@TECH

01239 612032 [email protected] www.ceredigion.ac.uk

campus. This facility will offer our students greater opportunity to explore and develop their Claymation skills whilst using the industry standard software used to create the Academy Award winning blockbusters of Aardman. I am very grateful to Laurie for giving her time and sharing her considerable experience with us and I look forward to continuing our links with her throughout the year.”

Laurie Sitzia said, “It was great to meet the students at Coleg Ceredigion and give them an insight into the world of stop motion animation. I hope they have been inspired and look forward to seeing how their personal projects develop this year.”

Aardman Animator Visit

Coleg Ceredigion continues to build links in exhibition

Coleg Ceredigion students recently had a valuable glimpse into the work produced by students at University.

Cardigan IT department arranged a visit to the University of Wales: Trinity Saint David campus in Swansea to visit the second year BA(Hons) Advertising and Brand Design‘s Fashion Branding Exhibition at the Dynevor Campus. During the visit students were given the opportunity to talk to UWTSD students and to discuss their projects and work processes from initial ideas to actually creating their designs.

"We were delighted to have the students from Coleg Ceredigion visit our

Exhibition,” explained Angela Williams, Programme Director BA(Hons) Advertising and Brand Design at UWTSD. “Our students really enjoyed the opportunity to talk through their ideas and final pieces of work and Coleg Ceredigion students were particularly interested in the design process and the diversity of ideas that our students had on display.”

Marion Phillips IT Course Team Leader at the Cardigan Campus commented: “Our Level 3 programme at Coleg Ceredigion includes a number of creative units, including Digital Graphics, Digital Animation and Multimedia Design; and it was useful to consider other applications for

their design work and to explore the possible progression opportunities available within the UWTSD group. We look forward to developing our links with the department throughout the coming year.”

Small World Theatre

Production

Coleg Ceredigion IT and GCSE students were recently invited to preview The Small World Theatre’s latest innovative production. One Way Street is a new adult puppet show touring Wales with support from The Arts Council of Wales.

This intriguing noir genre experience is a live theatre performance inhabited by puppets and animated film projections by artist Sean Vicary. The audience have the opportunity to take part in the show by downloading the app, answering a few simple questions and becoming a character with a line to deliver in the performance.

During the visit students were given the opportunity to appreciate the intricate detail of set construction, 2D and 3D puppets in different sizes reflecting close-ups and long shots, shadow puppets and animated projections that make up this mixed media theatrical presentation.

Coleg Ceredigion recently welcomed Aardman animator Laurie Sitzia to visit its new animation studio on the Cardigan campus. Laurie has nearly ten years experience of working at Aardman Animation Studios, which includes a portfolio of work featuring the likes of the Academy Award winning Creature Comforts, Shaun the Sheep, Timmy the Sheep and more recently the Academy Award nominated, The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists!

This exclusive visit provided students with the opportunity to gain a unique insight into the skills and techniques used to create full feature length and Claymation shorts, from one of their most experienced modern day animators.

Marion Phillips, IT tutor at Coleg Ceredigion, said “The Aardman Studios in Bristol are without doubt the biggest success story in the new wave of British animation and it’s been a fantastic experience for our students to learn from someone who works at the very pinnacle of this industry.

The animation units offered within the Level 2 Diploma and Level 3 Extended Diploma courses are incredibly popular, with many of our 2D digital animation projects being highlighted as excellent practice by our awarding body. I’m very excited that we can build on this success by further expanding our provision through the development of a new animation studio based at the Cardigan

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January 2015

Laurie animating Pirates, an Adventure with Scientists!


New Developments @ Cardigan

Building a Computer is

Easy PC!

Students on the new Computer Systems unit get some valuable experience in installing hardware and software.

Building on the success of last year, the Cardigan IT department has benefitted from a substantial investment in new equipment and facilities that will further enhance delivery.

These exciting developments will impact substantially on both the Level 2 and Level 3 Cambridge TEC Diplomas. As part of this investment two IT suites have been completely re-equipped with 27” widescreen PCs using Core i7 processors, running Adobe Design and Web Premium CS6 as well as the standard Microsoft Office suite of programs. The rooms have also benefitted from new widescreen interactive whiteboards with short throw projectors.

