Looking back at Photoshop

Hi everyone! Here is my screencast about my photoshop project! I had a lot of fun working with Photoshop and I liked how my pictures turned out! I hope you like it and I can't wait to see yours! :)

My day without the Internet

Sorry for the late post, but I was on my no Internet diet yesterday. From 2 pm Friday to 2 pm Saturday, I was determined not to go on the Internet or social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. I thought it was going to be hard to be honest. My daily routine has included Facebook status updates, looking at pictures my friends and family have posted on Instagram, and viral videos on YouTube. I spend a lot of my time on the Internet and I didn't know how much of my day was spent on the Internet until I had to stop. What was I going to do to fill the hours that had just opened up for me? Could I make it? I was determined to see this little experiment through, so although I did get urges to check Facebook or the Internet, I resisted. I survived!

So how did I spend my "free" time? Well, I read for my English class. I think this was one of the very few moments when I was grateful for homework. I had something to fill the hours. I also spent a couple of hours watching TV and continued reading until I was tired and went to bed. 

Going a day without the Internet was not as hard as I thought it was going to be. Maybe it's because I spent my time doing other things that took my mind away from the Internet. My day was quiet. There were no Facebook status updates, emails, silly cat videos, or pictures of food. It was just me and the book. There was nothing to distract me from reading my book or getting some homework done. It was a peaceful time without the Internet. But one thing that I missed the most was not being able to text or talk to my mother. I am very close to her and I usually text or call her to talk to her about my day. From all the distractions that the Internet has to offer, it does have its positive points too, like connecting people. I guess that's what I miss most from my no-Internet diet. I miss being able to talk to people that I am not physically there with. I realize that before the Internet people still were able to connect to each other, but the Internet has made it easier. 

This little experiment has taught me to stay away from the Internet and its distractions. It's important to live life outside the computer and not online. But it has also showed me that having Internet is a positive thing because it can connect people from anywhere in the world in just a few clicks. And for this reason, I don't think living an Internet-free world would ever be possible again. 

"B" On the Lookout

 Here is my "letter" picture:

This is the rough draft of the "letter" picture, and I do like the way it turned out. I like how the colors are bright and vibrant, bringing a sense of cheer and happiness to the photo. I also like how it has complementary colors, blue and orange, that also makes it visually appealing (I still don't understand how the blue/orange combo works, but it is!). The "vignette" effect, the darkening of the corners of the photo I like because it seems to draw your eye toward the center of the photo and the "b." I like this picture. It did take me awhile to get to this picture though.

This is the first first draft of the "b" photo. I had little experience with Photoshop and had no idea where to start (and I need to continue playing around with Photoshop) so I looked at YouTube tutorials on how to get certain effects. I believe this is called the "Lomo" effect and as you can see, I used elements of this effect on the final first draft of the "b" photo. While I like this picture, I like the first one more because the colors are more vibrant and bright, and the "b" is more clearly visible. In this picture, there is a lot going on and the eye can be drawn to all different sorts of things like the building or road. So I decided while this picture is okay, I had to make the "b" the focus of my picture.

This is the second "b" picture I cam up with. Now I like this one better than the second, because the "b" is closer and more defined. Again, I am using the "vignette" effect to get those darkened corners. I also played with the Marquee and Cut tool to get rid of the cars and the man that were in the photo so I got a nice clean photo of just the road and traffic signals. But I think I went a little too crazy with cutting things out because as you can see, the light post is striped of its bulbs and this gave it a weird look. It just seems strange to have a pole there right in the middle of the road. What is that pole for? The colors while I do like the almost vintage feel to them, they were still a bit dull and boring. 

What I learned from the process of creating this "letter" photo is how to think visually and how to manipulate the picture so that what I want to be the focus IS the focus. Like the second picture, it was just too far away and too busy for anyone to focus on and see the "b" so I need to crop everything else out and come closer to the traffic signals and bring out the "b" shape. But I also had to be careful, because if I had been too focused on making the "b" the focus, I can create something like the third picture, where although the "b" is visible, the overall picture looks strange and wrong. So figuring out what works visually and what doesn't takes time and a little work. Thankfully, we also had the readings like McCloud to help us figure out how to create better visuals.