New Year, New Goals

I know at the start of this academic year that I laid out a list of goals of what I want to achieve this year at University, however, based off my experience with my second year so far, some of those have changed and my priorities have shifted slightly so I wanted to give myself a revised list of goals.

1) My first goal originally was to improve my confidence with the Adobe Suite and although I am only 3 months into my second year, I can already say this has happened. These last 3 projects have really pushed me to use InDesign regularly but I have also had to use Photoshop for the first time ever and even though I still have a long way to go, I feel so much more confident now than I ever did before!

Therefore, my new goal is to continue using Adobe often and continue to build this newfound confidence!

2) This goal was to sketch for 15 minutes 5 times a week for personal projects. If I am being honest, I haven't had much time to do this purely because the latest projects have really taken a toll on my free time. However, although regular sketching is important this goal is the most drastic to change.

My new goal for sketching is to improve the quality of my sketching. For my most recent projects, my sketching has been the biggest weakness and so this is now my biggest area of development. I want to understand showing materials in sketching, I want to bring my sketches to life with shading and colour and rendering. Overall, I just want to improve the quality of my sketching and bring my work to life more!

3) SolidWorks was the next goal; being able to understand the software on a basic level independently. Fortunately, through University we can access SolidWorks from home and so I have been utilising this and practising with the software wherever possible. This has had a massive impact on my ability to use the application and I now can confidently use mates, assemblies, technical drawings, lofts, 3D sketches and much more! I really enjoy using SolidWorks now!

This goal is to improve my CAD skills overall but mainly focusing on the use of KeyShot as I have found this to be such a fun, creative tool for bringing my CAD models to life and I want to build on my current knowledge!

4) Since my placement year starts in July, my next goal was to find a placement and get myself in the right direction. Currently, I have had a look at a few companies that sound interesting and began to build my CV and portfolio, however, I have a long way to go just yet.

Therefore, this goal is to remain the same; focus on my placement year and get myself out there!

5) My final goal was to achieve a 2.1 by the end of my second year and so far that isn't looking too positive. I have had a rough start to this year and been knocked back down a lot but I am determined!

I WILL achieve a 2.1 by the end of this year and I will continue to work hard to get there. (Let's talk it into existence!)

So, although the majority have hardly changed, my skills over these last 3 months have grown in areas I never expected them to and I can't wait to see what the next 3 months will bring!