: Attach the video to an email as an attachment. The subject line of the email will be the title and the email body will be the description of the video.
Step 3: Send to submit@cheerino.com
You’re done!
Twitter Help:
If you are connected with our good friends “Twitter”, you may also send out a tweet to let your friends on there know about your listing on Cheerino! You are prompted to do so when you hit Step 3 of uploading content. Please note however that this option is only available once you have connected your Cheerino account to your Twitter account. To do this, follow these simple steps:
Step 1: Login to the Cheerino website.
Step 2: Click on the link “my account” in the left menu.
Step 3: Click on the “edit” tab underneath your username in the middle of your screen. The link “twitter accounts” should now appear right below the “edit” tab.
Step 4: Click on “twitter accounts” and then fill out your twitter details, this includes your Twitter username and password.
Step 5: Click on the “add account” button and you’re done! Easy right?
Note: To see all your Twitter posts on Cheerino, go “my account” then “twitter”. To add a new Twitter account simply repeat the above steps.
For any further questions or required assistance, please contact us using the e-mail below:
E-mail: info@cheerino.com
Logging into Cheerino is fast and easy to do. Simply type in your username and password and click on the “login” button. To login you will need to have created an account. If you haven’t done so already you will find the link to do so under the login box on the left of your screen. Simply follow the on screen instructions and you’ll be good to go. For more help on this, see below for more details.
Creating an Account:
You will first need to create an account in order to make full use of the Cheerino website, this will give you access to be able to upload your own videos to us to share with your friends, family or the general public. To create an account you will need a username and password. The username doesn’t have to be your name; it can be anything you want. A nickname or something unique created by yourself, an alias perhaps? You will then need to create yourself a password. This can also be whatever you choose, just make sure it’s something you can remember! The final thing you will need to verify the account is a valid e-mail address. If you don’t already have one of these then there are a lot of free email services out there for you to choose from e.g. Hotmail, Gmail.
Login Problems:
If you have forgotten your password, don’t panic! Simply click on the “request new password” link underneath the login box to the left on your screen, type in your email address and we will send you out a new password for you to be able to login again. Any further difficulties, please don’t hesitate to contact us using the details provided.
Changing Account Information:
Tired of your password? Have a new email address? Care to change your Cheerino skin theme? All of this is available to be changed or altered by first logging into Cheerino and then by clicking on “my account” in the left menu and then on the “edit” tab. Simple. Any problems please contact us on the details provided.
Searching for Content:
Searching is all the fun, can you find yourself a good deal? If there is something in particular you are trying to find then make use of our search box. Simply type in a keyword related to your search and Cheerino will do its best to find all items relevant. You may also do a self-search to find items that interest you. Click on the category tab in the link menu at the top of the screen. There you will find a range of categories that should pretty much cover all bases, e.g. after a good deal for a new TV? Click on the “entertainment” link to see if there are any good deals. You may search Cheerino whether you are a guest or a valued member.
Uploading Content From Computer:
To do this, you will need to become a member of Cheerino, simply create yourself an account to do so. This takes less than a minute and it’s free! So there’s no reason to hesitate.
Step 1: First you must login to Cheerino.
Step 2: Next click on the “upload video” tab that should appear in the header menu.
Step 3: Fill out the on screen details, i.e. choose a title and category for your content and browse your folders on your computer to choose what you want to upload. When you’re done with all this, click on the “upload” button, how easy was that!
NOTE: If you are connected with our good friends “Twitter”, you may also send out a tweet to let your friends on there know about your listing on Cheerino! For more information on this see “Twitter Help”.
Uploading Content From Mobile:
Step 1: Record a video with your mobile phone.
Step 2: Attach the video to an email as an attachment. The subject line of the email will be the title and the email body will be the description of the video.
Step 3: Send to submit@cheerino.com
You’re done!
Twitter Help:
If you are connected with our good friends “Twitter”, you may also send out a tweet to let your friends on there know about your listing on Cheerino! You are prompted to do so when you hit Step 3 of uploading content. Please note however that this option is only available once you have connected your Cheerino account to your Twitter account. To do this, follow these simple steps:
Step 1: Login to the Cheerino website.
Step 2: Click on the link “my account” in the left menu.
Step 3: Click on the “edit” tab underneath your username in the middle of your screen. The link “twitter accounts” should now appear right below the “edit” tab.
