Syl­labus

Con­tacting me

The best way to get in contact with me is to email alex@turnwall.com. I don’t have spe­cific office hours because I don’t actu­ally have an on-campus office, but I’m happy to provide addi­tional support for stu­dents, within reason, so you can email me to schedule a time.

You shouldn’t email me with spe­cific ques­tions about how to use a program feature. You should first check the tuto­rials on this site, on the sites listed in the resources section, and on Google.

Course Overview

From the Registrar’s website

ARTF 2251—Type Tools offers students an oppor­tunity to acquire tech­nical software skills used in type­setting, such as Adobe InDesign, in this intro­ductory lab.

My take on it

We’re going to make sure you’re a pro at using InDesign the smart way before the semester is over so you can spend your time designing instead of worrying about the program. We’re going to be focusing on InDesign in this class (even though you’ll be using illus­trator for parts of your Type 1 class) because you should have gotten the basics of Illus­trator in your 2D foun­da­tions course.

If you haven’t taken the 2D tools class, please let me know!

What I hope you’ll get out of it

Not only do I want you to be able to confi­dently use InDesign, I want to show you some of the tricks of the trade so you can more confi­dently apply for co-op jobs and work with printers. I’m going to cover some printing basics during the second half of the semester so you (hope­fully) won’t make the same mistakes I did. Hope­fully you’ll really gain an appre­ci­ation of the history of type­setting in general and realize that modern programs and methods don’t make it easier to design—they just allow you to do it faster (much faster). If we’re lucky, we might even get to take a trip to a letter­press studio where you might have the chance to set some type old-school style!

Schedule

Classes and Lesson Content

The general schedule for the class is listed on the Overview & Schedule page. There’s a brief overview of what we’ll cover in each class listed here. Please note that this is a Ten­ta­tive schedule. Things may need to shift based on how quickly the class moves through the content. The schedule will be updated fre­quently to rep­re­sent the most up-to-date infor­ma­tion sur­rounding planned lessons.

Assign­ments

Will be posted on the Overview & Schedule page with the schedule. Assign­ments will be posted here weekly after they have been assigned in the class. Unless oth­er­wise noted, every assign­ment is due at the begin­ning of the fol­lowing class. You’ll be instructed to upload your files to the appro­priate folder on the Art+Design server. If for some reason you’re unable to connect, you’ll email me your assign­ments at alex (at) turn­wall (dot) com.

Poli­cies

Atten­dance

Your atten­dance is expected at every class, but I realize that things come up. Everyone is allowed one (1) unex­cused absence. Two (2) unex­cused absences will result in a lowered letter grade (ie: from A to B) auto­mat­i­cally. Three (3) absences will require stu­dents to drop the course.

Some absences may be excused in accor­dance with Uni­ver­sity Policy, but YOU MUST BE NOTIFY ME IN ADVANCE if you’ll be out due to an excused absence. Reasons include par­tic­i­pa­tion in ath­letics, par­tic­i­pa­tion in student activ­i­ties, illness or per­sonal crisis, reli­gious obser­vances, jury duty, and mil­i­tary service. If you have more ques­tions about these, you should consult your student hand­book or email me.

Grades

How is my grade calculated?

Total of weekly assign­ments = 70% of your total grade
Final (ongoing) assign­ment and cor­rec­tions = 30% of your total grade

Each weekly assign­ment is equally weighted, adding to a total of 70% of your overall grade. Assuming there are 10 assign­ments, each of them would equal 7% of your overall grade. There may be more or less than 10 assign­ments as needed, the total of those assign­ments will still equal 70% of your overall grade.

You’ll receive full credit for your assign­ment if it is turned in at the begin­ning of the class that it’s due, and you’ve com­pleted all nec­es­sary require­ments. Late assign­ments will be accepted one week late for 66% of full credit and two weeks late for 33% of full credit possible (if every­thing else is correct.)

This website (www.turnwall.com/typetools) should contain all of the infor­ma­tion you need to know about assign­ments on the Overview & Schedule page. If you still have ques­tions about these require­ments from week to week, you must email me in advance to the class in which the assign­ment is due for clarification.

The final assign­ment for this class will be worth 30% of your overall grade. Detailed instruc­tions and require­ments for this assign­ment will be given later in the semester, based on the mate­rial we cover. The purpose of this assign­ment is for stu­dents to demon­strate under­standing of all of the con­cepts covered throughout the semester, so you’re welcome to and encour­aged to re-use your content from earlier in the semester.

How does atten­dance effect my grade?

Your grade is deter­mined for the most part by your work—perfect atten­dance won’t nec­es­sarily give you a higher grade, but missed classes will lower your grade. For example, if you miss two classes, the highest grade you’ll be able to get is a B.

When are assign­ments due if I miss a class?

If you’re going to miss a class, whether it’s an excused absence or oth­er­wise, assign­ments are still due on the orig­i­nally des­ig­nated date (usually one class section after orig­i­nally assigned, check the Overview & Schedule page for specifics). If you cannot make it to the class, you must email me your files prior to the start of the class when it’s due.

Ques­tions? Confused?

Shoot me an email, or stop by class a bit early to ask. Thanks.