Reflective Journal #8

This week I spend a great amount of time on my own coursework for print which was on printing techniques. I finished off my article by adding part of the interview I'd done with Mary because it needed to be added partly even if I couldn't add the whole thing due to wording issues. I also started working on a new story for the media website which didn't all go to plan but hopefully next week more will get done. That is literally all for now but until next time.

Print Coursework - Research page

The History of Printmaking- Research page

Name of website	Link	Description
Fine Art Printmaking	http://www.visual-arts-cork.com/printmaking.htm	This website is one that gives information on the different types of printmaking and how they were used in the past, as well as how they are used today. I used this for their glossary of all the different types of printmaking.
Prepressure.com	http://www.prepressure.com/printing/history	This website gives information on printing and the page from it I used was all about the history of printmaking over the centuries.
Lower east side printshop	http://www.printshop.org/web/Learn/Glossary/	This website is also has a glossary for the different types of printmaking. The overall website is meant for giving information on the classes that you can attend if you want to do printmaking.
Masterworks fine art	http://www.masterworksfineart.com/education/printmaking-techniques/	This website is a fine art website, giving it’s audience information on different artists and art education. This website also tells you when the latest exhibitions are taking place and where they are held, you can also purchase artwork from them and it tells you how you can do that. What I used this website for was their own glossary of terms and definitions for different types of printmaking. Unlike the rest of the glossaries I looked at, this one gives you a list with links to the information so you don’t spend forever looking for what you want.
3D Print Headquarters	http://3dprinthq.com/how-3d-printing-has-evolved-in-the-last-10-years/	This particular website it dedicated to all things on 3D printing, providing info on the history as well as the latest news. I found this particularly useful as I had no clue about 3D printing at all.
Trotec	http://www.troteclaser.com/en-US-GB/Support/FAQs/Pages/How-to-Laser-Engrave.aspx	This is a website dedicated to all things laser which includes cutting and graving. It gives you information on the different types of lasering, the materials used and a how to guide.
Interview with Mary Wells	Mary wells interview: Q: When did you start playing around with p m in art in a more serious way? M(answer): I started printmaking at GCSE year 10 but i never really tried out the more mechanical style of printing where you use plastic and metal to create prints until A level, but now I'm starting to take it seriously in foundation and taking it seriously as a course to take at university in the future. O: Could you name a few of the different forms of printmaking that you have used or been taught/ come across? M(answer): The more simple forms of print like mono print, relief print i've used since GCSE and they're quite easy to do, but the ones that i started to use more often in foundation and A level now are screen printing, dry point etching, and doing them in several different ways and different formats doing these different prints. M: My favorite would have to be dry point etching though, which can be done on a metal copper plate or on a plastic plate. O: Could you name a pro and con for each of these you've mentioned? M: Dry point etching is the closest form of printmaking to drawing where you actually scratch into a material, the con to it is that if you do it with metal you have to use acid and you have to be quite careful because it can end up either ruining your work or ruining your hands, it's quite a long winded process and you never know how your print's gonna turn out but that can also be a pro because it's quite a nice surprise pulling the paint back and seeing your print. (I ended up forgetting to ask about the rest oops) Q: Would you say that this was the one you enjoyed the most: Yeah, mainly because my prints turned out well. Q. Which type of printmaking would you say is your least favorite to use? M: Probably screen printing, it's a bit of a faff to do. Um it's quite different and there are different ways to do screen printing but it usually involves using quite block colours, and it's quite abstract usually, or you can go quite minimalist but I don't really like it. It's quite messy as well There's a lot of preparation and a lot of cleaning. Q:So, looking again at your shark one that you showed me earlier, why a shark? why did you choose that?  M: At the beginning of the week we were given (in college) some secondary sources to work with so we went to brick lane, I used a shark because it linked to a hat that I bought from brick lane so I created the shark with a sort of grungy look that I got from brick lane. Um and there's loads of street art down there, on brick lane so I was inspired by that and I really like sharks anyway so I decided to draw an illustration of a shark, and produce it in a grungy way that sort of replicated brick lane street art.  Q: What would you do differently about that design if you could do it again? M: I was quite pleased with it but when you go on the internet and look at other peoples etchings you realize where you can improve on. So I think if maybe if I gave a more tone to it, cause lots of etchings you find on the internet have lots of contrast in dark and light but mine was a bit more based on the line and illustration so I think if I add more tone to it and gave it a darker, more tonal look it could have improved it more, and if I tried it on different surfaces as well.  ~Finished~	The second I heard about what we were doing for this assignment I already had this person on my mind as an interview subject. Mary is currently studying fine art as a uni foundation at Cambridge Regional College and is specializing in Printmaking at the moment which is why she was perfect to talk to. It was all well researching these methods but I needed to hear from someone who has actually done some of these methods themselves. I recorded the interview on my phone and then played it back and copied it into a transcript because I couldn’t upload the voice recording to this.
How does 3D printing work – YouTube video	https://youtu.be/UCI7BgLrk-4	This youtube video was a 7 minute long video which gave an insight into how 3D printing works. As someone who had no idea how it worked, it was useful to have someone on video explain to me how it worked. This was more helpful for the glossary research as it was a more in depth description of the method but the information from this video was used in both the glossary and the article.
A brief history on 3D printing	http://individual.troweprice.com/staticFiles/Retail/Shared/PDFs/3D_Printing_Infographic_FINAL.pdf	When you write about a particular method of printing it is a lot easier to do so once you know where it comes from. To write about its evolution from method to another I had to write about the history of 3D printing. This website was ever so useful because it had a timeline and everything.
Wikipedia	https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Etching	Wikipedia is the most accessible source of information on anything which is why I turned to it for etching. Wikipedia has a wide source of information which you can’t find anywhere else and I used this website particularly when researching my techniques for my glossary.

