BLOG 1: 

Welcome to ZIQI's blog!!  I will be recording my ideas and my exploration from this module also the group process step by step with our project Mangrove & Enzymes in my blog.  

Last week I have done my own scavenger hunt which helped me explored my creativity ability,  I saw this unique tree growing sideways in Victoria Park, looks strong and healthy and reminds me of a physical disability cat so I combined two objects together and create a story of them.

The lecture for this week was talking about storytelling like what is the factor to writing a good story and some detail skills which give me a lot of inspiration, a good story always comes from something simple and detailed it makes people feel authentic here are my notes below

Into mangroves

For our group, we first came up with an idea for graffiti because there are so many graffiti artists in Portsmouth, as you can see their art pieces everywhere, and we discussed maybe we can cooperate on the project with one of these artists. Later we considered that time and money consumption was impossible. I felt like we have to focus on a single detail and explore it in a story making it easier to catch the audience's eyes or impress them. I started to do research and collect information on mangroves and I draw a mind map below to help me explore the idea. 

Classify it into 5 parts -identity/growth distribution/special power/ meaningful or maintenance/issues.

For their function: 

mangroves are viviparous plants and the most special for it is their strong root help them steady and resist the impact of the wave. Also, mangroves have a salt drainage system.

1. maintain biodiversity and support various creatures to survive including shrimp/crab/fish/crane migratory birds/seaweed/insects and so on. 

2. maintain ecological barriers and resist disaster which is beneficial to human safety and prevents natural disaster like typhoons/tsunamis/storms and protect farmland and fishing boat.

3. mangroves can purify. Absorb and degrade organic pollution which prevents the red tide phenomenon. 

4. carbon sequestration -mitigation of global climate change. 

5. scientific research value/education/tour/ornamental value (benefit for humans).

the problem mangroves are facing:

1. human activities impact like over-urban development/over-fishing/excessive logging garbage pollution/ micro-plastic.

2. other impacts: species invasion diseases and insect pests.

 After all my research and conclusion I felt mangroves are significant to humans and it is quite an interesting project that has a chance for us to get into science and help people understand it. I felt like people would care about something that directly impacts them so our project can try to approach how the mangroves affect people's life. I came up with the idea, that we could create a story about the shrimp/crab/fish/crane migratory birds/ seaweed/ insects that live in mangroves, I discussed the idea with our group they agreed with the idea and we finally pick the object of fiddler crabs.

BLOG 2:

It's week 5 already, before this week's class, I came up with an idea for the live creature in the mangroves-Fiddler Crabs. The idea was 24-hour live streaming and capturing how the crabs work in there to see how they communicate with each other and how they hunt for food. 

My original thinking was people can keep dropping in and out at any time of the day to satisfy their curiosity about wild creatures. It is more attractive to see something peaceful and vivid creature that is far away from residents' life, has a chance to bring people back to nature, and also has educational meaning.

I have drawn a map of the research on fiddler crabs (below) which helped me more clearly.

After I discuss my idea with my group, we found some problems at the moment, like the technique we can't realize and we also need to match with the plastic element as well. Sylvie came up with the idea of tracking the crabs so that people can follow their journey, the idea was really good but failed again because it was hard to track the tiny creature. 

Later in our group discussion, we wanted to build a website including the element below：

1. the abstract what are we doing now and our idea

2. what are mangroves?

3. what are fiddler crabs? and why are they important to mangroves?

4. how does plastic waste affect them?

5. how does the loss of mangroves affect us?

6. finally what can be done?

Also, we tried to contact Dr. Laura to see if it's possible to cooperate with us to set up a camera on mangroves and capture fiddler crabs. 

Later I started to do research on plastic find that plastics are leading the factor decline in the mangroves globally and with an increase in microplastics, there could potentially be a decline in fiddler crab numbers. Microplastics block their grills, clog their digestive system, and toxins are leached from the plastics, which can disrupt endocrine function.

micro-plastic is everywhere we can see from the image below.

https://course-module-catalog.port.ac.uk/#/courseDetail/U2957PYC/2022%2F23

BLOG 3:

This week, we have been to Kew Garden. Get swept up in the wonder of nature and explore the largest and most diverse collection of living plants in the world and connect with science. I discovered many amazing and beautiful plants there.

For the mangrove tree on the left side, the root is quite wider and long than I imagined and the trunk is thin for this one, it is almost 10 meters in the glass house. 