Step 4: Click on “twitter accounts” and then fill out your twitter details, this includes your Twitter username and password.
Step 5: Click on the “add account” button and you’re done! Easy right?
Note: To see all your Twitter posts on Cheerino, go “my account” then “twitter”. To add a new Twitter account simply repeat the above steps.
For any further questions or required assistance, please contact us using the e-mail below:
E-mail: info@cheerino.com
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Help!
With the extra time we have been given due to Morgan's falling sick, we are filling in some of the missing pieces. One of which is the addition of a help page to aid people in using the site. Again this task is about writing and that's my field so I took on the task in writing it up. I made sure I covered all bases and that it was written as simple as possible so that any Joe Blogg could read it and understand it. This is what I got:
Logging into Cheerino:
Logging into Cheerino is fast and easy to do. Simply type in your username and password and click on the “login” button. To login you will need to have created an account. If you haven’t done so already you will find the link to do so under the login box in the top right corner of your screen. Simply follow the on screen instructions and you’ll be good to go. For more help on this, see below for more details.
Creating an Account:
You will first need to create an account in order to make full use of the Cheerino website, this will give you access to be able to upload your own videos and images to us to share with your friends, family or the general public. To create an account you will need a username and password. The username doesn’t have to be your name; it can be anything you want. A nickname or something unique created by yourself, an alias perhaps? You will then need to create yourself a password. This can also be whatever you choose, just make sure it’s something you can remember! The final thing you will need to verify the account is a valid e-mail address. If you don’t already have one of these then there are a lot of free email services out there for you to choose from e.g. Hotmail, Gmail.
Login Problems:
If you have forgotten your password, don’t panic! Simply click on the “request new password” link underneath the login box in the top right corner, type in your email address and we will send you out a new password for you to be able to login again. Any further difficulties, please don’t hesitate to contact us using the details provided.
Changing Account Information:
Tired of your password? Have a new email address? Care to change your Cheerino skin theme? All of this is available to be changed or altered by first logging into Cheerino and then by clicking on “my account” in the left menu and then on the “edit” tab. Simple. Any problems please contact us on the details provided.
Searching for Content:
Searching is all the fun, can you find yourself a good deal? If there is something in particular you are trying to find then make use of our search box. Simply type in a keyword related to your search and Cheerino will do its best to find all items relevant. You may also do a self search to find items that interest you. Click on the category tab in the link menu at the top of the screen. There you will find a range of categories that should pretty much cover all bases, e.g. after a good deal for a new TV? Click on the “entertainment” link to see if there are any good deals. You may search Cheerino whether you are a guest or a valued member.
Uploading Content:
To do this, you will need to become a member of Cheerino, simply create yourself an account to do so. This takes less than a minute and it’s free! So there’s no reason to hesitate.
Step 1: First you must login to Cheerino.
Step 2: Next click on the “create content” link in the left menu.
Step 3: Choose whether or not you wish to upload a video or an image.
Step 4: Fill out the on screen details, i.e. choose a title and category for your content and browse your folders on your computer to choose what you want to upload. When you’re done with all this, click on the “upload” button, how easy was that!
NOTE: If you are connected with our good friends “Twitter”, you may also send out a tweet to let your friends on there know about your listing on Cheerino! For more information on this see “Twitter Help”.
Twitter Help:
If you are connected with our good friends “Twitter”, you may also send out a tweet to let your friends on there know about your listing on Cheerino! You are prompted to do so when you hit Step 4 of uploading content. Please note however that this option is only available once you have connected your Cheerino account to your Twitter account. To do this, follow these simple steps:
Step 1: Login to the Cheerino website.
Step 2: Click on the link “my account” in the left menu.
Step 3: Click on the “edit” tab underneath your username in the middle of your screen. The link “twitter accounts” should now appear right below the “edit” tab.
Step 4: Click on “twitter accounts” and then fill out your twitter details, this includes your Twitter username and password.
Step 5: Click on the “add account” button and you’re done! Easy right?
Note: To see all your Twitter posts on Cheerino, go “my account” then “twitter”. To add a new Twitter account simply repeat the above steps.
