NUS Almost Dropouts

LAB1201 Taken in: AY21/22 Semester 2 Lecturer: Ibu Emma Tutor: Ibu Elli Grading: 15% - Participation 15% - Oral Exam (Week 13) 15% - Lecture Quiz 15% - Written Homework (HW1, 2, and 4) 10% - Cultural Knowledge Participation + HW3 30% - Written Test 1 and 2 I had wanted to learn Malay, but my friend suggested I go for Indonesian instead. At a basic level, the languages have a lot of overlap. Anyway, this was a simple and lightweight module. I wish I had taken this in non-Covid semester as there was one cultural sharing activity done online which made it less interactive. In the past, it was in person which seems more engaging. As you may expect, this is a very basic level of Bahasa, but I enjoy that I can now understand certain simple conversations, even in Malay! The assessments aren't numerous and rela...

Very untrue to our name, I haven't quite dropped out of this school yet. Two years, and two years left, I'd like to reflect at the halfway point. In this post, I'll just be sharing my thoughts, what I'm grateful for, my regrets, and things I wish I knew earlier on. You don't have to read this haha this serves as a personal entry. Gratitudes The friends that have stuck with me two years in have mostly been made from orientation and CCA . Orientation, both as an OGL and OGC. They're also mostly from my major or faculty. If you're looking to make friends and connections, well, these are the obvious locations to look. Oh, and sometimes Discord/Telegram chats, but those are few and far between. On that note, I'm very glad to have joined a lot of CCAs. The first being NUS CNM Society, many of my good CNM friends were met there. I really wish we had more opportunity to do more but Covid really shafted a lot of our plans. I...

CS2040C Taken in: AY21/22 Semester 2 Lecturer: Dr Steven Halim (First half) and Dr Alan Cheng (Second half) Tutor: Audrey Grading: 3% - Tutorial Participation 16% - 6 Kattis Problem Sets PSET1 to PSET6 (2-3 weeks to complete), 3% each, PSET1 is 1%. 16% - VisuAlgo Quiz 4% Quiz 1 12% Quiz 2 10% - Midterm Test 15% - Practical Exam 40% - Final Exam This is a variant of the CS2040 module, taught using C++ instead of Java. While there will be slight differences in the teaching style between 2040, 2040C, and 2040S, concepts should remain the same. You'll learn about (as the name says) data structures and algorithms. Specifically, you'll learn about the following data structures: Array/List, Linked Lists, ...

NM3217 Taken in: AY21/22 Semester 2 Lecturer: Tan Kai En Tutor: Tan Kai En Grading: 10% - Participation 10% - 7 Lecture Assignments (All due week 13) 3x15% - Assignments 1-3 35% - Final Project (Brand Style Guide): 5% - Business Card 10% - Overall Brand Style Guide 10% - Logo 10% - Resume This is the design module that teaches you Adobe InDesign, Illustrator, and Photoshop, in order of how often you'll use the software. After taking this module, I discovered how much of a gem InDesign is, and grew less scared of working with Vector Graphics. Actually, most of the assignments require you to use InDesign and mostly use vectors. I actually didn't use Photoshop in any of my assignments... The final project of this mod...

CS3240 Taken in: AY21/22 Semester 2 Lecturer: Prof Bimlesh Wadhwa Grading: 20% - Participation 15% - Individual Design Exercise 25% - Final Test 40% - Group Project: 5% - G1: User Study 10% - G2: Wireframe and Prototyping (Individual) 25% - G3: Final Prototype, Evaluation, and Presentation I'll review this from a CNM-IMD student's perspective. It's a CS module that doesn't require coding, because it focuses on UI design. In short: This module is NM2213 on steroids. As you might expect, the module revolves around a large group project. In groups of 4, you will design a solution to a problem of your choosing. The scope of the project should be digital, like a mobile or desktop app. We are taught, and have to use Figma for the majority of the...

PH2224 Taken in: AY21/22 Semester 1 Lecturer: Prof John Holbo Grading: 25% - Participation 15% - Tutorial Participation 10% - Forum Participation 15% - Essay 1 20% - Essay 2 20% - Essay 3 20% - Essay 4 This module is for discussing film and philosophy, but mostly film (And the philosophy around film). This can include analysis of certain film techniques and interpretations of film. That, or even animation and silent film, and why sound/music are a core part of film, what makes animation different from live-action film, etc. The second half of the module was created on the spot. Prof Holbo asked us for suggestions on what to discuss, and from there the syllabus was built. For my semester, we decided on stuff like bad movies, adaptations, villains, thou...

NM3230 Taken in: AY21/22 Semester 2 Lecturer: Sarah-Tabea Sammel (3h Seminar-style) Grading: 20% - Participation 30% - Midterm Quiz 50% - Final Project This is the module where you'll learn to produce a short video to tell a story, learn Adobe Premier Pro, and it'll culminate in a final project that's a 2-minute video for an industry client. You'll learn a few things, including technical stuff like camera terms (What is exposure, shutter speed, etc), video production from start to finish: production (admin stuff), framing, composing, shooting, and editing video. Along the way, there are also a few theory, storytelling classes that border into film studies. This includes analysing snippets of film and reflecting on how certain techniques were used. There's also some coverage on the structure of a linear story. Basically, lectures were not ...