Week 1: Projects Part Two
Download the archive linked below. As before, read the handouts and follow the instructions.
Week1_AssignmentTwo_Instructions.pdf
Download Week1_AssignmentTwo_Instructions.pdf
Week1_AssignmentTwo_Files.zip
Download Week1_AssignmentTwo_Files.zip
Purpose
This assignment will introduce you to Font Book. You will activate a font and use it in a simple word processing document. I know that sounds boring, but it will be fun!
Directions
- For this assignment, you will upload the completed project directly to Canvas
- When you have completed this assignment return to this week's Module. Read through the Summary and head over to the Discussion forum with any questions you might have.
Turning in your Work
Follow these steps to upload your completed projects directly to Canvas:
- Place all the completed files into a single enclosing folder
- Name the folder WongWingTung_Mac1.2
- Compress the folder into a .zip archive. In the Finder, target the folder and go to File > Compress...
Working with Digital Fonts V I S U A L M E D I A D E S I G N 10 5 FONT MANAGEMENT WITH FONTBOOK We will use Font Book to manage the fonts for class projects throughout the semester. Font Book is a specialized type of software called a font manager. Font managers allow you to easily activate fonts without installing them into the System. Font managers are also useful in organizing large font collections. Font Book works in a window divided into three panes. The left sidebar is a place to organize your fonts, the middle column is a list where you can activate and disable fonts individually, and the last pane shows you a preview of the selected font. COLLECTIONS Collections allow you to organize fonts according to any useful criteria. Think of it like a playlist for Spotify. With a playlist you can put any songs together in any order regardless of artist, music genre, or year. With collections you can organize fonts by project, visual style, or just according to your preferences. Smart Collections allow you to organize fonts by attributes such as language or spacing. 23 Visual Media Design 105 > Digital Skills for Visual Media PROJECT: WORKING WITH APPLICATIONS This project will give you an opportunity to use Font Book to activate fonts and introduce you to some basic concepts in text formatting. It will also review essential file management and backup techniques. GETTING STARTED £ Navigate to the project files £ Locate the folder Working With Applications. Inside this folder you'll find some research for a blog post about the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake in the Bay Area. There are text files, images and links to YouTube videos. Note for PC users: You can download and install a PC version of the font for this project at fonts.google.com. ORGANIZE PROJECT FILES Let's begin by getting these files organized. £ With the window open in the Finder, switch over into list view and then sort the files by Kind. £ Select all the text files, right-click and choose New Folder with Selection. Name this folder Text. £ Do the same for the images and the video links. You should now have 3 subfolders in your project folder. £ Now, make your way through the images and the video links and give descriptive names to each file. Remember to use QuickLook to "peek" into the files without actually opening them. This was all just review. Now let's get into some new techniques. 24 Visual Media Design 105 > Digital Skills for Visual Media MERGE THE TEXT FILES You have text for your post that is spread out into three separate documents. You can use copy & paste to merge these into a single final file. To complete this step in the project, you'll copy the text from Damaged and World Series into the Intro file. £ Select all three text files and type Cmd-O to open them. By default they will open in TextEdit, the text editor that comes with all Mac computers. You should see three open windows on your screen. £ Make Damage the active file. £ Go to Edit > Select All [Cmd-A] to select all the text in this file. £ Now go to Edit > Copy [Cmd-C]. This copies all the characters to the Clipboard so that you can transfer the data to another file or application. £ Type Cmd-W to close this window; you're done with this file! £ Now, make Intro the active file. £ Click at the end of the paragraph and type one hard return. Now go to Edit > Paste [Cmd-V] to paste the contents of the Clipboard into this new file. £ Run through the same sequence to add the World Series file at the end of the Intro document. Try to use the keyboard shortcuts to work more efficiently. SAVE A MERGED FILE Now that you have all three files pasted into the Intro document, you need to save a copy of the file with a new name. £ In TextEdit, go to File > Duplicate £ Rename the file MergedPost. In other applications this process could be achieved through a command called Save As. £ Out in the Finder, navigate to the project folder and make a new sub folder inside of Text called Pieces. Drag the three original text files into this folder for safekeeping. 25 Visual Media Design 105 > Digital Skills for Visual Media ACTIVATE THE FONT Now that your final text file is ready, you will use Font Book to activate the typeface used in this project: Crimson Text. The digital font files are in the project folder, but they need to be activated in order to show up in your font menus. This is a good opportunity for a quick tour of the way this software works! £ In the Finder, jump into the menus and use the shortcut to get into the Applications folder: Go > Applications £ In this folder, locate the program Font Book. Double-click to open it. £ Your initial fontbook interface will look something like the screenshot at left. Font Book interface is divided into 3 panes: Collections, Font List, and Preview. £ A Collection is just a way to organize the fonts on your computer. Click on the + in the lower-left corner to add a new Collection; name it VMD105. £ Click on the + at the top of the middle column to add fonts to your Collection. Navigate to the project folder and choose the folder Crimson_Text. You can also add fonts by dragging a folder into your Collection. £ Crimson should now appear in your Collection! The font will now also appear in the font menus of any running Applications. If you decided at some point that you needed to trim your font menu, you can disable a font by using the checkmark at the top of the middle column. To reactivate a font, simply choose it from the list and tick the checkmark on. 26 Visual Media Design 105 > Digital Skills for Visual Media FORMAT THE TEXT FILE Let's fiish this project by cleaning up the text file, and adding some basic formatting. £ First, type Cmd-A to select all the text £ Now, use the formatting ruler to set the font to Crimson, Regular 12 pt. Much better! £ Create a headline for the post and format it to be Crimson Bold 36pt. £ Use the alignment controls to center this headline on the page. £ Finally, create a byline for the post with your own name centered under the headline. £ Use Crimson Italic 24 pt for this line. £ Save the file and move on. EXPORT A PDF PDF is a great file format to use when you want to send a file to another user and preserve font choices and formatting. £ With your completed file open in TextEdit, go to File > Export as PDF. £ Choose the Desktop as your save location. £ Name the file using this formula: LastnameFirstinitial_Fonts £ When you click Save, you should see a new file appear on your Desktop. 27 Visual Media Design 105 > Digital Skills for Visual Media BACKUP YOUR WORK Your work on this project is complete save for one essential step: a backup! You should always backup the work that you do in this class [and elsewhere!] In fact, for important projects, you should always make two backup copies to different locations and different media. £ As you did earlier, make a backup to your flash drive. £ Compress the project folder and make an online backup to Dropbox, Google Drive or related Cloud Storage. Try to get into the habit of making backups at the end of each class session. If you do, you'll never lose an important digital file. SUBMIT YOUR WORK Submit the exported PDF file. Hope you enjoyed these projects! The work we've done this week will lay the foundation for the rest of the course. 28 Visual Media Design 105 > Digital Skills for Visual Media