For any further questions or required assistance, please contact one of us using the details below:
Email:
Phone:
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Information Architecture - Completed over Tues 28th / Wed 29th
Right so it has been a while since I blogged about this so I figured I had better do so. As we decided to open up the site completely to all members of Wellington city rather than just have it Wellington city student based, a few changes needed to be made. Not only that there is also other things I hadn't yet filled in last blog such as the design or content. I needed to converse a lot more with the guys before I could do those parts as we are a team, it is not just me designing this website. So after speaking a lot more with the team and doing some research into other existing websites, here is the pretty much my final Information Architecture document for our group:
Information Architecture – Cheerino Website
1) Goals of site:
· To assist people with saving money by collating together various sales price information all together in one site.
· To advertise sales prices or anything that is “money saving” in New Zealand
2) Audience:
· People of Wellington
· Could also be used by people from other cities if we decide to incorporate a region based search function.
3) Use of the site:
· Public – Can use the site to find out about deals/sales going on in their city so that they can save themselves time in having to look around for the best deal on items and to more importantly save money!
· Businesses – Can use the site to advertise themselves and the sales/deals they have in their store/s. This will attract people to buying from them rather than elsewhere if the price is right.
4) Scenario:
5) Competitors:
1) Themarket.co.nz
In finding this website we thought we might be in trouble as it appeared to be quite a lot like the website we were intending on creating. Upon further investigation we realised this wasn’t the case. We found that it was only showing sales of online shops that are not very well recognised, there is no user generated content. These online shops also have to pay this website to create listings. The search engine was also quite confusing and it didn’t return many results which posed the question, what was the point? With very little content the website is rendered somewhat useless, I also don’t like the shops it advertises as they are not recognisable so it leaves you feeling a little unsure of whether or not they can be trusted. On a positive note however it did contain a wide range of categories to search from.
2) Simplesavings.co.nz
When we found this site soon after, we were kind of unsure as to what exactly the website was about, what sort of service it was trying to provide to public users. Eventually we came to the conclusion that it was a very complicated resource for trying to provide tips on how to save money and functions to help you keep a record of your savings. The layout was terrible, too much information was crammed into the homepage, this was visible not only by the amount of text you saw straight off, but also by the amount of scrolling you had to do in order to reach the bottom of the page.
3) Trademe.co.nz
This is a popular New Zealand website, used for trading and selling new and second-hand goods between users. What is good about this website is its very wide range of categories for grouping user listings. It is clear and concise and structured in a very user-friendly way.
6) Functions/Content:
After logging in users can upload videos or images of sales they wish to share with the public, each video will have a description including the place of sale, sale price and how long the sale is running. With this user generated content, the public can search and find sales that interest them, especially if they are after something specific.
7) Structure:
The website will be a simple, categorical site. Video’s that are uploaded to the website are placed into a category that is relevant to the video content so that when a user searches though the category menu on the homepage they can find the video content that applies to what they are searching for.
8) Visual Design:
We want to stick to three main colours so as to keep a consistent theme throughout our site.
The colours we have chosen are black and two shades of green, one light and one dark. We decided on this colour choice as green is commonly associated with money and our site is dedicated to sales and saving people mullah. Green is also associated with New Zealand, “clean and green” and since our site is based for people living in New Zealand, it seemed appropriate.
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Cheerino Navigation
I realised that we hadn't really documented our sites navigation clearly, we only really had basic sketches in our books on how we wanted the site structured and what linked to where. For this reason I thought it would be nice to revisit LovelyCharts and create a clear image of the site navigation etc. This would then make it not only clear for all of us on how things were going to work, but it would also give us something to present during the presentation process to help communicate our ideas.
Cheerino Navigation:
Monday, April 27, 2009
Monday 27 April - Class is back in session
Today 311 was back in session which is good as it meant our group could work together rather than separate like most of the holidays. Byron continued his focus on the coding side of things. Seems we can upload videos all good which is good to see, just need to refine the mobile upload of videos as there is still a bug. Tried to help him and give assistance where I could. The main thing of today though was to get the aesthetics down. Me and David showed Byron our ideas towards this layout which he liked so that was good. I also went away with Josh and Iafeta to go do some filming. Byron wanted some test videos so we went around the area and documented a few sales in some quick videos, Josh and Iafeta on camera duty and me the actor in the video. When we later finally got them downloaded to the computer they were pretty funny however they were also too short. They will do for now but if we have more time then I believe a reshoot will be in order.
