Week 9

Assignment:
-The assignment for this week was to create a first draft of the story using the pictures that were taken and modified using the photoshop program.

Craft: (How did you do it?)
-Having everything sorted out as far as which pictures will be used to create the appropriate slide of the story Jessica and I began working and meshing pictures together to get our story across to other people. Since there were twelve slides to the story and two of us we decided to divide the slides in half; this did not mean that each partner worked alone because even though the slides were divided we gave each other inputs on how the slide can be improved throughout the whole process. Having a rough idea of the layout of the slide and the picture in front of me I began by selecting a main photograph that will act as a background. After having that figured out I began working on the subjects. The first thing that I did was select the magic wand tool because this tool will be the most efficient; there were a couple of pictures were the background and the clothing on the subject matched in color and this presented a problem. This posed a problem because the magic wand tool works on the principle of selecting pixels that are similar in hue in comparisons to the one that was initially selected. Using the magic wand tool, I removed as much of the unwanted pixels as possible and the once that presented a problem I used the eraser tool to get rid of the pixels that were not desired. In some cases the edges were a little rough after the erasing so to fix that the smudge tool was utilized. Having learned how to apply different filters during the previous session of class, I applied those filters that I believed help accomplish the message. In some slides, I added digital color. This was done to improve the picture and to make the style of the slide a little more unique; all digital color that was added was added on a new layer because this gave the freedom to play around and trash anything that did not work out without harming the original. Before saving a copy I made sure that the image was still readable; once I was happy with the arrangement of elements and the colors I saved it. The described process above was applied to all the slides that I created. Today, during the critique, the groups were allowed to look at all the stories and had an opportunity to make comments on anything. The objective was to look at each slide individually, meaning not looking ahead to figure out the plot, but to look at each frame and decide what it is trying to say, and the comments had be written on the back of each slide. Doing this will help the creators of the story know if they are sending the right message; if the case is that the images or arrangement of these images is sending the wrong message than the comments should help guide the authors of the story on to a path to fixing the problem. After every group had a chance to examine other stories we were given a few minutes to look at the comments that our stories received. After reading the comments it became evident that some things need to be straightened out.

Composition: (Arrangement and order of elements)
-Slide number 9 which is the one where Dr. Little is inquiring about the convention; this photo was made using the previously described methods. Dr. Little is placed in the center and the eyes of the viewer are draw to him first. The next thing that becomes visible as the eye travels is the piece of paper that he is holding which is key to the story. The clerk is the next person that gets noticed because she is right next to the paper. Next, the eye travels to the big calendar date because the clerk is pointing to that location. Image has some digital color, but it was done purely for aesthetics. Some suggestions that were proposed was to add the month and the year to the white paper to make sure that it appears as a date and not just some random number.
-Slide number 8 is where the girls are exchanging the phone. The first person to get noticed is the girl wearing the orange sweater because of its brightness; next, the eye travels down the arm and reaches the phone and then travels to the next person in the picture. During the critique there was some confusion about the object being transferred from one person to the next; this problem occurred because of the filter that was applied, thus to solve this problem the filter needs to be removed or adjusted so no question can arise as to the identity of the object.
-Slide number 3 is when Amanda, the fictional character, is sleeping and dreaming about the family she wants to have. The first thing that jumps out is the girl sleeping which is followed by the bubble. In the bubble the eye travels clockwise because the man in the bubble is the closest; the next thing that gets noticed is the girl in the bubble. She gets noticed over the babies because she is bigger. Thus the last thing to get noticed are the babies. During the critique, for the most part, the message that was intended got out and was received.

Concept: (What are you trying to say?)
-Using the pictures above as well as other photographs that are part of the story I am trying to say that you should think hard and make sure that you are ready for commitment as well as make sure that the other person feels the same way before major commitments are made.