Print coursework - Glossary

Glossary

Hand:

Etching and Drypoint

Etching is a type of hand printing where the user cuts into substances such as plastic and metal to create images. Etching basically means to cut by pasting a layer of acid resistant paste onto the sheet and then the design is drawn in with an etching needle, after the plate is then dipped in acid which only effects the parts which had been scratched into, creating perfect groves for the into to trap itself in when it comes to printing the images on a material. A popular type of etching is called dry point etching which is where tiles of Perspex/acrylic plastic is scratched into using sand paper, special needles and craft knives. This is to create an image and after a thick ink is applied across the plastic. Using a cloth called scrim and tissue paper you then remove as much excess ink as possible. The scratches into the plastic however hold the ink in the groves. Damp paper is then used to print on through a printing press. After which it is left to dry in between layers of blotting paper and tissue paper for a day or two.

Pros

The main pro of these etching techniques is that the images that come out are that of the quality of an artist drawing on paper, they come out smooth and when it comes to production quality is everything.

Cons

A major con of this technique is that it can be quite dangerous for the user because of the use of acid and sharp objects. Another being that this technique is time consuming and you can only make one item at once.

Linocut

Linocut is a woodcut technique for printmaking in which a sheet of linoleum (sometimes mounted onto a wooden block) is used for the relief surface. A design is then carved into the linoleum with a sharp knife, after which the sheet is inked and the design is pressed onto paper. This technique is one of the easier ones as it doesn’t involve anything extra such as acid or fire.

Pros

The pro of this is that again it is very simple to do and isn’t all that time consuming depending on your design. Most importantly it isn’t dangerous (debatable about the knife).

Cons

The major con of this is how basic it is and you can’t do a massive lot of detail in your design as it simply wouldn’t work. This is why this type of printing would not be used in industry today for our more complex designs and the fact that we now have digital ways of doing the exact same thing at a faster pace.

Intaglio

In Intaglio printing, the lines to be printed are cut into a metal plate by means of a cutting tool called a burin. Using an etching needle, or a similar tool, the image is engraved into the ground, revealing the plate underneath. Ink is then rubbed into incised lines with felt dauber and after the ink is wiped of the surface with a tarlatan to get rid of the excess. The plate is then printed with damp paper and rolled through a printing press. This form of printmaking has died out in the print world and is now mostly used for stamps and bank notes, whereas before it was used for high quality magazines.

Pros

Intaglio is very fine when it comes to the strokes so it may get better results than say relief printing.