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Holiday Meeting
Decided to have another meet today, this time though it was only me, david and josh. The other two couldn't make it. With some assistance from david and a little bit toward the end from josh, I completed the final logo for our website. I think it has turned out rather well and am quite pleased with the result. Changes made to it today were the following:
1) rearranged the placement of all the letters. The two e's creating the cheeries we given more space between the other letters. Beforehand it seemed too squished.
2) refined the stalks of the cheeries, getting rid of the squiggly lines. Made them straight and sharp to follow the rest of the logo.
3) After making these changes and loading it to the website it didn't stand out enough, it sort of blended in too much. To fix this I added a white stroke to it which I think is pretty effective.
4) Added some extra transparent space around the logo to give it the correct amount of space when loaded onto the site. Previously when loading on the site the stroke would be cut off at each end of the logo. Adding the transparent space around the logo fixed this.
5) Figured the logo by itself wasn't enough. It needed a catch phrase to "complete" it. After a quick brainstorm between us we made our choice and added it to the logo then added the completed logo to the website. It was a proud moment :)
Our ideas for a catch phrase: ( please do note these were mostly quite lame :p )
* "Saving you money."
* "Sales prices you don't want to miss!"
* "Here's something to be happy about"
* "Beat the recession, Cheerino's in session!"
* "Sales worth cheering about" - This was our final pick.
* "Save yourself"
* "Something to cheer about"
* "Come on in, the prices are just right"
* "Savings at the lowest of prices"
After doing this me and David also brainstormed our ideas for layout of the website.
Friday, April 24, 2009
Friday 24th April - Holiday Meet
Today we had a big group meet to continue on with our working with the Cheerino website. Feka showed us the concepts he had made for our site logo and they were pretty good, he had some interesting ideas. In looking at them, me and David decided that there was none that would stand as our final but we agreed that there were aspects about 2 of them that we thought if combined could create our final. These 2 logos being the 2 above. What we liked about the top one was the text. Bold, clear and easy to read. The C was also quite nice. For the 2nd one, we liked the 2 e's combined to create cheeries. The only thing wrong with them was the colour choice, none of us liked the pink especially and either way it didn't fit in with our colour scheme we had now chosen, that being green and black.
So for the remainder of the meeting I tinkered around with these 2 logos in Illustrator to try and create our final, I came to the conclusion that the interesting C had to go as that combined with the 2 e's as cheeries was too much and out of the 2 interesting graphics, I thought the 2 e's were the most effective. I also then decided that I had to change the font type as it needed to be stronger so that it wasn't overpowered by the 2 e's. "Tahoma" was my final choice when also made bold.
My end result for the day was this:
Monday, April 20, 2009
Information Architecture
As I'm not the greatest when it comes to code, I delegated myself to working through the information architecture work. It came in real handy when I did it for the previous project in redeveloping the Mediazone website as it really puts things into perspective for you and you can get all your ideas down on paper so that when it comes to building the site, its pretty much as easy as reading off a piece of paper. There are a few things I am unsure about however such as design and the content we want on our website, but this is fine as it is early days yet. I'll have a talk with the other guys and get that stuff filled in as soon as I can.
Here is a short piece of what I have got so far:
Information Architecture – Cheerino Website
1) Goals of site:
· To assist students with saving money by collating together various sales price information all together in one site.
· To advertise sales prices or anything that is “money saving” in New Zealand
2) Audience:
· Students of Wellington
· Could also be used by the public and people from other cities if we decide to incorporate a region based search function.
3) Use of the site:
· Students – Can use the site to find out about deals/sales going on in their city so that they can save themselves time in having to look around for the best deal on items and to more importantly save money!
· Businesses – Can use the site to advertise themselves and the sales/deals they have in their store/s. This will attract people to buying from them rather than elsewhere if the price is right.
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Mediazone - Development - Maskot?
Since looking at the Natcoll website I have really wanted to include some form of animation on the front homepage of Mediazone. Rather than make it all complicated though I thought I could keep it simple and simply design a maskot character for Vic Digi Media and he could be on some kind of loop animation on the home page.
After sketching four hours in Adobe Illustrator this was my final resulting character:
Mediazone - Development - Logo
I have decided to keep Mediazone for the logo of the site but I decided I would redesign the old logo, so I'm keeping the name just going with a new style :D
Above are a few examples of what I made when tinkering in photoshop, I'm running with the one at the top of the image.