Me and my friends have traveled to all exhibitions in the Kew Garden, which makes me aware of the importance of the natural creatures. They are significant to our planet as well as to people's life. There are many interesting creative artworks in the garden which inspired me a lot.

Our group received the fiddler crabs video from Laura this week. It's really helpful for our project. We considered editing it as a video and putting it on our website page.  

Later our group discussed and Ryan can help with the technique.

On our website, I considered we could use illustrations to explain how microplastics affect both fiddler crabs and human, to show the process and make the audience easier to understand (as the draft illustrate below, I use multi-color spots to show the microplastics) we could design a single illustration for each page on our website as an instruct.  The illustrations can attract young ages children as well.

Our group laid out the information that we want to include on our website

The main page: 

Abstract/motivation/video

First page: What are mangroves?

1. introduction about the feature

2. Why it is important for human

3. The area distribution

4. Data shows the area of mangroves has declined sharply in recent years

5. What causes the result- main plastic pollution

Second page: What are fiddler crabs?

1. Introduction feature

2. Habitat, diet 

3. Why are they important to mangroves

4. How does plastic affect them

Last page: What can be done to rescue?

1. what can we do

2. what can be done by the communities

3. Advocate 

In the previous lecture, we learned what an enzyme is? Also, how does it work? We taught to personify the enzymes, which helped me with my creative ability, I create my enzyme with several rope plastic sticks and paper together and connect with black and blue in the middle. I quite enjoy the process especially enhancing my hands-on ability to create my object and helping us empathize with them. Our group also create our logo combined with earth and fiddler crabs and also pick our team name- mangrove media. 

BLOG 4:

Last week our group discussed the website concept with Simone. We separate the website into 6 pages which include the main video of fiddler crabs; the effects of micro-plastic; fiddler crabs; mangroves; also the data. which makes the website more clear down to the paper.

Me and Ryan edit the crabs into a video together after the class, last week I was worried about the video editing part before, but it is so lucky that our groupmate could solve the problem. During this process, we found it hard to cut them smoothly as a complete video, it felt like lost some parts from the video, so we decided to find more video material online,  I help him consider the sequence from each video and try to find more clips also finished the color adjustment.

I was considering how to make the website more attractive to the audience, I think it is more appealing with illustrations on each of the pages which makes people more easy and fast to know what we want to tell. I have tried to design the draft for each page. I want to use different colors to express the micro-plastic everywhere in the draft pictures below. 

I discussed my idea with my group, and they agreed. Sylvie and Roe will use Photoshop and adobe illustrator to make our website visually better. I felt like this is the biggest part I like working with different study people, each of us has our own strengths so when an idea comes up we will solve it and settle down smoothly.

This week we are trying to fill the text for each page, each of us takes one page to finish. We will finish them during the Easter break.

During Easter break I visited the National Museums Scotland and found a fiddler crab there, the introduction proves they eat from sand and mud to find enough nutrition which means there are easier to mis-intake the micro-plastic.

BLOG 5:

In the past two weeks, we started to build the website together, and each of us prepares an area. I have designed the illustration for each page also the text on the microplastic page, I have done some research on microplastic, and how it affects humans and mangroves.

Urbanization and industrialization over the past few decades have increased the application of microplastics. Due to continuous usage, spiked levels of concentrations are observed in almost all the environmental samples. Many freshwater and marine sources are more prone to this microplastic contamination, and the bioaccumulation within organisms seriously threatens the ecosystem.

We discuss the visual style of our website, I feel like the creative type test for each person is quite useful, as each of us gets to know each other better. We all have our strength areas, Ryan did the coding technique stuff for our website, Sylvie and Roe did the visuals like the color palette and the background, and I was helping with the concept design like the illustrations also the research for the website.

Sylvie used Adobe Illustrator, and we discussed the logo design for our website together. We combine the earth with the fiddler crab, which shows the mangroves and the crabs are important for our planet. Sylvie uses the software to trace the picture from our first design. We first tried filling it with different colors but didn't match our website style and felt blurred so she tried to remove the background and color the title which looks better.

Later we discussed the presentation and built the PowerPoint together this part we go over all we had done and our reflections.

All these processes improve my communication skills. I tried to express my idea and work out with our group. I felt the spirit of cooperation with my group member, we came out with different ideas each time but we would found the best solution that everyone was happy with. I felt like working as a team, I learned how to negotiate, understand, encourage, and help each other which was meaningful for me. To be honest, I felt quite stressed at the beginning of this module study, English is not my first language and I am less confident to express my ideas or even talk to others, but now I overcome this weakness and I am happy to work with my groupmates.