Theatre Design & Technology - Fall 2006 - 33

According to Kristina, several other
graphics programs are available that can be
used for specific needs: Graphic Converter is
very good at repairing corrupted image
files. Map Spinner is fantastic if you need to
build an image map. GifBuilder can help
animated GIF files, if you are interested in
that. Adobe ImageReady can help create
complicated, image-heavy Web page layouts.
After building the master image file in
Photoshop, ImageReady can help divide the
large image into a number of smaller images
to insert into a table. It will even generate the
HTML code needed to display the page online.
Kristina and her husband Jason work
together on her Web site; they are Mac users
at home but PC-based at work; the PC programs they use are all Mac compatible.
While Photoshop and ImageReady are
cross-platform programs, other graphics
software may not be.

Kristina. "My husband Jason got interested in
Web design originally and we couldn't afford
the software. So, for the price of an HTML for
Dummies book, he taught himself the programming language instead. Many people
don't realize that Web pages are actually just
text files containing specialized instructions
which tell the Web browser (Internet Explorer,
Netscape, Safari, etc.) what to do and how to
display information. We write out all the code
using a basic word processor. Our choice is
TextEdit or WordPad, which usually come
preloaded on computers. More robust word
processors like Microsoft Word can be problematic because they try to help by fixing spelling or formatting, but the HTML code doesn't
follow standard written English so that help
will often create bigger problems. Hand coding my Web pages also makes them more
streamlined and therefore faster loading. The
commercial programs add a lot of extraneous
code that isn't really needed and that extra
code makes the pages load slower. There is a
learning curve with either method. There are
many people who would advocate using the software designed for creating the Web pages for you
and they work really well for some people."

Scale and Display Venues: Web Pages
Sometimes taking the time to learn and experiment can pay off. "We don't use any of the
WYSIWYG programs on the market like
Dreamweaver to build our Web pages," says

Marketing: The CD Showcase
In order to reach as many people as possible
who have different levels of computer skills, it
is best to keep things simple. It is important to
develop simple templates for a Web site. The
template lets you update by plugging in content
rather than starting from scratch each time.
Keeping the site up-to-date is the most difficult
part, and having page templates makes that
process much less time consuming. The layout
and links must be easy to follow so the viewer
can easily access the files on display and get
the information needed.
Janie E. Howland is a scenic designer, a
member of United Scenic Artists Local 829, an
Elliot Norton Award winner, and founding
member of the Cyco Scenic production company. She says: "I used to carry around a large
portfolio case with images mounted onto black
mat board pages. There were approximately
fifteen pages. Now I have an electronic portfolio. Now I carry my laptop computer and show
producers a slide show of about thirty images
of my work and I leave them with a disc that
includes my résumé, the images, and the articles that have been published about me and
my work. I still present them with a printed
copy of my résumé."

The Slide Show: PowerPoint Presentations
Sometimes a digital portfolio can be used to
make a presentation or to teach a class. In
such cases, it is useful to turn to Microsoft's
PowerPoint. The program comes with many
creative features and can be used to create
presentation slides.
With PowerPoint, creating professional, unique presentations can be easy.
The software offers multiple tools for keeping slides clear, well designed, and professional looking. The many layout and design
options can be customized. When using
PowerPoint, it is important to create slides
that grab the viewer's attention by choosing
the graphics carefully and treating each one
of the frames as a portfolio page. Use the
space on the slides effectively; include only
elements that contribute to the points you
want to make, and choose images that serve
a purpose-such as the draftings, research,
sketches, or photographs that best display
your ideas. Presentations created with
PowerPoint resemble a filmstrip.

THEATRE

DESIGN

TECHNOLOGY
F

2006

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Theatre Design & Technology - Fall 2006