Mediazone - Development - Navigation
Here is the diagram I made in LovelyCharts to figure out the navigation of the new Mediazone site I am designing:
Mediazone - Information Architecture
1) Goals of Site:
* To assist students in course info, projects etc.
* Showcase student work.
* Allow communication between both students and tutors.
2) Audience:
* Tutors - See/Mark student work.
* Public - Looking at the strong showcase of work for a number of reasons.
a) Searching for talent (employer?)
b) Competition?
c) Interested in victoria uni
*Students -
a) Showcase work.
b) Get info on courses etc.
c) Forum - deal with problems or anything with other students, can also use this to talk with tutors if students can't make it to class and/or office hours.
3) Why use Mediazone?
Students- Connect with other students. Get important info etc.
Public - See talent of young designers of today.
4) Scenario???
Student needs help with project.
- Mediazone
- Login => Students each have a profile they can manage and update
- Profile => Sees a list of his enrolled subjects.
*If he needs project info:
-> Click on subject.
-> Choose project.
-> Read.
*If he needs help with a project:
->Login to student home page.
-> Forum
-> Click on link that might contain answer, otherwise start a new topic/discussion.
OR.
-> Login to student home page.
-> Chat
-> Find friend, talk.
or
-> Find tutor, talk.
5) Competitors???
*Massey
They have a forum!
*Media design school -- Auckland
Request option.
If I want to use this it would solve my problem with whether or not to have the chat function available to the public to use as well. With request it wouldnt be necessary as could just request info rather than trying to ask over IM.
Apply Now option - could be useful for public area of site.
Contact - Required. VERY IMPORTANT
6) Functions/Content
* Gallery
* Forum
* Logon
* Project info
* Chat/IM
* News/updates
* Events.
7) Navigation
See diagram i made in lovelycharts.
Extra:
Name?
Keep mediazone or something else?
Visual Design????
* Must incorporate VICTORIA UNI, at the moment you cannot tell mediazone is a part of the uni. They are too seperate. Could be fixed with logo? Colouring, use some greens?
Mediazone - Development
Purpose:
* Students to get course info/details.
* Add work for showcasing.
* Communication between students/tutors.
Solutions:
* Guests see showcase work when they get to site.
* Students see relevant courses and info after LOGIN.
* Login - Students get own profiles.
Guests: Archiving/Showcasing/Projects/Games?
Students: Info/Courses/Community/Forum/Messenger?/Portfolio/Events/Tools - Calendar?
Extra: Shout box?? Twitter Feed??
Mediazone - Where's My Blogs?
I realise I havn't posted much at all on my blog so I'm posting everything now as rather than blogging I scribbled, wrote and doodled everything in my book so I will copy everything from there to here for your viewing pleasure and to prove that I have had some trade of thought during this project :)
Thursday, March 12, 2009
A Brand New Mediazone???
Mediazone is a vital source of information for digital media students at Victoria Uni. Problem is though is that it is not being used enough and this comes down to the poor functionality of the site and the lack of functions and information available.
Working in a group today (first real class) we came up with the following problems and solutions:
*Users - Should have a forums area
=> Wikis, Discussions
=> Course info, how to's, help
=> Users can add their own work - comment!
*Mediazone should be more social!
*Animate recent projects or front page somehow... we are digi media, lets look like it!!
*Needs to show its linked to Victoria.....Its a bit of a dig to find/figure out the link between the two.
*Student news
*Student profiles??
*Private messenger perhaps? some form of chat/IM so students can easily communicate with each other as well as their tutors.
*Show more projects from everyone instead of those "chosen"
Working in a group today (first real class) we came up with the following problems and solutions:
*Users - Should have a forums area
=> Wikis, Discussions
=> Course info, how to's, help
=> Users can add their own work - comment!
*Mediazone should be more social!
*Animate recent projects or front page somehow... we are digi media, lets look like it!!
*Needs to show its linked to Victoria.....Its a bit of a dig to find/figure out the link between the two.
*Student news
*Student profiles??
*Private messenger perhaps? some form of chat/IM so students can easily communicate with each other as well as their tutors.
*Show more projects from everyone instead of those "chosen"
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