Aviary? Photo Shop? No Thank You!

So…I deffinately don’t know how to use this stuff. I’m deffinately about to fail this project. Just fail it all the way to the ground. Well… that’s what I would have said I had I not come to my senses. I just decided to stick to what I know. Technology and I have been long time enemies. I get reminded of this every time I try to register for classes. I took me the longest time to figure out this blogger website thing.

I decided to use the sweet and simple Microsoft Word Art and Clip Art. I don’t think you have to use all that fancy stuff they have these days to get a point across. In my poster, I was trying to rally more students to come and volunteer at L.A.R.A (Lafayette Adult Resource Academy) and use there majors to improve the community. I thought about trying to use Aviary because everyone else was. I didn’t want the instructor to think I wasn’t trying as hard as the other students who decided to use it to make their posters. I finally concluded that the most important thing is that my message is simple and clear. I feel that fancy graphics and overly flashy colors can distract readers from remembering the overall message. I sued a simple white background, a bold colored letters and a basic picture.  When looking at my poster some may think that I may have needed more colors or put something flashier in the background. I would ask them, “By looking at my just the way it is, what would a flashy background add to my overall message?” I think the most crucial part of my poster is the quote that I included at the end.

The quote “Bringing the community together through service” is simply a generic quote I used to summarize the main purpose behind getting students to volunteer at L.A.R.A. A big reason students should volunteer is because they are helping people improve themselves. Many students think they won’t be able to change or have a big positive effect on the world until they graduate and have their dream job. With this opportunity students will be able to have a positive effect on the world right now just using the basic skills they learned in high school and in undergrad. This quote shows students that there is a way to change the community for the better right now. The most important thing to understand about volunteering at L.A.R.A is that you are helping to bring the community together.

I hate Videogames...

I think the end of the course is a great time to say it finally...I really don't like video-games. They are the laziest way to spend your time. I believe video-games are the number two contributor to childhood obesity in the U.S. Number one would have to be those Little Debbie fat cakes...I really don't buy the idea that playing  video-games can solve real problems in this country or world. Show me some good solid evidence of what video-games have done to fix the economy, save starving babies, or fix our immigration and foreign relation issues.

Having said all of that I’m going to contradict myself just a little bit. Now, the new Xbox Kinect, that is my shit! I love that thing! If any video-game console can make me break a sweat and get my whole family dancing, including my 73 year-old GRANDMOTHER! It has to be good! I mean talk about dance party at my house, I never my grandmother could get down like that. That’s about it though… maybe I’m just being closed-minded, but it takes a lot for me to just believe something like a video-game could make a huge difference in the word.

Well, maybe I just haven’t been updated on all the things video-games have done for society yet. Perhaps there are some benefits to spending the whole day in a virtual killing off all your friends. Maybe World of War Craft has secret message to teach people about who to communicate in the real world and be successful. Perhaps there is a lesson to be learned from Halo. Maybe I just have to be a more abstract thinker in order to understand the potential that video-games may have. It’s hard to do that when all I see little kids playing these days are shoot and kill or racing games. I think the only thing they would get from that is excitement in being violent, and personally I would not allow my kids to play those violent games. I would be too afraid that my kids might start going crazy and try to do some crazy stuff like that to each other.