Artist Statment

Some of the things you will find in my portfolio are my self portraits, pictures altered by Photoshop, my personal metaphor, a movie moment, art from last semester, and much more. These pictures are influenced by emotion, but not just any emotion, it is my emotion that I tend to feel. My favorite pictures are two of my self portraits. My favorite project would have to be the frame project. I feel like my portfolio is a reflection of me and what I am somewhat about as a person. I am happy with my portfolio because I have never created such a thing before.
I struggled a little with my graduation cover because I am not the best at Photoshop. I also struggled with my personal metaphor because I knew what my goal was I just couldn’t translate in my picture. I feel I was most successful with my frame pictures because I got the right concept of what the project was, and they turned out nice and artistic.
I have learned about camera settings like ISO, shutter speed, and light metering this semester. I have learned how to set my camera if I was in a dark setting or bright setting to take better photographs. I have learned to not take regular pictures, and learned to make them more creative, and open my mind. I have learned to blend objects together in Photoshop as well.
In the future I feel I could improve in my Photoshop skills and taking better pictures. I know letting my mind run free will help me do this. I think I have improved just in taking pictures, because I have never done anything like we do in our class projects before. I am happy I took this class because I actually have learned a lot. I know I will use what I learned in the future.

Adjustment Self Portrait

Self Portraits

When I went into this project I thought of the show America’s next top model. I had no idea what I was going to do and express in my self portraits at first. Then I tried to get focused and realized I wanted to go for some sort of essentiality with my photos. The photograph I believe is most creative is my element photo. It is creative because it is not a normal pose that most people would do. I like how the lines lead up and down toward me making me the emphasis. I am not a creative person believe it or not especially when it comes to picture taking so the creativity overall difficult for me. At least with effort I managed to take somewhat good photos showing creativity which made each picture unique.
Most of my pictures were happy accidents I just moved around trying out different things. The picture that was set up was my element photo. I set my body position up and wanted my partner to take the picture with me up close with the gate lines moving down with the tree in the background. I chose the setting for the other photos trying to make myself the main focus at all times. For my light picture I did want the light to shine bright in the right left corner making me less visible, but still the emphasis. I would probably be more aware of my composition next time in my prop photo. I feel like it is a plain photo with no real balance. I feel like I had the best composition in my light and element photo because it has balance.
My craftsmanship was good not great. I believe my light picture came out a little too bright because there is a glare in the photo. My prop photo probably would have been better if it were taken from another angle. In my rule of thirds photo the craftsmanship is awesome because I am the main emphasis but you can still see the playground in the background. While taking the photos me and my partner rarely messed with the ISO or shutter speed we ended up leaving the settings the same. Maybe some photos would have come out better if we did however change the settings on the camera. Weakness would be knowing what I was doing first in the photo to get a better idea of how and were to set up the camera.
Overall my opinion of this project is I did try my best to come up with artistic portraits other than a senior picture portrait. The portrait I like the most is my light and element photo. If I were to do this assignment again I would probably allow myself to be more open minded so my creativity can transfer into the photos. My least favorite photo is my prop photo because I feel there is not emotion which there should be because it is an angel my best friend gave me and it means a lot to me. Overall I liked this project, and I hope to get over my fears of showing my creativity because I know I have it in me.

Shutter Speed

The two things that shutter speed effects is light as well as movement. Shutter speed is represented on my camera with an S. The modes on our camera that allow for shutter speed manipulation are the up and down arrows to change speed. Some modes are to make the shutter time longer which are fractions of a second. You would want to control the shutter speed if you are taking a still picture of moving picture. The longer the shutter speed the more light comes in. The shorter the shutter speed the less light comes in. The two photos I uploaded were using shutter speed on a moving and non moving subject. For the moving picture I followed my subject. For the still picture the shutter speed was two so the picture would not be blurry.

ISO

For the first picture I took of my partner it was on auto flash. You can barely see the Christmas lights in the background. So flash is bad to take if you wish to take pictures of the light. Auto flash is good if you wish to take pictures of a particular subject.

For the second photo I used ISO 50 which makes the lights stand out, but makes the person not vi sable. The lower the ISO the darker the person will be.

For my third picture I used ISO 5000. This made the picture come out very bright so you can see my partner. The higher the ISO the brighter the picture will be. This is good to use in dark settings.

Light Metering

The top picture we used light metering focusing on the computer screen. This made the screen turn out clear instead of the person by the computer. Light metering is good to use in dark settings because you can concentrate on the subject. On the bottom picture I set my camera close to my partners arm so the camera could save their skin light. This focused on my partner and made the computer screen much brighter. Light metering is a great function on the camera which you can take in different scenarios.