Cons

The major con for this method is that it isn’t as useful as many of the other methods; it’s not as clean cut which is why it is used little anymore. The printing needs specialist equipment which are going to make the whole process more expensive and again when there are other faster and cheaper methods there seems to be little point in splashing out.

Lithography

This type of hand printing is printing from a stone (limestone preferably) or a metal plate with a smooth surface. It is used to print text or artwork onto paper. This is done with a printing plate with a relief image on it which is then dampened with water and then coated with ink. The ink only sticks to the parts of the plate which are not damp with water. The printing plate is then fixed onto a roller and then the roller is used to roll the image onto paper. These days Lithography is called offset printing and uses a machine to do all the work. It is used to do maps, books, newspapers and packaging.

Pros

In mass production this method is useful for things such as packaging, especially the machine version because of the rolling technique which is fast and thorough. It’s good for medium to long prints.

Cons

There aren’t many cons to this printing technique because of the amount it can do and it’s use for I, the only thing I can say is that because of it being able to produce so much there is more room for error.

Digital:

Digital printing

Digital printing is a printing device which eliminates the need for a printing plate by using a desktop to send a pdf file to create a solid substance with said printer. This usually refers to professional printing where small-run jobs from desktop publishing and other digital sources are printed using large format and/or high-volume laser or inkjet printers.

Pros

The Pros for this device is literally everything about it. The fact that so many different devices can do this just saves time in the printing room.

Cons

The expense of this is a con because it’s not designed for mass production which are the people who can buy them without breaking a sweat.

3D Printing

3D printing is where a file on the screen of a desktop is printed in physical 3D form. This is done by layering up layers of material with the printing device to create a solid 3D object. This type of printing is used for things such as phone cases, something that most people use today.

Pros

3D printing is something which has evolved over the past 20 years from laser printing; it’s an item which brings objects out of the computer right in front of your very eyes. It’s the only device which can do that.

Cons

There are no cons to this method.

Inkjet Printing

Inkjet printing is a type of computer printing which recreates a digital image by propelling droplets of ink onto paper, plastic or other substrates. These types of printers are used for mass production like a newspaper or a magazine because of how many coloured documents it can print quickly as opposed to a personal desktop printer.

Pros

It can produce a mass amount of documents at a time which is good for any large business or company.

Cons

None at all.

Desktop Printing

This type of printing is the creation of documents using page layout skills on a personal computer. Desktop publishing software can generate layouts and produce typographic quality text and images comparable to traditional typography and printing. This software would be used for magazine articles, used by editors.

Pros

It’s useful for individual work in the journalism industry.

Cons

It’s for personal use which means that not a whole lot of documents can be printed at once.

Print Coursework- Printmaking techniques Article for a fine arts magazine

The history of printmaking

                                            By Katie Friel

Variations of printmaking have been used by people for thousands upon thousands of years. It has a long history with many different cultures using it in different ways and discovering new techniques. From Britain to Rome, to China this form of art has been discovered and copied throughout history, forever adaption to social change and conflict, and these days have being updated for modern times. In fine art, printmaking is something that is widely used creatively for artistic purposes instead of practical purposes, and today methods such as dry point etching and screen printing are more common to the art student rather than the media press. Many of these techniques are tricky and have many advantages and disadvantages to their methods.

In the past, printmaking was used in industry to produce that which we would use machine for today, such as newspapers, books and other important documents. From the 14^th and 15^th century machines like the Printing press which used Letter press and was able to print on paper in mass production for things like newspapers. However these presses were worked by hand which would have restricted the production flow but at the time this invention had a massive impact in print, so much so that it was named as one of the three inventions that changed the world by English Philosopher Francis Bacon in 1620. And today we wouldn’t have the printing technology that we do without such an invention.  Intaglio is another older method of printing which was used around the same time as the Printing press and was used to create the designs for playing cards and artists made engravings of religious scenes with it; it was a very sacred art. Around the time of Intaglio’s invention (14^th-15^th century) printing methods were being invented and used left, right and centre so many of the Intaglio techniques were invented around this time by different people. These were methods such as stippling, which was various kinds of shading through the use of dots and cross hatching which were groups of parallel lines which were vertical to each other. A widely used technique called drypoint was invented and used at this point, this was a version of engraving which was used to give a softer look by using a needle which causes the metal either side of the engraving to rise next to it. This causes better engravings which hold more ink to produce a richer image however, the ridges wear down quite quickly which means that this method was not suitable for mass production. One of the most popular forms of Intaglio has to be Etching, a development in the 16^th century and a method which involves covering a metal plate with a layer of acid resistant material and using an etching needle to carve an image before dipping the plate in acid to reveal an image . This method is feels similar to drawing with a pencil and this is why it is so popular among many artists. Again this is more of an individual piece method and not used for mass production.

