Working on the base means you spend a lot of time waiting for people to email/call you back, waiting for edits and waiting for approval. At the same time you are asked to get things done within small time frames ranging from the space of a day to a couple days. On top of that, as an intern everything goes through your mentor/superior first, which adds another step in the process and causes things to take longer. It can feel like a see-saw - a mix between large bursts of activity and work to do where you think to yourself 'I'm never going to get all of this done in time!' and long periods of stagnation and waiting where you find yourself staring down your computer screen waiting for a response to pop up in the bottom right-hand corner.
This week was a 'waiting' week for me. Last week I started working on an infographic after meeting with Paul, NAWCAD's Energy Manager, and getting the information I needed. I worked on it on a secondary basis because I had to finish editing factsheets and compiling information from posters for 4.0's "Getting to Know 4.0" Campaign first since that was due last Friday. I was given a template for inspiration for the infographic and I knew what I wanted it to look like so it was mainly down to simplifying the information and figuring out the best way to make sure everything Paul and I felt was relevant would be represented.
I finished writing the text and drew out the design on a piece of printer paper Wednesday afternoon and was ready for it to go from a sketch to a graphic. At first I thought the next step was to give everything to a graphic designer and work with him/her to ensure it turned out the way I visualized it but I found out it was intended to be more of a design learning experience so that I could be involved in the graphic design side too. I immediately started googling ‘how to make an infographic’ and opened about 15 tabs detailing various different ways to make infographics without special software, which I then proceeded to read and attempt. I tried a few of the free websites that were suggested and made a couple rudimentary infographics but was disappointed in the results when they weren’t as beautiful or visually appealing as the picture I had in my head…also the Windows computer I was on is probably around 1,000 years old and very slow (not exactly the snazzy Mac many of the websites recommended I use). I couldn’t watch tutorials because you can’t use YouTube on an NMCI computer so I watched a couple on my iPhone instead until the battery drained down to 20%. Although my attempts at generating a free graphic fell short I learned quite a bit about the different ways you can design infographics and I saved some of the links because I want to try out the websites I used at work on my Mac at home. All in all, I learned its probably best to use special software that is actually meant to generate graphics but hey it was worth a try to see if I could do it without -and for free!
If you’re curious/interested:
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/infographic-create-infographic/
http://www.graphs.net/201303/how-to-create-an-awesome-infographic.html
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/awesome-free-tools-infographics/
http://www.infographicsarchive.com/create-infographics-and-data-visualization/
I didn't have the necessary software on my computer to make the infographic so I got in contact with the David, the Visual Information Team Lead, about how to make that happen. (I was told I would probably be working with Adobe InDesign so I spent a little time reading a tutorial I found for creating infographics with it because I didn’t want to go in completely blind.) He wasn't available until Friday morning so the infographic got pushed to the back burner for Thursday and I spent most of the day designing the intern blog, (you're welcome for the collage of aircraft in the background:) ) pestering the graphic designer who sits next to me at FRC (but doesn't work for PAO) to see if my vision was going in the right direction, (<-- can I keep the comma there? Should blog posts be in AP style? Ahh the stylebook is making me question everything!) and receiving compliments on my highlighter orange dress. (see picture below, I'm not exaggerating...its shockingly bright!)
Friday morning I arrived at the VI building and learned that we are getting a graphic designer who will sit at VI permanently now. She is moving in today and I didn’t want to overwhelm her by throwing an assignment in her lap automatically but once she was partially settled in (by partially I mean her computer was up and running) we got the chance to sit down and talk about how to turn my vision into a reality. She’s really nice and I’m looking forward to learning from her and experiencing the drawing-to-design process. I’m just disappointed I won’t be back until Wednesday! (One of the major differences for me this summer compared to last…my time at PAO feels a little disjointed because I work somewhere else Monday and Tuesdays.)
I have to say, the blog is definitely nice to have in this internship of hurrying and waiting because now the interns will have something we can do when we’re in the in-between stages of other assignments.
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