The department has also seen an expansion to include a well equipped animation studio/computer systems lab. This facility is designed specifically to support our animation units including, Web Animation for Interactive Media, Animation Techniques, Computer Animation and 2D Animation as well as our more technically based units such as Computer Systems, Web Development and Web production. This will enhance the learners’ experiences by providing them with the opportunity to create Claymation as well as computer generated animations using industry standard equipment and software. Students will also gain hands-on experience involving the installation of hardware components, computer software set-up and networking.

Our Digital Graphics and Multimedia Development units have also benefitted from a range of new equipment. Nikon D3200 SLR still camera kits and a SONY HXR-MC1500P high definition video camera as well as several SONY HDR-CX220E Handycam video cameras, together with a set of Wacom Intuos Pro graphics tablets will allow students the opportunity to work within the professional requirements reflective of industry.

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November 2014

DIGITAL GRAPHICS

MULTIMEDIA

ANIMATION

It lives!

optical drive…..

and the memory,

That’s the hard drive,


Sustainability is an important theme that is embedded in all our IT courses and this was an excellent opportunity for our students to apply their knowledge, combined with their practical IT skills, in a creative project.

Winning Fairtrade T-shirt Design

IT Students Look at Sustainability Issues

In support of their sustainability studies Cardigan IT students enjoyed an interesting and thought provoking day at the Centre for Alternative

Technology at Machynlleth. The day started with an introductory talk from Gabi Ashton, Educational Administrator at the Centre where students were given

an insight into the history and development of the Centre. Students were then able to enjoy the wide and varied interactive displays spread around the site in order to experience environmental ideas and technologies in a practical way.

This educational visit provided students with opportunities to gather information and ideas that could be applied to a number of units, such as Website Production and Computer Animation, within their qualification.

Lecturer is Radio Cymru

IT Specialist

Cardigan IT lecturer Glyn Howells recently featured on BBC Radio Cymru discussing the hacking of eBay accounts and giving advice on ways to improve online safety.

Glyn has been the specialist IT consultant for the Welsh medium station for several years and is often called upon to offer professional opinion on a wide range of IT related issues.

This is an important link for Coleg Ceredigion and is another example of the department's ongoing commitment to promoting bilingualism in all aspects of their teaching and learning.

Michelle Furney, an IT Level 3 Extended Diploma student at the Cardigan campus, recently won the Fairtrade T-shirt design competition held across both campuses. This competition was one of the College’s activities during their Fairtrade Fortnight. Students were asked to create a T-shirt design reflecting the ethos of Fairtrade.

Michelle used the skills that she has developed as part of her Cambridge TEC Extended Diploma course to create her competition winning bilingual design. Sarah Wright, the ESDGC (Education for Sustainable Development and Global Citizenship) Co-ordinator arranged for the T-shirt design to be produced and Michelle was presented with her winning T-shirt at the Cardigan campus recently.

New Practical Units are Popular with Students

Last year saw the introduction of a range of more technically based practical units. They allow students the opportunity to practice installing hardware and software components,

configuring systems to meet the user’s needs and testing the systems. Students have found these units enjoyable and they have added a new dimension to the course.

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September 2014


This visit gave Coleg Ceredigion students a chance to meet staff and students from the University and to learn more about the courses available there.

The School of Applied Computing offer an exciting range of programmes at HND and degree level. The programmes range from more general areas such as Applied Computing and Business Computing to more specialist offerings such as Robotics and Intelligent Systems and Web Development.

Visit to UWTSD Swansea

Cardigan Student Features in Emlyn Film Festival

An animation by former Coleg Ceredigion student, Janet Lloyd Davies featured prominently in a recent festival celebrating the talents of budding filmmakers. The first ever Emlyn Film Festival, held at the Attic Theatre in Newcastle Emlyn, show-cased the work of up and coming filmmakers along with local talent.

Former Cardigan IT student, Janet Davies’ film, Gaia She Knows was produced in collaboration

with Planet Sunday film studio in Pembrokeshire for Californian band The Hipwaders.