Today, printing is much different to how it was many centuries ago. For starters we have much more advanced technology which speed up any printing process used in mass production and sometimes even individual production.  These days Letterpress or the Printing Press machine are rarely used and the only way we see the Printing press is in a museum about the medieval era whereas letterpress is only used by graphic designers or artists who want to produce fine looking letters for an art piece or a book cover. These days if we wanted to print newspapers and magazines we would use Inkjet printing or Desktop printing. Inkjet printing is a type of computer printing which recreates a digital image by propelling droplets of ink onto paper, card or plastic; this printing is used widely in industry because it can produce a mass amount in a short amount of time. Desktop printing is a smaller computer printer which can produce typographic quality text and generate layouts. This is used typically for magazines in the media by editors before going into publishing. Since its invention Intaglio has been used less for big media artistic images and magazine covers since the invention of the Laser printer and has been reduced to the printing of things such as banknotes and stamps. However Etching, especially dry point etching and screen printing are still widely used around the globe for art, particularly fine art because its engraving method is about the closest thing you’re going to get to drawing on metal with a pencil, and you’re more likely to get the image you want with your own hands than with a machine. In more recent years the use of the laser has been used more frequently and for things it has never been used for before such as, for etching. This is a contact free method of etching which uses a laser machine to cut into the metal or plastic plate, it’s a lot safer than the traditional hand method as you are not handling substances such as acid. This is a method used more in industry than fine art because of its minimal contact and fast paced movement.  Another printing method which has come into use in the more recent years has been 3D printing, which evolved from the Inkjet laser printer so instead of printing with ink, it printed with materials. In the first few years it was released it had only been used to make prototypes and not to make real objects , this was because the objects made were not up to the right standard at the time. A 3D printer takes a file on a computer and creates a 3D objects out of it which are things today such as phone cases, something that mostly everyone wants or needs. This is done by layering up the material to form 3D objects. A 3D printer is expensive, it could range from £175,000- £250,000 but it makes the process much quicker and which is why most production companies have them. Digital screen printing is the evolution of the type of printing techniques which were traditionally used by hand such as screen printing. This method of printing isn’t just used in the media industry; it’s used in all different areas for things like printing on garments, curtains and banners. Before things like those listed above would have all had to be done by hand and would have been fairly time consuming.

To get a better understanding on the art of printmaking and its use today I interviewed a talented fine art student named Mary Wells. Mary is currently doing her University foundation in fine art and one of the types of art she has been studying has been printmaking, making her the perfect interviewee. I’ve known Mary for a number of years and have always known her to have a love for art and when I went to interview her I noticed that her room was completely covered in her own artwork pieces that she has created over the years, some dating back five or so years. On Sunday the 11^th October I sat down with her to ask her a few questions about Printmaking and she was more than happy to answer.  I sat down with Mary and asked her what her favourite method of printmaking was, to which she replied “My favourite would have to be dry point etching, which can be done using a metal copper plate or a plastic plate” this answer lead onto the next question I asked which was for her to give me a pro and con for the one she had just mentioned, “Dry point etching is the closest form of printmaking to drawing where you actually scratch into a material, the con to it is that if you do it with metal you have to use acid and you have to be quite careful because it can end up either ruining your work or ruining your hands, it's quite a long winded process and you never know how your print's gonna turn out but that can also be a pro because it's quite a nice surprise pulling the paint back and seeing your print.” Mary responded with a lot of description which was good for me because a lot of people would only have responded with five words or less. I then asked her about her artwork which she had shown me (picture below) of the shark which had been done with dry point etching on a plastic plate, and I asked her why that design? What inspired it?, to which she responded “At the beginning of the week we were given (in college) some secondary sources to work with so we went to brick lane, I used a shark because it linked to a hat that I bought from brick lane so I created the shark with a sort of grungy look that I got from brick lane. Um and there's loads of street art down there, on brick lane so I was inspired by that and I really like sharks anyway so I decided to draw an illustration of a shark, and produce it in a grungy way that sort of replicated brick lane street art.” The interview with Mary was very useful in giving me an idea of how these printing methods I researched are used in fine art and whether they are any good for certain pieces of art.

