About me, this site,
and contacting me

I am a graduating senior at Ithaca College, where I’m studying communication management and design. My primary work is as a designer, both in print and for the web. This site showcases some of my work, both from my job at The Ithacan as online editor as well as internships and other special projects. For more information about work I’ve done, please take a look at my résumé.

You can contact me at nicbarajas at this domain.

nicbarajas.com (This website)

Ingredients
Adobe Photoshop
HTML/CSS
JavaScript (jQuery)

After waiting far too long to build a portfolio, I did a whirlwind two-day code crunch to get my stuff into place. There are still some places where the site isn’t completely done (I want to add more images to round out some of my pieces), I’m very proud of what I’ve been able to accomplish by dicking around with jQuery for not very long at all. And more importantly, I’m glad to have examples of my work online.

This site is em-based, and should expand and contract okay (there are some places where it breaks), and best of all, should nicely degrade without that fancy JavaScript magic.

I developed this website using TextMate and tested it in Safari and Mozilla Firefox, and I’m sure it works correctly in those two browsers. Safari of course looks a little nicer with some CSS3 goodies. I don’t have access to Internet Explorer for Windows, however, so anybody who is having trouble, be sure to contact me, but anyone using IE6 is probably out of luck because of my love for transparent PNGs.

Media Access Project

Ingredients
Adobe Photoshop
HTML/CSS
Textpattern
Adobe Illustrator

In the summer of 2007 I interned at Media Access Project as part of the Park School’s Progressive/Independent Media Internship program. Over the course of the summer I moved the content from their old website into a new CMS, Textpattern, and redesigned the site. I also trained the associate communications director to use the CMS and provided a manual to help those working with the website after I left. The site was officially launched in December 2007.

While I was working on their site, I found out the logo they used was still an original print and had never been accurately digitized, and created a high-quality digital version for use in print and on the web.

Visit Media Access Project

Ithaca College Senior Class

Ingredients
Adobe Photoshop
HTML/CSS
some JavaScript, some PHP

I was commissioned by the senior class to develop and maintain their senior class website, which provides updates for seniors about upcoming events and helps them donate to the Senior Class Gift Campaign. I created all the graphics (except the 8-ball and Senior Week logos) used on the site.

In January 2008, I experimented — somewhat successfully — with an em-based, fluid layout, and used JavaScript to create an accurate countdown to graduation.

Visit the Senior Class website

The Ithacan

Ingredients
Adobe Photoshop
HTML/CSS
JavaScript
WordPress MU
Final Cut Pro

I became online editor for the 2007–08 academic year and picked up where Matt Quintanilla ’07 left off. I converted the blogs over to a single installation of WordPress MU and helped create two new blogs for the site, Sharp Notes and South Hill. I also helped start our sports podcast, Bomber Nation.

My major accomplishment was pulling together all our multimedia onto a single page I designed from scratch. Along with making major advances in the amount of multimedia we produced, I helped edit some of our video packages.

Visit The Ithacan

Knowledge College

Ingredients
Adobe Photoshop
HTML/CSS

For my E-Learning class in the spring of 2007, my group was tasked with reinvigorating a final project simulation for the Strategic Communication course “Human Communication in Organizations.” My part of the project was to create an authentic-looking college website for the simulation to contain information pertinent to the course.

More information about my E-Learning project can be found on the Ithaca College website and a copy of the homepage (not the whole site) can be found on this site.

The New York Times Student Journalism Institute

Ingredients
QuarkXPress
Final Cut Pro

In January 2008, I was invited to spend 10 days in Tucson, Arizona, at The New York Times Student Journalism Institute. I got to learn from writers, editors, and designers from The New York Times and The Boston Globe among others, while working in a real newsroom environment.

My job at the institute was to create the design for the paper we produced at the end of program. I created the design from scratch and did the layouts for all 16 pages, including several photo pages and a convincing NYT front page layout.

While I was there, I also got a chance to learn more about Final Cut Pro and helped edit together some of the video profiles of students at the institute, and also helped out a little with others working on their video packages.

More information about the program can be found at its website, and the website our stories are on is also available.

Year in Review

Ingredients
Adobe InDesign

Year in Review is a special end-of-year publication, written in a magazine format. It compiles some of the major stories from the year and presents them with compelling photography.

The project started in 2005, where I was the lead designer, designing my first book-style publication ever. Although it didn’t go as well as I had hoped, it was largely successful and the run was picked up by the college to send to prospective students. I also worked as a designer on last year’s publication, led by Matt Quintanilla ’07.

This year, I was again in charge of the design, started by Rachel Roscoe ’09 before she took a semester to study in Washington, DC. That book will be available at the end of April 2008.

The Ithacan

Ingredients
Adobe InDesign
Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Illustrator
QuarkXPress

I worked as a design editor for The Ithacan for two years, first as a freshman as assistant design editor, and again my sophomore year as design editor.

As design editor, I was responsible for designing section fronts and helped create the concept for Accentuate, a special second page in the Accent (Arts and Entertainment) section.

Over the summer of 2005, I worked with Matt Quintanilla ’07 to create a top-to-bottom redesign of the newspaper and switched the layout program we used from QuarkXPress to Adobe InDesign. We also trained all the editors in the new software.

Park Design House

Ingredients
Adobe InDesign
Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Illustrator

I’ve been a designer for the Park Design House for the better part of a year. My main work has been in posters, but I have also re-appropriated my work for advertisements in newspapers.

The example to the right is one of my most recent posters, created in late January 2008 for a special summer program taking place this summer in London. In print, the colors are much brighter (actually resembling the Union Jack).

Ithaca College Senior Class

Ingredients
Adobe InDesign
Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Illustrator

Despite being the webmaster for the senior class website, I have also managed to give a helping hand to some of the marketing done for senior class events. I created a poster for a special event, Mr. Ithaca, promoting the event, and a postcard sent out to senior class members marketing merchandise for the senior class.

Church of the Holy Communion

Ingredients
Adobe Illustrator

In the summer of 2005, I worked with my hometown church, The Episcopal Church of the Holy Communion, to help update their website and do some rebranding.

The website has since changed, but the logo that I created was very successful, and is still in use by the church for promotional purposes.