Technical Communication Portfolio

Technical Communication Portfolio
for Jay Barker

Presentation Design
with Microsoft PowerPoint

Storyboards and Graphics
with Adobe Photoshop

Diagrams and Site Maps
with Microsoft Visio

Web Site Development
with Macromedia Dreamweaver

Online Help
with eHelp RoboHelp

Page Layout
with Adobe InDesign

• Overview
• Presentation
    Design
• Storyboards
    and Graphics
• Diagrams
    and Site Maps
• Web Site
    Development
• Online
    Help
• Page
    Layout

Overview

During autumn 2003, I was enrolled in TC 310 taught by Dr. Jennifer Turns. This web site contains examples of my work from that course, encompassing many aspects of the technical communication profession. These projects are samples of my work with:

• Presentation Design
• Storyboards and Graphics
• Diagrams and Site Maps
• Web Site Development
• Online Help
• Page Layout

These projects stand on their own; however, there are some common threads through all of them. They encompass knowledge I have gained not only in TC 310, but in seven other TC courses as well as related courses in informatics and industrial design.

Each project was made with the audience in mind. The documents were created to convey concepts to a specific individual or group. Any information provided was presented in a manner that a specific audience would find useful and intuitive. It was my intention to include design elements that catered to these audiences and eliminate anything that would stray from that purpose.

Consistency was a goal for every document. When a project encompassed multiple pages or screen, there were common design elements among them. The same colors, fonts, images, and layouts were used to make each document a unified whole. Often precise positioning down to the pixel level was done to ensure nothing would be out of place and potentially disorient the user.

Design decisions were made based on how the human visual system performs. High contrast between background and foreground elements like text was done to provide readability. Important items were emphasized with size and placed in a logical order to convey an overall hierarchy to the information; at a glance a reader could tell the general relationship between pieces of information placed on screen or page.

As you browse through this portfolio, you will notice some documents are offered in both original and alternative, web-friendly formats. The original formats contain the ideal presentation of the content, and the alternative formats are a nod to the standards-based and cross-platform nature of the web.

Thanks for viewing my technical communication work! Feel free to send any comments or questions to:

jcbarker[at]u[dot]washington[dot]edu

Jay Barker
December 9, 2003