Final

Reflection

I found that the capstone presentations were very interesting. The biggest difference that I saw between the students who did good work, and the ones who produced capstones that I would be ashamed to put my name next to were the ones that actually cared about their project. So many students are required to produce capstones that they don’t give too shits about and I think it matters if you care about your project. It matters that you want to create something good. So I think the biggest thing I saw was that I need to care about my capstone and not attempt to just do it, for the sake of doing it. So with this in mind, capstones need to be optional. It is hurting everyone in the school when students are producing half-assed projects. It makes the school look second rate, only let the people who want to, who actually care about their project present. If you don’t care, don’t present…  

 

I do like the idea of capstones, it make sense to have a final presentation about what you learned. I feel they need to change several things about them to make them better. 1) Preparing students for them. They need to have an idea before their senior year what they want to make. It needs to be more than just a last minute decision. So helping prepare students for their capstone is very important. It will make all the difference in the world. 2) Push group capstones. No one in the industry really works alone; so all these single person projects don’t make sense to me… 3) Two classes dedicated to capstones…. That is so much money that is being spent on this. This should be a class that is free, and pass/fail. If the university cannot offer it free, then it needs to be more than what is currently being offered.

 

Overall capstone night was good, it gave me perspective on what people are creating, and what/how they did their projects. I am glad that I was able to attend and see the pitfalls and how to avoid potential mistakes that my forerunners have made.

Interviews

Nathan

1 Because he is passionate about this. I want to do this for a living. He is also making a game called Run ‘n Gunz… so he is using this experience to make the game.

2 Thought about doing color, but ended up being to much.

3 I had a good handle on mine, so I didn’t need the timeline much, since I had been working on it so long. They are a good idea. Stick to them.

4 Have more panels completed

5 Start early.

Sal

1 Because I want to be in the film industry and this is something I care about.

2 I wish I had better quality audio. Sometimes  the audio quality wasn’t as good as it could have been.

3 I had issues keeping to the timeline. I didn’t stick to it as much as I should have. If you follow it, its good,  otherwise it is a waste of time.

4 Wanted to be longer… but it was too much to make it longer, so had to keep it current length

 5 Start in August

Kenny

1 Because it is something I care. I want to make a difference, and I planned on doing this as a business anyway.

2 Switching from aquaponics to hydroponics

3 Sticking to them is the hard part, but if you are able to stick to them it will help you out.

4 Have more funding for the actual company

5) Do it on something you care about. If you don’t care about it, why do it.

 

 

Timeline

Well my part in the timeline was minimal, I was added to a Scott William’s project, after my plan fell through. So he had already begun creating a timeline before I was even introduced into the group. We then just started talking about what my strengths are, and how I could benefit the team. So I am basically the support side of the project, doing the research, graphic development, programming certain modules, and presentation design. We have flexibility with this, because we set an aggressive schedule so we will be able to get done ahead of schedule. Since there are two of us, it even allows for more flexibility in developing, since we can each pick up and assist each other on their portion of the work, if one of us get bogged down.

Peer capstone support group

Web Developing and Video(filming and editing)

Tech Using:

Final cut for documentary
Aptana for website development
Illustrator and Photoshop for images

Class Discussion

It was most interesting talking about Emily’s Capstone. It was weird talking about someone’s “baby” . Since I asked Emily not to broadcast my capstone idea, I didn’t really have anyone talk about it, except in “abstract terms”, which was actually interesting… Even though I asked her to mask it, it felt weird hearing my idea being not given true credit… I want to make sure I am extra humble, and take in all the helpful ideas and input I can receive.  I realized that I don’t want to do my original idea, but I want to due the Amani Africa website project. I know that it will probably be more work, but I would like to do something that will make a difference, while showcasing my skills.

My Capstone ideas

Here are a couple Ideas I had for my capstone:

1) A cross platform app that would allow freshman, or people taking a class in a new building to see how to get to their classroom. It would be a google maps of the interior of buildings. It would take a lot of work to get a camera and film each level of the building, but I feel that it would be very beneficial to people who are new to the campus or building.

2) There is an African non profit company that my mom works for that helps African Refugees make hand made goods. They are in desperate need of a new website, all of their inventory needs to be photographed, and a small documentary for their website to showcase who they are.

3)  An application that would people to share ideas, and then rate the ideas. So good ideas would receive higher votes and can be showcased on the home panel of the app.  Conversely bad ideas would be voted down, so in theory the better the idea the more people can see it.

One of the questions was to talk about 3 things that inspired my ideas:

Idea 1: Google maps, are starting include the inside of some buildings. Augmented reality apps. Walk through videos that realtors post to get people interested in a house they are selling.

Idea 2: This didn’t really have inspiration, but I was thinking the Etsy site was really good.

Idea 3: It came from reddit, lookbook.com, and polyvore.com

1st Assignment. What is a capstone

DEFINITION:

Capstones- The culmination of our college education. They are supposed to represent everything that we have worked for during college. All of our experience and knowledge in our field should be utilized to make the best project we are capable of making.

MY INTERPRETATION: I want to make a project that I am enthusiastic about making. I have seen a lot of projects that have been done “half assed”, and I don’t want to be like that. I don’t care if people remember my project, but I do care that it meets my standard of excellence. I am the biggest self critic, and I want to make something that I am proud of having my name attached to it. In my humble opinion it is a “right of passage”. I  believe that if you don’t work hard and produce a project that is crap, then you should not receive a diploma. If that was the standard that was imposed on students it would increase the credibility of the university. The reason that so many students don’t get jobs is that they are allowed to skimp through a degree program, and are not held to a high standard. If students are allowed to produce crap, and are then hired by a company, but then are fired because of their poor performance… who does that hurt? It hurts future graduates. The reason so many college graduated don’t get degrees is that companies often don’t see the benefit in hiring another employee when so many are not worth their weight.

Make it hard.

Make it perfect.

I wish that a final project, our capstone, was something that we worked on our entire college career instead of the last two semesters. The title is self explaining, “CAPTSONE”. The stone used to cover something, oftentimes a wall. The wall needs to be built, but while the wall is being built, a capstone should be formed and crafted to fit the wall. So I think a holistic approach should be used to find a capstone and it should encompass the entire college experience.