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Thrilled and Inspired

I spent the last two days in a computer room on the second floor of the London College of Communication (LCC), at the Elephant and Castle, a good 10 minutes walk from my garret.

Having started a new job a couple of weeks ago, I am being sent to various training courses (amazingly all within walking distance of what I call home).

This week's was entitled "InDesign, the fundamental". Unexpectedly I found myself seated next to one of my former colleagues at VisitBritain. Small world and all!

We learnt how to create shapes, apply all sorts of rather amateurish (in our hands at least) effects (shadows, glows and embossing) to our documents, create business cards, master pages and style sheets, tables, lay out some text and insert images in the desktop publishing software that seems to have become the new professional tool (replacing Quark).

We were made to collate our efforts into a sort of booklet which we then turned into a pdf file. The results of my own efforts (albeit slightly redacted in the business card section) can seen by clicking on the picture above. Please bear in mind that there were exercises that don't necessarily reflect my taste...

At the end of the course, after being given our certificates, we were asked to fill in assessment forms on the quality of the training. One of questions was whether we felt inspired.

I can't say I was particularly inspired by the course itself. While it was fun to do and the tutor knew her subject, she wasn't the best of communicators and we only really learned about how to use a tool. There was nothing that actually helped develop our creativity as such.

What was thrilling however was to find myself (for the first time) within the walls of the LCC; a building I have passed quite often in the 5 years (?) I have lived in its vicinity.

Walking along the corridors of this temple of art and creativity was quite exciting (and I am not just talking about the cute young things on display at every corner!) and inspiring it was too. I felt slightly wistful at not having had the opportunity or even the idea to take the road those young people had decided to follow. And I felt like signing up and becoming a student again.

They, very thoughtfully, gave us a copy of their prospectus. I think they may see me again soon...
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Comments

  1. Tavdy10/20/2009 8:47 pm

    "cute young things on display at every corner"? You should check to make sure they didn't have mirrors up ;-)

    ReplyDelete
  2. zefrog10/20/2009 8:59 pm

    HA! I am neither young, nor on display... let alone cute!

    ReplyDelete

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