Unit 8 Activity 1

Henry Peach Robinson's "Fading Away"

Photomontages began to be made in the late 1800's. Photographers would expose certain sections of negatives to make a single image. Many people criticized this process, most likely because it could be considered "fake" photography. Skill may not be needed to get true art if you cheat and make it up. It isn't real. Photography was about the real world, and these innovators of photomontages made photography fake. People truly couldn't believe what they saw. In my opinion, however, I think it's very unique and creative. You can use your imagination and create things unseen and create emotions that simply couldn't appear if it was a "real" photograph. In today's age, photomontages are very popular. Partially because I feel there's been a surge of new creativity, but most likely because of technology. Before Photoshop, creating a photomontage was painstaking and took hours, possibly days. Now you can do everything on a computer easily, and it often looks better too. Pictures are better quality, colors are richer, and the photos merge together more smoothly. I think there's a correlation between the technology and creativity surge as well; it may not be that the imagination is new, but all of the creative photomontages just could not be done before. With technology, we can really express ourselves much better.

Unit 7 Activity 2

These are two pictures with a side-by-side comparison of the women. One is an obvious exaggeration of appearance, the other showing different hair. The top image shows the extremes of how a woman could look either attractive or unattractive. The right side is obviously more appealing, her face is more composed, her makeup is clean, her hair is made, and the lighting is better. The second picture is much more subtle, on the left the woman's hair is frizzy, and neat on the right. It's advertising a hair product, most likely. But it seems ridiculous to say the left side is less attractive. The media does play a huge part in what is or isn't attractive. Nearly all media revolves around fashion and appearance. Commercials tell people what is or isn't necessary to look better, celebrities bring in new trends, when looking for what is or isn't appealing, you look to a celebrity. To an extent, admiring these celebrities is a good thing, it gives confidence, something to strive for, and dreams. You can admire someone, but integrate the style with yourself. But completely obsessing over something in the media is not a good thing. You can become so self-absorbed in mimicking somebody or wasting your life trying to be something you just aren't

Unit 7 Activity 1

"Make a personal list of the categories you belong to or have conflict with and visual symbols that are associated with each. Aspirations and expectations should also be listed."

Age/ Generation - A teenager in this new generation of technology, which is rapidly changing and developing. I feel a lot of pressure now, preparing to become an adult and going to college. Suddenly all of these things are being thrown at my face that were just never emphasized all too much until now.

Gender - Male - a lot of times I almost feel looked down upon being there are many stereotypes of a "man" I just don't fit. I enjoy art and music, I'm not big on sports or fighting.

Race - White - I don't really feel any expectations or certain aspirations I'm supposed to conform to or try to have.

Religion - None (Atheist) - This affects how my family views me more than my peers. My mother's side is fairly Catholic and many would just see me different if they knew I didn't believe in a higher power. My mother just blows it off, she'll sometimes show her concerns, but most of the time it's out of her mind. My father has always accepted my views, and is one of the main reasons I have this view. He  is not an Atheist, but has open views of religion and has always welcomed new opinions.

Class/ Caste - Middle Class - Sometimes I feel like I'll end up being stuck into this class. I don't worry over it, but I'd like to achieve dreams above it. The older I get the harder these dreams seem to get.

Personality - Quiet and introverted, deep thinking on subjects. This one definitely harms me; I have trouble breaking out of my shell, and often end up by myself. It's just really hard to be open and converse with people I don't know. I've been told that it sometimes comes across as snobbish and that I don't want to associate with people; it's just really conflicting to speak up and express myself with strangers

Intelligence - Fairly smart. I could probably have more opportunities if I tried for them. I guess I don't utilize my intelligence

Political Persuasion - Leaning towards a democratic view. Belief in equal rights and a fair amount of government involvement for those in need.

Unit 6 Distortion Assignment

This assignment was heavily based on editing a photo to obvious degrees and bend reality. The particular assignment I chose said to make a cover for a book that is about paranormal phenomena. I based my subject on astral projection, and depicted a "soul" leaving it's sleeping body. It is hard to see, but the soul has open eyes, as if it is waking up from the dormant body. To achieve this effect, I edited three different images, adding opacity masks and using a blurring tool. I then merged them together, giving the appearance of a leaving spirit. The hardest part of this project was getting everything to blur without it looking choppy or having defining lines that would make the image look fake.

Unit 6 Activity 2

 Photo by Rafiq Iskandar

 Photo by Noboyuki Taguchi

Photo by Robin Anne

Here are images from other photographers using different methods of distortion made with either the lens or added in photoshop. The first image is a thing called "little planet". It is a 360 degree panorama that is stitched and edited in photoshop. With a special stitching effect, it makes a complete circle that makes it look like a small "planet". The second image was taken with a fisheye lens. This is really neat, because it makes straight, solid lines curved. It makes the building look like it is turning inside towards itself. The third image was edited in photoshop, most like with the liquify filter. This ones is neat because it makes straight lines take shape into funky lines and distortions. It takes a normal looking street and turns it into a new, abstract place.

Unit 6 Activity 1

This activity asks us to use different distortion methods in photoshop and with our cameras. The top image I took about a year ago; I saw an article about moving the lens while taking a picture, which gives the image a tunnel vision-esque look. The second image I tried to do a sabattier effect in photoshop, which was much easier than I thought it would be, and it also came out quite well. The third image I was messing around with blending and decided to try blending two separate panoramas. The outcome came out better than I thought it would have. The fourth image I changed the hues and saturation. I really like this one, it keeps the real textures, but has an unnatural coloring. The final image I used filters to manipulate the photograph. It's hard to tell when it is so small, but I did a spongify filter and watercolor filter. It really looks like a painting with it's silhouettes and sky.

Unit 5 Landscape Assignment

These are photos from two separate landscape photoshoots. The first picture was taken at Mt. Lemmon in Tucson, Arizona. The bottom two were taken around and at Sedona, Arizona. The top panorama was also the first one I have ever made. I really like the top image because of its great depth of field and the long road leading all the way to the horizon. It has a good mix of positive and negative space as well. For the second day I tried using the HDR method in Photoshop. I really like how it came out; the colors of the autumn leaves and the bushes with their flowers, along with all the detail and shadows in the nature, really make the image pop out. The final photo I took in Sedona. I really like how the panoramic came out, and the sky and mountains have a good complimentary color balance.