To view this animation go to the Coleg Ceredigion news page at:

http://www.ceredigion.ac.uk/news/

Ebrill 2014

Excellent Awarding

Body Feedback

At a recent visit the OCR verifier confirmed that the standards at Cardigan continue to be very high. The verifier noted that there were several examples of ‘excellent practice’ and that exemplar work was seen across the units examined. Evidence included presentations, storyboards, navigation maps, Gantt charts, questionnaires, test plans, user guides, scripting language code, animation sequences and web pages.

As part of the developing links between the IT department and the School of App-lied Computing at Swansea Metropolitan (UWTSD), students from both Level 2 and Level 3 of the Cambridge TEC IT courses were invited to participate in a robotics workshop held by Dr Nik Whitehead.

Collaboration Highlighted as Excellent Practice

Cardigan IT students recently completed an exciting collaborative project with the Welsh Language department to create an innovative educational animation. The students worked with a brief developed by Anna ap Robert, Welsh Language

Adviser, and with contributions from Aneirin Karadog, Bardd Plant Cymru, Cardigan Junior School pupils and staff and students from the college.

Their efforts were highlight-ed as ‘excellent practice’ by the OCR external verifier at a recent visit.

Caroline at UWTSD

Caroline Probert who completed the Cambridge TEC Level 3 Extended Diploma last year is now studying Web Development at Swansea Met (UWTSD). She said “I’m really enjoying my time here. It was quite a change at the beginning but I’m really glad that I came to Swansea Met.”

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Welcome to the first issue of @TECH, the newsletter for Coleg Ceredigion’s Infor-mation Technology Department at the Cardigan Campus. We hope that you’ll enjoy reading about the Department and some of the activities that students on the courses below have been involved with.

transferable skills which are essential in the workplace or for further study.

The Level 2 Diploma is equivalent to 4 GCSE A*-C standard and provides an excellent introduction to current technolo-gy and its ICT/business/creative sector applications. It is therefore of particular benefit to those seeking employment or progression onto the Cambridge TEC IT Level 3 Extended Diploma.

The Level 3 Extended Diploma is equiva-lent to three A Levels and develops a more advanced understanding of current technology and its ICT/business/creative sector applications making it ideal for those wishing to progress to higher edu-cation as well as those seeking employ-ment.

Welcome to @TECH

Open Day Family Photoshoot

The IT Department organ-ised a very successful Family Photoshoot event during the last open day held by Coleg Ceredigion.

The event hosted by Level 3 Extended Diploma stu-dents provided local fami-lies with the opportunity of having a free photoshoot using the latest software and equipment.

This provided an excellent opportunity for the students to apply their skills in a re-alistic professional setting.

February 2014

Guest Speakers

As part of the College’s Enterprise Week IT stu-dents benefitted from the expertise and experience of guest speakers Neal Jones and Greg David.

Cambridge TEC IT Courses at Cardigan

Level 2 Diploma (1 year)

Level 3 Extended Diploma (2 years)

These new qualifications are aimed spe-cifically at students aged 16+ and are de-signed to be more relevant to further edu-cation. They have a clear, practical and sensible approach to continuous assess-ment and provide exciting, inspiring and challenging qualifications that develop

Children in Need

IT students got involved with Children in Need again this year. They arranged a range of fundraising activi-ties including FIFA Xbox tournament, guess the weight of the Human Tur-key and a very loud and successful karaoke extrav-aganza enjoyed by staff

and students.

IT students raised a total of £146.12 towards the Coleg Ceredigion fundraising ef-fort.

Many thanks to Chris Flow-ers (Flowers Entertain-ment) for providing the kar-aoke equipment.

Neal Jones from Dragon Graphix based in Cardi-gan enthused students with his talk on entrepre-neurial opportunities in the field of digital graphics.

Greg David from Planet Sunday, based in Haver-fordwest, provided stu-dents with a unique insight into the world of 2D digital animation and his experi-ence of setting up and running an international animation studio in rural Wales.

Documents

@TECH