<- résumé
<- other projects
All screen images on this page are links to the actual pages at the Italian Academy site.
Whether it's a long-term project or a quick rush job, a coding or a design position, it helps to have reliable people on the production team. The person not only needs to be able to follow instructions and do his/her bits well, but s/he should be able to coordinate and communicate with other members of the team. Sometimes it means pitching in and extending oneself beyond the defined role one was originally given.
I was initially called in by The Italian Academy at Columbia University to do a rush job of coding and designing pages for a well-attended lecture (given by the curator of the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on the late Italian fashion designer Gianni Versace).I ended up doing other things as well, such as...
- setting up and monitoring the computer end of live-broadcasts over the internet (e.g. see now archived Versace lecture on Audio Lecture page, right)
- managing the constant updating some pages required
- introducing better file management for an overgrown site
- redeveloping contents and redesigning pages as needed (e.g. see Audio Lecture page, right)
- troubleshooting html coding problems of other pages
- troubleshooting real-audio events I wasn't monitoring
- coding, managing, and troubleshooting for a mirrored site on Unix servers using a Window 95 PC
- coordinating with different departments to get necessarily information and data
So although I have not dealt with live-broadcast before, I was able to calmed down a panicky administrator, who had just inherited the site and didn't know a lot about the internet. Dealt with step by step, I helped her make the transition to assuming responsibility for the site as smooth as possible and educated her about the internet in the process.
On the coding and designing end, given the lack of time to revamp the site, I tried to work with the existing look and feel of the site. The new pages introduced new but simple layout and coding techniques to help make the site look more sophisticated. For example, I used table cell background color to emulate the look of lecture slides for the visual aids index page (see right).
In addition to processing all the slide images, I also created simple new graphics for buttons and icons. Examples are the green bordered Versace lecture icon (Versace pages); the blue bordered visual, audio, read-me buttons(calendar page, main and audio lecture pages on day of broadcasted lectures); and the Columbia/Italynet links (main page, Audio Lectures page).
URLs:
(+ larger image pages linked to from this page, such as
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/casaitaliana/lectures/gv-imgs/93-52-3.htm)