Metaphor

I metaphor I chose was I feel like a glass sculpture sometimes beautiful on the outside, and very breakable. I chose this metaphor because I do feel like I can be broken real quick inside and out. I was trying to express my emotions that I feel pretty much all the time. Everything in life can be so perfect and beautiful to me until some heartless person messes things all up for me, and breaks me apart into a bunch of tiny pieces. Mostly the people who mean the most to me tend to make me feel this way. I feel like anyone I ever loved at some point pushes me to the floor and makes me break apart. So this is why I chose the metaphor I did to show what I feel everyday.
I placed everything to give my picture balance. I wanted to put the picture of me in the middle, but my body position made me not put it dead center. This is why I put myself to left corner, and my metaphor to the right of me. I believe the most focal images in my metaphor are me and my metaphor, which is good because that is what the project was about. I tried my best to make my pictures unified but it for some reason was very difficult for me. The picture looks unreal to me, and this is why it didn’t turn out so great.
The things I thought went well in my photo are mixing a lot of like things together. Object in my picture feel like they belong, and it to me at least feels like some kind of art gallery. I wish I could have made myself look more like glass, but it was hard because I couldn’t get myself to blend with clear objects. This is why I used and ice object to blend myself with. If I could change anything I would put a picture of someone who has hurt me before pushing me off my stand so I can fall. Maybe that would help people that see my picture understand what I am trying to say and express.

Aesthetic Experience

For this project we were all required to experience an aesthetic experience with a cup of water and color dye. To be truthful I didnt feel any emotion at all at first no matter how hard I consentrated, and allowed myself to feel such a feeling. I was really getting frustrated because I knew my life could not be so meaningless to not get emotions out of this experience. Then toward the middle when the clear water began to fade away I felt something. I felt like I was the water and the dye was covering me, and turning my world into darkness. I felt the dye was all the people in the world that have tried to bring me down. I know I'm not the only person who feels this way most of the time, and I have no idea why I let such things get to me. Maybe because I am not heartless even though sometimes I wish I wasn't to not get hurt. No matter how much I try to bring happiness into my life It always fades away in the dark. I feel like at the end of the day everything that I have done to make myself smile doesn't matter anymore because the sun always goes away. There is no more light then and I feel let down again. The sun does come back up but then it seems like I am right back were I started. Its just a big circle that I travel around in everyday of my existence, and I cant make it stop. I so wish my shape could be a straight line so I wont have to start over and over again, because I am really dizzy and about to stumble on my mistakes and fall. If my life was a straight line I can finally move forward, and forget about all this madness accruing.

Hybrid

In preparation for our PERSONAL METAPHOR project we brushed up our skills combining objects together. Using layer masks and the clone stamp we blended this dog and bird together. We tried to make the image look as real and natural as possible. It wasn't really difficult to do, I wouldn't change any steps I took doing this project.

Movie Moments

Inspired by Cindy Sherman, a contemporary photographer who took photos of herself starring in movies that never existed.
-Movie Title: Broken Picture
-Genre: Drama:
-Scene Summary:Our fake movie is about a teen inspiring model who is stuck with an controlling boyfriend who beats her all the time. He does does not want her to pursue her modeling career, and she can never get hired because of her bruises on her body and lack of confidence. She realizes that the life she has is not the one she dreams and starts taking self defense classes. She ends up killing him at the end of the movie through self defense, and ends up getting a modeling contract.
Scene Explanation: In our first scene the models boyfriend comes over to her house unexpectedly, and he is very drunk. He then sees a recruitment notice from a modeling agency and gets very angry. He then starts going crazy and starts to beat her. Leaving her with bruises and a black eye.
In our second scene she is walking with confidence, knowing that she cover came her fears of her abusive boyfriend, and she finally becomes the model she has always dreamed of.

Chocolate Frog

For Valentines day wer turned frogs into chcolate. I thought this project was pretty cool because I didnt realize that photoshop could help me create such a piece. I learned how to use different tools in photoshop with this project that I can use in the future.

Shadows and Reflections

In these exercises we learned how to create shadows and reflections to help us create more realistic artwork. A new tool we learned was layer masks. The things we learned here can help in the future because I can use these tools in photoshop to bring more creativity to my pictures.

Program Covers

These are the Si Se Puede and Graduation program covers that I have Created using photoshop. Even though I am not an expect at using photoshop I tryed my best, and believe they turned out fairly well. I do not think I would change anything for my Si Se Puede program, but for my graduation program I wish I made it with lighter colors with pictures of the school.

Aged Photo

In this project we used one of our frame images to practice using Photoshop to create specific effects. The effects we tried to portray is an old damaged photograph. The only thing I really dislike about this picture is the cup stain. I like everything else about it because it truly does look like it has been damaged.

Balance with Frames

In this project we were given double sided frames were we had to be in the picture creating balance in black & white. I created balance by my body position as well as the positioning of the frames having the right amount of blacks, whites, and greys. I like the lighting better in my top picture rather than the bottom because I had more sun than the bottom.

Random Object

For this project we had to take a photo using a random object focusing on "The Three C's". I like this picture because of the character snoopy and how he matches the umbrella. One thing I could have done better was show her entire face. Overall I like how it turned out.

Egg Challenge

For this piece we were each given a harboiled egg to photograph in the most creative way possible. We had to desaturate one picture and leave the other as it was. I liked my black and white picture a lot more than my color because the one in color came out a bit on the blurry side. I should have change the settings on the camera I had to avoid the photo coming out blurry.

My Favorite Project From Last Semester

This project was titled Social Issue which we had to represent a social issue that effected us, and represent it in a creative way. My social issue was overworked, and I wanted to represent this by creating a busy office space. I feel like we waist life by working to create a good life for ourselves, and we tend to get tired. I wish I added a coffee cup in my picture. The end result turned out exactly how I wanted it.

Last Semester