{"@context":{"rdf":"http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#","rdfs":"http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#","owl":"http://www.w3.org/2002/07/owl#","foaf":"http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/","dc":"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/","dct":"http://purl.org/dc/terms/","sioc":"http://rdfs.org/sioc/types#","blog":"http://vocab.amy.so/blog#","as":"https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams#","mf2":"http://microformats.org/profile/","ldp":"http://www.w3.org/ns/ldp#","solid":"http://www.w3.org/ns/solid#","view":"https://terms.rhiaro.co.uk/view#","asext":"https://terms.rhiaro.co.uk/as#","dbp":"http://dbpedia.org/property/","geo":"http://www.w3.org/2003/01/geo/wgs84_pos#","doap":"http://usefulinc.com/ns/doap#","time":"http://www.w3.org/2006/time#"},"@graph":[{"@id":"https://rhiaro.co.uk/2010/10/professional-1","@type":"as:Article","blog:bloggerid":"tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18505529.post-6437031516942092588","as:actor":{"@id":"http://www.blogger.com/profile/12227954801080178130"},"as:content":"
[This post is written as an informal part of a university module]
\r\n
\r\n
\r\nSpeaker: Ken Blair of BMP Recording
\r\nArea: Sound recording/engineer
Although Ken’s area of expertise is not directly relevant to my degree, I have\r\nfrequently worked alongside media students both informally and more recently\r\nas part of a start-up company in Sparkhouse. Thus I am able to relate to many\r\nof the things he discussed about sound engineering, as I have had second-hand\r\nexperience of creating soundscapes for animations, or musical tracks for short\r\nfilms, for example. I wrote lots of notes about the details of the things he\r\ndoes on a regular basis, and the differences between on-location and studio\r\nrecording; between recording pop music and recording classical. But it seems\r\nfruitless to transcribe them all here, when his day-to-day experience, while\r\ninteresting, is of little consequence to me personally.
\r\nHowever what did catch my interest was that Ken started his own company\r\nstraight out of university, similar to what I am involved with in Sparkhouse.\r\nHe discussed the ‘catch twenty-two’ of needing industry experience to find\r\nwork for your company, but people being unwilling to hire because of a\r\nperceived lack of experience. He also affirmed that the decreasing cost of\r\ntechnology has made it easier for people to create their own recording studio\r\nsetups, enabling freelancers to charge the absolute minimum for the work they\r\ndo, causing a very competitive price market.
\r\nI (and the others I am working with in Sparkhouse) have fortunately been able\r\nto take advantage of the latter issue to solve the former. Several years as\r\ninformal student freelancers meant we could afford to charge the minimum, or\r\nwork for free, with the focus being on gaining experience and reputation\r\nrather than worrying about earning money. Now we have started our own company,\r\nwe can start charging ‘real world’ prices to bigger companies, and are able to\r\ndo so supported by a significant portfolio of existing work.
\r\nKnowing that this method has so far worked for myself and others, I feel Ken\r\ncould have offered his hindsight to those in the audience who may not have had\r\nthe same experience. That is, he could have advised to take advantage of the\r\nyears of having a student loan and lots of free time to build up a portfolio\r\nof work and experience relevant to an individuals particular career aims,\r\nwithout needing to worry about taxes and bankruptcy. This would help to avoid\r\nthe problems that his own company had right at the beginning.
\r\nHaving said that, level three is probably too late for students to be hearing\r\nthat kind of advice; it might be more useful, and inspirational, during level\r\none.
\r\nKen did offer advice about writing CVs, for those who do have little industry\r\nexperience - to focus on one’s skills, rather than one’s past jobs - but\r\ncommented that employers of new graduates are sympathetic to the lack-of-\r\nexperience problem, understanding that their job applicants have just come out\r\nof university. I’m not convinced that this is a good message to be sending...\r\nPerhaps employees of sound engineers and audio technicians think differently,\r\nbut my experience so far in the computing industry (mainly software and web\r\ndevelopment areas) has taught me that the new grad job market is so saturated\r\nwith graduates with high calibre degrees that having something on your CV that\r\nyou have done, rather than can do is vital.
