Basic Photoshop: Xavier Dawn

One of the very first things we did in class was learn basic photoshop skills to edit a photo of Xavier Hall at Saint Joseph's College.  We learned how to change the colors, and edit brightness, change the contrast, hue and saturation.  We learned how to edit individual sections of a photo, without altering the rest of the image.  I think the coolest most interesting part of what I learned is that you can change something as minimal as the little house on the far side of the lake.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Social Media

Learning about social media was one of my favorite parts of this class.  I am totally a social media junkie, however it was interesting to explore all aspects of social media, and to look in depth at both the problems and successes of our new social media age.  For this assignment we used blogger to create blogs including various social media sources to tell news stories.  With social media anyone can post anything, and then can distribute that information to large amounts of people with literally the click of a button.  This can be both a good thing and a bad thing.  This is good because you can easily distribute information to a large group of people very efficiently.  This becomes a problem when the information is false.  A prime example of this is when the Boston bombings happened news sources like CNN social media sites and distribution got the completely wrong information out to people causing lots of rumors and false stories.

Here is a blog about the blizzard "Nemo" of 2013

Here is a blog about Obama proposing the raising of minimum wage

Video Using iMovie

For assignment number 8 we created a short video.  We spent time out of class with our small groups to write a script and film for our video.  After this was finished we individually edited our group footage to create a short unique video.  The program we used to do this was iMovie.  

Using iMovie, I learned:

-How to cut unneeded sections of my film out

-How to rearrange video clips to an order that flows and makes sense 

-Video clip transitions (ex: fading into the next clip)

-How to add additional sounds/music to a video

-How to add text to individual sections of a video or apply them to the whole video

-What formats to save your video in

-How to upload a video to YouTube

My video on Youtube: 10 Things NOT To Do In Class

Link to this video


VIDEO STORY BOARD

SCRIPT TEMPLATE 

Animation Using Adobe Flash

Assignment number 5 was creating a short animation using Adobe flash.  I think this was my most challenging assignment.  Creating an animation takes extreme patience, and it was hard to remain calm sometimes when things didn't go as planned.  

Using Adobe Flash, I learned how to:

 -create shapes and objects

-change the background color

-select individuals objects

-move these shapes and objects in different ways

-timing the animation

-using layers to individually edit certain aspects of my animation 

-create an animation that flows in an order that makes sense

And I guess you could say I learned to not freak out to much when things didn't go my way.

YOUTUBE VIDEO PENCIL TEST: BEHIND THE SCENES

KRAZY KAT EARLY ANIMATION

MY ANIMATION

Squirrel and the Apple Tree

Link to this animation

Raster Graphics: Photoshop Photo Montage

Assignment number 3 was making a photo montage using photoshop.  This was for our lesson on Raster Graphics.  Raster graphics are an image made up of a grid of pixels, known as a bitmap.  Raster graphics can generally be scaled smaller, but making them bigger can cause pixelation of the photo.  Raster graphics usually have larger file sizes but there are some ways to compress these images like JPEG or GIF. I learned so many new things, as I have never used photoshop before.  I learned how to use a combination of colors, words and pictures to create a photomontage.  I made mine about my two best friends from college.  

Some of the things I learned how to do were:

-using layers to edit certain aspects of the photo at a time, and easily making changes to certain parts

- selecting the exact part of the photo that you want to edit

- changing the coloring, saturation, hue, brightness ect. of either the whole photo or just a selected part

-softening the edges of certain parts of a photo

-different ways of creating and positioning text on a photo

-making all or some parts of a photo transparent

-being creative and interesting/thinking outside the box

NOTES ABOUT GRAPHICS

CUT AND PASTE COLLAGES IN THE DIGITAL WORLD

Link to this photo 

Here is an example of how photoshop can cause problems: Photo Fakery 

Pictures That Lie

Website using iWeb

We created a website for our second project.  We used a program called iWeb that isn't produced anymore.  The website we created was of our 3 favorite movies.  I leaned how to create links, add media like photos and video and edit texts and formatting on my website.  My website contained a home page, as well as 3 additional pages, one for each of my three favorite movies.  Each individual movie page contained a plot summery, photos from scenes in each movie, a quote from each movie, a youtube video of the trailer as well as a list of the cast with links to their IMBD page.  I had never made a website before, so I am happy with how mine came out and how much I learned.

Link to this website

Microsoft Word Publishing

The first assignment we did was making a news letter using Microsoft Word.  We chose a news article and formatted in the style of a news letter.  This news letter had to contain a news story, pictures and captions.  It is interesting how many different things you can do with Microsoft Word.  It is much more than just typing a paper.  You can create columns, change fonts, add pictures and position things in so many different ways.

Link to the PDF of this newsletter

TYPE FACE (LETTER STYLE)  DIAGRAM