Last weeks grades and next term's classes

Well, last week's grades are in and here is how I did:

Art History: 285/285 for a total of 1037/1072 (96.74%)

Image Editing for Games: 100/130 for a total of 540/570 (94.74%)

Introduction to Animation: 30/40 for a total of 970/1030 (94.17%)

Introduction to Game Development: 260/280 for a total of 679/780 (87.05%)

So ... I am still fighting to get back to an "A" in Game Development. I got a note back from the professor saying he won't grade any "late" work until the end of the term, so I won't know anything about that until next week.

I missed out on 30 points for my rough draft in my Photoshop class because I didn't list my text in it. Oh well .. no one is perfect. Speaking of Photoshop, Meredith (my wife) has signed me up to in the National Association of Photoshop Professionals. I now have access to their site and all of their tutorials, as well as getting the monthly magazine "Photoshop Users." It is a very informative magazine. I really do enjoy it and ahve learna lot from it already.

I am happy to say that with Meredith's help I got a perfect score on my Art History paper. I had to write a thesis on a famous Artist and some of their works, so I picked Norman Rockwell and his "Four Freedoms" poster. My thesis was that he was more of a propagandist than an artist. The profess made a note on my paper thiking that it was an interesting spin on him.

Of my four classes this term, three of them have final projects that are being critiqued by the other students:

Image Editing for Games: My picture that I uploaded as my final is what is showing, and it is getting mediocer reviews. Too much fog and that the text looks like it was added as an after-thought. Of well. Lets see what kind of grade I get from teh professor.

Introduction to Animation: My animated short is the only one so far to get 4 reviews while everyone else has one or two (one person has three). Everyone loves it and says that they laugh and cry over the story. One person asked if I was planning of doing a whole series of them as there are way too many possibilities to do with it all. Now, I will see if I can get these files over to my brother and see if he can find a way to show them on his site (18mb to get over to him).

Introduction to Game Development: We had to do a PowerPoint presentation on what we want to do in our careers, how we will get there kinf of skills we will need and such. I ahven't gotten any critiques on that yet, and the choice I picked was a texture artist. That is pretty much considered ground floor starting position, but it was more realistic to pick then Head Game Designer and Art Lead as many people picked. Sure, I hope to one day be in a leadership role such as that, but I went to do my presentation on something different. Let's see where that will take me.

So ... today I found out what classes I will be taking starting in January. They will be:

Digital Illustration: In this class students develop electronic illustration skills. Emphasis is placed on conceptual thinking, composition, creative type effects, and design campaigns. Upon completion of this course, students should be able to create effective layouts and illustrations through the use of digital illustration tools and menu items.

Color Theory: This course covers the principles of color as it applies to print and electronic media. Emphasis is placed on color relationships, composition and color mixture. Students will study the effects of color on the development of design as well as the psychology of color and its power to deliver effective marketing messages.

Both of these courses are 7 credit hours, so they should have some big projects in them. I am very excited about both of these. I eventually want to get into painting some digital pictures and would like to get a decent digital pen tablet to make it all easier. Photoshop and Vista have some great features for tablets, and am eager to play with them all.

Anyhoo ... that is all for now. I am very eager to know how I did on my final projects and will post the grades once I have them. I love you all and wish you all happy holidays!