Printmaking has evolved rapidly over the centuries; we went from the most basic method of carving into wood and stone to using computerized equipment such as the laser printer and Inkjet printing. Printmaking is used in everything from fine art to business, to media and it’s always evolving.

 

Mary's Print work 

Reflective Journal #7

This session myself, Leyla and Jasmin worked on completing our Nuremberg article by putting all of our individual work together to complete two separate articles. We ended up putting myself and Jasmin's work onto one article and Leyla's onto a second. 
As well as this I completed my article on Halloween around the world for the college website which can also be seen below on my blog. This was basically all I did this week which doesn't seem like  a lot but I was not present for the majority of the week due to being quite ill. There isn't anything more to write here so until next time.

My First Article For the Media Website

Halloween around the world

Halloween is a long running festival that takes place on October 31st and has been dating back centuries. Across the globe many different forms of this festival are held around this date with similar beliefs and ideas, however the names of this holiday vary, as do their traditions. Today, particularly in the UK and USA, Halloween is seen to be a commercial holiday with its soul purpose being to entertain. Most people host costume parties or Halloween movie fests, the most traditional thing that people today participate in is trick or treating which involves parents or siblings taking children out into their neighbourhood dressed up in scary or not so scary Halloween costumes, going from door to door and asking for sweets from their neighbours by saying the phrase “Trick or Treat”. Although this holiday isn’t serious for us, many cultures have far more serious traditions with meanings that go far beyond wanting to scare people and eat sweets.
 
In Mexico (particularly in the centre and south) a massive 3-day festival is held from October 31st – November 2nd called ‘Day of the dead’ (or De de los Muertos in Spanish). This festival is one, which gathers family and friends together to pay respects to and honour their loved ones, which have passed.
It is believed that on midnight of October 31st the gates of heaven will open and the spirits of deceased children will be allowed to join their families for 24 hours, and on November 2nd, the spirits of the deceased adults will come down to join in the festivities which are laid out for them by their loved ones.
The main way in which this holiday is celebrated is through the preparation of the altars and graves of the loved ones by their families. In many homes across the centre and south of Mexico, families create altars and shrines are built which is called and Ofrenda (meaning offering) and these are decorated with loads of candles, buckets of flowers such as wild marigolds and red cocks combs, and sugar skulls which are purchased from day of the dead markets. Food is also placed on these altars such as; fruit, peanuts, turkey mole, tortillas and day of the dead breads called pan de muerto as well as lots of water. This is done because it is believed that the altar needs lots of food and water for the weary spirits.

​On October 31st another thing that is placed on the altar is toys and sweets for the spirit children, and on November 2nd cigarettes, tequila and shots of mescal are put out on the altar for the adult spirits. A similar thing is done for the graves of their loved ones as well; this is on the 2nd of November where the festivities are taken from their homes and into the graveyard. On this day not only do they lay out candles, flowers, food, water and sugar skulls at the tombstones but they also clean the tombstones and properly celebrate with listening to the village band, play cards and reminisce of their loved one. In some parts of the country children dress up in costumes and roam the streets, knocking on doors and asking passers by for a small gift of candles or money. This tradition can be seen as similar to trick or treating in our country.
These traditions and activities in Mexico are not all the same as they vary from village to village in the way, which they celebrate and all are not universal.

