Social Networks

I have to say... I'm not a very social human being...
Before coming to this country I completely refused to get a Facebook account and only had a MSN one which I rarely used. Networks like Twitter and My space seem to me like networks full of gossip and random stuff that would only help me lose my time.

After coming here, I had no option rather than get used to use Facebook and Skype to keep in touch with friends and family, but never took it too serious.
Starting this course, I felt oblige to open a twitter account but decided to limit it to only follow people in my field of interests.
After thinking about the industry itself and how to start getting immerse in it, I started using more frequently other media that allowed me to start making connections that eventually turned into a social turning point in my life.
Deviantart, CGHub, Pixiv, Tumblr, Twitter, Linkedin, Flickr and Blogger itself became my daily way to connect with loads of people, some of them in a working way, some others who I share interest, but all of them, in their own way, have keep me informed and awake to what's around me, helping me in this way, to keep going forward.

I realised that being in a Digital media environment requires spaces to share, publish and discuss with people related to it, and also to create links with other disciplines that will allow to expand my future projects.
As part of the rule of thirds to be successful in any industry, the social aspects complements and important part of it, complementing the showcase and professional.
Some of the steps I'm currently taking to improve my social aspects are:

• Be social
• Visit other blogs and comment
• Respond to comments
• Be generous
• Subscribe 
• Share
• Know what I have posted about myself
• Assume EVERYTHING is permanent
• Be a conduit
• Be original
• Create a news feed
• Credit my sources
• Use keywords (tags and labels)
• Interview somebody
• Post frequently
• Do not copy and paste
• Stick with it!!!

Run, run, run!

For our PPP project I've been thinking about loads of stuff that I've learned over the last year and certainly it's been difficult to come up with one concrete idea. 

After a while I decided to start thinking about the stuff that I haven't done over the last year and that certainly is...excersise. It's been a year since I stopped running and going to the gym and after having an afternoon talk with a friend of mine that's been training really hard to run for a charity event on Manchester it kind of inspire me to do something related to it. 

I don't really have time to do anything in fancy in 3D so I'll stick with some sketchy 2D animation and to get some inspiration I went on youtube and found some inspiring Nike videos: 

An evaluation?

         Evaluation: ends in what to do to improve. Assessing the strengths and weakness of programs, products or people to improve the performance. 

An evaluation will always involves asking questions and answering not just in a way to sound clever, but instead to make an analysis, reflect the capacity and judging the evidence.
The purposes of this comparison making, landmark talking and measures is whit the whole purpose to make a change, to do something, to act.

Keeping in mind this points will certainly help myself to constantly improve my projects, but I just hope that while measuring my abilities with profesionals I dont get stuck in the comparison that could bring my hopes down. Also this is constructive way to give and revive feedback.

[Let your values guide you]

On January the 10th we had the a special guest called Andy Peers. He went on about part of his life and experiences that got him to where he is now (Love enterprise). More than talking about how to be successful, he mention the importance of your own values and how by sticking to them you create your own and personal success. Having said that, I started wondering about my values (since it was one of the questions that came on the exercise sheet). I believe that my values have always been really strong thanks to my family having loyalty, honesty and responsibility in hard work as the strongest ones. I've always had them in mind, but then I started wondering: 'what about the ones I lack the most?' After some moments of self reflection I started to realize that I often forget to analyse my own limitations, and I suppose it is still a sign of what's left of my young and naive side. Is not that I'm getting old, but certainly not getting any younger (lol) and this kind of reflections help me recognise myself as an individual. Being away from my family and most of my friends has help me to encourage my dedication and commitment to the games and animation world.

"It's not hard to make decisions when you know what your values are."       Roy Disney

Another of the questions on the exercise sheet was something like Why are you studying this course? (or something like that)  
Loads of things crossed my mind at that moment. My answer was 'Because I believe that I can create life that will inspire someone...one day' ...pretty lame, but I was thinking of the people that inspired me to decide to take this course, to drop my whole past and embark on this new adventure.

