Bonni Wattigney's Archive

I think I started out on a bad foot with this assignment. For me that was mostly the time frame it was assigned in and the fact that I’m just burnt out. I think it’s definitely not good for me to feel so completely unable to contribute good things when I’m this burnt out, it’s something I need to improve on in life in general. I think the main thing that got me motivated through this project was working in groups in the Learning Studio that couple of days. Hearing ideas I liked and didn’t like sort of helped me build a picture of what I wanted to go for in the end.

Since the beginning of the course I definitely think it is easier for me to build a web page. I understand the process and run through what I need on the page. This project I honestly didn’t do a great job with that, but if I was sitting down getting ready to build a website for a client, I feel confident that I could get everything I need to get in the site in there. This project was also helpful for working in a group setting. I feel like my ability to contribute to and benefit from a group has improved.

I will definitely continue to practice web design to see that I get better at it. I will also work on that whole getting things done when I’m not motivated to do it thing as well. Thanks!

Food Bank of West Central Texas: http://www.fbwct.org/

First United Methodist Church: http://www.fumcabilene.com/ministries/missions/fumc_food_pantry.html

Welcome Screen – the user can choose one of two options to get started or use the do this at home option to email the site to themselves.

• Serve
• Join a Community
• Do this at home, option so they can email site link to themselves.

Serve Process

• User filters process by Individual, Couple or Family
• User filters process by choosing an age range (and gender for individual)
• User clicks through options of areas that they are interested in.
• User is presented with an opportunities screen where results are filtered into internal and external opportunities
• User can click on individual opportunities and access a description page of the opportunity where they have an option to join the ministry.
• User opts to join a ministry and are presented with a screen with the leader’s contact info and a place to fill in their own as well as an option to say that they wish to be contacted by the leader.
• Screen 7 – If the user clicks the leader’s email address on the join screen, the program allows them to email the leader immediately.

Join a Community Process:

• User filters process by Individual, Couple or Family
• User filters process by age range of their group.
• User clicks through options of areas that they are interested in.
• User will filter options by clicking the times and days of the week they are available to commit to a community
• User will be presented with opportunities as well as a button to “Keep it close.”
• If the user clicks the “Keep it close” button they will be presented with a ZIP code box and a drop down of how many miles they are willing to travel. Once complete they will be taken back to a filtered opportunities list.
• When user clicks on the community group they will see a description with an option to join.
• When the user asks to join they will see a screen with the leader’s contact info, a place to put their own and an option to be contacted.
• If the user clicks the leader’s email address, they can immediately email the leader.

Monica is a 17 year old high school student who attends a megachurch with her family. She recently decided that she wants to go on a mission trip with the youth group at the church and finds that she has to do some service in the church to qualify to go. Unsure of what her options are as a teenager in such a large church, she heads to the “Get Involved” kiosk at the church. She starts the program by putting in her age and interests and finds that the “Bean Team” coffee and breakfast ministry needs help! Monica is very passionate about food and helping people enjoy their eating experiences so she sends the Bean Team leader an email immediately and is satisfied that she has found an exciting new ministry to help out with!

Bill and Laura are a middle aged couple who recently relocated to the DFW area. They are overwhelmed by the general size of churches in the area, but have finally decided to settle down at a local megachurch. The couple wants to serve together in a ministry and also get connected to a small group that fits their needs. They notice in the bulletin that the church has a “Get Connected” section where it asks them to either visit the lobby kiosk or go online to the church website. Once the couple gets home, they sit down at their computer and log on to the church website. They begin the Get Connected program by indicating that they are a couple who prefers to serve together and then indicates their age range and interests. Bill and Laura are excited to find that the college ministry in the church is always looking for small group leaders, and click the option for the college minister to contact them with more information. While they continue scrolling through unique opportunities they find a great small group where they can meet with their peers and discuss topics really relevant to their life situation. Bill and Laura are thrilled that the intimidating process of getting involved in such a large church situation ended up being so easy!

For my interviews I wanted to get a wide variety of people, so I made sure to get different age groups and genders. I talked to people from high school age to almost retired people. Every person I interviewed said that they would use a program similar to my project in a church. Nearly every person interviewed said they had attended or at least visited a megachurch and understood how difficult it can be to get involved. The question I got the most back and forth answer on was “Would you prefer to contact the leader of the ministry, or be contacted by the leader?” It was really 50/50 and I think that’s just based on someone’s personality type. This made me realize that the end page where the member gets information on how to get involved that they should maybe have a checkbox that says “Have the leader contact me.” Another thing I asked, just for curiosity’s sake, is would you be offended if the church used technology to help members initially get involved. I was a bit surprised to see that no one (even my older crowd) found this offensive as long as they were able to interact with a real person as the end result. I think this interview process, though small, was very helpful and would be interesting to present to churches in the future. The final thing I will mention is that I spoke with some people who are not active and regular church goers and these people even said that they would be willing to use a program like this to see how they could get involved in the church. I thought that was an awesome thought!

This project was really different for me than the previous two. On the last two, I struggled with design and ended up completely changing everything at some point in the process. For this project I started out with an idea and it worked well throughout the whole process. I had to tweak some things along the way, but I never completely scrapped my design and started over. That was nice, even though I felt like I was slacking because of how much less time it took me to do it. Then I remembered that I was spending twice as much time as I needed to on the previous projects and I felt better.

I think my technical struggles and weaknesses are definitely getting better. I really can’t think of anything I really struggled with technically on this project. I’m even getting to the point where creating layer folders and naming all the layers is second nature and I feel like the project is incomplete if my layers are a mess. I feel like that is a good sign for my infant web designing skills.

Conceptually, I did have to come back and rework a few things. In my first comp, I didn’t have a place related to each post to tell readers which category each post was related with. I had to go back in a reorganize things a bit to fit it in cohesively. I think I may have some areas on this project where I’m not using a web safe font where one is needed. I tried to correct this, but I think maybe this should be a technical struggle, but I’m not entirely sure where web safe fonts should and should not be.

I think coming up with a solid design idea from the beginning was definitely a sign of improvement to me. I don’t know if that was specific to just this project though because I spend most of my internet time on people’s personal blogs rather than corporate websites. It could be that I’m just more comfortable and familiar with blog themes and that’s what made this process easier.

My sketching got better! I have a few more this time, but I do need to continue learning how to work things out on paper first. I think in the world outside of school, sketching will come more naturally when I have longer amounts of time to commit to projects throughout the day. Frequent interruptions in the schedules of my day make it difficult for me to get in the mind set of sketching. I will keep trying here though!

Here is some more inspiration. The photos are links.

I like the top part of the post section on this one how it is different levels or layers. I think it makes it more interesting and breaks the space nicely.

On this one I like the use of a journal as visual language. I think they could lose a little bit of the business, but I like that they reference the old ways of blogging, journaling.

I was looking for ways to have photos as the main content on the home page. This one is more newsy in content but I like the presence of photos.

I wish the main photo here was bigger so that the bottom part didn’t take up so much visual weight, but I like the latest additions section.

Ok, for this one, just ignore that cheesy blog title, but notice the date and comments treatment. That’s the only thing I thought was interesting on this theme.

Again with this one the date and comments treatment, except for how it overlaps the post title.

I forgot to get the link for this one. Sorry.

Here are some cool blog themes. The first one is a more corporate feeling blog with very distinct posts. The second more of an out of the ordinary image focused blog, and the third a pretty typical, but nicely designed blog. Each image is a clickable link.