Many of Halloween's roots lie in the Irish Celtic festival of Samhain. This was known as when the dead would revisit the world and it also marked the end of the summer and the start to winter months, it was the end of the final harvest. This festival was firstly, an important fire festival, which was celebrated over the evening of October 31st and into the following day. The flames of the old fire had to be extinguished and then ceremoniously relit as a symbol of casting out the old and moving into the new which is something quite different to any other festival around the world today. It was also believed that, like the day of the dead, the souls of the deceased would return to their former homes and would be visible to the living.
In Ireland there are many other old traditions which people still participated in by folk today, some stranger than others. The more normal ones include: Carving pumpkins which is something that many different cultures so and isn’t an odd thing to do, another is having a bonfire lit which in itself isn’t strange at all however, the reason behind it is a little different than just being a place to hang out. The belief is that it’s supposed to encourage dreams of whom your future husband or wife is going to be and is done by dropping a lock of your own hair into the fire. Another one of the more unusual types comes from the belief that Fairies and Goblins try to collect as many souls as possible on Halloween night so sometimes holy water would be anointed on farm animals to keep them safe during the night, and if the animals were showing signs of poor health during Halloween eve then they would be spat on to ward off evil spirits. Ireland has some of the oldest Halloween traditions in the world and some of the most interesting.
 
In China, Halloween is called Teng Chieh and their beliefs are similar to that of All saints eve and Day of the dead in the fact that they believe that on October 31st spirits travel back down to earth. People leave out food and water in front of photographs of loved ones who have passed, and lanterns are lit to light the way for the spirits. Buddhist temple worshippers fashion what is called ‘Boats of the law” out of paper and are burned in the early hours, this is done in the remembrance of the dead and also to free trapped spirits from what is called ‘Pretas’ and send them to a heaven like place to put them to rest in peace. Preta means ‘hungry ghost’ in English and the presence of them among the living is thought by the Chinese to be dangerous which is why the boats of law are lit on Teng Chieh.
 
In England and France Halloween is celebrated in the western style that America follows. People dress up in costumes of scary things such a ghosts, goblins, witches and vampires. However, France traditionally just dresses in the traditionally scary costumes listed above unlike here in England where we also dress up in the more cartoonish costumes such as Princesses and superheroes. In France, trick or treating is very rare, unlike England again, and when it does happen it is usually kids going from store to store rather than door to door. In England trick or treating is very common, something that was adopted from the US and most kids these days do it by going from door to door of their neighbourhood and asking for sweets, dressed in costumes. Something with the two countries do exactly the same is the way in which we decorate for Halloween. France and England’s stores, restaurants, malls and homes are decorated with various Halloween decorations and jack-o-lanterns. When it comes to Halloween, both countries don’t really know what they’re celebrating as opposed to the countries above and feel as if it’s really an American holiday they’re celebrating.  

When it comes to celebrating October 31st, many cultures with specific traditions have similar ideas about what the holiday is about and their ways of traditions are fairly similar with similar meanings to them. All saints eve, Teng Chieh and Day of the dead all have the belief that this is the evening where spirits return to earth and they must be prepared for it, it’s quite superstitious. Whereas in the more westernised countries like France, England and America their Halloween celebrations have almost no meaning to them and are about the scares and having a good time.


This article was designed for the media website so it is quite long for an article however, it is my first article to be put out there so I'm proud of it.  

Reflective Journal #5

This week was really more of a reflection on what I imagine the rest of the year will be like, not including the first session which was our final session figuring out illustrator. 

We spent the whole of the session creating examples with the tools so that we would know how to use them. This took up quite a large amount of time and at the end we created our own logo that represented us using the tools on illustrator. 

The next session was in newsroom with imedia, radio and the 2nd years. The day was focusing on getting the website and radio show up and running. In print, any articles that were wanted on the website had to be sent to the imedia group by 2:00 to get put onto the website. My own article I was working on was for the winter issue so there was no rush for me but I wanted to get a good portion done. Another article I was working on was a joint article with two other students on places to go in Nuremberg. I was doing the section on the history of the place so I spend the rest of the day researching and planning out a few paragraphs.

The final session of the week was focused on our assignments for our coursework. The article we had to write was on printmaking in art and I spent this session planning out an interview which was to take place at the weekend, writing my glossary, writing my opening paragraph and structuring the article as well as researching.