\r\nAnyone can list the modules they’ve done, and the programming languages they\r\nhave dabbled in over the course of three years. You stand out if you write\r\nabout the open source project you contributed to in a specific language, or\r\nthe academic poster you presented at a technology conference about your chosen\r\nfield. Listing skills has a lot more impact if you can prove that they really\r\nare your skills.
","as:name":"Professional Practice, guest speaker number one","as:published":{"@type":"http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#datetime","@value":"2010-10-08T13:41:00.000Z"},"as:tag":[{"@id":"https://rhiaro.co.uk/tags/done"},{"@id":"blog:Done"},{"@id":"https://rhiaro.co.uk/tags/bsc"},{"@id":"https://rhiaro.co.uk/tags/Ken+Blair"},{"@id":"https://rhiaro.co.uk/tags/learning"},{"@id":"https://rhiaro.co.uk/tags/Lincoln"},{"@id":"https://rhiaro.co.uk/tags/professional+practice"},{"@id":"https://rhiaro.co.uk/tags/lincoln"},{"@id":"https://rhiaro.co.uk/tags/ken+blair"}],"as:updated":{"@type":"http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#datetime","@value":"2013-04-01T00:15:03.049Z"}},{"@id":"https://rhiaro.co.uk/2011/05/work-wanted","@type":"as:Article","blog:bloggerid":"tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18505529.post-7666757292937788553","as:actor":{"@id":"http://www.blogger.com/profile/12227954801080178130"},"as:content":"Their previous version of this particular site was the image from the event\r\nposter, with links mapped onto it. It was mere moments before my progressive\r\nenhancement / responsive design OCD kicked in. The site in question is to\r\nadvertise this year's University of Lincoln Grad Ball, and is little more than\r\nan online poster. So here goes.
\r\n1530
\r\nMarked up the page, with HTML5 tags and the content from the poster, using\r\ncurrently non-existent classes where needed, and also including a few non-\r\nexistant images. Added my own mini CSS reset for the elements I was using.
1545
\r\nCut the couple of images I needed out of the poster png and uploaded them.\r\nSpent a while trying to find something to match the obscure Mac font that had\r\nbeen used on the poster. Impact was close, but didn't quite cut it at small\r\nsizes. Played with weighting and letter spacing for ages, but eventually\r\npicked a font from Google Web Fonts that did\r\nthe trick and styled all the typography related stuff.
1605
\r\nAligned, padded, margined and weighted everything as I wanted. Remembered to\r\nuse a HTML5 enabling script so versions of IE lte8 would actually bother to style things properly.
1625
\r\nTook a step back to look at content. The organisation of it was great for a\r\nposter, where you can pretty much see everything at once, but in any scenario\r\nwhere scrolling is a possibility, the most important stuff needs to go at the\r\ntop. So I rearranged some things.
1630
\r\nUsed CSS to hide a couple of elements that would do more harm than good on a\r\ndevice with a small display. Used media queries to show them for displays with\r\na greater width than 480px. With help for IE, of course.
Nasty, dirty cheating
\r\nOne of the images I used consisted mostly of text, with a few images plonked\r\naround it. I didn't have the energy to recreate this in a two-column list,\r\nespecially not with the apparently randomly floating images. The image is\r\nonly used for 480px+ of course. Mobile get a list. Unfortunately, I just\r\nused display:none. So mobile browsers are still loading the image. I hate\r\nme, too. But hey, I had an hour. It's better than the whole site being an\r\nimage.
READ MORE ABOUT RESPONSIVE DESIGN.
\r\nI wrote that in capitals, because it is not a suggestion.
\r\nAnd, if you're University of Lincoln final year student, get your tickets for\r\nthe Grad Ball, and resize your browser\r\nwindow while you're there. It's going to be the best one yet, as they say\r\nevery year.
\r\nIt doesn't really seem like much when summarised like this, but I do wish I\r\nwas paid more than £6 an hour.
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