I found this on tumblr and decided to put it here. I know that posting about Pixar must be cliché by now, but I do believe that they all share really strong values that it's reflected on their work.

Creative - Courageous - Valuing Difference - Inspiring - Honest - Thoughtful

"Let your values guide you"  is a phrase that I'll try to make mine, hopping it will help me to be less scare about the future and focus more now on growing my talents and improve as a person. 

"You've got to find what you love. The only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking and don't settle"  Steve Jobs

+ Legacy in the sky +

Having the releases of games as renamed as skyrim or assassin's creed: Revelations makes other games not to look as attractive, specially when they lack of publicity.
I got really excited to get my special edition of The legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword specially for being a big fan of the series.

After playing it for several hours you realised how impressive this game is.  Knowing the graphic limitations of the Wii platform, the nintendo crew in charge of the develop clearly aimed to something not too ambitious for the system making a merge graphic style between the cartoonish wind waker and and the obscure twilight princess. The whole game and the cinematics creates a really colourful story telling experience that doesn't even include voice dialogs.

The gameplay is increased thanks to the motion control and now the enemies react to your decisions, making them more complicated and taking it off the just pressing A button battle system.

The maps are constantly challenging being transforming it into a really refresh approach to the series.
Knowing that not only is me (and Sarah) who think is an awesome game, but also it was qualified by IGN as 10/10 Masterpiece makes it even a better game.

Graphics don't make a game, so this is an invitation to all the sceptical to try the game and erase the idea of nintendo being repetitive and childish.

Wii Games - E3 2012 - The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

I am...a mom...

4th Oct 2011

We had our first lecture shared with other courses of the module Personal & professional practice (or PPP).
Being honest, I thought it was going to be a little bit boring and somehow pointless, but it turned out to be more or less more in a personal way.
It focused in how to describe myself in the professional environment, which is something I'm not very good at (in any language), so in someway I hope to make the most of this lecture not only for my professional development but also for my personal one.

For the first exercise we had to choose in between two columns of attitudes and reactions (or at least that would describe us the best) and at the end we ended up with four letters.
I ended up with ISFJ (Introvert, Sensing, Feeling, Judging)
I got a Nurturer, the same result as Siobhan the way she could better explain/describe in one word our result was: "your basically a mom"...
According to the result I have a high sense of duty, I'm loyal, quiet, friendly and responsible. (all very true :D... but still, I'm not a mom )

The second exercise consisted in just giving some aspects of your life some value and put them in a graph... not very impressed with the outcome, but I believe the important parts that make me keep going on are in the right place :)

The last one was about going online (to the BBC website) and filling this 'child of our time' test.
My result ended up being:

• -Openness 4.1/5 (high) [imaginative & curious, exploring new places, cultures and foods, sometimes daydreamer]
• -Conscientiousness 3.6/5 (medium) [good work life, non a workaholic]
• -Extroversion 2.8/5 (low) [ suited to intellectual or studious pursuits]
• -Agreeableness 2.6/5 (low) [less likely to be interested in what others are feeling (not true!)]
• -Neuroticism 4.4/5 (high) [often feel tense or anxious, powerful work ethic, will to succeed]

in other aspects:
-Life satisfaction: 6/7
-Relationships: 3.2/7
-Job satisfaction: 3.8/7
-Health: 60/100
-Life Goals: economic

Somehow I see how many things seem to be reflected by the fact that I have to work a lot to achieve the same goals that many others get without any effort. Also, being away from home and not having many people I could rely on (emotionally) tends to be a little bit lonely, but I'm sure that it will change eventually and that at the end I'll be able to appreciate my achievements in a more deep way. (also, my life goals has nothing to do with money, other wise I would have just stayed doing architecture lol )

The module itself seems to be something I need to develop myself as a future professional, understand more the way I am and more important, to be able to express it correctly and make good use of my qualities when it comes to be part of a working team.