This is everything that went on this week and until next time,

-Katie

Reflective Journal #4

This week that just went started with a session mostly spent on a program called illustrator. Illustrator is a program which allows you to create things such as print articles to a more professional standard than say using word. Clearly this was something that was going to be used a lot by my course this year so I spent a few hours learning about the program and the different things you could do with it, again this was very useful to me because I am absolutely rubbish with all technology and can't use things like Illustrator to save my life unless I know exactly what I am doing.

After this I used illustrator to design the layout of the article that I had been working on the previous Wednesday.

The next session was newsroom with the year 1 and 2's from Print, iMedia and Radio. On this particular day we were sorting out the articles in print which were going to be published in the online magazine as part of the launch of the website by iMedia. So we were really working on a tight schedule to get all of our articles finished, prof read and spell checked before the launch and I continued to work on my article on ios updates however, I wasn't sure whether I wanted it for the Winter or online issue. By the end of the day I realized that I wasn't going to be done in time so I postponed it to the winter issue.

Sorry about the lateness of this entry in my reflective journal, anyway until next time.

-Katie

Reflective Journal #3

This week was the week where I really started to get into the work that we would be doing for the rest of the year, the induction period was over. The first thing we did was have newsroom with Radio and IMedia which is always an experience because we rarely get to work with radio the rest of the week. The first and second years all worked together and we had a speaker from bbc cambridge radio come in and give us a talk. After this all three of the groups split and as Print, we started working on our articles for the college online Magazine's launch. We worked on this all through the day as the deadline was for the following Wednesday.

At the next session I was given my first assignment for the year which was an article for a creative arts magazine on Printwork art. This would include the advantages and disadvantages, and say what they were used for. We were also encouraged to get an interview with someone for our article and I chose a friend of mine who is doing a fine art foundation. I thought I would include quotes and pictures. For the rest of the session I started to research and draft an opening paragraph. Anyway, until next time,

Katie 

Reflective Journal #2

This week the first thing we had to do collectively as a Print Based Media Level 3 was to come up with a new name and logo for the school magazine. Originally the name was for many years 'Banter', and the second year print students felt that a change of name would benefit the magazine as Banter was not ideal and could not be taken completely seriously. In my class we split off into small groups to brainstorm ideas of a name and to design new logos for the best ideas we could come up with. Once we thought of possible names for the magazine we had to search said names on google to see if they were already names of existing magazine's, and two of our initial ideas came back as taken (these being 'Hustle' and 'Portal' which we thought were some of our better ideas). By the end of the session we had come up with three main ideas, which were 'Crackdown', Oodle and Tattle which were all unused. We had also created logos for these new names.

In between the time after the last session and the next session, by ourselves we had to brainstorm ideas for stories to print in the next issue of the college magazine. These ideas were to be pitched during the newsroom meeting with Print, iMedia and Radio as well as the overall journalism course tutor. I bullet pointed some rough ideas in my free time when I arrived home ready for the newsroom meeting. A lot of these ideas consisted of Halloween and Christmas stories because they are the closest holidays coming up in the next few months.

At the newsroom meeting radio, print and imedia all gathered in a rather crammed room to discuss the action for the day, afterwards each of the three sections divided up and split into separate classrooms to discuss how everything was going to run. In my course the year 1 and 2's were both there and we started off by giving out roles (e.g. Editor in chief, Editor and photographer)by a year 2 member simply asking what everyone wanted to do. This was a good was of sorting everything out as everyone got to decided themselves whether they wanted to do something or not instead of having a job thrust upon them. After this we again split up into small groups/pairs/individuals to think up fund raising ideas for the magazine and we came up with a whole load of ideas that we could use, for example; Having an American candy sale because if it a packet that the product isn't from around here, most will buy. Another idea was to hold a funfair with a number of stalls because it will be an event that will be planned in advance so more people are likely to come and it will actually be in a venue/hall so there won't be a load of people clogging up the college corridors with queue's. After my group came up with these ideas we put them on a power point presentation to pitch to the rest of the group at the end of the session. 

