Project 2: Instructions

As a technical developer, I have made many different projects over the years. These are a few of my favorites- either to work on or with the end product.

Transformers Go! Kenzan

Kenzan is a Transformer toy, who was exclusively released in Japan. He is very near and dear to my heart, and I want more American people to understand him. For that reason, I made him the subject of my first ever major technical communication project- writing a simple series of instructions for something of our choosing.

Kenzan, being a toy, naturally came with instructions. However, I thought they seemed somewhat lacking, especially since I myself had trouble figuring him out. It took trial and error, specifically in dealing with his legs- which formed the helm of the car.

However, there was a great moment of relief when I finally tested it out in public. While one of my test subjects fumbled a bit, they ultimately managed to figure it out. The other one had two brothers, so they were easily able to figure it out. This was a vindicating experience for me, and something that ultimately set me down my path of being a technical communicator.

How to Clean Your Bathroom

For an instructional video class that I did recently, I made a video about cleaning the bathroom- something that I have had to do for many years now.

The project was a cross-semester affair, with us picking our topic right at the start. Among other things, we had to write a script, read it into a mic, and record everything. Fortunately, I had help from various sources- and a little bit of ingenuity- in order to get the angles I wanted.

Unlike most other students, however, I had an advantage-my father worked in the video editing industry for many years. I cannot begin to express how much help he was. He filmed my video for me (according to the script I had written), and helped me edit, giving me insight and helping me to learn some more cinema tricks. I enjoyed doing this project, quite a bit actually- although I didn't win any awards with it, it did have a lot of promise- especially considering the winner had the same topic as me.