Conceptual

Introduction

This conceptual project teaches us how to be creative through poetry, music, art, animations, experimental film and web production, creating challenges to help us express our opinions through a clear style We started learning about technical communication skills by using many different modern professional equipment and applications such as DSLR Cameras, Tascam Audio Recorders, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Animate, Adobe Premiere Pro, Adobe After Effects, Adobe Audition, Avid Pro Tools, WordPress, and Google Apps.

During my 1st quarter at Freestyle, I learned how to use many different apps and electronics/technology. In English I was able to get lots of positive feedback from the teacher and some of my other classmates and I was also able to create my own story about something that I created in the past. In Digital Media I learned a lot about how to mash up music, how all the different controls on a camera work, or how to edit a video in Premiere Pro. After learning those things I was able to make make my own Art Reflection Video and make my own Parody song. Overall, both of the classes have been really fun so far.

Art Reflection

At the beginning of the school year we went on a field trip to SF MOMA. While we were there we had an assignment to do which was to find a piece of artwork of any kind that gave us the feeling of awe and also describe the artwork. When we came back the next week we started writing the voiceover text in English class which would later be recorded and be used in our Art Reflection Video. The other part of the assignment was creating the video in Digital Media. We started by making a practice video in Premiere Pro so that we could learn how to use different effects and animations to make our videos more entertaining. Then once we were finished with that we started making our Art Reflection Videos using the things that we learned from making the practice video.

What I valued from the Art Reflection Video production in both English and Digital Media is that I was able to get helpful feedback on my Voiceover Text and that I was able to make a Practice video to help me understand how to use different tools in Premiere Pro.

Parody Introduction

Our next project was for Digital Media and we had to create our own Parody Song about a topic of our choice. When the project was first announced to us I had a hard time thinking of a song and topic that I would do the song on. When I finally had an idea on what song I would use for the parody and what topic it would be on I started writing the lyrics for my parody. When I was done writing the lyrics I went to one of the isolation booths and started recording my song. It took a few tries but eventually I was able to get a good take. After i was done recording I started editing it in Adobe Audition to make the background music a little less loud so that you could hear the words more clearly and I also worked on writing my Artist Statement.

Artist Statement

My parody is about my plushie obsession and how every time I go to the store and see a plushie that I like I’d probably get it. I chose to do the parody on the song  ‘everything sucks’ by vaultboy because that was the only song that popped up in my head when we started the project. The struggles I encountered were that I had a hard time figuring out how to change the lyrics to match the topic I chose to sing about and that I’m a very shy person so I was kinda nervous to use isolation booths to record because they are not fully soundproof and others could hear me. I overcame my fear of recording in the isolation booths by taking a deep breath and focusing on what I need to get done in there. What I’m most proud of with this project is that I was able to sing the words clearly so that you can hear what the song is about.

Parody Lyrics

(sigh)

Plushies are awesome, just kidding

Plushies are awful, no really

I haven’t thought about buying another plushie today

Oh wait (ugh i just did)

But I went to the store for the first time 

In a few days and it felt nice 

And I might try buying something more useful (haha not really)

I wanna forget buying plushies, buying plushies 

And buy something useful, buy something useful

Spend my spare change on things I need

And then i’ll say, i’ll say

Design

In Design we do most of our assignments digitally on a Macbook computer and wacom tablet. We learned about a lot of things like how to use a camera, how to use Adobe Illustrator, and how to use Adobe Photoshop. So far we only had two projects that were on paper which was the color scheme blending project were had to use blend colored pencils together according to the different color scheme. The other one we did on paper was halloween themed. For this project we had to sketch a halloween design on a half piece of paper then cut out the shapes flipping and gluing them to the other side of the paper to create a mirror effect. Other than those projects the rest have all been mostly on the computer.

So far Design has been really fun for me and I kinda enjoy it. The project that I enjoyed the most so far was the halloween project that we did on paper. What I value about being a Design student is that I have classmates that are willing to help others.

Alpha Name Photography

Our first project in Design was the Alpha Name Photo project (Black and White Name photo project). For this project we had to go out and find things that looked like a letter in our name and take multiply photos of them. Then out of all those photos we made a contact sheet and turned that in while also looking through the photos to find the one s that looked the best and renaming them. When we were done with that we edited them and cropped them so that it was mostly showing the letter. After editing the photos we made a new file and dragged all of them together to create our first name.

Conceptual Photo

For the Conceptual Photo project in Design we had to take a photo of two different objects using our cameras to create a self portrait of ourselves. Each of us were given a prompt from Ms. P which talked about exploring a feeling through a type of emotion. Then we brainstormed some objects that we would use to put together in a photo to represent the feeling and the emotion as well as representing ourselves and what they mean to us. We narrowed it down to at least two objects. Before taking the photos we had to fill out a proposal doc which talked about how we were going to take the photos. We had to find those objects and use those to take photos of them together in different angles and lightings. The last thing we had to do was write the artist statement explaining what our photo is about and what we did to edit it.

Artist Statement – I Am Exploring The Feeling of Determination Through Destruction

In my photograph, there is a golf ball on a tee with a beaded bracelet underneath it and loose beads spread out all around it. The golf ball is supposed to portray the meaning of determination like when you’re playing a game against someone and you really want to beat them. The bracelet that is underneath the golf ball is portraying the meaning of destruction like when friendships were broken apart and you have to try making  new ones. The beads that are spread out under the golf ball are supposed to show how my friendships have fallen apart over the past few years after I switched schools back in 6th grade. The background has lots of grass around it which also represents destruction because the grass hasn’t been watered in a while so it turned yellow and it got really dry. I chose a golf ball with a tee because it represents how sometimes when I’m playing golf with dad and my brother I would be determined to beat them and get the ball into the hole before them with the least amount of hits. 

I learned that in Photoshop you can change the hue and saturation of an image by pressing the half white and black circle at the bottom of the layers panel then move the triangles to change the color and make it darker or lighter. What I learned in Photoshop helped me with my final composition because it helped me change the size of my images and change the lighting or color of my images. I edited the size of the photo and I made the color of the grass and the beads brighter to make them pop out more.