Monthly Archives: December 2013

Visual Art: Reflection on Park Illustration

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When we began the park illustration unit, we watched a video which showed a man starting from scratch, then drawing with a pencil, using water colours, and then using coloured pencils. This gave us an idea of what water colour painting is like.

In the second class we tested 10 different water colour techniques, I improved well in the area because I got to practice precision with the brush, and painting styles. In the next class, we got our art books and black sharpies, went out to the park, chose a spot to draw, and we drew. By the end of that class, I was almost done with most of the outlines. I improved a lot in realistic drawing because this was one of my best drawings in terms of realism, and clarity. The next class we did the same, just drew. But the class after that, we had to start drawing in with colour pencils. For me, it was quite a lot easier to draw in, than to outline the shapes and such. I don’t think I improved much in the aspect of colouring in with colour pencils. In the last class, we placed a border around the painting with masking tape, we put 4 different painting styles around the 4 sides, and we added a little bit of something to our paintings. This, once again helped me with my precision because the borders were pretty tight, and it gave me a chance to use some techniques we learn’t about. 

Well, one of my partners told me that the painting was not as clear as it could be. So I tried to draw in more clearly in some areas. Bold out important parts, like the large lamp at the right centre, and I also tried to make the ground less, squiggly. My teacher told me that the rocks that I drew, had good outline, and she could tell that they were rocks, even if drawn only with sharpie. I built upon that by trying to draw in the rock with a little bit of shading, and the closest colour pencil colour there was.

If I were to make this painting again, I guess I would try using water colour first, before colour pencil. I think this would help me in many ways. 1: If you try to use water colour on top of colour pencil, then due to the fact that coloured pencil is kind of waxy, the water colour will just float there in blobs. 2: I could have easily drawn the colours first, then draw in the texture with the coloured pencils. 3: I could have used some more water colour techniques on the painting, like splatter for an area that had small stains splattered everywhere. 4: It would be more visually aesthetic, and possibly more interesting.

 

Technology – Criteria E Reflection of the Digital Story

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Last Friday in Technology class, we finished our Digital Stories. Right before beginning to create our digital stories, we created 4 essential and 4 desirable specifications. 8 things that we had to, and wanted, to include in our digital stories.

Essential specifications: Number 1: My first essential specification was for the story to have an introduction, a hook, and a resolution. My story had an introduction, and a resolution, but it didn’t have… a HOOK! I think this was one of the most important things to have because it keeps the audiences attention.
Number 2: My other essential was, for the story to be within 2:30 to 6 mins. My story was 3:14. I guess it’s self explanatory.
Number 3: It had to be school appropriate. My story was about being late for a meeting, searching for the people, and finding them. It had no swears, and was not in any inappropriate place, just a beach, in the morning, when there was nobody.
Number 4: My last essential spec was that it had to be slightly interesting and /or entertaining. I guess some parts were interesting, and some parts were entertaining. But I think that some of my story was quite confusing and possibly boring.

Desirable specifications: Number 1: I wanted it to be humorous. I think my Digital Story was quite humorous in SOME parts, but mostly it was just explaining what happened, and some filming was done. I don’t think I completed this desirable spec.
Number 2: I would like my Digital Story to have a hook. As I said before, it didn’t have a hook.
Number 3: I would like to have fun, and be creative with my story. I guess I did have fun with my story because I tried new things and effects in Imovie. I also had fun filming with such randomness. I was two characters at the same time.
Number 4: For my last desirable spec, I wanted to finish my story on the weekend or a few days before it was due. I guess I didn’t COMPLETELY finish my story before class, in class I had to add the last finalising touches.

The first part of the design cycle was the investigate. In the investigate, we brainstormed ways of sharing our stories, what digital stories are, and analysed key features. In the part where we had to talk about the climax, and how the story progressed. I did put a lot of detail, but my line ( line which showed climax) did not go well with what I said.

The next part of the design cycle was the design. In the design we brainstormed some topics and wrote a simple, yet slightly detailed basic plan which our story would be like. We also were assigned to research about a tool which someone could use to present their story, the one I was assigned to was Fotobabble. After researching, we had to present about what we had learned about that tool.

The next part of the design cycle was the plan. For some reason, I really didn’t like it. Anyways, in the plan, we had to make a timeline, and a storyboard. The timeline was basically when we would film, gather materials, and record. The storyboard was just drawing our story with detail.

And now for the… CREATE!
The first part of the create was: “Pair Feedback”. To make the Essential and Desirable specifications. I I don’t think I did too well on this one because I didn’t explain in depth for if it was measurable and attainable. I think I did ok in the pair feedback because I gave some detail about what they could do better, but I don’t think I made my advice constructive enough. For example, let’s say that they ended their story with a sudden bang. Like “We then found the boat and swam to it, the end”. My feedback for this would be “I think that you ended the story too quickly, you could possibly add a small bit to the end, maybe describing how you got there. Or you could just say what you did afterwards.

The second part of the create was to make a mini-reflection on changes we made to our story, and talking about them in excellent detail. 

My mini-reflection didn’t make much sense, because all I wrote about were changes and reasons, so there wasn’t much of a story to reflect on there. I don’t think I did very well with explaining the reasons, and the reasons for my changes. I think I could improve there by explaining how I changed those bits and what I added.

The third part of the create was basically to finish the story. I did finish it by the end of class.

The unit question is: “How can we use media to communicate our stories?”

There are many ways of using media to communicate our stories to the world. Social networking sites, video sharing sites, and music sharing sites. But they all come together as one, which is also known as, media. Media, comes from the Latin plural of medium, and a medium is a way of doing something. So we can conclude that, media are mediums / ways of sharing our stories.