laurence alves
interaction and graphic laurence.alvesp@gmail.com laurencealves.com San Francisco, CA +1 (415) 9967893
Hello, I am currently an exchange student at California College of the Arts focusing my studies here in interaction design, programming & electronics and graphic design. This exchange is granted by the Brazilian Government in a fully funded scholarship (Brazil Science Mobility Program), developed to allow Brazilian students improve their knowledge and, as coming back to our home country, help develop the technology and science field. During my time in Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, I’m pursuing a Bachelor’s Degree in Industrial Design with the emphasis in Graphic Design. To better explain this, in my college, we are all designers and study about all fields in design, creating a vast knowledge of what’s to be a designer and not only graphic design. Therefore, I’ve worked in projects about industrial design, product design, material development (in a collaboration with the Chemistry and Engineering department in PUCRio), graphic design, game design, publication and even fashion design. In my period here in CCA, San Francisco, I’ve been expanding my knowledge about user-centered design with the department of Interaction Design. This opportunity allowed me to understand the user, develop a solid user experience, build better solutions and achieve a more efficient product. Also, I could learn more about UI by working in projects of apps and websites. This helped as a graphic designer too, by developing an aesthetics more centered on the needs of my user, more affordable. On top of that, I gained an understanding of programming and electronics. During this learning, I experienced working in projects with processing and Arduino, learning about JavaScript, soldering and making me want to learn more languages. Nowadays, I’m taking classes in more advanced programming and also HTML, CSS, and PHP. All these projects made my prototyping skills so much better, by not only building my projects but also conceptualizing my ideas, creating flows, concept maps, paper prototypes and so much more. I believe I can be an asset as a professional for my ample range of study, allowing me to understand better how to collaborate with a multidisciplinary team. I don’t like to restrain my major in only one thing because I believe a great designer needs to have a deep understanding in all fields to better in communicating and collaborating with a group. Respectfully, Laurence Alves Pereira.