After this, for the rest of the session I spent my time working on my article ideas, which honestly took forever because I myself am a perfectionist and nothing seemed good enough or anything I could write enough about. Finally, after a lot of procrastinating and running ideas by my classmates I came up with three possibilities which included one main article idea which I will follow through on and write to the best of my ability. Two of the three articles were Christmas themed because the next issue we're going to bring out is the winter issue, but the article I want to write is not Christmas themed. 

By the end of the session my course(Print)had collectively decided that the new name for the college magazine is going to be 'The Print' because it's simple, easy to remember and mature.

Finally in the last session of the week we each wrote a glossary of Print media terms that we may possibly be able to use or reference to in our coursework and/or articles. These were words such as Hand etching and Linocut. This was helpful because I had no idea what some of the words meant and wouldn't have wanted to make a fool of myself in the future for not knowing.

Today has been an interesting week but anyway until next time,

Katie 

Reflective Journal #1

The first week of college for me was my one and only induction day where Level 3 media students from Radio, iMedia and Print were gathered in a classroom to participate in the days activities and learn the basics of their courses as well as all the essential college info (e.g. Email setup, telephone numbers and course leaders). The most important thing of the day for me to do was to actually get enrolled because that was something I was yet to do. 

The first activity of the day, after a semi-long powerpoint presentation was to get to know our fellow classmates through an ice breaker game. This game involved us writing three things down on a piece of paper, two truths about ourselves and one lie about ourselves, and the rest of the class had to guess which one was the lie once the person read it out. This was a good way to get comfortable with one another as everyone on the first day is petrified with one another and it also gave us a chance to get to know a bit about the people we hadn't spoken to yet because maybe we weren't sitting near them. 

After this as a class we watched a video about Islamic women protesting about wanting work, which was really interesting because it made you think about all of the opportunities that we as women over her as opposed to women elsewhere. Also the fact that just by getting people to sign signatures on a document meant that they were at the risk of being sent to prison truly shocked me, because I am not the kind of person who regularly watches the news so whenever I see a story like this it really makes me think. Are parts of the world really that far behind? and are we ever going to be as women able to stop fighting for rights, rights that men have always haved just because they are men.

The last thing we had to do for the day was to pitch an idea for a story in groups to the rest of the class. The reason for this was to get a general idea of what we would be doing as a journalism course as a collective. For the remainder of the day we had to pitch an idea for a story that we could post in our school magazine 'Banter'. To break the ice a little in my group because none of us knew each other, I thought that it would be a good idea to find out what everyone was interested in so that we could find out if there was an area in particular that we could cover and find our story. After brainstorming for a fair amount of time we decided that fashion and music should be our area. After more brainstorming and sharing of ideas we decided that we were going to cover how music has influenced fashion over the years and researched fashion icons from the decade 1960-2010. At the end of the session we pitched the idea to the rest of the group and afterwards got mostly positive feedback from the rest of the group.

Unfortunately I couldn't attend the second induction day because of very personal reasons which I do not wish to share on the internet. Needless to say I have no more to write on the induction period of college. 

Anyway until my next update, 

Katie 

ABOUT ME:

Hey, My name is Katie Friel, I'm 18 years old and I am currently a student at Cambridge Regional College currently studying Print Based Media with Photography. I Previously attended Long Road sixth form college where I completed my A levels in Religious Studies, Media Studies and completed an AS level in Film studies. I thoroughly enjoy studying media, particularly in Journalism as that is the industry I wish to have a Job in.

In my spare time I enjoy reading different novels from different genres, from crime to fantasy, to religion and horror. I'm also a Christian, belonging to a free church and spend a lot of my time at different church events, socials and spending time with my friends there. I am also fascinated with the art of drag and enjoy attending drag shows with my sister whenever I can which may sound strange to some people but I find it to be a wonderful expression and form of art as well as it being entertaining. Another fascination of mine lies in the art of film. I watch a lot of films in my spare time when I am not doing my work or any of the above, no matter what industry I end up in I doubt that my love of film will ever go away. However when it comes to Journalism my min is set on working in the industry that I have loved since a young age, which is Fashion.

After this course I hope to go to university and achieve any goal/dream which I choose.