Self Destructive


Today’s society is unarguably tainted by pollution and greed. Pollution is constantly poisoning the air and destroying not only our habitats but also every living thing that lives on earth. The main basis of my picture is: Who is to blame? The exact answer; we are.
Humans are responsible for the slow but constant destrucion of our earth and since we live on Earth we are harming ourselves. That is the exact point of my picture.
This picture has many different procedures and steps to make it give a “dream” the surreal look I was aiming for. First I had to take many pictures of myself in various actions. Only a few of these were selected for use. I guess humour was achieved in this picture but along with that my message I believe is still clear. After I gathered all the pictures and put them on my computer I began to take the selected images, cut and shrink them.
I had to choose a main picture for the larger version of me getting attacked. After I cut the background out of that “main” picture I began to paste the previously shrunk ones into it. These added pictures looked a little out of place so I blurred them in to make them more in the picture.
The little men were placed around my body and layered properly so it looked like they were hitting me. I had the main picture done which was me getting attacked by, me. This scene did not look surreal or like a dream, which was off my mark so I had to change something. First I began individually change the colour balance on each little me. I made them a variety of vibrant colours. Reds, oranges, greens and many other colours were used to make the men more imaginary. After I was finished editing the little men I jumped up to the larger version of me. For this I wanted to cut out separate body parts and individually change the contrast of them. I cut out the legs, torso and head all into separate sections. I made the contrast on the head the highest and thus went a little lower with it as it progressed down my body. Finally, my body and all the men around me looked very odd and irregular; perfect. The picture is not quite ready yet. The background was what I started to edit now. I first made it a gradient from black to white matching the intensity of my body’s contrast; black on the top and white on the bottom. After this I decided to almost blend my body into the background. I swirled my body at different points twisting it into the background. After that I decided on the name Self Destructive. The matched my point and meaning of the picture.
Looking at it now it really has a gloomy feeling and I believe it has a lot of personality. Looking at all the faces in the picture this all gives you very mixed emotions. The little men resemble, earthquakes, hurricanes and all other natural disasters. I chose this because earth is angry at the human race for harming it so much. This gives earth emotion as well. If you look at the main part; my face, the agonizing emotion mixed with the extreme contrast really gives it an intense look.
I learnt a lot about the Photoshop program through this assignment. Since it really had no limits I feel that was a very expandable assignment. It really taught me to picture what my final piece will look like as I do it.

Finished Self Portrait

Projects that force us to look deep inside ourselves really push me to hit home with whatever idea I’ve come up with. As soon as this project was assigned I knew exactly what art style I was going to use, and precisely the message I intended to convey with it. Many ideas with several different layers of meaning all make up this personal scene. I wanted to show many different aspects of my personality, and not just one. I decided I was going to convey the message that I never give up. If I am passionate and believe in something, quitting is never an option. Sticking to a plan the whole way to the end is something I take great pride in. The next part of me I tried to convey is my reliability. I am a very sympathetic person and not doing something someone has put trust in me for hurts me emotionally as much as them. These ideas jumbled into one picture were very hard to achieve.
A first look at my picture leaves the viewer very confused; it is only when deeply analyzed the real meanings reveal themselves. You can see me, but green, standing among barren hills in a night time landscape. In the background is a floating city skyline, and a too-close for comfort sun. Immediately you can tell many aspects of the picture are impossible, which can directly be related to surrealism. These surrealist values all really add up in the end to describe each of my personal traits. I am green because I am a zombie, and zombies are known in movies to never quit. Three missing limbs and zero teeth won’t stop them from persistently trying to reach their goal; your brains. This I felt was the perfect way to show how I never give up. Making myself a zombie wearing a suit also shows how I keep persistent to my goal while staying composed. Setbacks will not make me freak out or get angry, but push me harder towards finishing. The sun and city and supposed to tell the viewer that this scene is far in the future. I am still existent this far in the future because of my reliability. This shows that I have meaning to be where I am. This meaning stops me from letting down who ever it is still needs me to be here. All of the content in the picture has a deeper meaning, that isn’t seen on the outside. To fully understand me and who I am allows someone to fully understand what I was aiming for with this piece.

Surrealism has always been my favourite art style. The freedom to hold your art by no bounds, and follow zero rules allows you to do exactly what you imagine. I feel in many ways surrealism directly relates to my personality. I like to feel free to do as I please, no matter who thinks it’s un-proper or “wrong”. I do not like to be confined to a set of rules, but would rather make my own and do things the way Dawson would. I feel that this has been consistent throughout my whole life.
With many aspects in this picture one would question how to get them so perfect. So would I. The floating city could have more to it, such as detail or light, and same goes for the sky. I tired many times to add some sort of feel to the sky, but couldn’t accomplish this. Noise would make the sky too important in the picture and stars would add more un-wanted clutter around my head. This could have been achieved differently, but I stuck with a gradient to avoid too much trouble. I am very proud of the detailing done to make myself a zombie. The gory hole in my head and missing left hand really add feeling to my emotionless face. Without these added I am staring blankly at nothing, and my positioning almost feels out of place. I found this very successful. Overall I am really happy with this piece. The personal connection could be discussed for hours, and the sheer confusion of the content hits what I had been aiming for. Keep Chuggin’ will always hold that personal piece of me within it and looking onto this paper is the equivalent of looking into me.

Freedom, The Flash Experience

My kinetic typography assignment is call Freedom, for the exact reason that freedom is the main focus of the solo the clip is to. It was done on Flash MX and Adobe Illustrator for some of the more difficult animations.
I was extremely excited when first assigned this kinetic typography assignment. Off the bat I knew exactly what audio clip I was going to use, and the message I intednded to convey with it. I chose to go with a more dark, urban mood, to match the song’s feeling. K’naan’s song “In the Beginning” brings up the importance of children, and their freedom. The song portrays the issue of child brutality and even brings police brutality to attention. With such serious issues I needed to convey a lot of deep thoughts into my clip.
The first issue was selecting a text. I needed a bold text that could be easily visible, even when words are up for a short amount of time. Tertre Extra Bold fit this perfectly. It bluntly displays the lines and stands out on the stage. For the more emphasized lines in the clip I needed a more intense looking font. Punks’ not Dead matches the song’s darker urban mood and really adds feeling to each line. This in my opinion was the most successful technical solution. It sums up all the moods throughout the whole clip into one font.
A lot of the main focal points in the clip go along with what K’naan is saying at the time. A candle lights up the dark when he says light a candle, and a heart appears when he says hearts we fill. These decision I believe were successful in directly portraying the message of the song into the clip. The text and content would also alter with the mood of the solo. The beginning of the solo has a much more calm mood, and for this reason I chose blue as the background. It gives it a more suggestive feeling and leaves you open for the more blunt messages towards the ending. The last half of the clip I mainly used a black background, to make the font have maximum contrast, making the words really stand out. I feel I was successful in using the right colours to stick to the songs feeling.
I am very happy with my final product because it is exactly like I imagined it being. All my initial thoughts were constant throughout all work on the clip. If there was one thing I would change on reflection it would be the detail in the background. It would be nice to see more than a flat colour in the back, maybe some pictures of buildings and alleyways here and there. I believe I made up for it by having a lot of movement in the clip. Probably the most difficult technical challenge was having the words keep up with K’naan’s fast flowing lyrics. Because it is rap the amount of words was very difficult to work with. So many lines had to be coming from everywhere at all times, and this made it challenging to keep up with the transitions. All in all I feel I was successful in this assignment, and really portrayed my initial message I intended to. The work was worth it and it is satisfying to see the final results.