Choice: Bald Eagle

Date taken: 10/13/2018

Canon PowerShot Sx420 IS
Shutter speed: 1/200 sec
F/6.6
ISO:100
Focal length: 180.6 mm
No tripod
No flash

Mysterical

Photography, Watercolor, Photoshop (fresco filter)

Date photo taken: 10/19/2018
Date watercolor created: 11/13/2018
Date edited: 11/15/18

Before beginning my work on this project I had begun creating watercolor paintings based off of the work of Czech Art Nouveau artist Alphonse Mucha. I admire the dual simplicity of his style and the complexity of his medium and subjects. I also began researching Mucha because of his Czech origins. I am of Czech descent and wanted to discover more about the art and culture of where I am from. I loved working on the watercolor portraits as they helped me explore Czech culture, work with Art Nouveau (which is something I do not have much experience with), as well as continue my watercolor portrait work. Because I loved working on these portraits I thought that it would be interesting to try to do a similar project using photography and Photoshop. A key part of this project for me was gaining more experience with Photoshop and the tools it offers. To begin this project I chose one of the portraits that I took at Hobby Lobby earlier in the semester. I wanted to choose a portrait that was simple but that I also felt expressed a serene quality, which I like to express in my work as art is a way for e to release control and gain peace. I then made a small grayscale watercolor painting of the pattern that I wanted in my background. I have been drawn to background of concentric circles with gradations and patterns created from that. The next step of the project was working with Photoshop, which proved to be more difficult than I expected, but that I was able to receive help with. I wanted to isolate the subject of the portrait photo from the background, and place the figure on the watercolor background that I had created. To do this I was able to use the magnetic select tool and the eraser tool to select and refine the portrait. I was then able to copy and paste the subject onto the background. One area that I did end up running into some trouble was figuring out how to put filters onto the image and have it affect the entire image, not just one layer like Photoshop wanted to do. To do this I saved the image as a jpeg. file and then reopened that image in Photoshop and was able to edit it that way. I loved playing with the different filters and fine tuning them to the way that I wanted. My favorite filter is the fresco filter, and that is the one that I used on this project. I think it is incredibly interesting to see the difference in the before and after of the image after filters are applied. Overall I think that this was a successful project, as I was able to experiment more in depth with Photoshop, learn skills that I can use in the future, as well as end up with a result that I enjoy.

Social Commentary: Hunger Awareness

 

(Above photo)

Date taken: 10/31/2018

LG-TP260 (phone)
Shutter speed: 1/20
F/2.2
ISO:100
Focal length: 3.7 mm
No tripod
No flash

For this project I wanted to comment on the issue of hunger in Billings MT. For the past month and a half I have been coordinating Rocky Mountain College’s annual Halloween for Hunger food drive. This food drive is a non traditional food drive where students and staff go out into the community to trick-or-treat for canned goods that are donated to Family Service and Rose Park Elementary School. Hunger is an extreme issue all over the world, but many people see it as an issue that “happens to other people” and doesnt effect people in their communities. Hunger is an issue that I hold close to my heart as my family has been taking advantage of food pantries and the food bank for years, and I want to be able to give back to people and help people who are in the same situation. In 2018 2,300 POUNDS of food were donated to Family service as well as the Rose Park Elementary school food pantry and backpack program, which helps provide students and their families with food. As far as documenting this

project, I, as well as Shayla Brown and Kim Woeste took photos of the Rocky volunteers before and after they went into the community to collect food. I also took photos of the students who came in to help sort and box up cans so that they would be ready to donate as well as photos of the donations themselves. I wanted to show the sheer volume of food that was donated, as this is food that will be helping feed hungry students and families in the community.

 
 

 

Night:1

Date taken: 10/12/2018

Canon PowerShot Sx420 IS
Shutter speed: 1/320 sec
F/5
ISO:1600
Focal length: 10.787 mm
No tripod
No flash

For this project I wanted to do a variety of night shots. I have always wanted to be able to take photos of the moon, as well as photos of fire as I think that they are difficult subjects to capture due to the dark surrounding and the brightness of the subject. My fire shot was was a chance. I had happened to be at an event where they had a fire going and I had my camera on me. I had tried to take photos of fire with my phone but it was always incredibly overexposed and never turned out the way that I wanted it to. I also have wanted to take photos of the moon for a long time. For this shot I took many photos over the course of several hours to take photos. For the first few hours I found that the lights from the football field interested with the shot and washed out the image. Once the lights were turned off I found it much easier to take clear photos. For my final shot I propped my camera on the balcony railing outside of my room and raised the exposure time to let more light in. I was very pleased with the way that the moon photo turned out, I was also surprised that my camera could take such a clear photo from so far away, as I do not have a particularly powerful camera.

Night: 2

Date taken: 10/24/2018

Canon PowerShot Sx420 IS
Shutter speed: 1/1000 sec
F/6.6
ISO:400
Focal length: 180.6 mm
No tripod
No flash

For this project I wanted to do a variety of night shots. I have always wanted to be able to take photos of the moon, as well as photos of fire as I think that they are difficult subjects to capture due to the dark surrounding and the brightness of the subject. My fire shot was was a chance. I had happened to be at an event where they had a fire going and I had my camera on me. I had tried to take photos of fire with my phone but it was always incredibly overexposed and never turned out the way that I wanted it to. I also have wanted to take photos of the moon for a long time. For this shot I took many photos over the course of several hours to take photos. For the first few hours I found that the lights from the football field interested with the shot and washed out the image. Once the lights were turned off I found it much easier to take clear photos. For my final shot I propped my camera on the balcony railing outside of my room and raised the exposure time to let more light in. I was very pleased with the way that the moon photo turned out, I was also surprised that my camera could take such a clear photo from so far away, as I do not have a particularly powerful camera.

Portrait(s)

Date taken: 10/19/2018

Canon PowerShot Sx420 IS
Shutter speed: 1/25 sec
F/3.5
ISO:200
Focal length: 4.476 mm
No tripod
No flash

   


For this project my roommates and I went to Hobby Lobby to take photos. For this project I wanted to take most of my photos in the floral and greenery sections. I wanted to take photos that had a playful fantasy element. My roommates are creative, playful, artistically minded ladies and I wanted to depict this in their portraits. For these portraits I did not want it to look like I was shooting in store, so I took my photos from a lower angle, to create a solid background of plants. I ended up taking a large variety of photos in various poses and backgrounds. I wanted to do as little editing to these photos as possible as I wanted to keep them as accurate to life a possible. I picked locations in the store where the light reflected off of surfaces to mitigate the harsh fluorescent lights throughout the store. I also worked with my roommates to arrange greenery and flowers to create a more dynamic shooting location by layering items in the foreground and background. I did not end up using a tripod for this shoot, although for several shots I did balance the camera on a surface. For the majority of the photos I placed the camera about 5-6 feet from my subject and then used the soom to get the shot that I wanted. I believe that this was a successful project as I was able to take photos of my roommates were there joyful personalities are captured in the photo.

Yellowstone Natonal Park 2018:

Date taken: 10/14/2018

Canon PowerShot Sx420 IS
Shutter speed: 1/250 sec
F/6.6
ISO:250
Focal length: 180.6 mm
No tripod
No flash