STA Blog

STA Work Blog

STAs: Student Technology Assistants

Who We Are
LAITS: IT and Facilities Director, Joe TenBarge initiated the Student Technology Assistant program in 2004. STAs are UT students who work on a variety of projects in collaboration with UT faculty and LAITS staff members. STAs assist College of Liberal Arts faculty members and administrative staff with print and web design. From building presentations, to creating audio/visual works, and producing online classes in the LAITS film studios, STAs are instrumental in helping COLA faculty realize their vision for multimedia projects that enhance their teaching and the students learning experience. By the end of their student careers, STAs have portfolios which demonstrate their accrued technical and design skills.

Prospective STAs:

Creative and technically inclined students are appointed as STAs for one year, with the possibility of being rehired as long as they study at the university. Applicants for the program are hired before both long semesters. Interested students may look for postings on Hire-A-Longhorn when positions are available. Positions will have Student Technology Assistant (illustrator or web designer) in the title of the job post.

Faculty and Staff:

Faculty & Staff with questions about services, please contact us.

https://liberalarts.utexas.edu/laits/contacts.php

  • Audio Services: Michael C Heidenreich, Director of Studio Operations & STA Program Coordinator
  • Video Services: Kelly Webster, Video Production Supervisor, Video STA Supervisor
  • Graphic Design & Web Design Services: Suloni Robertson, Art Director / Design & Coding STA Supervisor

Spring 2019 Online Courses Screen Ad and Flyer

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Spring 2019 Online Courses Screen Ad and Flyer

project: Spring 2019 Online Courses Screen Ad and Flyer
Client /Prof: LAITS
completion status: Started Oct 3rd, completed Oct. 18th, 2018
staff guidance: Suloni Robertson, Myra Gibbs, Marla
STA team members: na
description/plans: design a screen ad and banner (same style) using template to advertise online course registration for Spring 2019 courses
To be completed: Oct. 12th, 2018

 

 

Finalized Designs:

 

 

These designs were much cleaner and message-focused than previous Online Course announcements I’ve done in the past; this is due to my thought that students need to focus on the content, so the design needs to be straight-forward and professional (think of this as business-to-business advertising).

 

The cutesy elements of past designs I did were fun, but upon first glance, a student probably wouldn’t immediately recognize that it was about class registration; it could be easily mistaken for an organization announcement instead of a message from the university.

 

While these online course ad designs are mostly template-based, it is very rewarding to be able to re-visit them each semester with a new perspective thanks to my advertising courses!

 

 

For reference, here’s the first design I worked on for a screen ad

As you can see, the messaging is lost amongst distracting colors and rather campy graphical elements.

Great example of design choices made without backing them up with goals or reasons.

more illustration & adobe animate

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Today I have a short shift, so I worked on my Russian illustration assignment. I added more to the structure, but I think I need to give the composition more thought before diving in. I need a better idea of how the market stands will look before I continue making lines. So I looked up more pictures of Russian open air markets and then continued on with the drawing.

 

More progress!

 

I also worked on some more Adobe Animate and made this:

 

Here’s the side view of the remote!

 

That’s all I did for this very brief shift. There will be more tomorrow!

Russian Illustration

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Illustration Update

Illustrations are always super fun for me! Its super relaxing working with flat colors.

 

 

I used warm brown colors because a lot of the Russian classrooms incorporate wood cabinets and tables with lots of green plants! All of the textures are overlays of real photos of wood. There are multiple students present in the scene, so I tried to keep the focus on Polina by having classmates crowding around her and looking in her direction (so popular.).

 

BIC logo redesign

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Project: BIC/IRC logo redesign
Completion status: DONE!
Staff guidance: Suloni
STA team members: Me!
Description/plans: Redesign the current logo to make it more modern, clean, and polished. The deliverables must meet UT brand guidelines.
To be completed: October 2nd ~ October 10th

Inspiration provided:

Original:

Redesigns:

Variations: