Day 1: This week marks my first week since Jesse went on paternity leave! I spent most of the morning working on project #2. James, Jesse, and Monica had finalized their decision for the photography style for the overall branding and so I spent most of my time finding images that fit their vision and applying them to the project. I also made finishing touches to the layout in order to prepare for the client meeting on Wednesday at around noon. In the afternoon, I worked a bit on project #1 to prepare for the client meeting that was taking place on Wednesday in the late afternoon. It felt weird to not have Jesse around for quick feedback since James was getting busier in his absence.

Day 2: I started my morning by chatting with Toby, one of the project managers. He gave some great advice on how to sell yourself and knowing your worth. Specifically, he said “don’t be afraid to glorify your achievements and don’t hesitate to name drop clients you worked for or connections you have.” We also shared music and tv show recommendations, which caused us to go way over our scheduled time. I spend the rest of the day working on both projects #1 and #2. In the afternoon, I hopped on a quick internal check-in for project #2. We were concerned with some of the images effectively representing the information on each page. We were also worried about certain specs potentially interfering with the design. I was more concerned with the images as they were more time consuming so I worked on finalizing those for the rest of the day. With all the flipping between projects, lack of human interaction and time outside, my days were starting to blend. 

Day 3: I woke up from a wacky dream where my teeth and hair all fell out. It really set the mood for the day because my morning started in a panic!! I realized that I had made a big mistake by not testing out the specs for project #2 yesterday. The spot where we needed to punch a hole cut right into the design! I hopped on a call with James and Alyssa, rambled about the problem and James just said “ I think you got the measurements wrong”. And thank goodness he was right. I fixed my mistake, placed the marking for the hole in the right place, and finally finished project #2. Although James previously told me that he would still get nervous during presentations, he presented project #2 and communicated all of our ideas in a super effective and coherent way. The client was fairly happy, gave some feedback and I sent it off, wrapping it up nicely and throwing my anxiety away with it. My day ended with James presenting the revised project #1 to the clients, who were super happy with it! What a great end to a chaotic day.  

Day 4: I started my day with a regroup on continuing Jesse’s work on project #1 since he was on paternity leave. I had to somehow create more brand applications than I did for my part of project #1 but with much less time. It was exciting though because Jesse had created great work to build off of. I also had my end of practicum check-in with James. We talked about how it was a shame that I couldn’t be in office but how it was a great experience nonetheless. It was really interesting to get to know everyone in their homes, where they’re the most comfortable. It made it much less intimidating than going into a great big office with all these huge industry professionals. That and everyone’s great personalities at PSDDB. I was just starting to feel like I was more a part of the team and it was just hitting me that my time there was ending soon. 

Day 5: I started my morning by shadowing a casting callback for an ad campaign. It was really interesting (and funny) to watch people act things out over zoom. It was also interesting to see how the selection process happened and what factors made the actor the right fit (ex: look, personality, ability to quickly integrate feedback). I hopped out early to chat with an industry professional who found me on the grad show website and spent the rest of my day in a slight daze from screen fatigue. I ended the day by attending my final PSDDB’s Friday Shout-outs session where I almost cried happy (and sad) tears. I was (and still am) so grateful to the entire team at PSDDB for making this practicum a special experience despite all the struggles of working from home.